Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Cluster Analysis Approach to Comparing Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Data and Global Climate Model (GCM) Results

Cluster analysis was employed to compare ARM observational data at the Southern Great Plains (SGP) site with corresponding 6-hourly output from an integration of the Community Climate System Model Version 3 (CCSM3) run under the IPCC SRES A2 scenario for the current decade. Cluster analysis is a technique for classifying multivariate data into distinct regimes or states based on Euclidean distance in a phase space formed from the variables under consideration. A three-way process was used for the comparison: (1) CCSM output was projected onto states derived from ARM observations, (2) ARM observations were projected onto states derived from CCSM output, and (3) both ARM observations and CCSM output were projected onto states derived from the combination of the two datasets. A parallel clustering algorithm developed at ORNL has been improved by adding an acceleration technique and a method for handling empty clusters. Both serve to significantly reduce the time-to-solution. In addition, a parallel principal components analysis (PCA) tool has been developed to reduce the dimensionality of the analysis phase space while preserving most of the variance contained in the data.
Spatial correlation and texture-based fast Adaptive Loop Filter for HEVC

Many techniques have been developed to improve the coding performance of the emerging next generation High Efficient Video Coding (HEVC) standard. Among these techniques, Adaptive Loop Filter (ALF) is proposed and effectively enhances the coding efficiency, which is however at the cost of much higher computational complexity, thus increases the difficulty of practical real-time video encoding. Therefore, we address this problem and propose a fast algorithm of adaptive loop filter. We pre-judge the filter design mode for every largest coding unit (LCU) based on the spatial correlation and texture information of video content. By skipping some unnecessary mode, the time complexity of adaptive loop filter can be significantly reduced. The experimental results show that the proposed fast ALF algorithm can save on average 71.7% of the time for the adaptive loop filter in comparison with the original algorithm with only negligible video quality degradation.
Empirical study to test the independence of different acoustic voice parameters on a large voice database

voice parameters on a large voice database Dirk Michaelis and Hans Werner Strube Drittes Physikalisches Institut Georg-August-Universit at G ottingen B urgerstrasse 42-44 D-37073 G ottingen Phone +49-551 397731, 397729 Telefax +49-551 397720 ABSTRACT A new acoustic parameter for the description of hoarseness has been developed: The Glottal-to-Noise Excitation Factor (GNE-Factor). It shows to which extend a voice is excited by turbulent noise on a vocaltract constriction or by vocal-fold vibration. The new parameter is introduced brie y. Then the independence of this parameter from other well-known roughness parameters is demonstrated by multidimensional data analysis.
Understanding the Role of Research Universities in Improving College Preparation and Access at Local Urban High Schools

Urban colleges and universities not only have a responsibility to engage in activities designed to improve the educational attainment of local urban youth, but also have extensive financial, human, intellectual, and organizational resources that may be directed productively toward this purpose. This article describes the multipronged approach that the University of Pennsylvania is using to improve college opportunities for students attending Philadelphia high schools. We conclude by offering lessons that other institutions may draw from this example.
Performance Comparison of AODV and AOMDV routing protocols

Ad hoc networks are a new wireless networking paradigm for mobile nodes. It enabling devices to create and join networks on-the-fly anywhere, anytime. The military, emergency rescue, disaster relief operations are the main applications of ad hoc networks. Unlike traditional wireless networks, ad hoc networks do not rely on any fixed infrastructure. Instead, hosts rely on each other to keep the network connected. In this paper we compared single path and multipath routing protocols over mobile ad hoc wireless networks using ns-2 simulator. Simulation results are presented by varying number of source, pause time and node mobility. Keywords— AODV, AOMDV, Routing, ns-2, Simulation
Defining Malicious Behavior

In this paper we propose the use of formal methods to model malicious code behavior. The paradigm shift in malware detection from conventional, signature-based static methods to evaluating dynamic system behavior is motivated by the rising number and ever-increasing sophistication of malware currently in the wild. Because of advanced polymorphic and metamorphic techniques, a purely signature-based approach is no longer sufficient for accurate malware recognition. Automating the process of behavior analysis necessitates the use of formal methods. The modeling process is built upon two cornerstones: special system call execution traces generated through dynamic analysis of suspicious code and a self-defined taxonomy of (malicious) system activities. The formal model consists of two parts: A definition of malicious behavior in the form of combinations of tasks necessary to achieve a certain malign goal and of rules for translating each task into possible patterns of system calls. Both models are realized through formal grammars. The behavior model uses the tasks as the alphabet and the grammar rules define which patterns of activities can be used to accomplish certain high-level malicious goals. The translation model on the other hand contains an attributed context-free grammar for each task. The alphabet of each grammar consists of Windows system (API) calls, the grammar rules map each task to patterns of these calls. The attributes are used to convey information contained in the parameters of the individual calls.
MobiPETS-GRID Context-aware Mobile Service Provisioning Framework Deploying Enhanced Personalisation and Privacy and Security Technologies

The ambient lifestyle is characterised by interaction with your immediate environment no matter what kind of mobile and wireless sensor, service and network technology is behind it. The ambient user explicitly expects individual and seamless cooperation with those technologies depending on his current situation and context. Implicitly he requires transparent but inherent secure communications and trustworthy transactions. This paper introduces a context-aware mobile service provisioning framework to meet and fulfil the expectations of both the mobile users and service providers by deploying enhanced personalisation and privacy and security technologies following the multilateral security concept. Therefore, the domain oriented architecture is devided mainly into the user's trust domain and the service domain as the paper describes in detail. This approach is underpinned by (1) a user-centric Java Card enabled authentication and authorisation against your personal knowledge management system and (2) an event-driven and agent-based management of particular user tasks based on semantic cooperative reasoning.
Optical and thermal simulation chain for LED package

This paper presents a test case for coupling two physical aspects of an LED, optical and thermal, using specific simulation models coupled through an open source platform for distributed multi-physics modelling. The glue code for coupling is written with Python programming language including routines to interface specific simulation models. This approach can also be used for any other software. The main optical simulations are performed with an open source ray tracer software and the main thermal simulations are performed with Comsol Multiphysics. We show how to connect a Mie theory based scattering calculator with the ray tracer. Simulation results are compared to measured samples. The total radiant power emitted by the modelled LED is shown to be up to 3% consistent with the measurements.
Eye Blink Detection for Smart Glasses

Eye blink is a quick action of closing and opening of the eyelids. Eye blink detection has a wide range of applications in human computer interaction and human vision health care research. Existing approaches to eye blink detection often cannot suit well resource-limited eye blink detection platforms like Smart Glasses, which have limited energy supply and typically cannot afford strong imaging and computational capabilities. In this paper, we present an efficient and robust eye blink detection method for Smart Glasses. Our method first employs an eigen-eye approach to detect closing-eye in individual video frames. Our method then learns eye blink patterns based on the closing-eye detection results and detects eye blinks using a Gradient Boosting method. Our method further uses a non-maximum suppression algorithm to remove repeated detection of the same eye-blink action among consecutive video frames. Experiments with our prototyped smart glasses equipped with a low-power camera and an embedded processor show an accurate detection result (with more than 96% accuracy) on video frames of a small size of 16 × 12 at 96 fps, which enables a number of applications in health care, driving safety, and human computer interaction.
The Salmonella selC locus contains a pathogenicity island mediating intramacrophage survival

Pathogenicity islands are chromosomal clusters of horizontally acquired virulence genes that are often found at tRNA loci. The selC tRNA locus of Escherichia coli has served as the site of integration of two distinct pathogenicity islands which are responsible for converting benign strains into uro‐ and enteropathogens. Because virulence genes are targeted to the selC locus of E.coli, we investigated the homologous region of the Salmonella typhimurium chromosome for the presence of horizontally acquired sequences. At this site, we identified a 17 kb DNA segment that is both unique to Salmonella and necessary for virulence. This segment harbors a gene, mgtC, that is required for intramacrophage survival and growth in low Mg2+ media. The mgtC locus is regulated by the PhoP/PhoQ two‐component system, a major regulator of virulence functions present in both pathogenic and non‐pathogenic bacterial species. Cumulatively, our experiments indicate that the ability to replicate in low Mg2+ environments is necessary for Salmonella virulence, and suggest that a similar mechanism is responsible for the dissemination and acquisition of pathogenicity islands in enteric bacteria.
Boundedness and convergence of MPN for cyclic and almost cyclic learning with penalty

Weight-decay method as one of classical complexity regularizations is simple and appears to work well in some applications for multi-layer perceptron network (MPN). This paper shows results for the weak and strong convergence for cyclic and almost cyclic learning MPN with penalty term (weight-decay). The convergence is guaranteed under some relaxed conditions such as the activation functions, learning rate and the assumption for the stationary set of error function. Furthermore, the boundedness of the weights in the training procedure is obtained in a simple and clear way.
Epidemiological Surveillance of Low Pathogenic Avian Influenza Virus (LPAIV) from Poultry in Guangxi Province, Southern China

Low pathogenic avian influenza virus (LPAIV) usually causes mild disease or asymptomatic infection in poultry. However, some LPAIV strains can be transmitted to humans and cause severe infection. Genetic rearrangement and recombination of even low pathogenic influenza may generate a novel virus with increased virulence, posing a substantial risk to public health. Southern China is regarded as the world “influenza epicenter”, due to a rash of outbreaks of influenza in recent years. In this study, we conducted an epidemiological survey of LPAIV at different live bird markets (LBMs) in Guangxi province, Southern China. From January 2009 to December 2011, we collected 3,121 cotton swab samples of larynx, trachea and cloaca from the poultry at LBMs in Guangxi. Virus isolation, hemagglutination inhibition (HI) assay, and RT-PCR were used to detect and subtype LPAIV in the collected samples. Of the 3,121 samples, 336 samples (10.8%) were LPAIV positive, including 54 (1.7%) in chicken and 282 (9.1%) in duck. The identified LPAIV were H3N1, H3N2, H6N1, H6N2, H6N5, H6N6, H6N8, and H9N2, which are combinations of seven HA subtypes (H1, H3, H4, H6, H9, H10 and H11) and five NA subtypes (N1, N2, N5, N6 and N8). The H3 and H9 subtypes are predominant in the identified LPAIVs. Among the 336 cases, 29 types of mixed infection of different HA subtypes were identified in 87 of the cases (25.9%). The mixed infections may provide opportunities for genetic recombination. Our results suggest that the LPAIV epidemiology in poultry in the Guangxi province in southern China is complicated and highlights the need for further epidemiological and genetic studies of LPAIV in this area.
Real world, large scale IoT systems for community eldercare: Experiences and lessons learned

from their communities become increasingly critical. Internet-of-Things (IoT) technologies, particularly in-home monitoring solutions, are becoming mature. They can become the fundamental enabler for smart community eldercare. In this chapter, we share our real-world experiences gleaned from an ongoing large-scale project on IoT-enabled community eldercare. We identify technology-centric challenges that need to be addressed, so that such systems can be sustainably implemented and adopted by key stakeholders.
A localization algorithm for distorted or rotated QR code

Due to the efficient encoding of Chinese characters and quickly recognition, the Matrix QR code is widely used in numerous industries. Exact localization is the premise and crux of QR code recognition while existing localization algorithms have weak robustness when the QR code is distorted or rotated. A new adaptive and robust localization algorithm for QR code is proposed in this paper. First, we use the adaptive threshold algorithm to solve the influence of uneven illumination. On this basis, we propose a localization method which is based on contour tracking and contour sifting. The experiments of several sample sets show a high detection rate while the QR code is rotated freely or distorted slightly.
Comparison of V-BLAST / OSIC algorithm and the QR decomposition algorithm

MIMO-OFDM has become the core of future communication technologies for its great excellence, the detection algorithms are various, but only nonlinear algorithms are extensive used in practice. First, the ZF and MMSE criteria are briefly introduced, the nonlinear detection algorithms of V-BLAST algorithm and QR algorithm are analyzed in detail. Then the algorithms based on ZF criterion and MMSE criterion named ZF-OSIC, MMSE-OSIC, SQRD-ZF and SQRD-MMSE are studied. Finally the BER performance of them are compared, through MATLAB simulation.
A Study of Emotion Recognition for Constructive Learning using Robots

robot starts to play a prominent role in the modern world. They can be used in different areas like house hold activities, markets, military purposes, medical fields and schools. The main aim of this paper is to focus the use of robot in the educational field. Better feedback will be obtained through efficient human robot interactions. Human robot interaction defines the ability of the robot to interact efficiently with humans. The robot should monitor the student and analyze the emotions dynamically. The main aim is to maintain a healthy learning rate after recognizing the positive emotions. Real time face tracking and feature extraction is applied to recognize the emotional state of the student.
The Relation between Formal Concept Analysis and Rough Set Theory

Formal concept analysis and rough set theory have both similarities and differences. Although both are on the base of some data table, they provide two different methods for data mining and knowledge acquisition. At first, this paper discusses differences and relations between the extension of formal concepts in formal concept analysis and the equivalence classes of the rough set theory. Then, by introducing distinguishable relation of attribute set, it further studies the relationship between them. In the meanwhile, relevant theory and equivalent proposition is drawn out. At last, it discusses the relation between the consistent set of information system and consistent set of formal context, the relation between the consistent set with distinguish ability and consistent set of formal context. All the theoretical analysis here is meaningful and lays a theoretical foundation to further discuss the relation between reduction in the rough set theory and formal concept analysis.
Understanding Forgery Properties of Spam Delivery Paths

It is well known that spammers can forge the header of an email, in particular, the trace information carried in the Received: fields, as an attempt to hide the true origin of the email. Despite its critical importance for spam control and holding accountable the true originators of spam, there has been no systematic study on the forgery behavior of spammers. In this paper, we provide the first comprehensive study on the Received: header fields of spam emails to investigate, among others, to what degree spammers can and do forge the trace information of spam emails. Towards this goal, we perform empirical experiments based on two complementary real-world data sets: a 3 year spam archive with about 1.84M spam emails, and the MX records of about 1.2M network domains. In this paper, we report our findings and discuss the implications of the findings on various spam control eorts, including email sender authentication and spam filtering.
Photoreceptor Light Adaptation

The illumination at the earth’s surface varies by . 10 orders of magnitude during the normal day–night cycle, and the vertebrate visual system covers this entire range of light intensities with two neuronal subsystems that rely on the activity of two types of photoreceptor cells, rods and cones. Human rod vision operates over approximately seven decimal orders of illumination. The cone visual system operates over an even wider range (Rodieck, 1998). Light adaptation occurs at all levels of the visual system, from photoreceptors to central neurons. Yet, the function of the entire visual system depends on the ability of the photoreceptors themselves to adjust their sensitivity to the ambient lighting situation. Thus, photoreceptors must generate reliable signals at night when single photons are captured between long intervals of darkness, and must also continue to signal at the very high light intensities encountered on a sunny day. Photoreceptor light adaptation is likely to be mediated by multiple and perhaps redundant molecular mechanisms (Detwiler and Gray-Keller, 1992; Lagnado and Baylor, 1992; Bownds and Arshavsky, 1995; Pugh et al., 1999). Recently, Pugh et al. (1999) summarized nine individual molecular mechanisms thought to be involved in adaptation and discussed their relative contributions to the entire adaptation process. A study by the same authors, published on page 795 (Nikonov et al., 2000, this issue), provides the experimental support for their insights and further develops a theoretical framework that will impact future studies of photoreceptor light adaptation. The molecular mechanisms underlying light adaptation may be discussed in the context of the reactions governing cGMP in the photoreceptor cytoplasm (Hodgkin and Nunn, 1988):
A Three-Dimensional Sustainability Evaluation of Jatropha Plantations in Yucatan, Mexico

This paper presents a unique sustainability analysis of one of the first attempts to establish a biodiesel industry in Mexico. From 2008, several companies established medium to large-sized Jatropha curcas plantations in Yucatan, hiring local peasants to carry out the agricultural work. After five years, the plantations were abandoned due to poor seed yields and a lack of key knowledge for large-scale cultivation. Based on a multidisciplinary approach, we performed a three-dimensional sustainability evaluation of the potential biodiesel production chain, which included household interviews, a socioeconomic survey, and a life-cycle assessment (LCA). We identified both negative and positive effects in the three dimensions analyzed. Socially and culturally, the local peasant families understood sustainability as their ability to preserve their traditional lifestyle, and associated environmental services with their sense of identity. They therefore considered the jatropha plantations to be positive for sustainability, since they brought income, even though some perceived damage to the natural resources of the surrounding areas. Economically, peasants’ annual household income increased by approximately $1080 USD due to the increased salaries paid by the jatropha companies. The LCA predicted large savings of greenhouse gas emissions (>50% compared to fossil diesel), but also potential negative impacts in some categories (human/ecological toxicity and eutrophication potentials) associated with the use of mineral fertilizers, insecticides, and pesticides applied during the cultivation stage. Biodiesel production would be potentially energetically self-sufficient, in addition to producing a 40% energy surplus. Finally, even though the sustainability indicators suggested a positive overall assessment, the reality was that the jatropha projects failed because they were predicated on unrealistically optimistic projections and poor agronomic knowledge of the plant.
Linkage analysis of quantitative traits: increased power by using selected samples.

Although a number of methods have been developed for linkage analysis of quantitative traits, power is relatively poor unless there is a single major locus of very large effect. Here it is demonstrated that the use of selected samples (i.e., ascertainment of a proband with an extreme score on the quantitative measure) can dramatically increase power, especially when proband selection is performed on the tail of a distribution with an infrequent recessive gene. Depending on gene action and allele frequency, selected samples permit detection of a major locus that accounts for as little as 10%-20% of the phenotypic variation. The judicious use of selected samples can make an appreciable difference in the feasibility of linkage studies for quantitative traits.