Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Hybrid techniques for real-time radar simulation

This paper summarizes results of a study of the design and application of special-purpose computers for the simulation of air-to-ground radars. Specifically, the computers must generate information in real-time to simulate the display of a scanning radar in a vehicle flying at Mach 3 and arbitrary altitude. The radar can view 105 square miles of terrain per second with a resolution of 60 points per mile in range (five per microsecond). This paper describes a hybrid simulator that exploits both the redundancy in the terrain and the repetitiveness caused by the radar scan pattern. An overall design is presented that affords reductions of 103 in storage capacity and computation speed, compared with a straightforward digital approach for generation of topographic profiles from which the display is prepared. Details are presented of data formats and transfer schemes through the memory hierarchy, and of algorithms for the reconstruction of analog profiles from a digitally stored contour map.
Cost-effective condition-based inspection scheme for condition-based maintenance

In condition-based maintenance (CBM), the item is preventively replaced if failure risk exceeds a pre-determined threshold. The optimal replacement threshold is often determined such that the average maintenance costs per unit time due to preventive and failure replacements is minimized. It is assumed that inspections are performed at equal time intervals with no cost. However, in many practical situations, inspection cost is considerable and, thus, it is reasonable to inspect less during the time the item is in healthier states, and, to perform more inspections as the item degrades, namely, using a condition-based inspection scheme as opposed to a constant interval inspection scheme. In this paper a two-step approach, for the determination of the replacement threshold and a cost-effective condition-based inspection scheme for CBM, is proposed. In the first step, assuming that inspections are performed at equal time intervals with no cost, the optimal replacement threshold is determined. This assumption is, then, relaxed and its consequences on total average cost are evaluated using a proposed iterative procedure to obtain the condition-based inspection scheme. The proposed approach is illustrated through a numerical example.
3D well-composed pictures

A special class of subsets of binary digital 3D pictures called `well-composed pictures' is defined by two simple conditions on a local voxel level. The pictures of this class have very nice topological and geometrical properties; for example, a very natural definition of a continuous analog leads to regular properties of surfaces, a digital version of the 3D separation theorem has a simple proof, and there is only one connectedness relation in a well-composed picture, since 6-, 18-, and 26-connectedness are equivalent. This implies that many algorithms used in computer vision and computer graphics and their descriptions can be simpler, and the algorithms can be faster.
Event Extraction Approach from Texts

A new challenge is added to the Natural Language Processing Community; how to analyze the new documents forms resulting from the Web 2.0? We are interested in a particular kind of information which is events. Thus, we propose a generic approach to extract and analyze events from text. We propose an event extraction algorithm with a polynomial complexity O(n). This algorithm is based on developed semantic map of events. We validate the first component of our approach by the development of the "EventEC" system.
The cell-tethered BMP binding protein Crossveinless 2 is a short-range co-receptor that promotes or inhibits BMP signaling in a concentration dependant manner

In Drosophila, the BMP binding protein Short gastrulation (Sog) both enhances and inhibits BMP activity in a spatially dependent manner, likely by facilitating transport of BMPs. In this report we examine the properties of a second Sog-like protein, Crossveinless 2 (Cv-2), and show that like Sog, it is a secreted BMP-binding protein that can either augment or inhibit BMP signaling. Unlike Sog however, this biphasic response is not mediated by BMP transport. Instead, using experimental and computational approaches, we demonstrate that Cv-2 acts locally to produce biphasic responses as a coreceptor. Whether Cv-2 enhances or inhibits signaling is dependent on a number of biophysical parameters including the relative binding affinities of receptors and Cv-2 to BMPs and the Cv-2 concentration. Since we find that Cv-2 expression is also under the control of BMP signaling, these combined properties enable Cv-2 to exquisitely tune BMP signaling in time and space.
THE MEASUREMENT OF OVERALL CITIZEN SATISFACTION

Measuring citizens' overall satisfaction with urban services is important both for administrators involved in local citizen surveys and for scholars interested in understanding how citizens respond to municipal government. However, little empirical research has been devoted to developing and testing measures of overall citizen satisfaction. Using data from an online panel survey, this paper describes and compares several single- and multi-item scales of overall citizen satisfaction with urban services, including a newly developed Likert-type scale. Results suggest that multi-item scales generally perform better than single-item scales. A concise three-item scale similar to that used in the American Customer Satisfaction Index, along with another scale based on Hirschman's exit-voice-loyalty model, appears to offer the best combination of reliability, validity, and practical utility, although future methodological research is needed.
Automatic fall detection for elderly by using features extracted from skeletal data

Automatic detection of unusual events such as falls is very important especially for elderly people living alone. Realtime detection of these events can reduce the health risks associated with a fall. In this paper, we propose a novel method for automatic detection of fall event by using depth cameras. Depth images generated by these cameras are used in computing the skeletal data of a person. Our contribution is to use features extracted from the skeletal data to form a strong set of features which can help us achieve an increased precision at low redundancy. Our findings indicate that our features, which are derived from skeletal data, are moderately powerful for detecting unusual events such as fall.
Host Pubescence and the Behavior and Performance of the Butterfly Papilio Troilus (Lepidoptera: Papilionidae)

Abstract We found that leaf pubescence in Sassafras albidum (Nuttall) Nees negatively influences the growth and survivorship of a lepidopteran herbivore, Papilio troilus (L.). S. albidum leaves varied greatly in pubescence among plants. In laboratory choice experiments, P. troilus larvae preferred to eat and adult females preferred to oviposit on nonpubescent S. albidum leaves. Larvae fed pubescent S. albidum had slower growth and higher mortality in early instars than larvae fed on nonpubescent leaves. These negative effects of pubescence on adult oviposition, larval growth rate, and larval survivorship suggest that the population size of P. troilus will reflect availability of nonpubescent hostplants. In field surveys, the frequency of pubescent S. albidum was significantly greater in open habitats created by harvesting pine forest than in hardwood forests, perhaps because of higher light and lower moisture in open areas. By changing the availability of quality food resources, forest management may have unintended negative impacts on this butterfly population.
I.C.T : an implementation strategy in the Foothills School Division for the new elementary curriculum

ICT is the new Information and Communication Technology Curriculum, which has been mandated for use in schools as of September 1, 2000. Schools in Alberta have three years to fully integrate this program into their daily educational practices, not as a separate course but rather as a curriculum woven throughout the curricula. This project looks at the methods used to implement ICT in one school in the Foothills School Division.
Angular Velocity Affects Trunk Muscle Strength and EMG Activation during Isokinetic Axial Rotation

Objective. To evaluate trunk muscle strength and EMG activation during isokinetic axial rotation at different angular velocities. Method. Twenty-four healthy young men performed isokinetic axial rotation in right and left directions at 30, 60, and 120 degrees per second angular velocity. Simultaneously, surface EMG was recorded on external oblique (EO), internal oblique (IO), and latissimus dorsi (LD) bilaterally. Results. In each direction, with the increase of angular velocity, peak torque decreased, whereas peak power increased. During isokinetic axial rotation, contralateral EO as well as ipsilateral IO and LD acted as primary agonists, whereas, ipsilateral EO as well as contralateral IO and LD acted as primary antagonistic muscles. For each primary agonist, the root mean square values decreased with the increase of angular velocity. Antagonist coactiviation was observed at each velocity; however, it appears to be higher with the increase of angular velocity. Conclusion. Our results suggest that velocity of rotation has great impact on the axial rotation torque and EMG activity. An inverse relationship of angular velocity was suggested with the axial rotation torque as well as root mean square value of individual trunk muscle. In addition, higher velocity is associated with higher coactivation of antagonist, leading to a decrease in torque with the increase of velocity.
Configurable and scalable class of high performance hardware accelerators for simultaneous DNA sequence alignment

A new class of efficient and flexible hardware accelerators for DNA local sequence alignment based on the widely used Smith–Waterman algorithm is proposed in this paper. This new class of accelerating structures exploits an innovative technique that tracks the origin coordinates of the best alignment to allow a significant reduction of the size of the dynamic programming matrix that needs to be recomputed during the subsequent traceback phase, providing a considerable reduction of the resulting time and memory requirements. The significant performance of the enhanced class of accelerators is attained by also providing support for an additional level of parallelism: the capability to concurrently align several query sequences with one or more reference sequences, according to the specific application requisites. Moreover, the accelerator class also includes specially designed processing elements that improve the resource usage when implemented in a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), and easily provide several different configurations in an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) implementation. Obtained results demonstrated that speedups as high as 278 can be obtained in ASIC accelerating structures. A FPGA‐based prototyping platform, operating at a 40 times lower clock frequency and incorporating a complete alignment embedded system, still provides significant speedups as high as 27, compared with a pure software implementation.Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Review on Designing of Multi Bit Flip-Flop to Achieve Reduced Area in VLSI Design

— In this paper, we have designed Multi-bit Flip-flop (MBFF) and made performance comparison over the Single-bit Flip-flop (SBFF) We can increase Flip flop performance by merging clock pulse. But increase in clock pulse means it will increases the area. So the Multi-bit Flip-flop is designed by single clock pulse and achieves same functionality like two single-bit Flip-flop so it will reduce the area. The basic memory elements of designer considerations are Latch and flip flop. Optimizations in VLSI have been done on three factors: Area, Power and Timing (Speed). Area optimization means reducing the space of logic which occupy on the die. Memory elements play a vital role on Digital World but these elements consumes more area. Thus these elements can be designed using Multi-bit flip flop to reduce area.
Enterprise Bargaining and Productivity:Evidence from the Business Longitudinal Survey

Melbourne Institute Working Paper No. 8/01. This paper is the result of work being undertaken as part of a collaborative research program entitled:"The Performance of Australian Enterprises: Innovation, Productivity and Profitability". The project is generously supported by the Australian Research Council and the following collaborative partners: the Australian Tax Office, the Commonwealth Office of Small Business, IBIS Business Information Pty Ltd, the Productivity Commission, and the Victorian Department of State Development. The views expressed in this paper, however, represent those of the authors and are not necessarily shared by the collaborative partners. The authors also thank Lou Will, who acted as a referee for this paper, and provided many valuable comments.
New Insights and Faster Computations for the Graphical Lasso

We consider the graphical lasso formulation for estimating a Gaussian graphical model in the high-dimensional setting. This approach entails estimating the inverse covariance matrix under a multivariate normal model by maximizing the ℓ1-penalized log-likelihood. We present a very simple necessary and sufficient condition that can be used to identify the connected components in the graphical lasso solution. The condition can be employed to determine whether the estimated inverse covariance matrix will be block diagonal, and if so, then to identify the blocks. This in turn can lead to drastic speed improvements, since one can simply apply a standard graphical lasso algorithm to each block separately. Moreover, the necessary and sufficient condition provides insight into the graphical lasso solution: the set of connected nodes at any given tuning parameter value is a superset of the set of connected nodes at any larger tuning parameter value. This article has supplementary material online.
The Epstein-Barr Virus BRRF1 Protein, Na, Induces Lytic Infection in a TRAF2- and p53-Dependent Manner

ABSTRACT The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) BRRF1 lytic gene product (Na) is encoded within the same immediate-early region as the BZLF1 (Z) and BRLF1(R) gene products, but its role during EBV infection has not been well defined. We previously showed that Na cooperates with the R protein to induce lytic gene expression in latently infected EBV-positive 293 cells, and in some EBV-negative cell lines it can activate the Z promoter in reporter gene assays. Here we show that overexpression of Na alone is sufficient to induce lytic gene expression in several different latently infected epithelial cell lines (Hone-Akata, CNE2-Akata, and AGS-Akata), while knockdown of endogenous Na expression reduces lytic gene expression. Consistent with its ability to interact with tumor necrosis factor receptor-associated factor 2 (TRAF2) in a yeast two-hybrid assay, we demonstrate that Na interacts with TRAF2 in cells. Furthermore, we show that TRAF2 is required for Na induction of lytic gene expression, that Na induces Jun N-terminal protein kinase (JNK) activation in a TRAF2-dependent manner, and that a JNK inhibitor abolishes the ability of Na to disrupt viral latency. Additionally, we show that Na and the tumor suppressor protein p53 cooperate to induce lytic gene expression in epithelial cells (including the C666-1 nasopharyngeal carcinoma cell line), although Na does not appear to affect p53 function. Together these data suggest that Na plays an important role in regulating the switch between latent and lytic infection in epithelial cells and that this effect requires both the TRAF2 and p53 cellular proteins.
Semantics-based Automated Web Testing

We present TAO, a software testing tool performing automated test and oracle generation based on a semantic approach. TAO entangles grammar-based test generation with automated semantics evaluation using a denotational semantics framework. We show how TAO can be incorporated with the Selenium automation tool for automated web testing, and how TAO can be further extended to support automated delta debugging, where a failing web test script can be systematically reduced based on grammar-directed strategies. A real-life parking website is adopted throughout the paper to demonstrate the effectivity of our semantics-based web testing approach.
The Expectations Hypothesis of the Term Structure - The Case of Ireland

Using a number of short-term maturities and monthly data, 1984-1997, we provide a number of tests of the expectations hypothesis (EH) of the term structure. The paper draws on cointegration techniques and the methodological approach of Campbell and Shiller (1987,1991). On balance our results lend support to the EH and are broadly consistent with recent findings for the UK, but are in sharp contrast to those for the US.
Empowered or Disempowered? Women's Participation in a Development Project in Rural China

Abstract In the last two decades in China, large international donor agencies and domestic women's non-governmental organizations have become significant actors in improving the lives of rural women. Many development agencies have put the empowerment of women on the agenda of all their development projects and introduced new ideas and approaches to promote gender equality. This article aims to understand a new approach to women's empowerment and explore the impact of local socioeconomic circumstances and power relations on project design, implementation and outcomes. It draws on ethnographic research into one community development project, conducted by one of the largest Chinese women's NGOs in Pingxi County, Shaanxi province.
Study on the Ultra-Wide Band High Power Microwave coupling effect on electronic fuze system

The experimental method and results of ultra-wide band (UWB) high power microwave (HPM) radiation on the land minespsila fuzes are introduced, and the mechanism of the HPM coupling effects on electronic fuze systems is analyzed also. The coupling electric field of HPM radiation on the object was numerically simulated using the finite-difference time-domain (FD-TD) method. The coupling action principle of HPM on fuze systems is studied, and the sensitive points of fuzes have been discussed and discovered. These are very important for the studies on the HPM weapons and the HPM effects on other electronic systems, and the techniques of HPM reinforcement also.
Iterative localisation in wireless ad hoc sensor networks: one-dimensional case

This paper discusses a simple method of localisation in sensor networks in which a sensor with unknown location is localised to a disk of radius equal to the transmission range centered at a beacon if the sensor under consideration can receive a transmission from the beacon. This is a reliable and extremely easy-to-implement technique since it assumes only the basic communication capability. The real advantage, however, is that once localised, a sensor can aid the other sensors to localise. This way by collaboration sensors can learn and improve their localisation regions iteralively. We analyse this iterative scheme and construct a distributed algorithm for utilising it in sensor networks.
Weighted Schatten $p$-Norm Minimization for Image Denoising with Local and Nonlocal Regularization

This paper presents a patch-wise low-rank based image denoising method with constrained variational model involving local and nonlocal regularization. On one hand, recent patch-wise methods can be represented as a low-rank matrix approximation problem whose convex relaxation usually depends on nuclear norm minimization (NNM). Here, we extend the NNM to the nonconvex schatten p-norm minimization with additional weights assigned to different singular values, which is referred to as the Weighted Schatten p-Norm Minimization (WSNM). An efficient algorithm is also proposed to solve the WSNM problem. The proposed WSNM not only gives better approximation to the original low-rank assumption, but also considers physical meanings of different data components. On the other hand, due to the naive aggregation schema which integrates all the denoised patches into a whole image, current patch-wise denoising methods always produce various degree of artifacts in denoised results. Therefore, to further reduce artifacts, a data-driven regularizer called Steering Total Variation (STV) combined with nonlocal TV is derived for a variational model, which imposes local and nonlocal consistency constraints on the patch-wise denoised image. A highly simple but efficient algorithm is proposed to solve this variational model with convergence guarantee. Both WSNM and local \& nonlocal consistent regularization are integrated into an iterative restoration framework to produce final results. Extensive experimental testing shows, both qualitatively and quantitatively, that the proposed method can effectively remove noise, as well as reduce artifacts compared with state-of-the-art methods.
A Structure-Based Flexible Search Method for Motifs in RNA

The discovery of non-coding RNA (ncRNA) motifs and their role in regulating gene expression has recently attracted considerable attention. The goal is to discover these motifs in a sequence database. Current RNA motif search methods start from the primary sequence and only then take into account secondary structure considerations. One can think of developing a flexible structure-based motif search method that will filter datasets based on secondary structure first, while allowing extensive primary sequence factors and additional factors such as potential pseudoknots as constraints. Since different motifs vary in structure rigidity and in local sequence constraints, there is a need for algorithms and tools that can be fine-tuned according to the searched RNA motif, but differ in their approach from the RNAMotif descriptor language. We present an RNA motif search tool called STRMS (Structural RNA Motif Search), which takes as input the secondary structure of the query, including local sequence and structure constraints, and a target sequence database. It reports all occurrences of the query in the target, ranked by their similarity to the query, and produces an html file that displays graphical images of the predicted structures for both the query and the candidate hits. Our tool is flexible and takes into account a large number of sequence options and existence of potential pseudoknots as dictated by specific queries. Our approach combines pre-folding and an O(m n) RNA pattern matching algorithm based on subtree homeomorphism for ordered, rooted trees. An O(n(2) log n) extension is described that allows the search engine to take into account the pseudoknots typical to riboswitches. We employed STRMS in search for both new and known RNA motifs (riboswitches and tRNAs) in large target databases. Our results point to a number of additional purine bacterial riboswitch candidates in newly sequenced bacteria, and demonstrate high sensitivity on known riboswitches and tRNAs. Code and data are available at www.cs. bgu.ac. il/vaksler/STRMS.
International poverty projections

The authors investigate the methodology used in projections of international poverty - particularly those used in many World Bank documents. The methodology, as developed by Ahluwalia, Carter, and Chenery (1979) in an influential paper, is examined critically and subjected to sensitivity analysis. It was found that their projections of poverty are not robust to reasonable changes and improvements in the methodology; in some cases, even the projections'time trend is reversed. Thus, analysts and policymakers should treat such global forecasts of poverty with caution.