Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Convex nondifferentiable optimization: A survey focused on the analytic center cutting plane method

We present a survey of nondifferentiable optimization problems and methods with special focus on the analytic center cutting plane method. We propose a self-contained convergence analysis that uses the formalism of the theory of self-concordant functions, but for the main results, we give direct proofs based on the properties of the logarithmic function. We also provide an in-depth analysis of two extensions that are very relevant to practical problems: the case of multiple cuts and the case of deep cuts. We further examine extensions to problems including feasible sets partially described by an explicit barrier function, and to the case of nonlinear cuts. Finally, we review several implementation issues and discuss some applications.
Risk of cardiovascular events among women with high normal blood pressure or blood pressure progression: prospective cohort study

Objective To compare cardiovascular risk among women with high normal blood pressure (130-9/85-9 mm Hg) against those with normal blood pressure (120-9/75-84 mm Hg) and those with baseline hypertension. Design Prospective cohort study. Setting Women's health study, United States. Participants 39 322 initially healthy women classified into four categories according to self reported baseline blood pressure and followed for a median of 10.2 years. Main outcome measures Time to cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, or stroke (major cardiovascular event—primary end point); progression to hypertension. Results 982 (2.5%) women developed a major cardiovascular event, and 8686 (30.1%) women without baseline hypertension progressed to hypertension. The age adjusted event rate for the primary end point was 1.6/1000 person years among women with normal blood pressure, 2.9/1000 person years among those with high normal blood pressure, and 4.3/1000 person years among those with baseline hypertension. Compared with women with high normal blood pressure (reference group), those with normal blood pressure had a lower risk of a major cardiovascular event (adjusted hazard ratio 0.61, 95% confidence interval 0.48 to 0.76) and of incident hypertension (0.42, 0.40 to 0.44). The hazard ratio for a major cardiovascular event in women with baseline hypertension was 1.30 (1.08 to 1.57). Women who progressed to hypertension (reference group) during the first 48 months of the study had a higher cardiovascular risk than those who remained normotensive (adjusted hazard ratio 0.64, 0.50 to 0.81). Women with high normal blood pressure at baseline who progressed to hypertension (reference group) had similar outcome rates to women with baseline hypertension (adjusted hazard ratio 1.17, 0.88 to 1.55). Conclusion The cardiovascular risk of women with high normal blood pressure is higher than that of women with normal blood pressure. The cardiovascular risk of women who progress to hypertension is increased shortly after a diagnosis of hypertension has been made. Trial registration Clinical trials NCT00000479.
Exploring the importance and implementation of COBIT processes in Saudi organizations: An empirical study

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the importance and implementation of the Control Objectives for Information and Related Technology (COBIT) processes in Saudi organizations.Design/methodology/approach – An empirical survey, using a self‐administered questionnaire, was conducted to achieve this purpose. A total of 500 questionnaires were distributed to a selected sample of organizations in Saudi Arabia. Of these, 127 valid questionnaires – representing 25.4 percent response rate – were collected and analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16.Findings – The results of this paper reveal that the majority of respondents perceive the importance of the COBIT processes and domains, but a lower percentage believe that such processes are adequately implemented in their organizations. It is observed that banks, financial institutions, and service organizations show more concern and application of COBIT processes compared with other organizations. The results also r.
Capacity scaling of wireless ad hoc networks: Effect of finite wavelength

In this paper, we study the capacity scaling of wireless ad hoc networks considering the effect of a finite wavelength, which gives a unified view on two seemingly contradictory results on the capacity scaling. Recently, it was shown that the order-optimal linear throughput scaling is achievable for some networks using hierarchical cooperation (HC) by Özgür et al., but later it was proved to violate the physical limit by Franceschetti et al. The cause of such a contradiction is the idealized channel model in the former that does not capture the channel correlation due to the finite wavelength. Taking into account such an effect of the finite wavelength, we construct a modified HC scheme and analyze its throughput scaling in terms of both the number of nodes and wavelength. Our result is consistent with the physical limit while recovering the linear throughput scaling asymptotically as the wavelength tends to zero.
The Cyprus Conflict as a Prisoner's Dilemma Game

One hundred thirty-four Greek Cypriot and 51 Turkish Cypriot student teachers evaluated Cyprus now and in five years' time under four contingencies (peace, war, Enosis, and Taksim) on self-anchoring scales. Presentation of the resulting measures of utility in matrix form shows that of the 78 possible nonequivalent 2 x 2 games, the Cyprus conflict may be regarded as a Prisoner's Dilemma game where war is not seen as the worst possibility by either side, and peace offers a Pareto-optimal solution. Measures to resolve such conflicts suggested by the experimental literature are discussed.
Robust image forgery localization and recognition in copy-move using bag of features and SVM

Nowadays in the world of advanced digital computer, tampering and implication of digital images can be easily performed by a tyro with a number of accessible advanced image processing softwares like Adobe Photoshop, Corel Draw etc. Therefore it becomes very challenging for end users to distinguish whether the image is novel or forged. In the fields such as forensics, medical imaging, e-commerce, and industrial photography, legitimacy and integrity of digital images is crucial. This motivates the need for detection tools that are transparent to tampering and can reveal whether an image has been counterfeit just by scrutinizing the counterfeit image. Recently many new methods are presented with improved performances of detection. However there is still place to improve this performance further. Some of the proposed state-of-the-art image tamper detection techniques have been selected for proposal. In the training stage, it extracts the keypoints for every training image using the Mirror invariance feature transform (MIFT), a vector quantization technique maps keypoints from every training image into a unified dimensional histogram vector (bag-of-words) after K-means clustering. This histogram is treated as an input vector for a multiclass SVM to build the training classifier. In the testing stage, the keypoints are extracted and fed into the cluster model to map them into a bag-of-words vector, which is finally fed into the multiclass SVM training classifier to recognize the tampered region.
Sample bias in contingent valuation: A comparison of the correction methods

Abstract This article compares various methods for correcting contingent valuation aggregate benefits when the sample is known to be biased. A sample is defined as the population, and response rates are simulated on the basis of a measure of salience. The simulated response rates suffer from nonresponse bias and selection bias. Coefficient and benefit estimates that result from weighting and self‐selection correction approaches are compared with the true coefficient and benefit estimates. Our results indicate that at both low and high response rates the standard approach leads to bias, and either correction approach will reduce the bias in coefficient and benefit estimates.
Flavour preferences in youth versus adults: a review

Objective To understand the available evidence of how children and adults differ in their preferences for flavours that may be used in tobacco products. Data sources A total of 474 articles published between 1931 and August 2015 were retrieved through searches conducted in PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science and PsycINFO. Study selection and extraction A 2-phase relevancy review process resulted in the identification of 59 articles and information was extracted by 2 independent reviewers. Data synthesis Findings were grouped by taste and smell preferences, which are important components of overall flavour. For taste, evidence is summarised in the following categories: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami and fat; within each of them, findings are organised by age categories. For smell, evidence is summarised as follows: fruit/herbal/spices, tobacco and coffee and other odours. Major findings from this search indicated that sweet preference in children and adolescents was higher than in adults. Examples of preferred food-related tastes and odours for young people included cherry, candy, strawberry, orange, apple and cinnamon. Currently, all these are used to flavour cigars, cartridges for electronic cigarettes, hookah (waterpipe) and smokeless tobacco products. Conclusions Infants and children exhibited elevated sweet and salty preference relative to adults. Age-related changes in bitter, sour, umami and fat taste were not clear and more research would be useful. ‘Sweet’ food odours were highly preferred by children. Tobacco products in flavours preferred by young people may impact tobacco use and initiation, while flavours preferred by adults may impact product switching or dual use.
A Metric for Evaluating Discourse Coherence based on Coreference Resolution

We propose a simple and effective metric for automatically evaluating discourse coherence of a text using the outputs of a coreference resolution model. According to the idea that a writer tends to appropriately utilise coreference relations when writing a coherent text, we introduce a metric of discourse coherence based on automatically identified coreference relations. We empirically evaluated our metric by comparing it to the entity grid modelling by Barzilay and Lapata (2008) using Japanese newspaper articles as a target data set. The results indicate that our metric better reflects discourse coherence of texts than the existing model.
An educational purpose GUI for evolutionary computation in economic dispatch problem

In this paper we propose an evolutionary computation (genetic algorithm) based approach to economic dispatch problem. In case of thermal power plants fuel cost is an important element. Fuel price tend to rise from time to time. Therefore effort should be given on minimizing the fuel cost. In the proposed approach elitism operation in genetic algorithm is exploited very well to improve the quality of solution, and it is compared with the classical optimization technique. A Graphical User Interface (GUI) is developed for educational purposes.
Screening of Dengue Virus Antiviral Activity of Marine Seaweeds by an In Situ Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay

Dengue is a significant public health problem worldwide. Despite the important social and clinical impact, there is no vaccine or specific antiviral therapy for prevention and treatment of dengue virus (DENV) infection. Considering the above, drug discovery research for dengue is of utmost importance; in addition natural marine products provide diverse and novel chemical structures with potent biological activities that must be evaluated. In this study we propose a target-free approach for dengue drug discovery based on a novel, rapid, and economic in situ enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and the screening of a panel of marine seaweed extracts. The in situ ELISA was standardized and validated for Huh7.5 cell line infected with all four serotypes of DENV, among them clinical isolates and a laboratory strain. Statistical analysis showed an average S/B of 7.2 and Z-factor of 0.62, demonstrating assay consistency and reliability. A panel of fifteen seaweed extracts was then screened at the maximum non-toxic dose previously determined by the MTT and Neutral Red cytotoxic assays. Eight seaweed extracts were able to reduce DENV infection of at least one serotype tested. Four extracts (Phaeophyta: Canistrocarpus cervicornis, Padina gymnospora; Rhodophyta: Palisada perforate; Chlorophyta: Caulerpa racemosa) were chosen for further evaluation, and time of addition studies point that they might act at an early stage of the viral infection cycle, such as binding or internalization.
Learning to Answer Biomedical Questions: OAQA at BioASQ 4B

This paper describes the OAQA system evaluated in the BioASQ 4B Question Answering track. The system extends the Yang et al. (2015) system and integrates additional biomedical and generalpurpose NLP annotators, machine learning modules for search result scoring, collective answer reranking, and yes/no answer prediction. We first present the overall architecture of the system, and then focus on describing the main extensions to the Yang et al. (2015) approach. Before the official evaluation, we used the development dataset (excluding the 3B Batch 5 subset) for training. We present initial evaluation results on a subset of the development data set to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed new methods, and focus on performance analysis of yes/no question answering.
The Ability of High Function Individuals With Autism to Comprehend Written Discourse

This study assessed whether high functioning readers with autism are capable of drawing on prior knowledge during reading. Readers with autism and matched normal readers read ambiguous texts that described well-known historical events. The presence of an informative or noninformative title and primer texts that explicitly described the referenced events were manipulated. Story recall was collected. The results indicated that readers with autism were able to take advantage of cues to background knowledge to activate and associate the referenced event at a general level, but were not able to use that knowledge to interpret and remember specific information. These results suggest that difficulties in discourse understanding that are experienced by high functioning individuals with autism may stem from a difficulty in making use of relevant background knowledge to interpret ambiguities in language.
Term Weighting Classification System Using the Chi-square Statistic for the Classification Subtask at NTCIR-6 Patent Retrieval Task

In the present paper, a term weighting classification method using the chi-square statistic is proposed and evaluated in the classification subtask at NTCIR-6 patent retrieval task. In this task, large numbers of patent applications are classified into Fterm categories. Therefore, a patent classification system requires high classification speed, as well as high classification accuracy. The chi-square statistic can calculate the frequency of word appearance in the F-term and the frequency of word non-appearance in the F-term. The proposed method treats words as a scalar value and a ranking algorithm simply adds the word values of each word included in the test patent document in each F-term. Therefore, the proposed method provides classification that is significantly faster than other methods. The proposed method is evaluated in A-precision, R-precision, and F-measure. Although the proposed method did not obtain the best score, this method achieves a classification accuracy that is as high as those of other methods using machine learning or the vector classification method. In this task, the processing speed is not evaluated. Therefore, processing speed is also evaluated. The evaluation results show that the proposed method is much faster than that using the vector classification method. Evaluation results of classification accuracy and processing speed show that the proposed method is confirmed to be effective and to be practical.
Employment trajectory as determinant of change in health-related lifestyle: the prospective HeSSup study.

BACKGROUND Changes in employment status may be associated with changes in health-related lifestyle, but population level research of such associations is very limited. This study aimed to determine associations between lifestyle and five employment trajectories, i.e. 'stable', 'unstable', 'upward' 'downward' and 'chronic unemployment'. METHODS A cohort of 10,100 employees was followed up for 5 years. Associations of the employment trajectories with changes in smoking, alcohol drinking, body weight, physical activity and sleep duration were assessed with analysis of variance for repeated measures and pairwise post hoc comparisons. RESULTS Smoking was the only lifestyle component that was not associated with employment trajectory. In both genders, sleep duration decreased during chronic unemployment and among those on a downward employment trajectory. In men, alcohol consumption also increased in these two groups and body weight increased in the latter group. In women, physical activity decreased among those on a downward trajectory. In contrast, an upward labour market trajectory was associated with healthy or no changes in lifestyle both in men and women. CONCLUSION Changes in lifestyle may contribute to development of the health gradients between the employed and unemployed, whereas unstable employment versus permanent employment does not incur risk of unhealthy lifestyle changes. In order to prevent widening of employment-related health inequalities, passages into employment should be facilitated and opportunities for health promotion should be improved among those trapped in or moving towards the labour market periphery.
El CUIDA como instrumento para la valoración de la personalidad en la evaluación de adoptantes, cuidadores, tutores y mediadores

El cuestionario CUIDA (Cuestionario para la evaluacion de adoptantes, cuidadores, tutores y mediadores) fue proyectado en su momento como un instrumento para la evaluacion de los solicitantes de adopcion, por un grupo de profesionales (IVAI) que iniciaron un proceso de investigacion en esta area. A medida que se fue avanzando en la elaboracion de la prueba, los resultados obtenidos apuntaban hacia su aplicacion en otros campos como el juridico y el social siendo util en la valoracion de cuidadores, tutores y mediadores. El cuestionario contiene las siguientes escalas primarias: Altruismo, apertura, asertividad, autoestima, capacidad de resolver problemas, empatia, equilibrio emocional, independencia, flexibilidad, reflexividad, sociabilidad, tolerancia a la frustracion, capacidad de establecer vinculos afectivos o de apego, capacidad resolucion del duelo y los siguientes factores de segundo orden: Cuidado responsable, sensibilidad hacia los demas, cuidado afectivo y un factor adicional: La agresividad. El CUIDA es un instrumento fiable y valido que esta siendo aplicado en los diferentes campos y su uso esta avalado por la Comunidad de Madrid
Optimal Sensor Placement for 3-D Angle-of-Arrival Target Localization

This paper investigates optimal sensor placement strategies for angle-of-arrival (AOA) localization in three-dimensional space. We adopt the A-optimality criterion to determine optimal sensor placements under the Gaussian measurement noise. A comprehensive analysis of optimal sensor-target geometries is provided with no restriction on the number of AOA sensors, sensor-target range, and noise variances. A resistor network analogy is also presented to enable quick determination of optimal sensor-target geometries. The analytical results are verified by extensive simulation studies.
The Long-Term Effects of College Diversity Experiences: Well-Being and Social Concerns 13 Years After Graduation

Many college administrators and researchers assert that diversity interactions are critical for preparing young adults for a diverse society, but very little research has examined the long-term impact of these experiences. This study examines a longitudinal sample of college students (n = 416) who were followed into their mid-30s. Structural equation modeling analyses indicate that college engagement with racial/cultural diversity has a positive, indirect effect on personal growth, purpose in life, recognition of racism, and volunteer work 13 years after graduation.
Cooperative DNA binding by CI repressor is dispensable in a phage λ variant

Complex gene regulatory circuits contain many interacting components. In principle, all of these components and interactions may be essential to the function of the circuit. Alternatively, some of them may be refinements to a simpler version of the circuit that improve its fitness. In this work, we have tested whether a particular property of a critical regulatory protein, CI, is essential to the behavior of the phage λ regulatory circuit. In the lysogenic state, CI represses the expression of the lytic genes, allowing a stable lysogenic state, by binding cooperatively to six operators. A mutant phage lacking cooperativity because of a change in cI could not form stable lysogens; however, this defect could be suppressed by the addition of mutations that altered two cis-acting sites but did not restore cooperativity. The resulting triple mutant was able to grow lytically, form stable single lysogens, and switch to lytic growth upon prophage induction, showing a threshold response in switching similar to that of wild-type λ. We conclude that cooperative DNA binding by CI is not essential for these properties of the λ circuitry, provided that suppressors increase the level of CI. Unlike wild-type lysogens, mutant lysogens were somewhat unstable under certain growth conditions. We surmise that cooperativity is a refinement to a more basic circuit, and that it affords increased stability to the lysogenic state in response to environmental variations.
Pregnancy alters choline dynamics: results of a randomized trial using stable isotope methodology in pregnant and nonpregnant women.

BACKGROUND Although biomarkers of choline metabolism are altered by pregnancy, little is known about the influence of human pregnancy on the dynamics of choline-related metabolic processes. OBJECTIVE This study used stable isotope methodology to examine the effects of pregnancy on choline partitioning and the metabolic activity of choline-related pathways. DESIGN Healthy third-trimester pregnant (n = 26; initially week 27 of gestation) and nonpregnant (n = 21) women consumed 22% of their total choline intake (480 or 930 mg/d) as methyl-d9-choline for the final 6 wk of a 12-wk feeding study. RESULTS Plasma d9-betaine:d9-phosphatidylcholine (PC) was lower (P ≤ 0.04) in pregnant than in nonpregnant women, suggesting greater partitioning of choline into the cytidine diphosphate-choline (CDP-choline) PC biosynthetic pathway relative to betaine synthesis during pregnancy. Pregnant women also used more choline-derived methyl groups for PC synthesis via phosphatidylethanolamine N-methyltransferase (PEMT) as indicated by comparable increases in PEMT-PC enrichment in pregnant and nonpregnant women despite unequal (pregnant > nonpregnant; P < 0.001) PC pool sizes. Pregnancy enhanced the hydrolysis of PEMT-PC to free choline as shown by greater (P < 0.001) plasma d3-choline:d3-PC. Notably, d3-PC enrichment increased (P ≤ 0.011) incrementally from maternal to placental to fetal compartments, signifying the selective transfer of PEMT-PC to the fetus. CONCLUSIONS The enhanced use of choline for PC production via both the CDP-choline and PEMT pathways shows the substantial demand for choline during late pregnancy. Selective partitioning of PEMT-PC to the fetal compartment may imply a unique requirement of PEMT-PC by the developing fetus.