Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Humanoid motion planning for dual-arm manipulation and re-grasping tasks

In this paper, we present efficient solutions for planning motions of dual-arm manipulation and re-grasping tasks. Motion planning for such tasks on humanoid robots with a high number of degrees of freedom (DoF) requires computationally efficient approaches to determine the robot's full joint configuration at a given grasping position, i.e. solving the Inverse Kinematics (IK) problem for one or both hands of the robot. In this context, we investigate solving the inverse kinematics problem and motion planning for dual-arm manipulation and re-grasping tasks by combining a gradient-descent approach in the robot's pre-computed reachability space with random sampling of free parameters. This strategy provides feasible IK solutions at a low computation cost without resorting to iterative methods which could be trapped by joint-limits. We apply this strategy to dual-arm motion planning tasks in which the robot is holding an object with one hand in order to generate whole-body robot configurations suitable for grasping the object with both hands. In addition, we present two probabilistically complete RRT-based motion planning algorithms (J+-RRT and IK-RRT) that interleave the search for an IK solution with the search for a collision-free trajectory and the extension of these planners to solving re-grasping problems. The capabilities of combining IK methods and planners are shown both in simulation and on the humanoid robot ARMAR-III performing dual-arm tasks in a kitchen environment.
Pharmacokinetics of diclofenac hydroxyethylpyrrolidine (DHEP) plasters in patients with monolateral knee joint effusion.

The aim of this study was the assessment of blood and synovial levels of diclofenac after repeated epicutaneous dosing with DHEP plasters in patients with joint effusion. To eight volunteers suffering from monolateral knee joint effusion, DHEP plasters containing 180 mg DHEP each, were applied on the affected knee b.i. d. (at 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.) for 4 consecutive days (8 doses) and only at 8 a.m. of the 5th day (9th dose). Plasters were left on the affected area until the following application or for 12h the 5th day. Venous blood samples were collected immediately before the first dosis and 1, 4 and 8 hours after the 9th application, while synovial fluid (SF) from the affected knee joint was collected at the beginning of the study and at 4 hours after the 9th DHEP plaster application. Unchanged diclofenac was measured in plasma and SF by means of a GLC-mass spectrometry technique. Low but durable levels of diclofenac were obtained at each collection after dosing in plasma. Detectable SF concentrations of diclofenac at the 4th hour of the 9th application were obtained, thus indicating the diffusion of diclofenac into the synovial liquid. The authors conclude that the topical application of DHEP plaster b.i. d. for 4 days allows measurable levels of diclofenac to be obtained in the underlying affected joint, without producing elevated circulating blood concentrations of diclofenac, thus greatly reducing the risk of possible systemic side effects.
Screening older patients at risk for falling during hospitalization

An individual patient’s risk of falling during hospitalization is associated with several factors (Oliver et al. 2004). Few valid instruments are available for screening hospitalized patients at risk for falling (Perell et al. 2001, Oliver et al. 2004). Even though hospital fall-prevention programmes widely mandate fall-risk assessment, an appropriate fallrisk instrument cannot be recommended based on diagnostic values (American Geriatrics Society et al. 2001) The Morse Fall Scale (MFS) is a tool consisting of items that assess six risk factors: 1) history of falls; 2) secondary diagnosis; 3) intravenous access; 4) mobility aids; 5) gait; 6) mental status (Morse 1997). MFS total scores range from 0 to 125, with higher scores reflecting a higher risk of falling. The cut-off score distinguishing those at high risk for falling was originally set to 45 points (Morse et al. 1989). To evaluate the diagnostic value of the MFS in another hospital setting, its predictive validity was assessed using different cut-off scores to prospectively identify patients at risk for falling (Schwendimann et al. 2006).
Approximate Solutions to Dynamic Models - Linear Methods

Linear Methods are often used to compute approximate solutions to dynamic models, as these models often cannot be solved analytically. Linear methods are very popular, as they can easily be implemented. Also, they provide a useful starting point for understanding more elaborate numerical methods. It shall be described here first for the example of a simple real business cycle model, including how to easily generate the log-linearized equations needed before solving the linear system. For a general framework, formulas are provided for calculating the recursive law of motion. The algorithm described here is implemented with the "toolkit" programs available per
A network congestion-aware memory subsystem for manycore

The network-on-chip (NoC) plays a crucial role in memory performance due to the fact that it can handle the majority of traffics from/to the DRAM memory controllers. However, there has been little work on the interplay between the NoC and memory controllers. In this article, we address a problem called network congestion-induced memory blocking and propose a novel memory controller, which performs memory access scheduling and network entry control in a network congestion-aware manner. In case of network congestion, in order to avoid performance degradation due to the blocking caused by data bound for congested regions in the NoC, the proposed memory controller favors requests and data associated with uncongested regions. In addition, in order to avoid the fairness problem of such a policy, we also propose a gradual method, which enables a trade-off between performance (in memory utilization) and fairness (in memory access latency). Experimental results show that the proposed method can offer up to 1.76 ∼ 2.99 times improvement in memory utilization in the latency-tolerant designs.
Grid-based temporal logic inference

This paper introduces a new algorithm to infer temporal logic properties of a system from data consisting of a set of finite time system traces. We propose an algorithm that generates a Signal Temporal Logic formula by discretizing the entire domain and codomain of the system traces. Unlike many popular inference algorithms which require labeled data that represents whether a trace exhibits a desired behavior (positive) or not (negative), this approach only requires positive traces to infer temporal logic properties. We present two case studies to illustrate the efficiency and accuracy of the proposed algorithm. The first is a biological network consisting of a genetic logic circuit in a bacterial cell. The second is a fault detection problem in automotive powertrain systems. We also compare the performance of the algorithm with an existing inference algorithm.
Hierarchical Clustering for Semi-Supervised Ground Truth Generation

Supervised learning tasks can require a large collection of labeled data for accurate pattern recognition. For recognition of handwritten characters, manually producing ground truths can be very tedious. In this paper, we propose a semisupervised hierarchical clustering method to reduce the necessary amount of human effort required for labeling a dataset of handwritten characters. The experimental results demonstrate that the approach can improve labeling accuracy over baseline methods.
V Phagocytosis and H 2 O 2 Induce Catalase and Metallothionein Gene Expression in Human Retinal Pigment Epithelial Cells

Purpose. Reactive oxygen intermediates have been implicated in the aging process and degenerative diseases of the eye, including retinopathy of prematurity, cataractogenesis, and macular degeneration. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of phagocytosis of photoreceptor outer segments and the addition of exogenous H2O2 on catalase and metallothionein expression in human retinal pigment epithelial cells.
A First Resilient DC-Dominated Microgrid for Mission-Critical Space Applications

The advanced electrical power system (AEPS) is the first remote, resilient dc microgrid for mission-critical space applications. This structured microgrid features resiliency, energy balancing, autonomy, standard interface, fault tolerance, fault isolation, modularity, and scalability. The basic standard building modules are first described. Typical system configurations are then presented to illustrate its versatility and its ability to reduce cost. Fault-tolerant design principles are discussed. A-minute-day simulation is then presented to demonstrate the system-level energy balance and smooth dynamic behaviors when entering and exiting the lunar eclipse. Fuse clearing transient capability is also discussed. A dead-bus recovery circuitry is presented, which ensures self-resiliency. The test results are presented to validate the system design and to demonstrate self-recovery with a dead bus. The measured peak power tracking accuracy and current sharing accuracy among multiple batteries are also presented.
Post-processing of transform coded images using selective filtering and fuzzy-based enhancement

Transform coding often leads to artifacts called blocking when the image or video is compressed to low bit-rate. In this paper, a new post-processing scheme using selective low-pass filtering and fuzzy-based enhancement is proposed. The merit of the scheme is that it can remove most of the blocking artifacts found in image or video coding while preserving most of the fine details. Simulation results demonstrated that the proposed algorithm can significantly improve the visual quality of the decoded image.
Canonical Wnt Signaling Induces Vascular Endothelial Dysfunction via p66Shc-Regulated Reactive Oxygen Species

Objective— Reactive oxygen species regulate canonical Wnt signaling. However, the role of the redox regulatory protein p66Shc in the canonical Wnt pathway is not known. We investigated whether p66Shc is essential for canonical Wnt signaling in the endothelium and determined whether the canonical Wnt pathway induces vascular endothelial dysfunction via p66Shc-mediated oxidative stress. Approach and Results— The canonical Wnt ligand Wnt3a induced phosphorylation (activation) of p66Shc in endothelial cells. Wnt3a-stimulated dephosphorylation of &bgr;-catenin, and &bgr;-catenin–dependent transcription, was inhibited by knockdown of p66Shc. Exogenous H2O2-induced &bgr;-catenin dephosphorylation was also mediated by p66Shc. Moreover, p66Shc overexpression dephosphorylated &bgr;-catenin and increased &bgr;-catenin–dependent transcription, independent of Wnt3a ligand. P66Shc-induced &bgr;-catenin dephosphorylation was inhibited by antioxidants N-acetyl cysteine and catalase. Wnt3a upregulated endothelial NADPH oxidase-4, and &bgr;-catenin dephosphorylation was suppressed by knocking down NADPH oxidase-4 and by antioxidants. Wnt3a increased H2O2 levels in endothelial cells and impaired endothelium-dependent vasorelaxation in mouse aortas, both of which were rescued by p66Shc knockdown. P66Shc knockdown also inhibited adhesion of monocytes to Wnt3a-stimulated endothelial cells. Furthermore, constitutively active &bgr;-catenin expression in the endothelium increased vascular reactive oxygen species and impaired endothelium-dependent vasorelaxation. In vivo, high-fat diet feeding–induced endothelial dysfunction in mice was associated with increased endothelial Wnt3a, dephosphorylated &bgr;-catenin, and phosphorylated p66Shc. High-fat diet–induced dephosphorylation of endothelial &bgr;-catenin was diminished in mice in which p66Shc was knocked down. Conclusions— p66Shc plays a vital part in canonical Wnt signaling in the endothelium and mediates Wnt3a-stimulated endothelial oxidative stress and dysfunction
An Examination of the Alignment of Student-Athletes’ Undergraduate Major Choices and Career Field Aspirations in Life After Sports

Today higher education student affairs professionals are charged with not only understanding the challenges and needs of a diverse student body, they must also prepare students for careers in life after college. For this empirical study I explored the undergraduate major choices and career aspirations of 29 senior student-athletes at a large, highly selective Division I/Research I university to further understand how life experiences influence undergraduate major choice and the subsequent alignment of chosen major and future career aspirations. Framed from a constructivist epistemology, findings of this phenomenological study were guided by Savickas’s (2002) career construction theory (CCT). Personal narratives for 29 student-athletes were collected via semistructured individual interviews and analyzed by employing pattern and process coding techniques. Findings suggest 3 overarching life experiences influence undergraduate major choice as well as the alignment of participants’ undergraduate majors and future career aspirations. This article presents implications and recommendations for contemporary student affairs practitioners who work with student-athletes as they engage in processes of career exploration and major choice.
Online Newspaper Quality Factors: The impact of Gender, Age, and Skill Level

There has been a proliferation of online newspapers over recent years. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, some quality problems remain. Based on a two-factor model of hygiene and motivator factors, this paper examines quality for online newspapers giving attention to differences across gender, age, and computer skill level. Hygiene factors are essential requirements whose absence causes dissatisfaction, while motivators are desirable elements that add value and increase user satisfaction. This paper presents findings from an empirical study of 84 web users. Results show that hygiene factors for our respondents were Timeliness, Content Attractiveness, Content Coverage, Usefulness, and Navigation, while motivators were Writing Style, Layout, Archives, Services, Interactivity, and use of Multimedia. Four factors were borderline: Journalism Ethics, Ease of Use, Front Page & Headlines, and Locating Information. However, the research reveals some differences in perception of factors across gender, age, and computer skill levels, and further research is recommended to investigate these further.
Improved Methodical Approach for Quantitative BRET Analysis of G Protein Coupled Receptor Dimerization

G Protein Coupled Receptors (GPCR) can form dimers or higher ordered oligomers, the process of which can remarkably influence the physiological and pharmacological function of these receptors. Quantitative Bioluminescence Resonance Energy Transfer (qBRET) measurements are the gold standards to prove the direct physical interaction between the protomers of presumed GPCR dimers. For the correct interpretation of these experiments, the expression of the energy donor Renilla luciferase labeled receptor has to be maintained constant, which is hard to achieve in expression systems. To analyze the effects of non-constant donor expression on qBRET curves, we performed Monte Carlo simulations. Our results show that the decrease of donor expression can lead to saturation qBRET curves even if the interaction between donor and acceptor labeled receptors is non-specific leading to false interpretation of the dimerization state. We suggest here a new approach to the analysis of qBRET data, when the BRET ratio is plotted as a function of the acceptor labeled receptor expression at various donor receptor expression levels. With this method, we were able to distinguish between dimerization and non-specific interaction when the results of classical qBRET experiments were ambiguous. The simulation results were confirmed experimentally using rapamycin inducible heterodimerization system. We used this new method to investigate the dimerization of various GPCRs, and our data have confirmed the homodimerization of V2 vasopressin and CaSR calcium sensing receptors, whereas our data argue against the heterodimerization of these receptors with other studied GPCRs, including type I and II angiotensin, β2 adrenergic and CB1 cannabinoid receptors.
How mechanistic can accounts of interaction be ?

Ever since dialogue modelling first developed relative to broadly Gricean assumptions about utterance interpretation (Clark, 1996), it has been questioned whether the full complexity of higher-order intention computation is made use of in everyday conversation. In this paper, building on the DS account ofsplit utterances , we further probe the necessity of full-intention recognition/formation: we do so by exploring the extent to which the interactive coordination of dialogue exchange can be seen as emergent from mechanisms of language processing, without either needing representation by interlocutors of each other’s mental states, or fully developed intentions as regards messages to be conveyed (even in e.g. clarifications and completions when the content of the utterance is in doubt).
A unified framework for design validation and manufacturing test

New approaches to address the difficult problems in test are necessary if its current status as a major bottleneck in the production of quality integrated circuits is to be changed. The authors propose a new direction for solving the test problem using powerful methods already employed for the formal verification of large circuits. More specifically, they discuss how abstraction techniques can assist conventional ATPG tools when attacking hard to detect faults. The same abstractions can also be used in design verification to increase the level of confidence in a design following simulation, by providing a meaningful measure of the coverage achieved by the verification vectors. In this sense, the authors' approach is geared toward providing a unified fled framework for design validation and manufacturing test.
The Drosophila centrosome-associated protein CP190 is essential for viability but not for cell division

The Drosophila CP190 and CP60 proteins interact with each other and shuttle between the nucleus in interphase and the centrosome in mitosis. Both proteins can bind directly to microtubules in vitro, and have been shown to associate with a specific pattern of loci on salivary gland polytene chromosomes, but their functions are unknown. Here we show that reducing the level of CP190 or CP60 by >90% in tissue culture cells does not significantly interfere with centrosome or microtubule organisation, with cell division, or with cell viability. However, CP190 is an essential protein, as flies homozygous for mutations in the Cp190 gene die at late pupal stages of development. In larval brains of Cp190 mutants, mitosis is not radically perturbed, and a mutated form of CP190 (CP190ΔM), that cannot bind to microtubules or associate with centrosomes, can rescue the lethality associated with mutations in the Cp190 gene. Thus, CP190 plays an essential role in flies that is independent of its association with centrosomes or microtubules.
ATHLATES: accurate typing of human leukocyte antigen through exome sequencing

Human leukocyte antigen (HLA) typing at the allelic level can in theory be achieved using whole exome sequencing (exome-seq) data with no added cost but has been hindered by its computational challenge. We developed ATHLATES, a program that applies assembly, allele identification and allelic pair inference to short read sequences, and applied it to data from Illumina platforms. In 15 data sets with adequate coverage for HLA-A, -B, -C, -DRB1 and -DQB1 genes, ATHLATES correctly reported 74 out of 75 allelic pairs with an overall concordance rate of 99% compared with conventional typing. This novel approach should be broadly applicable to research and clinical laboratories.
Measuring Qualities of Articles Contributed by Online Communities

Using open source Web editing software (e.g., wiki), online community users can now easily edit, review and publish articles collaboratively. While much useful knowledge can be derived from these articles, content users and critics are often concerned about their qualities. In this paper, we develop two models, namely basic model and peer review model, for measuring the qualities of these articles and the authorities of their contributors. We represent collaboratively edited articles and their contributors in a bipartite graph. While the basic model measures an article's quality using both the authorities of contributors and the amount of contribution from each contributor, the peer review model extends the former by considering the review aspect of article content. We present results of experiments conducted on some Wikipedia pages and their contributors. Our result show that the two models can effectively determine the articles' qualities and contributors' authorities using the collaborative nature of online communities
Human Behavior Cognition Using Smartphone Sensors

This research focuses on sensing context, modeling human behavior and developing a new architecture for a cognitive phone platform. We combine the latest positioning technologies and phone sensors to capture human movements in natural environments and use the movements to study human behavior. Contexts in this research are abstracted as a Context Pyramid which includes six levels: Raw Sensor Data, Physical Parameter, Features/Patterns, Simple Contextual Descriptors, Activity-Level Descriptors, and Rich Context. To achieve implementation of the Context Pyramid on a cognitive phone, three key technologies are utilized: ubiquitous positioning, motion recognition, and human behavior modeling. Preliminary tests indicate that we have successfully achieved the Activity-Level Descriptors level with our LoMoCo (Location-Motion-Context) model. Location accuracy of the proposed solution is up to 1.9 meters in corridor environments and 3.5 meters in open spaces. Test results also indicate that the motion states are recognized with an accuracy rate up to 92.9% using a Least Square-Support Vector Machine (LS-SVM) classifier.
Genetically Modified Mouse Models for Biomarker Discovery and Preclinical Drug Testing

The ability to grow pluripotent mouse embryonic stem cells in culture, and to introduce precise genetic modifications into those cells through gene targeting, has greatly facilitated the generation of mouse models of human disease. This technology is playing a particularly important role in cancer research. In addition to their use in elucidating the role of individual genes or combinations of 2 or more genes, the genetically engineered mouse models are being used to develop biomarkers and for preclinical drug testing. By examining plasma samples from tumor-bearing mice from mice carrying specific mutations in tumor suppressor genes and/or oncogenes, investigators can identify tumor-specific biomarkers that are overexpressed in the tumor cells. These markers are directly relevant to the corresponding human cancer. The ability to generate tumors at the correct anatomical site within the normal cellular environment is augmenting the use of xenografts in drug testing in a preclinical setting. Clin Cancer Res; 18(3); 625–30. ©2012 AACR.