Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Scheduling real-time workflow on MapReduce-based cloud

As a popular programming model in cloud-based data processing environment, MapReduce and its open source implementation Hadoop, are widely applied both in industry and academic researches. A key challenge in MapReduce-based cloud is the ability to automatically control resource allocations to real-time workflows for achieving their custom-defined deadlines. Current researches on deadline-related MapReduce schedulers only support soft real-time scheduling, where the extension of the deadline is allowed. In this paper, the hard real-time scheduling problem with a strict deadline on MapReduce-based cloud is studied. We propose a SPS scheduler that can guarantee job completion time before the specified deadline for real-time workflows. SPS supports job preemption with low context-switch overhead so that it can make online scheduling decision when workflows randomly arrive in cloud. Experiments on Hadoop show that SPS effectively meets the deadline constraint even if the workflow demands exceed the cluster resources.
A four-dimensional motion field atlas of the tongue from tagged and cine magnetic resonance imaging

Representation of human tongue motion using three-dimensional vector fields over time can be used to better understand tongue function during speech, swallowing, and other lingual behaviors. To characterize the inter-subject variability of the tongue’s shape and motion of a population carrying out one of these functions it is desirable to build a statistical model of the four-dimensional (4D) tongue. In this paper, we propose a method to construct a spatio-temporal atlas of tongue motion using magnetic resonance (MR) images acquired from fourteen healthy human subjects. First, cine MR images revealing the anatomical features of the tongue are used to construct a 4D intensity image atlas. Second, tagged MR images acquired to capture internal motion are used to compute a dense motion field at each time frame using a phase-based motion tracking method. Third, motion fields from each subject are pulled back to the cine atlas space using the deformation fields computed during the cine atlas construction. Finally, a spatio-temporal motion field atlas is created to show a sequence of mean motion fields and their inter-subject variation. The quality of the atlas was evaluated by deforming cine images in the atlas space. Comparison between deformed and original cine images showed high correspondence. The proposed method provides a quantitative representation to observe the commonality and variability of the tongue motion field for the first time, and shows potential in evaluation of common properties such as strains and other tensors based on motion fields.
ReLauncher: Crowdsourcing Micro-Tasks Runtime Controller

Task execution timeliness, i.e., the completion of a task within a given time frame, is a known open issue in crowdsourcing. While running tasks on crowdsourcing platforms a requester experiences long tails in execution caused by abandoned assignments (those left by workers unfinished), which become available for other workers only after some expiration time (e.g., 30 minutes in CrowdFlower). These abandoned assignments result in significant delays and a poor predictability of the overall task execution time. In this paper, we propose an approach and an implementation called ReLauncher to identify such abandoned assignments and relaunch them for other workers. We evaluate our implementation with an experiment on CrowdFlower that provides substantive evidence for a significant execution speed improvement with an average extra cost of about 10%.
The mass production of celebrity

In Understanding Celebrity, I coined the term ‘the demotic turn’ as a means of characterizing the increasing production of ‘ordinary’ celebrities through reality TV and DIY celebrity websites. Refusing the idea that this necessarily constituted a democratizing process - hence the term ‘demotic’ - I wanted to examine the role that the access to mass-mediated fame plays within the construction of cultural identities. In this article, I develop this idea a little further by asking whether the shrinking distance between TV and ‘reality’, and between the famous and the ‘ordinary’, means that we need to reconsider our understandings of what kind of cultural apparatus the media has become.
Reduction of stimulus artifact in somatosensory evoked potentials: segmented versus subthreshold training

A new approach to stimulus artifact cancellation is introduced, which attempts to model the process of stimulus artifact generation. This is done by training an estimator with multiple exemplars of the stimulus artifact at levels below the threshold of evoked response stimulation. Two estimators are formulated: one using a dynamic neural network and another using a linear estimator. The performance of these new approaches is compared to the segmented training approach, which has been previously demonstrated to be one of the most capable methods available. Performance assessment is carried out using a novel metric introduced in this paper, which focuses upon the relevant portion of the recorded waveform. The new cancellation schemes show distinct performance advantages over the segmented training approach.
The effect of customers' emotional responses to service failures on their recovery effort evaluations and satisfaction judgments

This study examines the role of customer emotions in the context of service failure and recovery encounters. It investigates how customers' emotional responses to service failures influence their satisfaction judgments after accounting for cognitive antecedents of satisfaction. The study also considers how customers' emotional responses to service failures influence how they evaluate an organization's recovery efforts. The research is conducted by surveying customers about their satisfaction judgments in two service settings, restaurants and hotels. The results suggest that customers' emotional responses to service failures will influence their recovery effort evaluations and satisfaction judgments in some circumstances and that the effects of emotion vary across industry settings. This study identifies the types of efforts that are most effective in helping customers “recover” from the negative emotions caused by service failures.
Emotions : Essays on Emotion Theory

Contents: S.H. M. van Goozen, Overview. Part I:Energetic and Structural Aspects of Emotion. R.B. Zajonc, Emotions and Brain Temperature. Modulation. J.A. Gray, The Neuropsychology of the Emotions: Framework for a Taxonomy of Psychiatric Disorder. P.J. Lang, The Motivational Organization of Emotion: Affect-Reflex Connections. Part II:Expression and Consequences of Emotions. M.M. Bradley, Emotional Memory: A Dimensional View. E. Gilboa, W. Revelle, Personality and the Structure of Affective Responses. K.R. Scherer, Affect Bursts. Part III:Social Interaction and Emotions. J.A. R.A.M. van Hooff, F. Aureli, Social Homeostasis and the Control of Emotion. S.E. Taylor, L.G. Aspinwall, T.A. Giuliano, Emotions as Psychological Achievements. G. Mandler, Emotions and the Psychology of Freedom. N.H. Frijda, The Lex Talionis: On Vengeance. R.C. Solomon, Sympathy and Vengeance: The Role of the Emotions in Justice.
Mobile sensing and network analytics for realizing smart automated systems towards health Internet of Things

Internet of Things (IoT) provides an unprecedented opportunity to realize smart automated systems such as smart manufacturing, smart city and smart home in the past few years. Pervasive sensing and mobile technology deployed in large-scale IoT systems lead to the accumulation of big data. In particular, wearable biosensing accelerates human-centered computing for smart health management. However, limited work has been done to develop advanced IoT technologies for smart monitoring and control of heart health. There is an urgent need to develop a new IoT technology specific to the heart, namely Internet of Hearts (IOH) that will enable and assist (1) the acquisition of electrocardiogram (ECG) signals pertinent to space-time cardiac dynamics at anytime anywhere; (2) real-time management and compact representation of multi-sensor signals; (3) big data analytics in large-scale IoT contexts. This paper presents a new technology of Mobile and E-Network Smart Health (MESH), which is composed of 4 components as follows: 1) Mobile-based ECG sensing device; 2) Space-time representation of cardiac electrical activity; 3) Optimal model-based representation of ECG signals; 4) Dynamic network embedding for disease pattern recognition. Our preliminary experimental results demonstrated that network analytics is efficient and effective for smart health management in IoT contexts. The MESH technology shows strong potentials to provide an indispensable and enabling tool for realizing smart heart health and wellbeing for the population worldwide.
Standing stabilizability and stepping maneuver in planar bipedalism based on the best COM-ZMP regulator

The goal of this paper is to answer (i) how the stabilization performance of a biped controller can be evaluated on a certain invariant supporting region, (ii) how the standing stabilizer which performs the best on a given supporting region can be designed, (iii) how the system can be judged if it is stabilizable by the best standing stabilizer without deforming the current supporting region, and (iv) how the supporting region should be deformed if it is judged to be necessary. In order to answer these question, the stable standing region is defined. It gives a criterion to design the best standing stabilizer, to judge if the deformation of the supporting region is necessary to stabilize the system, and to maneuver the stepping motion in accordance with the standing stabilizability condition, which is also defined in the paper. It is found that the best standing stabilizer can be designed by a simple pole-assignment technique. This framework unifies the standing stability and the stepping stability of bipedalism, which have been separately considered in conventional studies. The discussion goes on an approximate planar COM-ZMP model, in which the total mass is concentrated at the center of mass, and the position of ZMP is regarded as the input. Though it is the simplest dynamical model of bipeds, it can conceal differences of body constitutions and represent the macroscopic dynamics. Therefore, this paper contributes to not only the biped robot controller design but also the biomechanical analyses.
Automatic data migration for reducing energy consumption in multi-bank memory systems

An architectural solution to reducing memory energy consumption is to adopt a multi-bank memory system instead of a monolithic (single-bank) memory system. Some recent multi-bank memory architectures help reduce memory energy by allowing an unused bank to be placed into a low-power operating mode. This paper describes an automatic data migration strategy which dynamically places the arrays with temporal affinity into the same set of banks. This strategy increases the number of banks which can be put into low-power modes and allows the use of more aggressive energy-saving modes. Experiments using several array-dominated applications show the usefulness of data migration and indicate that large energy savings can be achieved with low overhead.
Belgrade systemic approach to the treatment of alcoholism: principles and interventions

This article describes an ecosystemic approach to alcoholism (ESTA) developed in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. The fundamental principle is that alcoholism is a problem of the whole context, involving the index patient, the family and wider systems including the work system. The treatment programme, which integrates contemporary principles of the treatment of alcoholism with family-systems ideas covering biomedical-psychological-sociocultural levels, is also described and illustrated by a detailed case example.
Comparative performance analysis of GA, PSO, CA and ABC algorithms for ractional PIλDμ controller tuning

This paper presents a comparison of some well-known global optimization techniques' performance. The purpose of the comparison is to find the best algorithm for optimization. Parameters optimization was conducted in order to achieve better results in PID fractional controller. The proposed techniques are Genetic algorithm (GA), particle swarm optimization (PSO), culture algorithm (CA) and artificial bee colony algorithm (ABC), these techniques are used to approximate the parameters of the fractional order PIλDμ controller.
The Simultaneous Treatment of MMP‐2 Stimulants in Retinal Transplantation Enhances Grafted Cell Migration into the Host Retina

The success of functional retinal cell transplantation has been limited by the low efficiency of the transplanted cell integration into the host retina. Given that the extracellular matrix (ECM) is thought to inhibit entry and axonal outgrowth of grafted neural cells into the host retina, modulation of the ECMs in the host environment may overcome this limitation. Here, we demonstrate that matrix metalloprotease‐2 (MMP‐2) expression is associated with the high migratory potential of adult rat hippocampus‐derived neural stem cells compared with retinal progenitor cells. In addition, MMP‐2, as well as its reported inducers concanavalin A and 17β‐estradiol, can trigger the migration of retinal progenitor cells into explanted retinas. Inhibitors of MMP‐2 suppressed these effects. Intense cell migration is not required for photoreceptor transplantation; however, the environment that allows the transplanted cells to integrate is most important. Migration of the transplanted cells is a good index of the acceptance of grafted cell of the host tissue. Strategies modulating the environment by MMP‐2 stimulation may provide an advance in the development of retinal transplantation.
Whistle-Blowing: Myth and Reality

In this article, we attempt to separate myth from reality by reviewing research results pertinent to two questions: are whistle-blowers really crackpots and do most of them suffer retaliation following their actions? Because scholars interested in these questions have come from several different fields, and because integration is lacking among their perspectives, myth is often perpetuated. We try to ameliorate this situation by exploring the phenomenon from a broad interdisciplinary perspective and by reviewing the findings of recent empirical work in the area. Providing a realistic view of the problem is critical at this juncture, as organizations struggle to find mechanisms to deal with whistle-blowers and as legislators attempt to find policies to encourage whistle-blowing, in order to control illegal organizational behavior.
In vitro differentiation of chick embryo bone marrow stromal cells into cartilaginous and bone‐like tissues

Bone marrow stromal cells, progenitor cells involved in repair of bone and cartilage, can potentially provide a source for autologous skeletal tissue engineering. We investigated which factors were required to induce in vitro differentiation of avian bone marrow stromal cells into three‐dimensional cartilaginous and bone‐like tissues. Bone marrow stromal cells from embryonic chicks were expanded in monolayers, seeded onto biodegradable polyglycolic acid scaffolds, and cultured for 4 weeks in orbitally mixed Petri dishes. Cell‐polymer constructs developed an organized extracellular matrix containing glycosaminoglycans and collagen, whereas control bone marrow stromal cell pellet cultures were smaller and consisted predominantly of fibrous tissue. Bone marrow stromal cells expanded with fibroblast growth factor‐2 and seeded onto polymer scaffolds formed highly homogeneous three‐dimensional tissues that contained cartilage‐specific molecular markers and had biochemical compositions comparable with avian epiphyseal cartilage. When cell‐polymer constructs were cultured in the presence of beta‐glycerophosphate and dexamethasone, the extracellular matrix mineralized and bone‐specific proteins were expressed. Our work shows that cell expansion in the presence of fibroblast growth factor‐2 and cultivation on a three‐dimensional polymer scaffold allows differentiation of chick bone marrow stromal cells into three‐dimensional cartilaginous tissues. In the in vitro system studied, the same population could be selectively induced to regenerate either cartilaginous or bonelike tissue.
Unified cellular neural network cell dynamical equation using delta operator

The signal processing algorithms based on conventional shift operator tend to be ill-conditioned in situations involving fast sampling and shorter wordlength. To alleviate this problem delta operator based analysis and design has been proposed for high speed digital signal processing and control systems. The advantage for delta (/spl delta/) operator seems to come from the fact as sampling period T/sub s//spl rarr/0, the discrete time system process resembles that of continuous time system. In this paper we develop a unified cellular neural network (CNN) cell model using the delta operator approach. The model gives a general discrete-time (DT) CNN cell dynamics in which the sampling period T/sub s/ is an explicit parameter. As T/sub s//spl rarr/0, we get the continuous time (CT)-CNN equation. Several results connected with the stability and robustness of CT-CNN and DT-CNN can be linked using this approach. This approach highlights the similarities, rather than the differences between discrete and continuous CNNs, thus allowing continuous insights to be applied to the discrete CNN case. Further, more importantly from the implementation point of view, delta operator based DT-CNN cell design can be obtained using /spl delta//sup -1/ as an integrator {instead of a delay (z/sup -1/)}. The /spl delta//sup -1/ integrator can be realized using switched current/switched capacitor circuits. The dynamic circuit element in the DT-CNN is thus "/spl delta//sup -1/".
Relationships between voice variables and speech intelligibility in high level noise

Abstract : The investigation isolates those variables which seem to change intelligibility in military situations in which a talker must compete with the noise of planes, gunfire, and other battle confusion. Analyses were made of the voices of both good and poor speakers. The variables compared were intensity, speech time, voice quality, and pitch factors. Loudness was the most significant single factor that differentiated high and low intelligibility. Increased loudness improves intelligibility. Syllable and word duration affected intelligibility. A longer duration helps intelligibility. The other voice variables did not seem to be important. (Author)
Framing Latin America in the Spanish press: A cooled down friendship between two fraternal lands

Abstract This study focuses on a news framing analysis of Latin America and Latin Americans in the Spanish press. For this purpose 1,271 news articles with different Latin American countries or their citizens as main actors were examined. These news stories had been published by the main Spanish newspapers in 1999. The results reveal that attribution of responsibility, human interest, and conflict constitute the prevailing frames used by the Spanish press. Furthermore, significant differences in the considered variables in terms of main country actor were observed. Venezuela and Colombia, in particular, are associated with armed conflicts, natural disasters, crimes, and accidents using human interest and conflict news frames. This leads to a necessary consideration of the consequences this type of news coverage on Latin America may generate, and whether it will reinforce stereotypes or prejudices in the Spanish audience against peoples from these countries, especially those with a high migratory influx to Spain.
Antibiotics versus placebo for prevention of postoperative infection after appendicectomy.

BACKGROUND Appendicitis is the most common cause of acute abdominal pain requiring surgical intervention. The cause of appendicitis is unclear and the mechanism of pathogenesis continues to be debated. Despite improved asepsis and surgical techniques, postoperative complications, such as wound infection and intraabdominal abscess, still account for a significant morbidity. Several studies implicate that postoperative infections are reduced by administration of antimicrobial regimes. OBJECTIVES This review evaluated the use of antibiotics compared to placebo or no treatment in patients undergoing appendectomy. Will these patients benefit from antimicrobial prophylaxis? The outcomes were described according to the nature of the appendix, as either simple appendicitis (including the non-infectious stage) and complicated appendicitis. The efficacy of different antibiotic regimens were not evaluated. SEARCH STRATEGY We searched The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (Cochrane Library 2005 issue 1); Pubmed ; EMBASE; and the Cochrane Colorectal Cancer Group Specialised Register (April 2005). In addition, we manually searched the reference lists of the primary identified trials. SELECTION CRITERIA We evaluated Randomised Controlled Trials (RCTs) and Controlled Clinical Trials (CCTs) in which any antibiotic regime were compared to placebo in patients suspected of having appendicitis, and undergoing appendectomy. Both studies on children and adults were reviewed. The outcome measures of the studies were: Wound infection, intra abdominal abscess, length of stay in hospital, and mortality. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS Eligibility and trial quality were assessed, recorded and cross-checked by two reviewers. MAIN RESULTS Forty-five studies including 9576 patients were included in this review. The overall result is that the use of antibiotics is superior to placebo for preventing wound infection and intraabdominal abscess, with no apparent difference in the nature of the removed appendix. Studies exclusively on children and studies examining topical application reported results in favour to the above, although the results were not significant. AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS Antibiotic prophylaxis is effective in the prevention of postoperative complications in appendectomised patients, whether the administration is given pre-, peri- or post-operatively, and could be considered for routine in emergency appendectomies.
Assessment of polarization dependence of body shadow effect on dosimetry measurements in 2.4 GHz band

Personal exposure meters (PEMs) are portable measuring devices of electromagnetic field levels. Extreme proximity of the wearer causes an underestimation in logged data, known as body shadow effect (BSE), which undermines the reliability of exposure measurements. This paper analyzes the influence of horizontal polarization of the radiation source on PEM measurements in four multipath environments and under dynamic conditions, at a frequency band of 2.4 GHz. By comparing experimental measurements and simulated results, the PEM wearer is modeled theoretically as a shadow angle whose value is determined in terms of maximum P-value and minimum root mean square error. This angle is 9° for horizontal polarization, and tripled, 26°, for vertical polarization. Therefore, polarization of the radiation source is a dependence factor for exposure assessment, since in horizontal polarization, the BSE corresponds to a lower loss than in vertical polarization. In addition, the validity of using correction factors in order to mitigate errors induced by the BSE is questioned, since correction factors do not reflect all the properties of fading components of unperturbed exposure. Bioelectromagnetics. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.