Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Improving the Probability of Success of Repeated Genetic Algorithm on Affine Object Location Problem

Affine object location is a difficult problem in computer vision. Genetic algorithm (GA) provides an efficient solution to the problem when there is little noise or other artifacts. Nonetheless, there is a need to design better GA for complicated, noisy images. In this paper, we investigate the performance of improved operators in GA designs to solve the above problem. Three operators are investigated: redundancy checking, adaptive mutation and partial reshuffling. An intuitive discussion of why these operators are helpful is given in terms of the basic working principle of the GA. Experimental results on the probability of success are given using the framework of Repeated Genetic Algorithm (RGA), which is an application of the probabilistic amplification technique. Tests on both synthetic and real images, with random and structured noise are conducted. It is found that whilst all three operators can improve the GA’s probability of success for the affine object location problem, the redundancy checking operator is the most effective.
Retrieval system evaluation: automatic evaluation versus incomplete judgments

In information retrieval (IR), research aiming to reduce the cost of retrieval system evaluations has been conducted along two lines: (i) the evaluation of IR systems with reduced amounts of manual relevance assessments, and (ii) the fully automatic evaluation of IR systems, thus foregoing the need for manual assessments altogether. The proposed methods in both areas are commonly evaluated by comparing their performance estimates for a set of systems to a ground truth (provided for instance by evaluating the set of systems according to mean average precision). In contrast, in this poster we compare an automatic system evaluation approach directly to two evaluations based on incomplete manual relevance assessments. For the particular case of TREC's Million Query track, we show that the automatic evaluation leads to results which are highly correlated to those achieved by approaches relying on incomplete manual judgments.
Adaptive NN dynamic surface control for a class of uncertain pure-feedback systems

The tracking control problem of a class of pure-feedback system with uncertainty is considered. Dynamic surface control (DSC) design technique is used to avoid the problem of “explosion of complexity” in the traditional backstepping algorithm and overcome the circular construction of controller from function approximator in the backstepping design. Combining backstepping technique and neural network theorem, a semi-global uniformly ultimately bounded controller based on the Lyapunov stability theory is given. A simulation example is presented to demonstrate the method.
An analysis of P3P-enabled web sites among top-20 search results

Search engines play an important role in helping users find desired content. With the increasing deployment of computer-readable privacy policies encoded using the standard W3C Platform for Privacy Preferences (P3P) format, search engines also have the potential to help users identify web sites that will respect their privacy needs. We conducted a study of the quantity and quality of P3P-encoded privacy policies associated with top-20 search results from three popular search engines. We built a P3P-enabled search engine and used it to gather statistics on P3P adoption as well as the privacy landscape of the Internet as a whole. This search engine makes use of a privacy policy cache that we designed to facilitate fast searches. Using a list of "typical" search terms taken from AOL users' queries, we examined the trends in privacy policies that are returned from queries to the AOL, Google, and Yahoo! search engines. We then compared these results to results compiled after using "e-commerce search terms" from Google's Froogle service. We examined the top 20 search results returned by each search engine for each of the search terms and found at least one result with a P3P policy for 83% of the typical search terms. Overall we found that these typical search terms yielded P3P adoption rates of 10%. This contrasts with adoption rates of 21% percent when searching for e-commerce terms. Examining the content of the policies, we discovered that a minority of sites engage in direct marketing with or without a way of opting out, and that even fewer sites share personal information with other companies. Finally, we outline ways to increase P3P adoption rates as well as decrease policy errors.
A near linear shortest path algorithm for weighted undirected graphs

This paper presents an algorithm for Shortest Path Tree (SPT) problem. The presented algorithm is an improvement over a previously published work of the authors. The effort is put in to improve the running/execution time of the SPT problem. Introduced improvement is simple and easy to incorporate in to the existing algorithm. This algorithm uses Depth First Search (DFS) like graph traversal during a BFS like traversal i.e. combines and take advantage of the inherent properties of the two heuristic graph search techniques so that vertex weights can be kept balanced. The need of improvement is discussed in detail and the expected improvement in overall processing time is shown with the example.
Basis of the Ponzano-Regge-Turaev-Viro-Ooguri quantum-gravity model is the loop representation basis.

In three dimensions (3D) the Ponzano-Regge-Turaev-Viro-Ooguri model provides a combinatorial definition of quantum gravity. The model is written in terms of a specific basis in the Hilbert spaces associated with the 2D boundaries of spacetime. We show that this basis is the same as the one that defines the loop representation of quantum gravity. We extend this construction to the physical 4D case, by defining a modification of Regge calculus in which areas, rather than lengths, are taken as independent variables. We provide an expression for the scalar product in the loop representation in 4D. We discuss the general form that a nonperturbative quantum theory of gravity should have, and argue that this should be given by a generalization of Atiyah's topological quantum-field-theory axioms
Affinity modulation of integrin alpha 5 beta 1: regulation of the functional response by soluble fibronectin

We report that a beta 1 integrin (alpha 5 beta 1) can exist in different affinity states for its soluble ligand, fibronectin. The alpha 5 beta 1 expressed by the erythroleukemic cell line K562 binds soluble fibronectin with low affinity (Kd > 1 microM), but is induced to bind it with 20-fold higher affinity (Kd-54 nM) in the presence of the anti-beta 1 mAb 8A2. This activation seems to be due to direct antibody-induced change in the receptor that does not require intracellular signaling, and is a plausible basis for the 8A2-induced enhancement of beta 1-dependent adhesion to fibronectin and other immobilized ligands (Kovach, N. L., T. M. Carlos, E. Yee, and J. M. Harlan. 1992. J. Cell Biol. 116: 499-509). Fab fragments of 8A2 bind with higher affinity to alpha 5 beta 1 receptor that is occupied by the GRG-DSP peptide ligand suggesting that the antibody functions by stabilizing a high affinity (occupied) conformer of the receptor. A functional consequence of the affinity modulation is that soluble fibronectin (at physiological concentrations) occupies the high affinity receptors, and so becomes an effective inhibitor of adhesion to immobilized fibronectin. In contrast, the majority of low affinity receptors remain unoccupied and are still to mediate cellular adhesion.
Singularities of codimension two mean curvature flow of symplectic surfaces

We prove that for a mean curvature flow of a compact symplectic surface in a compact Kaehler-Einstein surface, the tangent cone at the first blow-up time consists of a finite union of more than two 2-planes in $R^4$ which are complex in a complex structure on $R^4$.
A cost-benefit evaluation method for web-based information systems

Most evaluations of web-based information systems are done with respect to their effectiveness in supporting users in finding and exploring the information they need. We believe (1) that we need to move beyond task effectiveness and look at the whole-of-system effectiveness, and (2) that we must balance benefits with costs. We propose a method that provides guidance in whole-of-system evaluations, explicitly considering all participants and both sides of the "bang for buck" equation.
Building a robust sentiment lexicon with (almost) no resource

Creating sentiment polarity lexicons is labor intensive. Automatically translating them from resourceful languages requires in-domain machine translation systems, which rely on large quantities of bi-texts. In this paper, we propose to replace machine translation by transferring words from the lexicon through word embeddings aligned across languages with a simple linear transform. The approach leads to no degradation, compared to machine translation, when tested on sentiment polarity classification on tweets from four languages.
An improvement in the build algorithm for Kd-trees using mathematical mean

Querying forms a central part of dealing with data. Hence, it becomes imperative to have efficient data structures and query-search algorithms for data retrieval. Among the different types of data structures, in this paper, we have focused on 4 tree data structures. These are B, Kd, Range and Quad trees. We have made a comparative study of their build processes. Traditionally, the median of dataelements is used for the building of Kd trees. This gives a time complexity of O (k*nlogn) where n is the number of points to be sorted and k is the dimensionality of the points. We propose the building of Kd trees on the basis of mean of the data elements. The proposed algorithm has been shown to reduce the number of computations in the build process. The Kd trees produced by this methodology are balanced. Hence, this provides an improvement over the traditional building mechanism.
Automatic Traffic Monitoring System Using Lane Centre Edges

: - Robust and reliable traffic monitoring system is an urgent need to improve traffic control and management. Vehicle flow detection appears to be an important part in traffic monitoring system. The traffic flow shows the traffic state in fixed time interval and helps to control the traffic. This paper proposes an automatic traffic monitoring system which is used for estimating the important traffic parameters from video sequences through vision based cameras, and also used to detect the traffic flow in different lanes. Mainly this paper tells that how to detect the lanes and vehicle centres in different frames. This is used to count the number of vehicles in different lanes based on lane width.
Beyond design by contract: formal specification of composed behaviour

The basic building blocks of Design by Contract are Boolean assertions, which are used to express preconditions, postconditions and invariants. For composed commands, i.e. for commands whose effect is realized using other commands, the expressiveness of such contracts appears to be insufficient. In this paper, we propose an extension of the Design by Contract methodology that enables us to express the specification of a composed method in terms of the specification of the composing methods. Among the main advantages of this approach, we distinguish increased expressiveness of contracts, better consistency and trivial code generation. Beyond Design by Contract: Formal Specification of Composed Behaviour Nele Smeets*, Eric Steegmans Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Department of Computer Science, Celestijnenlaan 200A, 3001 Leuven, Belgium {Nele.Smeets, Eric.Steegmans}@cs.kuleuven. ac.be *Research Assistant of the Fund for Scientific Research Flanders (Belgium) Abstract. The basic building blocks of Design by Contract are Boolean assertions, which are used to express preconditions, postconditions and invariants. For composed commands, i.e. for commands whose effect is realized using other commands, the expressiveness of such contracts appears to be insufficient. In this paper, we propose an extension of the Design by Contract methodology that enables us to express the specification of a composed method in terms of the specification of the composing methods. Among the main advantages of this approach, we distinguish increased expressiveness of contracts, better consistency and trivial code generation. The basic building blocks of Design by Contract are Boolean assertions, which are used to express preconditions, postconditions and invariants. For composed commands, i.e. for commands whose effect is realized using other commands, the expressiveness of such contracts appears to be insufficient. In this paper, we propose an extension of the Design by Contract methodology that enables us to express the specification of a composed method in terms of the specification of the composing methods. Among the main advantages of this approach, we distinguish increased expressiveness of contracts, better consistency and trivial code generation.
An Improved Parallel Algorithm of Genetic Programming Based on the Framework of MapReduce

Genetic programming lacks convergence prematurely and operating efficiency. This paper is to study this problem that integrates the genetic programming theory with the framework of Map/Reduce. This is to improve the efficiency by parallel and distributed capability proved by Map/Reduce. Our experiments show that the improved parallel algorithm of genetic programming under the framework of Map/Reduce has the better performance than the conventional approaches. KeywordsAlgorithm of Genetic Programming Map/Reduce Parallel Algorithm formatting
Relationship Between Multiple Forms of Childhood Maltreatment and Adult Mental Health in Community Respondents: Results From the Adverse Childhood

Objective: This study examined the prev­ alence of a history of various combinations of childhood maltreatment types (physical abuse, sexual abuse, and witnessing of ma­ ternal battering) among adult members of a health maintenance organization (HMO) and explored the relationship with adult mental health of the combinations of types of childhood maltreatment and emotional abuse in the childhood family environment. Method: A total of 8,667 adult members of an HMO completed measures of child­ hood exposure to family dysfunction, which included items on physical and sex­ ual abuse, witnessing of maternal batter­ ing, and emotional abuse in the childhood family environment. The adults’ current mental health was assessed by using the mental health scale of the Medical Out­ comes Study 36-item Short-Form Health Survey. Results: The prevalences of sexual abuse, physical abuse, and witnessing of maternal violence were 21.6%, 20.6%, and 14.0%, re­ spectively, when the maltreatment types were considered separately. Among re­ spondents reporting any of the maltreat­ ment types, 34.6% reported more than one type of maltreatment. Lower mean mental health scores were associated with higher numbers of abuse categories (mean=78.5, 75.5, 72.8, and 69.9 for re­ spondents with no, one, two, and three abuse types, respectively). Both an emo­ tionally abusive family environment and the interaction of an emotionally abusive family environment with the various mal­ treatment types had a significant effect on mental health scores. Conclusions: Childhood physical and sexual abuse, as well as witnessing of maternal battering, were common among the adult members of an HMO in this study. Among those reporting any mal­ treatment, more than one-third had expe­ rienced more than one type of maltreat­ ment. A dose-response relation was found between the number of types of maltreat­ ment reported and mental health scores. In addition, an emotionally abusive family environment accentuated the decrements in mental health scores. Future research examining the effects of childhood mal­ treatment on adult mental health should include assessments of a wide range of abusive experiences, as well as the family atmosphere in which they occur.
Bifurcations and Attractors in Synchronization Dynamics of Coupled Duffing-Van der Pol Oscillators

We demonstrate the synchronization dynamics of coupled Duffing Van der Pol (DVP) equation. The stability and sufficient criteria for synchronization alongside some pairs of period doubling (route to chaos) are discovered and periodic windows with the range of angular velocities for which the system is non-chaotic are experienced using linear matrix inequality (LMI). Numerical simulation tools such as bifurcation diagrams, Poincar e  maps and phase projections are used to exhibit some new complex dynamical behaviors of the systems. We obtained the full synchronization using a forth order Runge kutta routine as well as the software dynamics when the coupling parameter ( c  ) reaches a certain threshold 2587 . 0   th c . The numerical value of th c  obtained from the average energies of the systems is in good agreement with the theoretical analysis.
Cytogenetic studies in lymphocytes of patients with rectal cancer.

Spontaneous and clastogen-induced chromosomal instability in a high-risk group (i.e, 33 patients with rectal carcinomas) was investigated using peripheral blood lymphocytes as target cells. In addition to the analysis of spontaneous and clastogen-induced chromosome aberrations, this study also included classical karyotype analysis and scoring of sister chromatid exchanges (SCE) in some of the patients. Diepoxybutane (DEB), 4-nitroquinoline-1-oxide (NQO), and bleomycin were used as standard clastogens. Lymphocytes of healthy control individuals were studied in parallel with each cancer patient. While only slight but significant differences could be detected of the average spontaneous, DEB- and bleomycin (G2)-induced chromosome breakage between patient and control lymphocytes, individual patients and two of the control individuals showed a more distinct increase in the frequency of the studied end points. These increases were documented by a variegated mosaicism of karyotypic changes and by an increased breakage rate induced by the clastogens. Neither the bleomycin-exposure in the G1 phase nor SCE was capable of detecting differences between the patients and controls. Of particular interest in the sense of high-risk individuals were seven patients and two control persons whose lymphocytes exhibited increased chromosomal sensitivity under more than one of the studied experimental conditions.
Recommendations for Promoting Physical Activity for Children and Adolescents in Germany. A Consensus Statement

Increasing physical activity and reduction of sedentary behaviour play important roles in health promotion and prevention of lifestyle-related diseases in children and adolescents. However, the question of how much physical activity is useful for which target group is still a matter of debate. International guidelines (World Health Organization; European Association for the Study of Obesity), which are mainly based on expert opinions, recommend 60 min of physical activity every day. Age- and sex-specific features and regional differences are not taken into account. Therefore, expert consensus recommendations for promoting physical activity of children and adolescents in Germany were developed with special respect to national data, but also with respect to aspects of specific target groups, e.g., children with a lower socio-economic status (SES) or with migration background. They propose 90 min/day of physical activity, or at least 12,000 steps daily. Additionally, lifestyle factors, especially restriction of media consumption, were integrated. The recommendations provide orientation for parents and caregivers, for institutions such as schools and kindergartens as well as for communities and stakeholders.
A Conceptual Framework for Impact of Information Technology on Supply Chain Management

Supply chain management (SCM) is the 21st century operations strategy for achieving organizational competitiveness. Companies are attempting to find ways to improve their flexibility and responsiveness and in turn competitiveness by changing their operations strategy, methods and technologies that include the implementation of SCM paradigm and information technology (IT). However, our objective is to, with review of literature, specify the areas that IT affect on supply chain and develop a framework for impact of IT in SCM.
Willingness to Participate in HIV Therapeutic Vaccine Trials among HIV-Infected Patients on ART in China

Background More and more HIV therapeutic vaccines will enter clinical trials; however, little is known about the willingness to participate (WTP) in HIV therapeutic vaccine trials among HIV-positive individuals. Objective To investigate the WTP in HIV therapeutic vaccine trials among Chinese HIV-infected patients. Methods We conducted a cross-sectional survey on HIV-positive inpatients and outpatients at Shanghai Public Health Center. A total of 447 participants were recruited into this study. Following an introduction with general information on HIV therapeutic vaccine and its potential effectiveness and side effects, each participant completed a questionnaire in a self-administered form. The questionnaires covered demographics, high-risk behaviors, clinical characteristics and willingness to participate in HIV therapeutic vaccine trial. Results The overall willingness to participate in HIV therapeutic vaccine trials was 91.5%. Interestingly, multivariate logistic regression analyses demonstrated that the willingness was higher for those sexually infected by HIV (odds ratio [OR]: 4.36; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.53–12.41), diagnosed as HIV-1 infection for greater than 5 years (OR: 7.12, 95% CI: 1.83–27.76), and with the presence of infectious complications (OR: 2.75; 95% CI: 1.02–7.45). The primary reason for participation was to delay or reduce antiretroviral treatment (ART) and to avoid ART side effects (76.6%), and then followed by delaying disease progression (74.9%), increasing immune response to suppress opportunistic infections (57.7%) and preventing the development of drug resistance (37.1%). Reasons for unwillingness to participate mainly included concern for safety (37.0%), lack of knowledge on therapeutic vaccine (33.3%), and satisfaction with ART effectiveness (22.2%). Conclusions The WTP in HIV therapeutic vaccine trials was high among HIV-infected Chinese patients. HIV+ subjects who acquired infection through sexual contact and who were diagnosed for more than 5 years may represent a good candidate population for enrollment in therapeutic vaccine trials.
Assessment of new spectral features for eeg-based emotion recognition

The choice of appropriate features for automatic emotion recognition based on electroencephalographic (EEG) signals remains to date an open research question. In this paper we explore a wide range of potentially useful features, including original ones, comparing them to previous proposals through a rigorous experimental evaluation, using a strict cross-validation protocol. In particular we assess the effectiveness of new spectral features-both in multi-channel and single-channel EEG setups-for the problem of discriminating positively and negatively excited emotions. The evaluation is conducted using the ENTERFACE'06 dataset allowing us to study the behaviour of the tested features across different subjects. Our results prove the usefulness of various new spectral features even in single-channel setups. We also observe that the optimal selection of features is highly subject-dependent. Finally combining different groups of features we find the valence recognition accuracy to be possibly as high as 78%.