Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Photon manipulation in plasmonic crystal

Plasmonic devices, consisting of subwavelength nanostructures at optical frequency, have been widely applied to many research fields such as bio-sensing, super-resolution imaging, energy harvesting, nanolaser and so on. The strong confined electromagnetic fields in the affinity of nanostructures provides an efficient channel to guide, enhance, and modulate light energy beyond the diffraction limit. In this thesis, we first studied the plasmonic devices in linear optical regime, especially from the view of phase information in the light matter interaction; then more efforts were paid to the nonlinear plasmonics, in which the organic-plasmonic hybrid nanostructures provided a useful platform for demonstrating some interesting physical phenomena. Firstly, we studied the fundamental optical properties of typically propagating surface plasmonic polariton (SPPs), which were generated by plasmonic gratings. Optical elliptical response of excited SPPs was studied experimentally and theoretically in both amplitude and phase domains. Then we studied the strong coupling effect from plasmonic Fabry-Perot nanocavity, in which giant Rabi splitting phenomenon with a splitting energy ∼ 148 meV was obtained experimentally. From these studies, the interaction of SPP wave with other resonant structures were well understood from the view point of phase evolution. Secondly, we moved from linear optics the nonlinear plasmonic optics and tried to understand how the plasmon enhancement acts on the nonlinear optical processes. In the first example, plasmon enhanced third harmonic generation (THG) on one dimensional gratings was experimentally demonstrated by integrating the nonlinear active medium into the plasmonic devices. Later, the generation of THG vortex beam was also realized by introducing hologram based plasmonic design. Lastly, we re-examined a conventional symmetry problem in nonlinear molecular optics. It was found the that the metacrystal, consisting of plasmonic molecule with feature size much larger than conventional molecules, also follows the conventional selection rules
Kinetic Chain Exercises in a Restricted Range of Motion After Anterior Cruciate Ligament

http://ajs.sagepub. com/content/41/4/788 The online version of this article can be found at: DOI: 10.1177/0363546513476482 2013 41: 788 originally published online February 19, 2013 Am J Sports Med Scodeller, Aires Duarte, Jr, Mauro Martinelli and Flavio Fernandes Bryk Thiago Yukio Fukuda, Deborah Fingerhut, Viviane Coimbra Moreira, Paula Maria Ferreira Camarini, Nathalia Folco Reconstruction : A Randomized Controlled Clinical Trial Open Kinetic Chain Exercises in a Restricted Range of Motion After Anterior Cruciate Ligament
Executive function in adolescents with Down Syndrome.

BACKGROUND The present work is aimed at analysing executive function (EF) in adolescents with Down Syndrome (DS). So far, EF has been analysed mainly in adults with DS, showing a pattern of impairment. However, less is known about children and adolescents with this syndrome. Studying adolescents with DS might help us better understand whether performances on EF tasks of individuals with DS are determined by age or by Alzheimer disease, as some studies suggest, or whether their performances are directly related to DS cognitive profile. METHOD A battery of EF tasks assessing set shifting, planning/problem-solving, working memory, inhibition/perseveration and fluency, as well as a tasks assessing sustained attention has been administered to a group of 15 adolescents with DS and 15 typically developing children matched for mental age. All EF tasks were selected from previous studies with individuals with intellectual disabilities or from developmental literature and are thought to be useful for the samples considered. RESULTS The present results revealed that the group of individuals with DS performed at a significantly lower level on tasks assessing set shifting, planning/problem-solving, working memory and inhibition/perseveration, but not on the tasks assessing fluency. In addition, individuals with DS demonstrated a greater number of errors and less strategy use for the sustained attention task. CONCLUSIONS The results suggest a broad impairment in EF in adolescents with DS, and are consistent with several similar studies conducted with adults with DS. We assume that EF deficit is a characteristic of DS.
Factors influencing fatty acids in meat and the role of antioxidants in improving meat quality

Meat has been identified, often wrongly, as a food having a high fat content and an undesirable balance of fatty acids. In fact lean meat is very low in fat (20–50g/kg), pork and poultry have a favourable balance between polyunsaturated and saturated fatty acids (P:S) and grazing ruminants produce muscle with a desirable n–6:n–3 polyunsaturated fatty acid ratio. In all species, meat fatty acid composition can be changed via the diet, more easily in single-stomached pigs and poultry where the linoleic, α-linolenic and long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acid content responds quickly to raised dietary concentrations. Recent work in pigs has attempted to manipulate the n–6:n–3 ratio by feeding higher levels of α-linolenic acid (e.g. in rapeseed) or its products eicosapentaenoic acid (20:5) and docosahexaenoic acid (22:6) present in fish oils. In ruminants the challenge is to increase the P:S ratio whilst retaining values for n–6: n–3 found in cattle and sheep fed on forage diets. The saturating effect of the rumen can be overcome by feeding polyunsaturated fatty acids which are protected either chemically, by processing, or naturally e.g. within the seed coat. Some protection occurs when grain-based or grass-based diets are fed normally, leading to relatively more n–6 or n–3 fatty acids respectively. These produce different flavours in cooked meat due to the different oxidative changes occurring during storage and cooking. In pigs and poultry, high n–3 fatty acid concentrations in meat are associated with fishy flavours whose development can be prevented with high dietary (supranutritional) levels of the antioxidant vitamin E. In ruminants, supranutritional vitamin E delays the oxidative change of oxymyoglobin to brown metmyoglobin and may also influence the characteristic flavours of beef and lamb.
A personalized music recommender service based on Fuzzy Inference System

In this paper, we are proposing a personalized music recommender service based on Mamdani Fuzzy Interference System (M-FIS). Collection of playlist is used for gathering users' choice and mood while listening to songs. Similarity between audio files is calculated based on Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients (MFCC). We have developed a recommender model based on M-FIS with the aforementioned similarities and playlists. We were able to gain an acceptable accuracy rate using FIS compared to other method reported in literature.
Early Detection of Diabetes using Thermography and Artificial Neural Networks

According to the World Health Organization, in 2009, approximately 347 million were infected with the diabetes, and it is expected that in 2030 the number will reach about 500 million [1]. Libya is one of the North Africa countries, and according to the International Diabetes Federation estimates, the prevalence of diabetes among adults in Libya is 10.4% [2]. Foot ulcers are a common complication of poorly controlled diabetes, forming as a result of skin tissue breaking down and exposing the layers underneath. Early diagnosis of diabetic foot complications and their precursors is essential in preventing their signs consequences, such as foot infection and amputation. Abnormal skin temperature is a natural indicator of illness [3]. The human skin temperature distribution of a healthy body exhibits a contralateral symmetry [4]. From the traditional assessment of temperature by the thermometer, modern thermal imaging camera technology has opened up new perspectives, especially in the use of thermography to map a body temperature with a remote-sensing camera. Thermography is a reliable non-invasive technique for imaging skin temperature distribution. It is a remote and a non-contact temperature measuring technique that enables simultaneous monitoring a large area of the human skin surface. Infrared thermal imaging, unlike many other imaging techniques used in medicine, is not an internal imaging system for anatomical information. The human skin surface is a highly efficient radiator, with an emissivity of 0.98 [5]. This technology has the benefits of no material placed on a human skin surface, and that a whole image field-of-view can be characterized in a single measurement. Several applications of thermography in medical science has been highlighted in B Lahiri, et al., (2012) [3]. Thermography has been extensively used for diabetic neuropathy, breast cancer detection, fever screening, brain imaging and assessment of radiation damage to human body [3]. Bagavathiappan et al., [6] used the thermal imaging camera to study the plantar foot temperatures of 112 patient subjects with type 2 diabetes selected from a tertiary diabetes center in South India. They indicated that thermography can be used as an additional tool for evaluation of high risk diabetic feet. However, assessing thermal images is a complex and subjective task that can be greatly facilitated by artificial intelligence techniques.
A fuzzy hashing technique for large scale software birthmarks

Software birthmarks have been proposed as a method for enabling the detection of programs that may have been stolen by measuring the similarity between the two programs. A birthmark is created from each program by extracting its native characteristics. The birthmarks of the programs can then be compared. However, because the extracted birthmarks contain a large amount of information, a large amount of time is needed when using them to compare large programs. This paper describes our work to reduce this comparison time. Achieving faster comparisons will enable the evaluation of large programs and simplify the use of birthmarks. Specifically, our method creates hashes from conventional birthmark information using fuzzy hashing, and then measures the similarity of the programs using the obtained hash values. Using the proposed method, we achieved a major speed increase over the conventional birthmark method with distinction rates of over 90%. On the other hand, because preservation performance decreased substantially, the similarity threshold value needed to be lowered when using the proposed method.
A System for Dynamic Server Allocation in Application Server Clusters

Application server clusters are often used to service high-throughput web applications. In order to host more than a single application, an organisation will usually procure a separate cluster for each application. Over time the utilisation of the clusters will vary, leading to variation in the response times experienced by users of the applications. Techniques that statically assign servers to each application prevent the system from adapting to changes in the workload, and are thus susceptible to providing unacceptable levels of service. This paper investigates a system for allocating server resources to applications dynamically, thus allowing applications to automatically adapt to variable workloads. Such a scheme requires meticulous system monitoring, a method for switching application servers between \text it {server pools} and a means of calculating when a server switch should be made (balancing switching cost against perceived benefits). Experimentation is performed using such a switching system on a Web application testbed hosting two applications across eight application servers. The testbed is used to compare several theoretically derived switching policies under a variety of workloads. Recommendations are made as to the suitability of different policies under different workload conditions.
Cancer screening in Spain.

OBJECTIVE To describe the current status of breast, colorectal and cervical cancer screening in Spain. METHODOLOGY The situation was analysed on the basis of data drawn from surveys conducted in each autonomous region (Comunidad Autónoma). RESULTS Currently, breast cancer screening coverage is 100%. In 2007, overall participation was 67.0% with an adherence of 91.2%. The detection rate was 3.4 per thousand, 15.1% intraductal and 30% invasive <1 cm in diameter, with 65% showing axilary node negative. Colorectal cancer screening had been implemented in six regions (4.5% of the target population). Participation ranged from 17.2% to 42.3%, with positive test percentages ranging from 1.7 per thousand (guaiac) to 9.5% (immunological). The invasive cancer detection rate was 1.7 per thousand (guaiac) and 3.4 per thousand (immunological). In most cases, cervical cancer screening was undertaken opportunistically, with an estimated coverage of 69.0%. CONCLUSIONS In Spain, cancer screening is being conducted in accordance with national and international recommendations. The fact that screening programmes are operated as a network has led to a high degree of consensus as to the methodology and information systems to be used to enable joint evaluation.
Augmented Reality Environment Using a Web Browser - Content Presentation with a Two-Layer Display

We developed a prototype system to make an augmented reality (AR) environment using a Web browser. Although AR technology has the potential to be used in various applications, authoring/editing AR contents is a problem on the wide spread. Graphics expertise and knowledge of computer programming are necessary for creating contents for AR applications. We used a Web browser as a presentation tool so that users who had experience in creating Web contents could reuse the multimedia data as AR contents and modify the AR contents by themselves. A two-layer display was used in the system in order to superimpose virtual objects onto a real scene for creating an AR environment. Another problem is about identifying objects in the real scene. An open-source library, ARToolkit, is often used as an image-processing tool for detecting the position and orientation of markers as well as identifying them. However, the markers must be registered in the system in advance, and the registration becomes tedious work when many markers are used such as Japanese kanji characters. The optical character reader (OCR) middleware was implemented as a character-recognition function for Japanese character markers. This paper describes the system design and software architecture for constructing an AR environment using a Web browser display and the demonstration of the prototype system.
Probiotics: A Way of Value Addition in Functional Food Research Article

An intense acceptance of functional foods due to consumer’s demand, social attitudes, scientific evidence of the human health benefits of a particular ingredient coupled with commercially driven interest to add value to existing foods have pro jected probiotics as a new way in the current era of self-care and complementary medicine. Diverse functional properties of probiotics led their incorporation into conventional, dietary supplements and medicinal foods and must be ingested in sufficient quantities to exert health benefits but are often present at lower levels as per the label claims. Worldwide regulations related to probiotics are incoherent and adoption of assay techniques are inconsistent, therefore establishment and reinforcement of a quality assurance program to ensure “Standard of Identity” for adopting the label “Probiotic” is emerging.
Electric Source Imaging of Epileptic Foci

Summary In this article we outline how EEG source modeling can be used in clinical practice, especially as an additional tool during phase I of a presurgical epilepsy workup. The importance of number and positioning of the electrodes is addressed, together with the recent development in multichannel EEG recordings. It is also described how the choice of time period for source localizations of the epileptic activity may affect the source localization results. Different inverse solution approaches are discussed, together with the usefulness of realistic head shape models, and the possibility to integrate EEG source imaging with MRI. Finally a study demonstrating the clinical usefulness of multichannel EEG source imaging is presented.
Modest, Secure and Informed: Successful Development in Conflict Zones

Most interpretations of prevalent counterinsurgency theory imply that increasing government services will reduce rebel violence. Empirically, however, development programs and economic activity sometimes yield increased violence. Using new panel data on development spending in Iraq, we show that violence reducing effects of aid are greater when (a) projects are small, (b) troop strength is high, and (c) professional development expertise is available. These findings are consistent with a "hearts and minds" model, which predicts that violence reduction will result when projects are secure, valued by community members, and implementation is conditional on the behavior of non-combatants.
eHealth Literacy: Extending the Digital Divide to the Realm of Health Information

Background eHealth literacy is defined as the ability of people to use emerging information and communications technologies to improve or enable health and health care. Objective The goal of this study was to explore whether literacy disparities are diminished or enhanced in the search for health information on the Internet. The study focused on (1) traditional digital divide variables, such as sociodemographic characteristics, digital access, and digital literacy, (2) information search processes, and (3) the outcomes of Internet use for health information purposes. Methods We used a countrywide representative random-digital-dial telephone household survey of the Israeli adult population (18 years and older, N = 4286). We measured eHealth literacy; Internet access; digital literacy; sociodemographic factors; perceived health; presence of chronic diseases; as well as health information sources, content, search strategies, and evaluation criteria used by consumers. Results Respondents who were highly eHealth literate tended to be younger and more educated than their less eHealth-literate counterparts. They were also more active consumers of all types of information on the Internet, used more search strategies, and scrutinized information more carefully than did the less eHealth-literate respondents. Finally, respondents who were highly eHealth literate gained more positive outcomes from the information search in terms of cognitive, instrumental (self-management of health care needs, health behaviors, and better use of health insurance), and interpersonal (interacting with their physician) gains. Conclusions The present study documented differences between respondents high and low in eHealth literacy in terms of background attributes, information consumption, and outcomes of the information search. The association of eHealth literacy with background attributes indicates that the Internet reinforces existing social differences. The more comprehensive and sophisticated use of the Internet and the subsequent increased gains among the high eHealth literate create new inequalities in the domain of digital health information. There is a need to educate at-risk and needy groups (eg, chronically ill) and to design technology in a mode befitting more consumers.
Agile Information Security Using Scrum

OF THE PROJECT AGILE INFORMATION SECURITY USING SCRUM by James Richard Fitzer American Military University, August 2015 Charles Town, West Virginia Dr. Novadean Watson-Stone, Thesis Professor The increased importance of information protection, coupled with rapidly changing security landscape, has led to information security professionals finding it difficult to stay ahead of emerging threats. This problem has been compounded by the increased prevalence of agile software development methodologies, which ensure a rapidly changing system. This project unifies the principles of Agile software development, particularly Scrum, with established security best practices in the form of a technical book for mass-market publication. The book provides a guidance and framework for using the Scrum method to construct an information security program, conduct risk assessments, and implement policies and controls. This is accomplished through a review of existing knowledge on the topics of agile development and information security, and the author’s work to unify the two. Additionally, it provides guidance on leading such a team, and lessons and anecdotes from the author’s experience conducting security management on the Northern Border Integration Demonstration (NBID), an agile project. The book will be published through mainstream retail outlets and presented at conferences and events.
Balancing Survival of Feasible and Infeasible Solutions in Evolutionary Optimization Algorithms

Handling constraints in any optimization algorithm is as important as an algorithm’s progress towards the optimal solution. Population-based optimization algorithms allow a flexible way to handle constraints by making a careful comparison of feasible and infeasible solutions present in the population. A previous approach, which emphasized feasible solutions infinitely more than the infeasible solutions, has been popularly applied for more than a decade, mostly with real-parameter genetic algorithms (RGAs). In this paper, we extended the approach in a way so as to make a balance between survival of feasible and infeasible solutions in a population. And the balancing was controlled through an additional parameter (α) that could be prespecified or adaptively updated as the algorithm progresses. The approach was incorporated in the RGA, a significant improvement in performance was observed in the g-series test problem suite and a real-world application problem (welded-beam). A further analysis on the effect of α was performed and some standard values of α are suggested based on our empirical findings.
Six digital technologies to watch

This Report looks at what countries can do to get more out of the internet and other digital technologies. Although it looks ahead to a world in which the internet is universally available and affordable, the analysis largely takes the technology for granted. But technological change is continuous and frequently disruptive. This spotlight examines a range of technologies, identified in the technology forecasting literature that promise to be far-reaching in their impact on development. 1 They are at different stages of the “hype” cycle (figure S6.1). Like the internet, they are likely to be encountered first in the developed world, but will spread quickly to the developing world, where their impact may be even greater.2