Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Memory management thread for heap allocation intensive sequential applications

Dynamic memory management is one of the most ubiquitous and expensive operations in many C/C++ applications. Some C/C++ programs might spend up to one third of their execution time in dynamic memory management routines. With multicore processors as a mainstream architecture, it is important to investigate how dynamic memory management can exploit the multi-core parallelism for speeding up sequential programs. In this paper, we propose a way for exploiting multicore parallelism in dynamic memory management for sequential applications, by spinning off memory allocation and deallocation functions to a separate thread that we refer to as memory management thread (MMT). The goal of this study is to show how an efficient design and implementation of MMT can give performance without any algorithm or implementation level knowledge of underlying memory management library being offloaded. Using heap allocation-intensive benchmarks, we evaluate MMT on an Intel Core 2 Quad platform for widely used Doug Lea's memory allocator. Without any modifications to application source-code or memory management algorithm of underlying memory allocators, our MMT approach achieves an average speedup ratio of 1.19x, and 1.60x in the best case.
Determining tourists' valuation of the Big Five

The aim of this study is to determine the value of the Big 5 from a visitor’s perspective. This study will focus on determining the stated preference or contingent value (CV) of the Big 5 through a survey of tourists’, visiting the Kruger National Park, willingness to pay (WTP) for the conservation. The CV method is based on the principle of stated preferences, since participants are asked to state how much they are willing to pay for specific goods or services. Literature indicates that there is a relationship between education, income, professional standing, marital status, age, characteristics of visit, number of children and nationality and a tourist’s willingness to pay. By estimating the effect these variables have on a tourist’s willingness to pay will assist parks and private game reserves in future decisions concerning the conservation of wildlife. Additionally this information is also invaluable for marketing as well as pricing purposes since it gives a specific monetary value. The study found that visitors to the Kruger National Park (KNP) assigned a significant amount (34.64%) of total average spending to experience the Big 5. The value per species also differed. The main determinants of visitors’ willingness-to-pay for simply viewing the Big 5 include age, the marital status and the role of the Big 5 during decision to visit the KNP. Noticeable differences between international literature and this research are the determinants like education, income, age and country of residence.
Global Transcriptional and Phenotypic Analyses of Escherichia coli O157:H7 Strain Xuzhou21 and Its pO157_Sal Cured Mutant

Escherichia coli O157:H7 is an important food-borne pathogen that can cause hemorrhagic colitis and hemolytic-uremic syndrome in humans. pO157_Sal, a novel conjugative plasmid is present in a Chinese O157:H7 outbreak strain Xuzhou21. Here we investigated the phenotypic and transcriptional differences between the wild type strain Xuzhou21 and the pO157_Sal cured mutant strain Xuzhou21m. RNA-Seq analysis found that all 52 ORFs encoded on pO157_Sal were transcribed. One hundred and sixty eight chromosomal and pO157 genes were differentially expressed (≥2 fold difference) between Xuzhou21 and Xuzhou21m. Sixty-seven and 101 genes were up-regulated and down-regulated respectively by pO157_Sal including genes related to stress response, adaption and virulence. The plasmid-cured mutant Xuzhou21m grew slower than wild type Xuzhou21 and pO157_Sal plasmid complemented strain Xuzhou21c in M9 medium under the condition of high NaCl or presence of sodium deoxycholate (NaDC), corroborating with the RNA-Seq data. Seven differentially expressed genes are associated with NaDC resistance, including the adenine-specific DNA-methyltransferase gene (dam), multidrug efflux system subunit gene mdtA, hyperosmotically inducible periplasmic protein gene osmY and oxidation-reduction related genes while two differentially expressed genes (osmY and pspD) are likely to be related to resistance to osmotic pressure. A number of differentially expressed genes were virulence associated including four genes encoding T3SS effectors from the chromosome and ehxD from pO157. Through complementation of Xuzhou21m with a plasmid construct carrying the pO157_Sal hha homolog we further showed that the pO157_Sal hha represses the expression of T3SS effectors. These findings demonstrated that the plasmid pO157_Sal affects the transcription of the chromosomal and pO157 plasmid genes and contributes to the enhanced ability to resist stress. We conclude that pO157_Sal plays an important role in regulating global gene expression and affects the virulence and adaptation of E. coli O157:H7.
Moving to secondary school for children with ASN: a systematic review of international literature

This article presents the findings, from a systematic review of international literature, of the existing research into the transition to secondary school of children with additional support needs, which happens for most children at around 11–12 years of age in Scotland. It brings an original contribution to the existing literature through its focus on the holistic transition experience of this group of children. From an initial 52 texts that met the inclusion criteria, further scrutiny led to the identification of only 22 empirical studies published in the last 15 years which contained findings meeting the review objectives. Transition is an ongoing process; however, only five studies were longitudinal. There remains a paucity of international literature to inform good practice in a consistent manner, and a need for further longitudinal, qualitative research to support the development of inclusive education internationally. Implications for educational policy include personalisation of this school move. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Autonomic smart manufacturing

Smart manufacturing (SM) systems have to optimise manufacturing activities at the machine, unit or entire manufacturing facility level as well as adapting the manufacturing process on the fly as required by a variety of conditions (e.g. machine breakdowns and/or slowdowns) and unexpected variations in demands. This paper provides a framework for autonomic smart manufacturing (ASM) that relies on a variety of models for its support: (1) a process model to represent machines, parst inventories and the flow of parts through machines in a discrete manufacturing floor; (2) a predictive queueing network model to support the analysis and planning phases of ASM; and (3) optimisation models to support the planning phase of ASM. In essence, ASM is an integrated decision support system for smart manufacturing that combines models of different nature in a seamless manner. As shown here, these models can be used to predict manufacturing time and the energy consumed by the manufacturing process, as well as for finding the machine settings that minimise the energy consumed or the manufacturing time subject to a variety of constraints using non-linear optimisation models. The diversity of models used affords different levels of integration and granularity in the decision-making process. An example of a car manufacturing process is used throughout the paper to explain the concepts and models introduced here.
Vibrating RF MEMS overview: applications to wireless communications

Micromechanical RF filters and reference oscillators based on recently demonstrated vibrating on-chip micromechani-cal resonators with Q's >10,000 at 1.5 GHz, are described as an attractive solution to the increasing count of RF components (e.g., filters) expected to be needed by future multi-band wireless devices. With Q's this high in on-chip abun-dance, such devices might also enable a paradigm-shift in transceiver design where the advantages of high-Q are emphasized, rather than suppressed, resulting in enhanced robustness and power savings. An overview of the latest in vi-brating RF MEMS technology is presented with an addendum on remaining issues to be addressed for insertion into tomorrow's handsets.
Evaluating Message Understanding Systems: An Analysis of the Third Message Understanding Conference (MUC-3)

This paper describes and analyzes the results of the Third Message Understanding Conference (MUC-3). It reviews the purpose, history, and methodology of the conference, summarizes the participating systems, discusses issues of measuring system effectiveness, describes the linguistic phenomena tests, and provides a critical look at the evaluation in terms of the lessons learned. One of the common problems with evaluations is that the statistical significance of the results is unknown. In the discussion of system performance, the statistical significance of the evaluation results is reported and the use of approximate randomization to calculate the statistical significance of the results of MUC-3 is described.
THE USE OF OPTIMAL CONTROL TECHNIQUES TO MEASURE ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE

It is a common practice in political discussions in the United States to hold a presidential administration accountable for the state of the economy that existed during its four-year period in office. Administrations are generally blamed for high unemployment rates, low real growth, and high inflation rates during their years in office and praised for the opposite. Although at first glance this seems a natural way of evaluating the economic performances of administrations, there are at least two serious problems with it. The first is that this kind of evaluation does not take into account possible differences in the degree of difficulty of controlling the economy in different periods. The economy may be more difficult to control for one administration than for another either because of more unfavorable values of noncontrolled exogenous variables for one than for another or because of a more unfavorable initial state of the economy for one than for another (or both). The second problem with evaluating the economic performance of an administration on the basis of the state of the economy that existed during its four-year period in office is that it ignores the effects of an administration's policies on the state of the economy beyond the four-year period. If, for example, an administration strongly stimulates the economy in the year of the presidential election, in, say, the belief that this might improve the chances of its party staying in power, most of the inflationary effects of this policy may not be felt until the next four-year period. Any evaluation of performance that was concerned only with the administration's four-year period in office would not, of course, pick up these effects. The purpose of this paper is to propose a measure of economic performance that takes into account both of these problems. The measure is based on the solutions of optimal control problems. It requires that a welfare -or loss function be postulated and that the economy be represented by an econometric model.
Ethanol-induced c-fos expression in catecholamine- and neuropeptide Y-producing neurons in rat brainstem.

BACKGROUND Previous studies have used c-Fos-like immunoreactivity (cFLI) to examine the neuroanatomical location of cells that are activated in response to ethanol administration. However, the use of cFLI alone fails to reveal the phenotypical identity of cells. In the present study we used double-labeling procedures to identify the neurochemical phenotype of neurons that showed ethanol-induced cFLI in the rat brainstem. METHODS Individual groups of rats received intraperitoneal injection of ethanol (1.5 g/kg or 3.5 g/kg) or isotonic saline (23 ml/kg). To assess the specificity of cFLI induced by ethanol, we injected other rats with the drug lithium chloride (LiCl; 76 mg/kg). Two hours after injection, rats were killed and their brains were processed for immunohistochemistry. RESULTS Both doses of ethanol promoted cFLI in several brainstem regions, including the nucleus of the solitary tract (NTS), the locus coeruleus (LC), and the ventrolateral medulla (VLM). Although LiCl caused significant cFLI in the NTS, this drug promoted only minimal cFLI in the VLM and no significant activation in the LC. We found that a significant proportion of tyrosine hydroxylase (TH)-positive neurons coexpressed ethanol-induced cFLI in the VLM (approximately 75-85%), the NTS (approximately 65-75%), and the LC (approximately 30-65%). Additionally, a significant proportion of neuropeptide Y (NPY)-producing neurons in the VLM coexpressed ethanol-induced cFLI (approximately 60-75%). On the other hand, LiCl promoted activation of TH-positive neurons in the VLM and the NTS but failed to stimulate cFLI in TH-producing neurons in the LC or in NPY-producing neurons of the VLM. CONCLUSIONS Neurons in the rat brainstem that show ethanol-induced c-Fos expression produce catecholamines and NPY. This research demonstrates the usefulness of double-labeling immunohistochemistry procedures for identifying the neurochemical identity of neurons that are activated after ethanol administration.
Residual energy scan for monitoring sensor networks

It is important to have continuously updated information about network resources and application activities in a wireless sensor network after it is deployed in an unpredictable environment. Such information can help notify users of resource depletion or abnormal activities. However, constrained by the low user-to-node ratio, limited energy and bandwidth resources, it is infeasible to extract the state of each individual node. In this paper, we propose an approach to constructing abstracted scans of sensor network health by applying in-network aggregation of network state. Specifically, we design a residual energy scan which approximately depicts the remaining energy distribution within a sensor network. Simulations show that our approach has good scalability and energy-efficiency characteristics, compared to continuously extracting the residual energy level individually from each node.
Robust MR Image Segmentation Using 3D Partitioned Active Shape Models

A 3D partitioned active shape model (PASM) is proposed in this paper to address the problems of 3D active shape models (ASM) brought by small training sets, which is usually the case in 3D applications. When numbers of training samples are limited, 3D ASMs tend to be restrictive, because the plausible area/allowable region spanned by relatively few eigenvectors cannot capture the full range of shape variability. 3D PASMs overcome this limitation by using a partitioned representation of ASM. Given a point distribution model, the mean mesh is partitioned into a group of small tiles. The statistical priors of tiles are estimated by applying principal component analysis to each tile, and the priors serve as constraints for corresponding tiles during deformations. To avoid the shape inconsistency introduced by the independent estimations between tiles, samples and deformed model points are projected as curves in one hyperspace, instead of point clouds in several hyperspaces. The deformed model points are then fitted into the allowable region of the model using a curve alignment scheme. The experiments on 3D human brain MRIs show that the 3D PASMs segment objects more accurately and are more robust to noise and low contrast in images than two other current active shape models. Furthermore, a study for the PASM's sensitivity to different initializations shows that PASMs perform stable when initialization positions change
Ritalin and Attention Deficit Disorder : History of its Use , Effects and Side Effects

Introduction Attention deficit disorder (ADD) is a behavioral disorder in children who display in common characteristics of developmentally inappropriate levels of inattention, impulsiveness and in some cases hyperactivity (Barkley et al., 1991; Wolraich et al., 1990). ADD has been further defined in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 3rd edition, revised (DSM-III-R) to indicate the presence of hyperactivity. The abbreviation ADD+H indicates ADD children with hyperactivity while the abbreviation ADDH indicates those without hyperactivity. Emotionally, children with ADD often have low selfesteem or self-confidence and frequent low mood states. Socially, they often have peer problems with many described as loners or having no friends (Hechtman, 1985).
A consideration for physical literacy in Irish youth, and implications for physical education in a changing landscape

The concept of physical literacy (PL) has been suggested as one that can offer a catalyst for a new emphasis in physical education (PE). In the broadest sense, a physically literate child is confident, active, and can maintain health enhancing physical activity (PA) for life. PL includes engagement in PA, physical competence, and PA motivation, confidence, knowledge and understanding. The purpose of this study is to investigate the levels of PL in Irish adolescents. As part of a larger study data were collected from 535 (12.78 ± .42 years) adolescents across 20 schools, to measure physical activity, physical competence, and psychological correlates of physical activity. Less than half of participants are accumulating the minimum of 60 minutes of PA daily required for health (49% males, 26% females). Data highlight that Irish youth are performing ‘below par’ across the domains of PL, with cardiovascular fitness (45% of males and 67% of females reaching ‘optimal’ target) and self-efficacy (53% of males and 46% of females reaching ‘optimal’ target) of greatest concern. Findings are discussed in the context of the need for a targeted direction in post-primary PE in Irish schools to increase levels of PL in Irish adolescents.
Feedback design air-path control on a diesel engine based on Takagi-Sugeno Fuzzy descriptor systems

In this work a Parallel Distributed Compensation (PDC) Fuzzy controller is applied to regulate the intake and exhaust manifold pressures in a four-cylinder diesel engine with Exhaust Gas Recirculation (EGR). The control strategy implements a feedback controller that generates commands to regulate the mass flow rates and to force two internal variables (pressures) to follow the reference. The PDC-Fuzzy controller is based on a structure of the Takagi-Sugeno (TS) Fuzzy descriptor model, which permits to represent adequately the nonlinear multivariable structure of the process taking into account the constraints on inputs and states. The proposed model is based on a transformation of scalar functions that circumvents the difficulties inherent in the nonlinearity. The PDC-Fuzzy controller is designed using new conditions on Linear Matrix Inequialities (LMI) constraints without invertibility of the Lyapunov matrix to guarantee a robust stability of the diesel engine. The performance of the tracking control strategy is tested in simulations on a four-cylinder diesel engine.
An improved relaxation approach for mixed system analysis with several simulation tools

This paper introduces a modified relaxation approach that allows to improve the convergence of iterations while analyzing mixed systems with different simulators. The method reduces the local feedbacks in the decomposed system by the use of rough models of parts in the neighboring parts of the system. This improvement is very important for mixed systems where optimal partitioning methods are not possible and the choice of the suitable types of coupling is also restricted.
Optimizing neural-network learning rate by using a genetic algorithm with per-epoch mutations

Recently, performance of deep neural networks, especially convolutional neural networks (CNNs), has been drastically increased by elaborate network architectures, by new learning methods, and by GPU-based high-performance computation. However, there are still several difficult problems concerning back propagation, which include scheduling of learning rate and controlling locality of search (i.e., avoidance of bad local minima). A learning method, called “learning-rate-optimizing genetic back-propagation” (LOG-BP), which combines back propagation with a genetic algorithm by a new manner, is proposed. This method solves the above-mentioned two problems by optimizing the learning process, especially learning rate, by genetic mutations and by locality-controlled parallel search. Initial experimental results shows that LOG-BP performs better; that is, when required, learning rate decreases exponentially and the distances between chromosomes, which indicate the locality of a search, also decrease exponentially.
Activation of the Neuronal Extracellular Signal-Regulated Kinase 2 in the Spinal Cord Dorsal Horn Is Required for Complete Freund's Adjuvant-Induced Pain Hypersensitivity

Extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1 (ERK1) and ERK2 signaling in the spinal cord dorsal horn (SCDH) has been implicated in injury-induced pain hypersensitivity. Available ERK pathway inhibitors cannot distinguish between ERK1 and ERK2, nor can they differentially target the expression of neuronal or glial ERK1/2. We selectively inhibited the expression of ERK2 in neurons of the adult mouse SCDH by use of an ERK2 small interfering RNA (siRNA) delivered by a neurotropic adenoassociated viral vector. In situ hybridization revealed a siRNA vector-induced decrease in ERK2 mRNA in the ipsilateral SCDH. Immunohistochemistry showed a decreased neuronal phospho-ERK1/2 (pERK1/2), and Western blot analysis revealed that both ERK2 expression and phosphorylation were reduced by the siRNA vector. In contrast, basal ERK1 expression was not affected, although pERK1 was slightly increased. The siRNA vector-induced knockdown of ERK2 expression in the SCDH did not alter the baseline mechanical or thermal paw withdrawal thresholds. Hindpaw intraplantar injection of complete Freund's adjuvant (CFA) produced peripheral inflammation, mechanical allodynia, and thermal hyperalgesia in vector control animals that persisted for at least 96 h. It also caused an increase in SCDH ERK1 and ERK2 levels at 96 h and pERK1 and pERK2 levels at 1 and 96 h. The ERK2 siRNA vector prevented changes in ERK1, ERK2, and pERK2. In addition, the siRNA vector protected the animals from developing mechanical allodynia and thermal hyperalgesia throughout the 96 h after CFA. These findings indicate that ERK2 in the SCDH neurons is critical for the development of inflammatory pain hypersensitivity.
A model for extremely heterogeneous clutter

A new class of distributions, G distributions, arising from the multiplicative model is presented, along with their main properties and relations. Their densities are derived for complex and multilook intensity and amplitude data. Classical distributions, such as K, are particular cases of this new class. A special case of this class called G/sup 0/, that has as many parameters as K distributions, is shown able to model extremely heterogeneous clutter, such as that of urban areas, that cannot be properly modeled with K distributions. One of the parameters of this special case is related to the degree of homogeneity, and a limiting case is that of a scaled speckle. The advantage of the G/sup 0/ distribution becomes evident through the analysis of a variety of areas (urban, primary forest and deforested) from two sensors.