Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Handwritten Hangul character recognition with hierarchical stochastic character representation

In structural character recognition, a character is usually viewed as a set of strokes and the spatial relationships between them. In this paper, we propose a stochastic modeling scheme by which strokes as well as relationships are represented by utilizing the hierarchical characteristics of target characters. Based on the proposed scheme, a handwritten Hangul (Korean) character recognition system is developed. The effectiveness of the proposed scheme is shown through experimental results conducted on a public database.
Pricing reset options with multiple reset features under stochastic interest rate and jump diffusion model

The price for the reset option with multiple strike resets and reset dates when the risky asset follows a jump-diffusion model and interest rate satisfies Vasicek term structure framework is considered. We first obtain closed-form solution for the reset option by applying the change of numeraires. Second, we investigate the results of numerical evaluations of the reset option prices and show how they vary with both jump risks and the numbers of reset dates through numerical examples. The results show that the jumps risks can significantly affect the reset option values, and ignoring the jump risks may lead to serious biases in pricing option.
From Finland to fatland: beneficial effects of statins for patients with chronic kidney disease.

EBERHARD RITZ, FEATURE EDITOR After maturity, healthy humans exhibit an age-dependent physiologic decline in renal function, amounting to an average of 0.75 ml/min lost GFR per year after the age of 40 ([1][1]). In the situation of chronic renal failure (CRF), accelerated renal decline supervenes
Learning matrix quantization and variants of relevance learning

We propose an extension of the learning vector quantization frame- work for matrix data. Data in matrix form occur in several areas like gray-scale images, time dependent spectra or fMRI data. If the matrix data are vectorized, important spatial information may be lost. Thus, processing matrix data in matrix form seems to be more appropriate. However, it requires matrix dissimilarities for data comparison. Here Schatten-p-norms come into play. We show that they can be used in a natural way replacing the vector dissimilarities in the learning framework. Moreover, we transfer the concept of vectorial relevance learning also to this new matrix variant. We apply the resulting learning matrix quantization approach to the classification of time-dependent fluorescence spectra as an exemplary real world application.
Octopus : Anonymous and Secure DHT Lookup

Distributed Hash Table (DHT) lookup is a core technique in structured peer-to-peer (P2P) networks. Its decentralized nature introduces security and privacy vulnerabilities for applications built on top of them; we thus set out to design a lookup mechanism achieving both security and anonymity, heretofore an open problem. We first explore the essential anonymity vulnerabilities in DHT lookups, and propose mechanisms to address them. We present Octopus, a novel anonymous and secure DHT lookup, which provides strong guarantees for both anonymity and security. We design a novel attacker identification mechanism to discover and remove misbehaving malicious nodes, thus severely limiting an adversary’s ability to carry out active attacks. We analyze the security of Octopus by developing an event-based simulator to show that the attacker discovery mechanism can rapidly identify malicious nodes with low error rate. We calculate the anonymity of Octopus using probabilistic modeling and show that Octopus can achieve near-optimal anonymity guarantees: the anonymity provided by Octopus is 4-6 times better than that of any existing scheme (in terms of amount of leaked information). We evaluate Octopus’s efficiency on Planetlab with 207 nodes and show that Octopus has reasonable lookup latency and manageable communication overhead.
Iterative CT reconstruction using LabPET™ detector modules

A computed tomography (CT) simulator has been built using the LabPET™ detectors and front-end electronics. Acquisitions of energy-binned data sets were made using this low spatial resolution CT system in photon counting mode. To retrieve maximum accuracy out of these acquisitions, an iterative reconstruction library was developed and tested. Construction of the system matrix is based on a preliminary raster scan from which the experimental detector response is obtained. A meticulous description of the system geometry and misalignment corrections is imperative and must be incorporated into the matrix definition to achieve good image quality. Using this method, no sinogram pre-correction or interpolation is necessary and measured projections can be used as raw input data for the iterative reconstruction algorithm. CT and fused PET/CT images show that LabPET™ detectors can be successfully used as individual X-ray photon counting devices for low-dose CT imaging of the anatomy in a molecular PET imaging context.
Sensitivity to nicotine and brain nicotinic receptors are altered by chronic nicotine and mecamylamine infusion.

DBA/2 mice were chronically infused with saline (control), 4 mg/kg/hr of nicotine, 4 mg/kg/hr of mecamylamine or nicotine+mecamylamine for 7 days. The binding of L-[3H]nicotine was significantly increased in seven of eight brain regions dissected from mice 5 hr after cessation of drug treatment. Similarly, [3H]nicotine binding was increased in six of eight regions by chronic mecamylamine treatment. Treatment with both drugs led to increases in [3H]nicotine binding that were at least the sum of the those observed with either drug alone. These increases were partially reversed 48 hr after cessation of treatment. No significant effects of nicotine or mecamylamine treatment on alpha-[125I]bungarotoxin binding were observed 5 hr after treatment was stopped when assayed using a single ligand concentration. However, saturation analyses of the cerebral cortex detected small increases from control after treatment with nicotine or both drugs. No effects of chronic treatment on alpha-[125I]bungarotoxin binding were evident 48 hr after treatment was stopped. Mice treated with nicotine, mecamylamine or both drugs tested 5 hr after withdrawal were less sensitive to acute injection with nicotine than were saline-infused mice. However, the effects of mecamylamine may have been influenced by continued presence of this drug at the time of testing. Mice tested 48 hr after cessation of treatment were more sensitive to nicotine than those tested after 5 hr, but some tolerance to the effects of nicotine persisted in the nicotine-treated mice. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Sampling and quantization for optimal reconstruction

This thesis develops several approaches for signal sampling and reconstruction given different assumptions about the signal, the type of errors that occur, and the information available about the signal. The thesis first considers the effects of quantization in the environment of interleaved, oversampled multi-channel measurements with the potential of different quantization step size in each channel and varied timing offsets between channels. Considering sampling together with quantization in the digital representation of the continuous-time signal is shown to be advantageous. With uniform quantization and equal quantizer step size in each channel, the effective overall signal-to-noise ratio in the reconstructed output is shown to be maximized when the timing offsets between channels are identical, resulting in uniform sampling when the channels are interleaved. However, with different levels of accuracy in each channel, the choice of identical timing offsets between channels is in general not optimal, with better results often achievable with varied timing offsets corresponding to recurrent nonuniform sampling when the channels are interleaved. Similarly, it is shown that with varied timing offsets, equal quantization step size in each channel is in general not optimal, and a higher signal-to-quantization-noise ratio is often achievable with different levels of accuracy in the quantizers in different channels. Another aspect of this thesis considers nonuniform sampling in which the sampling grid is modeled as a perturbation of a uniform grid. Perfect reconstruction from these nonuniform samples is in general computationally difficult; as an alternative, this work presents a class of approximate reconstruction methods based on the use of time-invariant lowpass filtering, i.e., sinc interpolation. When the average sampling rate is less than the Nyquist rate, i.e., in sub-Nyquist sampling, the artifacts produced when these reconstruction methods are applied to the nonuniform samples can be preferable in certain applications to the aliasing artifacts, which occur in uniform sampling. The thesis also explores various approaches to avoiding aliasing in sampling. These approaches exploit additional information about the signal apart from its bandwidth and suggest using alternative pre-processing instead of the traditional linear time-invariant anti-aliasing filtering prior to sampling. Thesis Supervisor: Alan V. Oppenheim Title: Ford Professor of Engineering
Fast least-squares solution for sinusoidal, harmonic and quasi-harmonic models

Sinusoidal model and its variants are commonly used in speech processing. In the literature, there are various methods for the estimation of the unknown parameters of sinusoidal model such as Fourier transform based on FFT algorithm and Least Squares (LS) method. Least Squares method is more accurate and actually optimum for Gaussian noise, thus, more appropriate for high-quality signal processing, however, it is slower compared with FFTbased algorithms. In this paper, we study the source of computational load of LS solution and propose various computational improvements. We show that the complexity of LS solution as well the execution time are highly improved.
Analysis and Design of Multi-pattern Retrieval Scheme of Regional PACS System Based Medical Images

In order to make the massive medical image resources from different devices and corresponding to different human tissues and organs and many kinds of diseases in the Picture Archiving and Communication System accurately and quickly retrieved and located in auxiliary clinical diagnosis, remote medical treatment and other applications, this paper designs a multi-pattern retrieval scheme of medical images based on regional PACS system and analyzes semantic annotation, visual feature library construction and other key technologies involved in achieving multi-pattern retrieval.
On-line robot trajectory planning for catching a moving object

The problem of using a manipulator to catch a moving object without any advanced knowledge of its trajectory is discussed, and a heuristic procedure is proposed. The method is divided into two parts: a coarse tuning algorithm first drives the end effector into the neighborhood of the object in near-minimum time; a finite tuning algorithm then provides precise matching of the object's trajectory to ensure the relative velocity and acceleration at the time of grasping. The resulting sensor-based system is simulated for a two-degree-of-freedom planar robot with a highly nonlinear object path. The approach can rapidly be extended to six-degree-of-freedom manipulators. <<ETX>>
The Yersinia enterocolitica Motility Master Regulatory Operon, flhDC, Is Required for Flagellin Production, Swimming Motility, and Swarming Motility

ABSTRACT The ability to move over and colonize surface substrata has been linked to the formation of biofilms and to the virulence of some bacterial pathogens. Results from this study show that the gastrointestinal pathogen Yersinia enterocolitica can migrate over and colonize surfaces by swarming motility, a form of cooperative multicellular behavior. Immunoblot analysis and electron microscopy indicated that swarming motility is dependent on the same flagellum organelle that is required for swimming motility, which occurs in fluid environments. Furthermore, motility genes such asflgEF, flgMN, flhBA, andfliA, known to be required for the production of flagella, are essential for swarming motility. To begin to investigate how environmental signals are processed and integrated by Y. enterocolitica to stimulate the production of flagella and regulate these two forms of cell migration, the motility master regulatory operon, flhDC, was cloned. Mutations withinflhDC completely abolished swimming motility, swarming motility, and flagellin production. DNA sequence analysis revealed that this locus is similar to motility master regulatory operons of other gram-negative bacteria. Genetic complementation and functional analysis of flhDC indicated that it is required for the production of flagella. When flhDC was expressed from an inducible ptac promoter, flagellin production was shown to be dependent on levels of flhDC expression. Phenotypically, induction of the ptac-flhDC fusion also corresponded to increased levels of both swimming and swarming motility.
Protected Data Transfer in Wireless Sensor Network Using Promiscuous Mode

Wireless Sensor Networks consist of large number of sensor nodes computing the sense, and communications capabilities. Wireless sensor networks are widely used in many applications like battlefield monitoring, environment monitoring and so forth. These applications have the cooperation among various sensor nodes which is needed to forward the data packets to the base station. In this paper we are explaining about Wormhole attacks. A wormhole attack is a severe attack in wsn. It is a severe threat to the network layer. In Wormhole attack two or more malicious nodes makes a covert channel which attracts the traffic towards itself by depicting a low latency link and then start dropping and replaying packets in the multiple path route. In this paper we are suggesting about promiscuous mode with the help of two extensions called Watchdog and Path rater in AODV protocol. This method is used detect and isolate the malicious node during wormhole attack and it observes the nodes which are not participating in multi-path routing generates an alarm message during delay and then detects to isolate the malicious node from the network. Keywords— Wireless Sensor Networks, Security Attacks, Wormhole Attacks, AODV, Promiscuous mode
Selección de un modelo no lineal mixto de niveles múltiples para modelar el crecimiento de la soja

RESUMEN: Los datos obtenidos de la experimentación agrícola, frecuentemente, tienen una estructura jerárquica, pues las unidades de análisis están anidadas dentro de múltiples factores de agrupamiento y sobre esas unidades se realizan mediciones repetidas a través del tiempo. Los modelos no lineales mixtos de niveles múltiples son útiles para describir el proceso de crecimiento, pues sus efectos aleatorios corresponden a las diferentes fuentes de variabilidad. El propósito de este trabajo es modelar y seleccionar un modelo de niveles múltiples para el crecimiento de la soja. Se ajusta un modelo mixto con tres niveles anidados de efectos aleatorios y se verifica la bondad del ajuste. Los resultados muestran que el uso de efectos aleatorios en algunos de los parámetros de la función de crecimiento y una función de potencia de los valores ajustados en la variancia intra-unidad explica la heterogeneidad de los datos. PALABRAS CLAVE: Estudios longitudinales. Modelos no lineales mixtos de niveles múltiples. Construcción de modelos. Criterios de bondad de ajuste.
Analyse du corpus ORTHOTEL : apport du traitement automatique à la classification des déviations orthographiques

Veronique Auberge, Nadia Ghneim, Rabia Belrhali. Analyse du corpus ORTHOTEL : apport du traitement automatique a la classification des deviations orthographiques ; The aim of this study is to present organized statistical data extracted from a large corpus of 15 000 forms showing spelling errors. This corpus, ORTHOTEL, is the result of Minitel users wondering about word spelling. An automatic treatment has been applied to the corpus to separate and analyse erors. Half of the forms of the corpus are rightly spelled. It indicates the users' degree of linguistic insecurity. An automatic text-to-phone system applied on the badly spelled words shows that a great part are homophone to a correct word taken from a reference lexicon of 80 000 canonical forms. An alignment algorithm has classified the orthographic transformations which account for deviations from the reference lexicon .
Analyse harmonique sur les groupes et reconnaissance des formes

Ce memoire est une contribution aux aspects methodologiques de la reconnaissance des formes. Nous y presentons la m-transformee introduite dans la litterature scientifique depuis 1986 par g. Bornard et j. P. Gauthier, et les invariants qui en decoulent. Ces invariants appeles descripteurs de fourier generalises presentent de grands avantages par rapport aux descripteurs de fourier classiques car ils ne supposent aucune connaissance prealable sur le type de forme a etudier, et prennent en compte tout l'information contenue dans la texture. Nous exploitons les liens etroits qui existent entre ces invariants et les transformations de fourier usuelles pour construire un algorithme de calcul rapide. Nous etudions les problemes numeriques associes, analysons le probleme de completion et calculons des invariants plus riches proposes par gourd et gauthier. Ces algorithmes sont testes sur un probleme de suivi de croissance cristalline. Dans l'intention de resoudre entierement les problemes souleves dans le suivi de croissance cristalline, nous abordons les problemes de detection des droites dans les images, et celui de l'analyse multiresolution par transformee en ondelettes
Chlamydia pneumoniae infection is associated with elevated body mass index in young men

SUMMARY Chlamydia pneumoniae infection is said to be associated with obesity. We studied the association between C. pneumoniae infection and inflammation and increased BMI in 891 Finnish military recruits. IgG seropositivity in arrival and departure serum samples during 6–12 months of military service was considered as persistence of antibodies and a possible indication of chronic infection. Persistently high C-reactive protein (CRP) level (elevated on arrival and departure) (OR 2·2, 95% CI 1·3–3·9), and persistent C. pneumoniae antibodies (OR 2·1, 95% CI 1·5–2·8) were significant risk factors for overweight (BMI ⩾25 kg/m2). In addition, those who had persistent antibodies and persistently elevated CRP levels, or those who had either of them, had a significantly higher BMI (kg/m2) compared to those who had neither of them (25·8 vs. 24·6 vs. 23·5, respectively; P<0·001). These results provide new information about the association between possible chronic C. pneumoniae infection and obesity in young men.
Gender differences in access to methadone maintenance therapy in a Canadian setting.

INTRODUCTION AND AIMS Methadone maintenance therapy (MMT) is an evidence-based treatment for opioid addiction. While gender differences in MMT pharmacokinetics, drug use patterns and clinical profiles have been previously described, few studies have compared rates of MMT use among community-recruited samples of persons who inject drugs (PWID). DESIGN AND METHODS The present study used prospective cohorts of PWID followed between May 1996 and May 2013 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. We investigated potential factors associated with time to methadone initiation using Cox proportional hazards modelling. Stratified analyses were used to examine for gender differences in rates of MMT enrolment. RESULTS Overall, 1848 baseline methadone-naïve PWID were included in the study, among whom 595 (32%) were female. In an adjusted model, male gender was independently associated with increased time to MMT initiation and an overall lower rate of enrolment [adjusted relative hazard = 0.74 (95% confidence interval: 0.65-0.85)]. Among both female and male PWID, Caucasian ethnicity and daily injection heroin use were associated with decreased time to methadone initiation, while in females, pregnancy was also associated with more rapid initiation. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS These data highlight gender differences in methadone use among a population of community-recruited PWID. While factors associated with methadone use were similar between genders, rates of use were lower among male PWID, highlighting the need to consider gender when designing strategies to improve recruitment into MMT. [Bach P, Milloy M-J, Nguyen P, Koehn J, Guillemi S, Kerr T, Wood E. Gender differences in access to methadone maintenance therapy in a Canadian setting. Drug Alcohol Rev 2015;34:503-7].
The Heat Transfer of Microencapsulated Phase Change Material Slurry and Its Thermal Energy Storage Performance of Combined Heat and Power Generating Units

The application of thermal energy storage (TES) is an effective way of improving the power load regulation capability of combined heat and power (CHP) generating units. In this paper, a theoretical investigation on the thermal energy storage system of a CHP unit that employs the microencapsulated phase change material slurry (MPCMS) as the working fluid is carried out. The results indicate that the microcapsule particle internal melting rate is progressively small; 90% latent heat can be absorbed in 63% total melting time. The melting time of particles in micron is very short, and the diameter is an important factor for microcapsule melting. For the MPCMS flow in a circular tube, the temperature distribution between laminar flows and turbulent flows is different. In a turbulent flow, there is an approximate isothermal section along the tube, which cannot be found in a laminar flow. Additionally, a thermal storage system with MPCMS as heat transfer fluid for a CHP unit is proposed. A case study for a 300 MW CHP unit found that the use of an MPSMS thermal energy storage system increases the power peak shaving capacity by 81.4%. This indicates that the thermal storage system increases the peak shaving capacity of cogeneration units.
Weighted Set-Theoretic Alignment of Comparable Sentences

This article presents the STACCw system for the BUCC 2017 shared task on parallel sentence extraction from comparable corpora. The original STACC approach, based on set-theoretic operations over bags of words, had been previously shown to be efficient and portable across domains and alignment scenarios. Wedescribe an extension of this approach with a new weighting scheme and show that it provides significant improvements on the datasets provided for the shared task.
Integrating electrothermal coupling analysis in the calibration of experimental electromigration reliability of flip-chip packages

The electromigration reliability of solder interconnects is dominated by the current density and the temperature inside the interconnects. For flip-chip packages, current densities around the regions where traces connect a solder bump increase by a significant amount owing to the differences in feature sizes and electric resistivities between the solder bump and its adjacent traces. This current crowding effect along with induced Joule heating accelerates electromigration failures. In this paper, effects of current crowding and Joule heating in a flip-chip package are examined and quantified through a three-dimensional electrothermal coupling analysis. We apply a volumetric averaging technique to cope with the current crowding singularity. The volumetrically averaged current density and the maximum temperature in a solder bump are integrated in the Black's equation to calibrate experimental electromigration fatigue lives.