Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Toponym Resolution : A First Large-Scale Comparative Evaluation

Toponym resolution (TR) is the task of mapping the name of a location to a spatial representation of the location referred to, such as the centroid of the location, given as latitude/longitude. While a number of systems for automating the task have been described in the literature, to date no comparative evaluation study has existed, mainly for lack of a standard benchmark (i.e., gazetteer and evaluation corpus). On the basis of a benchmark methodology and dataset, we present the first systematic account of the utility of different heuristics for the toponym resolution task, based on experimental comparison on two novel, large-scale gold-standard corpora. Each heuristic’s utility is evaluated in isolation, and in addition, two previously reported complex methods are replicated in full.
Interracial Workplace Cooperation: Evidence from the NBA

Using data from the National Basketball Association (NBA), we examine whether patterns of workplace cooperation occur disproportionately among workers of the same race. We find that, holding constant the composition of teammates on the floor, basketball players are no more likely to complete an assist to a player of the same race than a player of a different race. Our confidence interval allows us to reject even small amounts of same-race bias in passing patterns. Our findings suggest that high levels of interracial cooperation can occur in a setting where workers are operating in a highly visible setting with strong incentives to behave efficiently.
Commonality, Information and Return/Return Volatility - Volume Relationship

This paper develops a common-factor model to investigate relationships between security returns/return volatility and trading volume. The model generalizes Tauchen and Pitts' (1983) MDH model by capturing possible interactions among securities. In our model, both price changes and trading volume are governed by three kinds of mutually independent variables: common factor variables, latent information variables and idiosyncratic variables. Despite its similarity to Hasbrouck and Seppi's (2001) model in terms of the form, the model extraordinarily allows us to identify the cause of interactions among securities by decomposing factor loadings into constant and random components. Three key implications are reached from our model. First, common factor structures in returns and trading volume stem from information flows. Second, returns' common factors are not related to trading volume's common factors. This implication directly opposes Hasbrouck and Seppi's (2001) assumption. Finally, cross-firm variations of returns and volume respectively rely on underlying latent information flows. The positive relation between return volatility and volume also results only from underlying latent information flows. Thus, common factor structures in returns and trading volume have no additional explanatory power in cross-firm variations and the positive return volatility-volume relationship. We fit the model for intraday data of Dow Jones 30 stocks using the EM algorithm. The results support specifications of our model. The empirical results demonstrate 3-factor structures in returns and trading volume, respectively. All 30 stocks in our sample are governed by at least one common factor. This fact implies that our model outperforms Tauchen and Pitts' (1983) model because their model is a special case of our model without the presence of common factors. We also show that after controlling the effect of information flows, persistence in return variance disappears.
Lean manufacturing methods in simulation literature: Review and association analysis

The lean manufacturing philosophy includes several methods that aim to remove waste from production. This paper studies lean manufacturing methods and how simulation is used to consider them. In order to do this, it reviews papers that study simulation together with lean methods. The papers that are reviewed are categorized according to the lean methods used and result types obtained. Analysis is performed in order to gain knowledge about the volumes of occurrence of different methods and result types. Typical methods in the papers are different types of value stream mapping and work-in-process models. An exploratory analysis is performed to reveal the relationships between the methods and result types. This is done using association analysis. It reveals the methods that are commonly studied together in the literature. The paper also lists research areas that are not considered in the literature. These areas are often related to the analysis of variation.
Maximum likelihood estimation of the parameters of a plane wave tone at an equispaced linear array

Maximum likelihood estimation of the amplitude, phase, frequency, and arrival angle of a plane wave tone at an M-element linear array using equispaced discrete-time observations is considered. The estimator is obtained for the case when the signal amplitude at each element is equal and is extended to the case of arbitrary amplitudes. The Cramer-Rao bounds are obtained for both cases and a Monte Carlo performance study is presented. <<ETX>>
How to keep your neighbours in order

I present a datatype-generic treatment of recursive container types whose elements are guaranteed to be stored in increasing order, with the ordering invariant rolled out systematically. Intervals, lists and binary search trees are instances of the generic treatment. On the journey to this treatment, I report a variety of failed experiments and the transferable learning experiences they triggered. I demonstrate that a total element ordering is enough to deliver insertion and flattening algorithms, and show that (with care about the formulation of the types) the implementations remain as usual. Agda's instance arguments and pattern synonyms maximize the proof search done by the typechecker and minimize the appearance of proofs in program text, often eradicating them entirely. Generalizing to indexed recursive container types, invariants such as size and balance can be expressed in addition to ordering. By way of example, I implement insertion and deletion for 2-3 trees, ensuring both order and balance by the discipline of type checking.
Rethinking Psychiatric Care: Assessing the Impact of a Community Intervention Program

Rehabilitation connects the personal relevant goals of the person to services that reduce disability and promote recovery. Achieving this goal requires the integration of medical and psychosocial models of interventions through a multidisciplinary team. In Romania the development of community alternatives to hospitalization and recovery-oriented services has been one of the main aims since 2005, as indicated by the Action Plan and Strategies of Ministry of Health. Despite that, little improvements were made, and health care is still mostly hospital based. In these problematic contexts, and drawing on previous experience of ACT interventions, an experimental case management program was implemented at Campulung Moldovenesc Community Mental Health Center in order to bridge the existent gap between hospital and community and support people with mental health problems not just improve their access to treatment services but also to improve their overall functioning and health. We have evaluated the impact of a Mental Health Program implemented Campulung Moldovenesc in comparison with standard treatment, on reducing symptoms and improving the overall level of functioning in a group of 91 participants diagnosed with depression and schizophrenia. Specifically compared with standard treatment, case management was associated with greater improvement in symptoms, fewer of hospital days, increased number of contacts between clients and professional staff , decrease of dropout rates from mental health services, greater improvement in the global and social functioning level, decreasing burden of care and increasing client and his family satisfaction with services and last, but not least, with lower total cost of care.
A New Method of Multi-sensor Vibration Signals Data Fusion Based on Correlation Function

In this paper to further enhance the measuring precision of vibration signal in the process of rotary machine fault diagnosis, a new data fusion method is presented on the basis of correlation function to determine the weighted value. The method doesn’t require knowing the prior knowledge about sensors, and the weighted value of sensors can be determined on the basis of the correlation measure of real-time data tested in the fusion process. It gives greater weighted value to the greater correlation measure of sensor signals, and vice versa. Through simulation analysis, the dynamic adaptability, precision, and fault-tolerance of this method are better than the traditional weighted averaging method. Furthermore, this method has good performance of anti-jamming due to the correlation measures between noises and effective signals are usually small. Finally, rotor dynamics and integrated fault diagnosis system is taken as an example to verify the feasibility and advantages of this method with respect to multi-sensor vibration signal processing.
Randomized Trial of Time-Limited Interruptions of Protease Inhibitor-Based Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) vs. Continuous Therapy for HIV-1 Infection

Background The clinical outcomes of short interruptions of PI-based ART regimens remains undefined. Methods A 2-arm non-inferiority trial was conducted on 53 HIV-1 infected South African participants with viral load <50 copies/ml and CD4 T cell count >450 cells/µl on stavudine (or zidovudine), lamivudine and lopinavir/ritonavir. Subjects were randomized to a) sequential 2, 4 and 8-week ART interruptions or b) continuous ART (cART). Primary analysis was based on the proportion of CD4 count >350 cells(c)/ml over 72 weeks. Adherence, HIV-1 drug resistance, and CD4 count rise over time were analyzed as secondary endpoints. Results The proportions of CD4 counts >350 cells/µl were 82.12% for the intermittent arm and 93.73 for the cART arm; the difference of 11.95% was above the defined 10% threshold for non-inferiority (upper limit of 97.5% CI, 24.1%; 2-sided CI: −0.16, 23.1). No clinically significant differences in opportunistic infections, adverse events, adherence or viral resistance were noted; after randomization, long-term CD4 rise was observed only in the cART arm. Conclusion We are unable to conclude that short PI-based ART interruptions are non-inferior to cART in retention of immune reconstitution; however, short interruptions did not lead to a greater rate of resistance mutations or adverse events than cART suggesting that this regimen may be more forgiving than NNRTIs if interruptions in therapy occur. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT00100646
Video tracking of human-faces with occlusion using enhanced Camshift approach

An enhanced Camshift approach in conjunction with Kalman filter is presented aiming at tracking the multi-human-faces with occlusion in the moving course. Starting with detection of facial region of interest, the proposed tactic induces overlap coefficient into determining whether or not the target occlusion occurs in the course of motion. The matching matrix is subsequently set up based on the target's dynamic model, solving the likely mismatching problem arising from posteriority of occlusion. The algorithm is put to test suggesting adequately promising occlusion-resistance capacity and practicality.
Multiple description image coding using dual-tree discrete wavelet transform

A novel multiple description image coding scheme, called dual-tree discrete wavelet transform based multiple description image coding is proposed. First, the 2D dual-tree discrete wavelet transform is applied to an image to produce 2 wavelet trees with complementary information. A noise-shaping algorithm is then employed to remove the redundancies of both trees and form the basic parts of two descriptions. A side noise shaping algorithm is proposed to draw the supplementary information for side decoding from the other tree. Basic information from one tree and supplementary from the other tree are grouped to form a description. Two descriptions are then dispatched from different channels. Because every description includes critical information of the picture, the reconstructed image from any single channel can have acceptable fidelity. The reconstructed image is of much better quality if both channels are available. Simulation results have demonstrated the performance of the proposed algorithm.
Real-time quasi dense two-frames depth map for Autonomous Guided Vehicles

This paper presents a real-time and dense structure from motion approach, based on an efficient planar parallax motion decomposition, and also proposes several optimizations to improve the optical flow firstly computed. Later, it is estimated using our own GPU implementation of the well-known pyramidal algorithm of Lucas and Kanade. Then, each pair of points previously matched is evaluated according to the spatial continuity constraint provided by the Tensor Voting framework applied in the 4-D joint space of image coordinates and motions. Thus, assuming the ground locally planar, the homography corresponding to its image motion is robustly and quickly estimated using RANSAC on designated well-matched pairwise by the prior Tensor Voting process. Depth map is finally computed from the parallax motion decomposition. The initialization of successive runs is also addressed, providing noticeable enhancement, as well as the hardware integration using the CUDA technology.
Temporal and Spatial Program Hot Spot Visualization Technical Report SOCS-01.6

Certain parts of computer programs are executed more often than others over the course of normal use. The most frequently visited portions of code are known as “hot spots. ” It is usually in these regions where most optimization effort should be focussed. The problem of locating and identifying program hot spots is related to that of detecting program phase changes. Different phases in a program are distinguishable by the unique behavioural patterns they exhibit. Two methods of visualizing program hot spots and phase changes are discussed. The first method is a common technique that shows program activity relative to the position of the code in memory. The second technique uses a re-numbering scheme based on the order of appearance of indirect branches. A test suite of large object oriented programs are viewed and certain conclusions, based on empirical observations, are made about the relative merits and disadvantages of each visualization method.
A novel method of cervical cell image segmentation via region merging and SLIC

Considering that the existing methods of cell segmentation are sensitive to noise, in this paper, a novel method was proposed to obtain the contour of cervical cell accurately and robustly. Firstly, the mean shift algorithm was utilized to smooth the cell image. Then, the initial contour of cervical cell was extracted by an adaptive threshold algorithm. Secondly, SLIC (Simple Linear Iterative Clustering, SLIC) was applied to the smoothed cell image to get the superpixels of the whole cell image. Finally, based on the initial contour, we can automatically set some marks for background and foreground in a cell image full of superpixels. Then the superpixels were merged by the rule of maximal similarity. A key property of our superpixel merging is that it does not require a preset threshold, and the non-marker background regions are merged with the marked area automatically, while the non-marker superpixels are identified to avoid from being merged into background. We validate our method via the cervical cell image database and demonstrate that our method can extract the contour of cytoplasm from a single-cell cervical smear image accurately in a relatively short time.
SEPARATION OF SPEECH SIGNALS WITH SEGMENTATION OF THE IMPULSE RESPONSES UNDER REVERBERANT CONDITIONS

BSS performance is not still enough for realistic acoustic signals, particularly when the lengths of the impulse responses are long. We propose to use a complete model expressed in frequency domain but which is exactly equivalent to a linear convolution in time-domain. This model is applied to acoustic responses by segmenting the overall impulse responses in K short segments. The data are then transformed for each frequency bin into convolutive mixtures of K taps. Finally, the separation is achieved with a natural gradient algorithm based on a maximum-entropy cost function. The interest of this complete model consists in combining both short Fourier Transforms (with N samples) and convolutive mixtures with few taps K. The resulting impulse responses lengths in the time-domain will be of (K.N) samples and can best suit with long real acoustic responses.
A Conformal ADI-FDTD Formulation for the Modeling of 3-D Curved Lossy Metal Surfaces

This paper presents a conformal first-order surface-impedance boundary condition (SIBC) for the unconditionally stable alternating-direction implicit (ADI) finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. The model can be used to consider conductor loss of arbitrarily-shaped lossy conductors. The quality factor Q of spherical and cylindrical cavity resonators is used to investigate the accuracy of the technique. The technique is validated by comparison with analytic results and numerical data calculated using CST microwave studio (MWS). The convergence rate of the results is of second order, i.e., the error reduces to one quarter as the mesh resolution is doubled.
Fuzzy forecast combiner design for fast fashion demand forecasting

In this study, a combiner method is developed to create weekly demand forecasts for a fast-fashion apparel company. The combiner generates forecasts by combining the forecasts of three different methods through fuzzy logic. The combination weights are adaptive in the sense that the weights of the better-performing methods are increased over time. One of the three methods, which is based on product lifecycle, is relatively novel. This method is observed to be quite successful in forecasts as it can reflect the inherent regular seasonality of demand, and it allows the input of expert knowledge. The approach is illustrated through a simulation study that uses real (distorted) data from a Turkish apparel company. The combined forecast method is shown to be better than any of the methods alone.
Nontrivial and Universal Helping for Wait-Free Queues and Stacks

This paper studies two approaches to formalize helping in wait-free implementations of shared objects. The first approach is based on operation valency, and it allows us to make the important distinction between trivial and nontrivial helping. We show that a wait-free implementation of a queue from common2 objects (e.g., Test&Set) requires nontrivial helping. In contrast, there is a wait-free implementation of a stack from Common2 objects with only trivial helping. This separation might shed light on the difficulty of implementing a queue from Common2 objects. The other approach formalizes the helping mechanism employed by Herlihy's universal wait-free construction and is based on having an operation by one process restrict the possible linearizations of operations by other processes. We show that objects possessing such universal helping can be used to solve consensus.
Wrapper Scan Chains Design for Rapid and Low Power Testing of Embedded Cores

Connection of internal scan chains in core wrapper design (CWD) is necessary to handle the width match of TAM and internal scan chains. However, conventional serial connection of internal scan chains incurs power and time penalty. Study shows that the distribution and high density of don't care bits (X-bits) in test patterns make scan slices overlapping and partial overlapping possible. A novel parallel CWD (pCWD) approach is presented in this paper for lowering test power by shortening wrapper scan chains and adjusting test patterns. In order to achieve shift time reduction from overlapping in pCWD, a two-phase process on test pattern: partition and fill, is presented. Experimental results on d695 of ITC2002 benchmark demonstrated the shift time and test power have been decreased by 1.5 and 15 times, respectively. In addition, the proposed pCWD can be used as a stand-alone time reduction technique, which has better performance than previous techniques.
SEMI-ALGEBRAIC IDEAS IN NONSMOOTH OPTIMIZATION

Modern variational analysis provides a sophisticated unification of convex and smooth optimization theory, achieving striking generality but at the expense of possible pathology. The general theory must handle highly irregular and oscillatory functions and sets, and yet, on the other hand, a rich family of concrete instances involve no such pathology. In particular, from a variety of variational-analytic perspectives, semialgebraic sets—finite unions of sets defined by finitely many polynomial inequalities—are well behaved.
Coping with highly imbalanced datasets: A case study with definition extraction in a multilingual setting

Abstract This paper addresses the task of automatic extraction of definitions by thoroughly exploring an approach that solely relies on machine learning techniques, and by focusing on the issue of the imbalance of relevant datasets. We obtained a breakthrough in terms of the automatic extraction of definitions, by extensively and systematically experimenting with different sampling techniques and their combination, as well as a range of different types of classifiers. Performance consistently scored in the range of 0.95–0.99 of area under the receiver operating characteristics, with a notorious improvement between 17 and 22 percentage points regarding the baseline of 0.73–0.77, for datasets with different rates of imbalance. Thus, the present paper also represents a contribution to the seminal work in natural language processing that points toward the importance of exploring the research path of applying sampling techniques to mitigate the bias induced by highly imbalanced datasets, and thus greatly improving the performance of a large range of tools that rely on them.
Animal modelling for inherited central vision loss

Disease‐causing variants of a large number of genes trigger inherited retinal degeneration leading to photoreceptor loss. Because cones are essential for daylight and central vision such as reading, mobility, and face recognition, this review focuses on a variety of animal models for cone diseases. The pertinence of using these models to reveal genotype/phenotype correlations and to evaluate new therapeutic strategies is discussed. Interestingly, several large animal models recapitulate human diseases and can serve as a strong base from which to study the biology of disease and to assess the scale‐up of new therapies. Examples of innovative approaches will be presented such as lentiviral‐based transgenesis in pigs and adeno‐associated virus (AAV)‐gene transfer into the monkey eye to investigate the neural circuitry plasticity of the visual system. The models reported herein permit the exploration of common mechanisms that exist between different species and the identification and highlighting of pathways that may be specific to primates, including humans. © 2015 The Authors. The Journal of Pathology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Pathological Society of Great Britain and Ireland.