Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Transcoding proxy placement in en-route Web caching

With the rapid growth of audio and video applications on the Internet, caching media objects in transcoding proxies has become an important research topic. We address the problem of finding the optimal locations for placing a fixed number of transcoding proxies among the nodes in a network such that the specified objective is achieved. We present an original model for this problem, which makes transcoding proxy placement decisions on all the en-route nodes along the routing path in a coordinated way. In our model, proxy status information along the routing path of requests is used for optimally determining the locations for placing a fixed number of transcoding proxies. We formulate this problem as an optimization problem and the optimal locations are obtained using a low-cost dynamic programming-based algorithm. We implement our algorithm and evaluate our model on different performance metrics through extensive simulation experiments. The implementation results show that our model significantly outperforms the random algorithm which places transcoding proxies among the nodes randomly in a network.
Circuit level technique for mitigating effects of NBTI for wide fan-in domino logic circuits using supply voltage tuning

Transistor ageing has been a major problem as far as nanometre technology is concerned which leads to performance degradation and reliability issues. Ageing in pMOS transistor takes place due to Negative bias temperature instability (NBTI) which is a major threat in reliability as Iscale down the transistor geometries aggressively in our quest for low power and high performance. Overcoming ageing effect requires additional power expense, which in turn aggravates the power and heating problem. I propose an adaptive supply voltage (ASV) scheme as an arguably power efficient approach for variation resilience since it attempts to allocate power resources only where the negative effect of ageing is strong. Upon implementing the proposed approach on a host of domino logic circuits which include Current comparison domino (CCD) Ihave mitigated the rise in delay problem by suitably allocating a supply voltage so that the delay specifications are continuously met even after a lifespan of 10 years of operation at the expense of very low power headroom. Simulations have been performed using the BSIM4v4.7 model & 32 nm predictive technology model in SILVACO EDA tool at a frequency of 2 GHz and nominal supply voltage of 0.9V. The proposed approach has been implemented on 32 bit & 64 bit OR gates and also on 32 bit comparator and the results have been noteworthy.
Title Presenting social media information on mobile devicesusing multiple contexts

Structured Abstract Purpose. Research has shown that when presenting large amounts of social media information on small devices, design should consider multiple contexts which include user preferences, time, location, environment and so on. It should also take into account the purpose of use, for example, the kind of tasks undertaken by users. However, little research has been done on the organization of social media information by multiple context and tasks. Design/methodology/approach. Using tourism as a domain, we conducted a user evaluation study with a prototype to investigate users' preferred ways of organizing different types of social media information based on multiple contexts. Findings. In this paper, we present a sequence of context types for organizing four types of social media information (recommendations, events, friends, and media elements). The study revealed that users preferred to view recommendations by location and environment context, events by location and temporal Page 2 of 26 context, contacts by location and identity context and finally, list of media elements by environment and identity context. Research limitations/implications. There may be different sequences of context types for organizing social media information in domains other than tourism. Researchers are encouraged to analyze users' needs in other domains so as to find their preferred ways of organizing social media information. Practical implications. This paper includes implications for the design and development of user interface, in particular, for mobile applications presenting large amount of social media information. Originality/value. It presents a new way of organizing social media information using multiple context types and with consideration of users' needs. have looked into breaking down and displaying information in chunks to improve readability and provide easy navigation on the small screens of mobile devices. Such chunked information should be clear and concise. This is consistent with mobile user interface design guidelines which propose to organize chunks of information in a top-down hierarchy so that users are presented with high level information and can decide whether or not to retrieve detailed information (Hurst & Darzentas, 2012). Hierarchical chunking facilitates better organizing and easy retrieving of information (Burigat display content from the content providers' perspective so as to allow reusability and sharing of content content and its readability when displayed. DiMarco (2010) emphasized that information should be chunked and arranged to inform users and to improve usability. Existing mobile applications chunk information differently. For example, SocialSearchBrowser, a social networking application, chunks their information by temporal …
What Is the Role of Apelin regarding Cardiovascular Risk and Progression of Renal Disease in Type 2 Diabetic Patients with Diabetic Nephropathy?

Aims. To evaluate the association of different apelin levels with cardiovascular mortality, hospitalization, renal function, and cardiovascular risk factors in type 2 diabetic patients with mild to moderate CKD. Methods. An observational, prospective study involving 150 patients divided into groups according to baseline apelin levels: 1 ≤ 98 pg/mL, 2 = 98–328 pg/mL, and 3 ≥ 329 pg/mL. Baseline characteristics were analyzed and compared. Multivariate Cox regression was used to find out predictors of cardiovascular mortality, and multivariate logistic regression was used to find out predictors of hospitalization and disease progression. Simple linear regressions and Pearson correlations were used to investigate correlations between apelin and renal disease and cardiovascular risk factors. Results. Patients' survival at 83 months in groups 1, 2, and 3 was 39%, 40%, and 71.2%, respectively (P = 0.046). Apelin, age, and eGFR were independent predictors of mortality, and apelin, creatinine, eGFR, resistin, and visfatin were independent predictors of hospitalization. Apelin levels were negatively correlated with cardiovascular risk factors and positively correlated with eGFR. Patients with lower apelin levels were more likely to start a depurative technique. Conclusions. Apelin levels might have a significant clinical use as a marker/predictor of cardiovascular mortality and hospitalization or even as a therapeutic agent for CKD patients with cardiovascular disease.
The Politics of Prioritization: Senators’ Attention in 140 Characters

Abstract For decades US senators have maximized their limited resources to juggle policy, party politics, and constituents, but the rise of social media sheds new light on how they make these strategic choices. David Mayhew’s seminal study of Congress (1974) argues that lawmakers engage in three types of activities – credit claiming, advertising, and position taking, but equally important is understanding how lawmakers make strategic choices among these activities. Senators’ limited resources and attention forces them to prioritize and make trade-offs among these activities, and new media platforms, like Twitter, offer a window into that decision-making process. This article examines what influences senators’ decisions to publicly communicate these activities on Twitter. By using senators’ daily Twitter activity in 2013 and 2015 as a measure of their individual agenda, I find that senators are most likely to prioritize position-taking activities. Women and committee leaders allocate the most attention to policy positions, but attention to policy may come at a cost. When senators do choose to prioritize policy through position taking, they often make trade-offs that lead to decreased attention to advertising and credit claiming. These activities and the choices among them not only have implications for lawmakers’ behavior in Congress, but also the type of representation and information constituents can expect from their elected leaders.
Exact schema theory for GP and variable-length GAs with homologous crossover

In this paper we present a new exact schema theory for genetic programming and variable-length genetic algorithms which is applicable to the general class of homologous crossovers. These are a group of operators, including GP one-point crossover and GP uniform crossover, where the offspring are created preserving the position of the genetic material taken from the parents. The theory is based on the concepts of GP crossover masks and GP recombination distributions (both introduced here for the first time), as well as the notions of hyperschema and node reference systems introduced in other recent research. This theory generalises and refines previous work in GP and GA theory.
Computer-aided surgery based on auto-stereoscopic augmented reality

Although augmented reality (AR) promises to provide valuable means for computer-aided surgery; the underlying technologies often create a cumbersome work environment that is inadequate for clinical employment. A great deal of research is still needed to develop comfortable and easy-to-use tools providing an augmented view of the patient and its main internal structures. We propose to develop an AR system for enhanced visualization of the liver that involves minimal annoyance for both the surgeon and the patient. The ultimate application of our system is to assist the surgeon in oncological liver surgery.
2.45 GHz and 5.8 GHz Compact Dual-Band Circularly Polarized Patch Antenna

A dual-band circularly polarized stacked microstrip antenna for ISM Bands (2.45 GHz & 5.8 GHz) applications is designed and implemented. By stacking two different corner-truncated square patches in a dielectric substrate layer, the microstrip antenna for dual-frequency circular polarization (CP) can be achieved with –11.5 dB and –12.8 dB measured return loss for 2.45 GHz and 5.8 GHz. Semicircular grooves are cut at the four sides of the low frequency patch to achieve compact design by ∼ 12% size reduction. Details of the obtained dual-band CP performances are presented and discussed. This antenna is a promising candidate to be installed for a smart antenna system, cognitive radio, radar application in the future.
Achieving Dilution without Knowledge of Coordinates in the SINR Model

Considerable literature has been developed for various fundamental distributed problems in the SINR (Signal-to-Interference-plus-Noise-Ratio) model for radio transmission. A setting typically studied is when all nodes transmit a signal of the same strength, and each device only has access to knowledge about the total number of nodes in the network $n$, the range from which each node's label is taken $[1,\dots,N]$, and the label of the device itself. In addition, an assumption is made that each node also knows its coordinates in the Euclidean plane. In this paper, we create a technique which allows algorithm designers to remove that last assumption. The assumption about the unavailability of the knowledge of the physical coordinates of the nodes truly captures the `ad-hoc' nature of wireless networks. Previous work in this area uses a flavor of a technique called dilution, in which nodes transmit in a (predetermined) round-robin fashion, and are able to reach all their neighbors. However, without knowing the physical coordinates, it's not possible to know the coordinates of their containing (pivotal) grid box and seemingly not possible to use dilution (to coordinate their transmissions). We propose a new technique to achieve dilution without using the knowledge of physical coordinates. This technique exploits the understanding that the transmitting nodes lie in 2-D space, segmented by an appropriate pivotal grid, without explicitly referring to the actual physical coordinates of these nodes. Using this technique, it is possible for every weak device to successfully transmit its message to all of its neighbors in $\Theta(\lg N)$ rounds, as long as the density of transmitting nodes in any physical grid box is bounded by a known constant. This technique, we feel, is an important generic tool for devising practical protocols when physical coordinates of the nodes are not known.
Social Sustainability and Its Indicators through a Disability Studies and an Ability Studies Lens

The present journal recently stated in the call for a special issue on social sustainability, “[t]hough sustainable development is said to rest on ‘three pillars’, one of these—social sustainability—has received significantly less attention than its bio-physical environmental and economic counterparts”. The current issue promises to engage the concepts of “development sustainability”, “bridge sustainability” and “maintenance sustainability” and the tensions between these different aspects of social sustainability. The aim of the present study is to identify the visibility of disabled people in the academic social sustainability literature, to ascertain the impact and promises of social sustainability indicators put forward in the same literature and to engage especially with the concepts of “development sustainability”, “bridge sustainability” and “maintenance sustainability” through disability studies and ability studies lenses. We report that disabled people are barely covered in the academic social sustainability literature; of the 5165 academic articles investigated only 26 had content related to disabled people and social sustainability. We also conclude that social sustainability indicators evident in the 1909 academic articles with the phrase “social sustainability” in the abstract mostly focused on products and did not reflect yet the goals outlined in the “development sustainability” aspect of social sustainability proposed by Vallance such as basic needs, building social capital, justice and so on. We posit that if the focus within the social sustainability discourse shifts more toward the social that an active presence of disabled people in this discourse is essential to disabled people. We showcase the utility of an ability studies lens to further the development and application of the “development sustainability”, “bridge sustainability” and “maintenance sustainability” concepts. We outline how different ability expectations intrinsic to certain schools of thought of how to deal with human-nature relationships (for example anthropocentric versus bio/ecocentric) impact this relationship and “bridge sustainability”. As to “maintenance development”, we posit that no engagement has happened yet with the ability expectation conflicts between able-bodied and disabled people, or for that matter with the ability expectation differences between different able-bodied groups within social sustainability discourses; an analysis essential for the maintenance of development. In general, we argue that there is a need to generate ability expectation conflict maps and ability expectations conflict resolution mechanisms for all sustainable development discourses individually and for ability conflicts between sustainable development discourses.
Inferring Causality through Counterfactuals in Observational Studies - Some Epistemological Issues

L’inférence causale par contrefactuels dans les études observationnelles — Quelques épistémologiques : Cet article contribue au débat sur les vertus et les vices de contrefactuels comme base pour l’inférence causale. L’objectif est de mettre l’approche contrefactuelle dans une perspective épistémologique. Nous discutons d’un certain nombre de questions, allant de sa base non observable au parallélisme établi entre cette approche en statistique et en philosophie. Nous soutenons que la question n’est pas de rejeter ou d’approuver l’approche contrefactuelle par principe, mais de décider quel cadre de modélisation est préférable en fonction du contexte de la recherche. This paper contributes to the debate on the virtues and vices of counterfactuals as a basis for causal inference. The goal is to put the counterfactual approach in an epistemological perspective. We discuss a number of issues, ranging from its non-observable basis to the parallelisms drawn between the counterfactual approach in statistics and in philosophy. We argue that the question is not to oppose or to endorse the counterfactual approach as a matter of principle, but to decide what modelling framework is best to adopt depending on the research context.
Sentence recognition in native- and foreign-language multi-talker background noise.

Studies of speech perception in various types of background noise have shown that noise with linguistic content affects listeners differently than nonlinguistic noise [e.g., Simpson, S. A. , and Cooke, M. (2005). "Consonant identification in N-talker babble is a nonmonotonic function of N," J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 118, 2775-2778; Sperry, J. L. , Wiley, T. L. , and Chial, M. R. (1997). "Word recognition performance in various background competitors," J. Am. Acad. Audiol. 8, 71-80] but few studies of multi-talker babble have employed background babble in languages other than the target speech language. To determine whether the adverse effect of background speech is due to the linguistic content or to the acoustic characteristics of the speech masker, this study assessed speech-in-noise recognition when the language of the background noise was either the same or different from the language of the target speech. Replicating previous findings, results showed poorer English sentence recognition by native English listeners in six-talker babble than in two-talker babble, regardless of the language of the babble. In addition, our results showed that in two-talker babble, native English listeners were more adversely affected by English babble than by Mandarin Chinese babble. These findings demonstrate informational masking on sentence-in-noise recognition in the form of "linguistic interference. " Whether this interference is at the lexical, sublexical, and/or prosodic levels of linguistic structure and whether it is modulated by the phonetic similarity between the target and noise languages remains to be determined.
MECHATRONICS Manuscript Number : MECH-D-07-00073 R 2 Title : Identification of the pneumatic artificial muscle manipulators by MGA-based nonlinear NARX fuzzy model

This paper investigates the technique of the modeling and identification a new dynamic NARX fuzzy model by means of genetic algorithms. In conventional identification techniques, difficulties such as poor knowledge of the process, inaccurate process or complexity of the resulting mathematical model, all which limit their usefulness during dealing with dynamic nonlinear industrial processes. To overcome these difficulties, this paper proposes a novel approach by using a modified genetic algorithm (MGA) combined with the powerfully predictive capability of nonlinear ARX (NARX) model for generating the dynamic NARX Takagi-Sugeno (TS) Fuzzy model. MGA algorithm processes the experiment input-output training data from the real system and optimizes the NARX fuzzy model parameters. This is referred to perform fuzzy identification by which generates automatically the appropriate fuzzy if-then rules to characterize the dynamic nonlinear features of the real plant. The prototype pneumatic artificial muscle (PAM) manipulator, being a typical nonlinear and time-varying system is used as a test system for this novel approach. The results prove that, with this MGA-based modeling and identification, the novel NARX Fuzzy model identification approach of the PAM manipulator achieved highly outstanding performance and high precision as well. The accuracy of proposed MGA-based NARX Fuzzy model (< 1.5[deg]) proves excellent in comparison with MGA-based TS Fuzzy model (< 5[deg]) and conventional GA-based TS Fuzzy model (> 10[deg]). Dear Sir/Madam Thank you very much for reviewing our paper. The modified parts with respect to your comments are as follows: Reviewer's Comments Reviewer #1: Based on the revisions made to this new version of the paper, I concur that the authors have adequately addressed all the concerns of the reviewers. There are some grammatical and typographical errors in the paper. Please make the necessary changes. I appreciate for your reviewing my paper. According to your comments, I corrected all grammatical and typographical errors in my paper. At the same time, I sent my manuscript to E World editing for checking my manuscript and based on their checking, I corrected my paper. The change in my manuscript is shown in blue and red characters in the manuscript.
Spiritual experiences of post-performance career ballet dancers: a qualitative study of how peak performance spiritual lived experiences continued into and influenced later teaching lives

ABSTRACT This study focusses on how peak performance lived experiences (identified as spiritual) during a dance career continued into and influenced the later teaching lives of former ballet dancers. The study is located in academic discussion of Western mystical and spiritual experiences. Five professional ballet teachers, who were formerly professional ballet dancers, were interviewed using an interpretative phenomenological analysis qualitative research approach. The three major themes identified indicated that the dance career peak performance spiritual lived experiences: continued into later professional teaching life; influenced teaching techniques; and changed world life points of view. These findings confirm previous research and provide significant in-depth insights of the focus area under review. A table with a summary of the findings is included.
Efficient Top-k Spatial Locality Search for Co-located Spatial Web Objects

In step with the web being used widely by mobile users, user location is becoming an essential signal in services, including local intent search. Given a large set of spatial web objects consisting of a geographical location and a textual description (e.g., Online business directory entries of restaurants, bars, and shops), how can we find sets of objects that are both spatially and textually relevant to a query? Most of existing studies solve the problem by requiring that all query keywords are covered by the returned objects and then rank the sets by spatial proximity. The needs for identifying sets with more textually relevant objects render these studies inapplicable. We propose locality Search, a query that returns top-k sets of spatial web objects and integrates spatial distance and textual relevance in one ranking function. We show that computing the query is NP-hard, and we present two efficient exact algorithms and one generic approximate algorithm based on greedy strategies for computing the query. We report on findings from an empirical study with three real-life datasets. The study offers insight into the efficiency and effectiveness of the proposed algorithms.