Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Wait-Free Consensus Using Asynchronous Hardware

This paper studies the wait-free consensus problem in the asynchronous shared memory model. In this model, processors communicate by shared registers that allow atomic read and write operations (but do not support atomic test-and-set). It is known that the wait-free consensus problem cannot be solved by deterministic protocols. A randomized solution is presented. This protocol is simple, constructive, tolerates up to $n-1$ processors crashes (where $n$ is the number of processors), and its expected run-time is $O(n^2)$.
LTE Network Enhancement for Vehicular Safety Communication

Direct vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) communications have been popularly considered for safe driving of manned or unmanned vehicles. The V2I communication is better than the V2V communication for propagating safety messages at critical regions like intersections where the safety messages must be delivered to surround vehicles with low latency and loss, since transmitters as infrastructure can have line of sight to the receiver vehicles and control wireless medium access in a centralized manner unlike V2V. Long-Term Evolution (LTE) cellular networks are rapidly deployed in the world with explosively increasing mobile traffic. As many automobile manufacturers choose LTE on-board devices for telematics, the LTE system can be utilized also for safety purposes instead of 802.11p/WAVE based roadside units (RSUs). Previous literatures have studied mostly current LTE system analysis in aspect of theoretical network capacity and end-to-end delay to investigate feasibility of V2I communication. In this paper, we propose new enhancement of a current LTE system specified by 3rd-Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) LTE standards while addressing major delay challenges. From simulation, we confirm that our three key solutions can reduce end-to-end delay effectively in the LTE system to satisfy requirements of safety message delivery.
Une étude rétrospective sur le cancer de l'ovaire avec un recul médian de 42 mois

Le cancer de l'ovaire est relativement fréquent mais grave et de mauvais pronostic. Le but de cette étude était de mettre en évidence les aspects épidémiologique, diagnostique, thérapeutique et évolutif de cette pathologie maligne prise en charge dans un pays en développement. Il s'agit d'une étude rétrospective et descriptive de 10 ans (2000- 2009) effectuée dans un CHU de chirurgie générale et d'Oncologie sur 62 patientes ayant développé un cancer de l'ovaire et opérées à visée curative. L’âge moyen des patientes était de 43 ans dont 53,23% avaient plus de 45 ans. Le dosage sanguin du CA-125 était positif chez 10 patientes sur 12. Les tumeurs étaient découvertes à l’échographie dans 87,10% des cas et à la laparotomie dans 12,90%. L'hystérectomie totale avec annexectomie bilatérale était l'intervention la plus pratiquée (64,52%). Les suites opératoires précoces étaient simples. Dix patientes étaient opérées de second regard (16,13%) pour des récidives locorégionales. Les tumeurs épithéliales étaient le type histologique le plus fréquent (93,55%) dont 79% au stade avancé (Ic-IV) et 21% au stade précoce (Ia-Ib). La chimiothérapie adjuvante était administrée chez 22,60% des patientes. Avec un recul médian de 42 mois, 29 patientes étaient perdues de vue. L’évolution était favorable dans 27,42% et dans 25,81% les décès se sont survenus en postopératoire tardif. Le cancer de l'ovaire n’était pas fréquent mais grave compte tenu des stades avancés et du taux élevé des décès postopératoires tardifs qui étaient largement observés chez les patientes privées d'une chimiothérapie adéquate.
Accurate calculations of phonon dispersion in CaF 2 and CeO 2

We report the lattice dynamic properties of CaF2 and CeO2 obtained using a direct method in combination of a mixed-space approach accounting for the vibration-induced dipole-dipole interactions. We overcame the overestimation of T1u TO mode shown in prior calculations using the linear response theory. For CaF2 ,w e employed the Perdew-Burke-Ernzerhof functional and achieved a significant improvement over previous linear response calculations by comparing the results with experimentally measured phonon dispersion curves. For CeO2, we adopted the Heyd-Scuseria-Ernzerhof hybrid functional and an elongated supercell and obtained results in excellent agreement with experimental measurements. We attributed the improved calculation results to the convenience of the direct method in implementing new exchange-correlation functionals and use of the mixed-space approach for treating the long-range dipole-dipole interactions. DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevB.88. 024304
Interleavers for turbo codes that yield a minimum distance growing with blocklength

This paper presents the study of interleavers that both use a reduced amount of random choice and moderate algebraic structure. The interleaver is essentially chosen at random among a family that produces quasicyclic turbo codes. A typical interleaver produces a turbo code with minimum distance log N. For moderate lengths these interleavers turn out to be also quite practical, comparing favorably with S-random interleavers in a number of instances.
Reinventing Foreign Aid for Inclusive and Sustainable Development: Kuznets, Piketty and the Great Policy Reversal

This survey essay reviews over 200 papers in arguing that in order to achieve sustainable and inclusive development, foreign aid should not orient developing countries towards industrialisation in the perspective of Kuznets but in the view of Piketty. Abandoning the former’s view that inequality will fall with progress in industrialisation and placing more emphasis on inequality in foreign aid policy will lead to more sustainable development outcomes. Inter alia: mitigate short-term poverty; address concerns of burgeoning population growth; train recipient governments on inclusive development; fight corruption and mismanagement and; avoid the shortfalls of celebrated Kuznets’ conjectures. We discuss how the essay addresses post-2015 development challenges and provide foreign aid policy instruments with which discussed objectives can be achieved. In summary, the essay provides useful policy measures to avoid past pitfalls. ‘Output may be growing, and yet the mass of the people may be becoming poorer’ (Lewis, 1955). ‘Lewis led all developing countries to water, proverbially speaking, some African countries have so far chosen not to drink’ (Amavilah, 2014). Piketty (2014) has led all developing countries to the stream again and a challenging policy syndrome of our time is how foreign aid can help them to drink.
The Zero-Root Property: Permanent vs Temporary Terms-of-Trade Shocks

In this contribution, we show that the persistence and the time of occurrence of a terms-of-trade shock matter in determining steady-state changes: (i) a strong persistent (temporary) terms-of-trade worsening induces a long-run decline in the real expenditure greater than after a permanent disturbance; (ii) an adverse permanent shift in the terms of trade raises the real expenditure in the long run if the shock is expected to occur in the distant future. Finally, according to whether a temporary terms-of-trade worsening is anticipated or not, the current account displays a monotonic or a nonmonotonic adjustment.
Determinants of the Willingness of Belgian Farmers to Participate in Agri-environmental Measures

This paper explores the willingness of Belgian farmers to participate in two voluntary agri‐environmental policies. Farmers' contingent behaviour is analysed on the basis of survey data. Derivations based on a conceptual micro‐economic model indicate that decision subject and decision maker characteristics are important for farmers' participation. The model is empirically tested through the specification and estimation of a probit model. Consistency is found between the theoretical framework and the empirical results indicating that both the expected effect on farm production and the farmers' environmental attitude, which is more positive among younger and better educated farmers, are significant determinants of the acceptance rate of agri‐environmental policies. Other variables which influence participation decisions are farm size and previous experience of farmers themselves or of neighbouring farmers with agri‐environmental measures.
Bad data detection by dynamic state estimation for the case of low redundancy of measurements

The paper presents a new approach to the validation of measurement which is based on the use of statistical information. Such information is presented by procedure of the dynamic state estimation. Dynamic state estimation makes it possible to take into account the interrelation among state variables changing in time. The method for validating the measurements is based on the fact that when the variance for the measurements in the state estimation problem is set incorrectly, the estimates will be little better, and in the case of a gross error even worse than the measurements themselves. Moreover, the statistics of the voltage vector estimates will not stabilize.
Mixed Pollutant Degradation by Methylosinus trichosporium OB3b Expressing either Soluble or Particulate Methane Monooxygenase: Can the Tortoise Beat the Hare?

ABSTRACT Methanotrophs have been widely investigated for in situ bioremediation due to their ubiquity and their ability to degrade halogenated hydrocarbons through the activity of methane monooxygenase (MMO). It has been speculated that cells expressing the soluble form of MMO (sMMO) are more efficient in cleaning up sites polluted with halogenated hydrocarbons due to its broader substrate range and relatively fast degradation rates compared cells expressing the other form of MMO, the particulate MMO (pMMO). To examine this issue, the biodegradation of mixtures of chlorinated solvents, i.e., trichloroethylene (TCE), trans-dichloroethylene (t-DCE), and vinyl chloride (VC), by Methylosinus trichosporium OB3b in the presence of methane using either form of MMO was investigated over longer time frames than those commonly used, i.e., days instead of hours. Growth of M. trichosporium OB3b along with pollutant degradation were monitored and analyzed using a simple comparative model developed from the Ω model created for analysis of the competitive binding of oxygen and carbon dioxide by ribulose bisphosphate carboxylase. From these findings, it appears that at concentrations of VC, t-DCE, and TCE greater than 10 μM each, methanotrophs expressing pMMO have a competitive advantage over cells expressing sMMO due to higher growth rates. Despite such an apparent growth advantage, pMMO-expressing cells degraded less of these substrates at these concentrations than sMMO-expressing cells during active growth. If the concentrations were increased to 100 μM, however, not only did pMMO-expressing cells grow faster, they degraded more of these pollutants and did so in a shorter amount of time. These findings suggest that the relative rates of growth substrate and pollutant degradation are important factors in determining which form of MMO should be considered for pollutant degradation.
Predictive Bayesian inference and dynamic treatment regimes

While optimal dynamic treatment regimes (DTRs) can be estimated without specification of a predictive model, a model‐based approach, combined with dynamic programming and Monte Carlo integration, enables direct probabilistic comparisons between the outcomes under the optimal DTR and alternative (dynamic or static) treatment regimes. The Bayesian predictive approach also circumvents problems related to frequentist estimators under the nonregular estimation problem. However, the model‐based approach is susceptible to misspecification, in particular of the “null‐paradox” type, which is due to the model parameters not having a direct causal interpretation in the presence of latent individual‐level characteristics. Because it is reasonable to insist on correct inferences under the null of no difference between the alternative treatment regimes, we discuss how to achieve this through a “null‐robust” reparametrization of the problem in a longitudinal setting. Since we argue that causal inference can be entirely understood as posterior predictive inference in a hypothetical population without covariate imbalances, we also discuss how controlling for confounding through inverse probability of treatment weighting can be justified and incorporated in the Bayesian setting.
The tyranny of scarcity: learning and economy at the construction site

This article investigates the interplay between learning and economy in the cooperation between participants from different professions on a construction site. From a situated perspective it is claimed that learning and economy are linked in two different ways: Firstly, it is argued that the participants have differing economic interests, which dynamically constitute the continual negotiations across professions. The economic interests are often contradictory to aspects of quality in the work, and it is claimed that learning involves the continual negotiation of this fundamental contradiction. Secondly, it is argued that the negotiations are carried out on the basis of an overall regulatory principle, which involves an economical logic based on reciprocal give-and-take relations between the different professions. In this way, issues of economy dynamically constitute and regulate practice. The conceptualisations are underpinned by qualitative interviews and participant observation from a construction site, and from a situated perspective it is suggested that issues of economy must be understood as preconditions for learning in the cooperation between different professions.
A Quantized Kernel Learning Algorithm Using a Minimum Kernel Risk-Sensitive Loss Criterion and Bilateral Gradient Technique

Recently, inspired by correntropy, kernel risk-sensitive loss (KRSL) has emerged as a novel nonlinear similarity measure defined in kernel space, which achieves a better computing performance. After applying the KRSL to adaptive filtering, the corresponding minimum kernel risk-sensitive loss (MKRSL) algorithm has been developed accordingly. However, MKRSL as a traditional kernel adaptive filter (KAF) method, generates a growing radial basis functional (RBF) network. In response to that limitation, through the use of online vector quantization (VQ) technique, this article proposes a novel KAF algorithm, named quantized MKRSL (QMKRSL) to curb the growth of the RBF network structure. Compared with other quantized methods, e.g., quantized kernel least mean square (QKLMS) and quantized kernel maximum correntropy (QKMC), the efficient performance surface makes QMKRSL converge faster and filter more accurately, while maintaining the robustness to outliers. Moreover, considering that QMKRSL using traditional gradient descent method may fail to make full use of the hidden information between the input and output spaces, we also propose an intensified QMKRSL using a bilateral gradient technique named QMKRSL_BG, in an effort to further improve filtering accuracy. Short-term chaotic time-series prediction experiments are conducted to demonstrate the satisfactory performance of our algorithms.
Enhanced obfuscation for multi-part biometric templates

Biometrie authentication is being exceedingly utilized into mobile devices as an alternative to passwords. However, for security and privacy reasons, it is important to protect the biometric template. In this paper, we introduce a method to obfuscate and match certain biometric templates comprised of multiple local descriptors derived around spatial interest points. Obfuscation starts by insertion of chaff (fake) interest points along with their respective synthesized descriptors that are statistically similar to original descriptors. Fusion of local matches along with global outlier rejection is used to mitigate the impact of the resulting obfuscation on biometric matching accuracy. The efficacy of the proposed method is demonstrated through ocular and face recognition experiments.
Searching for a Break in Gnp

It has been suggested that existing estimates of the long-run impact of a surprise move in income may have a substantial upward bias due to the presence of a trend break in post war U.S. GNP data. This paper shows that the statistical evidence does not warrant abandoning the no trend null hypothesis. A key part of the argument is that conventionally computed significance levels overstate the likelihood of the trend break alternative hypothesis. This is because they do not take into account that, in practice, the break date is chosen based on pre-test examination of the data.
Radiographic study of the upper cervical spine in the 22q11.2 deletion syndrome.

BACKGROUND The chromosome abnormality, deletion of 22q11.2, is one of the most common genetic syndromes. The 22q11.2 deletion syndrome encompasses a wide spectrum of abnormalities including cardiac, palate, and immunological anomalies. The purposes of the current study were (1) to define and determine the frequency of variations of the occiput and cervical spine on plain radiographs in patients with the 22q11.2 deletion syndrome and (2) to postulate the potential clinical importance of these variations. METHODS Seventy-nine consecutive patients with the 22q11.2 deletion underwent clinical and radiographic evaluation of the occiput and cervical spine. Radiographic studies included lateral plain radiographs of the cervical spine in neutral, flexion, and extension; anteroposterior radiographs; and open-mouth odontoid radiographs. RESULTS At least one developmental variation of the occiput or cervical spine was observed in every patient. The occipital variations were platybasia in fifty-two (91%) of the fifty-seven patients for whom data were available and basilar impression in two (3%) of the seventy-nine patients. The atlas variations were dysmorphic shape in fifty-nine (75%) of the seventy-nine patients, open posterior arch in forty-seven (59%) of the seventy-nine patients, and occipitalization in two (3%) of the seventy-one patients with adequate radiographs. The axis variations were dysmorphic dens in forty-six (58%) and upswept lamina and posterior elements or "C2 swoosh" in forty-seven (59%) of the seventy-nine patients. Of the seventy-one patients with adequate radiographs, twenty-four (34%) had fusion of C2-C3, fifteen (21%) had fusion of the posterior elements only, and nine (13%) had a complete block fusion. Increased segmental motion was observed in forty (56%) of the seventy-one patients. Thirteen (33%) of the forty patients had increased segmental motion at more than one level. Thirty-one patients (44%) had increased occipitoatlantal motion, seven (10%) had increased atlantoaxial motion, and four had increased C2-C3 motion. Eleven (15%) of the seventy-one patients had increased C3-C4 mobility, always adjacent to a fusion of C2-C3. CONCLUSIONS Variations of the upper cervical spine, including increased segmental motion, are common in the 22q11.2 deletion syndrome. It is premature to predict the clinical implications of these radiographic findings, but advanced imaging and further observation may be needed to clarify their clinical course.
Multi-echelon inventory management in supply chains with uncertain demand and lead times: Literature review from an operational research perspective

Abstract Historically, the echelons of the supply chain, warehouse, distributors, retailers, etc., have been managed independently, buffered by large inventories. Increasing competitive pressures and market globalization are forcing firms to develop supply chains that can quickly respond to customer needs. To remain competitive and decrease inventory, these firms must use multi-echelon inventory management interactively, while reducing operating costs and improving customer service. The current paper reviews the literature, addressing multiechelon inventory management in supply chains from 1996 to 2005. The behaviour of the papers against demand and lead-time uncertainty is the key analysis point of the literature review presented here and it is conducted from an operational research point of view. Finally, directions for future research are suggested.
A LONG‐RUN ANALYSIS OF DEFENCE SPENDING IN THE NATO COUNTRIES (1960–99)

This paper analyses the long‐run demand for defence output through a homogeneous treatment of 15 NATO member countries between 1960 and 1999. We carry out a progressive study of the interactions between either defence spending or defence burden and their main determinants: income, external threat and allied military spending. To that end, we use time‐series analysis with endogenously determined structural breaks. We further consider individual country functions related to one another through a common correlated effects method, in order to take into account explicitly the connections between members of an alliance.
A HARDWARE-ACCELERATED REAL-TIME IMAGE PROCESSING CONCEPT FOR HIGH-RESOLUTION EO SENSORS

Increasing the level of autonomy of systems demands confident controlling and task management units. To ensure a trusted system operation, several core capabilities have to be fulfilled: reliable sensing abilities, efficient data processing, and well-organised information dissemination. Dependent on the field of application, different types of sensors are required to meet the given operational tasks. In context of pattern recognition and object surveillance scenarios, electro-optical (EO) sensors offer superior sensing capabilities. Regarding to processing of high-resolution image data, real-time aspects represent one of the most challenging issues, especially in the domain of resource-limited, embedded systems. This paper presents a novel concept for hardware-accelerated computation of high-resolution EO sensor data using FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays). The concept focuses a complete integration of the image processing chain. Reconfigurable FPGA technologies combine the flexibility of general-purpose processors with the advantages of application-specific integrated circuits. We introduce two data processing approaches that utilise specific FPGA capabilities: data and task parallelisation. Data parallelisation reduces the amount of data to be treated by a discrete processing entity. Task parallelisation concatenates weak pattern detection methods to a strong detector. These strategies, used separately or combined, enable the conversion of sequential image processing chains to parallelised hardware design. The concepts in this paper improve the confidence of pattern recognition results significantly. At the same time, the computation speed increases, especially in comparison to microcontroller based processing units. This allows an energy-efficient realisation of complex high-resolution image processing tasks in resourcelimited, embedded environments.