Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
CurveFusion

We introduce CurveFusion, the first approach for high quality scanning of thin structures at interactive rates using a handheld RGBD camera. Thin filament-like structures are mathematically just 1D curves embedded in R3, and integration-based reconstruction works best when depth sequences (from the thin structure parts) are fused using the object's (unknown) curve skeleton. Thus, using the complementary but noisy color and depth channels, CurveFusion first automatically identifies point samples on potential thin structures and groups them into bundles, each being a group of a fixed number of aligned consecutive frames. Then, the algorithm extracts per-bundle skeleton curves using L1 axes, and aligns and iteratively merges the L1 segments from all the bundles to form the final complete curve skeleton. Thus, unlike previous methods, reconstruction happens via integration along a data-dependent fusion primitive, i.e., the extracted curve skeleton. We extensively evaluate CurveFusion on a range of challenging examples, different scanner and calibration settings, and present high fidelity thin structure reconstructions previously just not possible from raw RGBD sequences.
Predicting TCP congestion through active and passive measurments

The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) has proved to be a reliable transport protocol that has withstood the test of time. It is part of the TCP/IP protocol suite deployed on the Internet, and it currently supports a variety of underlying networking technologies such as Wireless, Satellite and High-Speed networks. The congestion control mechanism used by current implementation of TCP ( known as TCP-Reno/new Reno) is based on the Additive Increase Multiple Decrease (AIMD) algorithm that was first introduced by Van Jacobsen in 1988[1] after the Internet experienced heavy congestion which subsequently led to a phenomenon called congestion collapse. The algorithm assumes no prior knowledge of end-to-end path conditions and blindly follows the same routine at the beginning of every connection namely, a slow start phase, a congestion avoidance phase and in the event of a lost segment reduces the transmission rate accordingly. The network will experience different conditions depending on the amount of traffic exerted on it. At times it will endure heavy load while at other times there will be small amount of traffic. In the event that the end-to-end path characteristics are known and the amount of traffic generated is predictable, the AIMD algorithm does not take advantage of that information. In this thesis we investigate ways of predicting the available bandwidth between two hosts frequently in contact with each other through the deployment of bandwidth estimation tools. We would like to explore the possibility that AIMD can take advantage of bandwidth measurements collected between these hosts.
Impact of Gender of Stroke Outcomes: Results from 166 Community-Based Hospitals: P7

Objective: Stroke is the third leading cause of death and the leading cause of serious, long-term disability in the United States. Each year, over 700,000 people suffer a new or recurrent stroke. The objective of this investigation is to examine the impact of gender on stroke outcomes. Methods: Using the HCA Casemix database, an administrative database of all admissions to any HCA hospital, all 56,417 consecutive admissions with an embolic, thrombotic, or ischemic stroke from 1–1–03 thru 12–31–04 were analyzed. Patient comorbidities, procedures, and complications were identified using ICD9 codes. Univariate and multivariate regression analyses controlling for patient characteristics and comorbid conditions were used to analyze in-hospital mortality, pneumonia, mechanical ventilation, and discharge home. Findings: The 166 study hospitals averaged 340 stroke patients. Women represented 56% of the patients. Women were significantly older regardless of the type of stroke (73 yrs. Versus 67 yrs, p 0.001). Ischemic stroke was the largest group representing 82.5% of all strokes, followed by embolic (12.2%) and thrombotic (5.3%). There were no significant differences in the percentage of women or men in any of the three stroke groups. There were also no significant differences in the long-term use of anticoagulants, aspirin, or antiplatelet therapy based on gender. The use of thrombolytic therapy was low overall, with women receiving it less often than men (1.28% vs. 1.70%, p 0.001). Adjusted outcomes (odds ratios) by gender are reported below. Conclusion: Men, despite their younger age, are more likely to die (OR 1.08, p 0.044) or develop pneumonia (OR 1.90, p 0.001). However, men, if they survive, are significantly more likely to be discharged home than women (OR1.15, p 0.001). Given the dire consequences of stroke, further research is needed to improve the outcomes of both men and women.
The Process to Determine Quality Standards to Ensure the Quality of Graduates

The aim of the research is to describe the process of internal quality assurance conducted by the higher education, especially in determining quality standards to ensure the quality of graduates. This study used a qualitative approach, using case study design. Data were collected by deep interview, observation, and documentation. Data analysis was performed interactively with three phases which includes data reduction, presentation, and verification/conclusion. The result showed that the standard setting include standards needed in covering university level, faculty, and the level of department or study program. Referring to the standard determine by vision and mission of the university, the rules of national education, the national standard of education, the law of teachers and lectures, National Accreditation Board, and The Association of Southeast Asian Nations University Network Quality Assurance. The standards required involving various parties: Wali Amanat, the senate, rector, department, dean, lecturers, and students, the quality assurance agency, community leaders, alumni, and the profession association. Internal quality standards required by the College to be in line with the vision, mission and objectives that will be achieved the colleges. The involvement of stakeholders in the setting of standards will make it easier in the implementation. Keywords—the process of determine; quality assurance; quality
Practical and Context-Aware Resource Adaptation in Mobile Networks

With the proliferation of various portable devices such as smart phones, netbooks and tablets, it becomes more important to design and implement effective resource management schemes with (i) the increasing number of users in the network and (ii) the expectation of frequent and fast mobility of network users. In this dissertation, we conclude that the key to solve the problem in mobile networks is adaptive resource allocation, which requires the system to behave in an adaptive manner considering the dynamic network conditions and various context of mobile users. Specifically, we study the following critical resource allocation issues in this dissertation: (i) rate adaptation; (ii) station handoff; (iii) load balancing; and (iv) power saving, for each we have proposed an adaptive scheme, implemented it in the MadWifi device driver, and demonstrated its effectiveness via experiments.
Glass Box Software Model Checking

Model checking is a formal verification technique that exhaustively tests a piece of hardware or software on all possible inputs (usually up to a given size) and on all possible nondeterministic schedules. For hardware, model checkers have successfully verified fairly complex finite state control circuits with up to a few hundred bits of state information; but not circuits in general that have large data paths or memories. Similarly, for software, model checkers have primarily verified control-oriented programs with respect to temporal properties; but not much work has been done to verify data-oriented programs with respect to complex data-dependent properties. This dissertation presents glass box software model checking , a novel software model checking approach that achieves a high degree of state space reduction in the presence of complex data-dependent properties. Our key insight is that there are classes of operations that affect a program's state in similar ways. By discovering these similarities, we dramatically reduce the state space of our model checker by checking each class of states in a single step. To achieve this state space reduction, we employ a dynamic analysis to detect similar state transitions and a static analysis to check the entire class of transitions. These analyses employ a symbolic execution technique that increases their effectiveness. We also present a modular extension to glass box software model checking, to further improve the efficiency of checking large programs composed of multiple modules. In a modular checking approach program modules are replaced with abstract implementations, which are functionally equivalent but vastly simplified versions of the modules. We also apply the glass box model checking technique to the problem of checking type soundness. Since proving type soundness can be extremely difficult, a model checking approach takes a considerable burden off the language designer. Our experimental results indicate that glass box model checking is efficient and effective at checking a variety of programs and properties, including program invariants, equivalence to an abstraction, and type soundness. Comparisons with other model checking techniques show that our technique is more efficient at checking these programs and properties.
Procedures As A Representation For Data In A Computer Program For Understanding Natural Language

Abstract : The paper describes a system for the computer understanding of English. The system answers questions, executes commands, and accepts information in normal English dialog. It uses semantic information and context to understand discourse and to disambiguate sentences. It combines a complete syntactic analysis of each sentence with a 'heuristic understander' which uses different kinds of information about a sentence, other parts of the discourse, and general information about the world in deciding what the sentence means.
Clinical significance of glutamate metabotropic receptors in renal cell carcinoma risk and survival

Accumulating evidence suggests the roles of glutamate metabotropic receptors (GRMs) in cancer, in addition to synaptic signalling. The present study assessed the associations of genetic variants in eight GRM genes with regard to risk and overall survival (OS) in 780 renal cell carcinoma (RCC) patients and controls. After adjustment for known risk factors, GRM5 rs7102764 T was associated with an increased risk of RCC (P = 0.006). Additional analysis has provided evidence that rs7102764 T was correlated with a higher expression of GRM5, which is consistently found to be upregulated in tumours, compared to normal tissues. Furthermore, the GRM3 rs701332 C, GRM4 rs2499707 T, and GRM4 rs4713742 T alleles were significantly associated with a poorer OS (P ≤ 0.030). The three loci were also observed to have strong cumulative effects on OS. Additional analysis has revealed a significant genotype‐expression correlation of rs2499707 T with increased GRM4 expression, which in turn leads to poorer OS in patients with RCC. GRMs might be involved in RCC development and progression, and genetic variants in GRMs might be promising biomarkers.
HIV and AIDS education in pre-service teacher programmes

Currently there is very little integration of HIV and AIDS into curricula at higher education institutions. The Higher Education AIDS Programme piloted a module at a national level to address this gap. This report presents the findings of a qualitative investigation of the experience of one university that chose to implement the module with a group of 60 postgraduate students in education. The findings suggest that, although the students found the module to be interesting and indicated that it offered them new perspectives on the educational consequences of the pandemic, there was little evidence of an in-depth understanding of how to practically adapt pedagogical processes and curriculum content to integrate HIV and AIDS meaningfully into their teaching. The report provides lessons relevant to the design of future HIV and AIDS education. MIV en VIGS-onderrig in voorindiensname-onderwysprogramme Daar is tans bitter min integrasie van MIV en VIGS in die kurrikula van hoer onderwysinstansies. Die VIGS-program vir hoeronderwys loods 'n module op nasionale vlak om hierdie leemte te vul. Die verslag weerspieel die bevindinge van 'n kwalitatiewe ondersoek na die ervarings van een universiteit wat verkies het om die module te implementeer met 'n groep van 60 nagraadse onderwysstudente. Die bevindinge dui daarop dat alhoewel die studente die module interessant gevind het en dat dit nuwe perspektief bied op die opvoedkundige gevolge van die pandemie, daar egter min bewyse is van 'n in-diepte begrip hoe om prakties pedagogiese prosesse en kurrikuluminhoud aan te pas sodat hulle MIV en VIGS betekenisvol in hul onderrig kan integreer. Die verslag voorsien lesse vir die ontwerp van toekomstige MIV en VIGS onderrig.
Effective Wound Healing Enabled by Discrete Alternative Electric Fields from Wearable Nanogenerators

Skin wound healing is a major health care issue. While electric stimulations have been known for decades to be effective for facilitating skin wound recovery, practical applications are still largely limited by the clumsy electrical systems. Here, we report an efficient electrical bandage for accelerated skin wound healing. On the bandage, an alternating discrete electric field is generated by a wearable nanogenerator by converting mechanical displacement from skin movements into electricity. Rat studies demonstrated rapid closure of a full-thickness rectangular skin wound within 3 days as compared to 12 days of usual contraction-based healing processes in rodents. From in vitro studies, the accelerated skin wound healing was attributed to electric field-facilitated fibroblast migration, proliferation, and transdifferentiation. This self-powered electric-dressing modality could lead to a facile therapeutic strategy for nonhealing skin wound treatment.
Microphone Arrays Signal Processing Techniques and Applications

I. Speech Enhancement. - 1 Constant Directivity Beamforming. - 2 Superdirective Microphone Arrays. - 3 Post-Filtering Techniques. - 4 Spatial Coherence Functions for Differential Microphones in Isotropic Noise Fields. - 5 Robust Adaptive Beamforming. - 6 GSVD-Based Optimal Filtering for Multi-Microphone Speech Enhancement. - 7 Explicit Speech Modeling for Microphone Array Speech Acquisition. - II. Source Localization. - 8 Robust Localization in Reverberant Rooms. - 9 Multi-Source Localization Strategies. - 10 Joint Audio-Video Signal Processing for Object Localization and Tracking. - III. Applications. - 11 Microphone-Array Hearing Aids. - 12 Small Microphone Arrays with Postfilters for Noise and Acoustic Echo Reduction. - 13 Acoustic Echo Cancellation for Beamforming Microphone Arrays. - 14 Optimal and Adaptive Microphone Arrays for Speech Input in Automobiles. - 15 Speech Recognition with Microphone Arrays. - 16 Blind Separation of Acoustic Signals. - IV. Open Problems and Future Directions. - 17 Future Directions for Microphone Arrays. - 18 Future Directions in Microphone Array Processing.
Availability and price of healthier food choices and association with obesity prevalence in New Zealand Māori.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Examine availability and price of healthier foods-vs-regular counterparts and their association with obesity. METHODS AND STUDY DESIGN A cross-sectional survey of weight and height among Māori in 2 urban and 96 rural areas in the Waikato/Lakes Districts-NZ (year 2004-06) was undertaken. Concurrently, availability of 11 'healthier' food in fast-food-outlets was examined by location (urban vs rural) and median income (high-low). In supermarkets, five-specific 'regular' foods were scored against 'healthier' counterparts (white-vs-wholemeal bread, with-skin-vs-skinless chicken, regular-vs-trim meat, standard-vs-trim milk, sugarsweetened- beverages vs-water) for in-store availability and price according to the Nutrition Environment Measures Survey. RESULTS Overall, 3,817 Māori (BMI: women: 32.9±7.8 kg/m2; men: 33.1±6.7 kg/m2) were included with 451 food-outlets in two urban-clusters and 698 food-outlets in 96 rural-clusters. Fast-foods: The availability of healthier food choices was higher for 8/11 items in rural and low-income areas than urban and high-income areas. Multivariate analysis considered location and income as cofactors. No association between number of fast-food-outlets/cluster and healthier foods/cluster with obesity prevalence (General/Māori BMI cutoffs) was observed. Supermarkets: Water was cheaper than sugar-sweetened-beverages and negatively associated with obesity prevalence (General r=-0.53, p=0.03; Māori r=-0.53, p=0.03); high availability scores for trim milk compared to standard milk correlated with higher obesity prevalence (General r=0.49, p=0.04; Māori r=0.57, p=0.01). CONCLUSIONS Bottled water vs sugar-sweetened-beverages prices were inversely associated with obesity. This supports the argument to regulate the availability and price of sugar-sweetened-beverages in NZ. The positive association of the availability of trim milk with the prevalence of obesity warrants investigation into individual's dietary and food-purchase behaviour.
Android Based Control Softwarefor Small Unmanned AerialVehicles

GroundControl Station (GCS) is an essential part of the any Unmanned Aircraft Vehicle (UAV) system. In the UAV system the GCS’s main tasks are sendingcontrol commands and intelligence-gathering mission real-time data. This paper presents architecture of GCS for android operating system.Whole design process included two main parts. One was preparing the source code with appropriate programming languages. Another was GUI (Graphical User Interface) design. Weselected the Java programming language for coding.GCS communicates with the UAV via UDP connection get mission data and displays itwith the bi-directional processes. The system for the groundstation gives a flexible graphical interface monitoring the real-time status of the UAV machines. Keywords-Unmanned Aircraft Vehicle; Ground Control Station; Android mobile operating system.
Analyzing Diguanylate Cyclase Activity In Vivo using a Heterologous Escherichia coli Host

Bacterial biofilms are notorious for their deleterious effects on human health and industrial biofouling. Key processes in biofilm formation are regulated by the second messenger signal cyclic dimeric guanosine monophosphate (c‐di‐GMP); accumulation of c‐di‐GMP promotes biofilm formation, while lowering c‐di‐GMP promotes motility. Complex networks of modular enzymes are involved in regulating c‐di‐GMP homeostasis. Understanding how these enzymes function in bacterial cells can help enlighten how bacteria use environmental cues to modulate c‐di‐GMP and cell physiology. In this article, we describe a workflow that utilizes Escherichia coli as a heterologous host to allow the researcher to identify genes encoding potential c‐di‐GMP‐metabolizing proteins, to express the gene of interest from an inducible plasmid, and to directly detect changes in intracellular c‐di‐GMP using ultra‐performance liquid chromatography‐tandem mass spectrometry. © 2018 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Syntactic variation and lexical preference in the dative-shift alternation

In this paper we investigate the dative shift alternation on the basis of 580 million words annotated with a dependency parser. We explore the link between lexical and syntactic choice in a core case of syntactic variation. We show that the sheer amount of automatically parsed data permits new approaches toward studying not only lexis but also other language internal factors influencing the syntactic choice offered by the dative shift alternation. Our approach offers new possibilities by replacing intuition-based decisions inherent to traditional variationist methodology with decisions based on observation.
Enriching Feature Extraction for Cricket Video Event Detection

Video is rapidly becoming one of the most popular multimedia due to its high information and entertainment capability. It consists of audio, video and text together. Finding desired information in a video clip or in a video database is a difficult and laborious task due to its semantic gap between the low-level feature and high-level video semantic concepts. A video database contains lot of semantic information. The semantic information describes what is happening in the video and also what is perceived by human users. Techniques for rapid video browsing, video retrieval become essential as video material became more and more available and subtle. Video browsing is very important functionality of multimedia systems which offer the user efficient way to view relevant information from large amount of video material. On the other hand, video retrieval enables the user to search for particular video segment based on some description. In this paper, we have presented the work for cricket video event detection as sports media is increasing day by day and all national and international news broadcasts contain specific regular segments devoted to sports. The purpose of the video event detection evolves mainly due to viewing time constraints. The goal of this paper is to outline the advance concepts for cricket highlight generation which is an effort towards summarization.
Longitudinal assessment of cerebral perfusion and vascular response to hypoventilation in a bigenic mouse model of Alzheimer's disease with amyloid and tau pathology

Alzheimer's disease is the most common neurodegenerative disease, and many patients also present with vascular dysfunction. In this study, we aimed to assess cerebral blood flow (CBF) and cerebrovascular response (CVR) as early, pre‐symptomatic (3 months of age), imaging markers in a bigenic model of Alzheimer's disease (APP.V717IxTau.P301L, biAT) and in the monogenic parental strains. We further developed our previously published combination of pulsed arterial spin labeling perfusion MRI and hypo‐ventilation paradigm, which allows weaning of the mice from the ventilator. Furthermore, the commonly used isoflurane anesthesia induces vasodilation and is thereby inherently a vascular challenge. We therefore assessed perfusion differences in the mouse models under free‐breathing isoflurane conditions. We report (i) that we can determine CBF and hypoventilation‐based CVR under ketamine/midazolam anesthesia and wean mice from the ventilator, making it a valuable tool for assessment of CBF and CVR in mice, (ii) that biAT mice exhibit lower cortical CBF than wild‐type mice at age 3 months, (iii) that CVR was increased in both biAT and APP.V717I mice but not in Tau.P301L mice, identifying the APP genotype as a strong influencer of brain CVR and (iv) that perfusion differences at baseline are masked by the widely used isoflurane anesthesia.
Systems Analysis and Design: An Object-Oriented Approach with UML

Systems Analysis and Design: An Object-Oriented Approach with UML, 5th Edition by Dennis, Wixom, and Tegarden captures the dynamic aspects of the field by keeping students focused on doing SAD while presenting the core set of skills that every systems analyst needs to know today and in the future. The text enables students to do SADnot just read about it, but understand the issues so they can actually analyze and design systems. The text introduces each major technique, explains what it is, explains how to do it, presents an example, and provides opportunities for students to practice before they do it for real in a project. After reading each chapter, the student will be able to perform that step in the system development process.