Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Title A necessary and sufficient LMI condition for stability of 2 Dmixed continuous-discrete-time systems

This paper addresses the problem of establishing stability of 2D mixed continuous-discrete-time systems. Traditional stability analysis for 2D systems gives a sufficient condition based on 2D version of a Lyapunov equation. Here, a linear matrix inequality (LMI) condition is proposed that extends these results by introducing complex Lyapunov functions depending polynomially on a parameter and by exploiting the Gram matrix method. It is shown that this condition is sufficient for 2D exponential stability for any chosen degree of the Lyapunov function candidate, and it is also shown that this condition is also necessary for a sufficiently large degree. Moreover, an a priori bound on the degree required for achieving necessity is given. Some numerical examples illustrate the proposed methodology.
Just in time and future-proofing? Policy, challenges and opportunities in the professional development of part-time teachers

Abstract Part-time teachers form a growing proportion of the global Higher Education (HE) workforce. Their backgrounds can vary from Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) teaching for the first time, to practitioners bringing workplace experience into HE and sessional teachers, all with differing professional development needs. This paper builds on previous research to consider structures and practices promoting sustainable, effective professional development for part-timers, to propose proactive holistic professional development, and raise institutional awareness of the challenges of reaching part-timers. A case study exploring the lived experiences of part-time staff illustrates key features of part-timers’ preparation for their current work and future aspirations.
The effect of bicarbonate peritoneal dialysis solutions on cardiac structural and functional alterations.

BACKGROUND The systemic effects of absorbed glucose degradation products (GDPs) contained within the conventional peritoneal dialysis solutions (cPDS) are largely unknown, while they appear to affect also cardiovascular function. The aim of the present study was to evaluate if the new bicarbonate-based less bioincompatible new peritoneal dialysis solutions ameliorate cardiac structural and functional status as well as the peritoneal net ultrafiltration (UF) and residual renal function. Patients and methods. This is a single centre, prospective cohort study of 12 stable continues ambulatory peritoneal dialysis patients (four women, eight men) mean aged 71.3 ± of 6.01 years and mean peritoneal dialysis (PD) duration 31.9 ± 21.33 months, treated with the usual cPDS (Medital Bieffe®, with increased GDPs, low pH and lactate as a buffer system). The patients changed for a 6-month period to the newer biocompatible PD solutions (BicaVera, Fresenius® low GDPs, normal pH, bicarbonate as a buffer) and at the end of this time, they returned to their previous schema of conventional solutions, for another 6 months. During the study period, the left ventricle ejection fraction (EF), left ventricle end systolic and diastolic diameter (LVESD, LVEDD), left ventricle mass index (LVMI), glyoxal serum and peritoneal concentrations, net UF and 24 h urine volume were repeatedly estimated: at the beginning of the study (T0), after 6 months with the biocompatible solutions (T6) and at the end of study (T12), after the 6-month period using again the cPDS. The UF volume and glyoxal concentrations were estimated at end of a 4 h dwell of an exchange with a PD solution of 2.27 % glucose. RESULTS There was a statistically significant difference between the mean levels of EF, LVESD, LVEDD, LVMI, UF and glyoxal serum and peritoneal concentrations at the beginning (T0) and in the middle of the study (T6) (for serum glyoxal P = 0.005, for peritoneal glyoxal P = 0.0004, for EF P = 0.0004, for LVESD P = 0.023, for LVEDD P = 0.002, for LVMI P = 0.0005 and for UF P = 0.005) as well as between the mean values in the middle (T6) and at the end of the evaluation period (T12) (for serum glyoxal P = 0.043, for peritoneal glyoxal P = 0.006, for EF P = 0.00009, for LVESD P = 0.012, for LVEDD P = 0.00014, for LVMI P = 0.00013 and for UF P = 0.048). On the other hand, no statistically significant difference was revealed between the T0 and T12 mean values of glyoxal (serum and peritoneal), EF, LVESD, LVEDD, LVMI and UF. During the study period, there was no statistically significant difference in daily urine volume and glomerular filtration rate. CONCLUSIONS The use of bicarbonate-based PDS induced a statistically significant improvement of left ventricle structure (LVESD, LVEDD and LVMI) and functional (EF) indicators. These beneficial effects on left ventricle in combination with the improvement of net UF may designate a protective role of the newer bicarbonate peritoneal solutions on cardiovascular function morbidity and mortality risk of PD patients.
6 Facial behavior

We provide an overview of the current state-of-the-art regarding research on facial behavior from what we hope is a well-balanced historical perspective. Based on a critical discussion of the main theoretical views of nonverbal facial activity (i.e., affect program theory, appraisal theory, dimensional theory, behavioral ecology), we focus on some key issues regarding the cohesion of emotion and expression, including the issue of “genuine smiles. ” We argue that some of the challenges faced by the field are a consequence of these theoretical positions, their assumptions, and we discuss how they have generated and shaped research. A clear distinction of encoding and decoding processes may prove beneficial to identify specific problems – for example the use of posed expressions in facial expression research, or the impact of the psychological situation on the perceiver. We argue that knowledge of the functions of facial activity may be central to understanding what facial activity is truly about; this includes a serious consideration of social context at all stages of encoding and decoding. The chapter concludes with a brief overview of recent technical advances and challenges highlighted by the new field of “affective computing” concerned with facial activity.
Reconfigurable Single and Multiband Inset Feed Microstrip Patch Antenna for Wireless Communication Devices

Two novel designs for compact reconflgurable antennas are introduced for wireless communication devices. These designs solve the steering frequency problem by tracking the desired resonance frequency or by generating various operating frequency bands to be selected electronically. In the flrst design, the length of the rectangular defected ground structure (RDGS) is electrically adjusted to change the resonant frequency of the MPA. While in the second design difierent turns of spiral AMC ground plane generate frequency bands, or modes, that are selected/optimized to serve difierent communication systems simultaneously. These systems may include various combinations of bluetooth, S-band and wireless local-area network (WLAN). These designs have several advantages as the total antenna volume can be reused, and therefore the overall antenna will be compact, although, the radiation of the MPA is kept flxed without any degradation. The designs are verifled through both numerical simulations and measurement of a fabricated prototype. The results conflrm good performance of the single and multiband reconflgurable antenna designs.
Cell Blebbing upon Addition of Cryoprotectants: A Self-Protection Mechanism

In this work, the mechanism of cell bleb formation upon the addition of cryoprotectants (CPAs) was investigated, and the role of cell blebs in protecting cells was determined. The results show that after adding CPAs, the hyperosmotic stress results in the breakage of the cortical cytoskeleton and the detachment of the cell membrane from the cortical cytoskeleton, causing the formation of cell blebs. Multiple blebs decrease the intracellular hydrostatic pressure induced by the extracellular hyperosmotic shock and alleviate the osmotic damage to cells, which reduces the cell mortality rate. In the presence of a low concentration of CPAs, cell blebs can effectively protect cells. In contrast, in the presence of a high concentration of CPAs, the protective effect is limited because of severe disruption in the cortical cytoskeleton. To determine the relationship between blebs and the mortality rate of cells, we defined a bleb index and found that the bleb index of 0.065 can be regarded as a reference value for the safe addition of DMSO to HeLa cells. The bleb index can also explain why the stepwise addition of CPAs is better than the single-step addition of CPAs. Moreover, the mechanism of the autophagy of cells induced by the hyperosmotic stress was studied, and the protective effect associated with the autophagy was compared with the effect of the blebbing. The findings reported here elucidate a self-protection mechanism of cells experiencing the hyperosmotic stress in the presence of CPAs, and they provide significant evidence for cell tolerance in the field of cryopreservation.
The Role of Cognitive Control in Older Adults' Emotional Well-Being

Recently, the focus in gerontology has expanded from trying to avoid agerelated decline to also trying to promote optimal aging. One key component of optimal aging is maintaining or even enhancing emotional well-being over the life span (Baltes & Baltes 1990; Lawton, 2001; Rowe & Kahn, 1987). The traditional stereotype of old age depicts a period of evitable and continuous loss, with decreased subjective well-being. However, although negative life events tend to become more frequent and cognitive function and health tend to decline as people get older, emotional well-being does not appear to be compromised by the aging process. In fact, accumulating evidence indicates that healthy emotional aging— characterized by an overall enhancement of emotional experience across the life span—is part of normal human development (see Carstensen, Mikels, & Mather, 2006; Charles & Carstensen, 2007; Diener, Suh, Lucas, & Smith, 1999). Theories
Hidden Complexity of Synaptic Receptive Fields in Cat V1

In the primary visual cortex (V1), Simple and Complex receptive fields (RFs) are usually characterized on the basis of the linearity of the cell spiking response to stimuli of opposite contrast. Whether or not this classification reflects a functional dichotomy in the synaptic inputs to Simple and Complex cells is still an open issue. Here we combined intracellular membrane potential recordings in cat V1 with 2D dense noise stimulation to decompose the Simple-like and Complex-like components of the subthreshold RF into a parallel set of functionally distinct subunits. Results show that both Simple and Complex RFs exhibit a remarkable diversity of excitatory and inhibitory Complex-like contributions, which differ in orientation and spatial frequency selectivity from the linear RF, even in layer 4 and layer 6 Simple cells. We further show that the diversity of Complex-like contributions recovered at the subthreshold level is expressed in the cell spiking output. These results demonstrate that the Simple or Complex nature of V1 RFs does not rely on the diversity of Complex-like components received by the cell from its synaptic afferents but on the imbalance between the weights of the Simple-like and Complex-like synaptic contributions.
Determinants of Partially Distributed Team Performance: a Path Analysis of Socio-Emotional and Behavioral Factors

Distributed teams and their variant, globally distributed teams, are an increasingly common means of accomplishing work. A common team configuration is the partially distributed team (PDT), which has a hybrid structure consisting of two or more subgroups of geographically separated team members. Using partial least squares, we test a path model of the relationships among determinants of between-subgroup perceptions of PDT performance. The data are from a series of quasi-experimental field studies involving nearly 700 students working in PDTs that varied in distance between two subgroups separated by a few hundred miles to international distances that spanned cultures and multiple time zones. The factors examined in the model were shared identity, trust, competence, and conflict; the overall model explains 34% of the variance in perceived team performance.
Modeling and Simulation on Left-Turn Waiting Area at Isolated Signalized Intersection

Left-turn waiting area can improve the capacity and operational efficiency of the isolated signalized intersection. Based on the former researches and survey data, in this paper, we model the left-turn waiting area by dint of stop lines A, B and its length lAB, and parameters of left-turn signal, t1 ,t2 ,t3, t3. According to the flow chart and taking advantage of simulation software VISSIM, we emulate 2 scenarios about setting left-turn waiting area or not and just evaluate the left-turn flow at each approach. The results indicate that, comparing to the no waiting area scenario, the travel time of I.H-H with 3 signal phases is reduced by 5.64%, and average queue lengths of its 2 approaches are cut by 14.55% and 15.11%. The delay of I.W-W with 4 signal phases is declines by 5.64%, while the volume is increased by 7.01%. However, the results also show that the stop rates added 0.73 and 0.64 respectively.
MR enterography of Crohn disease: part 2, imaging and pathologic findings.

OBJECTIVE The purpose of this article is to review MR enterography technique and imaging findings suggestive of Crohn disease on these examinations. This article will also allow the reader to self-assess and improve his or her skills in the performance and interpretation of MR enterography examinations. CONCLUSION This article reviews the technique of performing MR enterography examinations. MRI plays a valuable role in providing accurate information about severity of and complications related to Crohn disease and can help in guiding surgical or medical treatment.
Progress in the Development of CdTe and CdZnTe Semiconductor Radiation Detectors for Astrophysical and Medical Applications

Over the last decade, cadmium telluride (CdTe) and cadmium zinc telluride (CdZnTe) wide band gap semiconductors have attracted increasing interest as X-ray and gamma ray detectors. Among the traditional high performance spectrometers based on silicon (Si) and germanium (Ge), CdTe and CdZnTe detectors show high detection efficiency and good room temperature performance and are well suited for the development of compact and reliable detection systems. In this paper, we review the current status of research in the development of CdTe and CdZnTe detectors by a comprehensive survey on the material properties, the device characteristics, the different techniques for improving the overall detector performance and some major applications. Astrophysical and medical applications are discussed, pointing out the ongoing Italian research activities on the development of these detectors.
Autosomal Dominant Diabetes Arising From a Wolfram Syndrome 1 Mutation

We used an unbiased genome-wide approach to identify exonic variants segregating with diabetes in a multigenerational Finnish family. At least eight members of this family presented with diabetes with age of diagnosis ranging from 18 to 51 years and a pattern suggesting autosomal dominant inheritance. We sequenced the exomes of four affected members of this family and performed follow-up genotyping of additional affected and unaffected family members. We uncovered a novel nonsynonymous variant (p.Trp314Arg) in the Wolfram syndrome 1 (WFS1) gene that segregates completely with the diabetic phenotype. Multipoint parametric linkage analysis with 13 members of this family identified a single linkage signal with maximum logarithm of odds score 3.01 at 4p16.2-p16.1, corresponding to a region harboring the WFS1 locus. Functional studies demonstrate a role for this variant in endoplasmic reticulum stress, which is consistent with the β-cell failure phenotype seen in mutation carriers. This represents the first compelling report of a mutation in WFS1 associated with dominantly inherited nonsyndromic adult-onset diabetes.
Text detection and recognition in images and video sequences

Text characters embedded in images and video sequences represents a rich source of information for content-based indexing and retrieval applications. However, these text characters are difficult to be detected and recognized due to their various sizes, grayscale values and complex backgrounds. This thesis investigates methods for building an efficient application system for detecting and recognizing text of any grayscale values embedded in images and video sequences. Both empirical image processing methods and statistical machine learning and modeling approaches are studied in two sub-problems: text detection and text recognition. Applying machine learning methods for text detection encounters difficulties due to character size, grayscale variations and heavy computation cost. To overcome these problems, we propose a two-step localization/verification approach. The first step aims at quickly localizing candidate text lines, enabling the normalization of characters into a unique size. In the verification step, a trained support vector machine or multi-layer perceptrons is applied on background independent features to remove the false alarms. Text recognition, even from the detected text lines, remains a challenging problem due to the variety of fonts, colors, the presence of complex backgrounds and the short length of the text strings. Two schemes are investigated addressing the text recognition problem: bi-modal enhancement scheme and multi-modal segmentation scheme. In the bi-modal scheme, we propose a set of filters to enhance the contrast of black and white characters and produce a better binarization before recognition. For more general cases, the text recognition is addressed by a text segmentation step followed by a traditional optical character recognition (OCR) algorithm within a multi-hypotheses framework. In the segmentation step, we model the distribution of grayscale values of pixels using a Gaussian mixture model or a Markov Random Field. The resulting multiple segmentation hypotheses are post-processed by a connected component analysis and a grayscale consistency constraint algorithm. Finally, they are processed by an OCR software. A selection algorithm based on language modeling and OCR statistics chooses the text result from all the produced text strings. Additionally, methods for using temporal information of video text are investigated. A Monte Carlo video text segmentation method is proposed for adapting the segmentation parameters along temporal text frames. Furthermore, a ROVER (Recognizer Output Voting Error Reduction) algorithm is studied for improving the final recognition text string by voting the characters through temporal frames.
Gabor Jets for Clutter Rejection in Infrared Imagery

Abstract : The performance of an infrared imagery based (IR) automatic target detection algorithm suffers from several variables. The target size, shape, orientation and brightness play a role, as well as the cluttered backgrounds [1-5], which often exhibit greater intensity than the sensor noise or intensity of the targets to be detected. Once the detection process is finished and further decisions pending in the ATR system, one would like a simple technique to further reduce false alarms. The problem again, is one of recognition and past research has shown that joint spatial-frequency representations using Gabor schemes is beneficial in many automated, computer vision applications. We will present results using Gabor Jets together with a back propagation neural network for a detector post processing procedure, which could substantially reduce false alarms.
Semantic Annotation of Japanese Functional Expressions and its Impact on Factuality Analysis

Recognizing the meaning of functional expressions is essential for natural language understanding. This is a difficult task, owing to the lack of a sufficient corpus for machine learning and evaluation. In this study, we design a new annotation scheme and construct a corpus containing 2,327 Japanese sentences and 8,775 functional expressions. Our scheme achieves high inter-annotator agreement with kappa score of 0.85. In the experiments, we confirmed that machine learning-based functional expression analysis contributes to factuality analysis.
Game Theoretic Modeling of WiFi Pricing

In this work we study the relationship between a WLAN owner acting as a wireless access provider and a paying client. We model the interaction as a dynamic game in which the players have asymmetric information – the client knows more about her utility function than the access provider knows. We find that if a client has what we call a web browser utility function, it is a Nash equilibrium for the provider to charge the client a constant price per unit time, and that clients with sufficiently high valuations for the service pay the price. In contrast, we find that if a client has what we call a file transferor utility function, with a bounded file length, the client should be unwilling to pay until the final time slot of her file transfer. We also analyze a Bayesian model in which the provider does not know whether he faces a web browser or file transferor type client, and study the case where there is no bound on the client’s file length.
USING IMAGE ANALYSIS TO LOOK INTO THE EFFECT OF IMPURITY CONCENTRATION IN NACL CRYSTALLIZATION

This paper presents and describes a methodology for morphology assessment, crystal particle classification and quantification of the complexity level of a crystal or a population of crystals. It further describes the application of such methodology to the study of the influence of MgCl 2 in the crystallization of NaCl, namely on crystal size and morphology. Image analysis techniques are combined with discriminant factorial analysis leading to results that allow the computation of the complexity of crystals through a new parameter, the agglomeration degree of crystals. With this methodology it has been possible to distinguish automatically among three different classes of crystals, and within each class as per their complexity. Agreement between manual and automated classification measured in terms of a performance index is 90% on average. The effect of supersaturation and impurity concentration on the type, amount and complexity level of the agglomerates was further determined.
Geometrical-Analysis-Based Algorithm for Stereo Matching of Single-Lens Binocular and Multi-Ocular Stereovision System

A geometrical analysis based algorithm is proposed to achieve the stereo matching of a single-lens prism based stereovision system. By setting the multi- face prism in frontal position of the static CCD (CM-140MCL) camera, equivalent stereo images with different orientations are captured synchronously by virtual cameras which are defined by two boundary lines: the optical axis and CCD camera field of view boundary. Subsequently, the geometrical relationship between the 2D stereo images and corresponding 3D scene is established by employing two fundamentals: ray sketching in which all the pertinent points, lines, and planes are expressed in the 3D camera coordinates and the rule of refraction. Landing on this relationship, the epipolar geometry is thus obtained by fitting a set of corresponding candidate points and thereafter, stereo matching of the prism based stereovision system is obtained. Moreover, the unique geometrical properties of the imaging system allow the proposed method free from the complicated camera calibration procedures and to be easily generalized from binocular and tri-ocular to multi-ocular stereovision systems. The performance of the algorithm is presented through the experiments on the binocular imaging system and the comparison with a conventional projection method demonstrates the efficient assessment of our novel contributions.