Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Script Based Approach for Interactive Multimedia Applications

This paper proposes an object oriented framework for scripting Interactive Multimedia Applications. Unlike other existing systems, the script (scenario) concept is central for the design since it handles the composition of the media objects both in spatial and temporal domains, the user interaction and system events. Moreover the proposed model incorporates an advanced scheme for complex composition in the temporal domain using a complete set of temporal operators defined in the framework. A sample application illustrates the potential of the proposed framework.
A hybrid Runge-Kutta convolution quadrature-temporal Galerkin approach to the solution of the time domain integral equations of electromagnetics

Implicit Runge-Kutta based convolution quadrature and temporal Galerkin approaches to the discretization of the time domain integral equations are combined to produce an accurate efficient solution approach. The underlying method is just the convolution quadrature approach itself, and is used to compute temporal interactions between proximal patches. More distant interactions are computed by a method that halts the dispersive effect of the CQ method, leaving in place a scheme that resembles a temporal Galerkin approach. The resulting scheme keeps the underlying order of accuracy equal to that of the implicit Runge-Kutta approach with the dispersion mitigated by the hybridization.
Semiparametric Estimation Of Regression Models For Panel Data

Linear models with error components are widely used to analyze panel data. Some applications of these models require knowledge of the probability densities of the error components. Existing methods handle this requirement by assuming that the densities belong to known parametric families of distributions (typically the normal distribution). This paper shows how to carry out nonparametric estimation of the densities of the error components, thereby avoiding the assumption that the densities belong to known parametric families. The nonparametric estimators are applied to an earnings model using data from the Current Population Survey. The model's transitory error component is not normally distributed. Use of the nonparametric density estimators yields estimates of the probability that individuals with low earnings will become high earners in the future that are much lower than the estimates obtained under the assumption of normally distributed error components. JEL Classification: C13, C14, C23
L-type calcium channel blocker suppresses calcineurin signal pathway and development of right ventricular hypertrophy.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Many studies have shown that L-type calcium channel blockers can prevent and treat right ventricular hypertrophy (RVH). In order to identify the mechanism, we investigated the role of the calcineurin signal pathway in the progression of RVH induced by chronic hypoxia and the effects of an L-type calcium channel blocker on the pathway. METHODS Rats were allocated to 1 of 3 groups (n=10 for each): chronic hypoxia group, amlodipine treatment group (30 mg/kg/day, administered via gavage); and control group. Rats in the amlodipine treatment group and the chronic hypoxia group were exposed to normobaric chronic hypoxia (9.5%-10.5% oxygen). We investigated the changes of right ventricle (RV) to left ventricle (LV) and interventricular septum (S) weight ratio [RV/(LV+S)], RV to body weight (BW) ratio (RV/BW), calcineurin A beta (CnAbeta) mRNA levels, cardiac myosin heavy chain beta (beta-MHC) mRNA levels and protein expression of CnAbeta, nuclear factor 3 of activated T cell (NFAT3), and beta-MHC. RESULTS After 21 days, RV/(LV+S) and RV/BW were significantly higher in the chronic hypoxia group than in the control group and the amlodipine group (p<0.01). The expression of CnAbeta mRNA and protein, NFAT3 protein, beta-MHC mRNA and protein in RV of the chronic hypoxia group was higher than that of the control group and the amlodipine treatment group (p<0.01). CONCLUSIONS The calcineurin signal pathway plays a critical role in the progression of RVH induced by chronic hypoxia. L-type calcium channel blockade suppresses the development of RVH by inhibiting this pathway.
Contribution of Subsaturating GABA Concentrations to IPSCs in Cultured Hippocampal Neurons

The time course of EPSCs and IPSCs is at least partly determined by the concentration profile of neurotransmitter acting on postsynaptic receptors. Several recent reports have suggested that the peak synaptic cleft concentration of the inhibitory neurotransmitter GABA likely reaches at least 500 μm, a level that saturates the GABAA receptor. In the course of investigating the experimental anticonvulsant 3,3-diethyl-2-pyrrolidinone (diethyl-lactam), we have observed an important contribution to IPSC decay by subsaturating concentrations of GABA. Diethyl-lactam augments currents elicited by the exogenous application of subsaturating concentrations of GABA in voltage-clamped, cultured hippocampal neurons and significantly prolongs the decay of autaptic IPSCs and miniature IPSCs in our cultures. In addition, diethyl-lactam potentiates currents in excised outside-out membrane patches elicited by the prolonged application of low concentrations of GABA. However, when patches are exposed to 1–2 msec pulses of 1 mm GABA, diethyl-lactam does not alter current decay. Tiagabine, which blocks GABA reuptake, does not prolong IPSCs, so it is unlikely that uptake inhibition accounts for the enhancement of IPSCs. EPSCs and miniature IPSC frequency are unaffected by diethyl-lactam, again consistent with a postsynaptic site of action. We propose that during an IPSC, a substantial number of postsynaptic receptors must be exposed to subsaturating concentrations of GABA. A simplified model of GABAA receptor kinetics can account for the effects of diethyl-lactam on exogenous GABA and IPSCs if diethyl-lactam has its main effect on the monoliganded states of the GABAAreceptor.
Extreme programming in the telecommunications domain

Extreme Programming (XP) is a lightweight methodology that is gaining industry acceptance and momentum. XP promises to reduce project risk, improve responsiveness to changing/vague requirements, and allow a system to grow naturally while at the same time facilitating an enjoyable development environment. XP consists of four values and twelve practices. This letter explores how well these values and practices can be applied in the telecommunications domain. © 2003 Lucent Technologies Inc.
Negotiation supports in a commodity trading market

Advanced electronic trading systems, such as the third phase of the TELCOT system, provide a negotiation mechanism for traders. The purpose of such a negotiation mechanism is to make the trading procedure more flexible. In principle, an electronic trading system establishes an environment in which traders select their partners based on posted trading terms such as product bid/offer prices, product attributes, and trading terms. Most trading systems, including the first and the second phases of the TELCOT system, assume that trading terms are fixed once they are posted by traders. The third phase of the TELCOT system, on the other hand, allows buyers to negotiate prices of sellers' products. As a result, the third phase of the TELCOT system increases the total volume of products traded in the market. However, its negotiation capacity is restricted in that a buyer can extend only one counter-offer to a seller and it does not provide any support functions such as the negotiation price estimation. Assuming the improvement of the third phase of the TELCOT system, we propose negotiation support functions of the elicitation of a buyer's preference on sellers and the estimation of negotiation prices. The preference elicitation is based on hierarchical constraint satisfaction, which is a technique of multi-constraint decision making. The negotiation price estimation function is proposed as a function of a buyer's and seller's price requirements, and the market quote.
Expansão térmica de nanotubos de carbono de duas camadas

The special properties of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have inspired researchers in many technological applications. Examples of macroscopic products that contain or are made of CNTs are tennis rackets, baseball bats, bicycle frames, lightweight wind turbine blades and boat hulls. In order to get more knowledge about the behavior of these products and materials, either to develop new applications or improve the actual ones, it is important to investigate the physical properties of individual CNTs in diverse situations. In this work, using tools of molecular dynamics simulations, we present three results for the coefficient of thermal expansion of the Double Walled CNTs (DWCNTs) (5.5)@(10,10) with and without defects. The types of defects considered here are carbon atoms at interstitial sites and sp connections between the walls of the (5,5)@(10,10) DWCNT. Our methods are, first, validated by the calculation of the coefficient of thermal expansion of the Single Walled CNT (SWCNT) (10,10) and the comparison of the result with that from the literature. We show that the coefficient of thermal expansion of the (5,5)@(10,10) DWCNT. This result is discussed in terms of the coefficient of thermal expansion of the diamond.
Impact Tension Damage Mechanism Analyses of Co-Woven-Knitted Composite from Hilbert–Huang Transform

The impact tensile behaviors of co-woven-knitted (CWK) composites were tested with split Hopkinson tension bar apparatus along 0°, 45°, and 90° directions under the strain rates from 1589 to 2586 s−1 and compared with that in quasi-static strain rate of 0.001 s−1. The impact tension damage mechanisms were analyzed in frequency domain with the Hibert–Huang transform (HHT) method. Specifically, the stress time histories curves of the CWK composite were transformed to find the frequency distributions for the different tension failure modes. It was found that thefailure mode of fiber breakages, fiber pull-out, resin cracks, and resin shear failurewere located at a specific frequency band. And also, the different failure modes under high strain rate loading are all located at the high frequency range. With such kind of HHT analyses, the damage mechanisms could be explored more precisely when combined with the observation results of the fractographs of the CWK composite under various strain rates.
Stabilization of quasi-passive pneumatic muscle walker

A passive dynamic walker can walk down a inclined floor without any actuators. When the passive dynamic walking is modified to use actuators, it is called "quasi-passive walking". This locomotion is efficient in energy consumption. In this study, a pneumatic muscle actuator is used for quasi-passive walking. It is more difficult to control the pneumatic actuator than the usual electric motor. One of the approaches to realize stable walking with pneumatic actuators is a design of the robot such that the dynamics of the robot are operated by simple controller. In this paper, a simple control law is proposed, and the relationship between input and output by real biped robot is observed. We also check the performance of the control by observing that the robot descends a small difference in level.
Interspecies Variation in the Fibroblast Distribution of the Anterior Cruciate Ligament

Background The future of the treatment of a ruptured anterior cruciate ligament is likely to involve cell-based therapies. These therapies are intrinsically dependent on the cellular distributions in the ligament. Thus, when selecting an animal model for testing of these new treatment methods, it is important to select a model that has similar cellular distributions to that of the normal human anterior cruciate ligament. Hypothesis There are interspecies differences in the histology of the anterior cruciate ligament. Study Design A descriptive histological study comparing the cell and vessel distribution of normal human anterior cruciate ligaments with that of 3 animal models and anterior cruciate ligaments from osteoarthritic human knees. Methods The histology of each of the anterior cruciate ligament sources was quantified in terms of cell number density, expression of α-smooth muscle actin, blood vessel density, and cell nuclear morphology using standardized histomorphometric techniques. Results The normal human anterior cruciate ligament was similar to the canine anterior cruciate ligament and the anterior cruciate ligament from patients with osteoarthritis with respect to cell density, blood vessel density, and cell nuclear shape. The normal anterior cruciate ligament had significantly fewer vessels than the bovine anterior cruciate ligament and rounder cells than the bovine and ovine anterior cruciate ligaments. Conclusions There is significant interspecies variation in the histology of the anterior cruciate ligament, with the canine anterior cruciate ligament most similar to the human anterior cruciate ligament. Clinical Relevance This finding may have an effect on the accuracy of testing of new, cell-based treatments for the ruptured anterior cruciate ligament, such as guided tissue regeneration.
A Study in Preference Elicitation under Uncertainty

In many areas of Artificial Intelligence (AI), we are interested in helping people make better decisions. This help can result in two advantages. First, computers can process large amounts of data and perform quick calculations, leading to better decisions. Second, if a user does not have to think about some decisions, they have more time to focus on other things they find important. Since users’ preferences are private, in order to make intelligent decisions, we need to elicit an accurate model of the users’ preferences for different outcomes. We are specifically interested in outcomes involving a degree of risk or uncertainty. A common goal in AI preference elicitation is minimizing regret, or loss of utility. We are often interested in minimax regret, or minimizing the worst-case regret. This thesis examines three important aspects of preference elicitation and minimax regret. First, the standard elicitation process in AI assumes users’ preferences follow the axioms of Expected Utility Theory (EUT). However, there is strong evidence from psychology that people may systematically deviate from EUT. Cumulative prospect theory (CPT) is an alternative model to expected utility theory which has been shown empirically to better explain humans’ decision-making in risky settings. We show that the standard elicitation process can be incompatible with CPT. We develop a new elicitation process that is compatible with both CPT and minimax regret. Second, since minimax regret focuses on the worst-case regret, minimax regret is often an overly cautious estimate of the actual regret. As a result, using minimax regret can often create an unnecessarily long elicitation process. We create a new measure of regret that can be a more accurate estimate of the actual regret. Our measurement of regret is especially well suited for eliciting preferences from multiple users. Finally, we examine issues of multiattribute preferences. Multiattribute preferences provide a natural way for people to reason about preferences. Unfortunately, in the worstcase, the complexity of a user’s preferences grows exponentially with respect to the number of attributes. Several models have been proposed to help create compact representations of multiattribute preferences. We compare both the worst-case and average-case relative compactness.
Geometric conservation laws for perfect Y-branched carbon nanotubes

Based on the integral theorems for mean curvature and Gauss curvature, geometric conservation laws for perfect Y-branched carbon nanotubes are presented. From the conservation laws, simple geometric regulations observed by spontaneous Y-branched carbon nanotubes are revealed, i.e. the angle between two neighbouring branches should be 120° and the radii of the three branches should be equal. These results coincide well with all experimental facts without exceptions. Possible applications of the geometric regulations to the design of super carbon nanostructures with self-similarities are predicted.
Gaining Perspective on What We've Lost: The Reliability of Encoded Anecdotes in Historical Ecology

Historical data are essential in fisheries management and conservation, especially for species that suffered significant population declines prior to ecological data collection. Within the field of historical marine ecology, studies have relied on anecdotal evidence, such as written accounts by explorers and interviews of different generations of resource users, to demonstrate the former abundance of certain species and the extent of their ranges. Yet, do we all agree on how these anecdotes are interpreted? This study examines the way that different people interpret anecdotes extracted from historical narratives. We outsource a survey to 50 randomly selected people using Amazon Mechanical Turk (www.mturk.com) and ask them to ‘code’ historical anecdotes based on their perceived abundance of species. We perform intercoder reliability tests to show that people's perceptions of historical anecdotes are generally consistent. The results speak to the reliability of using people's perceptions to acquire quantitative data, and provide novel insights into the use of anecdotal evidence to inform historical ecology.
Transmural Organization of the Arterial Media: The Lamellar Unit Revisited

When scanning electron micrographs of orthogonal transmural fracture surfaces of distended aortas were compared with appearances on corresponding semrthln light microscopic and ultrathln transmission electron microscopic sections, medial lamellar units could be resolved into composites of overlapping, musculo-elastlc fascicles lying parallel to tangential planes of section. Each fascicle consisted of a group of commonly oriented, elongated smooth muscle cells and an encompassing array of branching, similarly oriented elastic fibers. On longitudinal sections of straight segments of the aorta, fascicles appeared as closely packed, transversely transected smooth muscle cell groups within compartments formed by similarly transected elastic fibers. On transverse sections, fascicles appeared as groups of cells within cell strips or layers, each of which was bracketed on both its luminal and abluminal sides by straight elastic fibers. Fascicles were increasingly evident during growth as commonly oriented groups of cells within the already present concentric cell layers became demarcated by enlarging elastic fibers. Wavy collagen fiber bundles, distinct from the interlaced fibrils of the Immediate perlcellular matrix, were interposed mainly between the facing elastin systems within the fibrous regions between cell layers. Thus, the radial transmural disposition of cells and matrix fibers on transverse sections of the media in well developed aortas proved to be: elastln-cells-elastln – collagen bundles – elastln-cells-elastln – collagen bundles, etc. Medias of major branch arteries were also composed of musculo-elastic fascicles, but their encompassing elastic fiber systems were less prominent than In the aorta. In straight segments of aortas and arteries, fascicles were uniform In size at any given transmural level and oriented mainly clrcumferentially. At bends and branch points fascicles were smaller and less uniform in size and orientation. In relation to changes In vessel wall curvature, alignment of the fascicles was usually In the direction of presumed resultant tensile stress. The findings suggest that these subunits of medial organization correspond to the distribution and magnitude of tensile stresses.
Clonal Selection, Clonal Senescence, and Clonal Succession: The Evolution of the T Cell Response to Infection with a Persistent Virus1

We have analyzed the CD8+ T cell response to EBV and find that a larger primary burst size is associated with proportionally greater decay during the development of memory. Consequently, immunodominance and clonal dominance are less marked in memory than primary responses. An intuitive interpretation of this finding is that there is a limit to the number of cell divisions a T cell clone can undergo, and that the progeny of clones that have expanded massively during a primary immune response are more prone to die as a result of senescence. To test this hypothesis, we have derived a mathematical model of the response of different T cell clones of varying avidity for Ag in the primary and persistent phases of viral infection. When cellular survival and replication are linked to T cell avidity for Ag and Ag dose, then high-avidity T cells dominate both the primary and secondary responses. We then incorporated a limit in the number of cell divisions of individual T cell clones to test whether such a constraint could reproduce the observed association between cell division number and alterations in the contribution of clones to the response to persistent infection. Comparison of the model output with the experimental results obtained from primary and persistent EBV infection suggests that there is indeed a role for cellular senescence in shaping the immune response to persistent infection.
Detection of Disbond Growth in a Cyclically Loaded Bonded Composite Repair Patch Using Surface-mounted Piezoceramic Elements

This paper reports on an experimental study in which an array of surface-mounted lead zirconate titanate elements (PZT) are used for the in situ detection of disbond growth in a bonded composite repair patch. Two techniques are used to track the evolution of disbond growth: the transfer function method and the electromechanical impedance method. Both techniques were found to provide a reliable and robust basis for the detection of disbond growth. The results also demonstrate the importance of transducer placement relative to the disbond location as a factor in the sensitivity to disbond growth.
Invasion of the giant gravitons from Anti-de Sitter space

It has been known for some time that the AdS/CFT correspondence predicts a limit on the number of single particle states propagating on the compact spherical component of the AdS × S geometry. The limit is called the stringy exclusion principle. The physical origin of this effect has been obscure but it is usually thought of as a feature of very small distance physics. In this paper we will show that the stringy exclusion principle is due to a surprising large distance phenomenon. The massless single particle states become progressively less and less point-like as their angular momentum increases. In fact they blow up into spherical branes of increasing size. The exclusion principle is simply understood as the condition that the particle should not be bigger than the sphere that contains it.
Energy autonomous wireless filling detector

A wireless energy autonomous filling yarn detector for an air jet weaving machine has been designed, built and tested on an opto-mechanical mock-up of the weaving loom. The energy autonomous operation of the detector is sustained by a commercially available vibrational energy harvester which can deliver several mW to the sensor node. The sensor node relies on the combination of three main blocks: an optical detector, a microcontroller and a wireless transceiver. The first block is responsible for the detection of the filling yarn, the wireless transceiver for the communication with the base station integrated with the weaving machine controller, while the microcontroller supervises and regulates the overall system operation. The node has been designed and assembled selecting commercial off-the-shelf components among the most power efficient available on the market. In order to further limit the power consumption, the trigger to wake up the sensor and start a measurement relies on the same optical link used for the filling yarn detection. After a yarn detection, the system is configured to communicate the event to the base station and go back to sleep. It has been demonstrated that at a machine speed of 1500 rpm, the vibrational energy harvester can harvest a power of 11 mW while the sensor node board only consumes 2.5 mW on the average.