Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Minimizing clock latency range in robust clock tree synthesis

Given the extensive study of clock skew minimization, in the ISPD 2009 Clock Network Synthesis (CNS) Contest, clock latency range (CLR) was initially minimized across multiple supply voltages under capacitance and slew constraints. CLR approximates the summation of the clock skew and the maximum source-to-sink delay variation for multiple supply voltages. This work develops an efficient three-stage clock tree synthesis flow for CLR minimization. Firstly, a balanced clock tree with small skew is generated. Secondly, buffer insertion and wire sizing minimizes delay variation without violating the slew constraint. Finally, skew is minimized by inserting snaking wires. Experimental results reveal that the proposed flow can complete all ISPD'09 benchmark circuits and yield less CLR than the top three winners of ISPD'09 CNS contest by 59%, 52.7% and 35.4% respectively. Besides, the proposed flow can also run 5.52, 1.86, and 7.54 times faster than the top three winners of ISPD'09 CNS contest respectively.
The Core-collapse rate from the Supernova Legacy Survey

We use three years of data from the Supernova Legacy Survey (SNLS) to study the general properties of core-collapse and type Ia supernovae. This is the first such study using the "rolling search" technique which guarantees well-sampled SNLS light curves and good efficiency for supernovae brighter than i'~24. Using host photometric redshifts, we measure the supernova absolute magnitude distribution down to luminosities 4.5 mag fainter than normal SNIa. Using spectroscopy and light-curve fitting to discriminate against SNIa, we find a sample of 117 core-collapse supernova candidates with redshifts z < 0.4 (median redshift of 0.29) and measure their rate to be larger than the type Ia supernova rate by a factor 4.5±0.8(stat.)±0.6 (sys.). This corresponds to a core-collapse rate at z = 0.3 of [ 1.42±0.3(stat.)±0.3(sys.)] ×10-4 yr-1(h_70-1 Mpc)-3.
The anxiety of whole class teacher questioning for primary pupils

The introduction of the National Literacy (1998) and Numeracy (1999) Strategies placed a "greater emphasis on whole class work" in primary schools in England at the end of the 1990s (The NLS, Framework for Teaching, DfEE 1998, p. 10). As a result, it is likely that there has been an increase in whole class teacher questioning of pupils. However, it has been suggested that teacher questioning of pupils in front of their peers may lead to an emotional response including anxiety, worry and fear (Holt 1964,1982 revised) and associated negative feelings, including embarrassment and shame. In the light of empirical data gathered principally in a Year 4 primary classroom during 1999 - 2000, this research aimed to explore further the emotional response of pupils at times of whole class teacher questioning, with a particular focus on lessons of literacy and numeracy. In line with more recent educational research in schools, a key aim was that the main voices emerging from the data would be the children's own. There was therefore a strong emphasis on observation of their responses in whole class work, pupil interviews and associated pupil focused data. Drawing on this, I argue that there is evidence that numbers of pupils experience feelings during whole class teacher questioning that may impact on their identity as learners and lead to their employing coping strategies that may be detrimental to their education.
The Effects of Disturbance on Hypothalamus-Pituitary-Thyroid (HPT) Axis in Zebrafish Larvae after Exposure to DEHP

Di-(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP) has the potential to disrupt the thyroid endocrine system, but the underlying mechanism is unknown. In this study, zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryos were exposed to different concentrations of DEHP (0, 40, 100, 200, 400 μg/L) from 2 to 168 hours post fertilization (hpf). Thyroid hormones (THs) levels and transcriptional profiling of key genes related to hypothalamus-pituitary-thyroid (HPT) axis were examined. The result of whole-body thyroxine (T4) and triiodothyronine (T3) indicated that the thyroid hormone homeostasis was disrupted by DEHP in the zebrafish larvae. After exposure to DEHP, the mRNA expressions of thyroid stimulating hormone (tshβ) and corticotrophin releasing hormone (crh) genes were increased in a concentration dependent manner, respectively. The expression level of genes involved in thyroid development (nkx2.1 and pax8) and thyroid synthesis (sodium/iodide symporter, nis, thyroglobulin, tg) were also measured. The transcripts of nkx2.1 and tg were significantly increased after DEHP exposure, while those of nis and pax8 had no significant change. Down-regulation of uridinediphosphate-glucuronosyl-transferase (ugt1ab) and up-regulation of thyronine deiodinase (dio2) might change the THs levels. In addition, the transcript of transthyretin (ttr) was up-regulated, while the mRNA levels of thyroid hormone receptors (trα and trβ) remained unchanged. All the results demonstrated that exposure to DEHP altered the whole-body thyroid hormones in the zebrafish larvae and changed the expression profiling of key genes related to HPT axis, proving that DEHP induced the thyroid endocrine toxicity and potentially affected the synthesis, regulation and action of thyroid hormones.
Generalized contact force estimator for a robot manipulator

In this work, we present implementation and experiment of the theory of dynamic force sensing for robotic manipulators. In the robot manipulation context, end-effector contact forces may be difficult to measure due to tool interference, yet indirect measurement such as from wrist-mounted force sensors provide force measurement contaminated by inertial forces of the tool distal to the force sensor. In order to extract the contact force exerted by the robot, it is necessary to separate the contact forces from inertial forces. We propose a complete formulation and implementation of a new control strategy based on multi-sensor fusion with three different sensors - that is, encoders mounted at each joint of the robot with six degrees of freedom, a wrist force sensor and accelerometers - whose goal is to obtain a suitable contact force estimator. These new observers contribute to overcome many of the difficulties of uncertain world models and unknown environments, which limit the domain of application of contemporary robots used without external sensory feedback; in addition, the final observer can be applied to any kind of real robot system. An impedance control scheme was proposed to verify the improvement. The experiments were carried out on an industrial Staubli RX60 manipulator with open control system architecture
Improving Shape Context Matching for the Recognition of Sketched Symbols

In this paper we present an approach to recognize multistroke hand drawn symbols, which is invariant with respect to scaling and supports symbol recognition independently from the number and order of strokes. The approach is an adaptation of the algorithm proposed by Belongie et al. in 2002 to the case of sketched images. This is achieved by introducing a new step in which the original Shape Context point-to-point cost matrix is updated according to stroke related information. The approach has been evaluated on a set of symbols from the Military Course of Action domain and the results show that the new recognizer outperforms the original one.
The multi-step PEG and ACE constrained PEG algorithms can design the LDPC codes with better cycle-connectivity

This paper proposes two new cycle-optimized algorithms, called the multi-step progressive edge-growth (PEG) algorithm and the multi-step approximate cycle extrinsic message degree (ACE) constrained PEG algorithm, to design an LDPC code with larger girth and better cycle-connectivity. In addition, an efficient method is developed to calculate the distances between the variable nodes (VNs) and the check nodes (CNs) in the proposed algorithms. Simulation results show that compared to the conventional cycle-optimized algorithms, the proposed algorithms can achieve both better cycle-connectivity and foreseeable lower error floors.
Suitability of quantum cascade laser spectrometry for CH 4 and N 2 O eddy covariance measurements

Suitability of quantum cascade laser spectrometry for CH4 and N2O eddy covariance measurements P. S. Kroon, A. Hensen, H. J. J. Jonker, M. S. Zahniser, W. H. van ’t Veen, and A. T. Vermeulen Energy research Centre of the Netherlands (ECN), Department of Air Quality and Climate Change, Netherlands TU Delft, Department of Multi-Scale Physics, Research group Clouds, Climate and Air Quality, Netherlands Aerodyne Research, Inc., USA Received: 20 March 2007 – Accepted: 3 April 2007 – Published: 12 April 2007 Correspondence to: P. S. Kroon (p.kroon@ecn.nl)
Effects of Diets Supplemented with Ensiled Mulberry Leaves and Sun-Dried Mulberry Fruit Pomace on the Ruminal Bacterial and Archaeal Community Composition of Finishing Steers

This study investigated the effects of ensiled mulberry leaves (EML) and sun-dried mulberry fruit pomace (SMFP) on the ruminal bacterial and archaeal community composition of finishing steers. Corn grain- and cotton meal-based concentrate was partially replaced with EML or SMFP. The diets had similar crude protein (CP), neutral detergent fiber (NDF), and metabolizable energy. Following the feeding trial, the steers were slaughtered and ruminal liquid samples were collected to study the ruminal microbiome. Extraction of DNA, amplification of the V4 region of the 16S rRNA gene, and Illumina MiSeq pyrosequencing were performed for each sample. Following sequence de-noising, chimera checking, and quality trimming, an average of 209,610 sequences were generated per sample. Quantitative real-time PCR was performed to examine the selected bacterial species in the rumen. Our results showed that the predominant phyla were Bacteroidetes (43.90%), Firmicutes (39.06%), Proteobacteria (4.31%), and Tenericutes (2.04%), and the predominant genera included Prevotella (13.82%), Ruminococcus (2.51%), Butyrivibrio (2.38%), and Succiniclasticum (2.26%). Compared to the control group, EML and SMFP groups had a higher abundance of total bacteria (p < 0.001); however, the bacterial community composition was similar among the three groups. At the phylum level, there were no significant differences in Firmicutes (p = 0.7932), Bacteroidetes (p = 0.2330), Tenericutes (p = 0.2811), or Proteobacteria (p = 0.0680) levels among the three groups; however, Fibrobacteres decreased in EML (p = 0.0431). At the genus level, there were no differences in Prevotella (p = 0.4280), Ruminococcus (p = 0.2639), Butyrivibrio (p = 0.4433), or Succiniclasticum (p = 0.0431) levels among the groups. Additionally, the dietary treatments had no significant effects on the archaeal community composition in the rumen. Therefore, EML and SMFP supplementation had no significant effects on the ruminal bacterial or archaeal community composition of finishing steers.
Fuchsian methods and spacetime singularities

Fuchsian methods and their applications to the study of the structure of spacetime singularities are surveyed. The existence question for spacetimes with compact Cauchy horizons is discussed. After some basic facts concerning Fuchsian equations have been recalled, various ways in which these equations have been applied in general relativity are described. Possible future applications are indicated.
Millisecond Pulsars: Detectable Sources of Continuous Gravitational Waves?

Laboratory searches for the detection of gravitational waves have focused on the detection of burst signals emitted during a supernova explosion, but have not resulted in any confirmed detections. An alternative approach has been to search for continuous wave (CW) gravitational radiation from the Crab pulsar. In this paper, we examine the possibility of detecting CW gravitational radiation from pulsars and show that nearby millisecond pulsars are generally much better candidates. We show that the minimum strain h_c ~ 10E-26 that can be detected by tuning an antenna to the frequency of the milli- second pulsar PSR 1957+20, with presently available detector technology, is orders of magnitude better than what has been accomplished so far by observing the Crab pulsar, and within an order of magnitude of the maximum strain that may be produced by it. In addition, we point out that there is likely to be a population of rapidly rotating neutron stars (not necessarily radio pulsars) in the solar neighborhood whose spindown evolution is driven by gravitational radiation. We argue that the projected sensitivity of modern resonant detectors is sufficient to detect the subset of this population that lies within 0.1 kpc of the sun.
Tests on Thin Reinforced Concrete Walls Subjected to In-Plane and Out-of-Plane Cyclic Loading

The present data paper describes an experimental campaign on five thin T-shaped reinforced concrete walls (DOI: 10.6084/m9.figshare.3490754.v2), which includes: details on the test units, materials, test setup, loading protocol, instrumentation, main features of each unit's response, organization of the provided test data, and examples of derived data. The tests aimed at assessing the influence of wall thickness on member stability, the role of lap splices on damage distribution and displacement ductility, and the effects of the simultaneous application of out-of-plane loading on the member response. A set of five companion test reports, one for each of the tested units, are included in the data set and supplement the present manuscript.
Fisioterapia y su rol en el alto rendimiento: una revisión sistemática de la literatura

High-performance sport requires the development of recovery, training and rehabilitation strategies that favor adaptation to physical training. In physiotherapy, strategies are used to maintain the health of the athlete at the highest level, among the strategies most used are injury prevention, functional training, functional recovery focused on specific goals of the athlete. For this reason, the objective of this article is to perform a systematic review of the literature on the role of physiotherapist in high performance sport.
Role of partial protein unfolding in alcohol‐induced protein aggregation

Proteins aggregate in response to various stresses including changes in solvent conditions. Addition of alcohols has been recently shown to induce aggregation of disease‐related as well as nondisease‐related proteins. Here we probed the biophysical mechanisms underlying alcohol‐induced protein aggregation, in particular the role of partial protein unfolding in aggregation. We have studied aggregation mechanisms due to benzyl alcohol which is used in numerous biochemical and biotechnological applications. We chose cytochrome c as a model protein, for the reason that various optical and structural probes are available to monitor its global and partial unfolding reactions. Benzyl alcohol induced the aggregation of cytochrome c in isothermal conditions and decreased the temperature at which the protein aggregates. However, benzyl alcohol did not perturb the overall native conformation of cytochrome c. Instead, it caused partial unfolding of a local protein region around the methionine residue at position 80. Site‐specific optical probes, two‐dimensional NMR titrations, and hydrogen exchange all support this conclusion. The protein aggregation temperature varied linearly with the melting temperature of the Met80 region. Stabilizing the Met80 region by heme iron reduction drastically decreased protein aggregation, which confirmed that the local unfolding of this region causes protein aggregation. These results indicate that a possible mechanism by which alcohols induce protein aggregation is through partial rather than complete unfolding of native proteins. Proteins 2010. © Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
VMInsight: Hardware Virtualization-Based Process Security Monitoring System

Malicious software is one of the primary threats to information system on Internet, while the traditional host-based and network-based monitoring systems are vulnerable to prevent the malicious behavior of software because most current malicious software is capable of resisting security monitoring. Virtualization technology gives an impactful approach to monitoring the behavior of malicious software since it can provide an abstraction layer between the operating system and the hardware. In this paper, we propose a hardware-virtualization-based security monitor system named VMInsight, which can provide load-time and run-time monitoring for processes. VMInsight intercepts system calls and process behaviors by monitoring changes in the virtual machine CPU register, and it is implemented in the hyper visor, thus is completely transparent to the software and operating system running in the virtual machine. The experimental results show that the performance overhead of VMInsight is less than 10%, and it can be easily applied to the third-party security monitoring system.
Development of multi-wheeled snake-like rescue robots with active elastic trunk

A practical robot for search and rescue operation is demanded. We believe that one of the most promising robot is a snake-like robot with a slim and active trunk. This paper proposes a new multi-wheeled snake-like robot with active elastic trunk. We choose active wheels for the propulsive device due to mechanical robustness and simplicity, and increase locomotion capability by serially arranging many active wheels along to the trunk. We also propose a new mechanism for the trunk which satisfies both active bending motion and passive compliance. The active elastic trunk consists of deformable elastic segments made of sponge and rigid (or semi-rigid) segments, where active wheel is attached, stacked in layers. The active bending motion is generated by pulling the cables passing through the trunk from the head to tail. We develop three prototypes named “Souryu-VII”, “Souryu-VIII” and “Souryu-IX”. The mechanical design and features for each prototypes are explained and their performances are evaluated through the experiments with various measures.
Biochemical Differences Between Official and Simulated Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) Matches

Background One of the goals for training in combat sports is to mimic real situations. For mixed martial arts (MMA), simulated sparring matches are a frequent component during training, but a there is a lack of knowledge considering the differences in sparring and competitive environments. Objectives The main objective of this study was to compare biochemical responses to sparring and official MMA matches. Materials and Methods Twenty five male professional MMA fighters were evaluated during official events (OFF = 12) and simulated matches (SIM = 13). For both situations, blood samples were taken before (PRE) and immediately after (POST) matches. For statistical analysis, two-way analysis of variance (time x group and time x winner) were used to compare the dependent parametric variables. For non-parametric data, the Kruskal-Wallis test was used and differences were confirmed by Mann-Whitney tests. Results No significant differences were observed among the groups for demographic variables. The athletes were 26.5 ± 5 years with 80 ± 10 kg, 1.74 ± 0.05 m and had 39.4 ± 25 months of training experience. Primary results indicated higher blood glucose concentration prior to fights for OFF group (OFF= 6.1 ± 1.2 mmol/L and SIM= 4.4 ± 0.7 mmol/L; P < 0.01) and higher ALT values for OFF group at both time points (OFF: PRE = 41.2 ± 12 U/L, POST = 44.2 ± 14.1 U/L; SIM: PRE = 28.1 ± 13.8 U/L, POST = 30.5 ± 12.5 U/L; P = 0.001). In addition, the blood lactate showed similar responses for both groups (OFF: PRE= 4 [3.4 - 4.4] mmol/L, POST= 16.9 [13.8 - 23.5] mmol/L; SIM: PRE = 3.8 [2.8 - 5.5] mmol/L, POST= 16.8 [12.3 - 19.2] mmol/L; P < 0.001). Conclusions In conclusion, MMA official and simulated matches induce similar high intensity glycolytic demands and minimal changes to biochemical markers of muscle damage immediately following the fights. Glycolytic availability prior to the fights was raised exclusively in response to official matches.
International University Students in Thailand: Shifting from Universalistic Models to an Ethnicity Matters Approach

Historically, much of the research on acculturation and adjustment was conducted on migrant and refugee populations. The start of the twenty first century has seen a surprising surge in a new immigrant class, mobile students, their characteristics differing from the social, political and economic refugees of the twentieth century. This article provides an overview of the literature related to the salient features of acculturation, adaptation and adjustment models as applied to international university students and the stressors they most frequently encounter. It recommends that future research transitions from universalistic mode-based inquiry to more nuanced approaches which emphasize an individual’s characteristics from country of origin or perceived ethnic identity. A social constructivist position which emphasizes the historical and ethnic relationships among the visiting students and the host nationals is most beneficial to understanding the contemporary international student adjustment paradigm.
Design and analysis of the UW-OFDM signal

Unique word (UW-) OFDM is a novel multicarrier system that is shown to be suitable for cognitive radio systems. To construct the UW-OFDM signal, a code generation matrix is required to introduce redundancy in the frequency domain, implying that the code generation matrix must satisfy a number of conditions. In this paper, we use an algebraic construction method to separate the conditions imposed by the signal shape from the code design. The degrees of freedom resulting from this construction method are used to optimize different performance measures (i.e., the minimum Euclidean distance and the power) at the transmitter or at the receiver side. Based on the algebraic decomposition, a composite channel can be defined. Irrespective of whether the optimization is done at the transmitter or the receiver, we shown in the paper that always the strongest modes of this composite channel must be excited.
Short investigation on system diagnosis regarding parameter estimation

Fault Detection and Diagnosis (FDD) is a research field that has known a rapid development due to the increasing safety and dependability requirements in high-risk applications. Consequently, a significant number of FDD techniques and associated algorithms were developed, and their effectiveness was proven in practice. However, given the current trend that consist of designing and developing integrated real-time risk-management systems for safety-critical installations, it became obvious that most of these techniques, in their original form, fail to provide an efficient solution to the problems related to the implementation of the corresponding FDD schemes in real-time; this paper focuses on the use of parameter estimation techniques for achieving these objectives. First, a global overview of the current state of the FDD research is given, then the most commonly used parameter estimation techniques are described, with an emphasis on the possibility of using them within FDD schemes that respond to the requirements of modern industrial applications.