Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Optimization of regulatory architectures in metabolic reaction networks

Successful biotechnological applications, such as amino acid production, have demonstrated significant improvement in bioprocess performance by genetic modifications of metabolic control architectures and enzyme expression levels. However, the stoichiometric complexity of metabolic pathways, along with their strongly nonlinear nature and regulatory coupling, necessitates the use of structured kinetic models to direct experimental applications and aid in quantitative understanding of cellular bioprocesses. A novel optimization problem is introduced here, the objective of which is to identify changes in the regulatory characteristics of pertinent enzymes and in their cellular content which should be implemented to optimize a particular metabolic process. The mathematical representation of the metabolic reaction networks used is the S‐system representation, which at steady state is characterized by linear equations. Exploiting the linearity of the representation, we formulated the optimization problem as a mixed‐integer linear programming (MILP) problem. This formulation allows the consideration of a regulatory superstructure that contains all alternative regulatory structures that can be considered for a given pathway. The proposed approach is developed and illustrated using a simple linear pathway. Application of the framework on a complicated pathway—namely, the xanthine monophosphate (XMP) and guanosine monophosphate (GMP) synthesis pathway—identified the modification of the regulatory architecture that, along with changes in enzyme expression levels, can increase the XMP and GMP concentration by over 114 times the reference value, which is 50 times more than could be achieved by changes in enzyme expression levels only. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Ultrasound versus fluoroscopy-guided medial branch block for the treatment of lower lumbar facet joint pain

Abstract The aim of this study was to compare the mid-term effects and benefits of ultrasound (US)-guided and fluoroscopy (FL)-guided medial branch blocks (MBBs) for chronic lower lumbar facet joint pain through pain relief, functional improvement, and injection efficiency evaluation. Patients with chronic lumbar facet joint pain who received US (n = 68) or FL-guided MBBs (n = 78) were included in this retrospective study. All procedures were performed under FL or US guidance. Complication frequency, therapeutic effects, functional improvement, and the injection efficiency of MBBs were compared at 1, 3, and 6 months after the last injection. Both the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) and the verbal numeric pain scale (VNS) improved at 1, 3, and 6 months after the last injections in both groups. Statistical differences were not observed in ODI and VNS between the groups (P > .05). The proportion of patients who reported successful treatment outcomes showed no significant differences between the groups at different time points. Logistic regression analysis showed that sex, pain duration, injection methods, number of injections, analgesic use, and age were not independent predictors of a successful outcome. US guidance was associated with a significantly shorter performance time. US-guided MBBs did not show significant differences in analgesic effect and functional improvement compared with the FL-guided approach. Therefore, by considering our data from this retrospective study, US-guided MBBs warrant consideration in the conservative management of lower lumbar facet joint pain.
Curricula as Signposts of Cultural Change

According to this paper, curricula reflect a complex, ongoing process of knowledge construction and re-vision, in which organizational participants determine what counts as knowledge, what knowledge is worthy of transmitting, and what organizational forms are appropriate. By viewing faculty as mediators who negotiate a complex set of cultural and organizational influences, this paper offers a starting point for analyzing the emergence of new scholarly commitments and new subcultures among faculty. It thus offers researchers and administrators in higher education a place to begin analyzing issues of social cohesion.
Non-Cooperative Game Based Social Welfare Maximizing Bandwidth Allocation in WSNs

In this paper, we deal with possible data transmission congestion on the sink node in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). We consider a scenario in which all the sensor nodes have a certain amount of storage space and acquire data from the surroundings at heterogeneous speed. Because receiving bandwidth of the sink node is limited, a proper bandwidth allocation mechanism should be implemented to avoid possible congestion or data loss due to the overflow of some sensor nodes. To address this problem, we firstly design a novel bandwidth allocation mechanism, SWM, that can maximize the social utility, an indicator of every sensor node's satisfaction degree and the social fairness. Furthermore, we model the allocation process under the SWM as a noncooperative game and figure out the unique Nash Equilibrium. The uniqueness of the equilibrium demonstrates that this network will actually approach to a fair and stable state.
Cognitive mediators of reactions to rape.

Subjects were exposed to slides that primed different concepts associated with aggression, close personal interactions between men and women, and women as sex objects. Then, as part of an ostensibly unrelated study, they read the testimonies of several rape victims and made judgments concerning both the victim and the alleged rapist. Exposure to negative consequences of aggression apparently threatened subjects' beliefs in a just world, leading subjects to interpret rape incidents in ways that reaffirm this belief (i.e., it strengthened subjects' beliefs that the defendant should be punished, but it also caused them to attribute more responsibility for the incident to the victim). Portrayals of close personal relationships between men and women increased male subjects' beliefs that rape victims were responsible for the incident, but had the opposite effect on female subjects' beliefs. Portrayals of women as sex objects decreased male subjects' beliefs in the victim's credibility and increased their beliefs that she was responsible for the incident; however, it had the opposite effects on female subjects' judgments. Despite their effects on judgments of the rape victim, priming manipulations did not affect beliefs that the defendant should be convicted. Implications of these results for the effects of the public media on attitudes and beliefs about rape are discussed.
An algebraic model for parameterized shape editing

We present an approach to high-level shape editing that adapts the structure of the shape while maintaining its global characteristics. Our main contribution is a new algebraic model of shape structure that characterizes shapes in terms of linked translational patterns. The space of shapes that conform to this characterization is parameterized by a small set of numerical parameters bounded by a set of linear constraints. This convex space permits a direct exploration of variations of the input shape. We use this representation to develop a robust interactive system that allows shapes to be intuitively manipulated through sparse constraints.
Development of a velocity and contact force-based mechanical safety device for service robots

Safety is one of the most important issues in service robots. We have proposed a velocity-based mechanical safety device for service robots. The safety device is attached to each drive-shaft of service robots. If the device detects an unexpected high angular velocity of the drive-shaft, the device stops the robot. In this paper, in order to further improve human safety, we propose a velocity and contact force-based mechanical safety device for service robots. The safety device is also attached to each drive-shaft of service robots. The new device stops the robot, if the device detects an unexpected high angular velocity of the drive-shaft or an unexpected large contact force between the robot and the environments (e.g. humans). The device can work even if the robot's controller does not work, because the device consists of only passive mechanical components without actuators, controllers, or batteries. Firstly, we describe the characteristics of the new safety device. Secondly, we explain the structure and mechanism of the new safety device. Thirdly, we show a wheeled robot equipped with the new safety device which we developed. Finally, we verify the effectiveness of the new safety device by experiments.
Sexual Assault on Campus: The Problem and the Solution

Sexual assault on college campuses is a major problem, yet very few cases are reported. A small percentage are pursued through campus judicial procedures and an even smaller number are reported to the police, but of those only a fraction result in conviction. Further, campus authorities have often mishandled such cases, causing additional trauma to the victim. "Sexual Assault on Campus" examines what happens in the wake of a sexual assault and probes such issues as why so few women report an assault, why so many cases are mishandled, and, most importantly, what is the best way to deal with such an assault when it does occur.
Better Flow Estimation from Color Images

One of the difficulties in estimating optical flow is bias. Correcting the bias using the classical techniques is very difficult. The reason is that knowledge of the error statistics is required, which usually cannot be obtained because of lack of data. In this paper, we present an approach which utilizes color information. Color images do not provide more geometric information than monochromatic images to the estimation of optic flow. They do, however, contain additional statistical information. By utilizing the technique of instrumental variables, bias from multiple noise sources can be robustly corrected without computing the parameters of the noise distribution. Experiments on synthesized and real data demonstrate the efficiency of the algorithm.
Word and sentence prosody in Serbocroatian

This extensive field study and comprehensive analysis of existing scholarship provides a solid basis for interpreting the peculiar and much-debated Serbocroatian accentuation. Although addressed to Slavists in particular, the book also opens possibilities for linguists investigating the ways in which "accent" can be defined and utilized in various linguistic systems.The authors have been working together on Serbocroatian accentuation for more than two decades. The book summarizes their earlier findings and adds a wealth of new materials. It contains the results of thousands of spectrographic measurements of a rich corpus of data concerning word accentuation and sentence intonation, as well as the results of a series of listening tests that clarify the nature of the distinction between so-called falling and rising accents.Because Serbocroatian is one of the IndoEuropean languages with the most complex prosodic patterns, it is extremely important for comparative linguistics and also highly interesting from a typological viewpoint. The interplay of word accents and sentence intonation has offered an especially attractive subject of study for scholars.This book surveys the results of their work and reviews the rich variety of opinions expressed so far. A concluding section focuses on the authors own view, which takes into account not only the invariant elements in the relation between so-called falling and rising accents, but also the variation connected with the syllabic structure of the word and its position in the sentence and with the regional origin of the speaker.Ilse Lehiste is Professor of Linguistics, Ohio State University. Pavle Ivia is a member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and a retired professor of the University of Belgrade. W"ord and Sentence Prosody in Serbocroatian" is thirteenth in the series Current Studies in Linguistics, edited by Jay Keyser.
Rate Allocation and Network Lifetime Problems for Wireless Sensor Networks

An important performance consideration for wireless sensor networks is the amount of information collected by all the nodes in the network over the course of network lifetime. Since the objective of maximizing the sum of rates of all the nodes in the network can lead to a severe bias in rate allocation among the nodes, we advocate the use of lexicographical max-min (LMM) rate allocation. To calculate the LMM rate allocation vector, we develop a polynomial-time algorithm by exploiting the parametric analysis (PA) technique from linear program (LP), which we call serial LP with parametric analysis (SLP-PA). We show that the SLP-PA can be also employed to address the LMM node lifetime problem much more efficiently than a state-of-the-art algorithm proposed in the literature. More important, we show that there exists an elegant duality relationship between the LMM rate allocation problem and the LMM node lifetime problem. Therefore, it is sufficient to solve only one of the two problems. Important insights can be obtained by inferring duality results for the other problem.
Exploring 3D Virtual World Strategies in the Chinese Environment: An Institutional-Based View

Although some strategies of virtual worlds (e.g. Second Life) have been proven to be successful for attracting user acceptance in the western world, the effects of these strategies are questionable in the Chinese environment. When western model based virtual worlds plan business operations in China, they may face challenges such as government policy, law and cultural barriers. From the institutional-based view, this study provides a theoretical framework to explain 3D virtual world strategies in Mainland China, and employs the case study method to explore how the four strategies of virtual worlds (i.e. technology solution, business model, game model and virtual world culture) impact on determinants of user acceptance behavior in the Chinese environment. Two 3D virtual worlds, Second Life (western model based virtual world) and HiPiHi (Chinese local virtual world), are chosen as the cases in this study.
Adiposity and Fat Distribution in relation to Inflammation and Oxidative Stress in a Relatively Lean Population of Chinese Women

Objectives: This study evaluated associations of various anthropometric measures of adiposity with a panel of inflammatory and oxidative stress markers in a relatively lean population of Chinese women. Methods: This analysis included 1,005 Chinese women aged 40–70 years. Plasma concentrations of inflammatory and oxidative stress markers were measured. Anthropometric measurements were taken by trained interviewers. Results: Body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC), and waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) were all positively and linearly associated with the inflammatory markers, CRP, TNF-α, soluble TNF-receptor 1 (sTNF-R1), and IL-6. A significant positive association of these measures of adiposity with the oxidative stress marker F2-IsoP-M, a metabolite of F2-IsoPs, but with not F2-IsoPs was found. Differences in biomarkers between extreme quartiles of anthropometric measurements varied widely, ranging from 9.7% for sTNF-R1 to 162.0% for CRP. For each specific biomarker, various anthropometric measurements exhibited similar ability to explain variations in the biomarker, with the biggest partial r2 (11%) observed for CRP. Conclusions: This study suggests that both general adiposity (measured by BMI) and central adiposity (measured by WC and WHtR) are positively and similarly associated with various markers of inflammation and oxidative stress in relatively lean Chinese women. The metabolite F2-IsoP-M of F2-IsoPs may be a better marker of in vivo oxidative stress than its parent compounds.
Filling the Halls with English: Creating Self-Regulated Learners Through Co-Curricular Activities

Filling the Halls with English: Creating Self-Regulated Learners Through Co-Curricular Activities Sharon Tavares Department of Linguistics and English Language, BYU Master of Arts in TESOL This project investigates the benefits and practicality of applying Zimmerman’s (1994) dimensions of self-regulated learning to co-curricular activities so as to increase students’ willingness and opportunities to communicate in English in the hallways of intensive English programs. Three of these dimensions (social environment, motivation, and physical environment) work together to create a semi-structured liaison between in and out of class communicative environments and give students an occasion, location, and motivation to speak English with one another. To evaluate the effectiveness of such activities and conceptualize a means by which to assist intensive English programs to effectively incorporate co-curricular activities in their curricula, the principal researcher designed and conducted a co-curricular activity based on self-regulated learning. She obtained student feedback using surveys and interviews and found that the majority of students spoke mostly English, made new friends, practiced listening and speaking skills, and enjoyed themselves at this activity. As a result of this data, the principal researcher created a booklet to assist in the planning of future co-curricular activities. While only a preliminary study, this data and resulting booklet have great potential to fill the hallways of intensive English programs with English and thus create a holistic learning environment.
Efficiently correlating complex events over live and archived data streams

Correlating complex events over live and archived data streams, which we call Pattern Correlation Queries (PCQs), provides many benefits for domains which need real time forecasting of events or identification of causal dependencies, while handling data at high rates and in massive amounts, like in financial or medical settings. Existing work has focused either on complex event processing over a single type of stream source (i.e., either live or archived), or on simple stream correlation queries (e.g., live events trigerring a database lookup). In this paper, we specifically focus on recency-based PCQs and provide clear, useful, and optimizable semantics for them. PCQs raise a number of challenges in optimizing data management and query processing, which we address in the setting of the DejaVu complex event processing system. More specifically, we propose three complementary optimizations including recent input buffering, query result caching, and join source ordering. Furthermore, we capture the relevant query processing tradeoffs in a cost model. An extensive performance study on synthetic and real-life data sets not only validates this cost model, but also shows that our optimizations are very effective, achieving more than two orders magnitude throughput improvement and much better scalability compared to a conventional approach.
Generalized gramian framework for model reduction of switched systems

In this paper, a general method for model order reduction of switched linear dynamical systems is presented. The proposed technique is based on the generalized gramian framework for model reduction. It is shown that different classical reduction methods can be developed into generalized gramian framework. Balanced reduction within specified frequency bound is developed within this framework. In order to avoid numerical instability and also to increase the numerical efficiency, generalized gramian based Petrov-Galerkin projection is constructed instead of the similarity transform approach for reduction. The method preserves the stability of the original switched system under arbitrary switching signal and is applicable to both continuous and discrete time systems. The performance of the proposed method is illustrated by numerical examples.
Efficient formulation approach for the forward kinematics of 3-6 parallel mechanisms

This paper presents a new formulation approach to obtain a simplified form of the forward kinematic solution that can reduce the computational burden involved in determining the solution of the forward kinematics of the 3-6 parallel mechanism with three connecting joints on the moving platform. The conventional forward kinematics of haptic devices with serial–parallel mechanisms is formulated through employing the Denavit–Hartenberg notation, and results in complicated formulation procedures and computational burden. In order to reduce these problems, this paper transforms the haptic devices into an equivalent kinematic model of the 3-6 Stewart–Gough platform. The conventional forward kinematics of the 3-6 platform is formulated with trigonometric functions through complicated steps and results in the computational burden. Thus we introduce the new formulation approach, based on tetrahedron geometry, in order to simplify the formulation of the forward kinematics and to reduce the computational burden. The proposed formulation approach can allow intuitive derivation and considerable abbreviation of the number of calculations involved in the forward kinematic solution. The feasibility and convergence of the formulation approach is verified through a series of simulations and experiments.