Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Algorithmic Composition in Contrasting Music Styles

The aim of this research was to automate the composition of convincingly “real” music in specific musical genres. By “real” music we mean music which is not obviously “machine generated”, is recognizable as being of the selected genre, is perceived as aesthetically pleasing, and is usable in a commercial context. To achieve this goal, various computational techniques were used, including genetic algorithms and finite state automata. The process involves an original, top down approach and a bottom up approach based on previous studies. Student musicians have objectively assessed the resulting compositions.
The Human Lipodystrophy Gene BSCL2/Seipin May Be Essential for Normal Adipocyte Differentiation

OBJECTIVE—Berardinelli-Seip congenital lipodystrophy type 2 (BSCL2) is a recessive disorder featuring near complete absence of adipose tissue. Remarkably, although the causative gene, BSCL2, has been known for several years, its molecular function and its role in adipose tissue development have not been elucidated. Therefore, we examined whether BSCL2 is involved in the regulation of adipocyte differentiation and the mechanism whereby pathogenic mutations in BSCL2 cause lipodystrophy. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS—Following the characterization of BSCL2 expression in developing adipocytes, C3H10T1/2 mesenchymal stem cells were generated in which BSCL2 expression was knocked down using short hairpin RNA (shRNA). These cells were used to investigate whether BSCL2 is required for adipogenesis. BSCL2 constructs harboring pathogenic mutations known to cause lipodystrophy were also generated and characterized. RESULTS—BSCL2 expression was strongly induced during adipocyte differentiation, and the induction of BSCL2 expression was essential for adipogenesis to occur. The initial induction of key adipogenic transcription factors, including peroxisome proliferator–activated receptor (PPAR)γ and CAAT/enhancer-binding protein-α, was preserved in cells lacking BSCL2. However, the expression of these critical factors was not sustained, suggesting that the activity of PPARγ was impaired. Moreover, expression of key genes mediating triglyceride synthesis, including AGPAT2, lipin 1, and DGAT2, was persistently reduced and lipid accumulation was inhibited. Analysis of pathogenic missense mutants of BSCL2 revealed that the amino acid substitution A212P causes aberrant targeting of BSCL2 within the cell, suggesting that subcellular localization of BSCL2 may be critical to its function. CONCLUSIONS—This study demonstrates that BSCL2 is an essential, cell-autonomous regulator of adipogenesis.
Fast iterative calculation of large body mounted antenna radiation using adaptive cross approximation

This paper describes the application of ACA (Adaptive Cross Approximation) algorithm for acceleration of MoM solution of large scale radiation problems. System of linear equations is solved using iterative solution and ACA is used to reduce required memory for matrix storage and speed up matrix-vector-product operation. To demonstrate applicability and performance of described technique, two numerical experiments are presented: a) calculation of radiation pattern of Magellan spacecraft high gain reflector antenna operating at 3GHz and b) calculation of radiation pattern of Wi-Fi antenna mounted on the roof of the vehicle, operating at 5.9GHz frequency. We show that ACA calculation is much faster than direct solution, while accuracy is quite acceptable.
Towards a Generic Architecture for Autonomous Landing Systems 1

This paper outlines the design of a 2D analogue for autonomous landing on an asteroid as a hardware demonstrator/development platform, within an overall requirements structure that aims to develop a generic architecture for autonomous landing systems. Although wheeled laboratory robots may appear to be unlikely analogues for asteroid landing, the system is already proving useful as a platform for exploring and testing aspects of autonomy within the mission profile. Real-world sensor noise and inaccuracy as well as real-time issues are testing the system in a way that does not emerge from simulation alone.
Complementary constant-gm biasing of Nauta-transconductors in low-power gm-C filters to +/−2% accuracy over temperature

This paper describes the design of an accurate and simple static complementary constant-gm biasing circuit for Nauta's transconductors in low-power low-frequency CMOS gm-C bandpass filters and their optimization and trimming for process and temperature independent filter performance. Experimental results are presented for a prototype 3rd order Butterworth bandpass filter in a 180nm CMOS process with a 2MHz bandwidth and centre frequency. These filters are appropriate for the channel selection stage of a Zigbee receiver and show with a single trim for process over a 80C temperature range only a 2% deviation in the bandwidth and centre frequency.
Effects of Fas-mediated liver cell apoptosis on diethylnitrosamine-induced hepatocarcinogenesis in mice

The present study was designed to investigate the effect of Fas-mediated liver cell apoptosis, induced by a hamster monoclonal antibody against mouse Fas antigen, on diethylnitrosamine (DEN)-induced hepatocarcinogenesis in mice. DEN (10 μg g–1, intraperitoneally (i.p.)) was given to 15-day-old male C3H/HeJ mice. Three weeks after DEN treatment, Fas-mediated liver cell apoptosis induced by anti-Fas antibody resulted in a biphasic effect on induction of liver cell tumours, depending on dosage and time of antibody administration. Single or multiple treatment with high dose anti-Fas antibody (5 μg animal–1), induced gross liver cell damage and decreased the incidence of liver cell tumours in DEN-treated mice. In contrast, five treatments with low dose anti-Fas antibody (2 μg animal–1), induced dispersed localized liver cell damage and promoted the number of large-sized liver cell adenomas and hepatocellular carcinomas. These findings suggest that high dose anti-Fas antibody has a marked effect on the clearance of DEN-initiated liver cells, whereas repeated administration of low dose anti-Fas antibody promotes hepatocarcinogenesis. It is concluded that Fas-mediated liver cell apoptosis has a biphasic effect on hepatocarcinogenesis. © 2000 Cancer Research Campaign
Approximation Algorithms for the Multiply Constrained Assignment Problem

We consider the multiply constrained assignment problem (MCAP), which is a variation of the linear assignment problem with m additional constraints. First, we derive upper and lower bounds respectively by heuristic and relaxation methods. The latter also implies the Lagrangian relaxation, as well. Next, we introduce the pegging test to MCAP, and further a virtual pegging test to reduce MCAP into a binary integer problem of smaller size. By solving the reduced prob- lem, we obtain an approximate solution, which is often proved optimal. The results of numerical experiments are also given.
Error estimates for finite difference approximations of American put option price

Finite difference approximations to multi-asset American put option price are considered. The assets are modelled as a multi-dimensional diffusion process with variable drift and volatility. Approximation error of order one quarter with respect to the time discretisation parameter and one half with respect to the space discretisation parameter is proved by reformulating the corresponding optimal stopping problem as a solution of a degenerate Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation. Furthermore, the error arising from restricting the discrete problem to a finite grid by reducing the original problem to a bounded domain is estimated.
A microcosting study of the surgical correction of upper extremity deformity in children with spastic cerebral palsy

ABSTRACT Objective: Determine healthcare costs of upper-extremity surgical correction in children with spastic cerebral palsy (CP). Method: This cohort study included 39 children with spastic CP who had surgery for their upper extremity at a Dutch hospital. A retrospective cost analysis was performed including both hospital and rehabilitation costs. Hospital costs were determined using microcosting methodology. Rehabilitation costs were estimated using reference prices. Results: Hospital costs averaged €6813 per child. Labor (50%), overheads (29%), and medical aids (15%) were important cost drivers. Rehabilitation costs were estimated at €3599 per child. Conclusions: Surgery of the upper extremity is an important contributor to the healthcare costs of children with CP. Our study shows that labor is the most important cost driver for hospital costs, owing to the multidisciplinary approach and patient-specific treatment plan. A remarkable finding was the substantial amount of rehabilitation costs.
Defining Business Rules for REA Business Models

The REA business model language is an established vehicle (i) to model businesses in terms of domain specific value chains and their key concepts and (ii) to capture business data in terms of accounting artefacts. REA has evolved into a specification that could drive web shops, enterprise/trading information systems, enterprise resource planning systems, etc. Such systems require support for sophisticated business rules in order to decouple business logic from application logic. In this work we present a framework for structural integration of business rules into REA business models.
Bayesian Inference on Proportional Elections

Polls for majoritarian voting systems usually show estimates of the percentage of votes for each candidate. However, proportional vote systems do not necessarily guarantee the candidate with the most percentage of votes will be elected. Thus, traditional methods used in majoritarian elections cannot be applied on proportional elections. In this context, the purpose of this paper was to perform a Bayesian inference on proportional elections considering the Brazilian system of seats distribution. More specifically, a methodology to answer the probability that a given party will have representation on the chamber of deputies was developed. Inferences were made on a Bayesian scenario using the Monte Carlo simulation technique, and the developed methodology was applied on data from the Brazilian elections for Members of the Legislative Assembly and Federal Chamber of Deputies in 2010. A performance rate was also presented to evaluate the efficiency of the methodology. Calculations and simulations were carried out using the free R statistical software.
Geometry, flows, and graph-partitioning algorithms

1. intRoDuction " Graph partitioning " refers to a family of computational problems in which the vertices of a graph have to be partitioned into two (or more) large pieces while minimizing the number of the edges that cross the cut (see Figure 1). The ability to do so is a useful primitive in " divide and conquer " algorithms for a variety of tasks such as laying out very large circuits on laying out very large circuits on silicon chips and distributing computation among processors. Increasingly , it is also used in applications of clustering ranging from computer vision, to data analysis, to learning. These include finding groups of similar objects (customers , products, cells, words, and documents) in large data sets, and image segmentation, which is the first step in image analysis. Unfortunately, most graph-partitioning problems are NP-hard, which implies that we should not expect efficient algorithms that find optimal solutions. Therefore researchers have resorted to heuristic approaches, which have been implemented in several popular freeware codes and commercial packages. The goal of this paper is to survey an interesting combination of techniques that have recently led to progress on this problem. The original motivation for this work was theoretical, to design algorithms with the best provable approxi mation guarantees. * Surprisingly, these ideas have led also to a new framework for designing very fast and
Monte Carlo methods for lattice fields

A discussion of the Monte Carlo methods for the Ising model highlights the benefits of the Swendsen-Wang algorithm. Next, an a priori model that has been developed for the analytical reconstruction of crystal structures from xray crystallography data is discussed, and the feasibility of developing an algorithm for this model similar to the Swendsen-Wang algorithm is considered. Thesis Supervisor: Title: Professor Sanjoy K. Mitter Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Mix&Slice: Efficient Access Revocation in the Cloud

We present an approach to enforce access revocation on resources stored at external cloud providers. The approach relies on a resource transformation that provides strong mutual inter-dependency in its encrypted representation. To revoke access on a resource, it is then sufficient to update a small portion of it, with the guarantee that the resource as a whole (and any portion of it) will become unintelligible to those from whom access is revoked. The extensive experimental evaluation on a variety of configurations confirmed the effectiveness and efficiency of our solution, which showed excellent performance and compatibility with several implementation strategies.
Whole- and refined-grain intakes are differentially associated with abdominal visceral and subcutaneous adiposity in healthy adults: the Framingham Heart Study.

BACKGROUND Observational studies have linked higher intakes of whole grains to lower abdominal adiposity; however, the association between whole- and refined-grain intake and body fat compartments has yet to be reported. OBJECTIVE Different aspects of diet may be differentially related to body fat distribution. The purpose of this study was to assess associations between whole- and refined-grain intake and abdominal subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT) and visceral adipose tissue (VAT). DESIGN Cross-sectional associations between whole- and refined-grain intakes, waist circumference measures, and abdominal SAT and VAT volumes were examined in 2834 Framingham Heart Study participants (49.4% women; age range: 32-83 y). Dietary information was assessed with the use of a semiquantitative food-frequency questionnaire. RESULTS Whole-grain intake was inversely associated with SAT (2895 compared with 2552 cm³ in the lowest compared with the highest quintile category, P for trend < 0.001) and VAT (1883 compared with 1563 cm³, P for trend < 0.001), after adjustment for age, sex, current smoking status, total energy, and alcohol intake. In contrast, refined-grain intake was positively associated with SAT (2748 compared with 2934 cm³, P for trend = 0.01) and VAT (1727 compared with 1928 cm³, P for trend < 0.001) in multivariable models. When SAT and VAT were evaluated jointly, the P value for SAT was attenuated (P = 0.28 for whole grains, P = 0.60 for refined grains), whereas VAT remained associated with both whole grains (P < 0.001) and refined grains (P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS Increasing whole-grain intake is associated with lower VAT in adults, whereas higher intakes of refined grains are associated with higher VAT. Further research is required to elicit the potential mechanisms whereby whole- and refined-grain foods may influence body fat distribution.
Tangent-3 at the NTCIR-12 MathIR Task

We present the math-aware search engine Tangent-3 and report its results for the NTCIR-12 MathIR task. Tangent uses a federated search over two indices: 1) a TF-IDF textual search engine (Solr), and 2) a query-by-expression engine. We use an inverted index to store math expressions using pairs of symbols extracted from a Symbol Layout Tree representation built from Presentation MathML. We use a cascade model with two stages for retrieval. In the ﬁrst stage, relevant expressions are retrieved quickly using iterator trees over posting lists to ﬁnd matches and expressions are ranked using the Dice coeﬃcient of matched symbol pairs. In the second stage, the top-k best candidates are reranked with a more strict similarity metric supporting uniﬁcation and wildcard matching. Our system produces relevant (and partially relevant) Precision@5 values of 21% (50%) for the main arXiv task, 25% (49%) for the Main Wikipedia subtask and 45% (84%) for the Wikipedia Formula Browsing subtask.
The Clinical Relevance of Stromal Matrix Metalloproteinase Expression in Ovarian Cancer

Purpose: Matrix metalloproteinases (MMP) are proteolytic enzymes implicated in cancer progression and metastasis. We sought to determine the role of epithelial (tumor cell–derived) and stromal (host-derived) expression of MMPs in predicting the clinical outcome of patients with epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). Experimental Design: MMP-2, MMP-9, and membrane type 1 (MT1)-MMP expression was evaluated using immunohistochemistry in 90 invasive EOCs, and samples were scored for epithelial and stromal staining. Results were correlated with clinicopathologic characteristics using univariate and multivariate analyses. Results: High expression of MMP-2, MMP-9, and MT1-MMP in tumor epithelium was detected in 54%, 97%, and 100% of cases, and in stromal compartments, in 38%, 70%, and 38% of cases, respectively. High stromal expression of MMP-2, MMP-9, and MT1-MMP was significantly associated with aggressive features such as high stage, high grade ascites, and positive lymph node status. Kaplan-Meier analysis showed that high epithelial and stromal expression of MMP-2, MMP-9, and MT1-MMP were each significantly associated with shorter disease-specific survival (DSS; P < 0.01). On tree-structured survival analysis, patients with strong epithelial MT1-MMP expression had the shortest DSS, whereas patients with moderate epithelial MT1-MMP and low stromal MMP-9 expression had the longest DSS (P < 0.01). On multivariate analysis, high stromal expression of MMP-9 (P = 0.01) and MT1-MMP (P = 0.04), strong epithelial MT1-MMP (P = 0.01) and high stage (P = 0.04) were independent predictors of poor DSS. Conclusions: Overexpression of stromal MMP-9 and MT1-MMP is independently associated with shorter DSS in EOC. Thus, host-derived MMPs are valuable predictors of clinical outcome in EOC.
Project management elements as strategic assets: preliminary findings

Purpose – To examine project management assets and to explore the link between these and the achievement of competitive advantage from the project management process through it being valuable, rare, inimitable, and having organizational support.Design/methodology/approach – An online survey with North American Project Management Institute® members was conducted. Exploratory factor analysis was used to identify tangible and intangible elements of project management and the achievement of competitive characteristics of the project management process.Findings – Six factors were extracted that comprised project management assets and three factors that comprised the competitive characteristics of the project management process.Research limitations/implications – This was an exploratory study. It is expected to further develop the instrument, refine the model and constructs, and test it with a larger sample.Practical implications – This study highlights the importance of developing intangible project management.
Web mining driven semantic scene understanding and object localization

Knowledge acquisition from the Internet for robotic applications has received widespread attention recently. It has turned out to be an important supplementary or even a complete replacement to conventional robotic perception. In this paper, we investigate state-of-the-art online knowledge acquisition systems for robotic vision applications and present a framework for further fusion and tighter integration. Bootstrapped by an interconnected process wherein modules for object detection and supporting structure detection co-operate to extract cross-correlated information, a web text mining technique using sequential pattern retrieval is introduced for linking the search of objects with their potential localities. Experiments using an indoor mobile robot for an Active Visual Search (AVS) task demonstrate the benefits of our coherent framework for visual representation and knowledge acquisition from the Internet.
Cerebral Vasomotor Reactivity and Risk of Mortality: The Rotterdam Study

Background and Purpose— Accumulating vascular pathology in cerebral arteries leads to impaired cerebral vasomotor reactivity. In turn, impaired cerebral vasomotor reactivity is a risk factor for stroke in clinical populations. It remains unclear whether impaired cerebral vasomotor reactivity also reflects more systemic vascular damage. We investigated whether cerebral vasomotor reactivity is associated with the risk of mortality, focusing particularly on cardiovascular mortality independent from stroke. Methods— Between 1997 and 1999, 1695 participants from the Rotterdam Study underwent cerebral vasomotor reactivity measurements using transcranial Doppler. Follow-up was complete until January 1, 2011. We assessed the associations between cerebral vasomotor reactivity and mortality using Cox proportional hazards models, adjusting for age, sex, and blood pressure changes and subsequently for cardiovascular risk factors. We additionally censored for incident stroke. Results— During 17 004 person-years, 557 participants died, of whom 181 due to a cardiovascular cause. In the fully adjusted model, the hazard ratio per SD decrease in vasomotor reactivity was 1.10 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.01–1.19) for all-cause mortality, 1.09 (95% CI, 0.94–1.26) for cardiovascular mortality, and 1.10 (95% CI, 0.99–1.21) for noncardiovascular mortality. These associations remained unchanged after censoring for incident stroke. Conclusions— We found that lower cerebral vasomotor reactivity is associated with an increased risk of death. Incident stroke does not affect this association, suggesting that a lower cerebral vasomotor reactivity reflects a generally impaired vascular system.
Diachronic Trends in Word Order Freedom and Dependency Length in Dependency-Annotated Corpora of Latin and Ancient Greek

One easily observable aspect of language variation is the order of words. In human and machine natural language processing, it is often claimed that parsing freeorder languages is more difficult than parsing fixed-order languages. In this study on Latin and Ancient Greek, two wellknown and well-documented free-order languages, we propose syntactic correlates of word order freedom. We apply our indicators to a collection of dependencyannotated texts of different time periods. On the one hand, we confirm a trend towards more fixed-order patterns in time. On the other hand, we show that a dependency-based measure of the flexibility of word order is correlated with the parsing performance on these languages.
We Crashed, Now What?

We present an in-depth analysis of the crash-recovery problem and propose a novel approach to recover from otherwise fatal operating system (OS) crashes. We show how an unconventional, but careful, OS design, aided by automatic compiler-based code instrumentation, offers a practical solution towards the survivability of the entire system. Current results are encouraging and show that our approach is able to recover even the most critical OS subsystems without exposing the failure to user applications or hampering the scalability of the system.