Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Do Restrictions in Working Memory Capacity Account for Decrements in Cognitive Performance of Highly Test-Anxious Individuals? A Study among Selected Ghanaian University Students

This study investigated overly test-anxious students with non-test anxious in selected Ghanaian Universities. Findings suggest that states of anxiety and emotional arousal within and among students distract available working memory from current task leaving insufficient capacity to attend to task demands at hand. In this respect, Working Memory Capacity becomes impoverished because resources needed to perform concurrent task become insufficient indicating relationship between anxiety, cognition and students' academic performance. These were interpreted to mean students' academic assessment is not unrelated to how academic institutions help overly test anxious students to cope with strategies of stress. This gives plausibility to debate that school-based service delivery may need to migrate from traditional system of assessment to more comprehensive assessment that takes into consideration multiplicity of factors including response to interventions that are prevention-focused.
Combined Primary Tumor and Extracranial Metastasis Status as Constituent Factor of Prognostic Indices for Predicting the Overall Survival in Patients with Brain Metastases

We retrospectively analyzed the prognostic factors on overall survival (OS) in patients with brain metastasis (BM) and evaluated the role of combined primary tumor and extracranial metastasis (ECM) status as a constituent factor for prognostic index. This study involved 897 patients with BMs who underwent radiotherapy between April 2003 and December 2009. Among the clinical parameters, multivariate analysis showed that age, Karnofsky performance status (KPS), combined primary tumor and ECM status, number of BMs, and treatment group were significant prognostic factors for OS (P < 0.05). To compare the discriminatory ability of 5 prognostic indices, i.e., recursive partitioning analysis (RPA), basic score for BMs (BSBM), score index for radiosurgery (SIR), graded prognostic assessment (GPA), and modified GPA including the combined primary tumor and ECM status (mGPA), the Akaike information criteria (AIC) were calculated. The mGPA showed the lowest AIC value, followed by RPA, GPA, SIR, and BSBM, in that order. It is implicated that modified score of pre-existing factors (i.e., age and KPS) and addition of the combined primary tumor and ECM status to the prognostic index can improve its discriminatory ability and the combined primary tumor and ECM status may be useful as one of constituent factors for prognostic index.
IslandViewer: an integrated interface for computational identification and visualization of genomic islands

Summary: Genomic islands (clusters of genes of probable horizontal origin; GIs) play a critical role in medically important adaptations of bacteria. Recently, several computational methods have been developed to predict GIs that utilize either sequence composition bias or comparative genomics approaches. IslandViewer is a web accessible application that provides the first user-friendly interface for obtaining precomputed GI predictions, or predictions from user-inputted sequence, using the most accurate methods for genomic island prediction: IslandPick, IslandPath-DIMOB and SIGI-HMM. The graphical interface allows easy viewing and downloading of island data in multiple formats, at both the chromosome and gene level, for method-specific, or overlapping, GI predictions. Availability: The IslandViewer web service is available at http://www.pathogenomics. sfu.ca/islandviewer and the source code is freely available under the GNU GPL license. Contact: brinkman@sfu.ca
A Complete Recipe for Stochastic Gradient MCMC

Many recent Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) samplers leverage continuous dynamics to define a transition kernel that efficiently explores a target distribution. In tandem, a focus has been on devising scalable variants that subsample the data and use stochastic gradients in place of full-data gradients in the dynamic simulations. However, such stochastic gradient MCMC samplers have lagged behind their full-data counterparts in terms of the complexity of dynamics considered since proving convergence in the presence of the stochastic gradient noise is non-trivial. Even with simple dynamics, significant physical intuition is often required to modify the dynamical system to account for the stochastic gradient noise. In this paper, we provide a general recipe for constructing MCMC samplers--including stochastic gradient versions--based on continuous Markov processes specified via two matrices. We constructively prove that the framework is complete. That is, any continuous Markov process that provides samples from the target distribution can be written in our framework. We show how previous continuous-dynamic samplers can be trivially "reinvented" in our framework, avoiding the complicated sampler-specific proofs. We likewise use our recipe to straightforwardly propose a new state-adaptive sampler: stochastic gradient Riemann Hamiltonian Monte Carlo (SGRHMC). Our experiments on simulated data and a streaming Wikipedia analysis demonstrate that the proposed SGRHMC sampler inherits the benefits of Riemann HMC, with the scalability of stochastic gradient methods.
No increased risk of early revision during the implementation phase of new cup designs

Background and purpose — In Sweden, less than 5% of patients who undergo total hip arthroplasty (THA) have revision. Younger patients have an increased risk of revision. New prosthetic designs are being introduced in order to improve outcomes further. We investigated whether the introductory phase of new cup designs would increase the revision rate. Patients and methods — All THAs and first-time cup revisions performed from 1993 through 2011 were identified in the Swedish Hip Arthroplasty Register. The 15 types of cups used in more than 500 operations and inserted in more than 50 cases in each hospital (n = 52,903) were selected. All cups were given an order number, based on the order in which the cup had been inserted at each hospital. The influence of order number on the risk of revision was analyzed in a regression model, which was adjusted for potentially confounding demographic and surgical data. Revision within 2 years for all reasons (n = 940) was used as primary endpoint. Changes in the risk of revision based on the order number were analyzed using a spline. Results — The order number of the cup had no influence on the risk of early revision (p ≥ 0.7). Categorizing the order number using cutoff values obtained from the splines did not result in any statistically significant changes in risk of revision (p ≥ 0.2). Interpretation — We did not find any increased risk of early revision during the implementation phase of new cup designs. This finding is unexpected, and partly conflicts with data from other registries. The structured and stepwise introduction of new prosthesis designs, facilitated by the annual feedback from the Swedish Hip Arthroplasty Register, may partly explain this discrepancy.
Late-onset Diogenes syndrome in Chinese – an elderly case series in Hong Kong

We review a consecutive case series of elders presenting to a regional psychogeriatric service in Hong Kong in 1996–2001. Eighteen elders (aged 65 and over) fulfilled the classical symptoms of Diogenes syndrome (extreme squalor, neglected physical state, unhygienic condition & social isolation with or without hoarding). A diverse clinical and socio-demographic profile was observed. Most of our clients suffered from different stages of dementia. Other diagnoses such as schizophrenia and alcohol abuse were diagnosed in this cohort as comorbid or independent conditions. Neither psychopathology nor social situations could adequately account for the initiation and perpetuation of Diogenes syndrome in some cases. The plausible psychological etiologies are discussed in the context of existential values in Chinese culture and changes in traditional family dynamics as the society modernizes.
DESIGN STUDY OF THE PROPOSED 12SLOT-14POLE FIELD EXCITATION FLUX SWITCHING MACHINE (FEFSM) FOR HYBRID ELECTRIC VEHICLES NAZIRA BINTI YUNUS

A new structure of field excitation flux switching motor (FEFSM) as an alternative candidate of non-Permanent Magnet (PM) machine for HEV drives is presented in this thesis. Design principles and initial performances of the proposed motor with 12 stator slots and 14 rotor pole are demonstrated. Initially, the coil arrangement tests are examined to validate the operating principle of the motor and to certify the zero rotor position. Furthermore, the profile of flux linkage,cogging torque, torque versus Ja at various Je characteristics and torque versus power characteristics are observed and analyzed based on 2D-finite element analysis (FEA). The improvement design is done by using the “deterministic optimization method” to achieve the restriction and spesification target compared to Interior Permenant Magnet Synchronous Machines (IPMSM) that used in HEV drives. “The results obtained show that proposed 12S-14P FEFSM achieved the target performance for maximum power, maximum torque density, maximum power density and machine weight, while the maximum torque is not achieved as a target. Therefore, by further design modification and optimization it is expected that the low cost motor will successfully achieved the target performances.
Spectrum Utilization Efficiency Analysis in Cognitive Radio Networks

In cognitive radio network, secondary (unlicensed) users (SUs) are allowed to utilize the licensed spectrum when it is not used by the primary (licensed) users (PUs). Because of the dynamic nature of cognitive radio network, the activities of SUs such as "how long to sense" and "how long to transmit" significantly affect both the service quality of the cognitive radio networks and protection to PUs. In this work, we formulate and analyze spectrum utilization efficiency problem in the cognitive radio network with various periodic frame structure of SU, which consists of sensing and data transmission slots. Energy detection is considered for spectrum sensing algorithm. To achieve higher spectrum utilization efficiency, the optimal sensing and data transmission length are investigated and found numerically. The simulation results are presented to verify the our analysis and to evaluate the interference to the PU which should be controlled into tolerable level.
Nonlinear parameter prediction of fossil power plant based on OSC-KPLS

In order to solve problems of the failure of measured parameters and realize online optimal running in fossil power plant, a novel parameter prediction and estimation method based on orthogonal signal correction (OSC) and kernel partial least squares (KPLS) is proposed. OSC is a data preprocessing method that remove from X information not correlated to Y. Kernel partial least square is a promising regression method for tackling nonlinear problems because it can efficiently compute regression coefficients in high-dimensional feature space by means of nonlinear kernel function. In this paper, the prediction performance of the proposed approach (OSC-KPLS) is compared to those of PLS, OSC-PLS and KPLS using industrial example. OSC-KPLS effectively simplifies both the structure and interpretation of the resulting regression model and shows superior prediction performa- nce compared to PLS, OSC-PLS and KPLS.
Automated data extraction from the web with conditional models

Extracting data on the Web is an important information extraction task. Most existing approaches rely on wrappers which require human knowledge and user interaction during extraction. This paper proposes the use of conditional models as an alternative solution to this task. Deriving the strength of conditional models like maximum entropy and maximum entropy Markov models, our method offers three major advantages: the full automation, the ability to incorporate various non-independent, overlapping features of different hypertext representations, and the ability to deal with missing and disordered data fields. The experimental results on a wide range of e-commercial websites with different layouts show that our method can achieve a satisfactory trade-off between automation and accuracy, and also provide a practical application of automated data extraction from the Web.
Derivative method for hand palm texture biometric verification

In this work, a novel, simple and very robust biometric verification system through the use of the texture of the hand palm is proposed. It attempts to make the performance of existing palm-print systems better. First of all, the hand palm image with scale, rotation and translation invariance is isolated from the hand image recorded. Then, the “derivative method” presented in this paper, is used to extract the texture features from gray-scale images. It consists of a differentiation and binarization process. 1090 hand images of 109 people with 10 samples each one have been acquired by means of a commercial scanner with 150 dpi resolution. Support Vector Machine (SVM) is the main classifier used as verifier, in closed mode and open mode. An EER=0.30% and an EER=0.032% shown the final results of our system when it works in open and closed mode respectively.
Comparative study between pure tone audiometry and auditory steady-state responses in normal hearing subjects

Resumo Introdução As respostas auditivas de estado estável permitem avaliar de forma objetiva limiares auditivos frequência-específica. A audiometria tonal é o exame padrão-ouro; no entanto, nem sempre pode ser conclusiva, principalmente em crianças e adultos não colaborativos. Objetivo Comparar os limiares auditivos da RAEE aos da audiometria tonal em indivíduos com audição normal. Materiais e métodos Foram incluídos neste estudo prospectivo de corte transversal 26 adultos (52 orelhas), de ambos os gêneros, com audiometria normal e sem queixas otológicas. Os pacientes foram submetidos a anamnese, otomicroscopia, audiometria e imitanciometria. A seguir, realizou-se avaliação de respostas auditivas de estado estável. Os resultados obtidos foram analisados estatisticamente e comparados entre si. Resultados A diferença entre os limiares (em dB NA) obtidos em ambos os exames para cada frequência testada foi de 7,12 dB para 500 Hz; 7,6 dB para 1000 Hz; 8,27 dB para 2000 Hz e 9,71 dB para 4000 Hz, com limiares mais elevados na RAEE, em todas as frequências. Não houve diferença estatística entre as médias para cada frequência testada. Conclusão Os limiares obtidos na RAEE foram comparáveis aos da audiometria tonal em indivíduos normouvintes; entretanto, não deve ser usado como único método de avaliação auditiva. © 2014 Associação Brasileira de Otorrinolaringologia e Cirurgia Cérvico-Facial. Publicado por Elsevier Editora Ltda. Todos os direitos reservados.
TwinPeaks: A new approach for certificateless public key distribution

The current PKI has problems like certificate revocations and fraudulent certificates. To address such issues, we propose TwinPeaks, which is a new infrastructure to distribute public keys of named entities online. TwinPeaks leverages certificateless public key cryptography (CL-PKC), which we extend to make the public key of an entity depend on any combination of its networking parameters; thus TwinPeaks can mitigate spoofing attacks systematically. TwinPeaks needs public key servers, which constitute a DNS-like hierarchical tree. For each parent-child link in the tree, the parent and the child interact in such a way that every named entity has its own public/secret key pair. TwinPeaks removes certificates and hence has no revocation overhead. Instead, each named entity should keep/update its IP address and public key up-to-date in its DNS server and key server, respectively. TwinPeaks also achieves scalable distribution of public keys since public keys can be cached long term without elevating security risks.
Second order sliding mode for MIMO nonlinear uncertain systems based on a neural identifier

This paper deals with adaptive tracking for discrete-time nonlinear systems in presence of disturbances. A high order neural network structure is used to identify the plant model and based on this model, a discrete-time high order sliding mode, control law is derived. The paper also includes the respective stability analysis, for the whole system with a strategy. In order to show the applicability of the proposed scheme, simula-tion results are included for a Van der Pol oscilla-tor.
LEPP - Delaunay Algorithm: a Robust Tool for Producing Size-Optimal Quality Triangulations

The LEPP-Delaunay algorithm for the quality triangulation problem can be formulated in terms of the Delaunay insertion of midpoints of terminal edges (the common longest-edge of a pair of De-launay triangles) and boundary edges in the current mesh. In this paper we discuss theoretical results essentially based on the study of the triangle improvement properties of the basic point insertion operations, which precisely explain the observed practical behavior. We prove that optimal-size triangulations (within a constant factor near to 1), with smallest-angle greater than 30 are produced, excepting occasionally some isolated angles 22:2 < < 30 related with nonfrequent geometric conditions and boundary restrictions. The algorithm has a fast convergence behavior for attaining around 25 which approximately produces a radial "binary partition" point distribution around small geometric details; and a reasonable slower convergence for attaining the 30 .
Optimizing FOL Reducible Query Answering: Understanding Performance Challenges

Semantic Web data management raises the challenge of answering queries under constraints (i.e., in the presence of implicit data). To bridge the gap between this extended setting and that of query evaluation provided by database engines, a reasoning step (w.r.t. the constraints) is necessary before query evaluation. A large and useful set of ontology languages enjoys FOL reducibility of query answering: queries can be answered by evaluating a SQLized first-order logic (FOL) formula (obtained from the query and the ontology) directly against the explicitly stored data (i.e., without considering the ontological constraints). Our demonstration showcases to the attendees, and analyzes, the performance of several reformulation-based query answering techniques, including one we recently described in [5], applied to the lightweight description logic DL-LiteR underpinning the W3C's OWL2 QL profile.
Modelling Primary Energy Consumption under Model Uncertainty

This paper examines the long-term relationship between primary energy consumption and other key macroeconomic variables, including real GDP, labour force, capital stock and technology, using a panel dataset for 64 countries over the period 1965-2009. Deploying panel error correction models, we find that there is a positive relationship running from physical capital, GDP, and population to primary energy consumption. We observe however a negative relationship between total factor productivity and primary energy usage. Significant differences arise in the magnitude of the cointegration coefficients, when we allow for differences in geopolitics and wealth levels. We also argue that inference on the basis of a single model without taking model uncertainty into account can lead to biased conclusions. Consequently, we address this problem by applying simple model averaging techniques to the estimated panel cointegration models. We find that tackling the uncertainty associated with selecting a single model with model averaging techniques leads to a more accurate representation of the link between energy consumption and the other macroeconomic variables, and to a significantly increased out-of-sample forecast performance.
Using musical knowledge to extract expressive performance information from audio recordings

A computer system is described which performs polyphonic transcription of known solo pianomusic by using high-level musical information to guide a signal-processing system. This process, which we term expressive performance extraction, maps a digital audio representation of amusical performance to a MIDI representation of the same performance using the score of the music as a guide. Analysis of the accuracy of the system is presented, and its usefulness both as a tool for music-psychology researchers and as an example of a musical-knowledge-based signal-processing system is discussed.
Gaze-contingent display using texture mapping and OpenGL: system and applications

This paper describes a novel gaze-contingent display (GCD) using texture mapping and OpenGL. This new system has a number of key features: (a) it is platform independent, i.e. it runs on different computers and under different operating systems; (b) it is eyetracker independent, since it provides an interactive focus+context display that can be easily integrated with any eye-tracker that provides real-time 2-D gaze estimation; (c) it is flexible in that it provides for straightforward modification of the main GCD parameters, including size and shape of the window and its border; and (d) through the use of OpenGL extensions it can perform local real-time image analysis within the GCD window. The new GCD system implementation is described in detail and some performance figures are given. Several applications of this system are studied, including gaze-contingent multi-resolution displays, gaze-contingent multi-modality displays, and gaze-contingent image analysis.
Reading with choice of texts in the first grade classroom

v List of Tables . viii Chapter 1: Introduction . 1 Purpose Statement . 2 Statement of Research Problem and Question . 6 Story of the Question . 7 The Journey . 8 Chapter 2: Literature Review . 10 Independent Reading Time and Choice of Texts . 10 Self-Selection of Texts and Student Motivation . 13 Choice of Texts and Reading Engagement . 15 Choice of Reading Material and Learning Outcomes . 19 Conclusion . 21 Chapter 3: Context . 23 Community . 23 School . 24 Classroom . 25 Students . 26 Research Design/Methodology . 26 Procedure of Study . 28 Data Sources . 29
ConWIP-based Packing Order Planning Software Prototype for Variant-centered Manufacturing

—This paper is focused on the presentation of the concept, design, and implementation of a production planning software prototype built upon the methods of the constant work in process (ConWIP) manufacturing system. The paper discusses various aspects revolving around the field of application and system implementation itself. As an introduction, basics about ConWIP and the manufacturing processes of the company, in which this work has been conducted, are outlined. In subsequent sections, the decision to use ConWIP for production planning and various features and possibilities of the implemented software solution are illustrated. The paper concludes with a discussion about potentials and limitations of the system.