Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Deposition and Characterization of Mg Doped CuCrO2 Films by DC Magnetron Sputtering

Single-phase delafossite type Mg-doped copper-chromium oxide thin films were prepared on c-sapphire, quartz glass and n-Si substrates by direct current (DC) magnetron sputtering using a CuCr0.97Mg0. 03O2 (CCMO) ceramic target, followed by post annealing at 800 °C in a nitrogen atmosphere. X-ray diffraction (XRD) revealed that the film deposited on c-plane sapphire was highly c-axis oriented, while the films on quartz glass and Si only showed weak (0 1 2) peak. The transparencies of the films on c-sapphire and quartz glass were over 60 % in the visible light region and the direct bandgap of both films were estimated to be 3.16 eV. The in-plane resistivities were 0.24 Ωcm and 7.68 Ωcm for the crystallized films on c-sapphire and quartz glass, respectively. The electrical property of the formed CCMO/n-Si junction was found to be rectifying with a ratio of ~15 at ±2 V.
Identification of the Gene Encoding Sulfopyruvate Decarboxylase, an Enzyme Involved in Biosynthesis of Coenzyme M

ABSTRACT The products of two adjacent genes in the chromosome ofMethanococcus jannaschii are similar to the amino and carboxyl halves of phosphonopyruvate decarboxylase, the enzyme that catalyzes the second step of fosfomycin biosynthesis inStreptomyces wedmorensis. These two M. jannaschii genes were recombinantly expressed inEscherichia coli, and their gene products were tested for the ability to catalyze the decarboxylation of a series of α-ketoacids. Both subunits are required to form an α6β6 dodecamer that specifically catalyzes the decarboxylation of sulfopyruvic acid to sulfoacetaldehyde. This transformation is the fourth step in the biosynthesis of coenzyme M, a crucial cofactor in methanogenesis and aliphatic alkene metabolism. The M. jannaschiisulfopyruvate decarboxylase was found to be inactivated by oxygen and reactivated by reduction with dithionite. The two subunits, designated ComD and ComE, comprise the first enzyme for the biosynthesis of coenzyme M to be described.
Coronary Heart Disease in Postmenopausal Women with Type II Diabetes Mellitus and the Impact of Estrogen Replacement Therapy: A Narrative Review

Coronary heart disease is the main cause of death in postmenopausal women (PMW); moreover its mortality exceeds those for breast cancer in women at all ages. Type II diabetes mellitus is a major cardiovascular risk factor and there is some evidence that the risk conferred by diabetes is greater in women than in men. It was established that the deficiency of endogenous estrogens promotes the atherosclerosis process. However, the impact of estrogen replacement therapy (ERT) on cardiovascular prevention remains controversial. Some authors strongly recommend it, whereas others revealed a concerning trend toward harm. This review tries to underlines the different components of cardiovascular risk in diabetic PMW and to define the place of ERT.
Sensing Fabrics for Monitoring Physiological and Biomechanical Variables: E-textile solutions

In this paper is reported the experience gained in the last five years, in the implementation of wearable systems for personalized health care and their evolution in time. Sensing bio clothes for vital signs monitoring and wearable systems for gesture and posture recognition are specifically illustrated, resulting from the EU funded projects: Wealthy and My Heart.
P/G TSV planning for IR-drop reduction in 3D-ICs

In recent years, interconnect issues emerged as major performance challenges for Two-Dimensional-Integrated-Circuits (2D-ICs). In this context, Three-Dimensional-ICs (3D-ICs), which consist of several active layers stacked above each other, offer a very attractive alternative to conventional 2D-ICs. However, 3D-ICs also face many challenges associated with the Power Distribution Network (PDN) design due to the increasing power density and larger supply current compared to 2D-ICs. As an important part of 3D-IC PDNs, Power/Ground (P/G) Through-Silicon-Vias (TSVs) should be well-managed. Excessive or ill-placed P/G TSVs impact the power integrity (e.g. IR-drop), and also consume a considerable amount of chip real estate. In this work, we propose a Mixed-Integer-Linear-Programming (MILP)-based technique to plan the P/G TSVs. The goal of our approach is to minimize the average IR-drop while satisfying the total area constraint of TSVs by optimizing the P/G TSV placement. Therefore, the locations, sizes and the total number of the P/G TSVs are co-optimized simultaneously. The experimental results show that the average IR-drop can be reduced by 11.8 % in average using the proposed method compared to a random placement technique with a much smaller runtime.
RNN Based Sampling Technique for Effective Active Learning

In this paper, we address the problem of active learning using the notion of influence sets based on Reverse Nearest Neighbor. Active learning is an area of machine learning which emphasizes on achieving optimal classification performance using as few labeled samples as possible. Reverse nearest neighbors have been used in domains such as clustering and outliers detection in the past effectively. In this paper, we devise a new sampling method for instances based on the knowledge provided from RNN influence sets. To demonstrate the effectiveness of our sampling method, we compare its performance against existing sampling methods on few real life datasets. The experimental results show that our technique outperforms existing methods, particularly on multi-class datasets.
A new index to estimate the strain rate sensitivity of glassy polymers using conical/pyramidal indentation

The increasing use of polymeric materials as thin coatings requires appropriate mechanical characterization methods taking account of time-dependent effects. A well-known result is that a constant indentation strain rate allows us to determine the mechanical properties of such solids from indentation tests. To do that, most people assume a power-law creep behaviour and use the viscoplasticity index to determine the strain rate sensitivity. In the first part of this paper, we investigate the influence of the indentation strain rate on the hardness of power-law creep solids and elastic-viscoplastic solids. It is shown that the assumption of a power-law creep solid is not sufficient to describe the behaviour of polymeric materials in indentation. In the second part, we propose a new index, the EVP index, which gives a better approximation of the strain rate sensitivity than the viscoplasticity index. In the last part, we apply this method to nanoindentation tests on PMMA and polycarbonate samples.
Estudo da superfície de fibras de carbono após tratamento de implantação iônica por imersão em plasma (3IP)

In this work, plasma immersion ion implantation (PIII) treatments of carbon fibers (CFs) were performed in order to induce modifications of chemical and physical properties of the CF surface aimed to improve the performance of thermoplastic composite. The samples to be treated were immersed in nitrogen or air glow discharge plasma and pulsed at −3.0 kV for 2.0, 5.0, 10.0, and 15.0 min. After PIII processing, the specimens were characterized by atomic force microscopy (AFM), scanning electron microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, and X- ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). After CFs treatments, the CF/Polypropylene (PP) composites were produced by hot pressing method. Surface morphology of as-received CFs exhibited some scratches aligned along the fibers due to the fiber manufacturing process. After both treatments, these features became deeper, and also, a number of small particles nonuniformly distributed on the fiber surface can be observed. These particles are product of CF surface sputtering during the PIII treatment, which removes the epoxy layer that covers as- received samples. AFM analyses of CF samples treated with nitrogen depicted a large increase of the surface roughness (Rrms value approximately six times higher than that of the untreated sample). The increase of the roughness was also observed for samples treated by air PIII. Raman spectra of all samples presented the characteristic Dand G-bands at approximately 1355 and 1582 cm−1, respectively. Analysis of the surface chemical composition provided by the XPS showed that nitrogen and oxygen were incorporated onto the surface. The polar radicals formed on the surface lead to increasing of the CF surface energy. Both the modification of surface roughness and the surface oxidation contributed for the enhancement of CF adhesion to the polymeric matrix. These features were confirmed by ILSS tests because there was an increase of the interfacial shear strength up to 94% for N- treated sample and 60% for air-treated sample.
Running head : CIMT AND HAND FUNCTION The Effects of Constraint Induced Movement Therapy ( CIMT ) and Hand Function

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of modified CIMT and CIMT on hand function among persons with hemiparesis surgical post CVA. METHOD: A two phase, mixed methods approach, consisting of both qualitative and quantitative approaches, was utilized to examine the impact of stroke on hand function. Four subjects were placed in a mCIMT program and four in a CIMT program. Seven preto posttest scores on the WOLF were used to analyze the participants hand function. RESULTS: The results could not be tested for statistical significance due to small sample size. However, descriptive statistics revealed that both the CIMT and mCIMT resulted in improved hand function on the seven WOLF motor subtests used in this study. CONCLUSION: Modified CIMT and CIMT are effective treatment methods for improving hand function in persons who have experienced a stroke. Further research is needed to support these outcomes.
Self-cleaning wool: effect of noble metals and silica on visible-light-induced functionalities of nano TiO2 colloid

This study intends to enhance the functionality of titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles applied to wool fabrics under visible light. Herein, TiO2, TiO2/SiO2, TiO2/Metal, and TiO2/Metal/SiO2 nanocomposite sols were synthesized and applied to wool fabrics through a low-temperature sol–gel method. The impacts of three types of noble metals, namely gold (Au), platinum (Pt), and silver (Ag), on the photoefficiency of TiO2 and TiO2/SiO2 under visible light were studied. Different molar ratios of Metal toTiO2 (0.01, 0.1, 0.5, and 1%) were employed in synthesizing the sols. Photocatalytic efficiency of fabrics was analyzed through monitoring the removal of red wine stain and degradation of methylene blue under simulated sunlight and visible light, respectively. Also, the antimicrobial activity against Escherichia coli (E. coli) bacterium and the mechanical properties of fabrics were investigated. Through applying binary and ternary nanocomposite sols to fabrics, an enhanced visible-light-induced self-cleaning property was imparted to wool fabrics. It was concluded that the presence of silica and optimized amount of noble metals had a synergistic impact on boosting the photocatalytic and antimicrobial activities of coated samples. The fabrics were further characterized using attenuated total reflectance, energy-dispersive X-ray spectrometry, and scanning electron microscopy images.
Laser guided and stabilized gas metal arc welding processes (LGS-GMA)

The demands of the industry are cheap and fast production of highly sophisticated parts without compromises in product quality. To realize this requirement, we have developed a laser guided and stabilized gas metal arc process (LGS-GMA welding). The new welding process is based on a gas metal arc process using low power laser radiation for stabilization. The laser stabilization of gas metal arcs welding is applied to joint welding and cladding. With only 400 W laser power and a focal spot of 1.6 mm the laser radiation is mainly interacting with the arc plasma in order to guide and stabilize it. In joint welding up to 100% increase in welding speed is possible, at equal penetration depth. The guidance effect also enables the process to weld in challenging situations like different sheet thicknesses. Used for cladding, the enhanced process stability allows low penetration depth with dilutions of only 3%. Coatings with up to 63 HRC were achieved.
Many Uses, Many Annotations for Large Speech Corpora: Switchboard and TDT as Case Studies

This paper discusses the challenges that arise when large speech corpora receive an ever-broadening range of diverse and distinct annotations. Two case studies of this process are presented: the Switchboard Corpus of telephone conversations and the TDT2 corpus of broadcast news. Switchboard has undergone two independent transcriptions and various types of additional annotation, all carried out as separate projects that were dispersed both geographically and chronologically. The TDT2 corpus has also received a variety of annotations, but all directly created or managed by a core group. In both cases, issues arise involving the propagation of repairs, consistency of references, and the ability to integrate annotations having different formats and levels of detail. We describe a general framework whereby these issues can be addressed successfully.
Evolutionary algorithm approach for symbolic FSM traversals

State space traversal algorithms for finite state machine (FSM) models of synchronous sequential circuitry are used extensively in various formal verification approaches such as equivalence checking (EC) and model checking. Symbolic binary decision diagram (BDD) based approaches have allowed many FSM models to be verified due to the compact representations they provide. However, there still remain circuits for which the traversal cannot be carried out due to the size of the transition relation (TR) BDD becoming too large. Pruning algorithms designed to reduce the size of a BDD while maintaining as much functionality as possible are examined for here. These techniques are based upon evolutionary algorithms that have been shown to significantly reduce the size of BDD while retaining a large amount of functionality.
Possible Ontologies: How Reality Constrains the Development of Relevant Ontologies

For years, ontologies have been known in computer science as consensual models of domains of discourse, usually implemented as formal definitions of the relevant conceptual entities. Researchers have written much about the potential benefits of using them, and most of us regard ontologies as central building blocks of the semantic Web and other semantic systems. Unfortunately, the number and quality of actual, "non-toy" ontologies available on the Web today is remarkably low. This implies that the semantic Web community has yet to build practically useful ontologies for a lot of relevant domains in order to make the semantic Web a reality. Theoretically minded advocates often assume that the lack of ontologies is because the "stupid business people haven't realized ontologies' enormous benefits. " As a liberal market economist, the author assumes that humans can generally figure out what's best for their well-being, at least in the long run, and that they act accordingly. In other words, the fact that people haven't yet created as many useful ontologies as the ontology research community would like might indicate either unresolved technical limitations or the existence of sound rationales for why individuals refrain from building them - or both. Indeed, several social and technical difficulties exist that put a brake on developing and eventually constrain the space of possible ontologies
Comparing a Linguistic and a Stochastic Tagger

Concerning different approaches to automatic PoS tagging: EngCG-2, a constraint-based morphological tagger, is compared in a double-blind test with a state-of-the-art statistical tagger on a common disambiguation task using a common tag set. The experiments show that for the same amount of remaining ambiguity, the error rate of the statistical tagger is one order of magnitude greater than that of the rule-based one. The two related issues of priming effects compromising the results and disagreement between human annotators are also addressed.
Five Performability Algorithms. A Comparison

Since the introduction by John F. Meyer in 1980, various algorithms have been proposed to evaluate the performability distribution. In this paper we describe and compare five algorithms that have been proposed recently to evaluate this distribution: Picard's method, a uniformisation-based method, a path-exploration method, a discretisation approach and a fully Markovian approximation. As a result of our study, we recommend Picard's method not to be used (due to numerical stability problems). Furthermore, the path exploration method turns out to be heavily dependent on the branching structure of the Markov-reward model under study. For small models, the uniformisation method is preferable; however, its complexity is such that it is impractical for larger models. The discretisation method performs well, also for larger models; however, it does not easily apply in all cases. The recently proposed Markovian approximation works best, even for large models; however, error bounds cannot be given for it.
The Neuropsychology of Male Adults With High-Functioning Autism or Asperger Syndrome

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is diagnosed on the basis of behavioral symptoms, but cognitive abilities may also be useful in characterizing individuals with ASD. One hundred seventy‐eight high‐functioning male adults, half with ASD and half without, completed tasks assessing IQ, a broad range of cognitive skills, and autistic and comorbid symptomatology. The aims of the study were, first, to determine whether significant differences existed between cases and controls on cognitive tasks, and whether cognitive profiles, derived using a multivariate classification method with data from multiple cognitive tasks, could distinguish between the two groups. Second, to establish whether cognitive skill level was correlated with degree of autistic symptom severity, and third, whether cognitive skill level was correlated with degree of comorbid psychopathology. Fourth, cognitive characteristics of individuals with Asperger Syndrome (AS) and high‐functioning autism (HFA) were compared. After controlling for IQ, ASD and control groups scored significantly differently on tasks of social cognition, motor performance, and executive function (P's < 0.05). To investigate cognitive profiles, 12 variables were entered into a support vector machine (SVM), which achieved good classification accuracy (81%) at a level significantly better than chance (P < 0.0001). After correcting for multiple correlations, there were no significant associations between cognitive performance and severity of either autistic or comorbid symptomatology. There were no significant differences between AS and HFA groups on the cognitive tasks. Cognitive classification models could be a useful aid to the diagnostic process when used in conjunction with other data sources—including clinical history. Autism Res 2014, 7: 568–581. © 2014 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Channel routing optimization using a genetic algorithm

A modified approach for the application of Genetic Algorithm (GA) to the Channel Routing Problem has been proposed. The code based on the algorithm proposed in [1] has been implemented for the GA procedures of Initial Population Generation, Crossover, Mutation and Selection. A few improvements over the existing work have been made and the results so far obtained have been encouraging. Further experimentation is being done on the algorithm and other ideas generated during the development of the code are being implemented for faster convergence of the algorithm and for generation of more efficient results. Also application of variations of the GA technique like Vector GA and even other computationally intelligent techniques like Particle Swarm Optimization to the channel routing problem is being thought of.
Cloud Terminal: Secure Access to Sensitive Applications from Untrusted Systems

Current PC- and web-based applications provide insufficient security for the information they access, because vulnerabilities anywhere in a large client software stack can compromise confidentiality and integrity. We propose a new architecture for secure applications, Cloud Terminal, in which the only software running on the end host is a lightweight secure thin terminal, and most application logic is in a remote cloud rendering engine. The secure thin terminal has a very small TCB (23 KLOC) and no dependence on the untrusted OS, so it can be easily checked and remotely attested to. The terminal is also general-purpose: it simply supplies a secure display and input path to remote software. The cloud rendering engine runs an off-the-shelf application in a restricted VM hosted by the provider, but resource sharing between VMs lets one server support hundreds of users. We implement a secure thin terminal that runs on standard PC hardware and provides a responsive interface to applications like banking, email, and document editing. We also show that our cloud rendering engine can provide secure online banking for 5-10 cents per user per month.
Robust Statistics based Filter to Remove Salt and Pepper Noise in Digital Images

Visual information transmitted in the form of digital images is becoming a major method of communication in the modern age, but the image obtained after transmission is often corrupted with noise. The received image needs processing before it can be used in applications. This paper represents a robust statistics based filter to remove salt and pepper noise in digital images. The function of the algorithm is to detect the corrupted pixels first since the impulse noise only affect certain pixels in the image and the remaining pixels are uncorrupted. The corrupted pixels are replaced by an estimated value using the proposed robust statistics based filter. The proposed method perform well in removing low to medium density impulse noise with detail preservation upto a noise density of 70% compared to standard median filter, weighted median filter, recursive
Case of syndromic tufting enteropathy harbors SPINT2 mutation seen in congenital sodium diarrhea.

Mamata Sivagnanam, Andreas R. Janecke, Thomas Müller, Peter Heinz-Erian, Sharon Taylor and Lynne M. Bird, Divisions of Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, Dysmorphology and Genetics, Department of Pediatrics, University of California, Rady Children’s Hospital, San Diego, California, USA, Division of Clinical Genetics and Department of Pediatrics II, Innsbruck Medical University, Innsbruck, Austria
Does neonatal phenobarbital treatment affect testicular and adrenal functions and steroid binding in plasma in infancy?

Because of its enzyme-inducing properties, which are thought to explain its lowering effect on neonatal hyperbilirubinemia, phenobarbital (PB) has been widely used as prophylactic treatment in neonatal jaundice. Experimental data suggesting that PB might have various effects on endocrine metabolism or regulation prompted us to investigate whether PB had some adverse effects on testicular or adrenal function in human neonates. A group (I) of 12 prematures given a single im injection of 10 mg/kg PB on the day of birth were studied longitudinally for 6 months and compared with untreated, premature (group II), and fullterm (group III) infants. Plasma testosterone (T), Δ4-androstenedione (Δ4), 17α-hydroxyprogesterone, and cortisol (F) were similar in the 3 groups at birth and before PB therapy. A postnatal rise in T and 17α-hydroxyprogesterone levels occurred in the 3 groups. Study of the temporal patterns showed that peak T levels were lower, and their decline beyond 2 months of age was more rapid, in group I.