Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Feature reduction and database maintenance in NETNEWS classification

We propose a statistical feature reduction technique to filter out the most ambiguous articles in the training data for categorizing NETNEWS articles. We also incorporate a batch updating scheme to periodically do maintenance on the term structures of the news database after training. The baseline method combines the terms of all the articles of each newsgroup in the training set to represent the newsgroups as single vectors. After training, the incoming news articles are classified based on their similarity to the existing newsgroup categories. Our implementation uses an inverted file to store the trained term structures of each newsgroup, and uses a list similar to the inverted file to buffer the newly arrived articles, for efficient routing and updating purposes. Our experimental results using real NETNEWS articles and newsgroups demonstrate that: (1) applying feature reduction to the training set improves the routing accuracy, efficiency and database storage, (2) updating improves the routing accuracy; and (3) the batch technique improves the efficiency of the updating operation.
Spectrum Leasing to Cooperating Secondary Ad Hoc Networks

The concept of cognitive radio (or secondary spectrum access) is currently under investigation as a promising paradigm to achieve efficient use of the frequency resource by allowing the coexistence of licensed (primary) and unlicensed (secondary) users in the same bandwidth. According to the property-rights model of cognitive radio, the primary terminals own a given bandwidth and may decide to lease it for a fraction of time to secondary nodes in exchange for appropriate remuneration. In this paper, we propose and analyze an implementation of this framework, whereby a primary link has the possibility to lease the owned spectrum to an ad hoc network of secondary nodes in exchange for cooperation in the form of distributed space-time coding. On one hand, the primary link attempts to maximize its quality of service in terms of either rate or probability of outage, accounting for the possible contribution from cooperation. On the other hand, nodes in the secondary ad hoc network compete among themselves for transmission within the leased time-slot following a distributed power control mechanism. The investigated model is conveniently cast in the framework of Stackelberg games. We consider both a baseline scenario with full channel state information and information-theoretic transmission strategies, and a more practical model with long-term channel state information and randomized distributed space-time coding. Analysis and numerical results show that spectrum leasing based on trading secondary spectrum access for cooperation is a promising framework for cognitive radio.
Towards Objective Quality Assessment in Digital Collections

Digital preservation makes high claims concerning the quality of digital artifacts. How to reach or maintain such high quality is currently subject to ongoing research. How to assure this quality is missing sufficient attention. On the one hand, many of the commonly applied quality metrics do not provide an accurate interpretation of information loss and distortions, on the other hand initial quality assessment of digitized collections is in many parts an obstacle yet unsolved. We argue, that perceptual quality metrics should play an essential part in quality assurance of either initial digitization, migration or curation workflows. By identifying tasks critical to subjective quality estimation we outline relevant open research areas in different domains.
Approximability of scheduling with fixed jobs

The scheduling problem of minimizing the makespan is among the most well studied problems --- especially in the field of approximation. In modern industrial software however, it has become standard to work on a variant of this problem, where some of the jobs are already fixed in the schedule. The remaining jobs are to be assigned to the machines in such a way that they do not overlap with fixed jobs. In this paper we first focus on simple algorithms for this problem which have a reasonable performance guarantee and are easy to implement in practical settings. This is followed by a polynomial time approximation scheme (PTAS) for the case that the number m of machines is constant. Moreover, we show that, unless P = NP, there is no arbitrarily close approximation in the general case when the number of machines is part of the input. This will be extended by showing that there is no asymptotic PTAS in the general machine case. We finally show that there exists no FPTAS in the constant machine case, unless P = NP.
Joint depth map interpolation and segmentation with planar surface model

Depth map interpolation and segmentation has been a long-standing problem in computer vision. However, many people treat them as two independent problems. Indeed, the two problems are complementary. The results of one problem can aid in improving the results of the other in powerful ways. Assuming that the depth map consists of planar surfaces, we propose a unified variational formula for joint depth map interpolation and segmentation. Specifically, our model uses a multi-label representation of the depth map, where each label corresponds to a parametric representation of the planar surface on a segment. Using alternating direction method, we are able to find the minimal solution. Experiments show our algorithm outperforms other methods.
The Social Function of the Human Mirror System: A Motor Chauvinist View

Many different claims have been made concerning the function and role of the human mirror system. This chapter first examines the question of what makes the mirror system special, and whether this particular network can be clearly distinguished from visuomotor systems in the brain. Current studies suggest it is surprisingly hard to draw clear distinctions between mirroring and visuomotor systems. The second part then distinguishes between models for understanding, predicting and responding to social stimuli. I suggest that responding theories have been somewhat neglected, and that social responding should be considered as an important function of the mirror system, in the same way that grasping objects is an important function of the visuomotor system. The humble sea squirt provides an excellent example of motor chauvinism – after an early period of active swimming, it settles on a rock and assumes a passive lifestyle of waiting for food to drift by. At this point, it digests its own brain, because a body that does not move has no need for a brain. The motor chauvinist makes the claim that the primary function of the human brain is to move – to decide what actions to perform and then implement those actions in an efficient manner. In this chapter, I examine how this view can help us understand the functioning of the human mirror system. Mirror neurons were first discovered in the premotor cortex of the macaque monkey in the context of studies of motor physiology (di Pellegrino et al., 1992; Gallese et al., 1996). These neurons respond when a monkey picks up an object, but also when he sees a person pick up an object. However, the macaque monkey's abilities to engage socially and to imitate are somewhat limited. Neuroimaging studies allow us to examine equivalent brain systems in humans to test their role in human social behaviour. A large number of studies have now documented activation of the human premotor cortex and inferior parietal cortex when participants observe actions, perform actions and imitate actions (Caspers et al., 2010; Molenberghs et al., 2012). In this chapter, I focus on the properties of the brain systems that respond when typical adults observe actions – the mirror neuron system (MNS) and consider what role this plays in human behaviour. In particular, I draw comparisons between the MNS and other cortical motor systems for object use (object-motor system-OMS). This comparison aims to highlight which …
Usable Access Control inside Home Networks

WLAN link layer security has been well studied but very little work exists in the area of intuitive access control inside home networks. In this paper we propose an approach that allows fine-grained access control without overburdening users with difficult questions or complicated configuration tasks. The proposed concept originated from a user needs study and user trials, and it builds on the existing WiFi Protected Setup standard.
Self-development learning: Constructing optimal size neural networks via in-cremental data selection

In a beverage-maker including a vessel in which a liquid is heated, and a receptacle for a material to be infused in the liquid, the receptacle is mounted for movement in the vessel between an upper position such that contact between the contents of the receptacle and the liquid is prevented and a lower position in which such contact can take place. Means is provided for holding the receptacle in its upper position until the liquid reaches a predetermined temperature and the receptacle is then released to float on the surface of the liquid. Apertures in the bottom of the receptacle then admit liquid at a controlled rate such as to avoid the production of foam to an unacceptable degree by interaction between the liquid and the material in the receptacle.
Gravitational energy seen by quasilocal observers

There have been many attempts to define quasilocal energy/mass for a spacelike 2-surface in a spacetime by the Hamilton–Jacobi method. The main difficulty in this approach is the subtle choice of the background configuration to be subtracted from the physical Hamiltonian. Quasilocal mass should be positive for general surfaces, but on the other hand should be zero for surfaces in the flat spacetime. In this paper, we survey the work in a series of papers [6, 25–27] in which a new notion of quasilocal mass/energy–momentum is proposed and investigated. In particular, the notion of energy observed by a ‘quasilocal observer’ will be discussed.
Physical fitness, injuries, and team performance in soccer.

PURPOSE To investigate the relationship between physical fitness and team success in soccer, and to test for differences in physical fitness between different player positions. METHODS Participants were 306 male soccer players from 17 teams in the two highest divisions in Iceland. Just before the start of the 1999 soccer season, the following variables were tested: height and weight, body composition, flexibility, leg extension power, jump height, and peak O2 uptake. Injuries and player participation in matches and training were recorded through the 4-month competitive season. Team average physical fitness was compared with team success (final league standing) using a linear regression model. Physical fitness was also compared between players in different playing positions. RESULTS A significant relationship was found between team average jump height (countermovement jump and standing jump) and team success (P = 0.009 and P = 0.012, respectively). The same trend was also found for leg extension power (P = 0.097), body composition (% body fat, P = 0.07), and the total number of injury days per team (P = 0.09). Goalkeepers demonstrated different fitness characteristics from outfield players. They were taller and heavier, more flexible in hip extension and knee flexion, and had higher leg extension power and a lower peak O2 uptake. However, only minor differences were observed between defenders, midfield players, and attackers. CONCLUSION Coaches and medical support teams should pay more attention to jump and power training, as well as preventive measures and adequate rehabilitation of previous injuries to increase team success.
Contrast of Rainfall-SST Relationships in the Western North Pacific between the ENSO-Developing and ENSO-Decaying Summers*

While the overall summer rainfall‐sea surface temperature (SST) relationship has a negative correlation over the western North Pacific (WNP), this relationship experiences a significant interannual variation. During the ENSO-developing (decaying) summer, the rainfall‐SST correlation is significantly positive (negative). The positive correlation is attributed to interplay between the anomalous Walker circulation and the crossequatorial flows associated with the enhanced WNP summer monsoon. The former leads to negative rainfall anomalies in the western Pacific, whereas the latter leads to a cold SST anomaly resulting from enhanced surface latent heat fluxes. The negative correlation is attributed to the maintenance of an anomalous Phil
Quantifying intervention-related improvements in exercise tolerance

Among the benefits expected to result from a therapeutic intervention in patients with impaired systemic functioning is an increase in exercise tolerance. For this a constant high-intensity work rate has been shown to provide a more sensitive index of improvement than the maximum work rate, or oxygen uptake, on a symptom-limited incremental test. However, the extremely large variability of the improvement in this particular index of tolerance undermines the ability to make general inferences for the underlying functional improvement. We argue that this is a necessary consequence of the particular work rate chosen for the test and the change in the parameters of the subject's hyperbolic power–duration relationship for that form of exercise: its “critical power” and “curvature constant”. Without knowledge of these features, any absolute or per cent increase in tolerance time to a single constant-load exercise bout must be interpreted with caution regarding the physiological benefit(s) that have accrued from the intervention.
Impact of Genome Reduction on Bacterial Metabolism and Its Regulation

Simply Mycoplasma The bacterium Mycoplasma pneumoniae, a human pathogen, has a genome of reduced size and is one of the simplest organisms that can reproduce outside of host cells. As such, it represents an excellent model organism in which to attempt a systems-level understanding of its biological organization. Now three papers provide a comprehensive and quantitative analysis of the proteome, the metabolic network, and the transcriptome of M. pneumoniae (see the Perspective by Ochman and Raghavan). Anticipating what might be possible in the future for more complex organisms, Kühner et al. (p. 1235) combine analysis of protein interactions by mass spectrometry with extensive structural information on M. pneumoniae proteins to reveal how proteins work together as molecular machines and map their organization within the cell by electron tomography. The manageable genome size of M. pneumoniae allowed Yus et al. (p. 1263) to map the metabolic network of the organism manually and validate it experimentally. Analysis of the network aided development of a minimal medium in which the bacterium could be cultured. Finally, G‡ell et al. (p. 1268) applied state-of-the-art sequencing techniques to reveal that this “simple” organism makes extensive use of noncoding RNAs and has exon- and intron-like structure within transcriptional operons that allows complex gene regulation resembling that of eukaryotes. Reconstruction of a bacterial metabolic network reveals strategies for metabolic control with a genome of reduced size. To understand basic principles of bacterial metabolism organization and regulation, but also the impact of genome size, we systematically studied one of the smallest bacteria, Mycoplasma pneumoniae. A manually curated metabolic network of 189 reactions catalyzed by 129 enzymes allowed the design of a defined, minimal medium with 19 essential nutrients. More than 1300 growth curves were recorded in the presence of various nutrient concentrations. Measurements of biomass indicators, metabolites, and 13C-glucose experiments provided information on directionality, fluxes, and energetics; integration with transcription profiling enabled the global analysis of metabolic regulation. Compared with more complex bacteria, the M. pneumoniae metabolic network has a more linear topology and contains a higher fraction of multifunctional enzymes; general features such as metabolite concentrations, cellular energetics, adaptability, and global gene expression responses are similar, however.
Webtour: a system to record and playback dynamic multimedia annotations on web document content

In this paper, we present the key ideas involved in the design and implementation of “WEBTOUR,” a system to record, playback, store, search, and distribute personalized dynamic multimedia annotations on web documents in the form of guided web tours. Using WEBTOUR, web document designers can easily augment the contents of standard web documents by recording such annotations on each document. Upon playback, all media components that comprise the annotation are synchronized and overlaid on top of the web documents. We also present several application scenarios where WEBTOUR is both useful and cost effective.
Formation of Activity Cliffs Is Accompanied by Systematic Increases in Ligand Efficiency from Lowly to Highly Potent Compounds

Activity cliffs (ACs) are defined as pairs of structurally similar compounds sharing the same biological activity but having a large difference in potency. Therefore, ACs are often studied to rationalize structure-activity relationships (SARs) and aid in lead optimization. Hence, the AC concept plays an important role in compound development. For compound optimization, ligand efficiency (LE) represents another key concept. LE accounts for the relation between compound potency and mass. A major goal of lead optimization is to increase potency and also LE. Despite their high relevance for drug development, the AC and LE concepts have thus far not been considered in combination. It is currently unknown how compounds forming ACs might be related in terms of LE. To explore this question, ACs were systematically identified on the basis of high-confidence activity data and LE values for cliff partners were determined. Surprisingly, a significant increase in LE was generally detected for highly potent cliff partners compared to their lowly potent counterparts, regardless of the compound classes and their targets. Hence, ACs reveal chemical modifications that determine SARs and improve LE. These findings further increase the attractiveness of AC information for compound optimization and development.
Dispersal Rates Affect Species Composition in Metacommunities of Sarracenia purpurea Inquilines

Dispersal among local communities can have a variety of effects on species composition and diversity at local and regional scales. Local conditions (e.g., resource and predator densities) can have independent effects, as well as interact with dispersal, to alter these patterns. Based on metacommunity models, we predicted that local diversity would show a unimodal relationship with dispersal frequency. We manipulated dispersal frequencies, resource levels, and the presence of predators (mosquito larvae) among communities found in the water‐filled leaves of the pitcher plant Sarracenia purpurea. Diversity and abundance of species of the middle trophic level, protozoa and rotifers, were measured. Increased dispersal frequencies significantly increased regional species richness and protozoan abundance while decreasing the variance among local communities. Dispersal frequency interacted with predation at the local community scale to produce patterns of diversity consistent with the model. When predators were absent, we found a unimodal relationship between dispersal frequency and diversity, and when predators were present, there was a flat relationship. Intermediate dispersal frequencies maintained some species in the inquiline communities by offsetting extinction rates. Local community composition and the degree of connectivity between communities are both important for understanding species diversity patterns at local and regional scales.
Discrete-time sliding mode controllers for nonholonomic mobile robots trajectory tracking problem

This paper discusses two proposed robust controllers to solve the trajectory tracking problem of nonholonomic wheled mobile robots. The complete model of this can be divided into robot kinematics and robot dynamics. To take advantage from this fact, two combined controllers are design, which are based on Discrete Super Twisting Algorithm to kinematics and Discrete-time Neural Block Control and Discrete High Order Sliding Modes to dynamics including actuators dynamics, whitout the previous knowledged of the plant model or its paremeters. The performance analizes are performed and also simulations are included to show the effectiveness of both proposed controllers.
Whole-grain food consumption in Singaporean children aged 6–12 years

Abstract Public health bodies in many countries are attempting to increase population-wide habitual consumption of whole grains. Limited data on dietary habits exist in Singaporean children. The present study therefore aimed to assess whole grain consumption patterns in Singaporean children and compare these with dietary intake, physical activity and health parameters. Dietary intake (assessed by duplicate, multipass, 24-h food recalls), physical activity (by questionnaire) and anthropometric measurements were collected from a cross-section of 561 Singaporean children aged 6–12 years. Intake of whole grains was evaluated using estimates of portion size and international food composition data. Only 38·3 % of participants reported consuming whole grains during the dietary data collection days. Median intake of whole grains in consumers was 15·3 (interquartile range 5·4–34·8) g/d. The most commonly consumed whole-grain food groups were rice (29·5 %), wholemeal bread (28·9 %) and ready-to-eat breakfast cereals (18·8 %). A significantly lower proportion of Malay children (seven out of fifty-eight; P < 0·0001) consumed whole grains than children of other ethnicities. Only 6 % of all children consumed the amount of whole grains most commonly associated with improved health outcomes (48 g/d). There was no relationship between whole grain consumption patterns and BMI, waist circumference or physical activity but higher whole grain intake was associated with increased fruit, vegetable and dairy product consumption (P < 0·001). These findings demonstrate that consumption of whole grain foods is low at a population level and infrequent in Singaporean children. Future drives to increase whole-grain food consumption in this population are likely to require input from multiple stakeholders.
An Asynchronous Programmable Parallel 2-D Image Filter CMOS Ic Based on the Gilbert Vector Multiplier

A novel analogue power-efficient 2-D programmable finite impulse response image filter is proposed. This solution is based on the current-mode Gilbert-vector-multiplier operating in the weak inversion region, which allows for ultra low power operation. The main advantage is in the asynchronous and parallel calculation of all pixel values without using any clock generator. The filter is a programmable structure that allows programmability of different filter masks both low-pass and high-pass. An experimental filter integrated circuit with a resolution of 6x1 pixels dissipates in measurements a power of 30 μW at a data rate of 30 kframes/s in a 180 nm CMOS technology. One of the intended applications of our proposed image filter is in data compression in wireless endoscopic capsules.