Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Blackbox Constructions from Mix-Nets

Mix-nets constructed from homomorphic cryptosystems can be generalized to process lists of ciphertexts as units and use different public keys for different parts of such lists. We present a number of blackbox constructions that enriches the set of operations provided by such mix-nets. The constructions are simple, fully practical, and eliminates the need for some specialized protocols.
CPSC 490 Proposal

Narrative Economic is the study of the spread and dynamics of the collective verbal output of a society in order to understand economic fluctuations. Many reasons motivate individuals to focus on and propagate specific narratives from the many they come across. Each narrative originates in the mind of an individual before starting its evolutionary course through time. The Kermack-McKendrick (1927) SIR Model lends itself well to representing the spread of a narrative over time. An individual at a given point in time either has or has not been exposed to specific narrative. If this person has not come across a narrative, she is susceptible to coming across it for the first time. Otherwise, she is either infected (she will pass pass the narrative along to another susceptible individual) or recovered (she will not pass the narrative along to another susceptible individual). Given that more infected individuals implies a more powerful social epidemic, we hypothesize that narratives of certain valences should evoke aggregate market responses that manifest themselves as measurable economic fluctuations.
Further Investigations into the Causes of Flight Delays

A recent empirical study by Mayer and Sinai (2003a) finds that air traffic congestion due to airline hubbing and over-scheduling of flights at airport facilities are the primary causes of flight delays. Mayer and Sinai’s (2003a) analysis, however, relies on a non-traditional flight delay measure: travel time in excess of the route’s monthly minimum. While carriers may make such delay calculations, we argue that passengers do not. Hence this paper further investigates flight delays from both the airline and passenger perspectives. Moreover this paper provides a robustness check and critique of Mayer and Sinai’s (2003a) flight delay findings when more traditional measures of flight delays are employed. JEL Classifications: L13, L93
THE ALCOHOL PRICE AND THE FLEX CARS

The “flex” car is an innovative automobile that is able to run with either gasoline or alcohol. For flex cars owners, there is perfect substitutability between the two kinds of goods. Differences regarding fuel prices will now depend on the proportions of alcohol, gasoline and flex cars in the total stock. Conversely, the demand for each type of car will also depend on the expected future prices of alcohol and gasoline (in addition to the car prices). We build a model that incorporates this feedback and shows the long term relationships between the two types of energies. It also explains the actual trend for the predominance of flex cars in the domestic market. The model reflects our findings that energy prices are tied in the long run and that causality runs stronger from gasoline to alcohol. The estimated error correction parameter is stable, implying that the speed of adjustment towards equilibrium remains unchanged. The latter result is probably due to a still small fraction of flex cars in the total stock (approx. 5%), despite the fact that its sales nearly reached 100% in 2006.
Design and evaluation of an alert message dissemination algorithm using fuzzy logic for VANETs

Several multi-hop applications developed for vehicular ad hoc networks use broadcast as a means to either discover nearby neighbors or propagate useful traffic information to other vehicles located within a certain geographical area. However, the conventional broadcast mechanism may lead to the so-called broadcast storm problem, a scenario in which there is a high level of contention and collisions at the link layer due to an excessive number of broadcast packets. We present a fuzzy alert message dissemination algorithm to improve performance for road safety alert application in Vehicular Ad-hoc Network (VANET). In the proposed algorithm, when a vehicle receives an alert message for the first time, the vehicle rebroadcasts the alert message according to the fuzzy control rules for rebroadcast degree, where the rebroadcast degree depends on the current traffic density of the road and the distance between source vehicle and destination vehicle. Also, the proposed algorithm is the hybrid algorithm that uses broadcast protocol together with token protocol according to traffic density. The performance of the proposed algorithm is evaluated through simulation and compared with that of other alert message dissemination algorithms.
Shortlisting the Influential Members of Criminal Organizations and Identifying Their Important Communication Channels

Low-level criminals, who do the legwork in a criminal organization, are the most likely to be arrested, whereas the high-level ones tend to avoid attention. But crippling the work of criminal organizations is not possible unless investigators can identify the most influential, high-level members and monitor their communication channels. Investigators often approach this task by requesting the mobile phone service records of the arrested low-level criminals to identify contacts, and then they build a network model of the organization, where each node denotes a criminal and the edges represent communications. Network analysis can be used to infer the most influential criminals and most important communication channels within the network, but screening all the nodes and links in a network is laborious and time consuming. Here, we propose a new forensic analysis system called identifying influential criminals and their communication channels (IICCC) that can effectively and efficiently infer the high-level criminals and short-list the important communication channels in a criminal organization, based on the mobile phone communications of its members. IICCC can also be used to build a network from crime incident reports. We evaluated IICCC experimentally and compared it with five other systems, confirming its superior prediction performance.
jsr223: A Java Platform Integration for R with Programming Languages Groovy, JavaScript, JRuby, Jython, and Kotlin

The R package jsr223 is a high-level integration for five programming languages in the Java platform: Groovy, JavaScript, JRuby, Jython, and Kotlin. Each of these languages can use Java objects in their own syntax. Hence, jsr223 is also an integration for R and the Java platform. It enables developers to leverage Java solutions from within R by embedding code snippets or evaluating script files. This approach is generally easier than rJava’s low-level approach that employs the Java Native Interface. jsr223’s multi-language support is dependent on the Java Scripting API: an implementation of “JSR-223: Scripting for the Java Platform” that defines a framework to embed scripts in Java applications. The jsr223 package also features extensive data exchange capabilities and a callback interface that allows embedded scripts to access the current R session. In all, jsr223 makes solutions developed in Java or any of the jsr223-supported languages easier to use in R.
The E ect of Incentives in Non-Routine Analytical Team Tasks-Evidence From a Field Experiment

Despite the prevalence of non-routine analytical team tasks in modern economies, lile is known about how incentives inuence performance in these tasks. In a eld experiment with more than 3000 participants, we document a positive eect of bonus incentives on the probability of completion of such a task. Bonus incentives increase performance due to the reward rather than the reference point (performance threshold) they provide. e framing of bonuses (as gains or losses) plays a minor role. Incentives improve performance also in an additional sample of presumably less motivated workers. However, incentives reduce these workers’ willingness to “explore” original solutions. JEL codes: C92, C93, J33, D03, M52
A NOTE ON FORECASTING CROSS BORDER SHOPPING : THE VIRTUE OF SIMPLICITY

We use data on cross border shopping by Canadians in the U.S. from January 1972 to December 2007 and estimate three different regression models: (1) a model with a time-trend, deterministic seasonality and ARMA(p, q) disturbances, (2) a model with a time-trend, deterministic seasonality, and ARMA(p,q) disturbances including seasonal ARMA (P,Q)12, and (3) a naïve model which focuses only on deterministic seasonality. We test the forecasting performance of the models over one to five years. Our results show that as the time horizon grows, and as predicted by the theory, the naïve model performs best.
Complexity of controlled bad sequences over finite powersets of N

We provide lower and upper bounds for the length of controlled bad sequences over the majoring and the minoring ordering for finite powersets of Nk. The results are obtained by bounding the length of such sequences by functions from the Cichon hierarchy. This also allows us to translate these results to bounds over the fast-growing complexity classes. The obtained bounds are tight for the majoring ordering, which solves a problem left open in [1]. Further, to the best of our knowledge this is the first such upper bound provided for the minoring ordering.
Geographic Information Systems: An Overview

Geographic Information System (GIS) is an integrated information system that provides timely and quality spatial information for specific geographical applications. GIS ranges from a small piece of software programme to a highly complex and sophisticated integrated communications system. GIS is itself an integration of various specific subsystems. It also serves as an integration technology as it integrates knowledge from different disciplines and functions of various information technologies into one single system. GIS has been extensively used in government and private sectors for a number of scientific and non-scientific applications. Open GIS is the concept that provides inter-operability, extensibility and flexibility to this specific type of information system. This paper presents a generic definition of GIS from a broad perspective, the principal features and functions of GIS, and the application areas of GIS. The paper also includes a brief discussion on the integration technology concepts of GIS.
ANALYSIS HYDROPOWER POTENTIAL OF THE CRĂIASA VALLEY FOR EXPLOITATION IN THE FOREST SECTOR

Hydro was most exploited, even if lately, hydropower implementing programs in countries emerging were delayed because of financing, or social or environmental reasons. Unlocking the potential of hydropower streams, in our country, it should be treated with a maximum interest in the perspective shifting production of clean energy, especially due to the fact that the share of hydraulic energy exploited in Romania, represents less than half of that achieved in European countries, If hydrological and geo-climatic conditions comparable to those in our country. Due to the relatively limited energy resources, relative to the increasing needs, development of human society requires intensive exploitation of all forms of energy. Forestry, by its binary (with specific biological and technical) should participate in solving energy problems. The hydropower potential is the energy available to a volume of water and hydropower resources expresses the value of the rivers, on a given area. The water course (stream) analyzed and presented in this paper (Crăiasa Valley) is located in the mountainous area of Bihor County (northwestern Romania), ie where there are favorable conditions for the development and exploitation of hydropower potential. From measurements of flow and level differences conducted during 2005-2010 was done the analysis and evaluation of the merits of the hydropower potential of this stream. Thus, Crăiasa Valley sectors were defined watercourse ki, starting with the k1, the first after the spring, resulting in a total of eight sectors, denoted by k1, k2 . k8 from the source to the control section, for analysis hydropower potential hydropower cadastre and representation. It was found that the hydropower potential of the Crăiasa Valley is directly influenced by great differences in level (considered by sectors) in connection with the flow, and not of the basin surface or length of water to which it is registered. It should be noted that the maximum considered, are recorded within the basin, excluding those in control sections (hydrological stations).
Analysis and detection of fingerprint creases

Analysis and detection of fingerprint creases by Laseinde Peter Olaoluwa Master of Science in Computer Science West Virginia University Arun A. Ross, Ph.D., Chair Fingerprint is a biometric trait that is widely used for human identification and verification. Most fingerprint biometric systems make use of certain salient features on the fingerprint, including minutiae points, pores, and singular points, for comparing two fingerprint images. In this work, we explore the possibility of using fingerprint creases for comparing two fingerprints. Creases can be described as white lines or scars on a fingerprint image. Recent studies have determined that some creases are genetically influenced although the origin of creases has not been completely characterized. While no published work exists for crease matching, some studies have explored the problem of automated crease detection. In this thesis, we study the possibility of using creases for fingerprint matching. We also suggest two techniques to automatically extract creases from an input fingerprint image. Finally, we study the correlation between fingerprint creases and age of an individual.
R&D Expenditure, Spillovers and Productivity-Empirical Study of Taiwanese Optoelectronic Industry

In prior research on the productivity of Taiwanese optoelectronic industry as determined by panel data, the Cobb-Douglas production function and R&D spillovers are rarely discussed. Therefore, this paper examined the effects of R&D expenditure and R&D spillovers on productivity in the Taiwanese optoelectronic industry to explore. This paper constructed firm-level panel data of the Taiwanese optoelectronic industry from 2000 to 2018, and used Griliches and Mairesse (1979) extended Cobb-Douglas production function for our empirical framework. Then we chose the fit fixed effect or random effect model for our panel data by testing the empirical model. Besides the full-sample analysis, this paper divided our sample into the four sub-samples of optoelectronic information, display, component and communication to detect the difference from each group on productivity. The empirical results suggested that for both the total sample and the sub-samples of the optoelectronic industry, R&D expenditure and R&D spillover effects have positive contributions to productivity. Although Taiwan? s optoelectronic industry has considerable assembly application capabilities and a complete background of related industries, the mastering of core technology and the development of key components still need to be strengthened. Based on strong photo-electronics, information and manufacturing capacities, an in-depth study should be carried out by integrating these different fields and focusing on intellectual properties to create applications with high added value, high precision and a high price through R&D innovations. In this way, Taiwan manufacturers can contribute to the market and promote overall social and economic development.
Traitement actuel de l ’ infection à Helicobacter pylori chez les enfants et les adolescents

EPIDEMIOLOGY OF ULCERS To provide an evidence-based discussion on traditional therapy for Helicobacter pylori infection and develop recommendations on treatment guidelines, the prevalence and health care impact of peptic ulcer disease and the pathogenesis of ulcers in children must first be considered. Peptic ulcer disease causes significant morbidity and mortality in adults (1). Studies have yet to be performed that evaluate both the overall prevalence of peptic ulcer disease and the health care impact of this condition in children. Anecdotal reports suggest that ulcer frequency in children may be increasing, and multicentre studies may contribute to a better understanding of the prevalence and economic impact of this disorder in the pediatric population (2,3). We have employed the Pediatric Hospital Information System, a database of over 21 pediatric hospitals in the United States, to determine the prevalence of peptic ulcer disease in hospitalized children (unpublished data). Of 522,068 hospital discharges from October 1995 through December 1997, 3586 (0.7%) were for peptic ulcer disease or gastritis/duodenitis; of these, 1297 (268 ulcers, 1029 gastroduodenal inflammation) were the child’s primary diagnoses. Overall, 29% of patients with these diagnoses had an H pylori test performed in the hospital; testing increased from 17% in 1995 to 34% in 1997 (P<0.005). The median age of patients with a primary diagnosis of peptic ulcer disease was nine years (range less than one year to 17 years); 52% were white, 26% were black and 60% were boys. Fifty-four per
Does market structure of the banking sector affect the growth of different types of bank loans in the EU ?

The aim of this research is to investigate the issue of asymmetry of the credit market determinants of bank loans (corporate, consumer, and residential mortgage loans) between the CEE-11 countries (the Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Rumania, Croatia) and the EU-17 countries (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland, Luxembourg, Germany, Portugal, Sweden, United Kingdom, Italy, Malta and Cyprus) after the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) of 2007–09. For the analysis, we used the matching data over the period 2010-2016: annual bank-level data which are collected from the Bankscope-Orbis database and macroeconomic data on the GDP growth and interest rates for different loans from ECB data warehouse. Panel data include commercial banks, savings banks and cooperative banks that were operating in the EU-28 countries. Using the methodology of panel regression GMM estimator, this study finds the asymmetry of the credit market determinants between the CEE-11 and the EU-17 countries after the Global Financial Crisis. Panel data analysis of the credit market of the CEE countries against all EU-28 and EU-17 also find the differences between determinants of different type of bank loans.
THE IMPACT OF FISCAL POLICY CREDIBILITY ON THE INTEREST RATE : THE CASE OF INDONESIA

The objective of this paper is to investigate whether the effects of fiscal policy credibility, in the form of deficit rule, debt rule, discretionary, and openness, can affect the stability of interest rates. The main motivation behind this research is on the one hand, the credibility of fiscal policy has an influence on interest rates. To test the hypotheses, we use quarterly data in the case of Indonesia during the period of 2001 (1) -2013 (4). This research applies the ARDL (Auto Regressive Distributed Lag) model in the case in Indonesia. The result shows the debt rule is credible and has an impact on the interest rates in the long term. The short-term discretionary policy tends to increase the interest rates. The openness will also increase the interest rates in the longterm. It seems that the behavior of interest rates tend to be persistent. The economic implications of these findings, if the debt can be realized closely to the planned debt, the deviation will be small then interest rates will stabilize. Regarding to the trade openness, the government has to intervene in order to reduce the volatility of interest rates.
A Color‐Pair Based Approach for Accurate Color Harmony Estimation

Harmonious color combinations can stimulate positive user emotional responses. However, a widely open research question is: how can we establish a robust and accurate color harmony measure for the public and professional designers to identify the harmony level of a color theme or color set. Building upon the key discovery that color pairs play an important role in harmony estimation, in this paper we present a novel color‐pair based estimation model to accurately measure the color harmony. It first takes a two‐layer maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) based method to compute an initial prediction of color harmony by statistically modeling the pair‐wise color preferences from existing datasets. Then, the initial scores are refined through a back‐propagation neural network (BPNN) with a variety of color features extracted in different color spaces, so that an accurate harmony estimation can be obtained at the end. Our extensive experiments, including performance comparisons of harmony estimation applications, show the advantages of our method in comparison with the state of the art methods.
Describing educational trajectories of engineering students in individual high-failure rate courses that lead to late dropout

Understanding the phenomenon of late dropout has been gaining importance in engineering education. The process that leads to the decision to drop an academic program after freshman year, usually covers several academic periods, and is influenced by different factors. Longitudinal analysis is a good approach to analyze previous events that lead to late dropout. In this case study, we use a process mining approach to answer how educational trajectories of engineering students may describe the process that finishes in late dropout. It was conducted at the Universidad Austral de Chile, using academic records of highfailure rate courses. Through the analysis of educational trajectories in each one of the high-failure rate courses, we found that trajectories of students that dropout early and those that graduate on-time are clearly distinguishable from each other, but the trajectories of students that dropout late or graduate late need to be analyzed in more detail. Late dropout is higher among students that fail in freshman year courses compared to those that fail in sophomore year courses, and passing a course after failing it several times can be a dropout risk factor, which is consistent with the Investment Model. Such findings may be useful for managers and policy makers, because these trajectories can be related to entrance conditions and permanence requirements.
Ours ( b ) Diverse Search 1 ) Diverse Content Selection 2 ) Focused Generation ( c ) Mixture Decoder Dec 1 Dec 2 Enc Dec 3

Generating diverse sequences is important in many NLP applications such as question generation or summarization that exhibit semantically one-to-many relationships between source and the target sequences. We present a method to explicitly separate diversification from generation using a general plug-and-play module (called SELECTOR) that wraps around and guides an existing encoder-decoder model. The diversification stage uses a mixture of experts to sample different binary masks on the source sequence for diverse content selection. The generation stage uses a standard encoder-decoder model given each selected content from the source sequence. Due to the non-differentiable nature of discrete sampling and the lack of ground truth labels for binary mask, we leverage a proxy for ground-truth mask and adopt stochastic hard-EM for training. In question generation (SQuAD) and abstractive summarization (CNN-DM), our method demonstrates significant improvements in accuracy, diversity and training efficiency, including state-of-the-art top-1 accuracy in both datasets, 6% gain in top-5 accuracy, and 3.7 times faster training over a state-of-the-art model. Our code is publicly available at https://github.com/ clovaai/FocusSeq2Seq.