Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Improved upper and lower bounds for modal logics of programs

We describe novel techniques for establishing improved upper and lower bounds for modal logics of programs: 1) We introduce <italic>hybrid</italic> tree automata. These automata seems to be doubly exponential more powerful than Rabin tree automata but their emptiness problem is only exponentially harder (nondeterministic exponential time vs. nondeterministic polynomial time). The satisfiability problem for several logics is reducible to the emptiness problem for hybrid tree automata. Using this reduction we show that the satisfiability problems for Streett's delta-<italic>PDL</italic>. Kozen's μ-calculus and Parikh's game logic are solvable in nondeterministic exponential time, and the satisfiability problem for Emerson and Halpern's <italic>CTL</italic> and Vardi and Wolper's process logic (<italic>YAPL</italic>) are solvable in nondeterministic doubly exponential time. 2) We encode Turing machine computations by Kripke structures where every state in the structure represents a <italic>single</italic> tape cell. This yields a deterministic doubly exponential time lower bound for <italic>CTL</italic> and <italic>YAPL</italic>. 3) For variants of <italic>CTL</italic> and <italic>YAPL</italic> that deal only with finite computations we prove completeness for deterministic doubly exponential time.
Synchronous cooling and decline in monsoonal rainfall in northeastern Tibet during the fall into the Oligocene icehouse

The fall into the Oligocene icehouse is marked by a steady decline in global temperature with punctuated cooling at the Eocene-Oligocene transition, both of which are well documented in the marine realm. However, the chronology and mechanisms of cooling on land remain unclear. Here, we use clumped isotope thermometry on northeastern Tibetan continental carbonates to reconstruct a detailed Paleogene surface temperature record for the Asian continental interior, and correlate this to an enhanced pollen data set. Our results show two successive dramatic (>9 °C) temperature drops, at 37 Ma and at 33.5 Ma. These large-magnitude decreases in continental temperatures can only be explained by a combination of both regional cooling and shifts of the rainy season to cooler months, which we interpret to reflect a decline of monsoonal intensity. Our results suggest that the response of Asian surface temperatures and monsoonal rainfall to the steady decline of atmospheric CO2 and global temperature through the late Eocene was nonlinear and occurred in two steps separated by a period of climatic instability. Our results support the onset of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current coeval to the Oligocene isotope event 1 (Oi-1) glaciation at 33.5 Ma, reshaping the distribution of surface heat worldwide; however, the origin of the 37 Ma cooling event remains less clear.
Dietary calcium, sex hormones, and bone mineral density in men.

OBJECTIVE--To evaluate the factors that determine bone mineral density at axial and appendicular sites in normal men. DESIGN--Measurement of bone mineral density of the radius by single photon absorptiometry and of the lumbar spine and hip by dual photon absorptiometry to assess their relation with various determinants of bone mineral density. Dietary calcium was assessed from a questionnaire validated against a four day dietary record. SETTING--Local community, Sydney, Australia. PATIENTS--48 Men (aged 21-79, median 44) recruited from the local community including 35 male cotwins of twin pairs of differing sex recruited from the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council twin registry for epidemiological studies on determinants of bone mineral density. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES--Bone mineral density of the axial and appendicular skeleton and its relation to age, anthropometric features, dietary calcium intake, and serum sex hormone concentrations. RESULTS--Dietary calcium intake (g/day) was a significant predictor of bone mineral density of axial bones, explaining 24% and 42% of the variance at the lumbar spine and femoral neck respectively. This effect was independent of weight. In contrast with the axial skeleton, bone mineral density at each forearm site was predicted by weight and an index of free testosterone but not by dietary calcium intake. CONCLUSIONS--Dietary calcium intake has a role in the determination or maintenance, or both, of the axial but not the appendicular skeleton in adult men.
Strategies for improving land delivery for residential development: a case of the north-west metropolitan Melbourne

One of the factors affecting the housing supply is closely linked to the time taken to complete the land development assessment approval. Delays in completing the development process on time often results in difficulties of increasing housing supply. In parallel, housing demand continues to increase with increasing net population in Australian urban areas. This research aims to identify the current issues and challenges of releasing land for housing development in the established suburbs of Melbourne north-west area (involving six local government areas: Brimbank, Maribyrnong, Moreland, Moonee Valley, Hume and Melton). An application of multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) using the strategic residential potential assessment (SRPA) method is considered. This is designed to improve the method of land administration strategies for housing development. The analysis is set within the context of investigating land preparation processes and their impacts on land availability for housing supply. The research adopts interview techniques to gain insight into the processes of land release through the activities of town planners in the selected local council areas. The proposed SRPA methods are based on a land-use assessment approach that is underpinned by the current residential land-use schemes legislated by the Department of Transport Planning and Local Infrastructure.1 The results of applying the proposed model reveal the associated spatial pattern of areas with potential for residential development relative to the public transport and public service locations.
Nucleotide Occlusion in the Human Cystic Fibrosis Transmembrane Conductance Regulator

The function of the human cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) protein as a chloride channel or transport regulator involves cellular ATP binding and cleavage. Here we describe that human CFTR expressed in insect (Sf9) cell membranes shows specific, Mg2+-dependent nucleotide occlusion, detected by covalent labeling with 8-azido-[α-32P]ATP. Nucleotide occlusion in CFTR requires incubation at 37 °C, and the occluded nucleotide can not be removed by repeated washings of the membranes with cold MgATP-containing medium. By using limited tryptic digestion of the labeled CFTR protein we found that the adenine nucleotide occlusion preferentially occurred in the N-terminal nucleotide binding domain (NBD). Addition of the ATPase inhibitor vanadate, which stabilizes an open state of the CFTR chloride channel, produced an increased nucleotide occlusion and resulted in the labeling of both the N-terminal and C-terminal NBDs. Protein modification withN-ethylmaleimide prevented both vanadate-dependent and -independent nucleotide occlusion in CFTR. The pattern of nucleotide occlusion indicates significant differences in the ATP hydrolyzing activities of the two NBDs, which may explain their different roles in the CFTR channel regulation.
Design of localizer capture and track modes for a lateral autopilot using H-infinity synthesis

Results are presented of a design exercise in which the most recent developments in H-infinity synthesis theory were applied to the problem of designing a lateral autopilot for a typical transport airplane. The bulk of the engineering effort in applying these results was in the formulation of an appropriate synthesis model. Important aspects of this process are presented. The linear controller design was done using H-infinity synthesis theory. The linear design was suitably modified to satisfy some of the performance constraints. Results of linear analysis and simulation of the final nonlinear controllers are presented. <<ETX>>
Urban object extraction using Dempster Shafer feature-based image analysis from worldview-3 satellite imagery

ABSTRACT A detailed and up-to-date land use of the urban environment is essentially required in many applications. Very high-resolution (VHR), Multispectral Scanner System (MSS) Worldview-3 (WV-3) satellite imagery provides detailed information on urban characteristics, which should be professionally mined. In this research, WV-3 was processed by machine learning (ML) methods to extract the most accurate urban features. Fuze-Go panchromatic sharpening in conjunction with atmospheric and topographic correction was initially utilized to increase the image quality and colour contrast. Three image analysis approaches including, current pixel-based image analysis (PBIA), object-based image analysis (OBIA) and new feature-based image analysis (FBIA) were implemented on WV-3 image. The k-nearest neighbour (k-NN), Naive Bayes (NB), support vector machine (SVM) classifiers were represented by PBIA, the Decision Tree (DT) classifier was examined as OBIA and the Dempster–Shafer (DS) fusion classifier was manifested for the first time as FBIA. In order to engage DS as FBIA, four types of Belief Masses, namely, Precision, Recall, Overall Accuracy, and kappa coefficient (ĸ) were implemented and compared to assign the most likelihood urban features. All the applied classifiers were also trained on the first site and then tested on another site to examine the transferability. The accuracy, reliability, and computational time of all classifiers were examined by confusion matrix and McNemar assessment. Results show improvements on the detailed urban extraction obtained using the proposed FBIA with 92.2% overall accuracy in compared with PBIA and OBIA. The FBIA result of urban extraction is more consistent when transferred to another study area and consumes much lesser time than OBIA. Also, the precision mass belief measurement achieved highest efficiency regarding receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve rate.
RDI_Team at SemEval-2016 Task 3: RDI Unsupervised Framework for Text Ranking

Ranking is an important task in the field of information retrieval. Ranking may be used in different modules in natural language processing such as search engines. In this paper, we introduce a competitive ranking system which combines three different modules. The system participated in SemEval 2016 question ranking task for the Arabic language. The task is a ranking task that targets reordering results retrieved from search engine. Results reordering is done based on relevancy between search result and the original query issued. The data provided in the competition is in the form of question (query) and 30 question answer pairs retrieved from search engine. For each question retrieved from the search engine the system generates a relevancy score that is to be used for ranking. The proposed system came in the third position in the Competition. Since the majority of modules are unsupervised the unsupervised naming was used.
Using automated patch clamp electrophysiology platforms in pain‐related ion channel research: insights from industry and academia

Automated patch clamp (APC) technology was first developed at the turn of the millennium. The increased throughput it afforded promised a new paradigm in ion channel recordings, offering the potential to overcome the time‐consuming, low‐throughput bottleneck, arising from manual patch clamp investigations. This has relevance to the fast‐paced development of novel therapies for chronic pain. This review highlights the advances in technology, using select examples that have facilitated APC usage in both industry and academia. It covers both first generation and the latest developments in second‐generation platforms. In addition, it also provides an overview of the pain research field and how APC platforms have furthered our understanding of ion channel research and the development of pharmacological tools and therapeutics. APC platforms have much to offer to the ion channel research community, and this review highlights areas of best practice for both academia and industry. The impact of APC platforms and the prospects of ion channel research and improved therapeutics for chronic pain will be evaluated.
Low grade chronic inflammation in the RISC population: associations with insulin resistance and cardiometabolic risk profile

Abstract Objective: Low grade chronic inflammation has been hypothesized to underlie the constellation of cardiometabolic risk factors, possibly by inducing insulin resistance. In the present study we investigated associations between inflammation markers, insulin sensitivity (M/I) and a range of cardiometabolic risk factors in a large, healthy population. Research Design and Methods: The RISC cohort includes 1326 non-diabetic, European men and women, aged between 30-60 years. We measured cardiometabolic risk factors and performed a hyperinsulinaemic euglycaemic clamp. We determined total white blood cell count (WBC) and erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) as markers of chronic inflammation. Results: WBC and ESR were both strongly associated with M/I. WBC and ESR were further associated with a range of cardiometabolic risk factors. Associations between WBC and HDL cholesterol, triglycerides, heart rate, fasting C-peptide and insulin and 2h insulin in men and women and between WBC and 2h glucose in women remained significant after adjusting for both M/I and waist circumference. Associations between ESR and HDL cholesterol, heart rate, fasting and 2h insulin in men and women and between ESR and fat mass in women remained significant after adjusting for M/I and waist. Conclusions: This study showed that low grade chronic inflammation is associated with the cardiometabolic risk profile of a healthy population. Insulin resistance, although strongly associated with inflammation, does not seem to play a large intermediary role in this.
Nociceptin/orphanin FQ suppresses the excitability of neurons in the ventromedial nucleus of the hypothalamus

Non‐technical summary Feeding behaviour is controlled in part by activity within brain hypothalamic nuclei. The ventromedial nucleus of the hypothalamus (VMN) contains a population of neurons that inhibit feeding when they are active. The neuropeptide nociceptin or orphanin FQ (N/OFQ) acts within the VMN to stimulate food intake. We show that N/OFQ, through its receptor, directly inhibits these VMN neurons. We think that by inhibiting anorexigenic VMN neurons, N/OFQ thereby allows the stimulation of food intake. These studies increase our knowledge of how VMN neurons participate in regulating food intake and maintain energy homeostasis in the body.
Usability Evaluation Issues in Commercial and Research Systems

This paper briefly reviews current-practice usability evaluation methods and criteria for spoken dialogue systems. We then describe how two commercial and one research system were evaluated with respect to usability and discuss similarities and differences. Finally, we discuss the industrial need for cheaper ways of evaluating usability and the need to pursue research on usability in a field in which the technological capabilities of systems continue to improve and diversify at a rapid pace.
PROACTIVE ENERGY MANAGEMENT FOR NEXT-GENERATION BUILDING SYSTEMS

We present a proactive energy management framework that integrates predictive dynamic building models and day-ahead forecasts of disturbances affecting efficiency and costs. This enables an efficient management of re- sources and an accurate prediction of the daily electricity demand profile. The strategy is based on the on-line solu- tion of mixed-integer nonlinear programming problems. The framework is able to integrate forecasts of weather conditions, fuel prices, heat gains, and utility demands. We claim that a large adoption level of this proactive tech- nology can improve the predictability of the overall elec- tricity demand at high-level power grid operations.
Architectural Quality in Development Processes: A Case Study

Software quality is expressed through various attributes, many of them are architectural. So, an architecture-focused development process, with an integrated self-evaluation, must be selected. The purpose of this research is to present the incorporation of Architectural Tradeoff Analysis Method in the Rational Unified Process which emphasizes the definition of the software architecture through its 4+1 architectural views. The improved RUP was applied to a case study: a Knowledge Management System (KMS), and the most important quality attributes for it were selected during the elaboration phase (Maintainability, Reliability and Efficiency), candidates architectures were proposed and the most suitable architecture was gotten.
Asia's Long-term Growth and Integration: Reaching beyond Trade Policy Barriers

ERD Policy Brief Series is based on papers or notes prepared by ADB staff and their resource persons. The series is designed to provide concise nontechnical accounts of policy issues of topical interest to ADB management, Board of Directors, and staff. Though prepared primarily for internal readership within the ADB, the series may be accessed by interested external readers. Feedback is welcome via e-mail (policybriefs@adb.org). The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the ADB. The views expressed in this paper are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the Asian Development Bank.
Logical operations with localized structures

We show how to use excitable regimes mediated by localized structures (LSs) to perform AND, OR and NOT logical operations providing full logical functionality. Our scheme is general and can be implemented in any physical system displaying LSs. In particular, LSs in nonlinear photonic devices can be used for all-optical computing applications where several reconfigurable logic gates can be implemented in the transverse plane of a single device, allowing for parallel computing.
The Charged Linker Region Is an Important Regulator of Hsp90 Function*

Hsp90 is an ATP-dependent molecular chaperone which assists the maturation of a large set of target proteins. Members of the highly conserved Hsp90 family are found from bacteria to higher eukaryotes, with homologues in different organelles. The core architecture of Hsp90 is defined by the N-terminal ATP binding domain followed by the middle domain and the C-terminal dimerization domain. A long, highly charged linker between the N-terminal domain and the middle domain is a feature characteristic for Hsp90s of eukaryotic organisms. We set out to clarify the function of this linker by studying the effects of deletions in this region in vivo and in vitro. Here we show that increasing deletions in the charged linker region lead to defects ranging from mild temperature sensitivity to a lethal phenotype. The lethal deletion variants investigated in this study still exhibit ATPase activity. Deletion of the charged linker ultimately causes a loss of Hsp90 regulation by co-chaperones, as the sensitivity for Aha1-mediated ATPase acceleration declines, and binding of p23/Sba1 is lost in non-viable deletion constructs. In vivo client assays additionally demonstrated that the deletion of the linker had a pronounced effect on the ability of Hsp90 to facilitate client activation. A partial reconstruction of the linker sequence showed that the supplementation by artificial sequences can rescue the functionality of Hsp90 and restore the conformational flexibility of the protein, required for the processing of client proteins.
Sound mapping in reverberant rooms by a robust direct method

Direct methods estimate the position of an acoustic source by sampling the environment through a set of properly placed microphones. SRP-Phat is probably the most popular direct method. It is based on computation of the generalized cross- correlation (GCC) of signals on a grid of preselected points. Anyway, in the presence of reverberation, the functional employed by SRP-Phat can be very irregular from point to point, thus making the source localization a difficult task. In this paper, a new functional is presented that regularizes the SRP- Phat approach and makes it more efficient the use of optimization algorithms to further refine the source position estimation. After a brief introduction, the proposed approach is described and compared to SRP-Phat on simulated and real data at different reverberation levels.
Trypanocidal drugs: mechanisms, resistance and new targets

The protozoan parasites Trypanosoma brucei and Trypanosoma cruzi are the causative agents of African trypanosomiasis and Chagas disease, respectively. These are debilitating infections that exert a considerable health burden on some of the poorest people on the planet. Treatment of trypanosome infections is dependent on a small number of drugs that have limited efficacy and can cause severe side effects. Here, we review the properties of these drugs and describe new findings on their modes of action and the mechanisms by which resistance can arise. We further outline how a greater understanding of parasite biology is being exploited in the search for novel chemotherapeutic agents. This effort is being facilitated by new research networks that involve academic and biotechnology/pharmaceutical organisations, supported by public–private partnerships, and are bringing a new dynamism and purpose to the search for trypanocidal agents.
Spontaneous conformational change and toxin binding in α7 acetylcholine receptor: Insight into channel activation and inhibition

Nicotinic AChRs (nAChRs) represent a paradigm for ligand-gated ion channels. Despite intensive studies over many years, our understanding of the mechanisms of activation and inhibition for nAChRs is still incomplete. Here, we present molecular dynamics (MD) simulations of the α7 nAChR ligand-binding domain, both in apo form and in α-Cobratoxin-bound form, starting from the respective homology models built on crystal structures of the acetylcholine-binding protein. The toxin-bound form was relatively stable, and its structure was validated by calculating mutational effects on the toxin-binding affinity. However, in the apo form, one subunit spontaneously moved away from the conformation of the other four subunits. This motion resembles what has been proposed for leading to channel opening. At the top, the C loop and the adjacent β7-β8 loop swing downward and inward, whereas at the bottom, the F loop and the C terminus of β10 swing in the opposite direction. These swings appear to tilt the whole subunit clockwise. The resulting changes in solvent accessibility show strong correlation with experimental results by the substituted cysteine accessibility method upon addition of acetylcholine. Our MD simulation results suggest a mechanistic model in which the apo form, although predominantly sampling the “closed” state, can make excursions into the “open” state. The open state has high affinity for agonists, leading to channel activation, whereas the closed state upon distortion has high affinity for antagonists, leading to inhibition.