Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Internet literacy and digital natives’ civic engagement: Internet skill literacy or Internet information literacy?

ABSTRACT This study aims to show the role of Internet literacy in empowering digital natives’ civic engagement. Using a survey of 10th graders, we analyzed the effects of digital media use and Internet literacy on adolescents’ political and social interest, participation, and efficacy, controlling for their home and school environments. In doing so, we try to highlight the following points. First, we emphasize that there are two separate dimensions of Internet literacy: Internet skill literacy and Internet information literacy. Second, we adopt a broader concept of civic engagement reflecting the changing youth practices observed in the contemporary media environment. The study empirically found that Internet information literacy, not Internet skill literacy, is intricately related to adolescents’ civic engagement. It was also shown that adolescents’ Internet use contributed only to new and alternative forms of participation. Overall, the findings show that an adolescent who can critically understand and effectively evaluate online information is more likely to become an active civic participant than one who lacks such skills. The study concludes with a few policy suggestions.
Effect of Replica Placement on the Reliability of Large-Scale Data Storage Systems

Replication is a widely used method to protect large-scale data storage systems from data loss when storage nodes fail. It is well known that the placement of replicas of the different data blocks across the nodes affects the time to rebuild. Several systems described in the literature are designed based on the premise that minimizing the rebuild times maximizes the system reliability. Our results however indicate that the reliability is essentially unaffected by the replica placement scheme. We show that, for a replication factor of two, all possible placement schemes have mean times to data loss (MTTDLs) within a factor of two for practical values of the failure rate, storage capacity, and rebuild bandwidth of a storage node. The theoretical results are confirmed by means of event-driven simulation. For higher replication factors, an analytical derivation of MTTDL becomes intractable for a general placement scheme. We therefore use one of the alternate measures of reliability that have been proposed in the literature, namely, the probability of data loss during rebuild in the critical mode of the system. Whereas for a replication factor of two this measure can be directly translated into MTTDL, it is only speculative of the MTTDL behavior for higher replication factors. This measure of reliability is shown to lie within a factor of two for all possible placement schemes and any replication factor. We also show that for any replication factor, the clustered placement scheme has the lowest probability of data loss during rebuild in critical mode among all possible placement schemes, whereas the declustered placement scheme has the highest probability. Simulation results reveal however that these properties do not hold for the corresponding MTTDLs for a replication factor greater than two. This indicates that some alternate measures of reliability may not be appropriate for comparing the MTTDL of different placement schemes.
An improved method for measuring the radiation efficiency of mobile devices

In this paper, an improved method for measuring the radiation efficiency of small devices is introduced. The method is based on Wheeler's principle of measuring the antenna impedance within two controlled environments: free space and a closed metallic box. In addition to Wheeler's network model, an extended equivalent circuit is introduced, that gives an exact description of the behavior of the small device within the metallic box. This model is the basis for the determination of the radiation efficiency, independent of the size of the box and the location of the device within the box. Several measurements show that using the new method, the radiation efficiency of mobile devices can be determined very quickly and very accurately.
PRISM: PRivacy-Aware Interest Sharing and Matching in Mobile Social Networks

In a profile matchmaking application of mobile social networks, users need to reveal their interests to each other in order to find the common interests. A malicious user may harm a user by knowing his personal information. Therefore, mutual interests need to be found in a privacy preserving manner. In this paper, we propose an efficient privacy protection and interests sharing protocol referred to as PRivacy-aware Interest Sharing and Matching (PRISM). PRISM enables users to discover mutual interests without revealing their interests. Unlike existing approaches, PRISM does not require revealing the interests to a trusted server. Moreover, the protocol considers attacking scenarios that have not been addressed previously and provides an efficient solution. The inherent mechanism reveals any cheating attempt by a malicious user. PRISM also proposes the procedure to eliminate Sybil attacks. We analyze the security of PRISM against both passive and active attacks. Through implementation, we also present a detailed analysis of the performance of PRISM and compare it with existing approaches. The results show the effectiveness of PRISM without any significant performance degradation.
The Place and Role of Consciousness in Human Psychoarchitecture

The ontological place and causal role of consciousness is examined in evidence-based models of mind. The challenge is highlighted of placing disembodied functional cognitive models of conscious processes emphasizing downward causation into embodied neuropsychological structural models of unconscious processes emphasizing upward causation. For the first time in modern science, recent quantum theories that posit information space and nonlocal mind are progressing toward an ontological structure to resolve the challenge. The theories are shown to be converging on the model of levels of mind in ancient Vedic literature, with major implications.
Closing the loop

Closing the loop Eyal Dassau, Christian Lowe, Cameron Barr, Eran Atlas, Moshe Phillip University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA Sansum Diabetes Research Institute, Santa Barbara, CA, USA Diabetes Technolgies Center, Jesse Z and Sara Lea Shafer Institute for Endocrinology and Diabetes, Schneider Children’s Medical Center of Israel, Petah Tikva, Israel Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv, Israel
Robust Distributed Consensus Using Total Variation

Consider a connected network of agents endowed with local cost functions representing private objectives. Agents seek to find an agreement on some minimizer of the aggregate cost, by means of repeated communications between neighbors. Consensus on the average over the network, usually addressed by gossip algorithms, is a special instance of this problem, corresponding to quadratic private objectives. Consensus on the median, or more generally, consensus on a given quantile, is also a special instance of this problem. In this paper we show that optimizing the aggregate cost function regularized by a total variation (TV) term has appealing properties. First, it can be done very naturally in a distributed way, yielding algorithms that are efficient on numerical simulations. Secondly, the optimum for the regularized cost is shown to be also the optimum for the initial aggregate cost function under assumptions that are simple to state. Finally, these algorithms are robust to unreliable agents that keep injecting some false value in the network. This is remarkable enough, and is not the case, for instance, of gossip algorithms that are entirely ruled by unreliable agents as detailed in the paper.
Caching intermediate result of SPARQL queries

The complexity and growing scale of RDF data has made data management back end the performance bottleneck of Semantic Web applications. Caching is one of the ways that could solve this problem. However, few existing research projects focus on caching in RDF data processing. We present an adaptive caching scheme that caches intermediate result of basic graph pattern SPARQL queries. Benchmark test results are provided to illustrate the effectiveness of our caching scheme.
From Team to Organizational Knowledge : The Creation of a Digital Option

Much of the research in the area of knowledge management has been at the individual level. Knowledge management literature, on the other hand, argues for the building up of knowledge processing capacity at an organizational level to enhance organization performance. This study is an effort to address this research gap. It looks at the ability of the organizations to collect knowledge at subunit level and integrate the knowledge for use at the organizational level to achieve organizational effectiveness. Drawing from three theoretical foundations (behavioral theory of the firm, decision-making paradigm and theory of organizational agility), I develop a conceptual research model, which focuses on how knowledge management systems (KMS) impact organizational decision-making, agility and adaptive behavior. Two key components of KMS are focused on, the knowledge reach and knowledge richness of information systems. I propose to investigate the research model by conducting a 14 week business simulation game. To analyze the results of the data, I will use a statistical technique called latent growth modeling, which allows analysis of the dependent variables in this repeated measures experimental design.
Solution of a certain class of network flow problems with cascaded demand aggregation and capacity allocation

This article develops analytical models for a class of networking problems that includes two cascaded stages of demand aggregation and capacity allocation. The solutions to these problems are required in real time as the demand fluctuates rapidly. The capacity allocation problem makes a large-scale integer programming problem too complex for practical applications. Using the Lagrangian relaxation technique and a suitably developed heuristic for multiplier adjustment, the computational complexity is reduced to such a degree that a real-time implementation of the algorithm is feasible. This article also develops efficient heuristics to aggregate demand. The proposed algorithm produces a near-optimal solution in pseudo-polynomial time.
Disorder-induced incoherent scattering losses in photonic crystal waveguides: Bloch mode reshaping, multiple scattering, and breakdown of the Beer-Lambert law

Through a combined theoretical and experimental study of disorder-induced incoherent scattering losses in slow-light photonic crystal slab waveguides, we show the importance of Bloch mode reshaping and multiple scattering. We describe a convenient and fully three-dimensional theoretical treatment of disorder-induced extrinsic scattering, including the calculation of backscatter and out-of-plane losses per unit cell, and the extrapolation of the unit-cell loss to the loss for an entire disordered waveguide. The theoretical predictions, which are also compared with recent measurements on dispersion engineered silicon waveguides, demonstrate the failure of the Beer-Lambert law due to multiple scattering. We also explain why the previously assumed group velocity scalings of disorder-induced loss break down in general.
Spins in few-electron quantum dots

The canonical example of a quantum-mechanical two-level system is spin. The simplest picture of spin is a magnetic moment pointing up or down. The full quantum properties of spin become apparent in phenomena such as superpositions of spin states, entanglement among spins, and quantum measurements. Many of these phenomena have been observed in experiments performed on ensembles of particles with spin. Only in recent years have systems been realized in which individual electrons can be trapped and their quantum properties can be studied, thus avoiding unnecessary ensemble averaging. This review describes experiments performed with quantum dots, which are nanometer-scale boxes defined in a semiconductor host material. Quantum dots can hold a precise but tunable number of electron spins starting with 0, 1, 2, etc. Electrical contacts can be made for charge transport measurements and electrostatic gates can be used for controlling the dot potential. This system provides virtually full control over individual electrons. This new, enabling technology is stimulating research on individual spins. This review describes the physics of spins in quantum dots containing one or two electrons, from an experimentalist’s viewpoint. Various methods for extracting spin properties from experiment are presented, restricted exclusively to electrical measurements. Furthermore, experimental techniques are discussed that allow for 1 the rotation of an electron spin into a superposition of up and down, 2 the measurement of the quantum state of an individual spin, and 3 the control of the interaction between two neighboring spins by the Heisenberg exchange interaction. Finally, the physics of the relevant relaxation and dephasing mechanisms is reviewed and experimental results are compared with theories for spin-orbit and hyperfine interactions. All these subjects are directly relevant for the fields of quantum information processing and spintronics with single spins i.e., single spintronics.
Effects of Cooperative Learning on Achievement and Attitude Among Students of Color

Abstract The author examined the effects of cooperative learning on the achievement in and attitudes toward mathematics of a group of 5th-grade students of color in a culture different from the United States (i.e., Bermuda). Students participated in 12 weeks of R. Slavin's (1978) Student Teams Achievement Division method of cooperative learning in mathematics during the fall semester. Students completed 2 measures: the computation and application sections of the California Achievement Test (1985) Form E (Level 14) and Penelope Peterson's Attitude Toward Mathematics Scale for Grades 4-6 Students at 4 different intervals. The measures were completed as pretests at the beginning of the semester (before students were exposed to cooperative learning) and as posttests at the end of Weeks 5, 9, and 13. Data were analyzed with a 1-factor (4 levels) repeated measures analysis of variance design to ascertain whether there were significant differences among the pre- and posttest scores. Results suggest that there were positive gains in attitudes and achievement.
Efficient document retrieval in main memory

Disk access performance is a major bottleneck in traditional information retrieval systems. Compared to system memory, disk bandwidth is poor, and seek times are worse. We circumvent this problem by considering query evaluation strategies in main memory. We show how new accumulator trimming techniques combined with inverted list skipping can produce extremely high performance retrieval systems without resorting to methods that may harm effectiveness. We evaluate our techniques using Galago, a new retrieval system designed for efficient query processing. Our system achieves a 69% improvement in query throughput over previous methods.
Diatom Polysaccharides: Extracellular Production, Isolation and Molecular Characterization

This chapter aims to give an overview on the isolation procedures and techniques for macromolecular characterization of extracellular polysaccharides from laboratory cultures of selected diatom species and from native marine aggregates. The emphasis is given to the macromolecular behavior of isolated polysaccharide in solution and their propensity to aggregate and to form highly structured systems like gels. This was made possible by developing protocols and procedures for isolation/separation and application of physico-chemical techniques like laser light scattering and viscosimetry to marine and culture samples. A separate section is devoted to atomic force microscopy, the most versatile nanotechnology platform widely used in polymer biophysics and diatom nanotechnology. The first force spectra experiments conducted on isolated polysaccharide fibrils and on marine gel polysaccharide network are presented together with recently published works on high resolution imaging. Diatom exopolysaccharide force spectroscopy and interactions with nanoparticles are identified as future prospective contributing to the growing field of nanoecology and for rational design of polysaccharide gels with desired properties.
Health-related quality of life is associated with stroke deficits in older adults.

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES although the functional impairments of stroke survivors are associated with poor health-related quality of life (HRQoL), few studies have demonstrated the impact of individual stroke deficits on the quality of life of survivors. In this study, we investigated the association between HRQoL and stroke-related deficits, especially with respect to the number and types of deficits, in older adults. METHODS the data were obtained from the 2008 and 2009 Korean Community Health Survey. The EuroQoL 5 Dimension (EQ-5D) questionnaire used as the HRQoL index, and stroke-related information included the number of stroke deficits and five types of deficits. RESULTS of the 122,095 participants, 6,698 (5.5%) subjects had a history of stroke, of whom 2,222 patients (33.2%) reported one or more stroke-related deficits. After adjustments for potential variables, the EQ-5D scores of the stroke survivors with persisting deficits were significantly reduced as the number of stroke deficits increased (β = -0.080, -0.147, -0.229, -0.252 and -0.293 for one, two, three, four and five deficits, respectively). The type of stroke deficits was associated with the level of HRQoL. Specifically, the adjusted EQ-5D score of patients who suffered from hemiplegia (β = -0.143; P value < .00001) was worse than that of patients with any stroke deficits. The most frequent problems were related to mobility and pain/discomfort, regardless of the number or type of stroke deficits. CONCLUSION we found that impaired HRQoL was significantly associated with the number and type of stroke deficits in older adults with a history of stroke.
Supersymmetric Deformations of Type IIB Matrix Model as Matrix Regularization of N=4 SYM

: We construct a Q = 1 supersymmetry and U (1) 5 global symmetry preserving deformation of the type IIB matrix model. This model, without orbifold projection, serves as a nonperturbative regularization for N = 4 supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory in four Euclidean dimensions. Upon deformation, the eigenvalues of the bosonic matrices are forced to reside on the surface of a hypertorus. We explicitly show the relation between the noncommutative moduli space of the deformed matrix theory and the Brillouin zone of the emergent lattice theory. This observation makes the transmutation of the moduli space into the base space of target ﬁeld theory clearer. The lattice theory is slightly nonlocal, however the nonlocality is suppressed by the lattice spacing. In the classical continuum limit, we recover the N = 4 SYM theory. We also discuss the result in terms of D-branes and interpret it as collective excitations of D(-1) branes forming D3 branes.
A Scalable Low-Cost Solution to Provide Personalised Home Heating Advice to Households

In this paper, we present a deployed prototype of a scalable low-cost solution providing personalised home heating advice to households. Our solution, named MyJoulo (www.myjoulo.com), uses intelligent algorithms to analyse data collected from a specially designed USB temperature logger, placed on top of the thermostat, in order to build a thermal model of the home and to infer the operational settings of the heating system. This model is then used to calculate the impact, in terms of percentage reduction in heating costs, of various interventions (such as reducing the thermostat setpoint temperature or adjusting timer settings); providing specific actionable advice to the household. The system was launched in beta form in December 2012 and registered over 750 users in its three months of operation.
Simultaneously Optimizing Spatial Spectral Features Based on Mutual Information for EEG Classification

High performance of the brain-computer interface (BCI) needs efficient algorithms to extract discriminative features from raw electroencephalography (EEG) signals. In this paper, we present a novel scheme to extract spatial spectral features for the motor imagery-based BCI. The learning task is formulated by maximizing the mutual information between spatial spectral features (MMISS) and class labels, by which a unique objective function directly related to Bayes classification error is optimized. The spatial spectral features are assumed to follow a parametric Gaussian distribution, which has been validated by the normal distribution Mardia's test, and under this assumption the estimation of mutual information is derived. We propose a gradient based alternative and iterative learning algorithm to optimize the cost function and derive the spatial and spectral filters simultaneously. The experimental results on dataset IVa of BCI competition III and dataset IIa of BCI competition IV show that the proposed MMISS is able to efficiently extract discriminative features from motor imagery-based EEG signals to enhance the classification accuracy compared to other existing algorithms.
Exploitation of the UC-PBG structure as ground plane to enhance microstrip antenna bandwidth

The uniplanar compact photonic bandgap (UC-PBG) metamaterial structure has been profitably used for antenna miniaturization and radiation enhancement purposes. This paper presents an additional way to exploit it, when it is employed as ground plane for microstrip antennas. As a matter of fact, if a proper number of UC-PBG unit cells is selected, the antenna bandwidth can be remarkably increased. Such a behavior is here presented in dealing with a classical square patch antenna.
Calidez, competencia, moralidad y nacionalismo ideal como dimensiones autoestereotípicas del autoconcepto nacional en seis países de Latinoamérica

El presente estudio busca describir y analizar los contenidos auto-estereotipicos relacionados con la autoestima colectiva y el grado de identificacion nacional, en 6 naciones de America Latina. Para tal fin, se desarrollo un estudio por encuestas en Argentina, Brasil, Chile, Colombia, Peru y Venezuela (n=1573). Los resultados evidencian la presencia de 4 dimensiones auto-estereotipicas denominadas: calidez, competencia, moralidad y nacionalismo ideal. Las expresiones positivas de estas dimensiones se relacionan significativamente con la autoestima colectiva y el grado de identificacion con el pais. Sin embargo, las magnitudes de estas relaciones difieren segun las muestras por pais. De manera general, las dimensiones estereotipicas mas reconocidas como representativas de los endogrupos nacionales fueron las de calidez y competencia. Siendo menos reconocidas como representativas de estos grupos, las dimensiones de moralidad y nacionalismo ideal. No obstante, en un modelo general de las influencias de estos auto-estereotipos en la autoestima colectiva y el grado de identificacion, se aprecia que la calidez aunque es la dimension percibida como mas representativa de los auto-estereotipos nacionales, ejerce una influencia muy debil en la auto-estima colectiva y no influye en el nivel de identificacion con el endogrupo nacional