Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Two novel methods for compression of fluorescent dye cell images

This paper presents two novel methods for compression of fluorescent dye cell images. The compression methods achieve high compression ratio by pseudo-quantizing the pixel gray levels according to image statistics and extracting and saving the useful regions of the image. The proposed algorithms produce a better compression over the existing lossless image formats in the case of fluorescent dye cell images and this idea of compression can be further extended to other images.
Activation of Endothelial Nitric Oxide Synthase by a Vanadium Compound Ameliorates Pressure Overload-Induced Cardiac Injury in Ovariectomized Rats

We here investigated the effect of bis(1-oxy-2-pyridinethiolato) oxovanadium (IV), [VO(OPT)], against myocardial hypertrophy and cardiac functional recovery in pressure overload-induced hypertrophy in ovariectomized female rats and defined mechanisms underlying its cardioprotective action. Wistar rats subjected to bilateral ovariectomy were further treated with abdominal aortic stenosis. VO(OPT) (containing 1.25 and 2.50 mg of vanadium per kg) was administered orally once a day for 14 days starting from 2 weeks after aortic banding. Treatment with VO(OPT) significantly inhibited pressure overload-induced increase both in the heart weight:body weight ratio and the lung weight:body weight ratio. VO(OPT) also attenuated hypertrophy-induced impaired left ventricular end-diastolic pressure, left ventricular developed pressure, and left ventricular contractility (±dp/dtmax). VO(OPT) treatment significantly restored pressure overload-induced impaired endothelial NO synthase activity with concomitant increased phosphorylation of endothelial NO synthase (Ser1179). Moreover, VO(OPT) treatment significantly restored pressure overload-induced reduced Akt activity, as indicated by increased phosphorylation at Ser473 and at Thr308. Treatment with VO(OPT) also secondarily inhibited calpastatin and dystrophin breakdown and decreased myosin light chain phosphorylation. Finally, VO(OPT) treatment significantly attenuated mortality after repeated isoproterenol administration in pressure overloaded-ovariectomized rats. Taken together, VO(OPT) attenuates cardiac myocytes hypertrophy in vivo in pressure overload-induced hypertrophy in ovariectomized rats and prevents the process from hypertrophy to heart failure. These effects are mediated by inhibition of calpastatin and dystrophin breakdown in addition to increased Akt and endothelial NO synthase activities.
DIALOGUE-ACT TAGGING USING SMART FEATURE SELECTION; RESULTS ON MULTIPLE CORPORA

This paper presents an overview of our on-going work on dialogue-act classification. Results are presented on the ICSI, switchboard, and on a selection of the AMI corpus, setting a baseline for forthcoming research. For these corpora the best accuracy scores obtained are 89.27%, 65.68% and 59.76%, respectively. We introduce a smart compression technique for feature selection and compare the performance from a subset of the AMI transcriptions with AMI-ASR output for the same subset.
Hybrid maintenance cost optimization for EPC brake system of PMSM driven rail vehicle

This paper proposed a novel strategy to optimize maintenance costs of PMSM EPC system by combining both maintenance optimization and control optimization. The proposed infrastructure is divided into two parts: brake optimal control part and maintenance reconfiguration part. Compared with traditional maintenance schedule optimization problems, optimal control is executed in advance in order to relieve the wear of brake shoe. The results show that accurate estimation of the demagnetization condition was obtained, and real-time adaptive control for the optimal p-braking force profile was generated, which can effectively relieve brake shoe wear.
When Being Discrepant from One's Ideal or Ought Selves Hurts: The Moderating Role of Neuroticism

Self–discrepancy theory posits that people experience emotional consequences when they perceive discrepancies between their actual and possible selves. However, the extent to which people react emotionally to these self–discrepancies (i.e. ideal, ought and undesired) may be a function of individual differences in neuroticism. Across both experimental (Study 1; N = 155) and correlational designs (Study 2; N = 139) involving college students, the authors demonstrated that neuroticism moderated the discrepancy–emotion associations such that high–neuroticism individuals showed elevated depression and anxiety symptoms when their self–discrepancies were activated. The heightened symptoms were maintained over time. Negative repetitive thoughts (i.e. rumination and worry) were examined as potential mediating mechanisms between the discrepancy × neuroticism interaction and symptoms. Partial support was obtained in that rumination mediated between undesired discrepancy × neuroticism interaction and anxious/depressive symptoms. Implications and possible theoretical extensions for self–discrepancy theory are discussed. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Contribution of Endothelin 1 to the Vascular Effects of Diesel Exhaust Inhalation in Humans

Diesel exhaust inhalation impairs vascular function, and, although the underlying mechanism remains unclear, endothelin (ET) 1 and NO are potential mediators. The aim of this study was to identify whether diesel exhaust inhalation affects the vascular actions of ET-1 in humans. In a randomized, double-blind crossover study, 13 healthy male volunteers were exposed to either filtered air or dilute diesel exhaust (331±13 &mgr;g/m3). Plasma concentrations of ET-1 and big-ET-1 were determined at baseline and throughout the 24-hour study period. Bilateral forearm blood flow was measured 2 hours after the exposure during infusion of either ET-1 (5 pmol/min) or the ETA receptor antagonist, BQ-123 (10 nmol/min) alone and in combination with the ETB receptor antagonist, BQ-788 (1 nmol/min). Diesel exhaust exposure had no effect on plasma ET-1 and big-ET-1 concentrations (P>0.05 for both) or 24-hour mean blood pressure or heart rate (P>0.05 for all). ET-1 infusion increased plasma ET-1 concentrations by 58% (P<0.01) but caused vasoconstriction only after diesel exhaust exposure (−17% versus 2% after air; P<0.001). In contrast, diesel exhaust exposure reduced vasodilatation to isolated BQ-123 infusion (20% versus 59% after air; P<0.001) but had no effect on vasodilatation to combined BQ-123 and BQ-788 administration (P>0.05). Diesel exhaust inhalation increases vascular sensitivity to ET-1 and reduces vasodilatation to ETA receptor antagonism despite unchanged plasma ET-1 concentrations. Given the tonic interaction between the ET and NO systems, we conclude that diesel exhaust inhalation alters vascular reactivity to ET-1 probably through its effects on NO bioavailability.
Doing Childhoods in the Context of HIV and AIDS: Young Children in Early Schooling Speak

This study investigated children's experiences and understandings of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Grade 3 children (n=31) from the province of KwaZulu-Natal aged between 8–11 years were participants in the study. Data were collected through a four-stage focus group process including activities such as diagrammatic mapping, drawing, timelines, projective techniques and ranking exercises. The findings suggest that the meanings children make about HIV and AIDS are contextual and situational. Moreover, the contexts in which children live act as power sites where struggles over meaning and meaning making occur.
Neurobiological response to EMDR therapy in clients with different psychological traumas

We assessed cortical activation differences in real-time upon exposure to traumatic memory between two distinct groups of psychologically traumatized clients also in comparison with healthy controls. We used electroencephalography (EEG) to compare neuronal activation throughout the bilateral stimulation phase of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) sessions. We compared activation between the first (T0) and the last (T1) session, the latter performed after processing the index trauma. The group including all clients showed significantly higher cortical activity in orbito-frontal cortex at T0 shifting at T1 toward posterior associative regions. However, the subgroup of clients with chronic exposure to the traumatic event showed a cortical firing at both stages which was closer to that of controls. For the first time EEG monitoring enabled to disclose neurobiological differences between groups of clients with different trauma histories during the reliving of the traumatic event. Cortical activations in clients chronically exposed to traumatic memories were moderate, suggesting an association between social and environmental contexts with the neurobiological response to trauma exposure and psychotherapy.
The impact of inpatient boarding on emergency department crowding: a discrete-event simulation study

The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of inpatient boarding on the degree of Emergency Department (ED) overcrowding. We developed a discrete-event simulation (DES) approach to model ED patient flow based on a census of 26,984 patients from January through May, 2008. We modeled the Emergency Department of the University of California, Davis, Medical Center (UCDMC). This hospital is a Level 1 academic trauma center with an annual ED census of approximately 60,000. We used the National Emergency Department Over-Crowding Scale (NEDOCS) as our primary performance metric. Our decision variable was the boarder-released-ratio, which we defined as the ratio of admitted patients whose boarding time is zero to all admitted patients. Our analysis shows that under the current boarder-released-ratio conditions at UCDMC, 88.4% of days were defined as "Overcrowded+" (a NEDOCS score of over 100). When the boarder-released-ratio was increased from 0% to 50%, Overcrowded+ days decreased from 88.4% to 68.0%. Likewise, when the boarder-released-ratio was 100% (no patients held in the ED awaiting inpatient beds), the Overcrowded+ ratio fell to 50.4%. These results show that inpatient boarding significantly impacts the NEDOCS score. This analysis provides a quantification of the impact of boarding on emergency department patient crowding.
Using ART1 Neural Networks for Clustering Computer Forensics Documents

Computer forensic text corpora are usually very heterogeneous and easily surpass the terabyte range. Classification methods should be an aid in the exploration of such corpora, but they do not help in the task of thematically grouping together documents. In this paper, we propose the use of Adaptive Resonance Theory (ART), applying the ART1 algorithm, to help in the task of thematically grouping together computer forensics documents into clusters. For the clustering approach we present the defined conceptual model and the software package implemented, in which a modified version of the ART1 algorithm was developed to improve the running time. Furthermore, real world forensic experiments were carried out to validate the model using a two-fold approach with a quantitative and a qualitative analysis method. The results demonstrate that our approach can generate good clusters when compared to the gold standard defined by domain area experts, with one clear advantage over other clustering methods (e.g. SOM and k-means) since there is no need to supply parameters beforehand such as the number of clusters. keywords computer forensics; document clustering; artificial neural networks; adaptive reasonance theory; ART1 algorithm Using ART1 Neural Networks for Clustering Computer Forensics Documents Georger Rommel Ferreira de Araujo(1) and Celia Ghedini Ralha(2) (1) Technical-Scientific Unit, Federal Police Department, Juazeiro do Norte, Brazil, rommel dot grfa at dpf dot gov dot br (2) Computer Science Department, University of Brasilia (UnB), Brasilia, Brazil, ghedini at cic dot unb dot br
Automatic Range Image Registration in the Markov Chain

In this paper, a novel entropy that can describe both long and short-tailed probability distributions of constituents of a thermodynamic system out of its thermodynamic limit is first derived from the Lyapunov function for a Markov chain. We then maximize this entropy for the estimation of the probabilities of possible correspondences established using the traditional closest point criterion between two overlapping range images. When we change our viewpoint to look carefully at the minimum solution to the probability estimate of the correspondences, the iterative range image registration process can also be modeled as a Markov chain in which lessons from past experience in estimating those probabilities are learned. To impose the two-way constraint, outliers are explicitly modeled due to the almost ubiquitous occurrence of occlusion, appearance, and disappearance of points in either image. The estimated probabilities of the correspondences are finally embedded into the powerful mean field annealing scheme for global optimization, leading the camera motion parameters to be estimated in the weighted least-squares sense. A comparative study using real images shows that the proposed algorithm usually outperforms the state-of-the-art ICP variants and the latest genetic algorithm for automatic overlapping range image registration.
Acute social stress increases biochemical and self report markers of stress without altering spatial learning in humans.

OBJECTIVES Spatial learning is shown to be influenced by acute stress in both human and other animals. However, the intricacies of this relationship are unclear. Based on prior findings we hypothesized that compared to a control condition, a social stress condition would not affect spatial learning performance despite elevated biochemical markers of stress. METHODS The present study tested the effects of social stress in human males and females on a subsequent spatial learning task. Social stress induction consisted of evaluative stress (the Trier Social Stress Test, TSST) compared to a placebo social stress. RESULTS Compared to the placebo condition, the TSST resulted in significantly elevated cortisol and alpha amylase levels at multiple time points following stress induction. In accord, cognitive appraisal measures also showed that participants in the TSST group experienced greater perceived stress compared to the placebo group. However, there were no group differences in performance on a spatial learning task. CONCLUSION Our findings suggest that unlike physiological stress, social stress does not result in alterations in spatial learning in humans. It is possible that moderate social evaluative stress in humans works to prevent acute stress-mediated alterations in hippocampal learning processes.
Couple Burnout: Causes and Cures

InCouple Burnout, Ayala Pines offers a unique model to combat relationship burnout by describing the phenomenon of couples burnout; its causes, danger signs and symptoms; and the most effective strategies therapists can use. Distinguishing burnout from problems caused by clinical depression or other pathologies, Pines combines three major clinical perspectives that are used by couple therapists--psychodynamic, systems and behavioral--with additional approaches that focus attention on the social- psychological perspective and existential perspective to couples' problems.
Human teams for large scale multirobot control

We are developing an architecture for controlling robot teams based on considering how control difficulty for different tasks grows with increases in team size. Our analysis suggests that assignments of persons to commander (single commands to entire robot team), operator (commands to individual robots), and coordinator (control of interdependent robots) roles can lead to the most efficient organization. The ability to assign tasks within or between operators makes scheduling these interactions an important factor in team performance. Two possible ways to organize operators are through Individual Assignments of robots or as a Call Center in which operators service robots from the population as needed. In recent experiments we have found that participants performing an Urban Search And Rescue (USAR) foraging task using waypoint control were at or over their limits when controlling 12 robots. The present study uses the same robots, environment, and level of autonomy but with teams of two operators assigned to control 24 robots. These operators controlled teams of 12 robots in the Individual Assignment condition. In the Call Center condition operators shared control of the 24 robots. For this task and level of robot autonomy Individual Assignment participants performed marginally better searching larger regions but without finding more victims.
Impact of a Fault Management Architecture on the Performance of a Component-Based System

Increasingly, the application providers are using a separate fault management system that offers out-of-the-box monitoring and alarms support for application instances. A fault management system is usually distributed in nature and consists of a set of management components that does both fault detection and can trigger actions, for example, automatic restart of monitored components. Such a distributed structure supports scalability and helps to ensure that an application meets its quality requirements. However, successful recovery of an application then depends on the fault management architecture and the status of the management components. This paper presents a simulation model that accounts for the effect of management-architecture based coverage on the mean throughput of an application. Such a model would benefit the application providers for choosing the right fault management architecture for their applications.
Performance based on selective multipath reception

As wireless data rate requirements increase, multipath delay spread becomes an increasingly significant limitation on the performance of wireless systems. Techniques such as RAKE reception combat time dispersion by combining multipath components. Alternative implementations of RAKE receivers isolate the strongest multipath components and then shift each component to a common timing reference. The optimal timing reference in frequency-selective fading channels remains an open problem. This paper examines the impact pulse shaping and multipath delay spread on both signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and bit-error rate performance. The receiver being considered achieves symbol synchronization to the strongest multipath component. The performance when synchronization is achieved based on the first multipath component arrival is also found and used to illustrate performance differences. Multipath delay distributions used on the performance calculations are derived from indoor measurements. Pulse shapes considered in the analysis include root-raised cosine, raised cosine, and Gaussian filters. SNR losses are shown to range between 1-6 dB for bit rates of 10 Mb/s. Results show that synchronization of the receiver to the strongest multipath component gives a 1-3 dB advantage over synchronization to the first arriving multipath component.
The Impact of Maternal Literacy and Participation Programs: Evidence from a Randomized Evaluation in India

Using a randomized field experiment in India, we evaluate the effectiveness of adult literacy and parental involvement interventions in improving children's learning. Households were assigned to receive either adult literacy (language and math) classes for mothers, training for mothers on how to enhance their children's learning at home, or a combination of the two programs. All three interventions had significant but modest impacts on childrens math scores. The interventions also increased mothers' test scores in both language and math, as well as a range of other outcomes reflecting greater involvement of mothers in their children's education.
Finding similar regions in many strings

Algorithms for finding similar, or highly conserved, regions in a group of sequences are at the core of many molecular biology problems. We solve three main open questions in this area. Assume that we are given n DNA sequences 81,. , an. The Consensus Patterns problem, which has been widely studied in bioinformatics research [26, 16, 12, 25, 4, 6, 15, 22, 24, 271, in its simplest form, asks for a region of length L in each ai, and a median string s of length L so that the total Hamming distance from B to these regions is minimized. We show the problem is NPhard and give a polynomial time approximation scheme (PTAS) for it. We also give a PTAS for the problem under the original measure of [26, 16, 12, 251. As an interesting application of OUT analysis, we further obtain a PTAS for a restricted (but still NP-hard) version of the important star alignment problem allowing at most constant number of gaps, each of arbitrary length, in each sequence. The Closest String problem [Z, 3, 7, 9, 181 asks for the smallest d and a string d which is within Hamming distance d to each a;. The problem is NP-hard [7, 181. [3] gives a polynomial time algorithm for constant d. For super-logarithmic d, [Z, 91 give efficient approximation algorithms using linear program relaxation techniques. The best polynomial time approximation has ratio $ for all d, given by [18] ([9] also independently claimed the $ ratio but only for super-logarithmic d). We settle the problem with a PTAS. We then give the fist nontrivial better-than-2 approximation with ratio 2 & for the more eluive Closest Substring problem [IS]: find a string d of length L such that, for each i, s is within Hamming distance d from home substring, of length L, of si.
It Takes Two to Tango: Power Dependence in the Governance of Public-Private e-Government Infrastructures

National electronic identification systems (e-IDs) are key e-government infrastructures that form the backbone of e-government services. When developed via public-private partnerships (PPP), such e-government infrastructures require appropriate governance arrangements to sustain a delicate balance between governments and the private actors involved. Using the lens of power dependence theory, we investigate the ongoing tender process of the third-generation e-ID in Denmark. The key actors are public agencies and the financial sector. Early findings illustrate how contextual factors related to market, technology, regulations, and social norms affect the distribution of power dependence between the actors; such distribution will eventually shape the governance arrangement resulting from the tender. Through this study, we expect to contribute to research on governance of public-private e-government infrastructures, to research on large scale infrastructure procurement processes and e-ID, and to the theoretical development of power-dependence theory.
An Optimization Approach to Bearing-Only Navigation with Applications to a 2-D Unicycle Model

In this paper we consider the problem of bearingbased visual homing. Given a mobile robot which can measure bearing directions corresponding to known landmarks with respect to a fixed reference frame, our goal is to control the robot toward a known “home” location. We propose a control law based on the gradient field of a Lyapunov function, and give sufficient conditions on this function which ensure global convergence. We then derive a sliding mode control law for a unicycle model which follows this gradient field. Both controllers do not depend on range information. Finally, we show how our framework can be used to characterize the sensitivity of a home location with respect to noise in the specified bearings.