Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Novel generative model for facial expressions based on statistical shape analysis of landmarks trajectories

We propose a novel geometric framework for analyzing spontaneous facial expressions, with the specific goal of comparing, matching, and averaging the shapes of landmarks trajectories. Here we represent facial expressions by the motion of the landmarks across the time. The trajectories are represented by curves. We use elastic shape analysis of these curves to develop a Riemannian framework for analyzing shapes of these trajectories. In terms of empirical evaluation, our results on two databases: UvA-NEMO and Cohn-Kanade CK+ are very promising. From a theoretical perspective, this framework allows formal statistical inferences, such as generation of facial expressions.
From TEMPO+ to OPUS 2: What can music tests tell us about processor upgrades?

Abstract Tests for quantifying the music perception abilities of cochlear implant users are currently being developed and trialled at the South of England Cochlear Implant Centre. In addition to measures of speech perception, tests of rhythm, and pitch have been administered to MED-EL C40+ implant users before and after upgrading from the TEMPO+ processor with continuous interleaved sampling strategy to the OPUS 2 processor with fine structure processing strategy, with the aims of comparing device performance and evaluating the potential of music perception tests for informing processor upgrades and tuning. Eight experienced adult C40+ implant recipients performed tests of rhythm and pitch discrimination using the TEMPO+ processor and, after a minimum of 6 weeks acclimatization, using the OPUS 2 processor. Stimuli included piano and sine tones in two note ranges for the pitch tasks, and drum beats for the rhythm task. Rhythm, pitch, and speech perception scores were comparable for both processors. An effect of note range was observed (z = −2.52, p = 0.008 (two-tailed), r = −0.63), which indicated that the higher range of notes used for the pitch tasks was easier for participants than the lower range. Measures of pitch discrimination in different frequency ranges further informed changes made to one participant's map, resulting in improved pitch discrimination and speech perception scores. The outcomes of this study demonstrate that music perception tests can provide important additional measures for tuning cochlear implant parameters and assessing the impact of changes to device type and processing strategy.
‘Insights in the relationship of joint space narrowing versus erosive joint damage and physical functioning of patients with RA’

Objective To evaluate the contribution of joint space narrowing (JSN) and erosions in general and in four different joint groups in relation to physical disability in rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Methods 5-year follow-up data from the Behandel Strategieën (BeSt) trial were used, where 508 patients with recent onset RA were treated aiming at a disease activity score ≤2.4. Joint damage was assessed annually and scored according to the Sharp-van der Heijde method. Physical disability was measured 3-monthly with the Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ). Generalised Estimating Equations analyses were performed to assess the relationship between the HAQ and JSN scores and erosions scores, separately and in joint groups. Results Overall, damage scores were low, and neither total JSN nor erosions showed a significant effect on HAQ (β=0.001 95% CI −0.003 to 0.004 and β=0.002 95% CI −0.001 to 0.006, respectively). Of the total damage scores per joint group, damage in the wrist shows a trend for association with physical disability displaying the largest effect size (β=0.005 95% CI 0.000 to 0.011). Also in the analysis with erosions per joint group, the wrist was most strongly related with physical functioning (β=0.016 95% CI 0.003 to 0.029); in the analysis with JSN per joint group no joint group was significantly related to the HAQ. Analysis of all erosion and narrowing scores per joint group in one model reveals only erosions in the wrist to be independently associated with impaired physical functioning (β=0.017 95% CI 0.003 to 0.030). Conclusions Joint damage in the wrist, erosions more than JSN, is associated with impaired physical functioning even in patients with early RA with limited overall damage after 5 years tightly controlled treatment.
Intravenous Amiodarone for the Treatment of Atrial Fibrillation in the Nonsurgical Patient

Purpose: To review the literature to define the efficacy of intravenous (IV) amiodarone in the treatment of atrial fibrillation in the nonsurgical patient. Method: A MEDLINE search was conducted using the key words “intravenous amiodarone” and “atrial fibrillation. ” All trials evaluating the use of intravenous amiodarone in the surgical setting were excluded. Results: Twenty articles were identified, which were divided into acute and chronic atrial fibrillation. Within the acute setting, IV amiodarone was used alone, compared to a placebo-control, or compared to active drug regimens. In the trials without a control group, it was difficult to determine how much of the effect was due to spontaneous conversion. When compared to placebo, IV amiodarone offered a 61% to 92% conversion at 24 hours. Compared to active drug therapy, there was a trend to increased efficacy at 24 hours. However, amiodarone was no more effective for the conversion of atrial fibrillation than alternative therapies. In the case of chronic atrial fibrillation, intravenous amiodarone had no benefit. The incidence of thrombophlebitis, bradycardia, and hypotension was quite high, reported to be around 15% to 30% in many of the trials. Conclusion: The use of intravenous amiodarone should not be recommended as the first line agent for the conversion of atrial fibrillation.
Pomalidomide is effective for prevention and treatment of experimental skin fibrosis

Objectives Tissue fibrosis is a major hallmark and a leading cause of death in systemic sclerosis (SSc). Here, we investigated the antifibrotic effects of pomalidomide, an analogue of thalidomide with potent immunomodulatory effects, in preclinical models of skin fibrosis. Methods We evaluated the antifibrotic effects of pomalidomide in preventive as well as therapeutic treatment regimes using bleomycin-induced dermal fibrosis as a model of early, inflammatory stages of fibrosis and the tight-skin mouse model as a model of later stages of fibrosis with endogenous activation of fibroblasts. Results Treatment with pomalidomide in doses from 0.3 to 30 mg/kd/day prevented skin fibrosis in Tsk-1 mice and in bleomycin-induced dermal fibrosis in a dose-dependent manner and reduced the expression of transforming growth factor (TGF) β-target genes such as PAI-1, CTGF and col 1a1. Pomalidomide was also effective in the setting of pre-established fibrosis and reduced dermal thickness, myofibroblast counts and hydroxyproline content below pretreatment levels. Conclusions We demonstrate for the first time that pomalidomide exerts potent antifibrotic effects in different preclinical models of skin fibrosis. These findings lend preclinical support for the clinical studies of pomalidomide in SSc.
On generating continuous-curvature paths for line following problem with curvature and sharpness constraints

The main contribution of the paper is to provide a method to generate continuous curvature paths in order to converge to a line, based on combinations of clothoids with line segments and circular arcs. Different kinds of continuous curvature paths have been defined in order to solve problems with different complexity. The type of paths that we have generated get the benefits of higher comfort and safety. Generated paths take into account lower and upper bounds of sharpness and curvature simultaneously, while it is not the case of other continuous curvature paths such as Elementary and BiElementary paths. Wheeled mobile robots following a path with continuous curvature may also get benefit on wheels slippage reduction and low odometry errors, since transitions are softer with constant curvature rates.
DustCart, an autonomous robot for door-to-door garbage collection: From DustBot project to the experimentation in the small town of Peccioli

We report on the design and the experimental results of DustCart, a wheeled autonomous robot for door-to-door garbage collection. DustCart is able to navigate in urban environments avoiding static and dynamic obstacles and to interact with human users. The robot is managed by an Ambient Intelligence system (AmI) through a wireless connection: it navigates to collect garbage bags to the houses of users and then moves to discharge the collected waste to a dedicated area. The architecture, navigation and localization systems are described along with the results achieved in different urban sites. In particular, a localization approach based on optical beacons was used and guaranteed position errors sufficient for a safe robot navigation. We report also the first results of a long-term experimentation of the DustCart robot in Peccioli, a small town of Tuscany (Italy). This can be considered as a first step in using robotics in the everyday life of a real town for providing a real service.
A Frequency Domain Scheduling for Uplink Single Carrier Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access with Iterative Interference Cancellation

This paper proposes a frequency-domain (FD) scheduling for an uplink single carrier non-orthogonal multiple access (SC-NOMA) with the assistance of iterative interference cancellation (IC). In the SC-NOMA, an evolved Node B (eNB) with an iterative IC receiver is capable of allocating overlapped spectra to plural intra-cell user equipments (UEs) exceeding the number of receive antennas. As a result, the SC-NOMA can enhance the spectral efficiency owing to the non-orthogonal multiplexing. However, when the subband (SB) criterion scheduling, that assigns an SB to a UE on the basis of the metric only on an SB, is applied, this scheduling is not suitable in the SC-NOMA. This is because the throughput in single carrier transmission depends on all the allocated SBs. Therefore, we propose a novel FD scheduling based on the expected value of cell throughput which is calculated by both the SB selected by the metric as a candidate and the previously allocated SBs. The eNB assigns the candidate SB if the expected cell throughput increases after allocating the candidate SB. Computer simulations confirm that the proposal can improve throughput performances compared to the SB criterion scheduling in the SC-NOMA.
An extra dose of rituximab improves clinical response in rheumatoid arthritis patients with initial incomplete B cell depletion: a randomised controlled trial

Objectives Since clinical non-response to 2×1000 mg rituximab has previously been found to be associated with incomplete B cell depletion, we determined, in a randomised controlled proof of concept study, whether patients with initial incomplete B cell depletion would benefit from an additional infusion of rituximab at week 4. Methods Patients with active rheumatoid arthritis despite methotrexate received a first infusion of rituximab 1000 mg and were tested for persistent B cells using highly sensitive flow cytometry on day 15. All received a second infusion of 1 g (according to license), but patients with persistent B cells were subsequently randomised double-blind to receive, 2 weeks later, either a third infusion of 1000 mg rituximab or placebo. Clinical response was determined by European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) and American College of Rheumatology (ACR) criteria. Results Baseline characteristics were balanced between groups. Treatment with 3×1000 mg rituximab resulted in significantly greater depletion (lower B cell and plasmablast numbers between 8 and 28 weeks) paralleled by significantly better EULAR and ACR20 response rates at 40 weeks (p=0.035 and p=0.027, respectively) and 52 weeks (p=0.021 and p=0.043, respectively) compared with 2×1000 mg. Immunoglobulin titres remained stable in both arms, and adverse event rates were balanced. Conclusions In rituximab-treated patients with incomplete B cell depletion (predictive of poor response), an extra 1000 mg infusion of rituximab at 4 weeks produced both better depletion and clinical responses than placebo with no worsening of safety. Degree of depletion is an important, but modifiable, determinant of response.
Cluster Power Variation Estimation for MIMO Channel Modeling in Crowded Indoor Environment

In recent years, MIMO channel models for the crowded areas such as indoor offices, shops, and outdoor hot spot environments have become a topic of great interest. In the crowded environments, the propagation paths are blocked frequently by users walking around the mobile terminal, and it causes severe shadowing and fading of channel. In this paper, to take the impact of pedestrians on the channel model into consideration, we proposed the estimation method of clusters' power variation properties from the channel sounding data. We carried out the MIMO channel sounding experiments in a cafeteria in a weekday lunch time in the 3 GHz band assuming the use of LTE based cellular systems. We estimated the propagation parameters of clusters from the measured data and estimated the cluster power variation properties. The measurement results showed that the mean cluster power varied from -11.3 dB to 1.3 dB compared to the no pedestrian environment. The mean cluster powers tended to decrease as the clusters' propagation delay increased. The cluster power variation standard deviations. ranged from 0.9 dB to 2.4 dB and the cluster power variation correlation times ranged from 0.7 sec. to 1.1 sec.
Influence of locomotor training on the structure and myosin heavy chains of the denervated rat soleus muscle

Abstract Objective: Mechanism of denervation atrophy remains poorly understood. In particular, the question about irreversibility of the late atrophy is still open. Therefore, in the present study, we investigated whether and how a passive movement can affect a progress of atrophy in rat soleus muscle. To address this issue, a locomotor training on a treadmill was applied to rats with their right hindlimb muscles denervated. Methods: The hindlimb muscles were denervated by cutting the sciatic nerve. Starting either 7 days or 1 month after the surgery, the animals were trained on a treadmill. Two months after denervation, the soleus muscle was investigated using light and electron microscopy and biochemical methods. Control soleus muscles were obtained from non-trained animals: the untreated and the 2-month denervated. Results: Locomotor training caused slight increase in denervated rat soleus muscle weight and significant increase in its fiber diameter. The training positively affected some of the factors that were believed to be the reasons of atrophy irreversibility, because of significant increase in the number of capillary blood vessels and muscle fiber nuclei with the concomitant decrease in the number of severely damaged muscle fibers and amount of collagen. Morphology of the contractile apparatus was also improved as more regular organization of sarcomeres and the hexagonal arrangement of myosin filaments was evident. Moreover, the amount of myosin heavy chains (MHC) significantly increased after training. The effects were more evident in the animals with longer training. Conclusion: Passive movement seems to attenuate some of the pathologic processes within the denervated muscle.
Impact of Antenna Configuration on Feedback Generation for Non-Ideal CoMP Transmission

Coordinated multipoint (CoMP) transmission is a promised candidate in long term evolution advanced (LTEA) systems to assure coverage and broadband communication for cell edge user equipments (UEs). However, the presence of timing offsets (TOs) between the received signals from multiple transmitters might limit the performance of CoMP transmission. The promised advantages of closed-loop CoMP transmission vanish for the system configuration with four transmit antennas, showing significantly poorer performance than the transmitter equipped with two antennas for large TOs. The reason is that the transmit covariance matrix used for implicit feedback generation is affected by a phase shift caused by TO after orthogonal frequency division multiplexing demodulation, leading to improper precoding matrix index (PMI) selection and therefore limiting the beamforming gain at the cell edge UE. On the other hand the system configuration with two transmit antennas is robust against that phase shift, despite the TO. Keeping the phase shift in systems with four transmit antennas low, reliable PMI selection can be guaranteed and as a result the promised CoMP transmission benefits can be achieved in a practical realization with TO present.
Application of hidden Markov random field approach for quantification of perfusion/diffusion mismatch in acute ischemic stroke

Abstract The perfusion/diffusion 'mismatch model' in acute ischemic stroke provides the potential to more accurately understand the consequences of thrombolytic therapy on an individual patient basis. Few methods exist to quantify mismatch extent (ischemic penumbra) and none have shown a robust ability to predict infarcted tissue outcome. Hidden Markov random field (HMRF) approaches have been used successfully in many other applications. The aim of the study was to develop a method for rapid and reliable identification and quantification of perfusion/diffusion mismatch using an HMRF approach. An HMRF model was used in combination with automated contralateral identification to segment normal tissue from non-infarcted tissue with perfusion abnormality. The infarct was used as a seed point to initialize segmentation, along with the contralateral mirror tissue. The two seeds were then allowed to compete for ownership of all unclassified tissue. In addition, a novel method was presented for quantifying tissue salvageability by weighting the volume with the degree of hypoperfusion, allowing the penumbra voxels to contribute unequal potential damage estimates. Simulated and in vivo datasets were processed and compared with results from a conventional thresholding approach. Both simulated and in vivo experiments demonstrated a dramatic improvement in accuracy with the proposed technique. For the simulated dataset, the mean absolute error decreased from 171.9% with conventional thresholding to 2.9% for the delay-weighted HMRF approach. For the in vivo dataset, the mean absolute error decreased from 564.6% for thresholding to 34.2% for the delay-weighted HMRF approach. The described method represents a significant improvement over thresholding techniques.
Distributed User Selection in Network MIMO Systems with Limited Feedback

We propose a distributed user selection strategy in a network MIMO setting with M base stations serving K users. Each base station is equipped with L antennas, where LM ≪ K. The conventional selection strategy is based on a well known technique called semi-orthogonal user selection when the zero-forcing beamforming (ZFBF) is adopted. Such technique, however, requires perfect channel state information at the transmitter (CSIT), which might not be available or need large feedback overhead. This paper proposes an alternative distributed user selection technique where each user sets a timer that is inversely proportional to his channel quality indicator (CQI), as a means to reduce the feedback overhead. The proposed strategy allows only the user with the highest CQI to respond with a feedback. Such technique, however, remains collision free only if the transmission time is shorter than the difference between the strongest user timer and the second strongest user timer. To overcome the situation of longer transmission times, the paper proposes another feedback strategy that is based on the theory of compressive sensing, where collision is allowed and all users encode their feedback information and send it back to the base-stations simultaneously. The paper shows that the problem can be formulated as a block sparse recovery problem which is agnostic on the transmission time, which makes it a good alternative to the timer approach when collision is dominant.
Effects of Correlated Shadowing Modeling on Performance Evaluation of Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless links are typically modeled in isolation as independent and parallel links. However, in reality, there is often a correlation in defects and impairments between collocated links. The spatial correlation of shadowing among proximate wireless links has been frequently observed. Although different types of correlated shadowing models have been proposed for wireless channels, these models are not present in popular network simulators. Ignoring such correlations results in the diversity of adjacent links being over- estimated. Our hypothesis is that this could lead to incorrect results when evaluating the performance of wireless systems and network protocols. In this paper, the ns-3 simulation environment has been enhanced with a prototype correlated shadowing model developed in our previously published work. We study the end-to-end packet delivery ratio and delay in wireless sensor networks using both correlated and independent propagation models. Simulation results show that correlated and independent shadowing models produce significant differences in network performance. Moreover, we compare the complexity of different modeling options. It is shown that this correlated propagation model in ns-3 can improve simulation realism without inducing any considerable degradation of scalability.
Dietary assessment, anthropometric measurements and nutritional status of Greek professional athletes

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine the anthropometric characteristics and to assess dietary intakes of professional athletes, of four different sporting teams, in Northern Greece.Design/methodology/approach – Height and weight was measured using stasiometer and a scale devise, respectively. Body fat was measured using bioelectrical impedance analysis with multiple frequencies. A five‐day questionnaire was used to assess the dietary intakes of athletes. The sample consisted of male and female athletes, of ten volleyball and 21 basketball players, 20 weightlifters and 31 distance runners.Findings – Distance runners had the lower percentage of body fat and volleyball players the higher ones. In men, basketball players reported the lowest amounts for energy intake (1,900 kcal/day) and for carbohydrates (2 g/kg). In women, the lowest carbohydrate intake was reported in volleyball players. Volleyball men players consumed the highest amount of fat 110 g/day or 1.4 g/kg. Protein intakes were below .
Simultaneous estimation of aerodynamic and contact forces in flying robots: Applications to metric wind estimation and collision detection

In this paper, we extend our previous external wrench estimation scheme for flying robots with an aerodynamic model such that we are able to simultaneously estimate aerodynamic and contact forces online. This information can be used to identify the metric wind velocity vector via model inversion. Noticeably, we are still able to accurately sense collision forces at the same time. Discrimination between the two is achieved by identifying the natural contact frequency characteristics for both “interaction cases”. This information is then used to design suitable filters that are able to separate the aerodynamic from the collision forces for subsequent use. Now, the flying system is able to correctly respond to typical contact forces and does not accidentally “hallucinate” contacts due to a misinterpretation of wind disturbances. Overall, this paper generalizes our previous results towards significantly more complex environments.