Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Adaptive wideband beamforming with response variation constraints

A response variation (RV) element is introduced to control the consistency of the wideband beamformer's response over the frequency range of interest at the look direction. By constraining the value of RV in different ways, we develop two novel adaptive wideband beamformers based on the traditional least mean square (LMS) adaptation and the convex optimization method, respectively. Both beamformers can achieve an improved output SINR compared to the conventional Frost beamformer due to their increased number of degrees of freedom in suppressing the interferences, as shown in simulations.
Inhibitory Effects of Phylligenin on the Proliferation of Cultured Rat Neural Progenitor Cells

Abstract － Neural progenitor cells (NPCs) differentiate into astrocytes, neurons and oligodendrocytes, which is controlled by various factors in brain. Recent evidences suggest that small molecules modulating the proliferation and differentiation of NPCs may have therapeutic value as well as the potential use as chemical probes. Phylligenin is a lignan with anti-inflammatory activity that is isolated from the fruits of Forsythia koreana. We investigated effects of phylligenin on proliferation and differentiation of NPCs. Treatment of phylligenin decreased the number of proliferating NPCs in culture without effects on the differentiation and survival of neural cells such as neurons and astrocytes. To examine the mechanism of the decreased NPCs number, we performed cell cycle analysis. Proliferation of NPCs was decreased via G1-S transition block by phylligenin treatment, and it was mediated by the increase of p21 level. However, phylligenin did not induce apoptosis of NPCs as determined by TUNEL assay and PARP cleavage. We also found that viability of glioma cell lines such as C6 and U87MG glioma cells, but not that of primary neuron and astrocyte, was inhibited by phylligenin. These results suggest that phylligenin selectively inhibits proliferation of rapidly growing cells such as neural stem cells and glioma cells. Given that the possible role of brain tumor stem cells in the pathology of brain cancers, the inhibitory effects of phylligenin might be useful in the development of new therapeutic agents against brain cancers.Keywords: Neural progenitor cells, Phylligenin, Proliferation, p21, Glioma
Personalized Web search results with profile comparisons

The information explosion on the Internet makes it hard for users to obtain required information from the Web searched results in a more personalized way. For the same input word, most search engines return the same result to each user without taking into consideration user preference. For many users, it is no longer sufficient to get non-customized results. It is crucial to analyze users' search and browsing behaviors based on searching keywords entered by users, the clicking rate of each link in the result and the time they spend on each site. To this end, we have proposed a method to derive user searching profiles. We have also proposed a mechanism to derive document profiles, based on similarity score of documents. In this paper, we discuss how to use our model to combine the user searching profiles and the document profile, with a view to presenting customized search results to the users.
Interaction-Aware Data Management in the Cloud

Cloud computing is a recent trend of technology aimed at providing on-demand Information Technology (IT) services usually priced on a pay-per-use model. One of the main services provided by a cloud computing platform consists of the data management service, or data service for short. This service accepts responsibility for the installation, configuration and maintenance of database systems, as well as for efficient access to stored data. This paper presents a framework, denoted QIDMaC, for management of cloud databases. The proposed framework aims to provide software infrastructure required for the provision of data services in cloud computing environments in an efficiently manner. In this sense, the proposed solution seeks to solve some outstanding problems in the context of cloud databases, such as: query dispatching and scheduling. The proposed approach extends previous work by adding important features such as: support for unpredictable workloads and the use of information about query interactions. Support for the seasonal workloads is related to one of the main properties of cloud computing: fast elasticity. Query interactions can provide significant impacts on database systems's performance. For this reason, QIDMaC uses information about these interactions in order to reduce the execution time of the workloads submitted to the data service and thereby increase the service provider profit. In order to demonstrate the QIDMaC efficiency an experimental evaluation using TPC-H benchmark was performed on PostgreSQL. The results show that the designed solution has the potential to increase the profit of cloud data service providers.
Equation of state of nucleon matter and neutron star structure

Properties of dense nucleon matter and the structure of neutron stars are studied using variational chain summation methods and the new Argonne ${v}_{18}$ two-nucleon interaction, which provides an excellent fit to all of the nucleon-nucleon scattering data in the Nijmegen database. The neutron star gravitational mass limit obtained with this interaction is 1.67${M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}. $ Boost corrections to the two-nucleon interaction, which give the leading relativistic effect of order ${(v/c)}^{2},$ as well as three-nucleon interactions, are also included in the nuclear Hamiltonian. Their successive addition increases the mass limit to 1.80 and 2.20 ${M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}. $ Hamiltonians including a three-nucleon interaction predict a transition in neutron star matter to a phase with neutral pion condensation at a baryon number density of $\ensuremath{\sim}0.2 {\mathrm{fm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}. $ Neutron stars predicted by these Hamiltonians have a layer with a thickness on the order of tens of meters, over which the density changes rapidly from that of the normal to the condensed phase. The material in this thin layer is a mixture of the two phases. We also investigate the possibility of dense nucleon matter having an admixture of quark matter, described using the bag model equation of state. Neutron stars of 1.4${M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$ do not appear to have quark matter admixtures in their cores. However, the heaviest stars are predicted to have cores consisting of a quark and nucleon matter mixture. These admixtures reduce the maximum mass of neutron stars from 2.20 to 2.02 (1.91) ${M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}$ for bag constant $B=200 (122) {\mathrm{M}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}/\mathrm{f}\mathrm{m}}^{3}. $ Stars with pure quark matter in their cores are found to be unstable. We also consider the possibility that matter is maximally incompressible above an assumed density, and show that realistic models of nuclear forces limit the maximum mass of neutron stars to be below 2.5${M}_{\ensuremath{\bigodot}}. $ The effects of the phase transitions on the composition of neutron star matter and its adiabatic index $\ensuremath{\Gamma}$ are discussed.
Cross-level moderating effects of Conscientiousness on within-person relationships of self-efficacy to effort allocation

ABSTRACT Studies examining within-person level self-efficacy effects on effort allocation have produced mixed results, ranging from positive, to null, to negative. Drawing on individual differences literature, we propose that the within-person relationship between self-efficacy and effort allocation depends on Conscientiousness, a personality trait reflecting the will to achieve and capacity to self-discipline. Individuals with higher levels of Conscientiousness will respond to lower self-efficacy with increased effort, resulting in an inverse relationship between self-efficacy and effort expenditure. In contrast, individuals with lower levels of Conscientiousness will need higher self-efficacy to stay task focused and sustain effort allocation, leading to a positive effect of self-efficacy on effort expenditure. Findings from a 3-week daily diary study generally support the hypothesized moderating effects of Conscientiousness. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Family Labor Supply in Urban China

In this paper, we analyze family labor supply in urban China using discretized neo-classical labor supply model, where we take into account the unobserved heterogeneity of each spouse and their correlation, unobservability and measurement errors of the wage rates, and the correlation of the wage and preferences. The correlation of preference between spouses is also taken into account. Elasticities of labor supply are calculated. We also simulate the effect of tax policy on the labor supply. The elasticities are found to be quite small, but the signs are in accordance with the general findings for other countries in the literature. JEL CODES: J22, H31, C14, R23
Adaptive image normalisation based on block processing for enhancement of fingerprint image

Improved algorithms for enhancement of fingerprint images, which have the adaptive normalisation based on block processing, in the automatic fingerprint verification system, are proposed. To obtain an enhanced fingerprint image, first an input image is partitioned into sub-blocks with the size of K/spl times/L and the region of interest of the fingerprint image is acquired. The parameters for the image normalisation are then adaptively determined according to the statistics of each block. Utilising these parameters, the block image is normalised for the next process. The proposed algorithms are tested with the NIST fingerprint images and verified to have superb performance.
Control of supercavitating vehicles in the vertical plane using sliding mode

Because of supercavitation, there is no buoyancy force to balance the gravity of supercavitating vehicle. In addition, there exists the nonlinear planing force on the vehicle. The motion of vehicle in the vertical plane tends to be unstable and the dynamic model of it is complicated and nonlinear. By introducing a feed-forward compensation and nonlinear state feedback, the nonlinear system could be treated as a multi-input and multi-output (MIMO) linear system. Due to the time-varying factors and un-modelled dynamics of system, the sliding mode control is used to design the controller for motion of supercavitation vehicle in the vertical plane. The results of simulation show the effectiveness of the controller designed in the paper.
A Contact-Assisted Approach to Protein Structure Structure Prediction and Its Assessment in CASP 10

Among different approaches to predict the 3D structure of a protein, one important idea is to predict a protein residueresidue contact map and then construct a full 3D structure from the contact-map. Instead of building a structure purely from contacts information, here we describe a contactassisted structure prediction approach that uses only a few known contacts to improve the quality of already predicted models. Our approach for contact assisted structure prediction uses a novel method for selecting and refining protein structural models. With input test data as the predicted structures for 15 protein targets used in the contact-assisted prediction category in the 10th Critical Assessment of Techniques for Protein Structure Prediction (CASP10), we demonstrate that weighted contacts satisfaction score along with other established model quality assessment scores is a promising technique for selecting good structures and ultimately for better structure prediction. Availability: http://protein.rnet. missouri.edu/contact_assisted/index.html
Does This Computational Theory Solve the Right Problem? Marr, Gibson, and the Goal of Vision

David Marr's book Vision attempted to formulate a thoroughgoing formal theory of perception. Marr borrowed much of the “computational” level from James Gibson: a proper understanding of the goal of vision, the natural constraints, and the available information are prerequisite to describing the processes and mechanisms by which the goal is achieved. Yet, as a research program leading to a computational model of human vision, Marr's program did not succeed. This article asks why, using the perception of 3D shape as a morality tale. Marr presumed that the goal of vision is to recover a general-purpose Euclidean description of the world, which can be deployed for any task or action. On this formulation, vision is underdetermined by information, which in turn necessitates auxiliary assumptions to solve the problem. But Marr's assumptions did not actually reflect natural constraints, and consequently the solutions were not robust. We now know that humans do not in fact recover Euclidean structure—rather, they reliably perceive qualitative shape (hills, dales, courses, ridges), which is specified by the second-order differential structure of images. By recasting the goals of vision in terms of our perceptual competencies, and doing the hard work of analyzing the information available under ecological constraints, we can reformulate the problem so that perception is determined by information and prior knowledge is unnecessary.
Position‐based facial animation synthesis

We propose an integrated facial dynamics model addressing the animation of 3D humanoid faces in real time. The computational model mimics facial motion by reproducing the layered anatomical structure of a human head including the bony structure, overlapping facial muscles and the skin. The model is flexible enough to animate face meshes of various shape, connectivity, and scale. Different from previously proposed approaches based on mass–spring networks, overshooting problems are avoided by simulating the dynamics through a position‐based scheme, which allows for real‐time performance, control, and robustness. Experiments demonstrate that convincing expressive facial animation can be interactively prototyped on consumer class platforms. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Kernel-based learning of cast shadows from a physical model of light sources and surfaces for low-level segmentation

In background subtraction, cast shadows induce silhouette distortions and object fusions hindering performance of high level algorithms in scene monitoring. We introduce a nonparametric framework to model surface behavior when shadows are cast on them. Based on physical properties of light sources and surfaces, we identify a direction in RGB space on which background surface values under cast shadows are found. We then model the posterior distribution of lighting attenuation under cast shadows and foreground objects, which allows differentiation of foreground and cast shadow values with similar chromaticity. The algorithms are completely unsupervised and take advantage of scene activity to learn model parameters. Spatial gradient information is also used to reinforce the learning process. Contributions are two-fold. Firstly, with a better model describing cast shadows on surfaces, we achieve a higher success rate in segmenting moving cast shadows in complex scenes. Secondly, obtaining such models is a step toward a full scene parametrization where light source properties, surface reflectance models and scene 3D geometry are estimated for low-level segmentation.
A Robust Output Feedback Consensus Protocol for Networked Negative-Imaginary Systems

Abstract The robust output feedback consensus problem for homogeneous networked Negative-Imaginary ( NI ) systems is investigated in this paper. By virtue of the NI systems stability theorem, a set of reasonable yet elegant conditions are derived for guaranteeing consensus under L2 disturbances and NI model uncertainty. Furthermore, the eventual convergence sets of several special NI systems that are commonly studied in the literature are also presented. It is shown how the results in this work embed and generalise earlier results to these classes of systems. Numerical examples are given to illustrate the results of this paper.
Modified Trajectory Shaping Guidance for autonomous parallel parking

This paper presents a novel and computationally inexpensive method for motion planning of autonomous parallel parking of four wheeled nonholonomic vehicles. The proposed method makes use of Trajectory Shaping Guidance, given in [1] and [2], which was originally developed for missiles to hit the target at a given angle. This paper uses a modified version of Trajectory Shaping Guidance (TSG) for path planning. The method computes a feasible path by inherently considering nonholonomic constraints of the vehicle. Detailed simulation results show the robustness, simplicity and efficiency of the proposed method.
Analysing the visual complexity of web pages using document structure

The perception of the visual complexity of World Wide Web (Web) pages is a topic of significant interest. Previous work has examined the relationship between complexity and various aspects of presentation, including font styles, colours and images, but automatically quantifying this dimension of a web page at the level of the document remains a challenge. In this paper we demonstrate that areas of high complexity can be identified by detecting areas, or ‘chunks’, of a web page high in block-level elements. We report a computational algorithm that captures this metric and places web pages in a sequence that shows an 86% correlation with the sequences generated through user judgements of complexity. The work shows that structural aspects of a web page influence how complex a user perceives it to be, and presents a straightforward means of determining complexity through examining the DOM.
Kinetic Energy Budget for the Madden–Julian Oscillation in a Multiscale Framework

AbstractA kinetic energy budget for the Madden–Julian oscillation (MJO) is established in a three-scale framework. The three scales are the zonal mean, the MJO scale with wavenumbers 1–4, and the small scale with wavenumbers larger than 4. In the composite budget, the dominant balance at the MJO scale is between conversion from potential energy and work done by the pressure gradient force (PGF). This balance is consistent with the view that the MJO wind perturbations can be viewed as a quasi-linear response to a slowly varying heat source. A large residual in the upper troposphere suggests that much kinetic energy dissipates there by cumulus friction. Kinetic energy exchange between different scales is not a large component of the composite budget. There is a transfer of kinetic energy from the MJO scale to the small scale; that is, this multiscale interaction appears to damp rather than strengthen the MJO. There is some variation in the relative importance of different terms from one event to the next. I.
Association membership and generalised trust: Are connections between associations losing their value?

Research linking civic engagement to citizens' democratic values, generalized trust, cooperative norms, and so on often implicitly assumes such connections are stable over time. This article argues that, due to changes in the broader institutional environment, the engagement-values relation is likely to generally lack temporal stability. We investigate this empirically by analysing the engagement-trust relation using World Values Survey (WVS) data from the 1990 and 2000 waves. Overall, our results show that voluntary association memberships remain positively associated with generalised trust in both samples, but evidence that memberships in connected associations are better than in isolated ones appears, at best, scant in more recent years.
CHARMM general force field: A force field for drug‐like molecules compatible with the CHARMM all‐atom additive biological force fields

The widely used CHARMM additive all‐atom force field includes parameters for proteins, nucleic acids, lipids, and carbohydrates. In the present article, an extension of the CHARMM force field to drug‐like molecules is presented. The resulting CHARMM General Force Field (CGenFF) covers a wide range of chemical groups present in biomolecules and drug‐like molecules, including a large number of heterocyclic scaffolds. The parametrization philosophy behind the force field focuses on quality at the expense of transferability, with the implementation concentrating on an extensible force field. Statistics related to the quality of the parametrization with a focus on experimental validation are presented. Additionally, the parametrization procedure, described fully in the present article in the context of the model systems, pyrrolidine, and 3‐phenoxymethylpyrrolidine will allow users to readily extend the force field to chemical groups that are not explicitly covered in the force field as well as add functional groups to and link together molecules already available in the force field. CGenFF thus makes it possible to perform “all‐CHARMM” simulations on drug‐target interactions thereby extending the utility of CHARMM force fields to medicinally relevant systems. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Comput Chem, 2010
A UML profile to support requirements engineering with KAOS

One of the most important approaches to requirements engineering of the last ten years is the KAOS model as presented in [1] and [2]. We introduce a proﬁle that allows the KAOS model to be represented in the UML. The paper includes an informal presentation of the proﬁle together with a full account of the new stereotypes and tags. We also outline an integration of requirements models with lower level design models in the UML, leading to a uniform and comprehensive speciﬁcation document. A UML proﬁle can increase the usefulness of KAOS. A method can be truly successful only if a large number of professionals are suﬃciently convinced of its potential to use it in industrial cases. Use of the UML to support requirements engineering with KAOS may help achieve this end.
HO-1 induction ameliorates experimental murine membranous nephropathy: anti-oxidative, anti-apoptotic and immunomodulatory effects.

BACKGROUND Therapeutic agents for membranous nephropathy (MN) remain ill-defined. Haeme oxygenase (HO)-1 is considered to play a protective role in various disorders. Here, we assessed the efficacy of HO-1 induction therapy for MN. METHODS MN was induced in BALB/c mice with intravenous injections of cationic bovine serum albumin. Three groups of mice were administered 100 micromol/kg Cobalt protoporphyrin (CoPP, a potent HO-1 inducer), Tin protoporphyrin (SnPP, a potent HO-1 inhibitor) or phosphate-buffered saline via intra-peritoneal injections once a week starting from the induction of MN. Disease severity was verified by serum and urine metabolic profiles and by renal histopathology. Cytokine profiles, immunoglobulin production, the expression of oxidative stress markers (thiobarbituric acid reactive substances, TBARS) and apoptosis, as measured by TUNEL, were also determined. RESULTS Mice treated with CoPP displayed a significant reduction in proteinuria and a marked amelioration of glomerular lesions, accompanied by attenuated immune-complex deposition. The production of immunoglobulins in MN mice treated with CoPP was significantly reduced compared with that of mice in the other two groups. TBARS in the serum and kidneys, as well as apoptosis, were also significantly reduced in CoPP-treated mice. Cytokine mRNA expression in the renal cortex indicated that CoPP not only decreased the expression of proinflammatory cytokines, but also increased the expression of anti-inflammatory cytokines (interleukin-10). CONCLUSIONS HO-1 induction therapy may ameliorate experimental MN via multiple pathways, including anti-oxidative, anti-apoptotic and immunomodulatory effects. HO-1 inducing regimens should be considered as a potential therapeutic intervention in MN in the future.