Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Forecasting UK Industrial Production over the Business Cycle

This paper examines the information available through leading indicators for modelling and forecasting the UK quarterly index of production. Both linear and non-linear specifications are examined, with the latter being of the Markov-switching type as used in many recent business cycle applications. The Markov-switching models perform relatively poorly in forecasting the 1990s production recession, but a three-indicator linear specification does well. The leading indicator variables in this latter model include a short-term interest rate, the stock market dividend yield and the optimism balance from the quarterly CBI survey. Copyright © 2001 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
A Case for the One-offs: Improvisation and Innovation Within a Copper Age Potting Community

Unique objects are often poorly integrated into discussions about the social organization of production or technological processes. Often they are frustratingly interpreted as ritual or prestige objects, or they are simply consigned to footnotes in archaeological reports. This does not do them justice and their contextualization may provide greater insight into the social factors involved in production activities. This paper attempts to demonstrate what unique, or one-off, objects can tell us about technological systems and how improvisational technical choices can lead to innovation within society. It focuses on a particular example of pottery production and usage at the Copper Age site of San Blas (Spain) and how two particular vessels on the surface appear to be unique one-off products. This paper shows that one-off objects may in fact be opening the door to innovation through acts of improvisation within existing socially sanctioned production aesthetics and object ideals.
Detecting leak regions through model falsification

Pressurized fluid-distribution networks are strategic elements of infrastructure. In the case of fresh-water distribution networks, advanced sensor-based diagnostic methodologies have the potential to provide enhanced management support. Since a significant percentage of fresh water is lost globally due to leaks in these networks, the challenge to improve performance is compatible with goals of sustainable development. The scope of this research includes the diagnosis of water-distribution networks and more generally, pressurized fluid-distribution networks through development of model-based data-interpretation methods to assess performance. The strategy of model falsification is combined with network reduction techniques to obtain reliable and computationally efficient diagnoses. A case study involves the detection of leaks from an initial set of 263 leak scenarios. Preliminary results show that this methodology has the potential to detect leak regions, even with a small number of sensors.
Application Level Fault Tolerance in Heterogenous Networks of Workstations

We have explored methods for checkpointing and restarting processes within the distributed object migration environment (Dome), a C++ library of data parallel objects that are automatically distributed over heterogeneous networks of workstations (NOWs). System level checkpointing methods, although transparent to the user, were rejected because they lack support for heterogeneity. We have implemented application level checkpointing which places the checkpoint and restart mechanisms within Dome's C++ objects. Application level checkpointing has been implemented with a library-based technique for the programmer and a more transparent preprocessor-based technique. Dome's implementation of checkpointing successfully checkpoints and restarts processes on different numbers of machines and different architectures. Results from executing Dome programs across a NOW with realistic failure rates have been experimentally determined and are compared with theoretical results. The overhead of checkpointing is found to be low, while providing substantial decreases in expected runtime on realistic systems.
Nox1 Is Involved in Angiotensin II–Mediated Hypertension: A Study in Nox1-Deficient Mice

Background— Increased production of reactive oxygen species (ROSs) by angiotensin II (Ang II) is involved in the initiation and progression of cardiovascular diseases. NADPH oxidase is a major source of superoxide generated in vascular tissues. Although Nox1 has been identified in vascular smooth muscle cells as a new homolog of gp91phox (Nox2), a catalytic subunit of NADPH oxidase, the pathophysiological function of Nox1-derived ROSs has not been fully elucidated. To clarify the role of Nox1 in Ang II–mediated hypertension, we generated Nox1-deficient (−/Y) mice. Methods and Results— No difference in the baseline blood pressure was observed between Nox1+/Y and Nox1−/Y. Infusion of Ang II induced a significant increase in mean blood pressure, accompanied by augmented expression of Nox1 mRNA and superoxide production in the aorta of Nox1+/Y, whereas the elevation in blood pressure and production of superoxide were significantly blunted in Nox1−/Y. Conversely, the infusion of pressor as well as subpressor doses of Ang II did elicit marked hypertrophy in the thoracic aorta of Nox1−/Y similar to Nox1+/Y. Administration of a nitric oxide synthase inhibitor (L-NAME) to Nox1+/Y did not affect the Ang II–mediated increase in blood pressure, but it abolished the suppressed pressor response to Ang II in Nox1−/Y. Finally, endothelium-dependent relaxation and the level of cGMP in the isolated aorta were preserved in Nox1−/Y infused with Ang II. Conclusions— A pivotal role for ROSs derived from Nox1/NADPH oxidase was suggested in the pressor response to Ang II by reducing the bioavailability of nitric oxide.
Quasi-static image-based immersed boundary-finite element model of left ventricle under diastolic loading

Finite stress and strain analyses of the heart provide insight into the biomechanics of myocardial function and dysfunction. Herein, we describe progress toward dynamic patient‐specific models of the left ventricle using an immersed boundary (IB) method with a finite element (FE) structural mechanics model. We use a structure‐based hyperelastic strain‐energy function to describe the passive mechanics of the ventricular myocardium, a realistic anatomical geometry reconstructed from clinical magnetic resonance images of a healthy human heart, and a rule‐based fiber architecture. Numerical predictions of this IB/FE model are compared with results obtained by a commercial FE solver. We demonstrate that the IB/FE model yields results that are in good agreement with those of the conventional FE model under diastolic loading conditions, and the predictions of the LV model using either numerical method are shown to be consistent with previous computational and experimental data. These results are among the first to analyze the stress and strain predictions of IB models of ventricular mechanics, and they serve both to verify the IB/FE simulation framework and to validate the IB/FE model. Moreover, this work represents an important step toward using such models for fully dynamic fluid–structure interaction simulations of the heart. © 2014 The Authors. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Two-Layer Contractive Encodings with Linear Transformation of Perceptrons for Semi-Supervised Learning

It is difficult to train a multi-layer perceptron (MLP) when there are only a few labeled samples available. However, by pretraining an MLP with vast amount of unlabeled samples available, we may achieve better generalization performance. Schulz et al. (2012) showed that it is possible to pretrain an MLP in a less greedy way by utilizing the two-layer contractive encodings, however, with a cost of a more difficult optimization problem. On the other hand, Raiko et al. (2012) proposed a scheme for making the optimization problem much easier in deep networks. In this paper, we show that it is beneficial to combine these two approaches.
Users’ Perspectives on mHealth Self-Management of Bipolar Disorder: Qualitative Focus Group Study

Background Recent research indicates that current mHealth apps for bipolar disorders (BDs) show crucial shortcomings. They lack important functionality, are of inconsistent quality, and are insufficiently evidence-based. mHealth apps need to be better adapted to the needs of users. The perspectives of adult service users with BD regarding mHealth apps have not been well investigated. Objective The objective of this study was to examine the needs and expectations of adults with BD regarding mHealth apps. Methods Two focus group sessions were organized in which patients’ views on self-management and design and functionality of an mHealth app for BD were assessed. During session 1, four focus groups were organized to identify users’ needs regarding support for self-management. Session 2 contained three cocreation focus groups. Through this method, the desired functionality and design were explored. Results Participants indicated that they were in need of support in various ways. Not only support in psychoeducation, including daily routine, sleep pattern, maintaining social contacts, maintaining a healthy lifestyle, and avoidance of stimuli, was considered important for them but also gaining insight into their illness was found to be crucial. Conclusions According to the participants, their illness-related information is a key factor in gaining insight into their mood pattern. Participants wanted a functional design that would increase daily use and prevent overstimulation. The results of this study should be taken into account when developing new mHealth apps.
Mining Technology Landscape from Stack Overflow

The sheer number of available technologies and the complex relationships among them make it challenging to choose the right technologies for software projects. Developers often turn to online resources (e.g., expert articles and community answers) to get a good understanding of the technology landscape. Such online resources are primarily opinion-based and are often out of date. Furthermore, information is often scattered in many online resources, which has to be aggregated to have a big picture of the technology landscape. In this paper, we exploit the fact that Stack Overflow users tag their questions with the main technologies that the questions revolve around, and develop association rule mining and community detection techniques to mine technology landscape from Stack Overflow question tags. The mined technology landscape is represented in a graphical Technology Associative Network (TAN). Our empirical study shows that the mined TAN captures a wide range of technologies, the complex relationships among the technologies, and the trend of the technologies in the developers' discussions on Stack Overflow. We develop a website (https://graphofknowledge.appspot.com/) for the community to access and evaluate the mined technology landscape. The website visit statistics by Google Analytics shows the developers' general interests in our technology landscape service. We also report a small-scale user study to evaluate the potential usefulness of our tool.
Physiological and Psychological Effects of Rose ‘Wishing’ Flowers and Their Hydrosols on the Human Autonomic Nervous System and Mood State

Physiological and psychological effects of rose aromas have been reported. Many of these reports focused on the effect of rose essential oils, but the effect of rose fresh flowers on humans has not been sufficiently reported. We were also interested in the possibility of using rose hydrosol, a byproduct of the rose essential oil manufacturing process, for aromatherapy. In this study, the physiological and psychological effects of rose ‘Wishing’ fresh flowers and their hydrosols on humans were evaluated. R–R power spectral analysis of heart beats revealed the sedative effect of the fresh flowers’ scent. On the other hand, hydrosols did not show such an effect. Gas chromatography (GC) and GC-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis indicated the possibility that the sedative effect of the fresh flowers’ scent was derived from β-caryophyllene, phenylethyl acetate, and 3,5-dimethoxy toluene. It is possible that fresh rose flowers may be an alternative to rose essential oils in aromatherapy.
Improving location prediction services for new users with probabilistic latent semantic analysis

Location prediction systems that attempt to determine the mobility patterns of individuals in their daily lives have become increasingly common in recent years. Approaches to this prediction task include eigenvalue decomposition [5], non-linear time series analysis of arrival times [10], and variable order Markov models [1]. However, these approaches all assume sufficient sets of training data. For new users, by definition, this data is typically not available, leading to poor predictive performance. Given that mobility is a highly personal behaviour, this represents a significant barrier to entry. Against this background, we present a novel framework to enhance prediction using information about the mobility habits of existing users. At the core of the framework is a hierarchical Bayesian model, a type of probabilistic semantic analysis [7], representing the intuition that the temporal features of the new user's location habits are likely to be similar to those of an existing user in the system. We evaluate this framework on the real life location habits of 38 users in the Nokia Lausanne dataset, showing that accuracy is improved by 16%, relative to the state of the art, when predicting the next location of new users.
Carbon Dioxide Embolism During Laparoscopy: Effect of Insufflation Pressure in Pigs

Carbon dioxide embolism is a rare but potentially devastating complication of laparoscopy. To determine the effects of insufflation pressure on the mortality from carbon dioxide embolism, six swine had intravascular insufflation with carbon dioxide for 30 seconds using a Karl Storz insufflator at a flow rate of 35 mL/kg/min. The initial insufflation pressure was 15 mm Hg. Following recovery from the first embolism, intravascular insufflation using a pressure of 20 mm Hg at the same flow rate was performed in the surviving animals. Significantly less carbon dioxide (8.3 ± 2.7 versus 16.7 ± 3.9 ml/kg; p < 0.02) was insufflated intravascularly at 15 mm Hg than at 20 mm Hg pressure. All of the pigs insufflated at 15 mm Hg pressure with a flow rate of 35 mL/kg/min survived. In contrast, 4 of the 5 pigs insufflated at 20 mm Hg pressure died. The surviving pig died when insufflated with 25 mm Hg pressure following an embolism of 15.7 ml/kg. Intravascular injection was often associated with an initial rise in end-tidal carbon dioxide tension, followed by a rapid fall in all cases where the embolism proved fatal. Insufflation should be begun with a low pressure and a slow flow rate to limit the volume of gas embolized in the event of inadvertent venous cannulation. Insufflation should immediately be stopped if a sudden change in end-tidal carbon dioxide tension occurs.
Reproducibility, feasibility and validity of the Groningen Defecation and Fecal Continence questionnaires

Abstract Objectives: Current questionnaires on defecation disorders are often brief and fail to include questions considering causative factors. Furthermore, adult and pediatric questionnaires differ, which makes it impossible to monitor defecation disorders during the transition from childhood to adulthood. With these points in mind, we developed the Groningen Defecation and Fecal Continence (DeFeC) questionnaire and its pediatric equivalent, the P-DeFeC. The aim of this paper is to introduce the questionnaires and to assess their feasibility, reproducibility and validity. Materials and methods: Various Rome IV criteria and scoring tools for constipation and fecal incontinence were incorporated, resulting in nine categories. Feasibility and reproducibility were assessed by performing a test–retest survey in 100 adult participants. Concurrent validity was assessed in 27 patients and 18 healthy volunteers by comparing questionnaire-based diagnoses of constipation and fecal incontinence to final diagnoses based on anorectal function tests. Results: There were no remarks on the understandability of any questions. The Cohen’s kappa coefficient of all main questions ranged from 0.26 to 1.00, with an average of 0.57. All but one category showed moderate agreement or higher. The sensitivity of the questionnaire-based diagnosis of constipation was 75%; specificity was 100%. The sensitivity of the questionnaire-based diagnosis of fecal incontinence was 77%; specificity was 94%. Conclusions: Overall reproducibility of the Groningen DeFeC questionnaire is acceptable and its validity is good. This makes it a feasible screening tool for defecation disorders and, equally important, with these questionnaires defecation disorders can now be monitored during the transition from childhood to adulthood.
An Accessible Translation System between Simple Kannada and Tamil Sentences

A first level, rule based machine translation system has been designed and developed for words and simple sentences of the classical Dravidian language pair Kannada – Tamil. Both grammatical and colloquial translations are made available. One can also give English input and the system returns both Kannada and Tamil equivalents. With accessibility to the visually or hearing challenged as the focus, the system has an integrated Text-To-Speech system and also gives transliterated output in Roman script for both the languages. The system has been tested by 5 native users each of Tamil and Kannada for isolated words and sentences of length up to three words and found to be user friendly and acceptable. The system handles sentences of the types: greeting, introduction, enquiry, directions and other general ones useful for a new comer.
Area-specific development of distinct projection neuron subclasses is regulated by postnatal epigenetic modifications

During cortical development, the identity of major classes of long-distance projection neurons is established by the expression of molecular determinants, which become gradually restricted and mutually exclusive. However, the mechanisms by which projection neurons acquire their final properties during postnatal stages are still poorly understood. In this study, we show that the number of neurons co-expressing Ctip2 and Satb2, respectively involved in the early specification of subcerebral and callosal projection neurons, progressively increases after birth in the somatosensory cortex. Ctip2/Satb2 postnatal co-localization defines two distinct neuronal subclasses projecting either to the contralateral cortex or to the brainstem suggesting that Ctip2/Satb2 co-expression may refine their properties rather than determine their identity. Gain- and loss-of-function approaches reveal that the transcriptional adaptor Lmo4 drives this maturation program through modulation of epigenetic mechanisms in a time- and area-specific manner, thereby indicating that a previously unknown genetic program postnatally promotes the acquisition of final subtype-specific features. DOI: http://dx.doi. org/10.7554/eLife.09531. 001
Increasing the efficiency of accelerated knowledge sharing processes used for educating young software developers

The article approaches the subject of speeding-up the process of knowledge sharing and identifies elements that increase the efficiency of accelerating the educational process of young software developers. The focus of the article is on identifying elements that catalyze the process of knowledge sharing. The authors present a set of detailed practical results obtained while experimenting with an original knowledge sharing method applied for training young software developers in order to enable them to work for the world's most demanding IT companies. The main result of the article is a comparative analysis between a set of motivational factors tested experimentally.
Terahertz magnetoconductivity of excitons and electrons in quantum cascade structures

We examined the quasiparticles formed by the photoexcitation of GaAs/ AlGaAs terahertz quantum cascade structures using terahertz time-domain spectroscopy. At low temperature and excitation density the measured conductivity was excitonic, with a 1s-2p transition energy indicative of three-dimensional excitons correlated across the quantum well barriers. Free electrons increasingly dominated the conductive response at higher lattice temperatures and excitation densities. Under an external magnetic field transitions from the 1s level into 2p states with different magnetic quantum number were observed, while at high excitation densities the electron cyclotron resonance became more prominent.
The nerve supply of the human auricle

Knowledge of the innervation of the outer ear is crucial for surgery in this region. The aim of this study was to describe the system of the auricular nerve supply. On 14 ears of seven cadavers the complete course of the nerve supply was exposed and categorized. A heterogeneous distribution of two cranial branchial nerves and two somatic cervical nerves was found. At the lateral as well as the medial surface the great auricular nerve prevails. No region with triple innervation was found. Clin. Anat. 15:35–37, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
TOSCA-based clustering service for network function virtualization

Network function virtualization (NFV) is a promising solution for cost reduction, service agility, and scalability to cope with the dynamic changes of traffic volume and business requirements. In the NFV framework, management and orchestration framework (MANO) plays an important roles in the automated provisioning, configuration, lifecycle management, and high availability of virtual network functions (VNF). In order to achieve high availability and auto-scaling for VNFs, the MANO needs to integrate with cluster management service for scaling VNF in and out on demand basis. In this paper, we introduce an architecture which integrates clustering service into the MANO framework and define policies for cluster management in TOSCA template. Our architecture exploits policies-based cluster management and TOSCA service description template to provide the high availability and scalability to the NFV framework. We also shows our implementation using related open source projects.