Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Exemplar-based Age Progression Prediction in Children Faces

This work aims to develop a system for predicting age progression in children faces. Age progression prediction in children faces is critical to assist missing children searching. An integral module including feature extraction, distance measurement, and face synthesis is devised in this paper to predict faces at different ages. In the proposed method, a curvature-weighted plus bending-energy distance is employed for selecting similar facial components from an aging database. The growth curve of each facial component is used to predict the shape, size, and location of each component at a different age. Thin plate spline method is employed to synthesize a 3-D face model from the predicted components by minimizing the bending energy. Experiments are conducted to test the proposed method with various subjects and the results show that the proposed method is very promising.
Hyperspectral and multispectral image fusion based on constrained CNMF unmixing

Hyperspectral (HS) remote sensing image with finer spectral information has great advantages in feature identification and classification. However, the spatial resolution of HS image is usually low due to physical limitation and data transfer requirement. In this paper, the low-spatial-resolution HS image is fused with the high-spatial-resolution multispectral (MS) image of the same observation scene to improve its spatial resolution. A novel spectral unmixing based HS and MS image fusion approach (VSC-CNMF based fusion approach) is proposed, in which CNMF with minimum endmember simplex volume and abundance sparsity constraints is employed for coupled unmixing of HS and MS images. The fused image is built by the product of endmember signature matrix derived from HS image unmixing and fractional abundance matrix derived from MS image unmixing. Simulative experiments illustrate that compared with the CNMF based fusion technique, the newly proposed VSC-CNMF based fusion algorithm is capable of producing fused images closer to the reference image with better spectral fidelity.
ACTORS, NORMS, AND IMPACT: Recent International Cooperation Theory and the Influence of the Agent-Structure Debate

▪ Abstract This article reviews three recent developments in international cooperation theory: the introduction of nonstate actors, the study of norms and ideas, and increased examination of the effectiveness, or impact, of international cooperation. Through the lens of the agent-structure debate, we critique the literature that addresses these themes. We argue, first, for a view of structure that goes beyond material properties; second, that more attention could be paid to what distinguishes agency in actors; and third, that this would provide insights into how reflexivity and learning, as well as preference and identity formation, contribute to structural transformation in the international system through iterated processes of cooperation. We also develop ways of applying the agent-structure debate to empirical as well as metatheoretical questions. The article concludes by discussing directions for further research.
Wireless sensor network for exhausted oil collection management

Sensor networks have a large diffusion in several areas, using different kind of sensors, different line for data transmission and different ways for their collection and management. In this paper we present a particular typology of sensor network, created for optimally manage the collection of exhausted oil stored in particular bins located in a wide area (about 20.000 km2). A sensor is located on each bin measuring the distance from the lid of the collected oil; a transmission module communicate, once a day, the oil and the battery level to a web server via GPRS. In this way the control center (on a web server) has a complete overview of the situation in a wide zone, in way to optimize the run of collectors only in points that require an operation.
Current methodological approaches in conditioned pain modulation assessment in pediatrics

Conditioned pain modulation (CPM) paradigms have been used in various studies with healthy and non-healthy adult populations in an attempt to elucidate the mechanisms of pain processing. However, only a few studies so far have applied CPM in pediatric populations. Studies finding associations with chronic pain conditions suggest that deficiencies in underlying descending pain pathways may play an important role in the development and persistence of pain early in life. Twelve studies were identified using a PubMed search which examine solely pediatric populations, and these are reviewed with regard to demographics studied, methodological approaches, and conclusions reached. This review aimed to provide both clinicians and researchers with a brief overview of the current state of research regarding the use of CPM in children and adolescents, both healthy and clinical patients. The implications of CPM in experimental and clinical settings and its potential to aid in refining considerations to individualize treatment of pediatric pain syndromes will be discussed.
Dairy-Rich Diets Augment Fat Loss on an Energy-Restricted Diet: A Multicenter Trial

A 12-week randomized controlled multi-center clinical trial was conducted in 106 overweight and obese adults. Diets were designed to produce a 2,093 kJ/day energy deficit with either low calcium (LC; ~600 mg/day), high calcium (HC; ~1,400 mg/day), or high dairy (HD; three dairy servings, diet totaling ~1,400 mg/day). Ninety-three subjects completed the trial, and 68 met all a priori weekly compliance criteria. Both HC and HD contained comparable levels of calcium, but HC was only ~30% as effective as HD in suppressing 1,25-(OH)2D and exerted no significant effects on weight loss or body composition compared to LC. In the group that met compliance criteria, HD resulted in ~two-fold augmentation of fat loss compared to LC and HC (HD: -4.43 ± 0.53 kg; LC: -2.69 ± 0.0.53 kg; HC: -2.23 ± 0.73kg, p < 0.025); assessment of all completers and an intent-to-treat analysis produced similar trends. HD augmentated central (trunk) fat loss (HD: -2.38 ± 0.30 kg; HC: -1.42 ± 0.30 kg; LC: -1.36 ± 0.42 kg, p < 0.05) and waist circumference (HD: -7.65 ± 0.75 cm; LC: -4.92 ± 0.74 cm; LC: -4.95 ± 1.05 cm, p < 0.025). Similar effects were noted among all subjects completing the study and in an intent-to-treat analysis. These data indicate that dairy-rich diets augment weight loss by targeting the fat compartment during energy restriction.
An extended centroid localization algorithm based on error correction in WSN

Error correction is capable of enhancing the accuracy and validity of positioning, thus is attractive to utilize it for sensor positioning network. Considering the high accuracy feature of error correction, this paper provides a novel sensor positioning algorithm named ECL (An extended centroid localization algorithm based on error correction), which greatly improves the positioning accuracy. By analyzing the probability distribution of measurement error, the mathematical expression of measurement error based on two-point positioning scheme is given. Then the high-accuracy positioning is completed until the estimated coordinates based on three-point positioning have been corrected. In addition, the proposed ECL algorithm uses some sensors, which have known locations, participating in the second localization, and further improving centroid localization algorithm for reliability and practicality. Simulation results demonstrate that the accuracy and validity of the proposed algorithm all outperform conventional methods with acceptable complexity.
Race, class and urban poverty: A rejoinder

In this article I discuss the major arguments in three of my books that are the focus of attention in this special issue. The Declining Significance of Race (1978, 2nd edn 1980), The Truly Disadvantaged (1987), and When Work Disappears (1996). This discussion serves as the backdrop for my rejoinder to the points made in the preceding articles, including those on the relative significance of race and class, social isolation, the concept ‘ghetto’, complexity of inner-city family life, and affirmative action. I conclude this article with some reflections on the plight of poor blacks and social policy in the United States.
A New Associative Classifier based on CFP-Growth++ Algorithm

Association rule mining and Classification are the important task in data mining. The mining of frequent patterns with single minsup-based frequent pattern mining algorithms such as Apriori and FP-Growth leads to "rare item problem. " So to overcome this we use multiple minsup based frequent pattern mining algorithm called CFP-Growth++ for extraction of frequent patterns. The association rule mining is carried out to extract the rules and then the rule based classifier is build. In this, we have proposed a new associative classification method called Rule based classifier using CFP-Growth++. The method extends the efficient Frequent Pattern Mining method called CFP-Growth++ and constructs the MIS tree to mine the large datasets. The rules are generated from the frequent patterns mined from CFP-Growth++ and rule-based classifier is build. Our extensive experiments on datasets from UCI machine learning database repository show that our new technique is consistent, highly effective at classification of various kinds of datasets and has better average classification accuracy in comparison with FP-Growth based classifier. Moreover, our performance study shows that the method is highly efficient and scalable in comparison with previous associative classification methods.
Time Varying Multiserver Queues with Abandonment and Retrials

Spreadability and/or strength of water-setting inorganic bonding compositions are improved by incorporating in them a water-soluble condensation product of formaldehyde with a diphenol The condensation can also take place in the presence of a water-soluble sulfite, a water-soluble sulfamate, a water-soluble pyrosulfite, a phenol sulfonic acid or a naphthalene sulfonic acid.
Spoken term detection from bilingual spontaneous speech using code-switched lattice-based structures for words and subword units

This paper presents the first work known publicly on spoken term detection from bilingual spontaneous speech using code-switched lattice-based structures for word and subword units. The corpus used is the lectures with Chinese as the host language and English as the guest language recorded for a real course offered in National Taiwan University. The techniques reported here have been successfully implemented and tested in a real lecture system now available on-line over the Internet. We also present the approaches of using word fragment as the subword unit for English, and analyse the difficult issues when code-switched lattice-based structures for subword units are used for tasks involving languages of quite different natures.
Automatic Interlinking of Music Datasets on the Semantic Web

In this paper, we describe current efforts towards interlinking music-related datasets on the Web. We first explain some initial interlinking experiences, and the poor results obtained by taking a naive approach. We then detail a particular interlinking algorithm, taking into account both the similarities of web resources and of their neighbours. We detail the application of this algorithm in two contexts: to link a Creative Commons music dataset to an editorial one, and to link a personal music collection to corresponding web identifiers. The latter provides a user with personally meaningful entry points for exploring the web of data, and we conclude by describing some concrete tools built to generate and use such links.
Implementing Visually Cued Imitation Training With Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders and Developmental Delays

Clearly, imitation is linked to a variety of skill areas. As a result, children with autism and developmental delays are less likely than their typical peers to perform well in many areas of development, including play and speech. The purpose of this study was to determine if a simple, teacher-friendly strategy could be implemented that would affect peer imitation skills in children with autism spectrum and developmental disorders. A single-subject multiple baseline design was applied across four participants to determine the impact of a multicomponent visually cued imitation strategy. Results indicated that participants' imitation skills increased and reliance on physical prompts decreased. The results are discussed in terms of the amount of imitation that occurred, the level of prompts used, and the activities engaged in.
Motor Improvement and Corticospinal Modulation Induced by Hybrid Assistive Neuromuscular Dynamic Stimulation (HANDS) Therapy in Patients With Chronic Stroke

Background and objective . We devised a therapeutic approach to facilitate the use of the hemiparetic upper extremity (UE) in daily life by combining integrated volitional control electrical stimulation with a wrist splint, called hybrid assistive neuromuscular dynamic stimulation (HANDS). Methods. Twenty patients with chronic hemiparetic stroke (median 17.5 months) had moderate to severe UE weakness. Before and immediately after completing 3 weeks of training in 40-minute sessions, 5 days per week over 3 weeks and wearing the system for 8 hours each day, clinical measures of motor impairment, spasticity, and UE functional scores, as well as neurophysiological measures including electromyography activity, reciprocal inhibition, and intracortical inhibition were assessed. A follow-up clinical assessment was performed 3 months later. Results. UE motor function, spasticity, and functional scores improved after the intervention. Neurophysiologically, the intervention induced restoration of presynaptic and long loop inhibitory connections as well as disynaptic reciprocal inhibition. Paired pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation study indicated disinhibition of the short intracortical inhibition in the affected hemisphere. The follow-up assessment showed that improved UE functions were maintained at 3 months. Conclusion. The combination of hand splint and volitional and electrically induced muscle contraction can induce corticospinal plasticity and may offer a promising option for the management of the paretic UE in patients with stroke. A larger sample size with randomized controls is needed to demonstrate effectiveness.
Osteogenesis of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells on strontium-substituted nano-hydroxyapatite coated roughened titanium surfaces.

OBJECTIVE To investigate osteogenesis of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) on strontium-substituted nano-hydroxyapatite (Sr-HA) coated roughened titanium surfaces. METHODS Sr-HA coating and HA coating were fabricated on roughened titanium surfaces by electrochemical deposition technique and characterized by field emission scanning electron microscope (FESM). BMSCs were cultured on Sr-HA coating, HA coating and roughened titanium surfaces respectively. Cell proliferation, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity, mineralized nodules formation and cell osteocalcin (OC) secretion were measured. RESULTS Electrochemically deposited Sr-HA coating and HA coating had no effect on the proliferation of BMSCs and demonstrated that the materials have a good biocompatibility. BMSCs cultured on Sr-HA coating showed increased alkaline phosphatase activity, mineralized nodules formation, and cell OC secretion compared with the other two groups. Cells cultured on HA coating also showed increased biological activity compared with the roughened group. CONCLUSION Sr-HA coated titanium surfaces by electrochemical deposition can promote osteogenesis of BMSCs in vitro and have the potential to shorten bone healing period and enhance implant osseointegration.
Indexation of Syriac manuscripts using directional features

This paper presents a method to assist the indexation of digitized Syriac manuscripts. Syriac belongs to the Aramaic branch of Semitic languages, it is written from right to left intentionally tilted by an angle of approximately 45°. The proposed method is based on a word spotting approach that should locate all the occurrences of a certain query word image. The method is based on a selective sliding window technique from which directional features are extracted. Matching between features is done using Euclidean distance correspondence. The proposed method does not require any prior information, it is also fully independent of a word to character segmentation algorithm, which would be extremely difficult to realize due to the tilted nature of the handwriting.
Beyond Documentation

Software component integration is increasingly permeating product development, impacting everything from government, e-commerce and enterprise application systems. While companies and government agencies attempt to streamline their business and provide better customer service, software and middleware vendors are all vying for dominance to bridge the gap between legacy software and COTS, and the new technology that is available to integrate them. There are a number of major problems with this scenario, particularly those with respect to determining the fit of a component in a multi-component application, instantiating the medium by which components should be connected, assuring that the integration meets security requirements, and defining the enterprise infrastructure that enfolds them. We seek to demystify the integration process. The objective of our research is to efficiently assess qualified software properties, as well as other factors that constrain the multi-component application. To commence the assessment process, we use a software component conspectus that embodies static, architecturally significant properties. These properties can be easily described in the XML, making them portable and extensible, as well as available as part of online documentation. The evaluation produces the major architecture conflicts among the components and any requirements that govern the overall application. The conflicts can then be used to define the basic integration functionality needed for the middleware architecture. Hence, the result of this evaluation is an integration architecture that encompasses the application and the technology that it comprises. As we move toward further characterization of the technology at work in a multi-component application, we envision empowering developers to quickly assess their software components and integration needs. However, a critical issue is getting software and middleware vendors to embrace the conspectus idea: to go beyond traditional documentation toward qualifying a uniform set of properties that make evaluation easier. To develop the assessment technology, we must define the relevant properties of components, communication mediums, middleware, infrastructures and security concerns in a normalized and uniform way. The values of these properties should be easily discernable from documentation, external interfaces, functional paradigms, or application domains. With the advent of this technology businesses can achieve a large payoff by lessening time and developer resources.
A Syntropic Model of Consciousness

Chalmers divides the problems of consciousness into: The easy problem, which deals with the study of neurobiological models of consciousness. Considering the enormous progresses of science it is relatively simple to find neural correlates of the conscious experiences. The easy problems largely deals with the functioning of the brain in the way it transmits and reads sensory signals, in the processing of information, in the control of behaviour, in the mechanisms underlying intelligence and memory, in the capability of reproducing verbal accounts, etc. Nevertheless, according to Chalmers, this approach does not explain the subjective qualities that consciousness has for the subject; in other words this approach is not able to answer the problem of the phenomenal consciousness. The hard problem which deals with the explanation of the qualitative and subjective aspects of consciousness, which escape a physicalistic and materialistic analysis. In the first chapter of this work, models suggested by Antonio Damasio (1999), Gerald Edelman (2000) and Francisco Varela (1996) are described. These models try to explain consciousness using the principles of classical physics. These models show a different attitude towards localization: Damasio suggests neural sites in which consciousness could take place, Edelman suggests that consciousness is a global process of all the brain and Varela considers consciousness as a distributed quality of all the organism and of the interaction of the organism with the environment. In the second chapter, the models of consciousness based on quantum mechanics are reviewed. Using together the criteria of scientific falsification and the criteria of biological compatibility only two models, one suggested by Luigi Fantappie (1942) and the other one suggested by Chris King (2003), survive the selection. It is interesting to note that these models are not pure quantum mechanical models, as they both originate from the integration of Schrodinger’s wave equation (quantum mechanics) with special relativity
Differential forms in computational algebraic geometry

We give a uniform method for the two problems #CCC and #ICC of counting connected and irreducible components of complex algebraic varieties, respectively. Our algorithms are purely algebraic, i.e., they use only the field structure of C. They work efficiently in parallel and can be implemented by algebraic circuits of polynomial depth, i.e., in parallel polynomial time. The design of our algorithms relies on the concept of algebraic differential forms. A further important building block is an algorithm of Sántó [40] computing a variant of characteristic sets. The crucial complexity parameter for #ICC turns out to be the number of equations. We describe a randomised algorithm solving #ICC for a fixed number of rational equations given by straight-line programs (slps), which runs in parallel polylogarithmic time in the length and the degree of the slps.
An Online Convex Optimization Approach to Proactive Network Resource Allocation

Existing approaches to online convex optimization make sequential one-slot-ahead decisions, which lead to (possibly adversarial) losses that drive subsequent decision iterates. Their performance is evaluated by the so-called regret that measures the difference of losses between the online solution and the best yet fixed overall solution in hindsight. The present paper deals with online convex optimization involving adversarial loss functions and adversarial constraints, where the constraints are revealed after making decisions, and can be tolerable to instantaneous violations but must be satisfied in the long term. Performance of an online algorithm in this setting is assessed by the difference of its losses relative to the best dynamic solution with one-slot-ahead information of the loss function and the constraint (that is here termed dynamic regret); and the accumulated amount of constraint violations (that is here termed dynamic fit ). In this context, a modified online saddle-point (MOSP) scheme is developed, and proved to simultaneously yield sublinear dynamic regret and fit, provided that the accumulated variations of per-slot minimizers and constraints are sublinearly growing with time. MOSP is also applied to the dynamic network resource allocation task, and it is compared with the well-known stochastic dual gradient method. Numerical experiments demonstrate the performance gain of MOSP relative to the state of the art.