Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Measurement of the speed of sound in follicular fluid.

BACKGROUND Measurement of ovarian follicles by ultrasound is common practice in fertility treatment. However, the effect of the speed of sound is not taken into account. We present results from a study aimed at measuring this. METHODS The speed of sound was measured in samples of follicular fluid aspirated from patients undergoing fertility treatment. The transmitted and received pulses from a single element ultrasound transducer were recorded using a digital oscilloscope for a pulse passed through a sample of the fluid. The distance over which the pulse travelled was known from calibration with pure water. Variation with temperature was investigated in the range 25-45 degrees C. Dependence on ultrasound frequency, patient and time from aspiration were also investigated. RESULTS The speed of sound in follicular fluid was found to be 1550+/-3 m/s at 37.3 degrees C using 5.0 MHz ultrasound. The speed varied from 1528+/-3 m/s at 24.8 degrees C to 1561+/-3 m/s at 44.8 degrees C. Variation with patient, time and frequency were not detected. CONCLUSION The speed of sound in follicular fluid at body temperature is 1550 m/s. This small difference from the speed assumed by the ultrasound machine corresponds to the systematic bias in volume measurement evident in previously published results.
A 100MHz real-time tone mapping processor with integrated photographic and gradient compression in 0.13 μm technology

As the advance of high quality displays such as light-emitting diode (LED), liquid-crystal-display (LCD) or laser TV, the importance of a real-time high dynamic range (HDR) data processing for display devices increases significantly. Many tone mapping algorithms are proposed for rendering HDR images or videos on display screens. The choice of tone mapping algorithm depends on characteristics of displays such as luminance range, contrast ratio and gamma correction. An ideal HDR tone mapping processor should include different types of tone mapping algorithms and be able to select an appropriate one depending on devices and applications. The photographic tone reproduction has lower complexity and better quality among global tone mapping schemes. The gradient compression, a local tone mapping, is known for detail preservation. In this paper, we present an integrated photographic and gradient tone mapping processor that can be configured for different applications. This design that can process 1024 times 768 images at 60 fps runs at 100 MHz clock and consumes core area of 8.1 mm2 under TSMC 0.13 mum technology with 50% improvement in speed and area compared with previous results.
Development of Multiple Sensor Fusion Experiments for Mechatronics Education

The development of effective training equipment for students in engineering colleges to acquaint them with sensory devices in mechatronics is presented in this paper. This training is focused on sensors, transducers, signal conditioning circuits, and microprocessor interfaces. Software as well as hardware techniques for designing a dynamic measurement system were emphasized in this study. In this paper, a developed integrated sensor module for mechatronics experiments is described. This module consists of incremental shaft encoders, an electronic compass and a vehicle platform. The module will be used as a teaching instrument in the course sensors and transducers for sophomore and junior students in colleges and universities. Applying the Kalman filtering theory, we successfully fused shaft encoders and electronic compass to obtain improved position and heading angle estimation of a test vehicle. Using this experimental module, students can be trained in the concept and effectiveness of multiple-sensor fusion.
Reliance on Faith-Based Organizations for Tangible Assistance in Times of Disaster: Exploring the Influence of Bonding Social Capital

ABSTRACT Although there is a growing amount of research on the role that faith-based organizations play in disaster recovery, there is currently no research that has investigated the influence that social capital has on individual disaster victims’ proclivity to rely on these organizations for recovery assistance. This current exploratory research sought to observe the relationship between individuals’ bonding social capital, in addition to other individual characteristics, and their perceived reliance on faith-based organizations for tangible disaster aid in future events using a national survey administrated by the Associated Press–NORC for Public Affairs Research in 2013. As a by-product of the analysis performed, it is observed that bonding social capital is related to an individual’s perceived reliance on faith-based organizations, whereas other demographic variables such as race are not.
Secondary School Students’ LLL Competencies, and Their Relation with Classroom Structure and Achievement

There is a strong urge to foster lifelong learning (LLL) competencies with its key components – motivation and self-regulated learning – from early on in the education system. School in general is presently not considered to be successful in systematically imparting motivation and self-regulated learning strategies. There is strong evidence that decisive motivational determinants decrease the longer students stay in school. At present, the central sources of information about the situation in Austria are international monitoring studies, which only examine selected aspects of specific target groups, and their interpretability concerning mean values is constricted due to cultural differences. Thus, it is important to conduct additional and more differentiated national surveys of the actual state. This is why this study aimed at answering the following questions: (1) how well are Austrian students equipped for the future, in terms of their lifelong learning competencies, (2) can perceived classroom structure predict students’ LLL, and (3) is there a correlation of students’ LLL with their achievement in the school subjects math and German language. 5366 students (52.1% female) from 36 Austrian schools took part in the online-questionnaire (mean age 15.35 years, SD = 2.45), which measured their perceived LLL competencies in the subjects math and German language, their perceived classroom structure and their achievement. Results showed that the great majority of Austrian students – independent from domain and sex – know and are able to apply cognitive as well as metacognitive learning strategies. With regard to motivation the picture is less satisfactory: whilst students’ self-efficacy is not the problem, there is a lack of interest in the school subjects and they often report to follow performance approach goals. Classroom structure positively predicted students’ goals, interest, self-efficacy and learning strategies. Self-efficacy, performance approach goals, meta-cognitive and deep learning strategies in turn predicted achievement positively, and performance avoidance goals negatively.
Infrared Parallaxes for Methane T Dwarfs

We report final results from our 2.5 yr infrared parallax program carried out with the European Southern Observatory 3.5 m New Technology Telescope and the SOFI infrared camera. Our program targeted precision astrometric observations of 10 T-type brown dwarfs in the J band. Full astrometric solutions (including trigonometric parallaxes) for nine T dwarfs are provided along with proper-motion solutions for a further object. We find that HgCdTe-based infrared cameras are capable of delivering precision differential astrometry. For T dwarfs, infrared observations are to be greatly preferred over the optical, both because they are so much brighter in the infrared, and because their prominent methane absorptions lead to similar effective wavelengths through the J filter for both target and reference stars, which in turn results in a dramatic reduction in differential color refraction effects. We describe a technique for robust bias estimation and linearity correction with the SOFI camera, along with an upper limit to the astrometric distortion of the SOFI optical train. Color-magnitude and spectral type–magnitude diagrams for both L and T dwarfs are presented that show complex and significant structure, with major import for luminosity function and mass function work on T dwarfs. Based on the width of the early L dwarf and late T dwarf color magnitude diagrams, we conclude the brightening of early T dwarfs in the J passband (the "early T hump") is not an age effect, but due to the complexity of brown dwarf cooling curves. Finally, empirical estimates of the "turn on" magnitudes for methane absorption in field T dwarfs and in young stars clusters are provided. These make the interpretation of the T6 dwarf σ Ori J053810.1-023626 as a σ Ori member problematic.
Acute Stress Impairs Recognition for Positive Words—Association with Stress-induced Cortisol Secretion

Some studies suggest that stress-induced effects of cortisol on memory are modulated by the valence of the stimuli to be learned and retrieved. The present study investigated the effect of acute stress-induced cortisol secretion on acquisition and retrieval of pleasant, unpleasant and neutral words. Sixty healthy men were randomly assigned to one of the three experimental groups. Participants were either exposed to a standardized laboratory stressor (the Trier Social Stress Test) before learning a wordlist, or before retrieval, or were not stressed. Free recall and recognition were tested 24 h later. Free recall was not affected by stress exposure. For recognition, there was no main effect of the stressor, but a main effect of valence and a valence by group interaction emerged: recognition for positive words was significantly impaired when subjects were stressed before retrieval. In addition, a positive correlation between the cortisol response and errors of commission was found. The results suggest that acute stress impairs memory for positive stimuli and that stress-induced cortisol secretion interferes with accuracy of memory retrieval, i.e. the ability to discriminate true memories from false ones.
Flexible register management using reference counting

Conventional out-of-order processors that use a unified physical register file allocate and reclaim registers explicitly using a free list that operates as a circular queue. We describe and evaluate a more flexible register management scheme - reference counting. We implement reference counting using a bit-matrix with a column for every physical register and a row for every entity that can hold a physical register, e.g., an in-flight instruction. Columns are NOR'ed together to create a bitvector free list from which registers are allocated using priority encoders. We describe reference counting designs that support micro-architectural techniques including register file power gating, dynamic register move elimination, register file checkpointing, and latency tolerant execution. Performance and circuit simulation show that the energy cost of reference counting is low and is easily recouped by the savings of the techniques it enables.
Modeling and Investigation of Thermal Characteristics of a Water-Cooled Permanent-Magnet Linear Motor

For permanent-magnet linear motors (PMLMs), high-temperature rise can deteriorate their electromagnetic performance and limit their thrust output. A water-cooling system can be employed to reduce the temperature rise and to improve the thrust density. In order to study the thermal performance of a water-cooled, 14-pole, and 12-slot PMLM, a finite-element model and thermal network model are developed. Under continuous duty, the temperature distribution of this PMLM is investigated based on the two developed models, which are validated by experimental results. The effect of the water-cooling system and the impact of its parameters on the temperature rise are investigated. Then, the influence of the temperature rise on the motor thrust force and efficiency is studied. Finally, based on the finite-element model, thermal characteristics of this PMLM under short-time duty and intermittent duty are studied, and the relationship is obtained between the operation duration and the maximum allowed short-time current, as well as the impact of load sustained rate.
An enhanced communication model

The concept of information is often taken for more or less granted in research about information systems. This paper introduces a model starting with Shannon and Weaver data transmission model and ends with knowledge transfer between individual persons. The model is in fact an enhanced communication model giving a framework for discussing problems in the communication process. A specific feature of the model is the aim for providing design guidelines in designing the communication process. The article ends with identifying a need for develop the model further to incorporate also communication within and between organisations of different kinds.
ENGINEERING CHANGE MANAGEMENT-VERIFICATION , VALIDATION , AND TESTING PLANNING TOOL DEVELOPMENT

The majority of products will undergo numerous changes over the course of their product lifecycles, many of which will occur while the products are already in production. Research has shown that these engineering changes can propagate throughout the product of system and affect the functionality of the other components. Previous research in this lab has developed a 7-step method to generate a validation, verification and testing (VV&T) plan to assist change engineers in mitigating the negative effects of engineering change propagation. The proposed method can be a time-consuming and exhaustive process to execute, depending on the scope of the engineering change and the complexity of the system/product in question. As such, a computational support tool was developed that will assist the change engineering in the implementation of the method. The support tool will also assist in the documentation of the engineering change process and will help to minimize the opportunities for human error that can occur. In order to validate the execution of the support tool, an industry case study was used from the original research for the development of the 7-step method. The computational support tool successfully aided the development of a VV&T plan for the execution of an engineering change in an industry case study. However, additional testing is necessary to validate the claims.
Categorization and recognition performance of a memory-impaired group: Evidence for single-system models

Abstract Previous research has demonstrated dissociations between categorization and recognition performance in amnesic patients, supporting the idea that separate memory systems govern these tasks. However, previous research has also demonstrated that these dissociations are predicted by a single-system model that allows for reasonable parameter differences across groups. Generally, previous studies have employed categorization tasks that are less demanding than the recognition tasks. In this study, we distinguish between single-system and multiple-system accounts by testing memory-impaired individuals in a more demanding categorization task. These patients, just like previous amnesic participants, show a dissociation between categorization and recognition when tested in previously employed paradigms. However, they display a categorization deficit when tested in the more challenging categorization task. The results are interpreted as support for a single-system framework in which categorization and recognition depend on one representational system. (JINS, 2003, 9, 394–406.)
Fast Matching of Detour Routes and Service Areas

Novel road-network services, such as ride sharing, spatial crowdsourcing and keyword-aware routing often need to find out whether there exists a route that can go through (or match) a service area. A ride-sharing system, for instance, may need to find for a moving taxi a route that passes through a region in which a passenger is located. A fundamental question is: given two locations s and t, and an area A on the road network, is there a “reasonably short” route from s to t that also crosses A? This Route and Area Matching (ROAM) query is important as 1) its efficient evaluation allows the application involved to recommend appropriate services to objects in an online manner; 2) its algorithm can be incorporated into some sophisticated systems to optimize their performance. Despite its importance, the ROAM query has not been well studied especially when “service area” instead of “service point” is concerned. We examine efficient ROAM query algorithms. Particularly, we develop solutions for testing the existence of a ρ-route, which is an s-t path that passes through A, with a length of at most (1 + ρ) times the shortest distance between s and t. We propose index-free and index-based algorithms. Our index structures, with a size linear to the number of road network nodes, enable significant query improvement over baseline approaches. We have performed extensive experiments on several large road network datasets to validate the efficiency and scalability of our approaches. In addition, we incorporate our efficient algorithm to an existing keyword-aware routing system and one dynamic ride-sharing system. Our experiments show that an efficient ROAM query algorithm helps improve the performance of these systems.
An Approach to Improving Image Classification Using Visual Attention Weight Order

Combined with visual attention mechanism and cognitive psychology, a new model of visual perception VAWO (Visual Attention Weight Order) is proposed to model image regions based on multiple visual attention mechanism of human’s eye. The focus area of the image can be obtained from the visual attention weight of image regions and the semantic expression of different regional object will be analyzed in the image. Experiments of image classification with Local semantic feature vector is presented and the results shows that the new model proposed in this paper can recognize the focus area of the image precisely and improve image classification in precision.
Lipolytic Activity of Svetol®, a Decaffeinated Green Coffee Bean Extract

The beneficial health effects of chlorogenic acids (CGAs), major components of coffee beans, are well known and have been attributed to multiple mechanisms of action. However, the lipolytic activity of CGAs does not appear to have been reported. We studied the effects of varying concentrations of Svetol®, a decaffeinated green coffee bean extract enriched in CGAs, on the liberation of free fatty acids from human adipocytes following short‐term (2 h) and long‐term (192 h) exposure. The results showed that although lipolytic activity observed following short‐term incubation could be tentatively linked to residual caffeine traces in the sample, longer‐term exposure clearly showed the effects of Svetol® on release of free fatty acids, and this effect was not due to caffeine. The results of this study provide a further mechanism by which to explain the long‐term health benefits of CGAs and Svetol®. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Renewable energy ontology

Renewable energy applications nowadays are a critical factor to their success. Making sure that a specific information, service or product from an online provider is reliable and trustworthy may sometimes be a difficult task. The World Wide Web (WWW) is an open environment in which every person is allowed to populate some information. The accuracy or reliability of such information, to some extent, is unknown, and therefore cannot be trusted. In this paper, we argued that using ontologies may form a useful tool to find the best renewable energy provider. The contribution of this paper is to develop ontology concepts for measuring such "goodness". Common and frequent concepts from five popular and trusted online renewable energy providers were extracted, refined, and then checked against nine other online providers. These providers are also judged by experts who are renewable energy specialists. The results discussed in this paper have shown that the proposed approach has achieved high matching score to the experts' judgments.
Shortest inspection-path queries in simple polygons

We want to preprocess a simple n-vertex polygon P to quickly determine the shortest path p from a fixed source point s ∈ P to view a set Q ⊆ P of query points (i.e., such that each point q ∈ Q is visible from some point on the path p). We call such queries shortest inspection-path queries. For |Q| ≤ 2 we describe data structures that answer such queries in logarithmic time. The structures have linear (for |Q| = 1) respectively quadratic (for |Q| = 2) size and preprocessing time. For |Q| = 2 we also present a data structure with linear preprocessing time and space which achieves for any > 0 a query time of O( 1 2 logn) at the expense of providing only a (1 + )-approximate answer.
HC-HA/PTX3 Purified From Amniotic Membrane as Novel Regenerative Matrix: Insight Into Relationship Between Inflammation and Regeneration

Purpose Human limbal palisade of Vogt is an ideal model for studying and practicing regenerative medicine due to their accessibility. Nonresolving inflammation is a common manifestation of limbal stem cell deficiency, which is the major cause of corneal blindness, and presents as a threat to the success of transplanted limbal epithelial stem cells. Clinical studies have shown that the efficacy of transplantation of limbal epithelial stem cells can be augmented by transplantation of cryopreserved human amniotic membrane (AM), which exerts anti-inflammatory, antiscarring, and antiangiogenic action to promote wound healing. Methods Review of published data to determine the molecular action mechanism explaining how AM exerts the aforementioned therapeutic actions. Results From the water-soluble extract of cryopreserved AM, we have biochemically purified one novel matrix component termed heavy chain (HC)-hyaluronan (HA)/pentraxin 3 (PTX3) as the key relevant tissue characteristic responsible for the aforementioned AM's efficacy. Heavy chain–HA is a complex formed by a covalent linkage between HA and HC1 of inter-α-trypsin inhibitor (IαI) by tumor necrosis factor-stimulated gene-6 (TSG-6). This complex may then be tightly associated with PTX3 to form HC-HA/PTX3 complex. Besides exerting an anti-inflammatory, antiscarring, and antiangiogenic effects, HC-HA/PTX3 complex also uniquely maintains limbal niche cells to support the quiescence of limbal epithelial stem cells. Conclusions We envision that HC-HA/PTX3 purified from AM can be used as a unique substrate to refine ex vivo expansion of limbal epithelial stem cells by maintaining stem cell quiescence, self-renewal and fate decision. Furthermore, it can also be deployed as a platform to launch new therapeutics in regenerative medicine by mitigating nonresolving inflammation and reinforcing the well-being of stem cell niche.
Specialization in the medial temporal lobe for processing of objects and scenes

There has been considerable debate as to whether the hippocampus and perirhinal cortex may subserve both memory and perception. We administered a series of oddity tasks, in which subjects selected the odd stimulus from a visual array, to amnesic patients with either selective hippocampal damage (HC group) or more extensive medial temporal damage, including the perirhinal cortex (MTL group). All patients performed normally when the stimuli could be discriminated using simple visual features, even if faces or complex virtual reality scenes were presented. Both patient groups were, however, severely impaired at scene discrimination when a significant demand was placed on processing spatial information across viewpoint independent representations, while only the MTL group showed a significant deficit in oddity judgments of faces and objects when object viewpoint independent perception was emphasized. These observations provide compelling evidence that the human hippocampus and perirhinal cortex are critical to processes beyond long‐term declarative memory and may subserve spatial and object perception, respectively. ©2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.