Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Propeller EPI in the other direction

A new propeller EPI pulse sequence with reduced sensitivity to field inhomogeneities is proposed. Image artifacts such as blurring due to Nyquist ghosting and susceptibility gradients are investigated and compared with those obtained in previous propeller EPI studies. The proposed propeller EPI sequence uses a readout that is played out along the short axis of the propeller blade, orthogonal to the readout used in previous propeller methods. In contrast to long‐axis readout propeller EPI, this causes the echo spacing between two consecutive phase‐encoding (PE) lines to decrease, which in turn increases the k‐space velocity in this direction and hence the pseudo‐bandwidth. Long‐ and short‐axis propeller EPI, and standard single‐shot EPI sequences were compared on phantoms and a healthy volunteer. Diffusion‐weighted imaging (DWI) was also performed on the volunteer. Short‐axis propeller EPI produced considerably fewer image artifacts compared to the other two sequences. Further, the oblique blades for the long‐axis propeller EPI were also prone to one order of magnitude higher residual ghosting than the proposed short‐axis propeller EPI. Magn Reson Med, 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
How many classifiers do I need?

Combining multiple classifiers promises to increase performance and robustness of a classification task. Currently, the understanding which combination scheme should be used and the ability to quantify the expected benefit is inadequate. This paper attempts to quantify the performance and robustness gain for different combination schemes and for two classifier types. The results indicate that the combination of a small number of classifiers may already result in a substantial performance gain. Also, the increase in robustness can be substantial by combining an adequate number of classifiers.
Oligonucleotide and plasmid DNA packaging into polyoma VP1 virus‐like particles expressed in Escherichia coli

The drug delivery system described here is based on the properties of the capsoid or capsid‐like structure resulting from the assembly of polyoma virus capsid protein VP1 expressed in Escherichia coli. The capsid protein VP1 was expressed as a fusion protein with a completely removable N‐terminal His6 affinity tag. The pentameric morphology of the recombinant VP1 protein was confirmed by electron microscopy after affinity chromatography and factor Xa cleavage under conditions of low ionic strength. The self‐assembly of VP1 capsoids can be induced from purified VP1 pentamers by increasing the ionic strength with (NH4)2SO4. These VP1 capsoid particles were packed in vitro with anti‐sense oligonucleotides and plasmid DNA. The loading with DNA was pH‐dependent. We observed the highest efficiency at pH 5. DNase I treatment of particles with encapsidated material showed that 37–55% of the bound oligonucleotides and fragments of 1.5–1.8 kb double‐stranded DNA were protected against degradation.
Effects of parietal injury on covert orienting of attention

The cognitive act of shifting attention from one place in the visual field to another can be accomplished covertly without muscular changes. The act can be viewed in terms of three internal mental operations: disengagement of attention from its current focus, moving attention to the target, and engagement of the target. Our results show that damage to the parietal lobe produces a deficit in the disengage operation when the target is contralateral to the lesion. Effects may also be found on engagement with the target. The effects of brain injury on disengagement of attention seem to be unique to the parietal lobe and do not appear to occur with our frontal, midbrain, and temporal control series. These results confirm the close connection between parietal lobes and selective attention suggested by single cell recording. They indicate more specifically the role that parietal function has on attention and suggest one mechanism of the effects of parietal lesions reported in clinical neurology.
A possible new dipping X-ray source in the field of M 31

We report the discovery of the new dipping X-ray source, XMMU J004308.6+411247, in M 31, during a systematic search for periodicities in XMM- Newton archival observations. During the 2002 January 6 observation, the dips recur with a 107 min period and the source count rate is consistent with zero at the dip minimum. Dips with the same modulation and period are also observed during the XMM- Newton observations carried out on 2000 June 25, 2001 June 29 and the Chandra observation of 2001 October 5. The dips of XMMU J004308.6+411247 show no evidence of energy dependence. The average X-ray flux of XMMU J004308.6+411247 is nearly constant across different observations (${\sim} 10^{37}$ erg s -1 for an assumed M 31 distance of 780 kpc in the 0.3-10 keV band); the spectrum is well fitted by an absorbed power law with a photon index ∼ 0.8 or an absorbed Comptonization model. The photo-electric absorption is consistent with the Galactic value in the source direction. If XMMU J004308.6+411247 is located in M 31 its properties are consistent with those of dipping low mass X-ray binaries in the Galaxy. Present observations do not make it possible to distinguish between dips and eclipses. The possibility that XMMU J004308.6+411247 is a foreground X-ray source cannot be ruled out at present; in this case the source might be a magnetic cataclysmic variable.
Aspects and Software Components A case study of the Fractal Component Model

Component-Based Software Development (CBSD) swears software reuse but it suffers from code scattering and tangling. Aspect Oriented Programming (AOP) deals with these problems. We present in this paper, Fractal-AOP, an add-on to the Fractal component model that combines AOP and CBSD into an overall model. Combining is achieved by applying AOP principles on the Fractal component model. Indeed, we define new control interfaces on functional components that expose join points. Aspects are defined using plain Fractal generic components. Weaving relies only on classical operations on components, namely: Configuration and assembly. The configuration allows the definition of pointcuts. The assembly connects the components defining aspects with the rest of application components.
Local Structure-Based Image Decomposition for Feature Extraction With Applications to Face Recognition

This paper presents a robust but simple image feature extraction method, called image decomposition based on local structure (IDLS). It is assumed that in the local window of an image, the macro-pixel (patch) of the central pixel, and those of its neighbors, are locally linear. IDLS captures the local structural information by describing the relationship between the central macro-pixel and its neighbors. This relationship is represented with the linear representation coefficients determined using ridge regression. One image is actually decomposed into a series of sub-images (also called structure images) according to a local structure feature vector. All the structure images, after being down-sampled for dimensionality reduction, are concatenated into one super-vector. Fisher linear discriminant analysis is then used to provide a low-dimensional, compact, and discriminative representation for each super-vector. The proposed method is applied to face recognition and examined using our real-world face image database, NUST-RWFR, and five popular, publicly available, benchmark face image databases (AR, Extended Yale B, PIE, FERET, and LFW). Experimental results show the performance advantages of IDLS over state-of-the-art algorithms.
Railway direct braking system analysis using hybrid bond graph

Direct braking system is a key part of train security. This system is complex and nonlinear because of coupling multi-physic energies (pneumatic, electric, mechanical translation and rotation) and working in hybrid structure involving continuous and discrete modes because of presence of relays and diodes. The objective of the present paper is to use one representation: a hybrid bond graph as a multidisciplinary and integrated tool for dynamic modelling of all modes but also structural diagnosability analysis to improve the preventive maintenance, to insure the reliability and availability of the train for its health management.
Augmented Virtual Studio for Architectural Exploration

Immersive virtual environments and natural 3D user interfaces have shown great potential in the field of architecture, especially for exploration, presentation and review of designs. In this paper we propose an augmented virtual studio environment for architectural exploration based on a mixed-reality head-mounted display environment. The proposed system supports (1) real walking through large virtual building models, (2) visual feedback about the user's body and (3) display of real -world objects in the virtual view based on color transfer functions. We describe the locomotion user interface for immersive exploration, as well as a mixed-reality 3D user interface for interaction with virtual designs.
Fuzzy logic direct torque control for permanent magnet synchronous motors

An outstanding feature of the conventional direct torque control (DTC) for permanent magnet synchronous motors (PMSM) is its fast dynamic response. However, large torque and flux linkage ripples are generated because of the use of the hysteresis controllers and the crude position signals based on six 60/spl deg/ angular regions for selecting the space voltage vectors. This paper proposes a fuzzy logic based PMSM DTC system, in which the torque error, stator flux linkage error and the stator flux vector angular position are all properly fuzzified into several fuzzy subsets, so that a more suitable space voltage vector can be selected to minimize the torque and flux linkage ripples. Both the simulation and the experimental results show that the modified DTC system has a much better steady state performance while retaining the good dynamic performance.
Computing the Optimal Makespan for Jobs with Identical and Independent Tasks Scheduled on Volatile Hosts

Desktop grids harvest the cycles of idle workstations to sup port large-scale computation. As such, these systems are cost-effective platforms for compute-intensive applicat ions. Ongoing Internet-wide projects such as SETI@home and FOLDING@home use hundreds of thousands of PC’s for high-thr oughput applications. In addition to these public projects, several companies such as Entropia and United Dev ices [3, 10, 9] have developed software for desktop grids within an enterprise. The resources used by these projects are volatile; failures du to prolonged user activity (keyboard/mouse) or to a machine being shutoff are common. The default scheduling a ppro ch in most desktop grids systems [4, 5] is First Come First Serve (FCFS), by which the next application task i s assigned to the next available host. For high-throughput jobs, that is ones in which the number of tasks is orders of mag nitude larger than the number of resources, this method achieves close to optimal performance. However when the num ber of tasks in a job is comparable to the number of hosts and the goal is to minimize job makespan , that is the time between job submission and job completion, he FCFS approach is inadequate for two reasons [6]. First, FCFS migh t unnecessarily schedule tasks on slower resources near the end of job completion, thus delaying completion while ot her, faster hosts remain idle. Second, task failures near the end of job execution force the task to be restarted from sc ratch (assuming no checkpointing). In [6], we developed several heuristics for scheduling rela tively small jobs on an enterprise desktop grid, and evaluated their performance using simulations driven by tr aces of an actual desktop grid platform. To evaluate our heuristics, we wish to compare them to an optimal scheduler. In practice, an optimal schedule can generally not be achieved as resource availabilities are dynamic and unpred ictable. However, in trace-based simulation it is possible to devise an “omniscient” scheduling algorithm that has ful l knowledge of future resource availabilities, and that can use this knowledge to compute the optimal schedule. In [6], w e used a greedy algorithm to determine the optimal schedule, and thus the optimal makespan. While in that work we had only strong presumptions that the algorithm was optimal, in this report we give a formal proof of optimality. Our approach to prove optimality is as follows. After definin g the problem formally in Section 2, we first show optimality within a single availability interval on a singl e host in Section 3. Then, in Section 4, we show optimality for multiple availability intervals separated by failures on a single host. In Section 5, we show the optimality for multipl e availability intervals across multiple hosts. Finally, in Section 6, we consider a variation of the problem that allows for task checkpointing.
A meta-synthesis study of literature review and systematic review published in nurse prescribing

Background: Prescribing represents a new aspect of practice for nurses. To make qualitative results more accessible to clinicians, researchers, and policy makers, individuals are urged to synthesize findings from related studies. Therefore this study aimed to aggregate and interpret existing literature review and systematic studies to obtain new insights on nurse prescription. Methods: This was a qualitative meta synthesis study using Walsh and Downe process. In order to obtain data all Digital National Library of Medicine's databases, search engines and several related sites were used. Full texts with "review and nurs* prescri* " words in the title or abstract in English language and published without any time limitation were considered. After eliminating duplicate and irrelevant studies, 11 texts were selected. Data analysis was conducted using qualitative content analysis. Multiple codes were compared based on the differences and similarities and divided to the categories and themes. Results: The results from the meta synthesis of the 11 studies revealed 8 themes namely: leading countries in prescribing, views, features, infrastructures, benefits, disadvantages, facilitators and barriers of nursing prescription that are discussed in this article. The results led to a schematic model. Conclusion: Despite the positive view on nurse prescribing, there are still issues such as legal, administrative, weak research and educational deficiencies in academic preparation of nurses that needs more effort in these areas and requires further research.
Dimerization of Protegrin-1 in Different Environments

The dimerization of the cationic β-hairpin antimicrobial peptide protegrin-1 (PG1) is investigated in three different environments: water, the surface of a lipid bilayer membrane, and the core of the membrane. PG1 is known to kill bacteria by forming oligomeric membrane pores, which permeabilize the cells. PG1 dimers are found in two distinct, parallel and antiparallel, conformations, known as important intermediate structural units of the active pore oligomers. What is not clear is the sequence of events from PG1 monomers in solution to pores inside membranes. The step we focus on in this work is the dimerization of PG1. In particular, we are interested in determining where PG1 dimerization is most favorable. We use extensive molecular dynamics simulations to determine the potential of mean force as a function of distance between two PG1 monomers in the aqueous subphase, the surface of model lipid bilayers and the interior of these bilayers. We investigate the two known distinct modes of dimerization that result in either a parallel or an antiparallel β-sheet orientation. The model bilayer membranes are composed of anionic palmitoyl-oleoyl-phosphatidylglycerol (POPG) and palmitoyl-oleoyl-phosphatidylethanolamine (POPE) in a 1:3 ratio (POPG:POPE). We find the parallel PG1 dimer association to be more favorable than the antiparallel one in water and inside the membrane. However, we observe that the antiparallel PG1 β-sheet dimer conformation is somewhat more stable than the parallel dimer association at the surface of the membrane. We explore the role of hydrogen bonds and ionic bridges in peptide dimerization in the three environments. Detailed knowledge of how networks of ionic bridges and hydrogen bonds contribute to peptide stability is essential for the purpose of understanding the mechanism of action for membrane-active peptides as well as for designing peptides which can modulate membrane properties. The findings are suggestive of the dominant pathways leading from individual PG1 molecules in solution to functional pores in bacterial membranes.
How green is my outsourcer? Measuring sustainability in global IT outsourcing

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the intersection of sustainability and global IT outsourcing (GITO). GITO is well established as a business practice towards reducing costs and improving performance. Sustainability issues related to carbon footprint and greenhouse gases are increasingly important for all organizations. Responsible and economic energy management is a critical business capability and environmental responsibility in global outsourcing.Design/methodology/approach – Drawing on empirical work undertaken in the UK and North America together with content analysis of public data from leading GITO providers, this paper presents a model for measuring sustainability in outsourcing.Findings – The research findings demonstrate a growing environmental maturity in GITO firms, as measured against external recognized standards such as the Global Reporting Initiative, the Carbon Disclosure Project, the UN Global Compact and the ISO environmental and social responsibility standards.Practical.
Stereo-vision-based navigation of a six-legged walking robot in unknown rough terrain

In this paper we present a visual navigation algorithm for the six-legged walking robot DLR Crawler in rough terrain. The algorithm is based on stereo images from which depth images are computed using the semi-global matching (SGM) method. Further, a visual odometry is calculated along with an error measure. Pose estimates are obtained by fusing inertial data with relative leg odometry and visual odometry measurements using an indirect information filter. The visual odometry error measure is used in the filtering process to put lower weights on erroneous visual odometry data, hence, improving the robustness of pose estimation. From the estimated poses and the depth images, a dense digital terrain map is created by applying the locus method. The traversability of the terrain is estimated by a plane fitting approach and paths are planned using a D* Lite planner taking the traversability of the terrain and the current motion capabilities of the robot into account. Motion commands and the traversability measures of the upcoming terrain are sent to the walking layer of the robot so that it can choose an appropriate gait for the terrain. Experimental results show the accuracy of the navigation algorithm and its robustness against visual disturbances.
PENCIL: A Platform-Neutral Compute Intermediate Language for Accelerator Programming

Programming accelerators such as GPUs with low-level APIs and languages such as OpenCL and CUDA is difficult, error-prone, and not performance-portable. Automatic parallelization and domain specific languages (DSLs) have been proposed to hide complexity and regain performance portability. We present PENCIL, a rigorously-defined subset of GNU C99-enriched with additional language constructs-that enables compilers to exploit parallelism and produce highly optimized code when targeting accelerators. PENCIL aims to serve both as a portable implementation language for libraries, and as a target language for DSL compilers. We implemented a PENCIL-to-OpenCL backend using a state-of-the-art polyhedral compiler. The polyhedral compiler, extended to handle data-dependent control flow and non-affine array accesses, generates optimized OpenCL code. To demonstrate the potential and performance portability of PENCIL and the PENCIL-to-OpenCL compiler, we consider a number of image processing kernels, a set of benchmarks from the Rodinia and SHOC suites, and DSL embedding scenarios for linear algebra (BLAS) and signal processing radar applications (SpearDE), and present experimental results for four GPU platforms: AMD Radeon HD 5670 and R9 285, NVIDIA GTX 470, and ARM Mali-T604.
Characterization of a Vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium Outbreak Caused by 2 Genetically Different Clones at a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit

In July 2010, we identified an outbreak of vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) in our 26-bed neonatal intensive care unit. We performed an epidemiological investigation after clinical cultures of 2 neonates were positive for VRE. Identification, susceptibility testing, and molecular characterization were performed. Cultures of 3 surveillance stool samples of inpatients and 5 environmental samples were positive for VRE. All isolates were identified as Enterococcus faecium containing the vanA gene. Two distinct clones were identified by performing pulsed-field gel electrophoresis. The 2 clones exhibited different pulsotypes, but they represented identical Tn1546 types. Two sequence types, ST18 and ST192, were identified among all of the isolates with multilocus sequence typing. Our investigation determined that the outbreak in the neonatal intensive care unit was caused by 2 genetically different clones. The outbreak may have occurred through clonal spread and horizontal transfer of the van gene.
Profiling of tyrosine phosphorylation pathways in human cells using mass spectrometry

The reversible phosphorylation of tyrosine residues is an important mechanism for modulating biological processes such as cellular signaling, differentiation, and growth, and if deregulated, can result in various types of cancer. Therefore, an understanding of these dynamic cellular processes at the molecular level requires the ability to assess changes in the sites of tyrosine phosphorylation across numerous proteins simultaneously as well as over time. Here we describe a sensitive approach based on multidimensional liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry that enables the rapid identification of numerous sites of tyrosine phosphorylation on a number of different proteins from human whole cell lysates. We used this methodology to follow changes in tyrosine phosphorylation patterns that occur over time during either the activation of human T cells or the inhibition of the oncogenic BCR-ABL fusion product in chronic myelogenous leukemia cells in response to treatment with STI571 (Gleevec). Together, these experiments rapidly identified 64 unique sites of tyrosine phosphorylation on 32 different proteins. Half of these sites have been documented in the literature, validating the merits of our approach, whereas motif analysis suggests that a number of the undocumented sites are also potentially involved in biological pathways. This methodology should enable the rapid generation of new insights into signaling pathways as they occur in states of health and disease.
A Fast Way of Calculating Exact Hypervolumes

We describe a new algorithm WFG for calculating hypervolume exactly. WFG is based on the recently-described observation that the exclusive hypervolume of a point p relative to a set S is equal to the difference between the inclusive hypervolume of p and the hypervolume of S with each point limited by the objective values in p. WFG applies this technique iteratively over a set to calculate its hypervolume. Experiments show that WFG is substantially faster (in five or more objectives) than all previously-described algorithms that calculate hypervolume exactly.