Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Democratizing the Party: The Effects of Primary Election Reforms in Ghana

Abstract The recent expansion of the primary electorate by one of Ghana's major parties offers a rare opportunity to assess the effects of franchise extensions in contemporary new democracies. Using an original dataset on candidate entry and nominations, this article shows that expanding the primary electorate opened paths to office for politicians from social groups that were previously excluded, such as women and ethnic groups outside the party's core national coalition. The authors propose that democratizing candidate selection has two consequences in patronage-oriented political systems: vote buying will become a less effective strategy and the electorate will become more diverse. These changes, in turn, affect the types of politicians who seek and win legislative nominations. This suggests that a simple shift in who votes in intraparty primaries can be a key institutional mechanism for improving the descriptive representation of women and other under-represented groups.
A parallelizing compiler for multicore systems

This manuscript summarizes the main ideas introduced in [1]. We propose a compiler that automatically transforms a sequential application into a parallel counterpart for multicore processors. It is based on an intermediate representation, named KIR, which exposes multiple levels of parallelism and hides the complexity of the implementation details thanks to the domain-independent kernels (e.g., assignment, reduction). The effectiveness and performance of our approach, built on top of GCC, has been tested with a large variety of codes.
Secret Carrying for User Authentication

There are two important topics in user authentication: (1) protocols and (2) how to get secrets from the users, i.e. secret carrying. The objective of this paper is to give a critical overview of the practical security of the different approaches on secret carrying, including passwords, biometrics and tokens. This paper should give the reader a feel for the possibilities and limits of the different approaches.
Global Intelligent Content: Active Curation of Language Resources using Linked Data

As language resources start to become available in linked data formats, it becomes relevant to consider how linked data interoperability can play a role in active language processing workflows as well as for more static language resource publishing. This paper proposes that linked data may have a valuable role to play in tracking the use and generation of language resources in such workflows in order to assess and improve the performance of the language technologies that use the resources, based on feedback from the human involvement typically required within such processes. We refer to this as Active Curation of the language resources, since it is performed systematically over language processing workflows to continuously improve the quality of the resource in specific applications, rather than via dedicated curation steps. We use modern localisation workflows, i.e. assisted by machine translation and text analytics services, to explain how linked data can support such active curation. By referencing how a suitable linked data vocabulary can be assembled by combining existing linked data vocabularies and meta-data from other multilingual content processing annotations and tool exchange standards we aim to demonstrate the relative ease with which active curation can be deployed more broadly.
Performance based pruning and weighted voting with classification ensembles

Ensemble algorithms have been a very popular research topic because of their high performances. In this work, performance based ensemble pruning and decision weighting methods are investigated on 3 ensemble algorithms (Bagging, Random Subspaces, Random Forest) over 26 classification datasets. According to our experiments; the algorithm including most diversity among its base learners is Random Subspaces. The best performed ensemble algorithm is Random Subspaces with decision weighting.
Oxidative Stress Response in Patients Infected by Diverse Hepatitis C Virus Genotypes

Background: The molecular mechanism of hepatitis C-virus (HCV) genome-specific pathogenesis remains unclear. Oxidative stress is an important pathophysiological mechanism in chronic HCV infection, but its relation to HCV genotypes has not been thoroughly examined. Objectives: In the present case-control study, the effect of diverse HCV genotypes on oxidative status changes was investigated. Patients and Methods: From 310 patients examined by enzyme immunoassay and PCR, 160 patients with positive results for HCV with previously determined genotypes were chosen. For the control group, 160 first time blood donors referred to the Regional Blood Transfusion organization of the West Azerbaijan province, northwestern Iran were selected. Oxidative stress markers such as total antioxidant status (TAS), serum levels of reduced (GSH) and oxidized (GSSG) glutathione, Gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT) and malondialdehyde (MDA) were evaluated in patients infected with diverse HCV genotypes and those in the control group. Results: In the patient and control groups, the mean ± SE of TAS, GSH, GSSG, GGT and MDA were 1.04 ± 0.35 vs. 2.68 ± 0.77, 1.25 ± 0.37 vs. 3.12 ± 0.58, 0.20 ± 0.05 vs. 0.08 ± 0.04, 26.82 ± 5.62 vs 8.28 ± 2.03 and 2.56 ± 0.60 vs. 0.93 ± 0.34. All markers had statistical difference between the two groups (P <0.05). Obvious differences were found in oxidant/antioxidant balance among diverse HCV genotypes with an ascending trend in antioxidant levels among patients infected with genotypes 1a/b, 4, 2a/c, 2b, 3a and healthy controls and a vice versa trend in measures of oxidative markers except for malondialdehyde with a variable pattern. Conclusions: More serious disease in HCV genetic subtype 1a/1b might be associated with more severe oxidative stress. Milder damage in subtypes 4, 2a/c, 2b and 3a could be related to lower oxidative response, respectively. A combination of antiviral and antioxidative therapies may enhance the overall response rate of patients with HCV infection, especially with more destructive genotypes.
The Actin-Driven Movement and Formation of Acetylcholine Receptor Clusters

A new method was devised to visualize actin polymerization induced by postsynaptic differentiation signals in cultured muscle cells. This entails masking myofibrillar filamentous (F)-actin with jasplakinolide, a cell-permeant F-actin–binding toxin, before synaptogenic stimulation, and then probing new actin assembly with fluorescent phalloidin. With this procedure, actin polymerization associated with newly induced acetylcholine receptor (AChR) clustering by heparin-binding growth-associated molecule–coated beads and by agrin was observed. The beads induced local F-actin assembly that colocalized with AChR clusters at bead–muscle contacts, whereas both the actin cytoskeleton and AChR clusters induced by bath agrin application were diffuse. By expressing a green fluorescent protein–coupled version of cortactin, a protein that binds to active F-actin, the dynamic nature of the actin cytoskeleton associated with new AChR clusters was revealed. In fact, the motive force generated by actin polymerization propelled the entire bead-induced AChR cluster with its attached bead to move in the plane of the membrane. In addition, actin polymerization is also necessary for the formation of both bead and agrin-induced AChR clusters as well as phosphotyrosine accumulation, as shown by their blockage by latrunculin A, a toxin that sequesters globular (G)-actin and prevents F-actin assembly. These results show that actin polymerization induced by synaptogenic signals is necessary for the movement and formation of AChR clusters and implicate a role of F-actin as a postsynaptic scaffold for the assembly of structural and signaling molecules in neuromuscular junction formation.
Equilibrium Binding Agreements

Abstract We study equilibrium binding agreements, the coalition structures that form under such agreements, and the efficiency of the outcomes that result. We analyze such agreements in a context where the payoff to each player depends on the actions of all other players. Thus a game in strategic form is a natural starting point. Unlike the device of a characteristic function, explicit attention is paid to the behavior of the complementary set of players when a coalition blocks a proposed agreement. A solution concept and its applications are discussed. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C70, C71.
Nutrient Limitation Governs Staphylococcus aureus Metabolism and Niche Adaptation in the Human Nose

Colonization of the human nose by Staphylococcus aureus in one-third of the population represents a major risk factor for invasive infections. The basis for adaptation of S. aureus to this specific habitat and reasons for the human predisposition to become colonized have remained largely unknown. Human nasal secretions were analyzed by metabolomics and found to contain potential nutrients in rather low amounts. No significant differences were found between S. aureus carriers and non-carriers, indicating that carriage is not associated with individual differences in nutrient supply. A synthetic nasal medium (SNM3) was composed based on the metabolomics data that permits consistent growth of S. aureus isolates. Key genes were expressed in SNM3 in a similar way as in the human nose, indicating that SNM3 represents a suitable surrogate environment for in vitro simulation studies. While the majority of S. aureus strains grew well in SNM3, most of the tested coagulase-negative staphylococci (CoNS) had major problems to multiply in SNM3 supporting the notion that CoNS are less well adapted to the nose and colonize preferentially the human skin. Global gene expression analysis revealed that, during growth in SNM3, S. aureus depends heavily on de novo synthesis of methionine. Accordingly, the methionine-biosynthesis enzyme cysteine-γ-synthase (MetI) was indispensable for growth in SNM3, and the MetI inhibitor DL-propargylglycine inhibited S. aureus growth in SNM3 but not in the presence of methionine. Of note, metI was strongly up-regulated by S. aureus in human noses, and metI mutants were strongly abrogated in their capacity to colonize the noses of cotton rats. These findings indicate that the methionine biosynthetic pathway may include promising antimicrobial targets that have previously remained unrecognized. Hence, exploring the environmental conditions facultative pathogens are exposed to during colonization can be useful for understanding niche adaptation and identifying targets for new antimicrobial strategies.
A VISION AND BEHAVIOUR BASED APPROACH FOR SHORT-RANGE AUTONOMOUS NAVIGATION OF PLANETARY ROVERS

Planetary rovers, an essential robotic tool in planetary expeditions, have been used for decades to study the Moon and the planet Mars. The problem with operating on Mars and the dark craters on the Moon is the long cycle communication delay, which makes it inefficient to remotely operate the rover from Earth. Taking the MER (Mars Exploration Rovers) mission as an example, the rovers are remotely controlled by the ground station to perform long-range navigation. The distance between waypoints, which allows the rover to travel autonomously in a short range, is reported to be limited to a short distance due to the computational complexity of the hazard avoidance algorithm. As a result, the rover can sometimes travel only a few meters per Martian day (sol). Increasing onboard autonomy of the rover can help to reduce human intervention and improve mission efficiency. The aim of this project is to introduce and investigate a robust and fast onboard navigation system that allows the rover to travel autonomously and safely through a longer distance given a grand goal. We propose to use vision and behaviour based navigation algorithms based on 2D images collected by a single camera. The navigation algorithm relies on the extracted information from image processing, such as features, motion vectors, focus of expansion (FOE), time-tocontact (TTC), and makes behavioural decisions to track targets and/or avoid obstacles. To use a simple sensor for the system has advantages of low power consumption and low computation and design complexity.
Dynamic Power Estimation for Motion Estimation Hardware

Motion Estimation (ME) is the most computationally intensive and most power consuming part of video compression and video enhancement systems. In this paper, we propose a novel dynamic power estimation technique for ME hardware. We estimated the power consumption of a full search ME hardware implementation on a Xilinx Virtex II FPGA using several existing high and low level dynamic power estimation techniques and our technique. Gate-level timing simulation based power estimation of full search ME hardware for an average frame using Xilinx XPower tool takes 6 - 18 hours in a state-of-the-art PC, whereas estimating the power consumption of the same ME hardware for the same frame takes a few seconds using our technique. The average and maximum difference between the power consumptions estimated by our technique and the power consumptions estimated by XPower tool for four different video sequences are 3% and 13% respectively.
MECHANISMS FOR COLLABORATION INSIDE HETEROGENEOUS MULTI-AGENT SYSTEMS

Apparatus and method for continuous collecting, compressing and stacking folded multiple sheet signatures from a press fly end, wherein horizontally conveyed, overlapped signatures are stream-transferred from in-feed to vertical stacking position, the apparatus being characterized by a crusher station and a floating compressor station the latter of which has opposed tensioned conveyor belts which are retained in a face to face uniformly flat, negative angular relationship by multiple series-mounted rollers. The rollers are in compression contact with uppermost floating conveyor belts whereby compression is obtained through the signatures indirectly to tensioned lower conveyor belts, the signatures being thus continuously moved in a stream from a precise, endwise overlapping relationship, to a vertical endwise stacked relationship within a stacking receiver. To enhance the transfer function, a signature kicking apparatus engages each signature as it emanates from the floating conveyors, thereby forcing the signatures vertically upward against a stripper bar in the receiver.
Japanese Literacy Acquisition by Alphabetic-Based Background Indonesian Learners

This research aims to determine that the contribution of phonological and visual processes to literacy acquisition in two different scripts is important when studying kanji especially reading Japanese kanji characters. However, visual games are less well understood. For logographic scripts where symbols represent all words or units that are meaningful, the importance of visual memory in literacy acquisition may highly be expected due to visual complexity in logographic characters, but in reality is still the same. The research methodology complemented by a questionnaire and kanji tests involved 50 Indonesian students who took the Basic Reading Comprehension course on various literacy and cognitive tasks. Data from the research were collected from the questionnaires, kanji tests, and cognitive tasks. The results showed that the skills differences that predict literacy performance in phonological awareness and logographic Kanji provide experimental evidence that visual memory is important when learning Kanji. Therefore, the problem of literacy in Japanese as a foreign language and remediation program must be considered in a reading and writing lesson for elementary level learners. Keywords—alphabetic background learners; literacy acquisition; phonological awareness; second language acquisition; word recognition
Similar image search with a tiny bag-of-delegates representation

Similar image search over a large image database has been attracting a lot of attention recently. The widely-used solution is to use a set of codes, which we call bag-of-delegates, to represent each image, and to build inverted indices to organize the image database. The search can be conducted through the inverted indices, which is the same to the way of using texts to index images for search and has been shown to be efficient and effective. In this paper, we propose a tiny bag-of-delegates representation that uses a small amount of delegates with a high search performance guaranteed. The main advantage is that less storageis required to save the inverted indices while having a high search accuracy. We propose an adaptive forward selection scheme to sequentially learn more and more inverted indices that are constructed based on subspace partition, e.g. using spatial partition trees. Experimental results demonstrate that our approach can require a smaller number of delegates while achieving the same accuracy and taking similar time.
Epidermal growth factor alters fibroblast migration speed and directional persistence reciprocally and in a matrix-dependent manner.

Growth factors stimulate sustained cell migration as well as inducing select acute motility-related events such as membrane ruffling and disruption of focal adhesions. However, an in-depth understanding of the characteristics of sustained migration that are regulated by growth factor signals is lacking: how the biochemical signals are related to physical processes underlying locomotion, and how these events are coordinately influenced by interplay between growth factor and matrix substratum signals. To address these issues, we studied sustained migration of NR6 fibroblasts on a complex human matrix substratum, Amgel, comparing effects of epidermal growth factor (EGF) treatment across a range of Amgel levels. In the absence of EGF, cell migration speed and directional persistence are relatively independent of Amgel level, whereas in the presence of EGF speed is increased at intermediate Amgel levels but not at low and high Amgel levels while directional persistence is decreased at intermediate but not at low and high Amgel levels. The net effect of EGF is to increase the frequency of changes in the cell direction, and at the same time to slightly increase the path-length and thereby greatly enhance random dispersion of cells. Despite increasing migration speed during long-term sustained migration EGF treatment does not lead to significantly increased absolute rates of membrane extension in contrast to its well-known elicitation of membrane ruffling in the short term. However, EGF treatment does decrease cell spread area, yielding an apparent enhancement of specific membrane extension rate, i.e. normalized to cell spread area. Cell movement speed and directional persistence are thus, respectively, directly related and indirectly related to the increase in specific membrane extension rate (alternatively, the decrease in cell spread area) induced by EGF treatment during sustained migration. These results indicate that growth factor and matrix substrata coordinately regulate sustained cell migration through combined governance of underlying physical processes.
Managerial Leverage Is Limited by the Extent of the Market: Hierarchies, Specialization, and the Utilization of Lawyers’ Human Capital

This paper examines the role of hierarchies in the organization of human‐capital‐intensive production. We develop an equilibrium model of hierarchical organization and provide empirical evidence based on confidential data on thousands of law offices. The equilibrium assignment of individuals to hierarchical positions varies with the degree of field specialization, which increases as the extent of the market increases. As individuals’ knowledge becomes narrower but deeper, managerial leverage—the number of workers per manager—optimally increases to exploit this depth. Consistent with our model, the share of lawyers who work in hierarchies and the ratio of associates to partners increase as market size increases and lawyers field specialize. Other results provide evidence against alternative interpretations that emphasize unobserved differences in the distribution of demand, or firm‐size effects, and lend additional support to the view that, in legal services, hierarchies help exploit increasing returns associated with the utilization of human capital.
Empirical analysis of the relationship between China's scale of national debt and monetary supply

Previous theory indicates that the scale national debt issuance has the currency expansion effect and some extent influence on the economy. This article has made an empirical analysis of the effect of China's issuance of national debt on monetary supply by the economic date from 1994 to 2005. On the basis of previous research, this thesis studies the effects of China's issuance of national debt on monetary supply, analyses the effects on all levels of monetary supply when the new issued national bonds were purchased, and presents that national debt issuance for making up financial deficit is not the primary cause for inflation.
Supporting Implicit Human-to-Vehicle Interaction: Driver Identification from Sitting Postures

Mobile internet services have started to pervade into vehicles, approaching a new generation of networked, ”smart” cars. With the evolution of in-car services, particularly with the emergence of services that are personalized to an individual driver (like road pricing, maintenance, insurance and entertainment services) the need for reliable, yet easy to handle identification and authentication has arisen. Services that demand unambiguous and unmistakable continuous identification of the driver have recently attracted many research efforts, mostly proposing video-based face/pose recognition, or acoustic analysis. A driver identification system for vehicular services is proposed, that, as opposed to video or audio based techniques, does not suffer from the continuously changing environment while driving, like lighting or noise conditions. A posture recognition technique based on a high resolution pressure sensor integrated invisibly and unobtrusively into the fabric of the driver seat has been developed, taking the pelvic bone distance as a biometric trait. Data coming from two 32x32 pressure sensor arrays (seatand backrest) is classified according to features defined based on the pelvic bone signature, mid and high pressure distribution and body weight. Empirical studies, besides analyzing (quantitative) driver recognition performance, assess the identification technique according to the qualitative attributes universality, collectability, uniqueness, and permanency. The proposed driver identification technique is implicit and thus not reliant to attention, it is continuously in operation while seated, and requires no active person cooperation. Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. To copy otherwise, to republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. ISVCS 2008, July 22 – 24, 2008, Dublin, Ireland. Copyright 2008 ACM ISBN 978-963-9799-27-1 . $5.00. These characteristics encourage the universal use of the approach – a whole new modality for person-to-environment interaction seems possible.
A novel concept for the detection of tau neutrino appearance

A novel concept for the detection of tau neutrinos is presented, potentially suitable for use in a long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiment. It relies on the direct identification of the tau leptons produced in charged-current interactions, by imaging the Cherenkov light that the tau generates in C6F14 liquid. In a simple simulation about half of the tau leptons can be successfully identified in this way.