Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Exercise Training in Treatment and Rehabilitation of Hip Osteoarthritis: A 12-Week Pilot Trial

Introduction. Osteoarthritis (OA) of the hip is one of the major causes of pain and disability in the older population. Although exercise is an effective treatment for knee OA, there is lack of evidence regarding hip OA. The aim of this trial was to test the safety and feasibility of a specifically designed exercise program in relieving hip pain and improving function in hip OA participants and to evaluate various methods to measure changes in their physical functioning. Materials and Methods. 13 women aged ≥ 65 years with hip OA were recruited in this 12-week pilot study. Results. Pain declined significantly over 30% from baseline, and joint function and health-related quality of life improved slightly. Objective assessment of physical functioning showed statistically significant improvement in the maximal isometric leg extensor strength by 20% and in the hip extension range of motion by 30%. Conclusions. The exercise program was found to be safe and feasible. The present evidence indicates that the exercise program is effective in the short term. However, adequate powered RCTs are needed to determine effects of long-term exercise therapy on pain and progression of hip OA.
Design of an adaptive exoskeleton for safe robotic shoulder rehabilitation

After-stroke rehabilitation of patients with shoulder disabilities traditionally requires repeated and progressive training exercises. Complete recovery is usually costly and lengthy. Aimed at reducing the cost and time of shoulder rehabilitation, powered exoskeletons are developed to provide automatic and steady rehabilitation training. Our previously developed shoulder exoskeleton is small-size, light-weight, and requires low power consumption. This paper further improves its wearability and safety by introducing an adaptive mechanism. This adaptive mechanism can compensate for the misalignment between exoskeleton and human upper limb and size variation among different subjects. To ensure safe interaction, a compact two-axis force sensor will be realized in the adaptive mechanism to obtain accurate force at the human-exoskeleton interface. Combined with the series elastic input motors, the exoskeleton can provide accurate force control and avoid human injury. Bidirectional actuation between exoskeleton and human can also be allowed, which is required for various rehabilitation processes. We expect this shoulder exoskeleton can provide a means of automatic shoulder rehabilitation.
Tissue-specific regulatory network extractor (TS-REX): a database and software resource for the tissue and cell type-specific investigation of transcription factor-gene networks

The prediction of transcription factor binding sites in genomic sequences is in principle very useful to identify upstream regulatory factors. However, when applying this concept to genomes of multicellular organisms such as mammals, one has to deal with a large number of false positive predictions since many transcription factor genes are only expressed in specific tissues or cell types. We developed TS-REX, a database/software system that supports the analysis of tissue and cell type-specific transcription factor-gene networks based on expressed sequence tag abundance of transcription factor-encoding genes in UniGene EST libraries. The use of expression levels of transcription factor-encoding genes according to hierarchical anatomical classifications covering different tissues and cell types makes it possible to filter out irrelevant binding site predictions and to identify candidates of potential functional importance for further experimental testing. TS-REX covers ESTs from H. sapiens and M. musculus, and allows the characterization of both presence and specificity of transcription factors in user-specified tissues or cell types. The software allows users to interactively visualize transcription factor-gene networks, as well as to export data for further processing. TS-REX was applied to predict regulators of Polycomb group genes in six human tumor tissues and in human embryonic stem cells.
Filtering and Measuring the Intrinsic Quality of Human Compositionality Judgments

This paper analyzes datasets with numerical scores that quantify the semantic compositionality of MWEs. We present the results of our analysis of crowdsourced compositionality judgments for noun compounds in three languages. Our goals are to look at the characteristics of the annotations in different languages; to examine intrinsic quality measures for such data; and to measure the impact of filters proposed in the literature on these measures. The cross-lingual results suggest that greater agreement is found for the extremes in the compositionality scale, and that outlier annotation removal is more effective than outlier annotator removal.
Model predictive control-based trajectory planning for quadrotors with state and input constraints

A novel scheme to solve the trajectory planning problem for quadrotors with model and state constraints is proposed. First the RRT (Rapidly-exploring Random Tree) algorithm is employed to generate an initial route in context of a 3D environment. Then with the model of quadrotoer, the MPC (Model Predictive Control) method is used to construct an inner simulator which can generate the trajectories satisfying the state constraints by following the waypoints exported by the RRT solution. Finally, the trajectory generation of quadrotors with state and input constraints is transformed into a general form of QP problem, which can be solved expediently by common numerical algorithms. The proposed scheme can generates high-quality and feasible trajectories satisfying both state constraints and input constraints, which is verified sufficiently by extensive simulations.
UGENT-LT3 SCATE Submission for WMT16 Shared Task on Quality Estimation

This paper describes the submission of the UGENT-LT3 SCATE system to the WMT16 Shared Task on Quality Estimation (QE), viz. English-German word and sentence-level QE. Based on the observation that the data set is homogeneous (all sentences belong to the IT domain), we performed bilingual terminology extraction and added features derived from the resulting term list to the well-performing features of the word-level QE task of last year. For sentence-level QE, we analyzed the importance of the features and based on those insights extended the feature set of last year. We also experimented with different learning methods and ensembles. We present our observations from the different experiments we conducted and our submissions for both tasks.
THE ANTI-INFLAMMATORY ACTIVITY OF EUGENIA CARYOPHYLLATA ESSENTIAL OIL : AN ANIMAL MODEL OF ANTI-INFLAMMATORY ACTIVITY

Yüzüncü Yıl Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi Farmakoloji AD 65300 VAN / TURKEY Fax: 904322168352 E-mail: hanefiozbek@hotmail.com Aim: The aim of this study is gas chromatographic analysis of Eugenia caryaphyllata (clove) essential oil and investigation of its anti-inflammatory effects. Methods: The study involved eight groups; Serum physiologic, ethyl alcohol, indomethacin (3 mg/kg), etodolac (50 mg/kg), cardamom (0.05 mL/kg), EC-I (0.025 mL/kg), EC-II (0.050 mL/kg), EC-III (0.100 mL/kg) and EC-IV (0.200mL/kg). After measuring the volumes of right hind-paws of rats using a plethysmometer, drugs were injected intraperitoneally and lambda-carrageenan were injected subcutaneously into the plantar region. Three hours after the injections the volume measurements of the right hind-paws were repeated and the difference between the volumes were compared. Results: The composition of the essential oil was as follows: ß-caryophyllen % 44.7, eugenol % 44.2, α-humulen % 3.5, eugenyl acetate % 1.3 and α-copaen % 1.0. It was found that indomethazin reduced the inflammation by 95.70%, etodolac by 43.42 %, EC-I by 46.55 %, EC-II by 90.15 %, EC-III by 66.94 % and EC-IV by 82.78 %. The essential oil of Eugenia caryophyllata had an anti-inflammatory effect matching to that of etodolac at 0.025 and 0.1 mL/kg and to that of indomethacin at 0.05 and 0.2 mL/kg doses. Conclusion: As a result Eugenia caryophyllata essential oil extract was shown to have an antiinflammatory effect.
Evaluation of E-Learning Web Sites Using Fuzzy Axiomatic Design Based Approach

High quality web site has been generally recognized as a critical enabler to conduct online business. Numerous studies exist in the literature to measure the business performance in relation to web site quality. In this paper, an axiomatic design based approach for fuzzy group decision making is adopted to evaluate the quality of e-learning web sites. Another multi-criteria decision making technique, namely fuzzy TOPSIS, is applied in order to validate the outcome. The methodology proposed in this paper has the advantage of incorporating requirements and enabling reductions in the problem size, as compared to fuzzy TOPSIS. A case study focusing on Turkish e-learning websites is presented, and based on the empirical findings, managerial implications and recommendations for future research are offered.
PHI-DAC: protein homology database through dihedral angle conservation

UNLABELLED Finding related conformations in the Protein Data Bank is essential in many areas of bioscience. To assist this task, we designed a dihedral angle database for searching protein segment homologs. The search engine relies on encoding of the protein coordinates into text characters representing amino acid sequence, φ and ψ dihedral angles. The search engine is advantageous owing to its high speed and interactive nature and is expected to assist scientists in discovering conformation homologs and evolutionary kinship. The search engine is fast, with query times lasting a few seconds, and freely available at http://tarshish.md. biu.ac. il/∼samsona. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
Adaptive Load Balancing for Divide-and-Conquer Grid Applications

Divide-and-conquer has been demonstrated as a simple and ecien t programming model for grid applications. In previous work, we have presented the divide-and-conquer based Satin system and its load balancing algorithm, cluster- aware work stealing (CRS). In this paper, we provide a detailed analysis of CRS with respect to important properties of grid systems, namely scalability, heterogeneous compute clusters, and dynamically changing network interconnects. Our results show that CRS automatically adapts both to heterogeneous processor speeds and varying network performance, resulting in ecien t utilization of the computing resources.
Design Considerations in Instrumenting and Monitoring Web-Based Information Retrieval Systems

The Internet Web environment opens up extraordinary information are changing rapidly. Daily, hundreds of opportunities for user access to information. Techniques thousands of individuals use the Internet and Web for monitoring users and systems and for evaluating sys- browsers like Netscape to obtain a much broader range tem design and performance have not kept pace with of information than has previously been possible. This Web development. This article reviews concepts of Web information consists not only of bibliographic citations operations (including browsers, clients, information retrieval applications, servers, and data communications but of full text, data, images, sound, programs, and the systems) with specific attention given to how monitoring like. The manner of searching has changed as has the should take place and how privacy can be protected. It content of search results, but the design of transaction examines monitoring needs of users, systems designers, logging programs has not caught up with these changes. managers, and customer support staff and outlines mea- Despite the changing nature of the content of informasures of workload, capacity, and performance for hardware, software, and data communications systems. Fi- tion retrieval systems, the user interface, and the data nally, the article proposes a client-server design for communications interface, a basic research question remonitoring, which involves creation of a series of server mains: Is the system effective in helping users find inforand client systems to obtain and process transaction mation? It is growing more difficult to answer this quesand computer performance information. These systems tion because interface and communications systems are include: A Log Server, which captures all levels of transactions and packets on the network; a Monitor Server, more complex. However, there is much useful informawhich synthesizes the log and packet data; an Assis- tion ideally suited for logging ( such as user actions and tance Server, which processes requests for information system performance ) and these logs can be used to supand help from the Web Server in real time; and an Ac- plement qualitative evaluations or confirm user uncercounting Server, which authenticates user access to the tainty regarding actions taken. system. A special System Administrator Client is proposed to control the monitoring system, as is a System It is extremely expensive to conduct personal interInformation Client to receive real-time and on-demand views with users to find out if they are satisfied with reports of system activity. the information retrieved and / or the information system itself. So efficient evaluation must rely on computerized methods to capture this data as unobtrusively and effec
A Phoenix in Flames? Portfolio Choice and Violence in Civil War in Rural Burundi

This paper challenges the idea that farmers revert to subsistence farming when confronted with violence from civil war. While there is an emerging macroeconomic consensus that wars are detrimental to development, we find contrasting microeconomic evidence. Using several rounds of (panel) data at the farm and community level, we find that farmers in Burundi who are confronted with civil war violence in their home communities increase export and cash crop growing activities, invest more in public goods and reveal higher levels subjective welfare evaluations. We interpret this in the light of similar recent micro-level evidence that points to post-traumatic growth effects after (civil) warfare. Our results are confirmed across specifications as well as in robustness analyses.
A PAC-Bayesian approach to adaptive classification

This is meant to be a self-contained presentation of adaptive classification seen from the PAC-Bayesian point of view. Although most of the results are original, some review materials about the VC dimension and support vector machines are also included. This study falls in the field of statistical learning theory, where complex data have to be analyzed from a limited amount of informations, drawn from a finite sample. It relies on non asymptotic deviation inequalities, where the complexity of models is captured through the use of prior measures. The main improvements brought here are more localized bounds and the use of exchangeable prior distributions. Interesting consequences are drawn for the generalization properties of support vector machines and the design of new classification algorithms. 2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 62H30, 68T05, 62B10.
Fabrication and characterization of aluminum-molybdenum nanocomposite membranes

Nanomembranes with thicknesses less than 100 nm and high width-to-thickness ratios are of interest in sensing, energy storage, actuator, and optical applications. The fabrication of conductive nanocomposite aluminum-molybdenum (AlMo) membranes as thin as 28 nm and high fracture strength is reported. The density, Poisson's ratio, and Young's modulus of the membranes were determined to be ρ = 5000 ± 550 kg/m3, σ = 0.33 ± 0.05, and E = 127 ± 21 GPa, respectively. The intrinsic stress of the membranes was determined by bulge testing, finite element analysis (FEA), and classical mechanics. The resonance frequencies of the membranes were assessed using FEA and measured by optical interferometry. The fracture strength of the AlMo membranes was 1.89 ± 0.45 GPa, and the average resistivity was ρ = 5810 ± 44 μΩ cm. The high fracture strength and low resistivity of such AlMo membranes makes them attractive in the design of microdevices requiring ultrathin yet electrically conductive membranes.
Polyhedral AST Generation Is More Than Scanning Polyhedra

Abstract mathematical representations such as integer polyhedra have been shown to be useful to precisely analyze computational kernels and to express complex loop transformations. Such transformations rely on abstract syntax tree (AST) generators to convert the mathematical representation back to an imperative program. Such generic AST generators avoid the need to resort to transformation-specific code generators, which may be very costly or technically difficult to develop as transformations become more complex. Existing AST generators have proven their effectiveness, but they hit limitations in more complex scenarios. Specifically, (1) they do not support or may fail to generate control flow for complex transformations using piecewise schedules or mappings involving modulo arithmetic; (2) they offer limited support for the specialization of the generated code exposing compact, straightline, vectorizable kernels with high arithmetic intensity necessary to exploit the peak performance of modern hardware; (3) they offer no support for memory layout transformations; and (4) they provide insufficient control over the AST generation strategy, preventing their application to complex domain-specific optimizations. We present a new AST generation approach that extends classical polyhedral scanning to the full generality of Presburger arithmetic, including existentially quantified variables and piecewise schedules, and introduce new optimizations for the detection of components and shifted strides. Not limiting ourselves to control flow generation, we expose functionality to generate AST expressions from arbitrary piecewise quasi-affine expressions, which enables the use of our AST generator for data-layout transformations. We complement this with support for specialization by polyhedral unrolling, user-directed versioning, and specialization of AST expressions according to the location at which they are generated, and we complete this work with fine-grained user control over the AST generation strategies used. Using this generalized idea of AST generation, we present how to implement complex domain-specific transformations without the need to write specialized code generators, but instead relying on a generic AST generator parametrized to a specific problem domain.
Static analysis tools for security checking in code at Motorola

As part of an overall initiative to improve the security aspects in the software used in Motorola's products, training and secure coding standards were developed. The goal is to decrease the number of security vulnerabilities introduced during the coding phase of the software development process. This paper describes the creation of the secure coding standards and the efforts to automate as many of the standards as possible. Originally, the efforts focused on the Inforce tool from Klocwork, as many Motorola business units already used the tool for quality but without the security flags activated. This paper describes the efforts to evaluate, extend, and create the coverage for the secure coding standards with Klocwork. More recently, an opportunity arose which allowed a team to evaluate other static analysis tools as well. This paper also describes the findings from that evaluation.
Ultrasound scatter in heterogeneous 3D microstructures

This paper reports on a computational study of ultrasound propagation in heterogeneous metal microstructures. Random spatial fluctuations in elastic properties over a range of length scales relative to ultrasound wavelength can give rise to scatter-induced attenuation, backscatter noise, and phase front aberration. It is of interest to quantify the dependence of these phenomena on the microstructure parameters, for the purpose of quantifying deleterious consequences on flaw detectability, and for the purpose of material characterization. Valuable tools for estimation of microstructure parameters (e.g. grain size) through analysis of ultrasound backscatter have been developed based on approximate weak-scattering models. While useful, it is understood that these tools display inherent inaccuracy when multiple scattering phenomena significantly contribute to the measurement. It is the goal of this work to supplement weak scattering model predictions with corrections derived through application of an exact co.
Spatial and temporal characterization of SCIAMACHY limb pointing errors during the first three years of the mission

Abstract. Limb scattering retrievals of atmospheric minor constituent profiles require highly accurate knowledge of the tangent heights during the measurements. The limb scattering measurements of the Scanning Imaging Absorption spectroMeter for Atmospheric CartograpHY (SCIAMACHY) on Envisat are affected by tangent height errors of up to 2 km. This contribution provides a summary of the temporal and spatial variation of the SCIAMACHY limb pointing errors during the first three years of the SCIAMACHY mission. The tangent height errors are retrieved from the limb measurements in the UV-B spectral range. A seasonal modulation of the monthly mean tangent height offsets is identified with amplitudes of 800m (220m) before (after) the improvement of the Envisat orbit propagator model in December 2003. Even after the December 2003 orbit model improvement a constant offset component of about 1km is present. Furthermore, pointing discontinuities are identified that coincide with the daily updates of the on-board orbit propagator model. In order to reduce the errors in ozone profile retrievals caused by pointing errors to less than 5%, the tangent heights have to be known to within 250m.
In Vitro Antimycobacterial Activities of 2′-Monosubstituted Isonicotinohydrazides and Their Cyanoborane Adducts

ABSTRACT As a result of our search for new isoniazid derivatives with extended spectra of activity, we evaluated the in vitro antimycobacterial activities of isonicotinohydrazides (compounds 2) and their cyanoborane adducts (compounds 3), both obtained by the reaction of isonicotinoylhydrazones (compounds 1) with sodium cyanoborohydride. Most of the tested compounds displayed moderate to high activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37Rv, with MICs ranging from 0.2 to 12.5 μg/ml. In particular, some hydrazides showed activity similar to that of rifampin (MIC = 0.2 μg/ml) and rather low cytotoxicity, so that they were generally shown to possess high safety indices. In contrast, the coordination to a cyanoborane (BH2CN) group (compounds 3) in general brought about a decrease in antimycobacterial activity, while cytotoxicity increased. Interestingly, selected compounds 1 to 3, mostly hydrazides (compounds 2), were effective in killing M. tuberculosis growing within macrophages at concentrations in culture medium which were much lower than the corresponding MICs. These compounds also displayed good activity against drug-resistant M. tuberculosis strains.
Visualization of biological sequence similarity search results

Biological sequence similarity analysis presents visualization challenges, primarily because of the massive amounts of discrete, multi dimensional data. Genomic data generated by molecular biologists is analyzed by algorithms that search for similarity to known sequences in large genomic databases. The output from these algorithms can be several thousand pages of text, and is difficult to analyze because of its length and complexity. We developed and implemented a novel graphical representation for sequence similarity search results, which visually reveals features that are difficult to find in textual reports. The method opens new possibilities in the interpretation of this discrete, multidimensional data by enabling interactive investigation of the graphical representation.