Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Impact of Globalization on Small Farmers Worldwide : Implications on Information Transfer Dr .

Globalization can be viewed as the integration of inputs and outputs into global markets, sharing of information and knowledge, and promulgation of rules governing such integration. World Trade Organization, International Monetary Fund, and World Bank play a vital role in the process of economic globalization. The positive and negative affects of globalization and the groups that resist and support globalization are many. Some of the impacts of globalization can be seen on small farmers in developed and developing countries. Corporate globalization has impacted the rural communities in several ways. This paper presents impacts globalization on small farmers and mentions implications of these impacts on information transfer to small farmers.
Spectral Properties and Prosodic Parameters of Emotional Speech in Czech and Slovak

The methods of analysis of human voice are based on the knowledge of speaker individuality. One of basic studies on speaker acoustic characteristics can be found in (Kuwabara & Sagisaka 1995). According to them the voice individuality is affected by the voice source (the average pitch frequency, the pitch contour, the pitch frequency fluctuation, the glottal wave shape) and the vocal tract (the shape of spectral envelope and spectral tilt, the absolute values of formant frequencies, the formant trajectories, the long-term average speech spectrum, the formant bandwidth). The most important factors on individuality are the pitch frequency and the resonance characteristics of the vocal tract, though the order of the two factors differs in different research studies. According to (Scherer 2003) larynx and pharynx expansion, vocal tract walls relaxation, and mouth corners retraction upward lead to falling first formant and rising higher formants during pleasant emotions. On the other hand, larynx and pharynx constriction, vocal tract walls tension, and mouth corners retraction downward lead to rising first formant and falling higher formants for unpleasant emotions. Thus, the first formant and the higher formants of emotional speech shift in opposite directions in the frequency ranges divided by a frequency between the first and the second formant. In practice, the formant frequencies differ to some extent for different languages and their ranges are overlapped. According to (Stevens 1997) the frequency of vibration of the vocal folds during normal speech production is usually in the range 80 ÷ 160 Hz for adult males, 170 ÷ 340 Hz for adult females, and 250 ÷ 500 Hz for younger children. It means that female pitch frequencies are about twice the male pitch frequencies, pitch frequencies of younger children are about 1.5times higher than those of females and about 3-times higher than those of males. As regards the formant frequencies, females have them on average 20 % higher than males, but the relation between male and female formant frequencies is nonuniform and deviates from a simple scale factor (Fant 2004). Emotional state of a speaker is accompanied by physiological changes affecting respiration, phonation, and articulation. These acoustic changes are transmitted to the ears of the listener and perceived via the auditory perceptual system (Scherer 2003). From literature and our experiments follows that different types of emotions are manifested not only in prosodic patterns (F0, energy, duration) and several voice quality features (e.g. jitter, shimmer, glottal-to-noise excitation ratio, Hammarberg index) (Li et al. 2007) but also by significant
Towards the Quantification of the Semantic Information Encoded in Written Language

Written language is a complex communication signal capable of conveying information encoded in the form of ordered sequences of words. Beyond the local order ruled by grammar, semantic and thematic structures affect long-range patterns in word usage. Here, we show that a direct application of information theory quantifies the relationship between the statistical distribution of words and the semantic content of the text. We show that there is a characteristic scale, roughly around a few thousand words, which establishes the typical size of the most informative segments in written language. Moreover, we find that the words whose contributions to the overall information is larger, are the ones more closely associated with the main subjects and topics of the text. This scenario can be explained by a model of word usage that assumes that words are distributed along the text in domains of a characteristic size where their frequency is higher than elsewhere. Our conclusions are based on the analysis of a large database of written language, diverse in subjects and styles, and thus are likely to be applicable to general language sequences encoding complex information.
Naive Bayes as a Satisficing Model

We report on an empirical study of supervised learning algorithms that induce models to resolve the meaning of ambiguous words in text. We find that the Naive Bayesian classifier is as accurate as several more sophisticated methods. This is a surprising result since Naive Bayes makes simplifying assumptions about disambiguation that are not realistic. However, our results correspond to a growing body of evidence that Naive Bayes acts as a satisficing model in a wide range of domains. We suggest that bias variance decompositions of classification error can be used to identify and develop satisficing models.
ADHD in adults

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by pervasive or impairing levels of inattention or hyperactivity. It is most comprehensively defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition (DSM-5) criteria, which recognizes its clinical heterogeneity by grouping it according to three presentations: predominantly inattentive, predominantly hyperactive–impulsive, and combined subtypes. However, ADHD presentations can change significantly over time, most often presenting predominantly as hyperactive–impulsive in infants, with combined symptoms for children, and predominantly inattentive in the case of adults. This chapter focuses on the presentation of ADHD in adults, discussing the detrimental effects its various presentations can have on economic, educational, and social outcomes, before examining the systemic limitations of its recognition and treatment in certain countries. Finally, management and treatment methods are explored, for instance the administering of dopamine and noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors such as methylphenidate and atomoxetine, respectively, and the lack of data on their effectiveness in tackling ADHD comorbidities such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
Compress-And-Forward Cooperative Relaying in MIMO-OFDM Systems

In this paper, we investigate the capacity of compress-and-forward (C&F) cooperative relaying scheme when the C&F relay operates in time division duplex (TDD). In our evaluation we consider MIMO-OFDM transmission. An achievable rate was previously derived in (A. Host-Madsen et al., 2005) assuming scalar channel. We extend this Wyner-Ziv bound to MIMO-OFDM, by applying results from Bayesian vector estimation and rate-distortion coding theory. Then we derive the mutual information of a sub-optimum relaying scheme in which the relay applies Karhunen-Loeve transform to the signal received from the source before quantizing it and forwarding it to the destination as a new codeword. Finally, we illustrate by simulations (in an environment similar to IEEE 802.16) the fact that for some scenarios, the C&F approach outperforms other known relaying techniques. This remains true even if the C&F sub-optimum scheme is considered
Isogonic Formation with Connectivity Preservation for a Team of Holonomic Robots in a Cluttered Environment

A geometric approach to multi-robots group formation with connectivity preservation(from a graph-theoretic perspective) among group members has been presented. It has been proven that such formation approach would result into a unique shortest connectivity link among group members which would not only guarantee the communication preservation among the robotic agents but also facilitate the message passing and routing among the group members once needed.
Implementing Delay Tolerant Networking

The recently proposed Delay Tolerant Networking (DTN) architecture aims at supporting efficient messagebased communication over intermittent networks. This paper describes our experience in creating and evaluating a DTN reference implementation. We found that several concepts are not fully specified in the DTN literature, including the treatment of mobile and opportunistic contacts and the grouping of nodes into regions. Given the novelty and challenges inherent in DTN routing, the implementation includes a custom internal interface to the route selection and message forwarding components that eases development of new algorithms. We verify the implementation with an Emulab-based performance evaluation of the DTN store-and-forward approach as compared with traditional Internet-style data transfer methodologies, and a demonstration of an epidemic routing protocol. We found that in many “challenged” environments, the deployment of DTN systems can result in significant performance gains over other approaches.
Elastic optical networking: a new dawn for the optical layer?

Optical networks are undergoing significant changes, fueled by the exponential growth of traffic due to multimedia services and by the increased uncertainty in predicting the sources of this traffic due to the ever changing models of content providers over the Internet. The change has already begun: simple on-off modulation of signals, which was adequate for bit rates up to 10 Gb/s, has given way to much more sophisticated modulation schemes for 100 Gb/s and beyond. The next bottleneck is the 10-year-old division of the optical spectrum into a fixed "wavelength grid," which will no longer work for 400 Gb/s and above, heralding the need for a more flexible grid. Once both transceivers and switches become flexible, a whole new elastic optical networking paradigm is born. In this article we describe the drivers, building blocks, architecture, and enabling technologies for this new paradigm, as well as early standardization efforts.
Workload-Balanced Processing of Top-K Join Queries on Cluster Architectures

The observation that a significant class of data processing and analysis applications can be expressed in terms of a small set of primitives that are easy to parallelize has resulted in increasing popularity of batch-oriented, highly-parallelizable cluster frameworks. These frameworks, however, are known to have shortcomings for certain application domains. For example, in many data analysis applications, the utility of a given data element to the particular analysis task depends on the way the data is collected (e.g. its precision) or interpreted. However, since existing batch data processing frameworks do not consider variations in data utility, they are not able to focus on the best results. Even if the user is interested in obtaining a relatively small subset of the best result instances, these systems often need to enumerate entire result sets, even if these sets contain lowutility results. In this paper, we introduce and describe uSplit, a data partitioning strategy for processing top-k join queries in batch-oriented cluster environments. In particular, we describe how uSplit adaptively samples data from “upstream” operators to help allocate resources in a work-balanced and wasted-work avoiding manner for top-k join processing. Experimental results show that the proposed sampling, data partitioning, and join processing strategies enable uSplit to return top-k results with high confidence and low-overhead (up to ∼ 9× faster than alternative schemes on 10 servers).
An LFR of the controller may be written as K δ :

In this paper an analysis of the complexity involved in the implementation and synthesis of linear parameter-varying (LPV) controllers is presented. Its purpose is to provide guidance in the selection of a synthesis approach for practical LPV control problems and reveal directions for further research with respect to complexity issues in LPV control. Standard methods are classified into polytopic, linear fractional transformation and gridding-based techniques with an emphasis on output-feedback synthesis. Carried out as a convex optimization problem via finitely many linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) for both parameter-independent and parameter-dependent Lyapunov functions (PiDLF/PDLF), the complexity of LPV controller existence conditions is assessed in terms of the number of decision variables and total size of the LMI. The implementation complexity is assessed in terms of the number of arithmetic operations required to compute the parameter-varying state space matrices of the controller, as well as the memory requirements to store associated variables. The results are applied to the LPV controller synthesis for a three-degrees-of-freedom robotic manipulator and the charge control of a spark-ignited engine, for which multiple models, as well as associated synthesis results have been reported in the literature.
The daily timing of gene expression and physiology in mammals

Mammalian behavior and physiology undergo daily rhythms that are coordinated by an endogenous circadian timing system. This system has a hierarchical structure, in that a master pacemaker, residing in the suprachiasmatic nucleus of the ventral hypothalamus, synchronizes peripheral oscillators in virtually all body cells. While the basic molecular mechanisms generating the daily rhythms are similar in aIl cells, most clock out-puts are cell-specific. This conclusion is based on genomewide transcriptome profiling studies in several tissues that have revealed hundreds of rhythmically expressed genes. Cyclic gene expression in the various organs governs overt rhythms in behavior and physiology, encompassing sleep-wake cycles, metabolism, xenobiotic detoxification, and cellularproliferation. As a consequence, chronic perturbation of this temporal organization may lead to increased morbidity and reduced lifespan.
Vanna-Volga Methods Applied to FX Derivatives: From Theory to Market Practice

We study Vanna-Volga methods which are used to price first generation exotic options in the Foreign Exchange market. They are based on a rescaling of the correction to the Black–Scholes price through the so-called "probability of survival" and the "expected first exit time". Since the methods rely heavily on the appropriate treatment of market data we also provide a summary of the relevant conventions. We offer a justification of the core technique for the case of vanilla options and show how to adapt it to the pricing of exotic options. Our results are compared to a large collection of indicative market prices and to more sophisticated models. Finally we propose a simple calibration method based on one-touch prices that allows the Vanna-Volga results to be in line with our pool of market data.
Co-design Architecture and Implementation for Point-Based Rendering on FPGAs

Current graphic cards include advanced graphic processing units to accelerate the rendering of 3D objects with millions of polygons. As object models grow in complexity, the rendering approach based on points as primitives is regarded superior in terms of scalability and efficiency. Next generation graphic cards could contain reconfigurable fabrics, similar to those implemented in current FPGAs, to offer two advantages: a) fast rendering units and b) new mechanisms for custom, run-time exchangeable accelerators. In this paper, we propose a hardware point-rendering architecture tailored specifically for reconfigurable systems. The presented implementation on a real FPGA-based platform demonstrates on the one hand the effectiveness of the approach and on the other hand it provides valuable insights into possible future improvements for this problem scenario.
Measuring complexity through average symmetry

This work introduces a complexity measure which addresses some conflicting issues between existing ones by using a new principle—measuring the average amount of symmetry broken by an object. It attributes low (although different) complexity to either deterministic or random homogeneous densities and higher complexity to the intermediate cases. This new measure is easily computable, breaks the coarse graining paradigm and can be straightforwardly generalized, including to continuous cases and general networks. By applying this measure to a series of objects, it is shown that it can be consistently used for both small scale structures with exact symmetry breaking and large scale patterns, for which, differently from similar measures, it consistently discriminates between repetitive patterns, random configurations and self-similar structures
Honokiol Inhibits Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Cell Migration by Targeting PGE2-Mediated Activation of β-Catenin Signaling

Lung cancer remains a leading cause of death due to its metastasis to distant organs. We have examined the effect of honokiol, a bioactive constituent from the Magnolia plant, on human non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cell migration and the molecular mechanisms underlying this effect. Using an in vitro cell migration assay, we found that treatment of A549, H1299, H460 and H226 NSCLC cells with honokiol resulted in inhibition of migration of these cells in a dose-dependent manner, which was associated with a reduction in the levels of cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) and prostaglandin E2 (PGE2). Celecoxib, a COX-2 inhibitor, also inhibited cell migration. Honokiol inhibited PGE2-enhanced migration of NSCLC cells, inhibited the activation of NF-κB/p65, an upstream regulator of COX-2, in A549 and H1299 cells, and treatment of cells with caffeic acid phenethyl ester, an inhibitor of NF-κB, also inhibited migration of NSCLC cells. PGE2 has been shown to activate β-catenin signaling, which contributes to cancer cell migration. Therefore, we checked the effect of honokiol on β-catenin signaling. It was observed that treatment of NSCLC cells with honokiol degraded cytosolic β-catenin, reduced nuclear accumulation of β-catenin and down-regulated matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-2 and MMP-9, which are the down-stream targets of β-catenin and play a crucial role in cancer cell metastasis. Honokiol enhanced: (i) the levels of casein kinase-1α, glycogen synthase kinase-3β, and (ii) phosphorylation of β-catenin on critical residues Ser45, Ser33/37 and Thr41. These events play important roles in degradation or inactivation of β-catenin. Treatment of celecoxib also reduced nuclear accumulation of β-catenin in NSCLC cells. FH535, an inhibitor of Wnt/β-catenin pathway, inhibited PGE2-enhanced cell migration of A549 and H1299 cells. These results indicate that honokiol inhibits non-small cell lung cancer cells migration by targeting PGE2-mediated activation of β-catenin signaling.
HistoryPaper: A Magazine-Style Layout of Representative Web Pages Extracted From Browsing History

Web browsing history of people who use internet everyday represents processes they learned. Visualization of summarized browsing history can contribute to learn what we did. This paper proposes HistoryPaper, a system to extract representative Web pages from browsing history of users, and arranges them like a newspaper. The system helps users to remember what they did in a particular day. HistoryPaper firstly clusters browsed Web pages based on their contents. Then, it calculates the priority of Web pages from search terms and rality of accessed Web pages, and selects the representative page of each cluster. HistoryPaper arranges the representative pages by utilizing a layout algorithm following the magazine style applied in many news sites. This paper presents the numeric evaluation of the layout results to demonstrate the reasonableness of the algorithm.
Activation of p38 Plays a Pivotal Role in the Inhibitory Effect of Lipopolysaccharide and Interleukin-1β on Long Term Potentiation in Rat Dentate Gyrus*

Lipopolysaccharide (LPS), a component of the cell wall of Gram-negative bacteria, has been shown to induce profound changes both peripherally and centrally. It has recently been reported that intraperitoneal injection of LPS inhibited long term potentiation (LTP) in perforant path-granule cell synapses and that this effect was coupled with an increase in the concentration of the proinflammatory cytokine, interleukin-1β (IL-1β). The LPS-induced effects were abrogated by inhibition of caspase-1, suggesting that IL-1β may mediate the effects of LPS. Here we report that the inhibition of LTP induced by LPS and IL-1β was coupled with stimulation of the stress-activated protein kinase p38 in hippocampus and entorhinal cortex and that this effect was abrogated by the p38 inhibitor SB203580, while the effect of LPS was markedly attenuated in C57BL/6 IL-1RI-/- mice. The data also indicate that activation of the transcription factor, nuclear factor κB (NFκB), may play a role, since the inhibitory effect of LPS and IL-1β on LTP was attenuated by the NFκB inhibitor, SN50; consistently, LPS and IL-1β led to activation of NFκB in entorhinal cortex. We suggest that one consequence of these LPS and IL-1β-induced changes is a compromise in glutamate release in dentate gyrus, which was coupled with the inhibition of LTP. The evidence is consistent with the idea that the LPS-induced impairment in LTP is mediated by IL-1β and is a consequence of activation of p38.
Cluster Head Selection Protocol using Fuzzy Logic for Wireless Sensor Networks

trends in field of wireless networks is setting up Wireless Sensor Networks that, senses specified parameter(s) related to environment; processes sensed data and wirelessly communicates it to a base station. Such networks open up a whole new range of applications, including precision agriculture, monitoring and tracking vehicles, animals and humans, battle-field surveillance, civil structural monitoring etc. All these applications require extended network lifetime, scalability, and traffic balancing among nodes in the network. Clustering is one of the effectual techniques for achieving these requirements. In clustering, geographically adjacent nodes are organized into virtual groups called clusters. One of the cluster node acts as a cluster head and rest as cluster members. This paper presents Cluster Head selection protocol using Fuzzy Logic (CHUFL). It uses node's parameters like: residual energy, reachability from its neighborhood, quality of communication link with its neighborhood and distance from base station as fuzzy input variables for cluster head selection. A comparative analysis of CHUFL with cluster head selection mechanism using fuzzy logic by Indranil et. al.; Cluster Head Election mechanism using Fuzzy logic (CHEF) by Kim et. al. and cluster head selection method for wireless sensor networks based on fuzzy logic by J. Anno et. al. shows that CHUFL is up to 20 % more energy efficient and sends 72% more packets to base station compared to protocol by J. Anno et. al., one of the energy efficient clustering protocol.