Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Animage-based approach to the reconstruction of ancient architectures by extracting and arranging 3D spatial components

The objective of this research is the rapid reconstruction of ancient buildings of historical importance using a single image. The key idea of our approach is to reduce the infinite solutions that might otherwise arise when recovering a 3D geometry from 2D photographs. The main outcome of our research shows that the proposed methodology can be used to reconstruct ancient monuments for use as proxies for digital effects in applications such as tourism, games, and entertainment, which do not require very accurate modeling. In this article, we consider the reconstruction of ancient Mughal architecture including the Taj Mahal. We propose a modeling pipeline that makes an easy reconstruction possible using a single photograph taken from a single view, without the need to create complex point clouds from multiple images or the use of laser scanners. First, an initial model is automatically reconstructed using locally fitted planar primitives along with their boundary polygons and the adjacency relation among parts of the polygons. This approach is faster and more accurate than creating a model from scratch because the initial reconstruction phase provides a set of structural information together with the adjacency relation, which makes it possible to estimate the approximate depth of the entire structural monument. Next, we use manual extrapolation and editing techniques with modeling software to assemble and adjust different 3D components of the model. Thus, this research opens up the opportunity for the present generation to experience remote sites of architectural and cultural importance through virtual worlds and real-time mobile applications. Variations of a recreated 3D monument to represent an amalgam of various cultures are targeted for future work.
Wireless Non-contact EEG/ECG Electrodes for Body Sensor Networks

A wireless EEG/ECG system using non-contact sensors is presented. The system consists of a set of simple capacitive electrodes manufactured on a standard printed circuit board that can operate through fabric or other insulation. Each electrode provides 46dB of gain over a . 7-100Hz bandwidth with a noise level of 3.80uV RMS for high quality brain and cardiac recordings. Signals are digitized directly on top of the electrode and transmitted in a digital serial daisy chain, minimizing the number of wires required on the body. A small wireless base unit transmits EEG/ECG telemetry to a computer for storage and processing.
Parametric Deformation of Discrete Geometry for Aerodynamic Shape Design

We present a versatile discrete geometry manipulation platform for aerospace vehicle shape optimization. The platform is based on the geometry kernel of an open-source modeling tool called Blender and offers access to four parametric deformation techniques: lattice, cage-based, skeletal, and direct manipulation. Custom deformation methods are implemented as plugins, and the kernel is controlled through a scripting interface. Surface sensitivities are provided to support gradient-based optimization. The platform architecture allows the use of geometry pipelines, where multiple modelers are used in sequence, enabling manipulation difficult or impossible to achieve with a constructive modeler or deformer alone. We implement an intuitive custom deformation method in which a set of surface points serve as the design variables and user-specified constraints are intrinsically satisfied. We test our geometry platform on several design examples using an aerodynamic design framework based on Cartesian grids. We examine inverse airfoil design and shape matching and perform lift-constrained drag minimization on an airfoil with thickness constraints. A transport wing-fuselage integration problem demonstrates the approach in 3D. In a final example, our platform is pipelined with a constructive modeler to parabolically sweep a wingtip while applying a 1-G loading deformation across the wingspan. This work is an important first step towards the larger goal of leveraging the investment of the graphics industry to improve the state-of-the-art in aerospace geometry tools.
The OGLE view of microlensing towards the Magellanic Clouds – I. A trickle of events in the OGLE‐II LMC data★

We present the results from the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment II (OGLE-II) survey (1996–2000) towards the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), which has the aim of detecting the microlensing phenomena caused by dark matter compact objects in the Galactic halo [massive compact halo objects (MACHOs)]. We use high-resolution Hubble Space Telescope images of the OGLE fields and derive the correction for the number of monitored stars in each field. This also yields blending distributions which we use in ‘catalogue-level’ Monte Carlo simulations of the microlensing events in order to calculate the detection efficiency of the events. We detect two candidates for microlensing events in the All Stars Sample, which translates into an optical depth of 0.43 ± 0.33 × 10−7. If both events were due to MACHO, the fraction of mass of compact dark matter objects in the Galactic halo would be 8 ± 6 per cent. This optical depth, however, along with the characteristics of the events seems to be consistent with the self-lensing scenario, i.e. self-lensing alone is sufficient to explain the observed microlensing signal. Our results indicate the non-detection of MACHOs lensing towards the LMC with an upper limit on their abundance in the Galactic halo of 19 per cent for M= 0.4 M⊙ and 10 per cent for masses between 0.01 and 0.2 M⊙.
Endocannabinoids and traumatic brain injury

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) represents the leading cause of death in young individuals. It triggers the accumulation of harmful mediators, leading to secondary damage, yet protective mechanisms are also set in motion. The endocannabinoid (eCB) system consists of ligands, such as anandamide and 2‐arachidonoyl‐glycerol (2‐AG), receptors (e.g. CB1, CB2), transporters and enzymes, which are responsible for the ‘on‐demand’ synthesis and degradation of these lipid mediators. There is a large body of evidence showing that eCB are markedly increased in response to pathogenic events. This fact, as well as numerous studies on experimental models of brain toxicity, neuroinflammation and trauma supports the notion that the eCB are part of the brain's compensatory or repair mechanisms. These are mediated via CB receptors signalling pathways that are linked to neuronal survival and repair. The levels of 2‐AG, the most highly abundant eCB, are significantly elevated after TBI and when administered to TBI mice, 2‐AG decreases brain oedema, inflammation and infarct volume and improves clinical recovery. The role of CB1 in mediating these effects was demonstrated using selective antagonists or CB1 knockout mice. CB2 were shown in other models of brain insults to reduce white blood cell rolling and adhesion, to reduce infarct size and to improve motor function. This review is focused on the role the eCB system plays as a self‐neuroprotective mechanism and its potential as a basis for the development of novel therapeutic modality for the treatment of CNS pathologies with special emphasis on TBI.
Multicountry Burden of Chronic Hepatitis C Viral Infection among Those Aware of Their Diagnosis: A Patient Survey

Background The World Health Organization has called for global and regional assessments of the burden of hepatitis C (HCV) along with country-specific patient profiles to better inform healthcare policy. The present investigated the characteristics and burden of patients reporting a diagnosis of HCV infection in the US, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the UK, urban China, and Japan using a consistent methodology of patient-reported surveys. Methods The 2010 5EU (N = 57,805), 2009 US (N = 75,000), 2008/2009 Japan (N = 37,683), and 2009/2010 urban China (N = 33,261) waves of the National Health and Wellness Survey were used as the data source. Within each country, patients with a self-reported diagnosis of HCV were compared with those who did not report a diagnosis of HCV on sociodemographics, health behaviors, comorbidities, and health outcomes (e.g., Short Form-12v2). The effect of HCV was examined using regression analysis applying sampling weights. Results The prevalence of HCV ranged from 0.26% (China) to 1.42% (Italy). Patients in Japan and Italy (61.60 and 61.02 years, respectively) were the oldest, while patients in the US were the most likely to be obese (39.31%) and have concomitant anxiety (38.43%) and depression (46.05%) compared with other countries. Pooling countries and adjusting for sociodemographics, health behaviors, and comorbidities, HCV was associated with significantly lower physical component summary scores (b = −2.51) and health utilities (b = −0.04) and greater overall work impairment (b = 8.79), physician visits (b = 2.91), and emergency department visits (b = 0.30) (all p<.05). The effects on health status were strongest in the US and UK while the effects on healthcare resource use were strongest in Japan. Conclusions HCV was associated with a significant humanistic and economic burden. These results suggest that the manifestation of the HCV burden, and the profile of the patients themselves, varied dramatically by country. Successful disease management should be cognizant of region-specific unmet needs.
Bacterial Hydrolysis of Host Glycoproteins – Powerful Protein Modification and Efficient Nutrient Acquisition

Glycoproteins are ubiquitous in nature and fundamental to most biological processes, including the human immune system. The glycoprotein carbohydrate moieties, or glycans, are very diverse in their structure and composition, and have major effects on the chemical, physical and biological properties of these glycoproteins. The hydrolysis of glycoprotein glycans by bacterial glycosidases can have dramatic effects on glycoprotein function and, thereby, be beneficial for the bacteria in different ways. This review gives an introduction to the expanding field of extracellular glycosidases from bacterial pathogens with activity on host glycoproteins, describes some known and proposed consequences for the host and the bacteria and discusses some evolutionary and regulatory aspects of bacterial glycosidases.
After the games are over : decay of the Olympic Village effect following invasion implies a trade-off between dispersal and fitness

Dispersal is apt to evolve upwards on invasion fronts due to assortative mating by dispersal, a phenomenon known as the “Olympic Village effect” or spatial sorting. But what happens after the invasion front has passed? Empirical and theoretical studies have suggested a decline in dispersal following invasion, but hypotheses about what drives this decline have not been clearly articulated or tested. Here we use a simple model of the spatiotemporal dynamics of two dispersal phenotypes to propose a general explanation. Following invasion, spatial sorting drives dispersal of its inhabitants downwards. This shift is fleeting, however, as a mixture of fast and slow phenotypes sets in as equilibrium densities are attained. Afterwards, dispersal only continues to evolve downwards if there is a trade-off between dispersal and fitness at high density. We conclude that empirical observations of declines in dispersal following invasion imply the existence of a trade-off between dispersal and fitness. INTRODUCTION When a population spreads across space, several evolutionary forces come into play that should drive dispersal rates upwards on the invasion front (Travis & Dytham, 2002; Perkins et al., 2013). First, under the Olympic Village effect (Phillips et al., 2008), inhabitants at the farthest reaches of the invasion front tend to be limited to the most capable dispersers (Shine et al., 2011; Benichou et al., 2012), leading to spatially assortative mating by dispersal capability and the perpetuation of this effect in subsequent generations (Phillips et al., 2010). More recently, this phenomenon has been referred to as “spatial sorting,” which we adopt henceforth. Second, in a density-regulated context, these highly dispersive phenotypes arriving on the invasion front benefit from a fitness advantage through lowered competition with conspecifics (Phillips et al., 2008). Finally, this fitness advantage may increase over time, as reproduction also undergoes adaptive evolution in the vanguard population (Perkins et al., 2013). Despite the fact that these evolutionary forces have only recently been elucidated, there is a rapidly growing body of empirical work showing that they often do result in increased . CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license peer-reviewed) is the author/funder. It is made available under a The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not . http://dx.doi. org/10.1101/014852 doi: bioRxiv preprint first posted online Feb. 4, 2015;
Resilience of Self-Organised and Top-Down Planned Cities—A Case Study on London and Beijing Street Networks

The success or failure of the street network depends on its reliability. In this article, using resilience analysis, the author studies how the shape and appearance of street networks in self-organised and top-down planned cities influences urban transport. Considering London and Beijing as proxies for self-organised and top-down planned cities, the structural properties of London and Beijing networks first are investigated based on their primal and dual representations of planar graphs. The robustness of street networks then is evaluated in primal space and dual space by deactivating road links under random and intentional attack scenarios. The results show that the reliability of London street network differs from that of Beijing, which seems to rely more on its architecture and connectivity. It is found that top-down planned Beijing with its higher average degree in the dual space and assortativity in the primal space is more robust than self-organised London using the measures of maximum and second largest cluster size and network efficiency. The article offers an insight, from a network perspective, into the reliability of street patterns in self-organised and top-down planned city systems.
Self-driving vehicle acknowledgement of pedestrian presence conveyed via Light-Emitting Diodes

This paper describes a method of conveying perception information from a self-driving golfcart to nearby pedestrians via a Light-Emitting Diode (LED) strip. By equipping autonomous vehicles (AVs) with this feature, their performance as social robots is improved by building trust and engagement with interacting pedestrians; typical pedestrian-driver acknowledgement is replaced by visual feedback via lights which light blue for no nearby obstacle presence, and red for nearby obstacles. Various schemes for mapping detected obstacles to the LED display are discussed, the software and hardware systems are detailed, and a video demonstrates the working system in real application.
One-Pot Route towards Active TiO2 Doped Hierarchically Porous Cellulose: Highly Efficient Photocatalysts for Methylene Blue Degradation

In this study, novel photocatalyst monolith materials were successfully fabricated by a non-solvent induced phase separation (NIPS) technique. By adding a certain amount of ethyl acetate (as non-solvent) into a cellulose/LiCl/N,N-dimethylacetamide (DMAc) solution, and successively adding titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles (NPs), cellulose/TiO2 composite monoliths with hierarchically porous structures were easily formed. The obtained composite monoliths possessed mesopores, and two kinds of macropores. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS), Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray Diffraction (XRD), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET), and Ultraviolet-visible Spectroscopy (UV-Vis) measurements were adopted to characterize the cellulose/TiO2 composite monolith. The cellulose/TiO2 composite monoliths showed high efficiency of photocatalytic activity in the decomposition of methylene blue dye, which was decomposed up to 99% within 60 min under UV light. Moreover, the composite monoliths could retain 90% of the photodegradation efficiency after 10 cycles. The novel NIPS technique has great potential for fabricating recyclable photocatalysts with highly efficiency.
Medium access control protocols for multimedia traffic in wireless networks

This article presents a survey on medium access control protocols for multimedia traffic in wireless networks. A basic overview of MAC protocol concepts is presented, and a framework is developed on which to base qualitative comparisons. The MAC protocols covered include third-generation TDMA and CDMA schemes intended for use in a single-hop wireless system. The operation of each protocol is explained, and its advantages and disadvantages ore presented. Finally, a qualitative comparative outline of the discussed protocols is provided, based on multimedia traffic requirements.
Emerging Markets as Learning Laboratories: Learning Behaviors of Local Firms and Foreign Entrants in Different Institutional Contexts

In this work, we examine and integrate the research streams on learning behaviours of both local firms and foreign entrants in emerging markets. We propose that local firms and foreign entrants differ in the types of learning pursued and in the learning processes used. While emerging market firms engage in a significant amount of exploratory learning, they also attempt to exploit the newly gained knowledge in their current markets. Furthermore, foreign entrants engage in exploitative learning as expected but also must participate in exploratory learning to acquire knowledge of culture, institutional norms, and important social relationships. While much of the learning occurs through cooperative processes with both partners, they also each engage in experiential learning. We argue that emerging markets also differ; firms in the more mature emerging markets seek different types of learning and the learning processes used vary compared to those in less mature emerging markets. Our research suggests that emerging markets represent learning laboratories and provide a base to catalyse future research.
Deformation quantization of relativistic particles in electromagnetic fields

The Weyl–Wigner–Moyal formalism for Dirac second-class constrained systems has been proposed recently as the deformation quantization of Dirac bracket. In this paper, after a brief review of this formalism, it is applied to the case of the relativistic free particle. Within this context, the Stratonovich–Weyl quantizer, Weyl correspondence, Moyal ⋆-product and Wigner function in the constrained phase-space are obtained. The recent Hamiltonian treatment for constrained systems, whose constraints depend explicitly on time, are used to perform the deformation quantization of the relativistic free charged particle in an arbitrary electromagnetic background. Finally, the system consisting of a charged particle interacting with a dynamical Maxwell field is quantized in this context.
Trapezoidal and midpoint splittings for initial-boundary value problems

In this paper we consider various multi-component splittings based on the trapezoidal rule and the implicit midpoint rule. It will be shown that an important requirement on such methods is internal stability. The methods will be applied to initial-boundary value problems. Along with a theoretical analysis, some numerical test results will be presented.
Approximate Gaussian process inference for the drift of stochastic differential equations

We introduce a nonparametric approach for estimating drift functions in systems of stochastic differential equations from sparse observations of the state vector. Using a Gaussian process prior over the drift as a function of the state vector, we develop an approximate EM algorithm to deal with the unobserved, latent dynamics between observations. The posterior over states is approximated by a piecewise linearized process of the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck type and the MAP estimation of the drift is facilitated by a sparse Gaussian process regression.
TANDARDIZING S OURCE C ODE S ECURITY A UDITS

A source code security audit is a powerful methodology for locating and removing security vulnerabilities. An audit can be used to (1) pass potentially prioritized list of vulnerabilities to developers (2) exploit vulnerabilities or (3) provide proof-of-concepts for potential vulnerabilities. The security audit research currently remains disjoint with minor discussion of methodologies utilized in the field. This paper assembles a broad array of literature to promote standardizing source code security audits techniques. It, then, explores a case study using the aforementioned techniques. The case study analyzes the security for a stable version of the Apache Traffic Server (ATS). The study takes a white to gray hat point of view as it reports vulnerabilities located by two popular proprietary tools, examines and connects potential vulnerabilities with a standard community-driven taxonomy, and describes consequences for exploiting the vulnerabilities. A review of other security-driven case studies concludes this research.
Chronic-Pain-Associated Astrocytic Reaction in the Spinal Cord Dorsal Horn of Human Immunodeficiency Virus-Infected Patients

Studies with animal models have suggested that reaction of glia, including microglia and astrocytes, critically contributes to the development and maintenance of chronic pain. However, the involvement of glial reaction in human chronic pain is unclear. We performed analyses to compare the glial reaction profiles in the spinal dorsal horn (SDH) from three cohorts of sex- and age-matched human postmortem tissues: (1) HIV-negative patients, (2) HIV-positive patients without chronic pain, and (3) HIV patients with chronic pain. Our results indicate that the expression levels of CD11b and Iba1, commonly used for labeling microglial cells, did not differ in the three patient groups. However, GFAP and S100β, often used for labeling astrocytes, were specifically upregulated in the SDH of the “pain-positive” HIV patients but not in the “pain-negative” HIV patients. In addition, proinflammatory cytokines, TNFα and IL-1β, were specifically increased in the SDH of pain-positive HIV patients. Furthermore, proteins in the MAPK signaling pathway, including pERK, pCREB and c-Fos, were also upregulated in the SDH of pain-positive HIV patients. Our findings suggest that reaction of astrocytes in the SDH may play a role during the maintenance phase of HIV-associated chronic pain.