Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Frequency-Dependent Neural Activity in Patients with Unilateral Vascular Pulsatile Tinnitus

Previous resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) studies have shown that neurological changes are important findings in vascular pulsatile tinnitus (PT) patients. Here, we utilized rs-fMRI to measure the amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) in forty patients with unilateral PT and forty age-, gender-, and education-matched normal control subjects. Two different frequency bands (slow-4, 0.027–0.073 Hz, and slow-5, 0.010–0.027 Hz, which are more sensitive to subcortical and cortical neurological signal changes, resp.) were analyzed to examine the intrinsic brain activity in detail. Compared to controls, PT patients had increased ALFF values mainly in the PCu, bilateral IPL (inferior parietal lobule), left IFG (inferior frontal gyrus), and right IFG/anterior insula and decreased ALFF values in the multiple occipital areas including bilateral middle-inferior occipital lobe. For the differences of the two frequency bands, widespread ALFF differences were observed. The ALFF abnormalities in aMPFC/ACC, PCu, right IPL, and some regions of occipital and parietal cortices were greater in the slow-5 band compared to the slow-4 band. Additionally, the THI score of PT patients was positively correlated with changes in slow-5 and slow-4 band in PCu. Pulsatile tinnitus is a disease affecting the neurological activities of multiple brain regions. Slow-5 band is more sensitive in detecting the alternations. Our results also indicated the importance of pathophysiological investigations in patients with pulsatile tinnitus in the future.
Foundations of Probabilistic and Utility-Theoretic Indexing

One of the most perplexing problems of reformation retrieval has been the estabhshment of rational criteria for deciding what index terms or descriptors to assign to a unit of stored information for purposes of later retrieval Both probablhstJc and utlhty-theoretlc criteria have m the past been proposed for thts purpose. The present paper derives explicit decision rules of both kinds from a common conceptual and mathematical foundation The result IS a unified theory of indexing
Towards Planning Uncertain Commitment Protocols (Extended Abstract)

In the context of a business process modeled by commitments, agents enact a protocol by carrying out goals that service their part of commitments. In a competitive or even in a cooperative setting, an agent does not know for sure that its partners will successfully act on their part of the commitments. We introduce uncertainty into a successful recent approach of planning rst-order commitment protocols. Probabilities reect a semantics of the belief of an agent about the successful completion of tasks by other agents within the protocol, capturing notions of trust. We take a deterministic Hierarchical Task Network (HTN) planner, introduce probabilities into the task networks, and derive a protocol enactment which maximizes expected utility from the point of view of one agent. We illustrate our approach on a business scenario in e-commerce.
Bisimulations for Reasoning about Input-to-State Stability Properties of Hybrid Systems

In this paper, we investigate pre-orders for reasoning about input-to-state stability properties of hybrid systems. We define the notions of uniformly continuous input simulations and bisimulations, which extend the notions in previous work to include inputs. We show that uniformly continuous input bisimulations preserve incremental input-to-state stability of hybrid systems, and thus provide a basis for constructing abstractions for verification. We show that Lyapunov functionions for verification. We show that Lyapunov function based input-to-state stability analysis can be cast in our framework as constructing a simpler one-dimensional system, using a uniformly continuous input simulation, which is input-to-state stable, and thus, inferring the input-to-state stability of the
A Flexible Infrastructure for Large Monolingual Corpora

In this paper we describe a flexible and portable infrastructure for setting up large monolingual language corpora. The approach is based on collecting a large amount of monolingual text from various sources. The input data is processed on the basis of a sentencebased text segmentation algorithm. We describe the entry structure of the corpus database as well as various query types and tools for information extraction. Among them, the extraction and usage of sentence-based word collocations is discussed in detail. Finally we give an overview of different application for this language resource. A WWW interface allows for public access to most of the data and information extraction tools (http://wortschatz.uni-leipzig.de).
RANDOMNESS AND GÖDEL'S THEOREM

Complexity, non-predictability and randomness not only occur in quantum mechanics and non-linear dynamics, they also occur in pure mathematics and shed new light on the limitations of the axiomatic method. In particular, we discuss a Diophantine equation exhibiting randomness, and how it yields a proof of Gödel’s incompleteness theorem. Our view of the physical world has certainly changed radically during the past hundred years, as unpredictability, randomness and complexity have replaced the comfortable world of classical physics. Amazingly enough, the same thing has occurred in the world of pure mathematics,
Task Repetition Can Affect Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging-Based Measures of Language Lateralization and Lead to Pseudoincreases in Bilaterality

Repeated functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during learning and recovery can inform us about functional reorganization in the brain. We examined how, in the absence of reorganization, simple task repetition affects measures of fMRI activation. We studied fMRI activation over 10 consecutive sessions of silent word generation in a healthy subject. Additionally, we performed functional transcranial Doppler sonography (fTCD) to learn about the temporal pattern of corresponding changes in cerebral blood flow velocity (CBFV) and pulsatility. With repetition, word generation-associated increases in heart rate diminished steadily. Task repetition also led to a net increase in CBFV bilaterally and to a bilateral increase in the number of activated voxels on fMRI. As a result, whereas the absolute interhemispheric difference of activated voxels remained constant, there was a decrease in the standard fMRI index for language lateralization [LIfMRI = 100 (activated voxels in left hemisphere - voxels in right)/(voxels in left + voxels in right)]. Thus task repetition can lead to changes in task-related autonomic drive and an augmentation of bihemispheric blood flow. This can mimic increasing bilaterality of brain activation.
NEARLY PERIODIC FLUCTUATIONS IN THE LONG-TERM X-RAY LIGHT CURVES OF THE BLAZARS AO 0235+164 AND 1ES 2321+419

We have performed a structure function analysis of the Rossi X-Ray Timing Explorer All-Sky Monitor data to search for variability in 24 blazars using data trains that each exceed 12 yr. Although 20 of them show nominal periods through this technique, the great majority of these “periods” are clearly related to yearly variations arising from the instrument. Nonetheless, an apparently real periodic component of about 17 days was detected for the blazar AO 0235+164 and it was confirmed by discrete correlation function and periodogram analyses. For 1ES 2321+419, a component of variability with a near periodicity of about 420 days was detected by all of these methods. We discuss several possible explanations for these nearly periodic components and conclude that they most likely arise from the intersections of a shock propagating down a relativistic jet that possesses a helical structure.
Diagnosis of automata failures: a calculus and a method

The problem considered is the diagnosis of failures of automata, specifically, failures that manifest themselves as logical malfunctions. A review of previous methods and results is first given. A method termed the "calculus of D-cubes" is then introduced, which allows one to describe and compute the behavior of failing acyclic automata, both internally and externally. An algorithm, called the D-algorithm, is then developed which utilizes this calculus to compute tests to detect failures. First a manual method is presented, by means of an example. Thence, the D-algorithm is precisely described by means of a program written in Iverson notation. Finally, it is shown for the acyclic case in which the automaton is constructed from AND'S, NAND'S, OR'S and NOR'S that if a test exists, the D-algorithm will compute such a test.
Assessing the health of the poor: towards a pro-poor measurement strategy.

The problems of measuring the health of the poor are now becoming a priority area for development agencies. This is not only because of the consensus on equitable health status as a worthy and agreed goal in itself, but also because of the emerging understanding of the crucial role that health plays in the production of poverty. Furthermore, the current impetus for preparing Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) requires an effective monitoring and evaluation process to be planned as part of each country’s strategy. Much data on the health of the world’s poor is already collected on a regular basis in developing countries by the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) programme. More information on the economic status of individuals in developing countries is also collected, less frequently and with less standardised questionnaires, by the World Bank under the Living Standards Measurement Survey (LSMS) programme. Other data on both health and income or wealth is also available from a range of uncoordinated sources. So far, the only focused attempt to measure the health of the poor uses DHS data to track health indicators for different ‘wealth’ groups, where wealth is measured by calculating household assets and amenities. Using DHS data as the main strategy for measuring health is the best way forward, given that it is the highest quality and most standardised scheme of data collection. The DHS is very unlikely, however, to include income in its questionnaire schedule, so that general agreement needs to be reached on the asset approach as an appropriate way forward, the alternative being a consistent set of health questions being included in LSMS surveys. Apart from undertaking analyses of data which has already been collected, there should also be supplementary data collection undertaken to cover the shortcomings of the DHS in any given setting. According to the country characteristics in any given setting, the following range of techniques should be considered to supplement DHS and LSMS monitoring: poverty mapping from the most recent census; piggybacking poverty studies on already functioning population ‘laboratories’; and undertaking new cluster surveys in new poor areas. It is also advisable to engage in a dialogue for undertaking new standardised surveys in-country such as DHS and LSMS. The latter is particularly amenable to flexibility of subject matter to be included in the questionnaire.
Notes on a fitness solution for Nash equilibria in large games

In game theory, every equilibrium can be characterized by a binary relation on the game strategies. This relation - called generative relation - induces an appropriate solution concept. Game equilibrium is described as the set of non dominated strategies with respect to the generative relation. Evolutionary algorithms do not perform well for large games (hundred of players). This may be either because their poor scalability or because of some properties of the generative relation. Such possible properties are invesigated in this paper with relation to the Pareto dominance used in multiobjective optimization. Some numerical results on two Cournot models illustrate the situation.
Performance of GNSS Time of Arrival Estimation Techniques in Multipath Environments

The Time Of Arrival (TOA) of a received signal is the most important parameter for position estimation. The accuracy of the estimated TOA is limited by multipath errors. Consequently, multipath mitigation techniques are essential for high accuracy positioning using TOA observations. Narrow Correlator and double delta correlator were introduced to reduce multipath errors in pseudoranges. These correlator-based multipath mitigation techniques have been used extensively in most high grade GNSS receivers. Besides early-late correlators, the super-resolution techniques such as Multiple Signal Classification (MUSIC) have been applied broadly in the TOA estimation of indoor propagation channels. In this paper, the MUSIC TOA estimation technique is adopted for estimating the propagation delay of GNSS signals. The main contribution of this paper is the comparison of the performance of the early-late correlator family with the MUSIC high-resolution TOA estimator under various multipath environments. Experimental results reveal that early-late correlators cannot correctly estimate the code phase in severe multipath environments or in specular multipath situations where the multipath component has more power than the direct signal (e.g. indoor environments and urban canyons). A hardwarein-the-loop system configuration is used to provide a controlled environment for these investigations. Experimental results reveal that the performance of the MUSIC algorithm is better than early-late estimators under the severe multipath scenarios tested. Empirical results confirm that the code phase estimation error using the Narrow Correlator and double delta correlator can reach up to one chip.
Social Media and Nonprofits: Increasing Fundraising and Volunteerism for the Kahlo Cultural Center

This report takes a look at how the role of public relations in nonprofit organizations is changing with the increasing popularity of social media tools. Social media encompasses a wide variety of interactive Web tools like e-newsletters, Facebook, YouTube, blogs, discussion boards, and more. As literature, research, interviews, and a case study suggest, these tools are important because they keep the public engaged and informed about an organization. More specifically, this project looks at the benefits of social media on fundraising, volunteerism, and branding. Although social media is new to many public relations practitioners, social media helps not only the growth of the organization but also donations, awareness, and volunteers. Kahlo Cultural Center, a new nonprofit organization in San Luis Obispo, is used as a case study. By looking at their current social media tools suggestions can be made for improvement based on research findings. Social media, especially in hard economic times, should be used and updated consistently within any nonprofit organization to gain and sustain as much support as possible.
Feasibility of dialectical behavior therapy skills training as an outpatient program in treating alcohol use disorder: The role of difficulties with emotion regulation and experiential avoidance

Abstract Background: This study aimed to investigate the feasibility of a 3-month Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Training stand-alone outpatient program (DBT-ST-OP) for alcohol use disorder (AUD) by comparing primary and secondary outcomes with the same intervention provided in a mixed format (inpatient + outpatient). The study also assessed experiential avoidance (EA) changes during treatment and its early predictive role in treatment retention. Ultimately, the mediating role of difficulties with emotion regulation (DER), EA changes, and the functional relationships between them were explored in relation to abstinence maintenance (AM). Methods: A voluntary sample of 171 treatment-seeking individuals with AUD was consecutively admitted. AM was indicated by random weekly urine toxicological screening. DER and EA were assessed at the beginning, after 1 month, and at the end of treatment. Two serial multiple mediational models were estimated.Results: DBT-ST-OP showed more beneficial primary (i.e., AM, attrition rate, treatment attendance) and secondary (i.e., DER levels) outcomes compared with the same treatment provided in a mixed format. EA significantly decreased during the treatment, independently of baseline levels. Further, it did not represent an early predictive factor for drop-out. DER changes were a full mediator of AM and explained EA changes during the treatment.Conclusion: DBT-ST is a feasible stand-alone outpatient program for AUD. DER represents a relevant therapeutic process in explaining AM and EA changes. Future controlled and follow-up studies should focus on the efficacy of DBT-ST in treating AUD and evaluate the role of DER and EA in long-term relapse prevention.
Educating Educators for Virtual Schooling: Communicating Roles and Responsibilities

New forms of electronic media have enabled the creation of virtual classrooms in K-12 schools across the U.S. The virtual schooling (VS) movement, in which courses are offered mostly or completely via distance technologies, is expanding rapidly, yet many educators who work in these environments receive little or no foundation for effectively communicating with students at a distance. This paper codifies our current thinking on communication demands for K-12 VS teachers, designers, and facilitators, and provides a conceptual framework to ground further research and development in this critical aspect of virtual schooling. Communication theories which have direct application to the design and implementation of VS can inform practice and enhance the experience of students and teachers who participate in this increasingly common educational option. In this paper we provide an overview of how communication theories can be applied as a lens to inform VS practice.
Behavior recognition based on dynamic programming and Concurrence Probabilistic Petri Nets

In this paper, we present an approach based on dynamic programming and Concurrence Probabilistic Petri Nets for recognition and matching human action and behavior. Each human motion is represented by the body parts angular variation. Each body part angular motion is represented by one-dimensional time series. These time series are compared separately for every body part with templates, using dynamic programming (DTW). The results of the comparisons are used as input for the Concurrence Probabilistic Petri Nets that classifies the human action and behavior.
Deep belief networks for i-vector based speaker recognition

The use of Deep Belief Networks (DBNs) is proposed in this paper to model discriminatively target and impostor i-vectors in a speaker verification task. The authors propose to adapt the network parameters of each speaker from a background model, which will be referred to as Universal DBN (UDBN). It is also suggested to backpropagate class errors up to only one layer for few iterations before to train the network. Additionally, an impostor selection method is introduced which helps the DBN to outperform the cosine distance classifier. The evaluation is performed on the core test condition of the NIST SRE 2006 corpora, and it is shown that 10% and 8% relative improvements of EER and minDCF can be achieved, respectively.
TCP rate control

This paper presents TCP rate control, a new technique for transparently augmenting end-to-end TCP performance by controlling the sending rate of a TCP source. The sending rate of a TCP source is determined by its window size, the round trip time and the rate of acknowledgments. TCP rate control affects these aspects by modifying the ack number and receiver window fields in acknowledgments and by modulating the acknowledgment rate. From a performance viewpoint a key benefit of TCP rate control is to avoid adverse performance effects due to packet losses such as reduced goodput and unfairness or large spread in per-user goodputs. Further, TCP rate control positively affects performance even if the bottleneck is non-local and the end-host TCP implementations are non-conforming. These aspects are demonstrated through a comparative study of TCP rate control, RED and TCP-ECN. The TCP rate control approach has been implemented and patented by Packeteer Inc.
Personality traits and personal values of servant leaders

Purpose Servant leaders focus on their direct reports to enable them to grow to be independent and autonomous leaders. The purpose of this paper is to understand the way personal values and personality traits collectively influence this other-centered behavior. This will go a long way to unravel this unique style of leadership. Design/methodology/approach The study surveys managers and their direct reports. Leaders rated their personality trait and personal values, while their direct reports rated the leader’s servant leadership behaviors. Age, educational level, conscientiousness, extraversion and neuroticism of leaders were used as controls. The study also checked for endogeneity threats. Findings Using a sample of 81 leaders and 279 of their direct reports, the study finds that the personal value of benevolent dependability relates negatively to servant leadership behaviors. In addition, the personality traits of agreeableness and openness/intellect moderate the relationship between benevolent dependability and servant leadership behaviors. Research limitations/implications The findings shed important insights into what motivates servant leaders to engage in other-directed behaviors, thereby enabling future research into individual characteristics that define servant leaders. Originality/value Although studies have examined how values and personality traits influence leadership behaviors, no research has examined both types of individual differences in a single study. Studies examining the individual differences of servant leaders are few, and this study answers the call by Liden et al. (2014) to examine individual characteristics that are both personality based (traits) and malleable (values).
Innate Susceptibility to Norovirus Infections Influenced by FUT2 Genotype in a United States Pediatric Population.

BACKGROUND Norovirus is a leading cause of acute gastroenteritis (AGE). Noroviruses bind to gut histo-blood group antigens (HBGAs), but only 70%-80% of individuals have a functional copy of the FUT2 ("secretor") gene required for gut HBGA expression; these individuals are known as "secretors. " Susceptibility to some noroviruses depends on FUT2 secretor status, but the population impact of this association is not established. METHODS From December 2011 to November 2012, active AGE surveillance was performed at 6 geographically diverse pediatric sites in the United States. Case patients aged <5 years were recruited from emergency departments and inpatient units; age-matched healthy controls were recruited at well-child visits. Salivary DNA was collected to determine secretor status and genetic ancestry. Stool was tested for norovirus by real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. Norovirus genotype was then determined by sequencing. RESULTS Norovirus was detected in 302 of 1465 (21%) AGE cases and 52 of 826 (6%) healthy controls. Norovirus AGE cases were 2.8-fold more likely than norovirus-negative controls to be secretors (P < .001) in a logistic regression model adjusted for ancestry, age, site, and health insurance. Secretors comprised all 155 cases and 21 asymptomatic infections with the most prevalent norovirus, GII.4. Control children of Meso-American ancestry were more likely than children of European or African ancestry to be secretors (96% vs 74%; P < .001). CONCLUSIONS FUT2 status is associated with norovirus infection and varies by ancestry. GII.4 norovirus exclusively infected secretors. These findings are important to norovirus vaccine trials and design of agents that may block norovirus-HBGA binding.