Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
RTSTREAM: real-time query processing for data streams

Many real-time applications, such as traffic control systems, surveillance systems and health monitoring systems, need to operate on continuous unbounded streams of data. These applications also have inherent real-time performance requirements that have to be met under high-volume, time-varying incoming data streams. In this paper, we present a real-time data stream query model named PQuery, which provides periodic real-time queries on data streams for the aforementioned real-time applications. To support the PQuery model, a real-time data stream management prototype system named RTSTREAM is developed to provide deadline miss ratio guarantees for periodic queries over continuous and unbounded data streams. We describe the periodic query semantics and discuss why the periodic query model is appropriate for real-time applications. To handle irregular data arrival patterns and query workloads, we propose data admission as an overload protection mechanism. We conduct performance studies with synthetic workloads as well as real workloads from network traffic monitoring applications. The experimental results show that the proposed periodic query model suits the need of the real-time applications and the data admission overload protection approach is effective in managing the workload fluctuations
NanoStringNorm: an extensible R package for the pre-processing of NanoString mRNA and miRNA data

Motivation: The NanoString nCounter Platform is a new and promising technology for measuring nucleic acid abundances. It has several advantages over PCR-based techniques, including avoidance of amplification, direct sequence interrogation and digital detection for absolute quantification. These features minimize aspects of experimental error and hold promise for dealing with challenging experimental conditions such as archival formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded samples. However, systematic inter-sample technical artifacts caused by variability in sample preservation, bio-molecular extraction and platform fluctuations must be removed to ensure robust data. Results: To facilitate this process and to address these issues for NanoString datasets, we have written a pre-processing package called NanoStringNorm in the R statistical language. Key features include an extensible environment for method comparison and new algorithm development, integrated gene and sample diagnostics, and facilitated downstream statistical analysis. The package is open-source, is available through the CRAN package repository, includes unit-tests to ensure numerical accuracy, and provides visual and numeric diagnostics. Availability: http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/NanoStringNorm Contact: paul.boutros@oicr.on. ca Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
OntoOrpha : An Ontology to Support the Editing and Audit of Knowledge of Rare Diseases in ORPHANET

ORPHANET is the reference information portal on rare diseases and orphan drugs for healthcare professionals and for general audience. After ten years of evolution, current ORPHANET tools cannot support efficiently the edition, update and data sharing processes demanded by a constantly growing rare diseases knowledge. In order to improve the editing workflow, we are conducting research to build and use a rare diseases knowledge base in an ontology-based architecture that complies with the W3C standards of the semantic web: OWL, RDF, SPARQL and SKOS. Our ontology design approach is based on both domain expertise (in rare diseases and in knowledge engineering) and knowledge extraction from our relational database. The current version of OntoOrpha comprises over 11,000 classes and 190,000 annotations organized under a Rare Diseases Core Ontology. In comparison with the current ORPHANET editing tools, our preliminary experiments are consistent with: (1) better visualization of the knowledge base (2) improved classification editing procedures (3) improved annotation editing procedures (4) valid semantic validation procedures.
Regularized Principal Component Analysis for Spatial Data

ABSTRACT In many atmospheric and earth sciences, it is of interest to identify dominant spatial patterns of variation based on data observed at p locations and n time points with the possibility that p > n. While principal component analysis (PCA) is commonly applied to find the dominant patterns, the eigenimages produced from PCA may exhibit patterns that are too noisy to be physically meaningful when p is large relative to n. To obtain more precise estimates of eigenimages, we propose a regularization approach incorporating smoothness and sparseness of eigenimages, while accounting for their orthogonality. Our method allows data taken at irregularly spaced or sparse locations. In addition, the resulting optimization problem can be solved using the alternating direction method of multipliers, which is easy to implement, and applicable to a large spatial dataset. Furthermore, the estimated eigenfunctions provide a natural basis for representing the underlying spatial process in a spatial random-effects model, from which spatial covariance function estimation and spatial prediction can be efficiently performed using a regularized fixed-rank kriging method. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated by several numerical examples.
Adverse experience in childhood as a developmental risk factor for altered immune status in adulthood

Compelling evidence is now available that adverse childhood experiences are associated with adult pathology. However, understanding of the pathways and mechanisms underlying these associations is limited. Participants in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition in Norfolk, UK (EPIC-Norfolk), aged 40 to 80 years, provided an opportunity to investigate the hypothesis that adverse experience in childhood is associated with peripheral leukocyte count in adulthood in the context of a large-scale population-based cohort study. White blood cell counts were available from 11,367 participants and, after a mean interval of 44 months, from 11,857 at a second health check. A self-completion questionnaire that included the assessment of adverse experience during childhood was administered during the interval between health checks. Associations were observed between early adverse experiences and lymphocyte counts at both health checks. Lifestyle factors accounted for about half of this association. Caution is needed in the interpretation of these findings that require replication but they may be seen to aid understanding of the mechanisms through which early environmental exposures act.
Participation of Children with and without Disabilities in Social, Recreational and Leisure Activities

Background One method of promoting children’s friendship development is through activity participation with peers. However, children with disabilities seem to engage in fewer of these activities, and when they do participate often do so primarily with adults. Materials and Methods This study compared activity participation and friendship in typically developing (TD) children (n = 90), children with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD; n = 65), and children with an intellectual disability (n = 30) between the ages of 5 and 17 years. Parents completed a questionnaire about their child’s participation in social, recreational and leisure activities. Results The TD children participated in significantly more social and recreational activities and had more friends than the children with disabilities. Notable differences emerged among groups in the percentage of activities the children participated in with peers, parents and/or other adults. Some significant differences were noted between the ASD and intellectual disability groups. Conclusions Research concerning activity participation should continue to take into account not only whether children are engaging in activities, but explore more precisely ‘with whom’ these activities are occurring.
The Nature of Rapport

Duncan, S. D. , Jr., & Farley, A. M. (1990). Achieving parent-child coordination through convention: Fixedand variable-sequence conventions. Child Development, 61, 742-753. Duncan, S. D. , Jr., Fiske, D. W. , Denny, R. , Kanki, B. G. , & Mokros, H. B. (1985). Interaction structure and strategy. New York: Cambridge University Press. Ervin-Tripp, S. (1972). On sociolinguistic rules: Alternation and cooccurrence. In J. J. Gumperz & D. Hymes (Eds.), Directions in sociolinguistics (pp. 213-258). New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. Kanki, B. G. (1985). Participant differences and interactive strategies. In S. D. Duncan, Jr., D. W. Fiske, R. Denny, B. G. Kanki, & H. B. Mokros, Interaction structure and strategy (pp. 233-293). New York: Cambridge University Press. Mokros, H. B. (1985). Patterns of persistence and change in action sequences. In S. D. Duncan, Jr., D. W. Fiske, R. Denny, B. G. Kanki, & H. B. Mokros, Interaction structure and strategy (pp. 175-232). New York: Cambridge University Press. Silverstein, M. (1976). Shifters, linguistic categories, and cultural description. In K. A. Basso & H. A. Selby (Eds.), Meaning in anthropology (pp. 11-55). Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
Hardware-Efficient Coherent Digital Receiver Concept With Feedforward Carrier Recovery for $M$ -QAM Constellations

This paper presents a novel digital feedforward carrier recovery algorithm for arbitrary M-ary quadrature amplitude modulation (M-QAM) constellations in an intradyne coherent optical receiver. The approach does not contain any feedback loop and is therefore highly tolerant against laser phase noise. This is crucial, especially for higher order QAM constellations, which inherently have a smaller phase noise tolerance due to the lower spacing between adjacent constellation points. In addition to the mathematical description of the proposed carrier recovery algorithm also a possible hardware-efficient implementation in a parallelized system is presented and the performance of the algorithm is evaluated by Monte Carlo simulations for square 4-QAM (QPSK), 16-QAM, 64-QAM, and 256-QAM. For the simulations ASE noise and laser phase noise are considered as well as analog-to-digital converter (ADC) and internal resolution effects. For a 1 dB penalty at BER = 10-3, linewidth times symbol duration products of 4.1 x 10-4 (4-QAM), 1.4 x 10-4 (16-QAM), 4.0 x 10-5 (64-QAM) and 8.0 x 10-6 (256-QAM) are tolerable.
A unified approach to controller design for systems with quantization and time scheduling

We generalize and unify a range of recent results in quantized control systems (QCS) and networked control systems (NCS) literature and provide a unified framework for controller design for control systems with quantization and time scheduling via an emulation-like approach. A crucial step in our approach is finding an appropriate Lyapunov function for the quantization/time-scheduling protocol which verifies its uniform global exponential stability (UGES). We construct Lyapunov functions for several representative protocols that are commonly found in the literature, as well as some new protocols not considered previously.
An improved MLMA+ and its application in ontology matching

Ontology matching is one of the main aspects of semantic web, which aims at finding correspondences between entities of given ontologies. These found correspondences can be used for applications such as ontology merging, query rewriting, instance transformation, and so on. There has been proposed some algorithms and techniques for matching ontologies. One of these algorithms is multi-level matching algorithm plus (MLMA+) algorithm which has been recently proposed. In this paper we introduced a similarity measure based on Levenshtein measure used in MLMA+ and also made some enhancements to MLMA+ algorithm's neighbor search technique to improve it and enhance its result's quality in ontology matching task. These improvements in the neighbor search make it more efficient and increase its performance by reducing both memory usage and computation time specifically in matching large ontologies.
Single-stranded DNA library preparation from highly degraded DNA using T4 DNA ligase

Abstract DNA library preparation for high-throughput sequencing of genomic DNA usually involves ligation of adapters to double-stranded DNA fragments. However, for highly degraded DNA, especially ancient DNA, library preparation has been found to be more efficient if each of the two DNA strands are converted into library molecules separately. We present a new method for single-stranded library preparation, ssDNA2.0, which is based on single-stranded DNA ligation with T4 DNA ligase utilizing a splinter oligonucleotide with a stretch of random bases hybridized to a 3΄ biotinylated donor oligonucleotide. A thorough evaluation of this ligation scheme shows that single-stranded DNA can be ligated to adapter oligonucleotides in higher concentration than with CircLigase (an RNA ligase that was previously chosen for end-to-end ligation in single-stranded library preparation) and that biases in ligation can be minimized when choosing splinters with 7 or 8 random nucleotides. We show that ssDNA2.0 tolerates higher quantities of input DNA than CircLigase-based library preparation, is less costly and better compatible with automation. We also provide an in-depth comparison of library preparation methods on degraded DNA from various sources. Most strikingly, we find that single-stranded library preparation increases library yields from tissues stored in formalin for many years by several orders of magnitude.
BONY NARES AIR PRESSURE AND NASAL PLUG MUSCLE ACTIVITY DURING CLICK PRODUCTION IN THE HARBOUR PORPOISE , PHOCOENA PHOCOENA , AND THE BOTTLENOSED DOLPHIN , TURSIOPS TRUNCATUS

Sound production mechanisms have been studied in two delphinid species the harbour porpoise, Phocoena phocoena (L.), and the bottlenosed dolphin, Tursiops truncatus (Montagu). It was found that, in both species, the click sound production was coupled to a considerable pressure increase in the bony nares. The maximum pressure recorded in Phocoena was approximately 54kPa and in Tursiops close to 81 kPa; it was equal in time and amplitude in both nares. The nasal plug muscle was found to be active up to 450 ms prior to and during sound production. Sound production without such activity was not seen. The results suggest that an identical mechanism underlies click production in both species, with pressurized air being the driving force and the nasal plug muscle having some active regulating function. Probes were inserted into the bony nares of three harbour porpoises, Phocoena phocoena, and one bottlenosed dolphin, Tursiops truncatus, in order to record air pressure variations together with sound production. Sounds were picked up by a hydrophone manually held to the forehead of the animals. In several of the Phocoena recordings, electromyographic activity in the nasal plug muscle was also recorded.
Pronunciation-specific adjustment strategies for intelligibility in L2 teacher talk: results and implications of a questionnaire study

A questionnaire study was conducted to examine how 120 highly experienced EFL (English as a foreign language) teachers in Japan adjust their pronunciation in order to facilitate and refine their students’ learning skills to approach mutual intelligibility in second language (L2) classrooms (i.e. pronunciation-specific teacher talk). The results of this questionnaire study exhibits that the majority of these teachers reported their conscious and/or intuitive efforts to make classroom input comprehensible to their students via phonological input modification. Then, by coding the questionnaire results, 12 pronunciation-specific adjustment strategies (e.g. speech rate and fluency modification, assimilation and liaison avoidance) were identified, and their frequency among the teachers was measured (e.g. they are likely to enunciate their speech, especially at a lexical level). These findings will not only aid and inform teachers on scaffolding and how to boost mutual intelligibility in L2 classrooms but will also assist to advocate and increase learners’ awareness of the essential importance of acquiring accuracy in L2 pronunciation.
Chapter 2: Help-Seeking Behavior in Learning

Learning is rarely a completely asocial enterprise. Learners are influenced directly and indirectly by their social and cultural environment, so that the why, what, when, where, and how of learning are not always decided by the individual alone. Because learning involves effecting changes in the individual's knowledge state and skill repertoire, it is not surprising that learners may seek help from others in order to effect such changes. Help-seeking has become a topic of growing interest for educators and psychologists concerned with the development and enhancement of children's active learning skills. Indeed, many scholars consider that the ability to utilize adults and peers appropriately as resources to cope with difficulties encountered in learning situations is one of the most important skills children can cultivate (Anderson & Messick, 1974; Nelson-Le Gall, 1981; Nelson-Le Gall, Gumerman, & Scott-Jones, 1983; White & Watts, 1973). The aim of this chapter is to explicate the instrumental role of help-seeking in learning. Major conceptualizations of help-seeking that are currently influential in guiding psychological and educational research will be examined and evaluated for their utility in understanding help-seeking in school-aged learners. Cognitive, developmental, and motivational characteristics of the help-seeker as well as situational/contextual characteristics of the helping interaction have been the focus of much research and will therefore be examined in this chapter. This review will concentrate on help-seeking in learning contexts and give consideration to the role that school environments play in teaching this important achievement strategy.
DEA as a tool for bankruptcy assessment : the agribusiness case study

Bankruptcy assessment provides valuable information for the governments and investors to base their decisions in order to prevent possible financial losses. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) has generally been used to assess relative efficiency of decision making units. Recently, several approaches have appeared that reformulate DEA as a bankruptcy prediction tool. However, only several studies have been published on evaluation of suggested approaches and, if so, the focus was given to manufacture industry and IT industry only. In this paper we discuss the possibility of application of recent results in DEA bankruptcy prediction models in a specific field of agribusiness. Using the AMADEUS database, the Czech Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN CZ) and the financial statements issued in the Czech Business Register, we collect primary data set on the Czech agriculture firms financial performance, apply the DEA based model, evaluate the results obtained and discuss the prediction power of the approaches in the agriculture industry.
Other Topics You May Also Agree or Disagree: Modeling Inter-Topic Preferences using Tweets and Matrix Factorization

We presents in this paper our approach for modeling inter-topic preferences of Twitter users: for example, “those who agree with the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) also agree with free trade”. This kind of knowledge is useful not only for stance detection across multiple topics but also for various real-world applications including public opinion survey, electoral prediction, electoral campaigns, and online debates. In order to extract users’ preferences on Twitter, we design linguistic patterns in which people agree and disagree about specific topics (e.g., “A is completely wrong”). By applying these linguistic patterns to a collection of tweets, we extract statements agreeing and disagreeing with various topics. Inspired by previous work on item recommendation, we formalize the task of modeling inter-topic preferences as matrix factorization: representing users’ preference as a user-topic matrix and mapping both users and topics onto a latent feature space that abstracts the preferences. Our experimental results demonstrate both that our presented approach is useful in predicting missing preferences of users and that the latent vector representations of topics successfully encode inter-topic preferences.
Digital control applications using TI digital signal controller

Two digital control applications are presented: velocity control of a DC motor and adaptive system identification and control of an automotive alternator. A tuning method is proposed for DC motors. Experimental application for the DC motor illustrates the effectiveness and the simplicity of the proposed method for controller design. Using adaptive system identification, an automotive alternator is identified. A regulator is implemented in order to control its output voltage. The control applications run on a Texas Instruments Digital Signal Controller. Rapid Control Prototyping is used for code generation. Once the desired functionality has been captured and simulated, using the MATLAB/Simulink/Real-Time Workshop environment can be generated code for the DSP. All task assignments to processor are automatically made by the software.
Bandwidth selection for kernel-based classification

Dimensionality reduction is an essential step in various machine learning tasks. Applying classification algorithms to the reduced space is often more efficient and accurate. We focus on kernel based dimensionality reduction techniques, and propose to set the bandwidth such that a coherent mapping is extracted. The proposed framework is simulated on artificial and real dataset, results show a high correlation between optimal classification rates and the proposed bandwidth.
Polities Change, Oppression Remains: on the Psychology and Politics of Oppression

While both postindustrial and emerging states face economic, cultural, and political changes, the constant of oppression remains. Economically and culturally marginalized groups continue to endure untold degrees of suffering. From a moral point of view, it is imperative that social scientists attend to the needs of the oppressed This paper examines the dynamics of oppression in postindustrial and emerging states from both a psychological and political perspective. The reality of oppression may be understood from various levels of analysis, from the macrolevel of global economic and political structures, to the microlevel of internalized psychological images of inferiority. A comprehensive analysis of oppression will emerge only from an interdisciplinary approach that integrates the political with the psychological. Otherwise, efforts to reduce conditions of oppression will be inhibited by limited perspectives that neglect either the internal or external domains. We explore some of the psychological mechanisms accounting for oppression, such as learned helplessness, internalization of hegemonic self-rejecting views, and obedience to authority. Some of the political mechanisms accounting for oppression in emerging countries include the oppressive structure of international financial systems and internal colonization. We conclude by outlining the process of conscientization necessary to overcome conditions of oppression at all levels of analysis.
Working Paper No . 474 Wage and Price Dynamics in a Large Emerging Economy : The Case of Chine by

This study finds that the growth in labour costs in China is not passed through fully to final prices in China, neither in the tradable goods sector nor in the economy as a whole. This probably reflects the strong pressure on profit margins from a highly competitive environment, especially in manufactured goods. The potential implications of labour cost increases in China for global inflation pressures are also discussed.