Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
LSTM-based iterative mask estimation and post-processing for multi-channel speech enhancement

Recently, we propose an iterative mask estimation (IME) approach to improve the conventional complex Gaussian mixture model (CGMM) based beamforming and yield the best multi-channel speech recognition accuracy in CHiME-4 challenge. In this study, we focus on multi-channel speech enhancement and present a novel approach via long short-term memory (LSTM) based IME and post-processing. First, an LSTM is adopted to estimate the ideal ratio mask (IRM) to improve the mask estimated by a CGMM. Then, the improved mask is used to derive a beamformer. Finally, the IME-based beamformed speech is processed by the LSTM-based regression model. Experiments on the CHiME-4 simulation data show that LSTM-based IME approach can improve the PESQ performance comparing to unprocessed signals, with relative PESQ improvements of 17.33% and 13.89%, and the LSTM-based post-processing can further yield performance gains based on the IME approach, with relative PESQ improvements of 11.42% and 10.00% for 6-channel and 2-channel cases, respectively.
Air pollution as a risk factor in health impact assessments of a travel mode shift towards cycling

ABSTRACT Background: Promotion of active commuting provides substantial health and environmental benefits by influencing air pollution, physical activity, accidents, and noise. However, studies evaluating intervention and policies on a mode shift from motorized transport to cycling have estimated health impacts with varying validity and precision. Objective: To review and discuss the estimation of air pollution exposure and its impacts in health impact assessment studies of a shift in transport from cars to bicycles in order to guide future assessments. Methods: A systematic database search of PubMed was done primarily for articles published from January 2000 to May 2016 according to PRISMA guidelines. Results: We identified 18 studies of health impact assessment of change in transport mode. Most studies investigated future hypothetical scenarios of increased cycling. The impact on the general population was estimated using a comparative risk assessment approach in the majority of these studies, whereas some used previously published cost estimates. Air pollution exposure during cycling was estimated based on the ventilation rate, the pollutant concentration, and the trip duration. Most studies employed exposure-response functions from studies comparing background levels of fine particles between cities to estimate the health impacts of local traffic emissions. The effect of air pollution associated with increased cycling contributed small health benefits for the general population, and also only slightly increased risks associated with fine particle exposure among those who shifted to cycling. However, studies calculating health impacts based on exposure-response functions for ozone, black carbon or nitrogen oxides found larger effects attributed to changes in air pollution exposure. Conclusion: A large discrepancy between studies was observed due to different health impact assessment approaches, different assumptions for calculation of inhaled dose and different selection of dose-response functions. This kind of assessments would improve from more holistic approaches using more specific exposure-response functions.
Influence of GABA on gonadotrophin release in the goldfish.

The influence of GABA on pituitary gonadotrophin (GTH) release in the goldfish was studied by means of in vivo and in vitro techniques. It was found that GABA injected intraperitoneally caused an increase of serum GTH levels in regressed or early maturing fish, but not in late maturing animals. Moreover, injection of a GABA transaminase inhibitor caused a significant increase of GABA within the hypothalamus and pituitary, and a dose-dependent increase in serum GTH levels. To determine if this effect could be exerted directly at the level of the pituitary, dispersed pituitary cells in static incubation or in perifusion were exposed to increasing concentrations of GABA or its agonists muscimol and baclofen. None of these drugs was able to modify the spontaneous or GnRH-induced secretion of GTH, indicating that the in vivo effect of GABA was most likely mediated via another hypothalamic factor. Using in vitro incubation of pituitary slices, it was found that GABA caused a dose-related stimulation of GnRH release at the level of the pituitary, providing a possible explanation for the observed in vivo stimulatory effect of GABA on GTH release. Since the seasonal effect of GABA in vivo indicated a possible interaction of GABA with sexual steroids, GABA was given intraperitoneally to female goldfish implanted with either testosterone or estradiol. We found that the stimulatory effect of GABA on GTH release was abolished in estradiol-treated females but was still observed in testosterone-implanted fish. Moreover, estradiol but not testosterone caused a decrease of the GABA concentration within the telencephalon. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
LSSS Matrix-Based Attribute-Based Encryption on Lattices

Attribute-Based Encryption (ABE) schemes show unprecedented flexibility and expressiveness through the introduction of access policies. Compared to ABE schemes for thresholds or circuits from lattices, Linear Secret Sharing Schemes (LSSS) matrix-based ABE is more difficult to design for its abstract mathematical structure. We propose an ABE scheme for LSSS matrix from lattices in this work. The prior lattice-based ABE scheme for LSSS matrix constructed a large virtual encryption matrix to embed the LSSS matrix in secret key. We use a completely different but common method in lattice-based encryption schemes to achieve the same task. Moreover, we prove that our scheme is secure against chosen plaintext attack in the selective security model under the Learning with Errors (LWE) assumptions.
Three-Phase Quasi-Z-Source Inverter With Constant Common-Mode Voltage for Photovoltaic Application

In trasformerless grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) systems, common-mode voltage (CMV) fluctuations cause leakage current flow through the stray capacitance of the PV panels. Shoot-through states in a quasi-Z-source inverter (q-ZSI) increase the amplitude of high-order harmonics of CMV. In this paper, by using the modulation technique based on odd pulse width modulation and minor change in the Z network of the three-phase q-ZSI, the leakage current is blocked. No extra semiconductor element is added. By the proposed technique, CMV is kept nearly constant during switching cycles. The experimental results for CMV analysis in a $\text{1}\;{\text{kW}}$ prototype are presented to verify the theoretical analysis.
Villi-specific Gene Expression Reveals Novel Prognostic Biomarkers in Multiple Human Cancers

Despite many striking connections, the biological similarities between embryonic development and tumorigenesis have not been well explored. Development of the placental villi is a crucial process involving many cellular activities, including immunity, proliferation, and cell adhesion. In this study, we designed a strategy to identify the gene expression pattern of villi development and to explore the corresponding features in tumors. We discovered villi-specific genes that are highly expressed in the villus as opposed to the mature placenta and then measured the expression levels of these genes in tumors. We found large changes in the expression of villi-specific genes in multiple types of cancer. These villi-specific genes showed distinct expression patterns and were primarily involved in three biological processes: immune-related (5), proliferation-related (6), and focal adhesion-related (8); these genes were extracted from the corresponding enriched Gene Ontology (GO) terms. We observed that these genes were also dysregulated at the transcriptional level across several tumor types. Moreover, the expression of these three gene groups was associated with poor prognosis in a subset of tumors. Based on villi-specific gene expression, this correlation study indicated the existence of common gene expression patterns between embryonic development and tumorigenesis. Therefore, a systematic analysis of villi-specific gene aberrations in various tumors could serve as an indicator for identifying novel prognostic biomarkers.
The Applicability of RFID for Indoor Localization

Although RFID has a relatively long history of more than 50 years in the field of wireless communications, only the last decade it has received a considerable attention for becoming a useful general purpose technology. Actually, RFID was initially developed as an automatic identification system consisting of two basic component types, a reader and a tag (Want, 2006). The reader is able to read the IDs of tags in its vicinity by running a simple link-layer protocol over the wireless channel. RFID tags can be either active or passive depending on whether they are powered by battery or not, respectively. Passive tags are prevalent in supply chain management as they do not need a battery to operate. This makes their lifetime large and cost negligible. The low cost of passive tags, the non-LOS requirement, the simultaneous reading of multiple tags and the reduced sensitivity regarding user orientation motivated the academia and industry for exploring its potentials in more intelligent applications Baudin & Rao (2005). This chapter studies whether an RFID deployment can be applied for the purpose of indoor localization. It is widely accepted that location awareness is an indispensable component of the future ubiquitous and mobile networks and therefore efficient location systems are mandatory for the success of the upcoming era of pervasive computing. However, while determining the location of objects in outdoor environments has been extensively studied and addressed with technologies such as the Global Positioning System (GPS) (Wellenhoff et al., 1997), the localization problem for indoor radio propagation environments is recognized to be very challenging, mainly due to the presence of severemulti-path and shadow fading. The key properties of RFID motivated the research over RFID-based positioning schemes. Correlating tag IDs with their location coordinates is the principle concept for their realization. Though RFID offers promising benefits for accurate and fast tracking, there are some technology challenges that need to be addressed and overcome in order to fully exploit its potential. Indeed, the main shortcoming of RFID is considered the interference problem among its components, mainly due to the limited capabilities of the passive tags and the inability of communication between readers (GP & SW, 2008). There are three main types of RFID interference. The first one is due to the responses of multiple tags to a single reader’s query, the second is related to the queries of multiple readers to a single tag and finally, the third is due to the low signal power of weak tag responses compared to the stronger neighbor readers’ transmissions. The first type affects the time response of the system, whereas the other two reduce the positioning accuracy. In addition, interference from non-conductive materials such as metal or glass imposes one more concern regarding the appropriateness of RFID for widespread deployment. 11
EFFECT OF CUTTING SPEED AND SURFACE CHEMISTRY OF CUTTING TOOLS ON THE FORMATION OF BUL OR BUE AND SURFACE QUALITY OF THE GENERATED SURFACE IN DRY TURNING OF AA6005 ALUMINIUM ALLOY

In the present investigation, AA6005 (ISO: AlSiMg) alloy was machined in turning operation with different cutting tools, such as uncoated cemented carbide insert, PVD TiN coated, CVD diamond coated and PCD insert, under dry environment. Effect of cutting speed was studied for each of the cutting tools with regard to the formation of built-up layer (BUL) or built-up edge (BUE). The rake surface of the tools was characterized by optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) spectroscopic microanalysis. Particular emphasis was given on wear mechanism of PVD TiN coated insert, conventionally used in machining ferrous alloys, during dry turning of AA6005 alloy. It has been observed that increase of cutting speed from 200 m/min to as high as 1000 m/min could not substantially reduce formation of BUL over tool rake surface during dry machining of AA6005 alloy with uncoated or PVD TiN coated cemented carbide inserts. The potential of diamond-based tools in dry machining of aluminium alloy was also studied. Finally, the effect of cutting speed on surface finish of the workpiece machined with different cutting tools was studied during dry turning of AA6005 alloy.
Propagation of short fatigue cracks

AbstractFatigue crack propagation in engineering materials has been the subject of considerable research, and extensive review articles have appeared over the past several years. Most of these investigations focused on the behaviour of ‘long’ fatigue cracks, even though the characteristics associated with the extension of small cracks in metals and alloys remain relatively unexplored, despite their unquestionable importance from an engineering standpoint. In this review, the mechanics and micromechanisms of the subcritical growth of short fatigue cracks are examined, and aspects of their propagation behaviour are contrasted with those of long cracks in terms of fracture mechanics, microstructure, and environment. Cracks are defined as being short (i) when their length is small compared to relevant microstructural dimensions (a continuum mechanics limitation), (ii) when their length is small compared to the scale of local plasticity (a linear elastic fracture mechanics limitation), or (iii) when they are s.
Bandwidth Widening of Piezoelectric Cantilever Beam Arrays by Mass-Tip Tuning for Low-Frequency Vibration Energy Harvesting

Wireless sensor networks usually rely on internal permanent or rechargeable batteries as a power supply, causing high maintenance efforts. An alternative solution is to supply the entire system by harvesting the ambient energy, for example, by transducing ambient vibrations into electric energy by virtue of the piezoelectric effect. The purpose of this paper is to present a simple engineering approach for the bandwidth optimization of vibration energy harvesting systems comprising multiple piezoelectric cantilevers (PECs). The frequency tuning of a particular cantilever is achieved by changing the tip mass. It is shown that the bandwidth enhancement by mass tuning is limited and requires several PECs with close resonance frequencies. At a fixed frequency detuning between subsequent PECs, the achievable bandwidth shows a saturation behavior as a function of the number of cantilevers used. Since the resonance frequency of each PEC is different, the output voltages at a particular excitation frequency have different amplitudes and phases. A simple power-transfer circuit where several PECs with an individual full wave bridge rectifier are connected in parallel allows one to extract the electrical power close to the theoretical maximum excluding the diode losses. The experiments performed on two- and three-PEC arrays show reasonable agreement with simulations and demonstrate that this power-transfer circuit additionally influences the frequency dependence of the harvested electrical power.
Assessing the role of Ku 70 vWA domain phosphorylation in the inhibition of Aurora B and activation of the DNA damage response

Ku is a key component of the Non-Homologous End Joining DNA repair pathway. Recently, a function for Ku in DNA damage response (DDR) signalling was identified through studies exploring a Ku70 S155D phosphomimetic mutant. We hypothesize that Ku70 S155D mimics phosphorylation of Ku70 in response to DNA damage, and that Ku S155 phosphorylation inhibits Aurora B leading to sustained DDR activation. In this study we show that the S155D mutant is competent for heterodimerization, and its expression does not induce DNA damage. Phosphorylated Ku70 associates with Aurora B by co-immunoprecipitation and this association was demonstrated in situ with Ku70 S155D. Additionally, we demonstrate that the Ku70 S155D vWA domain is sufficient to inhibit Aurora B in an in vitro kinase assay. Finally, Aurora B inhibitor treatment of Ku70 S155D cells does not increase the prevalence of a DDR marker γH2AX. This work suggests that Ku70 S155 phosphorylation inhibits Aurora B which in turn leads to DDR activation.
TEM observation of oxide scale formed on a Ti–Al–Zr alloy oxidized at 360°C in alkaline steam

Ti–Al–Zr alloy has been oxidized at 360°C in alkaline steam at a pressure of 10.3 ± 0.7 MPa. Cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observations indicated that the oxide scale of Ti–Al–Zr alloy was composed of outer and inner subscales, in which the outer layer consists of anatase-TiO2 and the inner layer a mixture of TiO and Ti2O. The thickness of the Ti2O, TiO and anatase-TiO2 were approximately 50, 100 and 400 nm, respectively. These results were confirmed by X-ray energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS) measurements. The enhanced corrosion of titanium alloys in LiOH solution is attributed to a high hexagonal Ti2O to tetragonal TiO2 phase transformation rate induced by the substitution of Li+ for Ti4+ in the oxide layer.
Natural auditory sensitivities as universal determiners of phonemic contrasts

Are there acoustic invariants that mediate the perception of phonemes? If there were, they might be shared by a number of languages. But this acoustic-phonemic relationship does not occur in a simple way for any of the languages that have been examined. Has, then, such an approach to speech perception been abandoned? Not entirely; some theorists argue that there are invariant acoustic properties which occur whatever context a phoneme is spoken in. On the other hand, some have considered that the speech signal is inherently variable and the invariant relations only occur at higher levels of processing (Liberman et al. 1967; Liberman and Studdert-Kennedy 1978). Stevens has been the main protagonist of the view that the signal contains invariant acoustic correlates of phonemic categories (Stevens 1975, 1981; Stevens and Klatt 1976; Halle and Stevens 1980). He has considered all the problems that need to be accounted for by a theory which holds that acoustic invariants exist in the signal — how these invariant relations arise in speech production, what factors make it difficult to isolate them from acoustic records, and what evidence there is that these acoustic relations are used for the purpose of perceiving phonemic categories. Other workers have taken a similar theoretical line in explaining phonemic perception. For example, Kuhl and Miller (1975) have reported that chinchillas label synthetic speech in a remarkably similar way to English-speaking humans. This finding has been interpreted as showing that the animals are responding to acoustic factors in these sounds which underlie the phoneme categories common to the languages of the world. In this chapter we will assess whether invariant auditory factors can mediate perception of phonemic categories within and across the world's languages. The invariant acoustic factors associated with phonemes are supposed to give rise to the phenomena of categorical perception whether it occurs in human or other mammalian
ULTI-DIMENSIONAL A CTION S PACE

This paper considers entropy bonus, which is used to encourage exploration in policy gradient. In the case of high-dimensional action spaces, calculating the entropy and its gradient requires enumerating all the actions in the action space and running forward and backpropagation for each action, which may be computationally infeasible. We develop several novel unbiased estimators for the entropy bonus and its gradient. We apply these estimators to several models for the parameterized policies, including Independent Sampling, CommNet, Autoregressive with Modified MDP, and Autoregressive with LSTM. Finally, we test our algorithms on a multi-hunter multi-rabbit grid environment. The results show that our entropy estimators substantially improve performance with marginal additional computational cost.
Two-photon fluorescence and confocal reflected light imaging of thick tissue structures

The technology of two-photon excitation has opened a window of opportunity for developing non-invasive medical diagnostic tools capable of monitoring thick tissue biochemical states. Using cellular endogenous chromophores, (beta) -nicotinamide- adenine dinucleotide phosphate [NAD(P)H], the cellular metabolic rates in living human skin were determined. Although important functional information can be obtained from the fluorescence spectroscopy of endogenous chromophores, these chromophores are rather poor contrast enhancing agent for mapping cellular morphology. First, most endogenous chromophores are confined to the cellular cytoplasm which prevents the visualization of other cellular organelles. Second, there is significant variability in the distribution and the quantum yield of endogenous chromophores which depends on tissue biochemistry but prevents consistent comparison of cellular morphology. On the other hand, the deep tissue cellular morphology has been imaged with excellent resolution using reflected light confocal microscopy. In reflected light microscopy, the image contrast originates from the index of refraction differences of the cellular structures. The organelle boundaries with significant index differences such as the plasma membrane and the nucleus envelope can be consistently visualized. A combination of morphological and functional information is required for a thorough tissue study. This presentation describes the development of a new microscope which is capable of simultaneously collecting both two-photon fluorescence and confocal reflected light signals. Promising biomedical applications include the non-invasive diagnosis of skin cancer and the study of wound healing.
Out-distribution training confers robustness to deep neural networks

The easiness at which adversarial instances can be generated in deep neural networks raises some fundamental questions on their functioning and concerns on their use in critical systems. In this paper, we draw a connection between over-generalization and adversaries: a possible cause of adversaries lies in models designed to make decisions all over the input space, leading to inappropriate high-confidence decisions in parts of the input space not represented in the training set. We empirically show an augmented neural network, which is not trained on any types of adversaries, can increase the robustness by detecting black-box one-step adversaries, i.e. assimilated to out-distribution samples, and making generation of white-box one-step adversaries harder.
Learning and Hierarchies in Service Systems

Motivated by diverse application areas such as healthcare, call centers, and crowdsourcing, we consider the design and operation of service systems that process tasks with types that are ex ante unknown, and employ servers with different skill sets. Our benchmark model involves two types of tasks, Easy and Hard, and servers that are either Junior or Senior in their abilities. The service provider determines a resource allocation policy, i.e., how to assign tasks to servers over time, with the goal of maximizing the system’s long-term throughput. Information about a task’s type can only be obtained while serving it. In particular, the more time a Junior server spends on a task without service completion, the higher her belief that the task is Hard and thus needs to be rerouted to a Senior server. This interplay between service time and task-type uncertainty implies that the system’s resource allocation policy and staffing levels implicitly determine how the provider prioritizes between learning and actuall.