Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The contrast experiment on visual attention regions and saliency maps based on the eye tracker

In this paper, an experimental system is realized to record and analyze the visual attention regions of images based on an eye tracker. Then eye-movement events of observers during an image observation such as fixations are captured by an eye tracker in the experiment. Furthermore, the relationships between visual attention regions and saliency maps of the test images are analyzed by calculating the saliency rate of fixations. Experimental results show a high consistency of visual attention regions and saliency regions defined by saliency maps.
Effects of tobacco smoke on the gene expression of the Cyp1a, Cyp2b, Cyp2e, and Cyp3a subfamilies in mouse liver and lung: relation to single strand breaks of DNA.

Cigarette smoking is a worldwide health problem and is the greatest risk factor for lung cancer. By activating procarcinogens, hepatic and extrahepatic cytochromes P450 can participate in lung carcinogenesis. Tobacco smoke contains numerous cytochrome P450 inducers, substrates, and inhibitors. In the present study we investigated, in male NMRI mice, the effects of cigarette smoke on hepatic and pulmonary cytochrome P450 expression and their possible role in the induction of DNA lesions such as DNA single strand breaks (SSB). Hepatic and pulmonary mouse cytochrome P450 isozymes involved in carcinogenesis (Cyp1a, 2b, 2e, 3a) were differently induced by cigarette smoke. Cyp2e1 mRNA was dramatically enhanced (12.7-fold increase) while Cyp2b10 mRNA remained unchanged and Cyp1a1 was decreased or not detected. Cyp3a protein and mRNA were not detected in lung, suggesting that this isozyme is not expressed in mouse pulmonary tissue. The SSB of DNA increased in lung and liver treated mice. In contrast no modification was observed in lymphocytes that barely expressed cytochromes P450. Cimetidine and propylene glycol reduced SSB of DNA induced by smoking in liver and lung cells. The inhibition (-70%) observed in lung following treatment by propylene glycol, a CYP2E1 inhibitor, suggested that this isozyme is at least in part involved in pulmonary DNA damage induced by tobacco smoke. The high concentration of CYP2E1 function and regulation in mammals suggests that this protein could be involved in pulmonary carcinogenesis in human smokers.
Completely Heterogeneous Transfer Learning with Attention - What And What Not To Transfer

We study a transfer learning framework where source and target datasets are heterogeneous in both feature and label spaces. Speciﬁcally, we do not assume explicit relations between source and target tasks a priori , and thus it is crucial to deter-mine what and what not to transfer from source knowledge. Towards this goal, we deﬁne a new heterogeneous transfer learning approach that (1) selects and attends to an optimized subset of source samples to transfer knowledge from, and (2) builds a uniﬁed transfer network that learns from both source and target knowledge. This method, termed “Attentional Heterogeneous Transfer”, along with a newly proposed unsupervised transfer loss, improve upon the previous state-of-the-art approaches on extensive simulations as well as a challenging hetero-lingual text classiﬁcation task.
Using Input-Output Analysis to Identify Australia's High Employment Generating Industries

The objective of this paper is to identify Australia’s high employment generating industries. It attempts to do this by using the 1996-97 input-output table. The direct and indirect contributions of the tradeable industries to employment are quantified by adopting the ‘loss of the industry’ or ‘shut-down of industry’ approach. Sectoral employment elasticities are then calculated to determine the leading employment generating sectors. This analysis sheds some light on sectoral potentials for the creation of jobs. We suggest, inter alia, that the following industries will play a crucial role in generating employment in the years to come: Retail Trade, Construction, Health and Community Services, Property and Business Services, and Education. These industries are not only the fastest growing and the largest sectors in terms of employment but also possess relatively higher employment elasticities.
Understanding complex systems: When Big Data meets network science

Abstract Better understanding and controlling complex systems has become a grand challenge not only for computer science, but also for the natural and social sciences. Many of these systems have in common that they can be studied from a network perspective. Consequently methods from network science have proven instrumental in their analysis. In this article, I introduce the macroscopic perspective that is at the heart of network science. Summarizing my recent research activities, I discuss how a combination of this perspective with Big Data methods can improve our understanding of complex systems.
Modulation of Hepatocyte Growth Factor Secretion in Human Female Reproductive Tract Stromal Fibroblasts by Poly (I:C) and Estradiol

Citation Coleman KD, Ghosh M, Crist SG, Wright JA, Rossoll RM, Wira CR, Fahey JV. Modulation of Hepatocyte Growth Factor secretion in human female reproductive tract stromal fibroblasts by poly (I:C) and estradiol. Am J Reprod Immunol 2012; 67: 44–53
Computational Prediction, Target Identification and ExperimentalValidation of miRNAs from Expressed Sequence Tags in Cannabis sativa. L

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are approximately 20-22 nucleotide non-coding RNAs, which play an important role in posttranscriptional degradation of target mRNA or inhibition of protein synthesis through binding the specific sites of target mRNA. miRNAs have been extensively studied in various plant species, however, there is no miRNA identified in Cannabis sativa, a crop which has long been used for hemp fibre, for seed and seed oils, for medicinal purposes, and as a recreational drug. In this study, a computational based approach was used to identify and characterize C. sativa miRNAs. A total of 7 miRNAs belonging to 3 miRNA families were identified in cannabis based on homolog search and series of filtering criteria. The identified miRNAs were validated by endpoint PCR and quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR), confirmed the existence of conserved miRNAs in C. sativa. Based on near-perfect complementarity between cannabis miRNAs and their target mRNA gene sequence, a total of 23 miRNAs targets were identified involved in processes such as plant development, signal transduction, secondary metabolite production, protein degradation, response to environmental stress and pathogen invasion, and ability to regulate their own biogenesis. The cisregulatory elements relevant to biotic and abiotic stress, plant hormone response flavonoid and cannabinoids biosynthesis were identified in the promoter regions of those miRNA genes. Overall, findings from this study will accelerate the way for further researches of miRNAs and their functions in C. sativa, particularly cannabinoid metabolic pathway
Pilot-assisted short-packet transmission over multiantenna fading channels: A 5G case study

Leveraging recent results in finite-blocklength information theory, we investigate the problem of designing a control channel in a 5G system. The setup involves the transmission, under stringent latency and reliability constraints, of a short data packet containing a small information payload, over a propagation channel that offers limited frequency diversity and no time diversity. We present an achievability bound, built upon the random-coding union bound with parameter s (Martinez & Guillen i Fabregas, 2011), which relies on quadrature phase-shift keying modulation, pilot-assisted transmission to estimate the fading channel, and scaled nearest-neighbor decoding at the receiver. Using our achievability bound, we determine how many pilot symbols should be transmitted to optimally trade between channel-estimation errors and rate loss due to pilot overhead. Our analysis also reveals the importance of using multiple antennas at the transmitter and/or the receiver to provide the spatial diversity needed to meet the stringent reliability constraint.
A Cascaded Convolutional Nerual Network for X-ray Low-dose CT Image Denoising

Image denoising techniques are essential to reducing noise levels and enhancing diagnosis reliability in low-dose computed tomography (CT). Machine learning based denoising methods have shown great potential in removing the complex and spatial-variant noises in CT images. However, some residue artifacts would appear in the denoised image due to complexity of noises. A cascaded training network was proposed in this work, where the trained CNN was applied on the training dataset to initiate new trainings and remove artifacts induced by denoising. A cascades of convolutional neural networks (CNN) were built iteratively to achieve better performance with simple CNN structures. Experiments were carried out on 2016 Low-dose CT Grand Challenge datasets to evaluate the method's performance.
Evaluation of safety of bevacizumab as second-line treatment of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer.

PURPOSE Bevacizumab is a relatively new monoclonal antibody introduced in the treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC). Since varied efficiency and adverse events of this drug were reported, the purpose of this study was to assess the safety of bevacizumab as second-line treatment of patients with metastatic CRC. METHODS This observational, non-interventional study involved 35 patients with metastatic CRC treated with bevacizumab. Patients were from the Oncology Clinic, Clinical Centre of Montenegro. Monitoring of patients was done according to the study protocol. RESULTS The number of subjects with abnormal values of tumor marker CEA has decreased from 56.8% (enrollment visit) to 50% in the sixth visit (p<0.01). The number of subjects with abnormal values for tumor marker Ca19-9 ranged from initial 45% (enrollment visit) to 50% on the sixth visit (p>0.05). No significant differences in the average values of hematological and biochemical parameters and the average values of the CEA and Ca19-9 were noticed. In 26 (46.2%) patients, adverse events were recorded. Of 72 adverse events, 31 (43.05%) were related to bevacizumab. Regarding adverse events intensity, 68.1% were moderate. The most common adverse event was hypertension, which was recorded in 12 patients. There was no life-threatening adverse event connected with the drug use. CONCLUSION Use of bevacizumab caused moderate adverse effects, none of which was life-threatening.
H∞-Control for Markov jump systems subject to actuator saturation

This paper considers the problem of Hinfin controller design for a class of Markov jump systems subject to actuator saturation. The gains of Hinfin controller are mode-dependent and governed by the stochastic transition rate matrix. The stochastic stability region is constructed via finding an ellipsoid invariant set for system. Based on the state feedback method, the resulting closed-loop system is stochastically stable and satisfies a certain level of Hinfin disturbance attenuation. The solvability condition of the above controller can be equivalent to a feasibility problem of coupled linear matrix inequalities (LMIs). The simulation results of a numerical example are given to verify the effectiveness of this method
FPGA Implementation of a Fix-Point Digital Baseband Pre-Distorter for the Linearization of Wireless Transmitters

Digital baseband predistortion (DPD) is a cost effective solution to improve the energetic efficiency of power amplifiers (PA) for wireless communication systems. This paper addresses the design of DPD in fix-point arithmetic, suitable for real-time implementation in a low-cost hardware such as a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA). The design starts in floating-point double-precision arithmetic for the parameter identification of a DPD having a memory polynomial topology. Then, the not straightforward conversion to fix-point arithmetic is discussed. The presented fix-point design allows for the realtime applicability of the DPD, by processing the polynomials as Look-Up-Tables (LUT) and by using a sequential logic circuit that exploits as much as possible the parallel processing. For the FPGA Xilinx Virtex 5 and for numbers having 16 bits, it was verified that a DPD frequency as high as 60 MHz can be used and the DPD power consumption is approximately 0.5 W. The validation of the accuracy of the designed fix-point DPD is done based on computer simulations performed on a PA behavioral model excited by a 3GPP WCDMA signal. It is verified that, if the PA is operated with a constant average output power in the cases with and without DPD, then the inclusion of the DPD improves the ACPR metric at the PA output by 25 dB. Index Terms — FPGA, linearization, memory polynomial, power amplifiers, VHDL language.
Finger-vein and fingerprint recognition based on a feature-level fusion method

Multimodal biometrics based on the finger identification is a hot topic in recent years. In this paper, a novel fingerprint-vein based biometric method is proposed to improve the reliability and accuracy of the finger recognition system. First, the second order steerable filters are used here to enhance and extract the minutiae features of the fingerprint (FP) and finger-vein (FV). Second, the texture features of fingerprint and finger-vein are extracted by a bank of Gabor filter. Third, a new triangle-region fusion method is proposed to integrate all the fingerprint and finger-vein features in feature-level. Thus, the fusion features contain both the finger texture-information and the minutiae triangular geometry structure. Finally, experimental results performed on the self-constructed finger-vein and fingerprint databases are shown that the proposed method is reliable and precise in personal identification.
Managing ecommerce service failures: incorporating validity, provenance and trust from the semantic web

High volume, B2C eCommerce web sites that often experience millions of visitors and 100,000s of orders a day in the lead up to major gift giving occasions, must meet customer demands of high availability, responsiveness, and functionality. These same web sites often integrate a large number of 3rd party web services that need to but often fail to meet the same demands. This paper describes a Semantic Web-based solution to meeting such demands. By distinguishing between action versus information, required versus optional, time constrained, and substitutable services, combined with the semantic web concepts of information validity, provenance and trust, more targeted and flexible responses to service failures can be provided.
TRANSPLACENTALLY ACQUIRED IMMUNOGLOBULIN G ANTIBODIES AGAINST MEASLES, MUMPS, RUBELLA AND VARICELLA-ZOSTER VIRUS IN PRETERM AND FULL TERM NEWBORNS

IgG antibody values against measles, mumps, rubella and varicella-zoster virus in 71 full term and 101 preterm infants and their 152 mothers and the decay of maternally acquired antibodies during infancy were studied. Both magnitude of transplacental antibody passage and cord blood antibody values correlated with gestational age. After 6 months preterm infants born before 32 weeks of gestation had lost maternal antibodies.
Determining predictors of delayed recovery and the need for transitional cardiac rehabilitation after cardiac surgery

Purpose: To examine the relationship between demographic and clinical characteristics of cardiac surgery patients with postoperative length of stay (PLOS) greater than 7 days and determine the demographic, social, and clinical predictors of the need for transitional cardiac rehabilitation (TCR) after cardiac surgery. Data sources: A retrospective review of characteristics, clinical indices, caregiver availability, and patient status (whether living alone) was completed for 304 patients undergoing cardiac surgery over 24 consecutive months. Univariate analyses and multivariable logistic regression models were used to evaluate risk factor characteristics for PLOS greater than 7 days and to predict discharge disposition to TCR or home. Conclusions: Older patients, those with preoperative comorbidities, and those without a caregiver at home experience delays in functional recovery and discharge and are more likely to need TCR services. Implications for practice: Our findings support the addition of functional recovery and social support risk items to the preoperative cardiac surgery risk assessment.
Accurate simulation of phase noise in oscillators

This paper describes a new method that calculates the phase noise power of an oscillator as a function of the offset frequency. Through the use of a sophisticated frequency selection method, the partial noise spectra of the different noise generating components can be constructed. An appropriate combination of these spectra results in the overall output phase noise spectrum. A number of solutions are discussed which improve the numerical accuracy and reduce the necessary CPU time. This new method is demonstrated with the phase noise evaluation of a 1.8 GHz CMOS VCO, and the results are compared with measurements. The difference is not larger than 1.3 dBc/Hz, which can be accounted for by the statistical fluctuations.
Temporal proteomic profiling of embryonic stem cell secretome during cardiac and neural differentiation

During recent years, increased efforts have focused on elucidating the pluripotency and self‐renewal of stem cells. Differentiation towards the different lineages has attracted significant attention given the potential use of stem cells in regenerative medicine. Embryonic stem cell differentiation is a complex process coordinated by strictly regulated extracellular signals that act in an autocrine and/or paracrine manner. Through secreted molecules, stem cells affect local niche biology and influence the cross‐talking with the surrounding tissues. Emerging evidence supports the hypothesis that fundamental cell functions, including proliferation and differentiation, are strictly regulated by the complex set of molecules secreted from cells. The understanding of this molecular language could largely increase our knowledge on pathways regulating stem cell differentiation. Here, we have used a proteomics platform to investigate the profile of proteins secreted during differentiation of murine embryonic stem cells. We have followed the dynamics of protein secretion by comparing the secretomes at different time points of murine embryonic stem cell cardiac and neural differentiation. In addition to previously reported molecules, we have identified many secreted proteins not described so far as released from embryonic stem cells nor shown to be differentially released during the process of cardiomyogenesis and neurogenesis.
Investigation of Window Instability in Program/Erase Cycling of TANOS NAND Flash Memory

TANOS endurance is mainly governed by interface traps at the substrate-tunnel oxide interface, generated upon electrical stress, rather than by fixed charge in the tunnel oxide/blocking dielectric or by incomplete charge compensation in the nitride. As a result of acceptor resp. donor trap formation in the upper resp. lower half of the Si band gap, the V,h program/erase window monotonically shifts upward whereas the V fb window exhibits turn-around behavior. Interface trap generation rate is highest during the erase operation and depends also on the memory stack process.
Wireless Sensor Network for Air Quality Monitoring and Control

A network of low-power wireless sensors for the detection of air quality pollutants (acetone, toluene, ammonia, formaldehyde, ethanol, benzene, dichloromethane, acetic acid, xylene and dimethylacetamide) is described in this paper. The network consists of several sensor nodes responsible for receiving information and wirelessly, through ZigBee protocol, sending it to a gateway connected to the Internet. A cloud infrastructure is used to store the data of each node and to perform the data processing. Several autonomous nodes equipped with four different gas sensors are used to measure the pollutants concentration in air. Each node also includes a pump and a 3-way electric valve to carry the air samples to the sensor cell. The 3-way electric valve can be operated in order to switch between reference clean air or gas samples from the vials containing the samples. The communication between nodes and the gateway is based on the standard IEEE 802.15. 4 (Zig-Bee protocol). Data processing and analysis have been performed with the use of principal component analysis (PCA) and artificial neural networks.
Eficiencias externa, técnica, interna y de gestión de las entidades financieras

El presente trabajo analiza los factores determinantes de la ineficiencia en costes soportada por las entidades bancarias espanolas. La consideracion de variables relativas a las condiciones economicas vigentes en el entorno y de determinados indicadores de productividad arroja niveles de ineficiencia del 1-5 por 100, ostensiblemente inferiores al 20-25 por 100 obtenido en trabajos anteriores. La evolucion de dichos indicadores de productividad constituye el principal factor explicativo de la reduccion de los costes operativos, la cual excedio en cinco veces a la mejora de eficiencia experimentada a lo largo del periodo 1992-2001. este comportamiento justifica la estabilidad - y la reducida dimension - de la ineficiencia a lo largo del tiempo, hecho que contrasta con las continuas variaciones mostradas por los costes bancarios.
Image-based path-planning algorithm on the joint space

To design an image-based path-planning algorithm, we should decrease the sum of moving distances of degrees-of-freedom of a manipulator. The algorithm A* selects the shortest path in the joint space by hard search. The combination search requires long distance moving. In a computer (virtual) world, the moving is not always time consuming. However in a real world, the moving is extremely time consuming. To overcome this drawback, we are seeking for a one-way search. For this reason, the sensor-based path-planning algorithms are preferred to an image-based path-planning algorithm. On the observation, we adopt a three or more dimensional sensor-based path-planning algorithm as the image-based path-planning algorithm. Its heuristics is defined by a difference between present and objective images. If the heuristics amounts to zero, the image-based algorithm stops. Therefore, convergence of a camera on a manipulator tip to an objective state is kept, and it is not influenced at all by uncertainties of robot and camera parameters.
Preemptive Striking in Individual and Group Conflict

In this study, we conducted a laboratory experiment to assess preemptive striking by and towards individuals or groups. In the framework of a preemptive strike game, we set the following four conditions: one person faced another person, one person faced a three-person group, a three-person group faced an individual, and a three-person group faced another three-person group. Previous studies have revealed that greed is activated when participants belong to a group, while fear is activated when participants interact with a group, and further, that attacking behaviors in the preemptive strike game are driven by fear. These observations led to a hypothesis that high attack rates would be realized when participants interact with a group, regardless of whether the participants make decisions as individuals or a group. The results of our experiment, however, rejected this hypothesis. Among the four conditions, the attack rate was highest when a three-person group faced an individual. As possible reasons for our observation, we discuss the potential threat stemming from the imbalance in the effectiveness of attack between individuals and groups, and the (incorrect) belief by groups that single individuals would be more likely to attack out of fear.