Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Facility layout design using a multi‐objective interactive genetic algorithm to support the DM

The unequal area facility layout problem (UA‐FLP) has been addressed by many methods. Most of them only take aspects that can be quantified into account. This contribution presents a novel approach, which considers both quantitative aspects and subjective features. To this end, a multi‐objective interactive genetic algorithm is proposed with the aim of allowing interaction between the algorithm and the human expert designer, normally called the decision maker (DM) in the field of UA‐FLP. The contribution of the DM's knowledge into the approach guides the complex search process, adjusting it to the DM's preferences. The entire population associated to facility layout designs is evaluated by quantitative criteria in combination with an assessment prepared by the DM, who gives a subjective evaluation for a set of representative individuals of the population in each iteration. In order to choose these individuals, a soft computing clustering method is used. Two interesting real‐world data sets are analysed to empirically probe the robustness of these models. The first UA‐FLP case study describes an ovine slaughterhouse plant and the second, a design for recycling carton plant. Relevant results are obtained, and interesting conclusions are drawn from the application of this novel intelligent framework.
Exploring Domain Differences for the Design of a Pronoun Resolution System for Biomedical Text

Much effort in the research community has been spent on solving the anaphora resolution or pronoun resolution problem, and in particular for news texts. In order to selectively inherit the previous works and solve the same problem for a new domain, we carried out a comparative study with three different corpora: MUC, ACE for the news texts, and GENIA for bio-medical papers. Our corpus analysis and experimental results show the significant differences in the use of pronouns in the two domains, thus by properly considering the characteristics of a domain, we can improve the performance of pronoun resolution for that domain.
A 6-bit 50-MS/s threshold configuring SAR ADC in 90-nm digital CMOS

A threshold configuring SAR A/D converter is presented that programs its comparator threshold at runtime to approximate the input signal via binary search. Low power and small area are achieved via a fully dynamic configurable comparator and an asynchronous controller with no need for capacitor-based feedback D/A converter. A 6-bit prototype in 90-nm digital CMOS technology achieves 32-dB SNDR at 50 MS/s consuming 240 μW from 1-V analog and 0.7-V digital supplies, i.e. 150fJ/conversion-step, in a core area occupation of only 0.0055 mm2, a 4× improvement on state-of-the-art designs.
Power Controlled Adaptive Sum-Capacity of Fading MACs with Distributed CSI

We consider the problem of finding optimal, fair and distributed power-rate strategies to achieve the sum capacity of the Gaussian multiple-access block-fading channel. In here, the transmitters have access to only their own fading coefficients, while the receiver has global access to all the fading coefficients. Outage is not permitted in any communication block. The resulting average sum-throughput is also known as `power-controlled adaptive sum-capacity', which appears as an open problem in literature. This paper presents the power-controlled adaptive sum-capacity of a wide-class of popular MAC models. In particular, we propose a power-rate strategy in the presence of distributed channel state information (CSI), which is throughput optimal when all the users have identical channel statistics. The proposed scheme also has an efficient implementation using successive cancellation and rate-splitting. We propose an upperbound when the channel laws are not identical. Furthermore, the optimal schemes are extended to situations in which each transmitter has additional finite-rate partial CSI on the link quality of others.
Satem: Trusted Service Code Execution across Transactions

Web services and service oriented architectures are becoming the de facto standard for Internet computing. A main problem faced by users of such services is how to ensure that the service code is trusted. While methods that guarantee trusted service code execution before starting a client-service transaction exist, there is no solution for extending this assurance to the entire lifetime of the transaction. This paper presents Satem, a Service-aware trusted execution monitor that guarantees the trustworthiness of the service code across a whole transaction. The Satem architecture consists of an execution monitor residing in the operating system kernel on the service provider platform, a trust evaluator on the client platform, and a service commitment protocol. During this protocol, executed before every transaction, the client requests and verifies against its local policy a commitment from the service platform that promises trusted code execution. Subsequently, the monitor enforces this commitment for the duration of the transaction. To initialize the trust on the monitor, we use the Trusted Platform Module specified by the Trusted Computing Group. We implemented Satem under the Linux 2.6. 12 kernel and tested it for a Web service and DNS. The experimental results demonstrate that Satem does not incur significant overhead to the protected services and does not impact the unprotected services
Cigarettes, Culture, and Korean American Emerging Adults

Korean American emerging adults (KAEA) constitute an understudied, at-risk group for smoking and related health consequences. The cultural meanings of smoking and cessation among KAEA were explored. Sixty-seven KAEA participated in 10 focus groups. Themes from the sessions were identified and domain analysis was conducted. Regarding reasons for smoking, we identified (a) association between the culture of origin and gender identification, (b) access/availability of cigarettes in homes/community, and (c) competing social environments where KAEA adjust their health behaviors. Regarding contexts for cessation, we identified (a) a sense of invincibility/denial, (b) lack of role models or pressure to quit, and (c) lack of significant life events. Using cessation aids represented lacking personal discipline/willpower. The results show that smoking among KAEA is highly contextualized in the culture of origin, despite U.S. tobacco control policies. Implications for culturally sensitive prevention/cessation programs for KAEA include modifying culturally based norms and social spaces regarding cigarettes and cessation.
Real-time automatic tag recommendation

Tags are user-generated labels for entities. Existing research on tag recommendation either focuses on improving its accuracy or on automating the process, while ignoring the efficiency issue. We propose a highly-automated novel framework for real-time tag recommendation. The tagged training documents are treated as triplets of (words, docs, tags), and represented in two bipartite graphs, which are partitioned into clusters by Spectral Recursive Embedding (SRE). Tags in each topical cluster are ranked by our novel ranking algorithm. A two-way Poisson Mixture Model (PMM) is proposed to model the document distribution into mixture components within each cluster and aggregate words into word clusters simultaneously. A new document is classified by the mixture model based on its posterior probabilities so that tags are recommended according to their ranks. Experiments on large-scale tagging datasets of scientific documents (CiteULike) and web pages del.icio. us) indicate that our framework is capable of making tag recommendation efficiently and effectively. The average tagging time for testing a document is around 1 second, with over 88% test documents correctly labeled with the top nine tags we suggested.
Globalisation, new technologies (ICTs) and dual labour markets: the case of Europe

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to argue that in spite of the widely optimistic held view on the effect of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in promoting the “knowledge society” in Europe and economic development elsewhere, evidence suggests that ICT's could be strengthening labour duality world wide.Design/methodology/approach – The paper addresses these issues by presenting a brief assessment of the “Washington Consensus” and the emergence of ICTs in terms of trade, growth and inequality in different regions of our planet. The paper also describes the effects of globalisation and ICTs on European economies. Finally, the paper presents the key finding and raises some policy implications to exploit ICT potentialities to ensure welfare systems in advanced economies and development in emerging countries.Findings – The lack of sufficient institutional mechanism of distribution in developing economies is not only making it more difficult for economic growth to translate into development.
Molecular Characterization of the Na+/H+-Antiporter NhaA from Salmonella Typhimurium

Na+/H+ antiporters are integral membrane proteins that are present in almost every cell and in every kingdom of life. They are essential for the regulation of intracellular pH-value, Na+-concentration and cell volume. These secondary active transporters exchange sodium ions against protons via an alternating access mechanism, which is not understood in full detail. Na+/H+ antiporters show distinct species-specific transport characteristics and regulatory properties that correlate with respective physiological functions. Here we present the characterization of the Na+/H+ antiporter NhaA from Salmonella enterica serovar Thyphimurium LT2, the causing agent of food-born human gastroenteritis and typhoid like infections. The recombinant antiporter was functional in vivo and in vitro. Expression of its gene complemented the Na+-sensitive phenotype of an E. coli strain that lacks the main Na+/H+ antiporters. Purified to homogeneity, the antiporter was a dimer in solution as accurately determined by size-exclusion chromatography combined with multi-angle laser-light scattering and refractive index monitoring. The purified antiporter was fully capable of electrogenic Na+(Li+)/H+-antiport when reconstituted in proteoliposomes and assayed by solid-supported membrane-based electrophysiological measurements. Transport activity was inhibited by 2-aminoperimidine. The recorded negative currents were in agreement with a 1Na+(Li+)/2H+ stoichiometry. Transport activity was low at pH 7 and up-regulation above this pH value was accompanied by a nearly 10-fold decrease of Km Na (16 mM at pH 8.5) supporting a competitive substrate binding mechanism. K+ does not affect Na+ affinity or transport of substrate cations, indicating that selectivity of the antiport arises from the substrate binding step. In contrast to homologous E. coli NhaA, transport activity remains high at pH values above 8.5. The antiporter from S. Typhimurium is a promising candidate for combined structural and functional studies to contribute to the elucidation of the mechanism of pH-dependent Na+/H+ antiporters and to provide insights in the molecular basis of species-specific growth and survival strategies.
Identification, Recombinant Expression, and Characterization of the 100 kDa High Molecular Weight Hymenoptera Venom Allergens Api m 5 and Ves v 3

Insect stings can cause life-threatening IgE-mediated anaphylactic reactions in venom-allergic patients. Although several compounds have already been described as venom allergens, prominent allergen candidates especially in the higher m.w. range have still remained elusive. Tandem mass spectrometry-based sequencing assigned a candidate gene to the most prominent putative high m.w. allergen Api m 5 (allergen C) in honeybee (Apis mellifera) venom and also allowed identification of its homologue Ves v 3 in yellow jacket (Vespula vulgaris) venom. Both proteins exhibit a pronounced sequence identity to human dipeptidyl peptidase IV or CD26. Reactivity of a human IgE mAb verified the presence of these proteins in the venoms. Both proteins were produced in insect cells and characterized for their enzymatic activity as well as their allergenic potential using sera and basophils from insect venom-allergic patients. Both Api m 5 and Ves v 3 were recognized by specific IgE of the majority of patients even in the absence of cross-reactive carbohydrate determinants. Serologic IgE reactivity closely matched activation of human basophils by Api m 5 or Ves v 3, thus underlining their relevance in functional assays. With Api m 5 and Ves v 3, a new pair of homologous allergens becomes available for future clinical applications in diagnosis and therapy that may also contribute to the understanding of molecular mechanisms of insect venoms. Moreover, the patient IgE reactivity together with the cellular activation demonstrates for the first time the relevance of high m.w. allergens in the context of hymenoptera venom allergy.
Power Comparison of Admixture Mapping and Direct Association Analysis in Genome‐Wide Association Studies

When dense markers are available, one can interrogate almost every common variant across the genome via imputation and single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) test, which has become a routine in current genome‐wide association studies (GWASs). As a complement, admixture mapping exploits the long‐range linkage disequilibrium (LD) generated by admixture between genetically distinct ancestral populations. It is then questionable whether admixture mapping analysis is still necessary in detecting the disease associated variants in admixed populations. We argue that admixture mapping is able to reduce the burden of massive comparisons in GWASs; it therefore can be a powerful tool to locate the disease variants with substantial allele frequency differences between ancestral populations. In this report we studied a two‐stage approach, where candidate regions are defined by conducting admixture mapping at stage 1, and single SNP association tests are followed at stage 2 within the candidate regions defined at stage 1. We first established the genome‐wide significance levels corresponding to the criteria to define the candidate regions at stage 1 by simulations. We next compared the power of the two‐stage approach with direct association analysis. Our simulations suggest that the two‐stage approach can be more powerful than the standard genome‐wide association analysis when the allele frequency difference of a causal variant in ancestral populations, is larger than 0.4. Our conclusion is consistent with a theoretical prediction by Risch and Tang ([2006] Am J Hum Genet 79:S254). Surprisingly, our study also suggests that power can be improved when we use less strict criteria to define the candidate regions at stage 1.
Error behaviours in an unreliable in-air gesture recognizer

This article presents results of two pilot studies that investigated error behaviours with an unreliable in-air gesture recognizer. During the studies, users performed a small set of simple in-air gestures. In the first study, these gestures were abstract. The second study associated concrete tasks with each gesture. The error patterns in the two studies were substantially different.
Geometric contamination for GMM/UBM speaker verification in reverberant environments

Reverberation generated by multi-path acoustic propagation in enclosures is one of the most critical issues for distant-speech speaker veriﬁcation systems. While late arrivals can be treated as additive noise, early reﬂections critically affects the speech spectral properties that allow differentiating among speakers. Considering a standard GMM/UBM speaker veriﬁcation system based on MFCC, a geometric data contamination scheme rely-ing on a rough modeling of the sound propagation through the image method is presented to attack the reverberation. The con-tribution of this paper is twofold: ﬁrst, an analysis of the amount of knowledge of the impulse response needed for an effective contamination is carried out on simulated data; second, the geometric contamination is applied to real impulse responses to validate its use in real application contexts. Preliminary experimental results are provided to support the theoretical study and show the effectiveness of the approach.
Sex Differences in Diabetes and Risk of Incident Coronary Artery Disease in Healthy Young and Middle-Aged Adults

OBJECTIVE Controversy exists about the coronary artery disease (CAD) risk conveyed by diabetes in young and middle-aged women. We investigated sex differences in CAD by diabetes status among healthy individuals with different underlying risks of heart disease. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS We examined subjects aged <60 years without CAD at enrollment in the high-risk GeneSTAR Study (n = 1,448; follow-up ∼12 years), Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA; n = 3,072; follow-up ∼7 years), and National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey III (NHANES III) Mortality Follow-up Study (n = 6,997; follow-up ∼15 years). Diabetes was defined by report, hypoglycemic use, and/or fasting glucose ≥126 mg/dL. The outcome was any CAD event during follow-up (fatal CAD in NHANES). RESULTS In the absence of diabetes, CAD rates were lower among women in GeneSTAR, MESA, and NHANES (4.27, 1.66, and 0.40/1,000 person-years, respectively) versus men (11.22, 5.64, and 0.88/1,000 person-years); log-rank P < 0.001 (GeneSTAR/MESA) and P = 0.07 (NHANES). In the presence of diabetes, CAD event rates were similar among women (17.65, 7.34, and 2.37/1,000 person-years) versus men (12.86, 9.71, and 1.83/1,000 person-years); all log-rank P values > 0.05. Adjusting for demographics, diabetes was associated with a significant four- to fivefold higher CAD rate among women in each cohort, without differences in men. In meta-analyses of three cohorts, additionally adjusted for BMI, smoking, hypertension, HDL, and non-HDL cholesterol, antihypertensive and cholesterol-lowering medication use, the hazard ratio of CAD in men versus women among nondiabetes was 2.43 (1.76–3.35) and diabetes was 0.89 (0.43–1.83); P = 0.013 interaction by diabetes status. CONCLUSIONS Though young and middle-aged women are less likely to develop CAD in the absence of diabetes, the presence of diabetes equalizes the risk by sex. Our findings support aggressive CAD prevention strategies in women with diabetes and at similar levels to those that exist in men.
Identification of MINUS, a small polypeptide that functions as a microtubule nucleation suppressor

In eukaryotic cells, tubulin polymerization must be regulated precisely during cell division and differentiation. To identify new mechanisms involved in cellular microtubule formation, we isolated an activity that suppresses microtubule nucleation in vitro. The activity was due to a small acidic polypeptide of 4.7 kDa which we named MINUS (microtubule nucleation suppressor). MINUS inhibited tau‐ and taxol‐mediated microtubule assembly in vitro and was inactivated by dephosphorylation. The protein was purified to homogeneity from cultured neural (PC12) cells and bovine brain. Microinjection of MINUS caused a transient loss of dynamic microtubules in Vero cells. The results suggest that MINUS acts with a novel mechanism on tubulin polymerization, thus regulating microtubule formation in living cells.
Iterative Learning of Parallel Lexicons and Phrases from Non-Parallel Corpora

While parallel corpora are an indispensable resource for data-driven multilingual natural language processing tasks such as machine translation, they are limited in quantity, quality and coverage. As a result, learning translation models from nonparallel corpora has become increasingly important nowadays, especially for low-resource languages. In this work, we propose a joint model for iteratively learning parallel lexicons and phrases from non-parallel corpora. The model is trained using a Viterbi EM algorithm that alternates between constructing parallel phrases using lexicons and updating lexicons based on the constructed parallel phrases. Experiments on Chinese-English datasets show that our approach learns better parallel lexicons and phrases and improves translation performance significantly.
CSIEC (Computer Simulator in Educational Communication): An Intelligent Web-Based Teaching System for Foreign Language Learning

In this paper we present an innovative intelligent web-based computer-aided instruction system for foreign language learning: CSIEC (Computer Simulator in Educational Communication). This system can not only grammatically understand the sentences in English given from the users via Internet, but also reasonably and individually speak with the users. At first the related works in this research field are analyzed. Then we introduce the system goals and the system framework, i.e., the natural language understanding mechanism (NLML, NLOMJ and NLDB) and the communicational response (CR). Finally we give the syntactic and semantic content of this instruction system, i.e. some important notations of English grammar used in it and their relations with the NLOMJ.
Cardiac and CNS defects in a mouse with targeted disruption of suppressor of fused

The hedgehog (Hh) pathway is conserved from Drosophila to humans and plays a key role in embryonic development. In addition, activation of the pathway in somatic cells contributes to cancer development in several tissues. Suppressor of fused is a negative regulator of Hh signaling. Targeted disruption of the murine suppressor of fused gene (Sufu) led to a phenotype that included neural tube defects and lethality at mid-gestation (9.0-10.5 dpc). This phenotype resembled that caused by loss of patched (Ptch1), another negative regulator of the Hh pathway. Consistent with this finding, Ptch1 and Sufu mutants displayed excess Hh signaling and resultant altered dorsoventral patterning of the neural tube. Sufu mutants also had abnormal cardiac looping, indicating a defect in the determination of left-right asymmetry. Marked expansion of nodal expression in 7.5 dpc embryos and variable degrees of node dysmorphology in 7.75 dpc embryos suggested that the pathogenesis of the cardiac developmental abnormalities was related to node development. Other mutants of the Hh pathway, such as Shh, Smo and Shh/Ihh compound mutants, also have laterality defects. In contrast to Ptch1 heterozygous mice, Sufu heterozygotes had no developmental defects and no apparent tumor predisposition. The resemblance of Sufu homozygotes to Ptch1 homozygotes is consistent with mouse Sufu being a conserved negative modulator of Hh signaling.
Detecting English Writing Styles For Non-native Speakers

This paper presents the first attempt, up to our knowledge, to classify English writing styles on this scale with the challenge of classifying day to day language written by writers with different backgrounds covering various areas of topics.The paper proposes simple machine learning algorithms and simple to generate features to solve hard problems. Relying on the scale of the data available from large sources of knowledge like Wikipedia. We believe such sources of data are crucial to generate robust solutions for the web with high accuracy and easy to deploy in practice. The paper achieves 74\% accuracy classifying native versus non native speakers writing styles. Moreover, the paper shows some interesting observations on the similarity between different languages measured by the similarity of their users English writing styles. This technique could be used to show some well known facts about languages as in grouping them into families, which our experiments support.