Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Power efficient hardware implementation of a fuzzy neural network

This paper presents a digital, transistor level implemented neo-fuzzy neural network. This type of neural network is particularly well suited for real-time applications like those encountered in signal processing and nonlinear system identification. We consider in detail a flexible reconfigurable circuit of a single nonlinear synapse of this network. When combining such circuits, single-layer or multilayer networks can be designed. The advantages of the proposed circuit come in the form of reduced redundancy, high data rate due to parallel operation, low power consumption, and an overall flexibility of system configuration.
The Role of Vitamin D in Inflammatory Bowel Disease

Vitamin D is known to be vital in maintaining bone health, mineralisation and for fracture prevention. It has also been implicated in a number of autoimmune diseases and has therefore been studied for its potential role in Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD). This review looks at the current literature on the role of vitamin D and its potential role as an immunomodulator, disease modifier and bone health in IBD patients. There is substantial supporting evidence of an important role from epidemiological, genetic and immunological studies, but there is also conflicting evidence and nothing proving to be definitive from clinical studies. There are also a number of confounders with IBD patients, as their lifestyles and medications may affect vitamin D levels. Murine studies have added vast amounts to our knowledge of vitamin D and its antimicrobial role, as well as its effect on immune cell proliferation other inflammatory molecules, such as Tumour Necrosis Factor-α (TNFα). It is clear that larger trials investigating the effects of oral supplementation of vitamin D in IBD patients are necessary.
Quantum chaos, localization and tunnelling: Microwave experiments on model geometries

Abstract Microwave experiments using two-dimensional billiard geometries are a precise test of basic issues in quantum chaos, localization and tunnelling. In closed chaotic geometries, analysis of eigenvalue statistics yields good agreement with random-matrix theory. A unique aspect of the experiments is the ability to measure eigenfunctions directly. The influence of periodic orbit scarring in chaotic eigenfunctions is directly demonstrated. Disordered microwave billiards are a textbook model system for studying the quantum properties of a single particle in a disordered potential. Localization is directly observed in eigenfunctions of the disordered billiards. Statistical properties of disordered eigenfunctions deviate from universal behaviour due to localization. These statistical properties are in good agreement with predictions from nonlinear-sigma models, although many challenges for further theoretical understanding remain. The experiments can also probe open systems, in terms of the quantum resonances and escape rate of a fractal repeller.
2 4 Ju l 2 00 1 Connections and curvings on lifting bundle gerbes

We construct a connection and a curving on a bundle gerbe associated with lifting a structure group of a principal bundle to a central extension. The construction is based on certain structures on the bundle, i.e. connections and reduced splittings. The Deligne cohomology class of the lifting bundle gerbe with the connection and with the curving coincides with the obstruction class of the lifting problem with these structures.
Labeling, Covering and Decomposing of Graphs — Smarandache’s Notion in Graph Theory

This paper surveys the applications of Smarandache's notion to graph theory appeared in International J.Math.Combin. from Vol.1,2008 to Vol.3,2009. In fact, many problems discussed in these papers are generalized in this paper. Topics covered in this paper include: (1)What is a Smarandache System? (2)Vertex-Edge Labeled Graphs with Applications: (i)Smarandachely k-constrained labeling of a graph; (ii)Smarandachely super m-mean graph; (iii)Smarandachely uniform k-graph; (iv)Smarandachely total coloring of a graph; (3)Covering and Decomposing of a Graph: (i)Smarandache path k-cover of a graph; (ii)Smarandache graphoidal tree d-cover of a graph; (4)Furthermore.
Parallel Proof Checking in Isabelle/Isar

We address the “multicore problem” for mathematical assistants with full proof checking, with special focus on Isabelle/Isar and its main SML platform Poly/ML. On the one hand, working with explicit definitions, statements, and proofs requires significant runtime resources, so the question of parallel checking is really relevant. On the other hand, the inherent structure of formal theories provides various possibilities for parallelism (both implicit and explicit), which is in fact an almost ideal situation. Exploiting this potential in practice requires to reconsider various aspects of the ML platform, the inference engine, and some higher prover specific layers. We report on an implementation of all that for Isabelle/Isar, and point out some general considerations for parallelism in functional programming, and other provers like Coq and HOL.
Filtrage particulaire marginalisé pour la poursuite multi-objets

Résumé – Nous nous intéressons dans cette communication au problème de ﬁltrage multi-objets dans le contexte des ensembles statistiques ﬁnis et du ﬁltre Probability Hypothesis Density (PHD), une fonction à valeurs réelles qui permet d’estimer à la fois le nombre d’objets et leur état caché. L’utilisation des méthodes de Monte Carlo Séquentielles (SMC) peut produire dans ce contexte des mauvais estimateurs du nombre d’objets et des états cachés inconnus si la dimension du vecteur d’état de chaque objet est importante. Pour pallier ce problème, nous proposons de combiner une méthode de marginalisation visant à réduire la variance des estimateurs considérés avec une méthode de tirage efﬁcace visant à guider les particules dans des régions de l’espace d’état où se trouvent probablement les états cachés. Abstract – In this paper, we focus on the multi-object ﬁltering problem via Random Finite Sets. In this context, the problem consists in propagating the Probability Hypothesis Density (PHD) function which enables to estimate the number of objects and the hidden states. The use of Sequential Monte Carlo (SMC) methods may lead to innacurate estimates when the dimension of the state vector is high. In order to cope with this issue, we combine a marginalisation technique to an efﬁcient sampling method which guides the particles in regions where the objects are likely to be present.
Experimental Human Glioblastomas Deaminase / 5-Fluorocytosine Gene Therapy Is Effective for Intratumoral 5-Fluorouracil Produced by Cytosine Updated Version

5-Fluorouracil (5-FU) is a potent antimetabolite used for chemotherapy of gastrointestinal (GI), breast, and head and neck malignancies. Although clinical trials have been conducted, the poor therapeutic index of 5-FU has precluded its clinical use for a number of other tumor types. It is unclear whether this lack of utility is due to problems with drug delivery or inherent insensitivity. Adenovirus (Ad) vector-mediated cytosine deaminase (CD)/5fluorocytosine (5-FC) gene therapy has the potential to overcome pharmacokinetic issues associated with systemic 5-FU and is particularly well suited to use with tumors in which local control is paramount, such as recurrent, localized prostate cancer and malignant gliomas. In this study, the in vitro response by a panel of human tumor cell lines derived from both GI (colon, pancreas) and non-GI (prostate, glioma) tumors to 5-FU and to AdCMVCD (an Ad encoding Escherichia coli CD)/5-FC was examined. Whereas the sensitivity (IC50) of individual cell lines to these agents varied, no significant difference in median IC50 for either 5-FU or AdCMVCD/5-FC was evident for the four tumor types tested (P > 0.1). The relevant contributions of Ad gene transfer efficiency and inherent 5-FU sensitivity in determining response to AdCMVCD/5-FC were then assessed. Multiple linear regression analysis revealed that whereas both factors significantly contribute to the response, inherent 5-FU sensitivity was substantially more important ( 0.78 versus 0.48; P < 0.001). Finally, the therapeutic efficacy of a single intratumoral injection of AdCMVCD followed by systemic 5-FC was assessed in three intracranial C.B17 severe combined immunodeficient mouse models of human glioma. AdCMVCD/5-FC efficacy was specific, virus dose-dependent, and closely paralleled in vitro 5-FU and CD/5-FC sensitivity in two of three models tested. These results reveal that glioma cells are as sensitive as GI tumor cells to the antineoplastic effects of 5-FU, identify inherent 5-FU sensitivity as an important factor in determining CD/5-FC efficacy, and confirm previous findings in rat models that demonstrate the potential clinical utility of AdCMVCD/5-FC gene therapy for gliomas.
Designing a blended teaching environment in higher education: A case study in statistics

This study focuses on a challenging area in designing the blended teaching strategies for enhancing student learning of a statistics subject at the university. Findings reveal that to design an effective blended and flexible learning (BFL) environment, educators need to understand learners’ attributes in detail, use appropriate pedagogical methods and teaching strategies, integrate different learning theories with technological and content knowledge, and align learning outcomes with teaching or learning activities and assessments. It also demonstrates a more holistic and state-of-the-art approach of BFL design in meeting the university’s goals towards offering BFL-based online education to the local and global students.
Anterior Overgrowth in Primary Curves, Compensatory Curves and Junctional Segments in Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis

Introduction Although much attention has been given to the global three-dimensional aspect of adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS), the accurate three-dimensional morphology of the primary and compensatory curves, as well as the intervening junctional segments, in the scoliotic spine has not been described before. Methods A unique series of 77 AIS patients with high-resolution CT scans of the spine, acquired for surgical planning purposes, were included and compared to 22 healthy controls. Non-idiopathic curves were excluded. Endplate segmentation and local longitudinal axis in endplate plane enabled semi-automatic geometric analysis of the complete three-dimensional morphology of the spine, taking inter-vertebral rotation, intra-vertebral torsion and coronal and sagittal tilt into account. Intraclass correlation coefficients for interobserver reliability were 0.98–1.00. Coronal deviation, axial rotation and the exact length discrepancies in the reconstructed sagittal plane, as defined per vertebra and disc, were analyzed for each primary and compensatory curve as well as for the junctional segments in-between. Results The anterior-posterior difference of spinal length, based on “true” anterior and posterior points on endplates, was +3.8% for thoracic and +9.4% for (thoraco)lumbar curves, while the junctional segments were almost straight. This differed significantly from control group thoracic kyphosis (-4.1%; P<0.001) and lumbar lordosis (+7.8%; P<0.001). For all primary as well as compensatory curves, we observed linear correlations between the coronal Cobb angle, axial rotation and the anterior-posterior length difference (r≥0.729 for thoracic curves; r≥0.485 for (thoraco)lumbar curves). Conclusions Excess anterior length of the spine in AIS has been described as a generalized growth disturbance, causing relative anterior spinal overgrowth. This study is the first to demonstrate that this anterior overgrowth is not a generalized phenomenon. It is confined to the primary as well as the compensatory curves, the junctional zones do not exhibit this growth discrepancy, however, they are straight.
Information Behavior of Electrical Engineering and Computing Doctoral Students and Their Perception of the Academic Library’s Role: A Case Study in Croatia

Abstract Th aim of the paper is to present findings of a study on information sources and information behavior of doctoral students at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing at the University of Zagreb, Croatia. The study also looked into student perceptions of the role of the academic library and their attitudes toward it as a legitimate partner in the research process, as doctoral students are required to publish the results of their doctoral research in high-ranking peer-reviewed journals during their course of study. However, they rarely use the library and its services; the study was undertaken with the intent to obtain insight into the students’ information behavior as well as needs and reasons for overlooking the library as a relevant partner in their research process. The online survey was conducted on a sample of 138 postgraduate students, with semi-structured interviews with five postgraduate students also conducted. The findings show a dominant student orientation towards online sources such as online databases and Google Scholar. Students tend to overlook the library as a relevant information source but have positive attitudes toward librarians (their knowledge, skills and courtesy). The library needs to become more active in promoting its services and, especially in the domain of postgraduate education, needs to be regarded as a necessary location for any serious research work, where librarians are regarded as cooperating partners in the research process. There were a few limitations of the study: respondents were unwilling to dedicate their time to this research and therefore the interviews were too short to examine the topics discussed in-depth, while the sample was extremely homogeneous, making the results only in part transferable to other contexts.
NMDA and non-NMDA receptor-mediated increase of c-fos mRNA in dentate gyrus neurons involves calcium influx via different routes

We examined the effects of selective agonists of ionotropic excitatory amino acid (EAA) receptor subtypes on induction of the immediate early gene c-fos. We used in situ hybridization to measure c-fos mRNA and fura-2 imaging to measure intracellular calcium (Ca2+i) in individual dentate gyrus neurons maintained in vitro. Activation of either NMDA or non-NMDA receptor subtypes is sufficient to induce the rapid and dramatic increase of c-fos mRNA. Activation of either NMDA or non-NMDA receptors also induces a rapid and dramatic increase of Ca2+i, effects blocked by the removal or chelation of extracellular calcium (Ca2+e). c- fos mRNA induction by either receptor subtype is Ca2+ dependent, since chelation of Ca2+e with EGTA prevents c-fos mRNA induction by both NMDA and non-NMDA receptor agonists. The increase in Ca2+i induced by activating non-NMDA receptors is inhibited either by removal of extracellular sodium (Na+e) or by the voltage-sensitive calcium channel (VSCC) blocker nifedipine. By contrast, the increase of Ca2+i induced by activating NMDA receptors is not inhibited by removal of Na+e or nifedipine. Consistent with these effects on Ca2+i, nifedipine inhibits induction of c-fos mRNA by non-NMDA, but not by NMDA, receptor agonists. These findings indicate that Ca2+ serves as a second messenger coupling ionotropic EAA receptors with transcriptional activation of c-fos mRNA. The route of Ca2+ entry into dentate neurons, however, depends on the EAA receptor subtype stimulated. Non-NMDA receptor activation results in Ca2+ influx indirectly via VSCCs, whereas NMDA receptor activation results in Ca2+ influx directly through the NMDA channel itself. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
MRTree: Functional Testing Based on MapReduce's Execution Behaviour

MapReduce is a paradigm that allows parallel processing of large amounts of data. MapReduce programs combined with their underlying run-time framework have distinctive features that are prone to include unexpected behaviors not present in other types of programs. This paper describes an approach to functional testing of MapReduce programs based on a hierarchical classification of a number of potential faults that may occur in MapReduce programs over Hadoop. This classification, called MRTree, is then used to derive test cases able to detect the faults represented in MRTree and illustrated with some examples.
Seasonality and Competition in Time : An Empirical Analysis of Release Date Decisions in the U . S . Motion Picture Industry

Strong seasonality in demand, a short product life cycle, and the absence of any price competition make the release date of first-run movies one of the main strategic decisions taken by movies’ distributors. These endogenous timing decisions, in turn, generate a strong seasonal pattern of release dates. Therefore, the observed seasonal pattern of sales is a combination of both seasonality in underlying demand and seasonal variation in the quality of movies released. In analyzing the strategic timing game over the release dates of movies one ought to take the endogeneity of release dates into account and break down the observed seasonal pattern of sales into these two component. The absence of good observable measures of product quality creates a difficulty in separately identifying the two layers of seasonal pattern. In this paper I identify these layers by estimating weekly demand for movies, using movie fixed-effects, a long panel of movies’ weekly revenues, and reasonable restrictions on their decay pattern. I find that the estimated seasonal effects in underlying demand are much smaller and quite different from the observed seasonal pattern of sales. I then use the demand estimates to construct and to structurally estimate a timing game played by distributors. The results suggest that the perceived (by distributors) seasonal pattern in underlying demand that rationalizes the observed release pattern is most closely related to the observed seasonal pattern of sales and not to the estimated underlying demand. This implies, for example, that distributors may significantly increase their revenues by pushing some of their Memorial Day releases to
Speaker Abstracts Poster Abstracts

One of the fundamental problems in neuroscience today is to understand how the activation of large populations of neurons give rise to the higher order functions of the brain including learning, memory, cognition, perception, action and ultimately conscious awareness. Electrophysiological recordings in behaving animals over the past forty years have revealed considerable information about what the firing patterns of single neurons encode in isolation, but it remains largely a mystery how collections of neurons interact to perform these functions. Recent technological advances have for the first time provided a glimpse into the global functioning of the brain. These technologies include functional magnetic resonance imaging, optical imaging methods including intrinsic, voltage-sensitive dye, and two-photon imaging, high-density electroencephalography and magnetoencephalography, and multi-microelectrode array electrophysiology. These technologies have expanded our knowledge of brain functioning beyond the single neuron level. At the same time, our understanding of how neuronal ensembles carry information has allowed the development of brain-machine interfaces (BMI) to enhance the capabilities of patients with sensory and motor deficits. Knowledge of how neuronal ensembles encode sensory stimuli has made it possible to develop perceptual BMIs for the hearing and visually impaired. Likewise, research in how neuronal ensembles decode motor intentions has resulted in motor BMIs by which people with severe motor disabilities can control external devices. There are three major goals of this conference. First and foremost, this conference is intended to bring scientific leaders from around the world to present their recent findings on the functioning of neuronal ensembles. A secondary goal of the conference is to provide an informal yet spectacular setting on Santorini in which conference attendees can discuss and share ideas outside of the presentations at the conference center. Third, this conference is the kick-off event for our long term project to form a systems neuroscience research institute within Greece. This institute will conduct state-of-the-art research, offer meetings and courses, and provide a center for visiting scientists from around the world to interact with Greek researchers and students.
Memristors for Hardware Security Applications

Memristors have recently been explored for hardware security applications such as true random number generators (TRNGs) and physical unclonable functions (PUFs). Several typical designs for memristor‐based PUFs and TRNGs are summarized. PUFs are a novel hardware security primitive utilizing the intrinsic randomness of a physical system, and PUFs have broad potential applications in key protection and authentication. Unlike most conventional PUFs based on manufacturing variations, memristors have both manufacturing variations and intrinsic randomness in their resistance‐switching mechanisms that can be utilized as entropy sources; for instance, device to device (D2D) variation and probabilistic switching behaviors. TRNGs are a cornerstone of hardware security and are widely used in secure chips and encryption protocols. Memristors have random telegraph noise (RTN) and cycle to cycle (C2C) variation characteristics that can be used for high‐quality TRNGs. Here, research progress in memristor‐based PUFs and TRNGs is reviewed, and how these sources of randomness are leveraged to generate security primitives is discussed.
Regulation of the Regulators: Post-Translational Modifications, Subcellular, and Spatiotemporal Distribution of Plant 14-3-3 Proteins

14-3-3 proteins bind to and modulate the activity of phosphorylated proteins that regulate a variety of metabolic processes in eukaryotes. Multiple 14-3-3 isoforms are expressed in most organisms and display redundancy in both sequence and function. Plants contain the largest number of 14-3-3 isoforms. For example, Arabidopsis thaliana contains thirteen 14-3-3 genes, each of which is expressed. Interest in the plant 14-3-3 field has swelled over the past decade, largely due to the vast number of possibilities for 14-3-3 metabolic regulation. As the field progresses, it is essential to understand these proteins' activities at both the spatiotemporal and subcellular levels. This review summarizes current knowledge of 14-3-3 proteins in plants, including 14-3-3 interactions, regulatory functions, isoform specificity, and post-translational modifications. We begin with a historical overview and structural analysis of 14-3-3 proteins, which describes the basic principles of 14-3-3 function, and then discuss interactions and regulatory effects of plant 14-3-3 proteins in specific tissues and subcellular compartments. We conclude with a summary of 14-3-3 phosphorylation and current knowledge of the functional effects of this modification in plants.