Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Provenance changes of eolian dust at Lingtai section in the Chinese Loess Plateau since 7 Ma and its implication for desert development in East Asia

Abstract. It is suggested that the uplift of Himalaya-Tibetan Plateau enhanced interior aridity in East Asia and resulted in development of middle latitude gobi and sandy deserts and accumulation of the eolian sediments in the Chinese Loess Plateau. Therefore, estimation of the provenance for eolian sediments in the Chinese Loess Plateau is critical to reconstruct the environmental changes in East Asia and their relation to the Himalaya-Tibetan Plateau uplift. We recently developed a new provenance tracing method by using a combination of Electron Spin Resonance (ESR) signal intensity and Crystallinity Index (CI) of quartz, and demonstrated that fine fraction of the surface sediments from nine major deserts in East Asia could be distinguished one another on the ESR signal intensity versus CI diagram. Here, we measured ESR signal intensity and CI of quartz in fine fractions of samples covering the last 7 Ma obtained from Lingtai section in the central Chinese Loess Plateau, and compared the results with those of the surface samples from nine major deserts in East Asia. The results suggest that the provenance of fine fraction of the eolian sediment in Lingtai section changed at 4.3, 2.1, 1.4, 1.1, 0.8 and 0.4 Ma. During 7 to 4.3 Ma, the dust might be have been supplied from Precambrian to Paleozoic metamorphic and granitic rocks and granite exposed in the present central to eastern part of the Tian Shan Mountains. The contribution from the Taklimakan desert appeared at 4.3 Ma, increased drastically at 1.1 Ma, and persisted till 0.8 Ma, whereas the main source of detrital material to the Taklimakan desert might have changed from eastern part of the Kunlun and the Altyn Mountains to western part of the Kunlun and the Tian Shan Mountains. During 0.8 to 0.4 Ma, contribution from the Badain Juran desert gradually increased. Finally, contribution from the Tengger desert appeared from 0.4 to 0 Ma. Together with tectonic evidences from literatures, the provenance changes from 4.3 to 0.8 Ma seem to reflect uplift of the Tian Shan and the Kunlun Mountains and consequent formation of the Taklimakan desert, whereas the change at 0.4 Ma may reflect uplift of the Qilian Mountains although formation of mountain glaciers could be an alternative possibility. These provenance changes will provide important constraints not only on the development of arid areas and evolution of monsoon but also on the uplift and erosion of mountains in East Asia.
Antipole Clustering for Fast Texture Synthesis

This paper describes a new method for analysis/synthesis of textures using a non-parametric multi-resolution approach able to reproduce efficiently the generative stochastic process of a wide class of real texture images. This is realized through a new data structure the Antipole Tree and a suitable research strategy able to outperform both the classical linear full-search heuristic and the TSVQ (Tree Structure Vector Quantization) acceleration used in previous related works. Experimental results performed on an exhaustive set of textures [VisTex] show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.
Tractability of parameterized completion problems on chordal and interval graphs: minimum fill-in and physical mapping

We study the parameterized complexity of several NP-Hard graph completion problems: The minimum fill-in problem is to decide if a graph can be triangulated by adding at most k edges. We develop an O(k/sup 5/ mn+f(K)) algorithm for the problem on a graph with n vertices and m edges. In particular, this implies that the problem is fixed parameter tractable (FPT). proper interval graph completion problems, motivated by molecular biology, ask for adding edges in order to obtain a proper interval graph, so that a parameter in that graph does not exceed k. We show that the problem is FPT when k is the number of added edges. For the problem where k is the clique size, we give an O(f(k)n/sup k-1/) algorithm, so it is polynomial for fixed k. On the other hand, we prove its hardness in the parameterized hierarchy, so it is probably not FPT. Those results are obtained even when a set of edges which should not be added is given. That set can be given either explicitly or by a proper vertex coloring which the added edges should respect. <<ETX>>
Autonomous control of real snake-like robot using reinforcement learning; Abstraction of state-action space using properties of real world

In this paper we consider autonomous control of a real snake-like robot using reinforcement learning. We focus on curse of dimensionality and lack of generality, and point out that the causes of the problems are not in learning algorithm but in neglect of properties of the real world. To solve the problems we propose new framework in which body of robot abstract general meaning by using properties of the real world as information processor. We apply the proposed framework for controlling a snake-like robot and confirm that the two problems are solved simultaneously, without changing learning algorithm at all. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed framework experiments has been carried out.
Design of a Millimeter-Wave CMOS Radiation Oscillator With an Above-Chip Patch Antenna

This brief presents a design method of a millimeter-wave CMOS radiation oscillator for broadband short-range communication. An above-chip patch antenna is proposed for the radiation oscillator. The proposed antenna has a balanced port, which makes it suitable for the direct connection of CMOS cross-coupling transistors. The properties of the antenna are analyzed by an electromagnetic field solver, and, in particular, the input resistance is discussed in detail, so that the condition of millimeter-wave oscillation is satisfied even by CMOS FETs having gains lower than GaAs FETs. Furthermore, on/off-keying modulation can be carried out using switch transistors, and two switching techniques are used to realize a large data rate. A performance of 500 Mb/s and a total efficiency of 0.12, which includes both the antenna and the circuit efficiencies, are confirmed by circuit simulation
Who wants to speak first ? Endogenous debate design with career concerns

We model a committee made up of informed experts whose members have to reach an agreement on a particular decision. They reach an agreement in debating, following a protocol that determines the order of speech in the debate and the type of messages debaters are allowed to send. We consider that members of the committee have career concerns, namely that their payoff depends both on the decision made by the committee and the state of the world. We show that career concerns of the experts may imply that they disagree about the choice of the debate protocol. Yet we show that this disagreement can not be common knowledge. In other words, if expert’s preferences about the debate protocol are common knowledge, then they have to be the same.
Anaerobic bacteria in the intestinal microbiota of Brazilian children

OBJECTIVE: Changes in the neonatal gut environment allow for the colonization of the mucin layer and lumen by anaerobic bacteria. The aim of the present study was to evaluate Bifidobacterium, Lactobacillus and Lactococcus colonization through the first year of life in a group of 12 Brazilian infants and to correlate these data with the levels of Escherichia coli. The presence of anaerobic members of the adult intestinal microbiota, including Eubacterium limosum and Faecalibacterium prausnitzii, was also evaluated. METHODS: Fecal samples were collected during the first year of life, and 16S rRNA from anaerobic and facultative bacteria was detected by real-time PCR. RESULTS: Bifidobacterium was present at the highest levels at all of the studied time points, followed by E. coli and Lactobacillus. E. limosum was rarely detected, and F. prausnitzii was detected only in the samples from the latest time points. CONCLUSION: These results are consistent with reports throughout the world on the community structure of the intestinal microbiota in infants fed a milk diet. Our findings also provide evidence for the influence of the environment on intestinal colonization due to the high abundance of E. coli. The presence of important anaerobic genera was observed in Brazilian infants living at a low socioeconomic level, a result that has already been well established for infants living in developed countries.
Support-Set-Assured Parallel Outsourcing of Sparse Reconstruction Service for Compressive Sensing in Multi-clouds

By leveraging the concept of signal sparsity, the new signal acquisition paradigm Compressive Sensing (CS) has successfully shifted the system complexity of the encoder to the decoder. If consideration must be given to solving the heavy decoding work while guaranteeing the privacy of the signal, one of the best choices is to outsource the sparse reconstruction service to a cloud with abundant computing resources. We propose to outsource sparse reconstruction service to multi-clouds in parallel with an assumption that multi-clouds cannot collude with each other in private. The owner protects the 2D signals' support-set, a set consisting of the indices of the nonzero entries in that signal, using a simple exchange primitives with low complexity and less memory rather than a full random permutation matrix. When carrying out parallel compressive sensing, this exchange primitive is equivalent to random permutation matrix, thus relaxing the RIP for 2D sparse signals with high probability. Then, the compressive measurements and support-set are distributed over multi-clouds for storage and reconstruction service. Each cloud only has a small amount of information of both the measurements and asymmetric support-set, therefore, the privacy of the original signal can be guaranteed.
Multi-Scale Wavelet Domain Residual Learning for Limited-Angle CT Reconstruction

Limited-angle computed tomography (CT) is often used in clinical applications such as C-arm CT for interventional imaging. However, CT images from limited angles suffers from heavy artifacts due to incomplete projection data. Existing iterative methods require extensive calculations but can not deliver satisfactory results. Based on the observation that the artifacts from limited angles have some directional property and are globally distributed, we propose a novel multi-scale wavelet domain residual learning architecture, which compensates for the artifacts. Experiments have shown that the proposed method effectively eliminates artifacts, thereby preserving edge and global structures of the image.
Firmware-only implementation of time-to-digital converter (TDC) in field-programmable gate array (FPGA)

A Time-to-Digital Converter (TDC) implemented in general purpose field-programmable gate array, (FPGA) for the Fermilab CKM experiment will be presented. The TDC uses a delay chain and register array structure to produce lower bits in addition to higher bits from a clock counter. Lacking the direct controls custom chips, the FPGA implementation of the delay chain and register array structure had to address two major problems: (1) The logic elements used for the delay chain and register array structure must be placed and routed by the FPGA compiler in a predictable manner, to assure uniformity of the TDC binning and short-term stability. (2) The delay variation due to temperature and power supply voltage must he compensated for to assure long-term stability. We used the chain structures in the existing FPGAs that the venders designed for general purpose such as carry algorithm or logic expansion to solve the first problem. To compensate for delay variations, we studied several digital compensation strategies that can be implemented in the same FPGA device. Some bench-top test results will also be presented in this document.
Egidio: A non-invasive approach for synthesizing organizational models

To understand and improve processes in organizations, six key questions need to be answered, namely, what, how, where, who, when, why. Organizations with established processes have IT system(s) that gather(s) information about some or all of the key questions. Software organizations usually have defined processes, but they usually lack information about how processes are actually executed. Moreover, there is no explicit information about process instances and activities. Existing process mining techniques face problems in coping with such environment. We propose a tool, Egidio, which uses non-invasively collected data and builds organizational models. In particular, we explain the tool within a software company, which is able to extract different aspects of development processes. The main contribution of Egidio is the ability to mine processes and organizational models from fine-grained data collected in a non-invasive manner, without interrupting the developers' work.
The Possible Origin of Culture by Andy Lock Review of : The Evolution of Culture : An Interdisciplinary View

There are four great systems whereby that phenomenon called ‘life’ variously sustains itself by moving information around in time. Three of these, the genetic system, the immune system, and the various nervous systems that support learning, are miracles of individual biology. Our understanding of each of these is conceptually united and underpinned by the Darwinian explication of ‘selection’. Natural selection explains how a profusion of genotypes is winnowed down to a set of ‘adapted’ individuals. Clonal selection theory explains how a profusion of lymphocytes are selected by their fit to antigens. And as Skinner (1953: 430) has pointed out ‘In certain respects [learning] resembles the natural selection of evolutionary theory. Just as genetic characteristics which arise as mutations are selected or discarded by their consequences, so novel forms of behavior are selected or discarded through reinforcement. ’ The fourth great system – culture – has never been satisfactorily fitted into this framework. The social systems of sub-human animals have proved to be explainable within an evolutionary framework, but human culture is more elusive. Cultural behaviour has a moral component rooted in self-awareness that the other systems do not display. It is fundamental to the maintenance of cultures that the individuals who make them up must have some awareness of their social standing with respect to age, sex, hierarchies of social standing, etc, for ‘if [they] were not aware of [their] roles they would not be in a position to appraise their own conduct in terms of traditional values and social sanctions’ (Hallowell, 1971: 83); they would not be able to provide an acceptable account of their actions when called to do so upon transgressing ‘custom’ – accounts which draw on the local ‘social constructs’ of the group; and without such an awareness, human groups would be, if they could even exist under such conditions, little more than a collection of mindless sociopaths. Culture has thus, within the social sciences, come to be felt of as some-
ENERGY DETECTION TECHNIQUE FOR SPECTRUM SENSING IN COGNITIVE RADIO

With unprecedented growth of the subscribers in modern cellular and wireless data communications, there is an acute scarcity of additional bandwidth to meet the ever growing demand. To ease the constraint of additional bandwidth, utilization of the existing system has been a topic of recent interest. Cognitive Radio is a new technique in which the spectral holes in unutilized spectrum are determined to be used for instantaneous communication by secondary users. The Cognitive Radio determines the occupancy of the frequency spectrum observed over a time interval by spectrum sensing methods. Spectrum sensing forms a key front end block of Cognitive Radio systems. This paper deals with the design and simulation of the spectrum sensing algorithm for Cognitive Radio under low SNR scenario. The Energy Based Spectrum Sensing (EBSS) technique has been identified for its relatively simple implementation. However in the published literature on EBSS, the procedure for the Threshold Energy computation lacks both clarity and defined steps. An attempt has been made to improve the conventional EBSS technique by combining it with the statistical Principal Component Analysis (PCA) technique. In conventional PCA the ratio of the signal space power to the noise space power do not usually match the actual SNR. This paper proposes a correction factor to the conventional PCA technique. The correction factor is applied to the ratio of decomposed signal space power and the noise space power to equate it to the actual SNR. The noise power obtained through the modified PCA based technique and the chosen value of probability of false alarm determines the threshold energy for the EBSS algorithm. The proposed method which is a combination of PCA and EBSS has been validated for wide range of SNRs, different values of probability of false alarm and frequencies of interest. The correction factor to the PCA and the clearly defined process for Threshold Energy computation invoking the PCA as well as the Radar principles are the contributions of this paper.
Difficulties with Recovering the Masses of Supermassive Black Holes from Stellar Kinematical Data

We investigate the ability of three-integral, axisymmetric, orbit-based modeling algorithms to recover the parameters defining the gravitational potential (mass-to-light ratio ϒ and black hole mass M•) in spheroidal stellar systems using stellar kinematical data. We show that the potential estimation problem is generically underdetermined when applied to long-slit kinematical data of the kind used for most black hole mass determinations to date. A range of parameters (ϒ, M•) can provide equally good fits to the data, making it impossible to assign best-fit values. The indeterminacy arises from the large variety of orbital solutions that are consistent with a given mass model. We demonstrate the indeterminacy using a variety of data sets derived from realistic models, as well as published observations of the galaxy M32. The indeterminacy becomes apparent only when a sufficiently large number of distinct orbits are supplied to the modeling algorithm; if too few orbits are used, spurious minima appear in the χ2(ϒ,M•) contours, and these minima do not necessarily coincide with the parameters defining the gravitational potential. We show that the range of degeneracy in M• depends on the degree to which the data resolve the radius of influence rh of the black hole. For FWHM/2rh ≳ 0.5, where FWHM refers to the instrumental resolution, we find that only very weak constraints can be placed on M•. In the case of M32, our reanalysis demonstrates that when a large orbit library is used, data published prior to 2000 (FWHM/2rh ≈ 0.25) are equally consistent with black hole masses in the range 1.5 × 106 M☉ < M• < 5 × 106 M☉, with no preferred value in that range. Exactly the same data can reproduce previous published results with smaller orbit libraries. While the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) data for this galaxy (FWHM/2rh ≈ 0.06) may overcome the degeneracy in M•, HST data for most galaxies do not resolve the black hole's sphere of influence and in these galaxies the degree of degeneracy allowed by the data may be greater than previously believed. We investigate the effect of regularization, or smoothness constraints, on the degree of degeneracy of the solutions. Enforcing smoothness reduces the range of acceptable models, but we find no indication that the true potential can be recovered simply by enforcing smoothing. For a given smoothing level, all solutions in the minimum χ2 valley exhibit similar levels of noise; as the smoothing is increased, there is a systematic shift in the midpoint of the χ2 valley, until at a high level of smoothing the solution is biased with respect to the true solution. These experiments suggest both that the indeterminacy is real (i.e., that it is not an artifact associated with nonsmooth solutions) and that there is no known empirical way to choose the smoothing parameter to ensure that the correct solution is selected.
Geometric Filtering for Subspace Tracking

We address the problem of tracking principal subspaces using ideas from nonlinear ltering. The subspaces are represented by their complex projection-matrices, and time-varying subspaces correspond to trajectories on the Grassmann manifold. Under a Bayesian approach, we impose a smooth prior on the velocities associated with the subspace motion. This prior combined with any standard likelihood function forms a posterior density on the Grassmannian, for ltering and estimation. Using a sequential Monte Carlo method, a recursive nonlinear tracking algorithm is derived and some implementation results are presented.
The Geometry of the Elongated Phase in 4-D Simplicial Quantum Gravity

We discuss the elongated phase of 4D simplicial quantum gravity by exploiting recent analytical results. In particular using Walkup's theorem we prove that the dominating configurations in the elongated phase are tree-like structures called "stacked spheres". Such configurations can be mapped into branched polymers and baby universes arguments are used in order to analyse the critical behaviour of theory in the weak coupling regime.
Landslide Susceptibility Mapping in Nepal Using Spatial Feature Vectors

Section 1: Introduction According to the USGS (U.S. Geological Survey), the earthquake of April 2014 in Nepal and its aftershocks claimed the life of almost 9,000 people. Many of the deaths were caused by landslides which also blocked important routes for emergency response and evacuations. These kinds of disasters are not uncommon in other parts of the world and vastly underestimated as recent research shows. Landslide prediction can be a valuable tool for planning first response (Where to send first response helpers if there is no communication after an earthquake? ) and emergency evacuations. Unlike the US, countries like Nepal do not have extensive infrastructure to measure and monitor seismic occurrences that could help predict and locate disasters. For this project we try to identify high risk zones prone to landslides based on features that have been studied by research institutions (vanWesten et al., 2008). We use expert labeled GPS locations, which occurred in Nepal as a consequence of the earthquake, as our training set. Figure 1 shows a zoomed-in image of some of Nepal’s landslides taken from Google Earth.
Inducing effective operator control through ecological interface design

Abstract Ecological Interface Design (EID) is a theoretical framework for designing interfaces for complex human-machine systems. This article investigates the utility of EID in inducing effective real-time operator control performance during both normal and abnormal conditions. Two interfaces for a thermal-hydraulic process were compared, an EID interface based on physical and functional (P+F) system representations and a more traditional interface based solely on a physical (P) representation. Subjects were given 4 weeks of daily practice with one of the two interfaces before their performance on normal events and unfamiliar faults was evaluated. Under normal conditions, there was no performance difference between the P+F and P interfaces. However, dual task results indicate that the P interface loads more on verbal resources, whereas the P+F interface loads more on spatial resources during normal trials. Furthermore, a process tracing analysis of the fault trials showed that the P+F interface led to faster fault detection and more accurate fault diagnosis. Moreover, the P+F subjects exhibited a more sophisticated and effective set of fault management strategies that are similar to those observed in field studies of experienced operators in complex human-machine systems. In addition, a deficiency of the P+F interface was identified, suggesting a need for integrating historical information with emergent feature displays. Collectively, these findings have significant practical implications for the design of advanced computer interfaces for complex industrial systems.