Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Automated City Modeling from Omnidirectional Image Sequences PhD Thesis Proposal

City models are needed in many areas of human activities including urban planning, virtual reality, and architecture preservation. Aerial, ground level, and omnidirectional city modeling techniques are compared and their main advantages and disadvantages are presented. We also show several city modeling systems and address their novelties as well as their limitations. Next, we present our previous work dealing with a step towards a 3D reconstruction system for city modeling from omnidirectional video sequences using structure from motion together with stereo constraints. We concentrate on two issues. First, we show how the tracking and reconstruction paradigm were adapted to use omnidirectional images taken by lenses with 180 degrees field of view. Secondly, we compare the results of the reconstruction using additional stereo constraints to the results when these constraints are not used. Performance of the system is demonstrated on a sequence of 870 images acquired while driving in a city. Finally, scalability and other open problems of city modeling from image sequences are presented together with problems which have been solved already. The main goal of the thesis is to design a scalable modeling and localization system consisting of two mutually interacting modules: a structure from motion (SfM) module and a near identical image detection (NIID) module.
Non‐linear state space modelling of fisheries biomass dynamics by using Metropolis‐Hastings within‐Gibbs sampling

State space modelling and Bayesian analysis are both active areas of applied research in fisheries stock assessment. Combining these two methodologies facilitates the fitting of state space models that may be non‐linear and have non‐normal errors, and hence it is particularly useful for modelling fisheries dynamics. Here, this approach is demonstrated by fitting a non‐linear surplus production model to data on South Atlantic albacore tuna (Thunnus alalunga). The state space approach allows for random variability in both the data (the measurement of relative biomass) and in annual biomass dynamics of the tuna stock. Sampling from the joint posterior distribution of the unobservables was achieved by using Metropolis‐Hastings within‐Gibbs sampling.
HIV-GRADE: A Publicly Available, Rules-Based Drug Resistance Interpretation Algorithm Integrating Bioinformatic Knowledge

Background: Genotypic drug resistance testing provides essential information for guiding treatment in HIV-infected patients. It may either be used for identifying patients with transmitted drug resistance or to clarify reasons for treatment failure and to check for remaining treatment options. While different approaches for the interpretation of HIV sequence information are already available, no other available rules-based systems specifically have looked into the effects of combinations of drugs. HIV-GRADE (Genotypischer Resistenz Algorithmus Deutschland) was planned as a countrywide approach to establish standardized drug resistance interpretation in Germany and also to introduce rules for estimating the influence of mutations on drug combinations. The rules for HIV-GRADE are taken from the literature, clinical follow-up data and from a bioinformatics-driven interpretation system (geno2pheno[resistance]). HIV-GRADE presents the option of seeing the rules and results of other drug resistance algorithms for a given sequence simultaneously. Methods: The HIV-GRADE rules-based interpretation system was developed by the members of the HIV-GRADE registered society. For continuous updates, this expert committee meets twice a year to analyze data from various sources. Besides data from clinical studies and the centers involved, published correlations for mutations with drug resistance and genotype-phenotype correlation data information from the bioinformatic models of geno2pheno are used to generate the rules for the HIV-GRADE interpretation system. A freely available online tool was developed on the basis of the Stanford HIVdb rules interpretation tool using the algorithm specification interface. Clinical validation of the interpretation system was performed on the data of treatment episodes consisting of sequence information, antiretroviral treatment and viral load, before and 3 months after treatment change. Data were analyzed using multiple linear regression. Results: As the developed online tool allows easy comparison of different drug resistance interpretation systems, coefficients of determination (R2) were compared for the freely available rules-based systems. HIV-GRADE (R2 = 0.40), Stanford HIVdb (R2 = 0.40), REGA algorithm (R2 = 0.36) and ANRS (R2 = 0.35) had a very similar performance using this multiple linear regression model. Conclusion: The performance of HIV-GRADE is comparable to alternative rules-based interpretation systems. While there is still room for improvement, HIV-GRADE has been made publicly available to allow access to our approach regarding the interpretation of resistance against single drugs and drug combinations.
An E¢ cient Approach to Analyzing State-Space Representations

We develop a numerical procedure that facilitates e¢ cient likelihood evaluation and …ltering in applications involving non-linear and non-Gaussian state-space models. The procedure approximates necessary integrals using continuous approximations of target densities. Construction is achieved via e¢ cient importance sampling, and approximating densities are adapted to fully incorporate current information.
Ieee Transactions on Image Processing 1 Synthetic Aperture Radar Autofocus Based on a Bilinear Model

—Autofocus algorithms are used to restore images in nonideal synthetic aperture radar imaging systems. In this paper, we propose a bilinear parametric model for the unknown image and the nuisance phase parameters and derive an efficient maximum likelihood autofocus (MLA) algorithm. In the special case of a simple image model and a narrow range of look angles, MLA coincides with the successful multichannel autofocus (MCA). MLA can be interpreted as a generalization of MCA to a larger class of models with a larger range of look angles. We analyze its advantages over previous extensions of MCA in terms of identifia-bility conditions and noise sensitivity. As a byproduct, we also propose numerical approximations to the difficult constant modulus quadratic program that lies at the core of these algorithms. We demonstrate the superior performance of our proposed methods using computer simulations in both the correct and mismatched system models. MLA performs better than other methods, both in terms of the mean squared error and visual quality of the restored image.
A framework for Internet adoption in sporting bodies: A local New Zealand sporting case

Sport at a local, or social level, requires volunteers to support the needs of sporting associations and their participating clubs. Research has shown that volunteers and associations are starting to adopt the Internet to assist in the administration of their clubs and their association. This study uses Rogers' Innovation-decision process as a framework to identify how this process of adoption is occurring. The researchers have applied this framework to investigate how this is occurring in a cricket association in Auckland, New Zealand.
Proving the Completeness Theorem within Isabelle/HOL

This is a report about formalising a maths proof with the theorem prover Isabelle/HOL. The proof was for the completeness theorem of first order logic. The informal proof used symmetry arguments (duality) and also gave the cut elimination theorem as a corollary. Both these aspects were preserved formally. The paper outlines this formalisation. It notes that parts of the proof can be viewed as a correctness proof for a naive proof procedure. Some speculative comments about the possibility of a proven reflection principle are made in the conclusions.
A System for Querying With Qualitative Distances in Networks

A central role of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) is to allow the identification and visualisation of relevant spatial features from typically large volumes of data. This requires a querying system to provide both flexibility and usability. While standard GIS querying capabilities are often either very limited, or require a user to have knowledge in specialised areas, techniques in qualitative spatial reasoning have been developed that provide a powerful and intuitive method of representing and reasoning about spatial information. In this paper we present a method for querying about the qualitative distance between features using dynamic networks such as roads, bus or ferry services, and flight paths, rather than only using the Euclidean distance. Linguistic values are used to implement qualitative distances for the linguistic variable proximity. TreeSap GIS with qualitative querying support is presented to demonstrate how qualitative distance measures through a network can provide both a computationally practical solution and a mechanism through which non-experts benefit from powerful search tools.
Detect Zero by Using Symmetric Homomorphic Encryption

First, we prove that a homomorphic encryption with a function of detecting zero, detecting equality, comparing the value or detecting overflow on cipher texts is not secure if there is no restriction to limit the times of operating these functions. Then we analyze that a homomorphic encryption scheme can still detect zero with some restrictions. If we allow all the people to detect zero on cipher texts, then there is no method better than the key-owner decrypts the cipher text and announces the result. However, if we allow only few people to detect zero when key owner agrees, then we can construct a symmetric homomorphic encryption scheme with our new version of ring learn with error assumption.
Antipsoriatic activity and Cytotoxicity of ethanolic extract of Psoralia corylifolia seeds

Plan: Traditionally in India and China, Psoralia corylifolia seed decoction used for treating psoriasis. However, the antipsoriatic activity of Psoralia corylifolia seeds has not been scientifically evaluated using mouse tail model. Methodology: Ethanolic extract of Psoralia corylifolia seeds were analyzed by high performance thin layer chromatography (HPTLC) . The In vivo antipsoriatic activity of 95% of ethanolic extract of Psoralia corylifolia seeds was done by using mouse tail model for psoriasis and In vitro antipsoriatic activity was carried out by Sulphorhodamine B (SRB) assay using HaCaT human keratinocyte cell lines. Outcome: HPTLC fingerprinting revealed the presence of gallic acid. The ethanolic extract shown IC50 255 µg/ml, with good antiproliferant activity when compared with Asiaticoside as positive control with potent IC50 value of 20.13 µg/ml. Psoralia corylifolia seed extract showed an overall antipsoriatic activity of 75.87%, when compared with standard tazarot gel activity 87.94% by using mouse tail model, confirmed its traditional use in psoriasis treatment.
User Authentication Through Mouse Dynamics

Behavior-based user authentication with pointing devices, such as mice or touchpads, has been gaining attention. As an emerging behavioral biometric, mouse dynamics aims to address the authentication problem by verifying computer users on the basis of their mouse operating styles. This paper presents a simple and efficient user authentication approach based on a fixed mouse-operation task. For each sample of the mouse-operation task, both traditional holistic features and newly defined procedural features are extracted for accurate and fine-grained characterization of a user's unique mouse behavior. Distance-measurement and eigenspace-transformation techniques are applied to obtain feature components for efficiently representing the original mouse feature space. Then a one-class learning algorithm is employed in the distance-based feature eigenspace for the authentication task. The approach is evaluated on a dataset of 5550 mouse-operation samples from 37 subjects. Extensive experimental results are included to demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed approach, which achieves a false-acceptance rate of 8.74%, and a false-rejection rate of 7.69% with a corresponding authentication time of 11.8 seconds. Two additional experiments are provided to compare the current approach with other approaches in the literature. Our dataset is publicly available to facilitate future research.
The Talent Development Middle School. Essential Components.

The Talent Development approach to helping greater numbers of students succeed in middle school is based on a belief that all students can learn challenging material if the right types of support are given. This report presents the essential components of the Talent Development framework and describes their initial implementation in Evans Junior High School, Washington, D.C. and Central East Middle School, Philadelphia (Pennsylvania). The essential components of the framework include a curriculum aimed at active learning, an emphasis on cultural empowerment, a communal organization of school, a total detracking of instruction, growth-oriented assessment, a multilayered pedagogy, career exploration, and family affirmation. Evans Junior High School is a regular junior high in a low socioeconomic area of the city. It enrolls approximately 320 students, all of whom are African American. Approximately 25% receive Title I services and about 6% are in special education. Central Middle School has about 1,000 students in grades 5 through 8, mostly from low socioeconomic levels. The school has a highly diverse student body, with about 457. Hispanic students, 24% African American, 13% Asian, 8% White, and about 10% who define themselves in other ways. Although the implementation of the Talent Development approach is in its early stages, these schools are recognizably different from schools operating under the traditional sorting paradigm. Three appendixes discuss student team writing and reading, the career exploration approach and decision-making training, and present active affirmation program materials. (Contains 1 figure and 34 references.) (SLD) Serge Madhere Douglas J. Mac Iver Report No. 3 / September 1996 CRESPAR THE TALENT DEVELOPMENT MIDDLE SCHOOL Essential Components U.S DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office or Educational Research and Improvement EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER IERICI This document ties been reproduced as received Iron the person or organization originating it. O Minor changes have been made to improve' reproduction quality. Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. CENTER FOR RESEARCH ON THE EDUCATION OF STUDENTS PLACED AT RISK Johns Hopkins University & Howard University
Regional cerebral blood flow (SPECT) during anaesthesia with isoflurane and nitrous oxide in humans.

Nitrous oxide and isoflurane have different effects on absolute cerebral blood flow (CBF) and regional distribution of CBF in humans. In this study we examined the effects of isoflurane in combination with nitrous oxide on CBF. We studied 10 patients (two groups of five patients, ASA I) anaesthetized with 50% nitrous oxide and either 0.5 or 1.0 MAC of isoflurane during normocapnia (PaCO2 5.7 kPa) using two-dimensional CBF measurement (CBFxenon) (i.v. 133xenon washout technique) and a three-dimensional method for measurement of regional CBF (rCBF) distribution with SPECT (single photon emission computer-aided tomography with 99mTc- HMPAO). The results were compared with 1.0 MAC of isoflurane from a previous study performed in exactly the same way as the present investigation. During normocapnia, anaesthesia with 50% nitrous oxide and 0.5 MAC of isoflurane resulted in a mean CBFxenon of 45 (SEM 5) ISI units. Increasing the isoflurane concentration to 1.0 MAC had no significant effect on mean CBFxenon (53 (5) ISI units). Both flow values were significantly (P = 0.01) higher than the CBFxenon value obtained when 1 MAC of isoflurane was administered alone (33 (3) ISI units). There were no significant differences in rCBF distribution regardless of whether or not isoflurane was given alone or together with nitrous oxide at 0.5 or 1 MAC. In all situations there were higher relative flows in subcortical regions (thalamus and basal ganglia, 10%) and in the pons (7-10% above average). rCBF in the cerebellum was approximately 10% greater than average. In summary, we have found that mean CBF was greater with combined nitrous oxide and isoflurane anaesthesia than previously found with isoflurane alone; however, relative flow distribution was similar.
Quantitative interpretation of the rotation curves of spiral galaxies at redshifts z ~ 0.7 and z ~ 1

We present decompositions of the rotation curves of three spiral galaxies at redshifts z ∼ 0.7 and 1 into contributions by their bulges, disks, and dark halos, respectively. In order to set constraints on the degeneracy of the decompositions we inter- pret the morphology of the spiral structures quantitatively in the framework of density wave theory. Galaxy models constrained in such a way show that the distant galaxies, which are much younger than nearby galaxies, have very likely "maximum disks", i.e. are dominated in their inner parts by baryonic matter. We argue that current theories of the cosmogony of galaxies must allow for these types of galaxies.
Gamma-ray burst synthetic spectra from collisionless shock pic simulations

The radiation from afterglows of gamma-ray bursts is generated in the collisionless plasma shock interface between a relativistic outflow and a quiescent circum-burst medium. The two main ingredients responsible for the radiation are high-energy, non-thermal electrons and a strong magnetic field. In this Letter we present, for the first time, synthetic spectra extracted directly from fir st principles particle-in-cell simulations of relativist collisionless plasma shocks. The spectra are generated by a numerical Fourier transformation of the electrical far-field from each of a large number of particles, sample d directly from the particle-in-cell simulations. Both the electromagnetic field and the non-thermal particle acceleration are self-consistent products of the Weibel two-stream instability. We find that the radiation sp ectrum from a = 15 shock simulation show great resemblance with observed GRB spectra—we compare specifically with that of GRB 000301C. Subject headings:radiation, acceleration of particles, gamma rays: bursts, shock waves, instabilities, magnetic fields, plasmas Radiation from gamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglows is generally believed to be synchrotron radiation. The main ingredients in this type of radiation are a strong magnetic field and a power-law distribution of high-energy electrons. Multiwavelength observations are more or less well fitted by hiding our ignorance about the microphysical details of these ingredients in the parameters: ǫB and ǫe describing the amount of the total shock energy that is deposited in magnetic field and electrons respectively, and p; the slope of the non-thermal
Training Intuitive Decision Making in a Simulated Real-World Environment

Objective: We investigated whether naturalistic, intuitive (pattern recognition–based) decision making can be developed via implicit statistical learning in a simulated real-world environment. Background: To our knowledge, no definitive studies have actually shown that implicit learning plays a causal role in the development of intuitive decision making when the latter is defined as pattern recognition of real-world, or simulated real-world, environmental situations. Method: The simulated environment was presented dynamically so as to induce a sense of simulated locomotion through the scene and over sequences of objects on the ground. During training, participants passively viewed the objects sequences; during test, participants made intuitive decisions about related or unrelated sequences. Results: Intuitive decision making can be developed via implicit learning. Articulatory suppression, which affects working memory, exerted a significant inhibitory effect on the training of intuitive decision making. Intuitive decision making trained in the simulated environment fully transferred to a flat display (but not vice versa). Conclusion: Intuitive decision making is developed by an implicit learning process that is engaged by the meaning inherent in naturalistic scenes. Application: Implicit learning can be used for training intuitive decision making.
Large-scale magnetized outflows from the Virgo Cluster spiral NGC4569

Using the Effelsberg radio telescope at 4.85GHz and 8.35 GHz we discovered large symmetric lobes of polarized radio emission around the strongly HI deficient Virgo cluster spiral galaxy NGC4569. These lobes extend up to 24 kpc from the galactic disk. Our observations were complemented by 1.4 GHz continuum emission from existing HI observations. This is the first time that such huge radio continuum lobes are observed in a cluster spiral galaxy. The eastern lobe seems detached and has a flat spectrum typical for in-situ cosmic ray electron acceleration. The western lobe is diffuse and possesses vertical magnetic fields over its whole volume. The lobes are not powered by an AGN, but probably by a nuclear starburst producing >10^5 supernovae which occurred ~30 Myr ago. Since the radio lobes are symmetric, they resist ram pressure due to the galaxy's rapid motion within the intracluster medium.
A toolkit approach to partially connected operation

Partially connected operation is the circumstance in which the communication link between two computers is intermittent, either by choice or because of failure. This paper describes the design and performance of a user level toolkit that is suited to accessing the home directory of a partially connected user in a bandwidth-efficient manner. Compared to custom file systems for partially connected operation, the toolkit is easier to deploy and provides extra degrees of flexibility because it runs at user level and uses the local file system for its cache. The toolkit makes it possible for unaltered clients to access NFS file systems exported by unaltered servers. The maintenance of consistency between client and server is automatic provided that certain assumptions are upheld, the primary one being that sharing is limited in such a way that there is a "single locus of update. " That is, for extended periods, updates are applied either to the client's cache or directly to the server, but not to both simultaneously. This pattern of use is typical of a user's home directory. Performance is the disadvantage of user level operation. The client's cache is managed by a "caching tool" that services every file system operation and this redirection increases latency substantially.
A low noise amplifier simultaneously achieving input impedance and minimum noise matching

A CMOS complementary capacitive loaded LNA with inductively source degeneration is implemented for 900MHz application using a 0.18-µm CMOS process. In order to achieve simultaneous input impedance and minimum noise matching, the capacitive loading technique is proposed. Owing to the capacitive loading technique, the noise figure (NF) of the proposed LNA can be perfectly close to NFmin while maintaining the source impedance matching by reducing the source degeneration inductor and gate inductor contrast to conventional cascode LNA with inductively source degeneration. The measurements demonstrate that the LNA has a power gain of 12 dB, a NF of 1 dB, an IIP3 of +7.7 dBm, and an input P1-dB of −5 dBm at 900 MHz while drawing 9 mA from a 1.8 V supply voltage.