Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
CONNECT: Fast Flexible FPGA-Tuned Networks-on-Chip

In this paper we present CONNECT, a exible NoC architecture and RTL generation engine for fast, FPGA-tuned Networks-on-Chip (NoCs). The CONNECT NoC architecture embodies a set of FPGA-motivated design principles that uniquely inuence key NoC design decisions, such as topology, link width, router pipeline depth, network buer sizing, and ow control. The exibility, lightweight nature and high performance of CONNECT-based NoCs makes them ideal candidates for use in FPGA-based research studies. We evaluate CONNECT against a high-quality publicly available synthesizable RTL-level NoC design intended for ASICs. Our results show a signicant gain in specializing NoC design decisions to FPGAs’ unique mapping and operating characteristics. For example, in the case of a 4x4 mesh conguration evaluated using a set of synthetic trac patterns, we obtain comparable or better performance than the state-of-the-art NoC while reducing logic resource cost by 58%, or alternatively, achieve 3-4x better performance for approximately the same logic resource usage. To demonstrate CONNECT’s exibility and extensive design space coverage, we also report synthesis and network performance results for a variety of dierent CONNECT networks. This paper is based on [13] previously published at FPGA 2012.
Dexterous manipulation using both palm and fingers

This paper focuses on the problem of manipulating the orientation of a polygonal object in hand. We propose a control technique which integrates the use of palm and fingers to pick up a given object on the table, to drop it on a specific spot on the palm, and to let it roll continuously and controllably on the palm, subject to the gravitational and contact forces. We formulate a simple and fast algorithm to control the tilting angle of the palm based on the conservation of mechanical energy and an empirical model of energy dissipation due to collisions. We also develop a multifingers controller for stable grasp and for correcting the rolling motion. The proposed technique is demonstrated on a simulated robotic hand manipulating a wide range of objects with different geometry and physical properties.
Determining and Allocating Capacity-Driven Safety Stock in Multi-Echelon Systems

In this paper, we study a multi-item, multi-echelon capacitated production and inventory system under periodic review. The approach is designed to plan and allocate production of items for which it is possible to determine probability distributions describing the demand process at each location. We begin by presenting a stochastic dynamic program for decision making in this environment. Due to its computational complexity, this formulation is of little practical value. We develop an alternative approximation approach for making production and allocation decisions which is com-putationally eecient. It uses a combination of the inventory shortfall random variable to describe the state of the system and a new capacity allocation mechanism that mitigates the impact of inventory imbalances among items and locations. The approach is suitable for systems with tens of thousands of items across many locations. We conclude by reporting the results of a large simulation study. This study demonstrates the eeectiveness of the approach under a wide variety of scenarios. When the proposed methods are used in systems with short lead times, both the existence of imbalance and its impact on costs are negligible.
A 2 A 2 A 3 A 3 A 3 A 1 Local FS Local FS Local FS Local FS Interconnect

We present the design, prototype implementation and initial evaluation of FedFS a novel cluster file system architecture that provides a global file space by aggregating the local file systems of the cluster nodes into a loose federation. The federated file system (FedFS) is created ad-hoc for a distributed application that runs on the cluster, and its lifetime is limited by the lifetime of the distributed application. FedFS provides location-independent global file naming, load balancing, and file migration and replication. It relies on the local file systems to perform the file I/O operations. The local file systems retain their autonomy, in the sense that their structure and content do not change to support the federated file system. Other applications may run on the local file systems without realizing that the same file system is part of one or multiple FedFS. If the distributed application permits, nodes can dynamically join or leave the federation anytime, with no modifications required to the local file system organization. FedFS is implemented as an I/O library over VIA, which supports remote memory operations. The applicability and performance of the federated file system architecture is evaluated by building a distributed NFS file server.
Application of liposomes in drug development — focus on gastroenterological targets

Over the past decade, liposomes became a focal point in developing drug delivery systems. New liposomes, with novel lipid molecules or conjugates, and new formulations opened possibilities for safely and efficiently treating many diseases including cancers. New types of liposomes can prolong circulation time or specifically deliver drugs to therapeutic targets. This article concentrates on current developments in liposome based drug delivery systems for treating diseases of the gastrointestinal tract. We will review different types and uses of liposomes in the development of therapeutics for gastrointestinal diseases including inflammatory bowel diseases and colorectal cancer.
Can Vendors Influence Switching Costs and Compatibility in an Environment with Open Standards?

This paper examines the potential social costs of standardization, including possible vendor reactions to standards and their impacts on the adoption of new technology and long-term market structure. Specifically, we study how vendors might react to standards in the market for routers and switches, two of the most important pieces of networking hardware for the information systems infrastructure of modern firms. Using data from over 22,000 establishments surveyed by Harte Hanks Market Intelligence, we provide evidence that vendors are able to maintain high switching costs in the market for routers and switches despite the presence of open standards in the industry. Several vendor actions are discussed in this paper, including manipulating horizontal compatibility between comparable rival products and vertical compatibility between complementary products, maintaining a broader product line, creating product suites, and targeting specific market segments. Our results further suggest that the presence of switching costs can lead to inefficient adoption of new information technology and that vendors may be able to influence the speed of new information technology adoption.
SMIT2 mediates all myo‐inositol uptake in apical membranes of rat small intestine

This study presents the characterization of MI uptake in rat intestine using purified membrane preparations (BBMv). The two Na+‐coupled myo‐inositol (MI) cotransporters identified (SMIT1 and SMIT2) can be differentiated through inhibition studies using the selective substrates D‐chiro‐inositol (DCI, specific for SMIT2) and L‐fucose (specific for SMIT1). Results show that SMIT2 is exclusively responsible for apical MI transport in rat intestine. Other sugar transport systems present in apical membranes (SGLT1 and GLUT5) lacked any significant contribution to MI uptake. Functional analysis of rat SMIT2 activity determined using electrophysiological studies in Xenopus oocytes, demonstrated similarities to the activities of SMIT2 from species (rabbit and human), displaying high affinities for MI (0.150 ± 0.040 mM), DCI (0.31 ± 0.06 mM) and Pz (0.016 ± 0.007 mM), low affinity for glucose (36 ± 7 mM) and no affinity for L‐fucose. Electrophysiological studies essentially confirmed those found in rat intestinal BBMv with exception of glucose affinity which was about 40‐fold higher in vesicles (Ki = 0.94 ± 0.35 mM) when compared to oocytes. Finally, GLUT2 expressed in oocytes did not mediate any significant radiolabelled MI uptake, indicating that this transport system does not participate in the basolateral exit of MI from small intestine.
Milking the Cash Cow: Earnings Pressure and Competitive Behavior in the US Electricity Industry

This study examines the effect of earnings pressure on firms’ strategic behavior in output competition. We argue that firms facing earnings pressure will attempt to increase current profits to meet analysts’ forecasts by exploiting market power opportunities in their product markets, even at the risk of encouraging future entry and rival expansion. In commodity industries, this behavior will lead to restricting output in markets where market structure and rival characteristics are more favorable for the exercise of market power. Using data from the US electricity generation industry, our findings show that firms facing earnings pressure tend to be less aggressive in output competition, particularly when they can exploit market power, but that this behavior incites their product-market rivals to produce more aggressively.
Understanding digital piracy through the lens of psychosocial, criminological and cultural factors

World's leading reports on piracy published by organisation such as WIPO and BSA have not explicitly explained the act of digital piracy from a psychosocial, cultural and criminological perspective. A total of 624 studies were identified which discussed the digital piracy phenomenon from varied perspective such as economic, political, legal, cultural, psychological, criminological and sociological factors. Relevant papers were further shortlisted from the identified studies by following an inclusion criterion of psychosocial, criminological and cultural factors that impact the behaviour of the perpetrators of digital piracy. Based on these criteria, 74 studies were included in this review which included following factors: social learning theory, self-control theory, neutralising techniques and justification of perpetrators, ethical, moral and religious predisposition of digital piracy. Theoretical constructs in explaining digital piracy and collectivistic and individualistic economies. It also identified potential area of future research based on critical construct of existing literature.
The Global Jihadist Movement: The Most Lethal Ideology?

Prior research has established a link between ideology and lethality, both within the homicide and terrorism literatures. We examine this relationship as it pertains to the Global Jihadist Movement (GJM). Using a series of logit and negative binomial models with a sample from the Global Terrorism Database, we find that the GJM is indeed more deadly. However, this relationship does not seem to differentially affect Americans, despite their role as the GJM’s defined “other. ”
Nitrous oxide emissions from European agriculture; an analysis of variability and drivers of emissions from field experiments

Nitrous oxide emissions from a network of agri- cultural experiments in Europe were used to explore the rel- ative importance of site and management controls of emis- sions. At each site, a selection of management interventions were compared within replicated experimental designs in plot-based experiments. Arable experiments were conducted at Beano in Italy, El Encin in Spain, Foulum in Denmark, Log˚ arden in Sweden, Maulde in Belgium, Paulinenaue in Germany, and Tulloch in the UK. Grassland experiments were conducted at Crichton, Nafferton and Peaknaze in the UK, G¨¨ ¨ o in Hungary, Rzecin in Poland, Zarnekow in Germany and Theix in France. Nitrous oxide emissions were measured at each site over a period of at least two years us- ing static chambers. Emissions varied widely between sites
Empirical research on financial distress early warning based on ternary Logistic model

Most scholars applied dichotomy to the company financial distress research, which classifies listed companies into two categories. We apply trisection method, which classifies listed companies into three categories: financial distress companies, financial unstable companies and financial healthy companies, and apply principal component analysis method and ternary Logistic model to construct a financial distress prediction model. The empirical results indicate that the financial distress prediction model based on ternary Logistic model has better forecast ability and lower misjudge costs.
A Starvation-free Algorithm For Achieving 100% Throughput in an Input- Queued Switch

It is well known that head-of-line blocking limits the throughput of an input-queued switch with first-in-first-out (FIFO) queues. Under certain conditions, the throughput can be shown to be limited to approximately 58.6%. It is also known that if non-FIFO queueing policies are used, the throughput can be increased. However, it has not been previously shown that if a suitable queueing policy and scheduling algorithm are used, then it is possible to achieve 100% throughput for all independent arrival processes. In this paper we prove this to be the case using a simple linear programming argument and quadratic Lyapunov function. In particular, we assume that each input maintains a separate FIFO queue for each output and that the switch is scheduled using a maximum weight bipartite matching algorithm. We introduce two maximum weight matching algorithms: longest queue first (LQF) and oldest cell first (OCF). Both algorithms achieve 100% throughput for all independent arrival processes. LQF favors queues with larger occupancy, ensuring that larger queues will eventually be served. However, we find that LQF can lead to the permanent starvation of short queues. OCF overcomes this limitation by favoring cells with large waiting times.
Monads, zippers and views: virtualizing the monad stack

We make monadic components more reusable and robust to changes by employing two new techniques for virtualizing the monad stack: the monad zipper and monad views. The monad zipper is a higher-order monad transformer that creates virtual monad stacks by ignoring particular layers in a concrete stack. Monad views provide a general framework for monad stack virtualization: they take the monad zipper one step further and integrate it with a wide range of other virtualizations. For instance, particular views allow restricted access to monads in the stack. Furthermore, monad views provide components with a call-by-reference-like mechanism for accessing particular layers of the monad stack. With our two new mechanisms, the monadic effects required by components no longer need to be literally reflected in the concrete monad stack. This makes these components more reusable and robust to changes.
Video stabilization with a depth camera

Previous video stabilization methods often employ homographies to model transitions between consecutive frames, or require robust long feature tracks. However, the homography model is invalid for scenes with significant depth variations, and feature point tracking is fragile in videos with textureless objects, severe occlusion or camera rotation. To address these challenging cases, we propose to solve video stabilization with an additional depth sensor such as the Kinect camera. Though the depth image is noisy, incomplete and low resolution, it facilitates both camera motion estimation and frame warping, which make the video stabilization a much well posed problem. The experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of our algorithm.
Practical Methods for Analyzing Pedestrian and Bicycle Use of a Transportation Facility

The objective of the project is to analyze existing technologies used for the process of generating counts of bicycles and pedestrians in transportation facilities such as walk and bicycle bridges, urban bicycle routes, bicycle trails etc. The advantages and disadvantages of each existing technology which is being applied to counting has been analyzed and some commercially available products were listed. A technical description of different methods that were considered for vision based object recognition is also mentioned along with the reasons as to why such methods were overlooked for our problem. Support Vector Machines were used for classification based on a vocabulary of features built using interest point detectors. After finalizing the software and hardware, five sites were picked for filming and about 10 hours of video was acquired in all. A portion of the video data was used for training and the remainder was used for testing the algorithm’s accuracy. Results of counts are provided and an interpretation of these results is provided in this report. Upon detailed analysis the reasons for false counts and undercounting in some cases have been identified and current work concerns dealing with these issues. Changes are being made to the system to improve the accuracy with the current level of training and make the system available for practitioners to perform counting.
The influence of target acceleration on velocity estimation in dual-channel SAR-GMTI

This paper investigates the effects of target acceleration on estimating the velocity vector of a ground moving target from single-pass dual-channel synthetic aperture radar data. Although vehicles traveling on roads and highways routinely experience acceleration, the majority of estimation algorithms assume a constant velocity scenario, which may result in erroneous estimates of target velocity. It is shown that under most conditions, acceleration has only minor effects on the estimation of across-track velocity using along-track interferometric phase. However, under the assumption of constant velocity, acceleration may significantly bias the estimate of along-track velocity. The influence of both along-track and across-track accelerations is examined through simulations of an airborne geometry and experimental data from Environment Canada's airborne CV 580 dual-channel synthetic aperture radar system.
Frontal beta-theta network during REM sleep

We lack detailed knowledge about the spatio-temporal physiological signatures of REM sleep, especially in humans. By analyzing intracranial electrode data from humans, we demonstrate for the first time that there are prominent beta (15–35 Hz) and theta (4–8 Hz) oscillations in both the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and the DLPFC during REM sleep. We further show that these theta and beta activities in the ACC and the DLPFC, two relatively distant but reciprocally connected regions, are coherent. These findings suggest that, counter to current prevailing thought, the DLPFC is active during REM sleep and likely interacting with other areas. Since the DLPFC and the ACC are implicated in memory and emotional regulation, and the ACC has motor areas and is thought to be important for error detection, the dialogue between these two areas could play a role in the regulation of emotions and in procedural motor and emotional memory consolidation. DOI: http://dx.doi. org/10.7554/eLife.18894. 001
Prolegomena to sonic toys

A variety of electronic sonic toys is available in the market. However, such toys are usually played by pushing buttons which trigger different sampled sounds. In this paper we advocate the possibility of using continuous natural gestures connected with synthesized sounds for the creation of enactive sonic toys. Keywords— sonic toys, Human-Computer Interaction, Multimodal Interaction
Validity and reliability of the Zarit Burden Interview in assessing caregiving burden.

INTRODUCTION This study aims to validate the Zarit Burden Interview as an instrument to measure the level of burden experienced by caregivers of patients with dementia (PWD) in Singapore. MATERIALS AND METHODS Adult family caregivers of PWD were recruited from the ambulatory dementia clinic of a tertiary hospital and the Alzheimer's Disease Association. All subjects completed a battery of questionnaires which consisted of demographic questions and the following instruments: the Zarit Burden Interview (ZBI), Burden Assessment Scale (BAS), General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28), Dementia Management Strategies Scale (DMSS), and the Revised Memory and Behaviour Problems Checklist (RMBPC). A subgroup of subjects also completed the ZBI for the second time 2 weeks after the fi rst survey. RESULTS A total of 238 subjects completed the survey. As hypothesised, the Zarit burden score was strongly correlated with BAS, GHQ-28, DMSS, and RMBPC scores (Pearson's correlation coefficient: 0.53 to 0.73); caregivers who undertook the major role in caregiving, had spent >1 year in caregiving, or experienced financial problems had higher Zarit burden scores than those who were not main carers, with ≤1 year of caregiving, or reported no/minimal financial problems, respectively. The Cronbach's alpha value for the ZBI items was 0.93; the intra-class correlation coefficient for the test-retest reliability of the Zarit burden score was 0.89 (n = 149). CONCLUSION The results in this study demonstrated that the Zarit Burden Interview is a valid and reliable instrument for measuring the burden of caregivers of PWD in Singapore.
A Study of Priors for Relevance-Based Language Modelling of Recommender Systems

Probabilistic modelling of recommender systems naturally introduces the concept of prior probability into the recommendation task. Relevance-Based Language Models, a principled probabilistic query expansion technique in Information Retrieval, has been recently adapted to the item recommendation task with success. In this paper, we study the effect of the item and user prior probabilities under that framework. We adapt two priors from the document retrieval field and then we propose other two new probabilistic priors. Evidence gathered from experimentation indicates that a linear prior for the neighbour and a probabilistic prior based on Dirichlet smoothing for the items improve the quality of the item recommendation ranking.
A 5.2 GHz BFSK Receiver with On-Chip Antenna for Self-Powered RFID Tags and Medical Sensors

A completely integrated receiver design suitable for short range wireless applications is presented. The circuit represents one half of an SoC solution that makes use of an on-chip antenna, and consumes 5.5 mW while receiving. A thin film ultracapacitor and a solar cell can be stacked on top of the chip to supply power to the radio; yielding a completely integrated solution. The receiver makes use of a PLL to initially lock an RF VCO which is then allowed to be injection-locked to an incoming FM signal. An integrated antenna provides adequate gain given the short range radio's intended applications. The solution has a communication range of 1.75 m which can be increased at the expense of the bit-rate, increased power consumption in the receiver, or by using off-chip antennas.
An Intrusion Detection System for Security Protocol Traffic

The Internet has emerged as a medium for wide-scale electronic communication involving financial transactions and other sensitive information. Encrypted exchanges between principals are widely used to ensure data security. Security protocols are rules that govern such encrypted exchanges. This paper describes a system for detecting intrusions on encrypted exchanges over public networks by recognizing the characteristics of security protocols and attacks on them.