Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Load Balancing Content-Based Publish/Subscribe Systems

Distributed content-based publish/subscribe systems suffer from performance degradation and poor scalability caused by uneven load distributions typical in real-world applications. The reason for this shortcoming is the lack of a load balancing scheme. This article proposes a load balancing solution specifically tailored to the needs of content-based publish/subscribe systems that is distributed, dynamic, adaptive, transparent, and accommodates heterogeneity. The solution consists of three key contributions: a load balancing framework, a novel load estimation algorithm, and three offload strategies. A working prototype of our solution is built on an open-sourced content-based publish/subscribe system and evaluated on PlanetLab, a cluster testbed, and in simulations. Real-life experiment results show that the proposed load balancing solution is efficient with less than 0.2% overhead; effective in distributing and balancing load originating from a single server to all available servers in the network; and capable of preventing overloads to preserve system stability, availability, and quality of service.
“Pandemic Public Health Paradox”: Time Series Analysis of the 2009/10 Influenza A / H1N1 Epidemiology, Media Attention, Risk Perception and Public Reactions in 5 European Countries

In 2009, influenza A H1N1 caused the first pandemic of the 21st century. Although a vaccine against this influenza subtype was offered before or at the onset of the second epidemic wave that caused most of the fatal cases in Europe, vaccination rates for that season were lower than expected. We propose that the contradiction between high risk of infection and low use of available prevention measures represents a pandemic public health paradox. This research aims for a better understanding of this paradox by exploring the time-dependent interplay among changing influenza epidemiology, media attention, pandemic control measures, risk perception and public health behavior among five European countries (Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Spain and the UK). Findings suggest that asynchronicity between media curves and epidemiological curves may potentially explain the pandemic public health paradox; media attention for influenza A H1N1 in Europe declined long before the epidemic reached its peak, and public risk perceptions and behaviors may have followed media logic, rather than epidemiological logic.
OntoPsic: Leveraging the Knowledge in the Treatment and Diagnosis of Telepsychiatry

Mental illness has always been target of debate and criticism by the society (modern or ancient). Several problems and challenges regarding Psychiatry, Telepsychiatry specifically are found in literature. The lack of information and the fear of the unknown have long been seen as a barrier for people with mental illness as well as all those involved in the process, such as family and the medical team. In the past, the lack of knowledge led the society to adopt harsh punishment for the patients, under the pretext that the same were possessed by some supernatural force. In this context, the lack of a public, formal and standardized model regarding any sort of information about this field was and remains as the central problem. Therefore, this paper proposes the OntoPsic, a domain-ontology for psychiatry applied to Healthcare Information System to define a common vocabulary about mental illness and Telepsychiatry. Besides relying on this base of knowledge to assist all involved in the treatment of mental disorders, this article also describes the OntoConsult, a system for the deduction of facts to support the decision making. In order to motivate the use of OntoPsic, the article reviews some applications and some practical results with the ontology.
On the Law of Distribution of Energy in the Normal Spectrum

The recent spectral measurements made by O. Lummer and E. Pringsheim[1], and even more notable those by H. Rubens and F. Kurlbaum[2], which together con rmed an earlier result obtained by H. Beckmann,[3] show that the law of energy distribution in the normal spectrum, rst derived by W. Wien from molecular-kinetic considerations and later by me from the theory of electromagnetic radiation, is not valid generally. In any case the theory requires a correction, and I shall attempt in the following to accomplish this on the basis of the theory of electromagnetic radiation which I developed. For this purpose it will be necessary rst to nd in the set of conditions leading to Wien's energy distribution law that term which can be changed; thereafter it will be a matter of removing this term from the set and making an appropriate substitution for it. In my last article[4] I showed that the physical foundations of the electromagnetic radiation theory, including the hypothesis of "natural radiation," withstand the most severe criticism; and since to my knowledge there are no errors in the calculations, the principle persists that the law of energy distribution in the normal spectrum is completely determined when one succeeds in calculating the entropy S of an irradiated, monochromatic, vibrating resonator as a function of its vibrational energy U . Since one then obtains, from the relationship dS/dU = 1/q, the dependence of the energy U on the temperature q, and since the energy is also related to the density of radiation at the corresponding frequency by a simple relation,[5] one also obtains the dependence of this density of radiation on the temperature. The normal energy distribution is then the one in which the radiation densities of all di erent frequencies have the same temperature. Consequently, the entire problem is reduced to determining S as a function of U , and it is to this task that the most essential part of the following analysis is devoted. In my rst treatment of this subject I had expressed S, by de nition, as a simple function of U without further foundation, and I was satis ed to show that this from of entropy meets all the requirements imposed on it by thermodynamics. At that time I believed that this was the only possible expression and that consequently Wein's law, which follows from it, necessarily had general validity. In a later, closer analysis,[6] however, it appeared to me that
4D Segmentation of Brain MR Images with Constrained Cortical Thickness Variation

Segmentation of brain MR images plays an important role in longitudinal investigation of developmental, aging, disease progression changes in the cerebral cortex. However, most existing brain segmentation methods consider multiple time-point images individually and thus cannot achieve longitudinal consistency. For example, cortical thickness measured from the segmented image will contain unnecessary temporal variations, which will affect the time related change pattern and eventually reduce the statistical power of analysis. In this paper, we propose a 4D segmentation framework for the adult brain MR images with the constraint of cortical thickness variations. Specifically, we utilize local intensity information to address the intensity inhomogeneity, spatial cortical thickness constraint to maintain the cortical thickness being within a reasonable range, and temporal cortical thickness variation constraint in neighboring time-points to suppress the artificial variations. The proposed method has been tested on BLSA dataset and ADNI dataset with promising results. Both qualitative and quantitative experimental results demonstrate the advantage of the proposed method, in comparison to other state-of-the-art 4D segmentation methods.
PKUICST at TREC 2013 Microblog Track

This paper describes PKUICST’s entry into the TREC 2013 Microblog track. In this year of microblog track, we designed and conducted a series of experiments based on both our local crawled collection and the ocial track API. For runs with local crawled dataset, we exploited dierent retrieval models, such as TFIDF, Okapi BM25 and statistic language model and tuned optimal parameters for all these models with the dataset in TREC 2012. Furthermore, we attempted to combine these models to gain a better performance with the help of learning to rank framework. For runs with the ocial track API, we employed language model with two-stage pseudo feedback query expansion. In addition, a ltering component was adopted to rene the results retrieved by the expanded query. Experimental results demonstrate that our approach obtains convincing performances.
Report : A solution of Sylvester-like problems for convex quadrilaterals

The probability p n that n points, uniformly and independently distributed within a convex planar body K, have a triangular convex hull is known (at least for some values of n ≥ 3) when K is either a triangle, an ellipse, a parallelogram or a regular polygon. The apparent absence of a solution for the case when K is a general quadrilateral was of interest to us. So, we derived simple expressions for p n when K is a general convex quadrilateral – for 4 ≤ n ≤ 7. The method, which finds moments of the triangular area formed by three random points within a convex quadrilateral K, is outlined in this report. It can in principle be applied for higher n. Subsequent to the completion of this work, we discovered that Deltheil [8] had addressed the quadrilateral problem and derived the equivalent of our formula (8). Curiously, the research literature of the last 40 years appears to have totally overlooked his work. It has been completely forgotten, it seems (even by referees of our work). We are happy therefore that we uncovered Deltheil's work, independently of the refereeing process, before our paper was published and can help remedy this oversight of the literature. Some results of our's extend the basic formula (8) and are therefore new; these will appear in the literature as a brief letter to the Editor [6].
Chemometric analysis of attenuated total reflectance infrared spectra of Proteus mirabilis strains with defined structures of LPS

Proteus spp. strains are some of the most important pathogens associated with complicated urinary tract infections and bacteremia affecting patients with immunodeficiency and long-term urinary catheterization. For epidemiological purposes, various molecular typing methods have been developed for this pathogen. However, these methods are labor intensive and time consuming. We evaluated a new method of differentiation between strains. A collection of Proteus spp. strains was analyzed by attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared (ATR FT-IR) spectroscopy in the mid-infrared region. ATR FT-IR spectroscopy used in conjunction with a diamond ATR accessory directly produced the biochemical profile of the surface chemistry of bacteria. We conclude that a combination of ATR FT-IR spectroscopy and mathematical modeling provides a fast and reliable alternative for discrimination between Proteus isolates, contributing to epidemiological research.
A 1.74 ppm/°C, high PSRR bandgap reference with fast start-up

A novel BiCMOS bandgap reference (BGR) with low temperature coefficient (TC), high power supply rejection ratio (PSRR) and fast start-up is presented in this paper. Utilizing the currents' temperature characteristics of BJTs in active region and MOS FETs in subthreshold region, the temperature drift of the proposed BGR is greatly reduced in full temperature range. This method focuses on achieving several points with zero TC on the curve of reference voltage instead of single valley or peak in the whole temperature range. Besides, clamping operational amplifier is designed not only to stabilize the loop, but also to reduce the start-up time. The proposed BGR is implemented with 0.6-μm BCD technology, and is validated with Hspice in a temperature range of −45°C ∼ 125°C. Simulation results demonstrate that a TC of 1.74ppm/°C is realized, and a PSRR of 87dB is achieved. The start-up time of the proposed BGR is only 8us at room temperature.
3 Higher insulin and glucagon-like peptide-1 (GlP-1) levels in healthy, young South Asians as compared to white Caucasians during an oral glucose tolerance test

Objective: Higher insulin levels during an oral glucose test (OGTT) have consequently been shown in South Asians. We aimed to investigate if this increased insulin response causes reactive hypoglycemia later on, and if an increased glucagon-like-peptide-1 (GLP-1) response, which could contribute to the hyperinsulinemia, is present in this ethnic group. Methods: A prolonged, 6-hour, 75-g OGTT was performed in healthy, young white Caucasian (n = 10) and South Asian (n = 8) men. The glucose, insulin and GLP-1 response was measured and indices of insulin sensitivity and beta-cell activity were calculated. Results: Age (Caucasians 21.5±0.7 years vs. South Asians 21.4±0.7 years (mean±SEM) and body mass index (Caucasians 22.7±0.7 kg/m 2 vs. South Asians 22.1±0.8 kg/m 2 ) were comparable between the two groups. South Asian men were more insulin resistant, as indicated by a comparable glucose but significantly higher insulin response, and a significantly lower Matsuda index (Caucasians 8.7(8.6) vs. South Asians 3.2(19.2), median(IQR)). South Asians showed a higher GLP-1 response, as reflected by a higher area under the curve for GLP-1 (Caucasians 851 ± 100 mmol/L*h vs. South Asians 1235 ± 155 mmol/L*h). During the whole 6-hour period, no reactive hypoglycemia was observed. Conclusion: Healthy, young South Asian men have higher insulin levels during an OGTT as compared to white Caucasians. This does not, however, lead to reactive hypoglycemia. The hyperinsulinemia is accompanied by increased levels of GLP-1. Whether this is an adaptive response to facilitate hyperinsulinemia to overcome insulin resistance or reflects a GLP-1 resistant state has yet to be elucidated.
Facilitating Communication across Lines of Political Difference: The Role of Mass Media

We use national survey data to examine the extent to which various sources of political information expose people to dissimilar political views. We hypothesize that the individual’s ability and desire to exercise selective exposure is a key factor in determining whether a given source produces exposure to dissimilar views. Although a lack of diverse perspectives is a common complaint against American news media, we find that individuals are exposed to far more dissimilar political views via news media than through interpersonal political discussants. The media advantage is rooted in the relative difficulty of selectively exposing oneself to those sources of information, as well as the lesser desire to do so, given the impersonal nature of mass media.
Kozlowski Growth of Laser-Induced Damage During Repetitive Illumination of HfO 2-SiO 2 Multilayer Mirror and Polarizer Coatings

As designers want to increase the peak fluence of high power laser, it becomes necessary to tolerate some damage on mirrors and polarizers. To quantify how the different types of damage morphologies initiate and grow during repetitive illumination, hafnia-silica multilayer mirror and polarizer coatings were laser damage tested. The coatings were prepared by e-beam evaporation and irradiated with a 3-ns-pulse at 1064 nm. The morphology of laser-induced damage was recorded after each shot to determine the types of damage that cause massive unstable failure and lower the optic’s functional damage threshold. The results of the tests were summarized on damage stability maps plotting the average damage size as a function of the number of shots for fluences ranging from 10 to 40 J/cm. The maps indicate that the commonly observed damage morphologies (i.e. pits, flat bottom pits, scalds and outer layer delamination) have distinct growth behaviors and influence the value of the functional damage threshold differently. While pits are stable up to fluences as high as 40 J/cm, flat bottom pits can grow during repetitive illumination above a critical fluence of about 35 J/cm. Scalds are formed in the first shot and never grow at fluences below 40 J/cm. Finally, delaminates are highly unstable and have the potential for damaging the coating catastrophically above 15 J/cm. The results show that the delaminate damage morphology should be prevented. This knowledge has allowed coatings development efforts to focus on eliminating the origin of such damage morphology.
The Dorsal Rather than Ventral Pathway Better Reflects Individual Syntactic Abilities in Second Language

The left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) has been reported to be critically involved in syntactic processing, not only in first language (L1), but in second language (L2). Indeed, the leftward lateralization of the IFG has been shown to be correlated with the performance of a syntactic task in L2. Given that posterior language-related regions are systematically connected with the left IFG, the next question is which of the dorsal and ventral pathways is more critical to the individual syntactic abilities in L2. Here we used diffusion magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and tractography with newly developed semi-automatic methods of defining seeds and selecting regions of interest (ROIs). We calculated mean thickness and fractional anisotropy (FA) in each ROI for the arcuate fasciculus (Arcuate) of the dorsal pathway, as well as for the inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF) of the ventral pathway. In Experiment I, we performed partial correlation analyses between FA and the accuracy of the syntactic task, removing the effects of the accuracy of a spelling task, gender, and handedness. Among the two pathways in each hemisphere, only FA of the left Arcuate was significantly correlated with individual accuracy of the syntactic task. In Experiment II, we recruited monozygotic twins and examined to what extent their L2 abilities and their structural properties were similar. Within twin pairs, the highest significant correlation was observed for reaction times of the spelling task, while the correlation for the accuracy of the syntactic task was marginal; these two correlation coefficients were significantly different. Moreover, the thickness of the left Arcuate was highly correlated within pairs, while its FA, as well as the thickness/FA in the ventral pathways, was not significantly correlated. The correlation coefficient for the thickness of the left Arcuate was significantly larger than that of the left IFOF. These results suggest that the thickness of the left Arcuate is more associated with the shared genetic/environmental factors, whereas both of mutually correlated FA in the left Arcuate and individual syntactic abilities in L2 may be less prone to these shared factors.
Study to Determine the CLinical Significance of HEmolysis During Orbital AtheRectomy (CLEAR Study)

Purpose: To evaluate the incidence of clinically evident hemolysis associated with orbital atherectomy used to treat severe peripheral artery disease. Methods: The observational CLEAR study enrolled 31 subjects (16 men; mean age 71±10 years, range 44–92) with claudication (58.1%) or critical limb ischemia (38.7%) who underwent orbital atherectomy with the Diamondback 360 system at 4 US centers. The 42 lesions in 31 limbs were located in the superficial femoral (n = 19, 45.2%), popliteal (n=8, 19.0%), and tibial arteries (n = 15, 35.8%). The majority of lesions (34, 81.0%) were de novo; moderate or severe calcification was identified in 90.5% of cases. Lesion and procedural parameters were analyzed at a core laboratory. Blood samples were collected during and post procedure and analyzed for markers of hemolysis. The primary endpoint was the occurrence of clinically significant hemolysis. The secondary endpoints included the occurrence of any clinical symptoms/signs potentially related to hemolysis. Statistical analysis was performed to identify predictors for hemolysis. Results: Laboratory evidence of hemolysis was seen in 11 (35.5%) subjects. No one met the clinical event criteria, and so the primary endpoint of the study was not reached. The secondary endpoints were hypertensive crisis (1, 3.2%) and transient hemoglobinuria (3, 9.7%). Lower glomerular filtration rates, calcified plaque, long atherectomy runs, and solid crown selection were independent predictors of hemolysis. Conclusion: There was no clinically significant hemolysis after orbital atherectomy. The results of this study will enable users to predict conditions that predispose to high levels of red cell hemolysis following orbital atherectomy and to take appropriate measures to limit its occurrence.
A neural-net based self-tuning fuzzy looper control for rolling mills

Looper control is one of the challenging problems in rolling mills. The purpose of the paper is to propose an intelligent control method using fuzzy logic and neural networks for improved the performance of looper control over conventional loop control methods. The focus of the paper is on the rule-tuning aspect of the proposed fuzzy looper control. Simulation results are presented to verify the performance of the control system.
Function of Periplasmic Hydrogenases in the Sulfate-Reducing Bacterium Desulfovibrio vulgaris Hildenborough

ABSTRACT The sulfate-reducing bacterium Desulfovibrio vulgaris Hildenborough possesses four periplasmic hydrogenases to facilitate the oxidation of molecular hydrogen. These include an [Fe] hydrogenase, an [NiFeSe] hydrogenase, and two [NiFe] hydrogenases encoded by the hyd, hys, hyn1, and hyn2 genes, respectively. In order to understand their cellular functions, we have compared the growth rates of existing (hyd and hyn1) and newly constructed (hys and hyn-1 hyd) mutants to those of the wild type in defined media in which lactate or hydrogen at either 5 or 50% (vol/vol) was used as the sole electron donor for sulfate reduction. Only strains missing the [Fe] hydrogenase were significantly affected during growth with lactate or with 50% (vol/vol) hydrogen as the sole electron donor. When the cells were grown at low (5% [vol/vol]) hydrogen concentrations, those missing the [NiFeSe] hydrogenase suffered the greatest impairment. The growth rate data correlated strongly with gene expression results obtained from microarray hybridizations and real-time PCR using mRNA extracted from cells grown under the three conditions. Expression of the hys genes followed the order 5% hydrogen > 50% hydrogen > lactate, whereas expression of the hyd genes followed the reverse order. These results suggest that growth with lactate and 50% hydrogen is associated with high intracellular hydrogen concentrations, which are best captured by the higher activity, lower affinity [Fe] hydrogenase. In contrast, growth with 5% hydrogen is associated with a low intracellular hydrogen concentration, requiring the lower activity, higher affinity [NiFeSe] hydrogenase.
Toward featureless visual navigation: Simultaneous localization and planar surface extraction using motion vectors in video streams

Unlike the traditional feature-based methods, we propose using motion vectors (MVs) from video streams as inputs for visual navigation. Although MVs are very noisy and with low spatial resolution, MVs do possess high temporal resolution which means it is possible to merge MVs from different frames to improve signal quality. Homography filtering and MV thresholding are proposed to further improve MV quality so that we can establish plane observations from MVs. We propose an extended Kalman filter (EKF) based approach to simultaneously track robot motion and planes. We formally model error propagation of MVs and derive variance of the merged MVs. We have implemented the proposed method and tested it in physical experiments. Results show that the system is capable of performing robot localization and plane mapping with a relative trajectory error of less than 5.1%.