Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Endodontic treatment of mandibular molar with root dilaceration using Reciproc single-file system

Biomechanical preparation of root canals with accentuated curvature is challenging. New rotatory systems, such as Reciproc, require a shorter period of time to prepare curved canals, and became a viable alternative for endodontic treatment of teeth with root dilaceration. Thus, this study aimed to report a clinical case of endodontic therapy of root with accentuated dilaceration using Reciproc single-file system. Mandibular right second molar was diagnosed as asymptomatic irreversible pulpitis. Pulp chamber access was performed, and glide path was created with #10 K-file (Dentsply Maillefer) and PathFile #13, #16 and #19 (Dentsply Maillefer) up to the temporary working length. The working length measured corresponded to 20 mm in the mesio-buccal and mesio-lingual canals, and 22 mm in the distal canal. The R25 file (VDW GmbH) was used in all the canals for instrumentation and final preparation, followed by filling with Reciproc gutta-percha cones (VDW GmbH) and AH Plus sealer (Dentsply Maillefer), using thermal compaction technique. The case has been receiving follow-up for 6 mon and no painful symptomatology or periapical lesions have been found. Despite the difficulties, the treatment could be performed in a shorter period of time than the conventional methods.
PR ] 2 1 Ju n 20 04 Diffusion local time storage

In this paper we study a storage process or a liquid queue in which the input process is the local time of a positively recurrent stationary diffusion in stationary state and the potential output takes place with a constant deterministic rate. For this storage process we find its stationary distribution and compute the joint distribution of the starting and ending times of the busy and idle periods. This work completes and extends to a more general setting the results in Mannersalo, Nor-ros, and Salminen [9].
Contrast‐aware Halftoning

This paper proposes two variants of a simple but efficient algorithm for structure‐preserving halftoning. Our algorithm extends Floyd‐Steinberg error diffusion; the goal of our extension is not only to produce good tone similarity but also to preserve structure and especially contrast, motivated by our intuition that human perception is sensitive to contrast. By enhancing contrast we attempt to preserve and enhance structure also.
Improving the Speed of LZ77 Compression by Hashing and Suffix Sorting

Two new algorithms for improving the speed of the LZ77 compression are proposed. One is based on a new hashing algorithm named two-level hashing that enables fast longest match searching from a sliding dictionary, and the other uses suffix sorting. The former is suitable for small dictionaries and it significantly improves the speed of gzip, which uses a naive hashing algorithm. The latter is suitable for large dictionaries which improve compression ratio for large files. We also experiment on the compression ratio and the speed of block sorting compression, which uses suffix sorting in its compression algorithm. The results show that the LZ77 using the two-level hash is suitable for small dictionaries, the LZ77 using suffix sorting is good for large dictionaries when fast decompression speed and efficient use of memory are necessary, and block sorting is good for large dictionaries. key words: LZ77, hash, gzip, suffix sorting, block sorting
Identifying Design Activities via Discourse and Content Analysis

A qualitative analysis of three video-taped and transcribed interviews of two-person developer teams solving a software design problem is presented. The transcripts are converted to XML and manually annotated with codes that identify engaged engineering activities and addressed requirements. The annotated transcripts are visualized, to support comparison, in a timeline matrix. The results are analyzed to provide insights into the various kinds of design activities involved. Observations and inferences about design activities and problem solving strategies are presented.
A comparison of classification techniques for seismic facies recognition

AbstractDuring the past decade, the size of 3D seismic data volumes and the number of seismic attributes have increased to the extent that it is difficult, if not impossible, for interpreters to examine every seismic line and time slice. To address this problem, several seismic facies classification algorithms including k-means, self-organizing maps, generative topographic mapping, support vector machines, Gaussian mixture models, and artificial neural networks have been successfully used to extract features of geologic interest from multiple volumes. Although well documented in the literature, the terminology and complexity of these algorithms may bewilder the average seismic interpreter, and few papers have applied these competing methods to the same data volume. We have reviewed six commonly used algorithms and applied them to a single 3D seismic data volume acquired over the Canterbury Basin, offshore New Zealand, where one of the main objectives was to differentiate the architectural elements of a tu.
Anticipation and Anticipatory Systems: and Introduction

An anticipatory system S2 is one which contains a model of a system S1 with which it interacts. This model is a predictive model; its present states provide information about future states of S1. Further, the present state of the model causes a change of state in other subsystems of S2; these subsystems are (a) involved in the interaction of S2 with S1, and (b) they do not affect (that is, are unlinked to) the model of S1. In general, we can regard the change of state in S2 arising from the model as an adaptation, or pre-adaptation, of S2 relative to its interaction with S1.
Informationally Robust Optimal Auction Design ∗ Dirk Bergemann

A single unit of a good is to be sold by auction to one of two buyers. The good has either a high value or a low value, with known prior probabilities. The designer of the auction knows the prior over values but is uncertain about the correct model of the buyers' beliefs. The designer evaluates a given auction design by the lowest expected revenue that would be generated across all models of buyers' information that are consistent with the common prior and across all Bayesian equilibria. An optimal auction for such a seller is constructed, as is a worst-case model of buyers' information. The theory generates upper bounds on the seller's optimal payo for general manyplayer and common-value models.
FPGA realization of ALU for mobile GPU

Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU) is the most important component of processors. All arithmetic and logical computations are performed inside the ALU. This paper presents the design and the implementation of the ALU. The design is based on Approximated Precision Shader and Look-Up Table (LUT) multiplier. The lookup table, Wallace tree, and Carry Look-ahead Adder (CLA) are used in combination to speed up the multiplier operation. The proposed ALU is designed using Verilog and verified using Xilinx Virtex-5 XC5VLX30 FPGA.
Friend Recommendation Using Offline and Online Social Information for Face-To-Face Interactions

The combination of online social networking services (OSNSs) and the smartphones has changed the ways to acquire information and also influenced the ways people get to know and interact with each other. Despite with many advanced functions, online social interactions can hardly provide online social users with real-world (i.e., offline) social interactions. In this paper, we present an offline friend recommendation system for the OSNS users to have more serendipitous offline interactions. For that, we modeled both offline information (i.e., place visit history) and online social data (i.e., friend relationships) for recommending their offline interactions. Our system discovers those who seems most likely to have potential friend relationship so as to meet in the physical world. We present the design and implementation of our proposed system and conduct real-world experiment to show how the place visit information and online friend relationship together produce a new offline social networking service.
A Post-Crisis Reading of the 'Role of Monetary Policy'

In 1967 Milton Friedman delivered "The Role of Monetary Policyâ€™ as his presidential address to the American Economic Association (AEA). In its published version â€“ Friedman (1968) â€“ it has become, arguably, the most influential paper in modern monetary economics and was recently included in the AEAâ€™s list of the twenty most influential papers published in the first century of the American Economic Review. But the influence of Friedmanâ€™s address is based on an interpretation that seriously distorts the content of his main argument. His emphasis on (i) the inadequacy of interest rate policy and (ii) the primacy of financial stability among the positive goals of monetary policy have been ignored or neglected. While balance sheet policies have become â€˜unconventionalâ€™ in the modern consensus, these policies held a central position in Friedmanâ€™s work. I support this argument with a textual analysis of Friedmanâ€™s address, read in the light of his preceding scholarship on monetary policy. This reinterpretation is relevant in a world where the balance sheets of central banks have returned to centre stage as has the priority for financial stability.
AFFINE PROCESSES, ARBITRAGE-FREE TERM STRUCTURES OF LEGENDRE POLYNOMIALS, AND OPTION PRICING

Multivariate Affine term structure models have been increasingly used for pricing derivatives in fixed income markets. In these models, uncertainty of the term structure is driven by a state vector, while the short rate is an affine function of this vector. The model is characterized by a specific form for the stochastic differential equation (SDE) for the evolution of the state vector. This SDE presents restrictions on its drift term which rule out arbitrages in the market. In this paper we solve the following inverse problem: Suppose the term structure of interest rates is modelled by a linear combination of Legendre polynomials with random coefficients. Is there any SDE for these coefficients which rules out arbitrages? This problem is of particular empirical interest because the Legendre model is an example of factor model with clear interpretation for each factor, in which regards movements of the term structure. Moreover, the Affine structure of the Legendre model implies knowledge of its conditional characteristic function. From the econometric perspective, we propose arbitrage-free Legendre models to describe the evolution of the term structure. From the pricing perspective, we follow Duffie et al. [22] in exploring their conditional characteristic functions to obtain a computational tractable method to price fixed income derivatives.
Correlation Clustering with Constrained Cluster Sizes and Extended Weights Bounds

We consider the problem of correlation clustering on graphs with constraints on both the cluster sizes and the positive and negative weights of edges. Our contributions are twofold: first, we introduce the problem of correlation clustering with bounded cluster sizes. Second, we extend the regime of weight values for which the clustering may be performed with constant approximation guarantees in polynomial time and apply the results to the bounded cluster size problem.
Filtering and Portfolio Optimization with Stochastic Unobserved Drift in Asset Returns

We consider the problem of filtering and control in the setting of portfolio optimization in financial markets with random factors that are not directly observable. The example that we present is a commodities portfolio where yields on futures contracts are observed with some noise. Through the use of perturbation methods, we are able to show that the solution to the full problem can be approximated by the solution of a solvable HJB equation plus an explicit correction term.
Comparison of the Viability of Cryopreserved Fat Tissue in Accordance with the Thawing Temperature

Background Adipose tissue damage of cryopreserved fat after autologous fat transfer is inevitable in several processes of re-transplantation. This study aims to compare and analyze the survivability of adipocytes after thawing fat cryopreserved at -20℃ by using thawing methods used in clinics. Methods The survival rates of adipocytes in the following thawing groups were measured: natural thawing at 25℃ for 15 minutes; natural thawing at 25℃ for 5 minutes, followed by rapid thawing at 37℃ in a water bath for 5 minutes; and rapid thawing at 37℃ for 10 minutes in a water bath. The survival rates of adipocytes were assessed by measuring the volume of the fat layer in the top layers separated after centrifugation, counting the number of live adipocytes after staining with trypan blue, and measuring the activity of mitochondria in the adipocytes. Results In the group with rapid thawing for 10 minutes in a water bath, it was observed that the cell count of live adipocytes and the activity of the adipocyte mitochondria were significantly higher than in the other two groups (P<0.05). The volume of the fat layer separated by centrifugation was also measured to be higher, which was, however, not statistically significant. Conclusions It was shown that the survival rate of adipocytes was higher when the frozen fat tissue was thawed rapidly at 37℃. It can thus be concluded that if fats thawed with this method are re-transplanted, the survival rate of cryopreserved fats in transplantation will be improved, and thus, the effect of autologous fat transfer will increase.
The effect of weight-loss dieting on cognitive performance and psychological well-being in overweight women

This study investigated the effect of a weight reduction diet on cognitive performance and psychological well-being among overweight women. A total of 42 women undertook a 12-week weight reduction diet while 21 women maintained their usual diet and exercise habits for 12 weeks. All women completed neuropsychologcial tests of speed of information processing, executive function, working memory, immediate and delayed recall and recognition, and verbal ability. They also completed measures of weight locus of control, dieting beliefs, self-esteem, mood and dysfunctional attitudes, before and after the 12-week interval. Being on the diet had a minimal impact on cognitive performance and a positive effect on emotional eating, feelings of depression and dysfunctional attitudes. A sense of control over weight and eating behaviour increased among the dieters, but an internal locus of control was negatively related to self-esteem.
Algorithms-Modeling and Simulation Analysis An Intelligent Coherent Approach to Cooperation between TCP and ATM Congestion Control

The combination of transmission control protocol (TCP) and asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) to deliver transport services may incur significant performance penalties due to the interaction of congestion control algorithms of TCP and ATM. In this paper, the authors examine two control categories (explicit window adaptation [EWA] and ACK bucket control [ABC]) and their representative schemes. In particular, they propose the fair intelligent EWA scheme for EWA and the fair intelligent ABC scheme for ABC. The key idea is to combine the feedback information from the receiver, from the ATM network , and from the local information at edge device intelligently to explicitly/implicitly control the TCP rate. The authors present simulation results to show that their schemes can control the buffer occupancy at edge device efficiently and can carry the benefits of ABR end-to-end, resulting in significant improvement in throughput, fairness, packet loss rate, and end-to-end delay for TCP connections. Both schemes are transparent to TCP, requiring no modifications in the ATM networks except at the network edge device. Importantly, they allow TCP to be used with any underlying network, not just ATM, as long as the network is capable of providing explicit feedback information concerning the availability of bandwidth.
An advanced shape-fitting algorithm applied to quadrupedal mammals: improving volumetric mass estimates

Body mass is a fundamental physical property of an individual and has enormous bearing upon ecology and physiology. Generating reliable estimates for body mass is therefore a necessary step in many palaeontological studies. Whilst early reconstructions of mass in extinct species relied upon isolated skeletal elements, volumetric techniques are increasingly applied to fossils when skeletal completeness allows. We apply a new ‘alpha shapes’ (α-shapes) algorithm to volumetric mass estimation in quadrupedal mammals. α-shapes are defined by: (i) the underlying skeletal structure to which they are fitted; and (ii) the value α, determining the refinement of fit. For a given skeleton, a range of α-shapes may be fitted around the individual, spanning from very coarse to very fine. We fit α-shapes to three-dimensional models of extant mammals and calculate volumes, which are regressed against mass to generate predictive equations. Our optimal model is characterized by a high correlation coefficient and mean square error (r2=0.975, m.s.e.=0.025). When applied to the woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) and giant ground sloth (Megatherium americanum), we reconstruct masses of 3635 and 3706 kg, respectively. We consider α-shapes an improvement upon previous techniques as resulting volumes are less sensitive to uncertainties in skeletal reconstructions, and do not require manual separation of body segments from skeletons.
Agomelatine facilitates positive versus negative affective processing in healthy volunteer models

Agomelatine is a new antidepressant with a novel profile of pharmacological action. The clinical efficacy of agomelatine has been established in major depression, but its actions on emotional bias are unknown. Consequently, the current experimental study assessed the effect of agomelatine on emotional processing in healthy volunteers using an Emotional Test Battery shown to be sensitive to serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors. Volunteers were randomized to receive placebo, 25 mg or 50 mg of agomelatine over a 7-day period in a double-blind parallel groups design. Emotional processing (n = 48) was assessed on the morning of day 8 using the Emotional Test Battery which included facial expression recognition, emotional memory, attentional visual probe and emotion-potentiated startle. Mood and subjective state were monitored before and during treatment. Agomelatine (25 mg) decreased subjective ratings of sadness, reduced recognition of sad facial expressions, improved positive affective memory and reduced the emotion-potentiated startle response. The results show that agomelatine has more selective effects on the processing of social facial cues than conventional antidepressants, which could contribute to less blunting of emotional experience. The study highlights the potential value of volunteer models in drug development for screening and profiling of novel antidepressants.
Automatic motion analysis of the tongue surface from ultrasound image sequences

The authors present a system for automatic 2D analysis of the tongue movement from digital ultrasound image sequences. The system focuses on extraction, tracking and analysis of the tongue surface during speech production and swallowing. The input to the system is provided by a Head and Transducer Support System (HATS), which is developed for use in ultrasound imaging of tongue movement. The authors developed a novel active contour (snakes) model that uses several adjacent images during the extraction of the tongue surface contour for an image frame. The user supplies an initial contour model for a single image frame in the sequence. This initial contour is a form of expert knowledge input to the system, which is used to find the candidate contour points in the adjacent images. Subsequently, the new snake mechanism is applied to estimate optimal contours for each image frame using these candidate points. Finally, the system uses a postprocessing method to refine the positions of the contours by utilizing more spatiotemporal information. The authors extended their previous work by applying the system to different speech and swallowing sequences using various constraints. The extended system can also extract qualitative local deformations with only a minimal computational overhead which may be useful for the diagnosis of Cerebellar Ataxic disorder. The authors tested the system on several different speech and swallowing sequences produced by HATS. During the tests, the authors saw that the system is flexible enough to be used in a wide variety of cases. In addition, visual inspection of the detected contours by the speech experts confirms that the results are very promising and this system can be effectively employed in speech and swallowing research.
Serum Cyr61 is Associated With Clinical Disease Activity and Inflammation in Patients With Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

AbstractOur previous studies have shown that secreted extracellular matrix-associated protein Cysteine rich angiogenic inducer 61 (Cyr61), a novel proinflammatory factor, is involved in the pathogenesis of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). However, whether Cyr61 has any effect in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) remains unknown. This study aims to assess the level of serum Cyr61 and to investigate the association of serum Cyr61 and clinical disease activity in SLE. We found the level of serum Cyr61 in patients with SLE was significantly higher than healthy controls (P < 0.001), and Cyr61 was high expressed in renal tubule of lupus nephritis compared to control. The sensitivity of Cyr61 in diagnosis of SLE was 47.3%. In receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis, the area under the curve (AUC) was 0.830, with a 95% confidence interval (CI) from 0.776 to 0.885. Cyr61 was present in 60.0%, 54.5%, and 41.5% of anti-double stranded DNA (dsDNA), anti-antinuclear antibodies (ANA), and anti-Sm negative SLE patients, respectively. Serum Cyr61 levels were significantly higher in high systemic lupus erythematosus disease activity index (SLEDAI) group than that in low SLEDAI group (P = 0.003). Correlation analyzes showed a significant negative correlation between serum Cyr61 and complements (C3) (P = 0.015), C4 (P = 0.04). Moreover, increased Cyr61 level in SLE was associated with serum level of TNF-&agr;, interleukin 6 (IL-6), and IL-17. In conclusion, serum Cyr61 was increased in patients with SLE which was associated with clinical disease activity and inflammation in SLE, suggesting Cyr61 may be a novel potential auxiliary marker for the diagnosis of SLE.