Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Learning compact discriminant local face descriptor with VLAD

Local Binary patterns (LBP) and its extensions typify the present face descriptors due to their intrinsic capability of featuring the neighborhood changes striding over every pixel. These descriptors are usually engineered in an obsolete handcrafted manner and thus sufficient prior knowledge and expertise are necessitated to assure the recognition performance. This paper outlines an improved face descriptor to the recently proposed learning-based discriminant face descriptor (DFD), coined compact discriminant local face descriptor (CDLFD). In general, the pixel discriminant matrices (PDMs) that store the LBP-like local intensity variations are pruned onto the discriminant pixel vectors (DPVs) with respect to the DFD learned feature filters and the optimal soft-sampling matrices. Different from DFD and other analogous state of the arts that cluster the extracted features into the bag-of-word representation, CDLFD encodes the DPVs as a set of vector of locally aggregated descriptors (VLADs). The global VLAD signature, i.e., the concatenation of all local VLADs, is appropriately normalized and PCA whitened to yield the globally compact representation. The CDLFD performance is scrutinized based on the standard FERET evaluation protocol and the AR dataset. The experimental results disclose that CDLFD outperforms the handcrafted LBP variants, DFD, and other face descriptors, in terms of rank-1 recognition rate (%).
Simulation of database-valued markov chains using SimSQL

This paper describes the SimSQL system, which allows for SQLbased specification, simulation, and querying of database-valued Markov chains, i.e., chains whose value at any time step comprises the contents of an entire database. SimSQL extends the earlier Monte Carlo database system (MCDB), which permitted Monte Carlo simulation of static database-valued random variables. Like MCDB, SimSQL uses user-specified "VG functions" to generate the simulated data values that are the building blocks of a simulated database. The enhanced functionality of SimSQL is enabled by the ability to parametrize VG functions using stochastic tables, so that one stochastic database can be used to parametrize the generation of another stochastic database, which can parametrize another, and so on. Other key extensions include the ability to explicitly define recursive versions of a stochastic table and the ability to execute the simulation in a MapReduce environment. We focus on applying SimSQL to Bayesian machine learning.
Approximate Mechanism Design Term Paper

Mechanism Design is concerned with how to implement system wide solutions to problems that involve multiple self-interested agents, each with private information about their preferences. Mechanism Design Optimization Problem is a mechanism design problem where the output specification is given by a positive real valued objective function and a set of feasible outputs, and we require an output that minimizes (or maximizes) the objective function. Classical mechanism design theory assumes that the optimization problem is solved precisely. However, the optimization problem, for most of the interesting computational applications, is infeasible. This means that, we need to use approximate algorithms for solving the optimization problem. However, the properties proved with optimal algorithm, like incentive compatibility, may no longer be satisfied. This calls upon the need for designing alternative mechanisms, like approximate mechanism, randomized mechanism etc. Truthful Approximate Mechanisms are the mechanisms that use approximation algorithms for the underlying algorithmic problem while maintaining the incentive-compatibility property of the mechanism. This paper presents an overview of truthful approximate mechanism design, discuss various techniques available in the literature, and recent advances of the same. We have also briefly discussed certain other mechanisms.
Noncoherent Modulation for MIMO Training and Related Capacity Analysis

A stable, homogeneous, aqueous detergent slurry is described containing polymeric acrylic stabilizers. The slurry contains about 14 weight percent to about 30 weight percent of a sodium polyphosphate, 0 to about 1 weight percent of sodium carboxymethylcellulose, 0 to about 5 weight percent of a compatible inorganic alkali metal hydroxide or salt as a viscosity modifier, a soluble nonionic surface-active agent in amounts of from about 13 weight percent to about 20 weight percent, a stabilizing amount ranging from about 0.4 to about 2 weight percent of a high molecular weight polymer of an acrylic acid, and wherein said sodium polyphosphate is present in part as insoluble particles having an average diameter of about 1 to about 10 microns.
Turkish Nationalism and the Kurdish Question: Nation, State and Securitization of Communal Identities in a Regional Context

For students of the region’s politics, the Kurdish question often symbolises the incompleteness or even failure of the twentieth-century project of nation-building and post-colonial statehood in the Middle East. The Kurds, like many of the minorities in the region, have borne very heavy costs in the process of states forging their nations out of heterogeneous populations. Meanwhile, something seems to have changed for Kurds since the establishment of de jure autonomy for the Kurds of Iraq. With the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime and the foreign occupation of Iraq in 2003, new dilemmas emerged for the Kurds in Iraq and Turkey, which they hardly had the freedom to resolve on their own. In addition, mounting socioeconomic discontent is manifest in the zone of Kurdish self-rule in Iraq, in southeast Turkey and in the struggles of the Kurdish working poor in the region’s metropolises. This situation has increased clashes between local and national politicians and Kurdish activists and leaders—some of whom entertain distinctly separatist agendas—thus further complicating the ‘Kurdish problem’.
Circuit Applications of Nanoelectronic Devices

For many years, the primary approach to meet circuit performance, power consumption, and functionality in VLSI circuits has been scaling [1]. However, as the dimensions of transistors get smaller and smaller, circuit designers have to face a whole new set of problems; examples of such problems are short-channel effects and quantum effects [2]. Therefore, there is a need to change the structures inside the transistors and more radically, to find new alternatives to silicon-based transistors. Such non-silicon substitutes are molecular wires, switches and carbon nanotubes [3]. The current research dealt mainly with the Carbon Nanotube Field Effect Transistors (CNFET). There is a need to fully understand these nanotube transistors and to implement them in circuit designs. Some questions that can be asked are the following: What is the operating speed of a CNFET transistor? What is its drive current? What is its power consumption? What will be the impact of CNFETs? In this talk, a SPICE model based on ballistic transport was used to simulate a few circuits on HSPICE, to be able to compare CNFET circuits with 65-nm MOSFET circuits and hence to discover the potential of the former. First a ring oscillator was built. This simple circuit has no important interconnects and it could be used to find the intrinsic speed of these novel transistors. Parasitic capacitors were also introduced to see their effect on the frequency of the CNFET oscillator and the MOSFET oscillator. Then a full adder, using XOR and NAND gates was built. Building a more complex circuit helped to see the various delays that are introduced due to 'interconnects' and also to understand in depth the effects of parasitic capacitors. Furthermore, important parameters such as the power-delay product and
Islamic Banking - A $300 Billion Deception: Observations and Arguments on Riba (interest or usury), Islamic Banking Practices, Venture Capital and Enlightenment

As recognized, adventure as without difficulty as experience about lesson, amusement, as with ease as conformity can be gotten by just checking out a books islamic banking a 300 billion deception observations and arguments on riba interest or usury islamic banking practices venture capital and enlightenment also it is not directly done, you could take on even more on the order of this life, in the region of the world.
Design and evaluation of a novel dataflow based bigdata solution

As the attention given to big data grows, cluster computing systems for distributed processing of large data sets become the mainstream and critical requirement in high performance distributed system research. One of the most successful system is Hadoop which uses MapReduce as programming/execution model and takes disks as intermedia to process huge volume of data. However, currently, it is a consensus that Hadoop is not the final solution to BigData due to MapReduce programming model, disk based computing, synchronous execution model and the constraint that only supports batch processing, and so on. A new solution, especially, a fundamental evolution is needed to bring BigData solution into a new era. In this paper, we introduce a new cluster computing system called HAMR which supports both batch and streaming processing. To achieve better performance, HAMR integrates HPC approaches, i.e. DataFlow fundamental into a big data solution. With more speicifications, HAMR is fully designed based on In-Memory computing to reduce the unnecessary disk access overhead; task scheduling and memory management are in fine-grain manner to explore more parallelism; asynchronous execution improves efficiency of computation resource usage, and furtherly makes workload balance across the whole cluster better. The experimental results show that HAMR can outperform Hadoop by up to 10x in the same cluster environment.
A Higher Frequency of CD4+CXCR5+ T Follicular Helper Cells in Adult Patients with Minimal Change Disease

Background. T follicular helper (TFH) cells are involved in the humoral immune responses. This study is aimed at examining the frequencies of different subsets of CD4+CXCR5+ TFH cells in adult patients with minimal change disease (MCD). Methods. A total of 27 patients and 14 healthy controls (HC) were characterized for the levels of sera cytokines, inducible T-cell costimulator (ICOS), and programmed death 1 (PD-1) of positive TFH cells by flow cytometry. The level of sera IL-21 was examined; 24 h urinary protein and eGFR were calculated. The potential correlation between the frequency of different subsets of TFH cells and the values of clinical measures in MCD patients were analyzed. Results. The frequency of circulating CD4+CXCR5+, CD4+CXCR5+ICOS+, and CD4+CXCR5+PD-1+ TFH cells and the levels of sera IL-17A, IFN-γ, IL-2, IL-10, IL-4, and IL-21 were significantly higher in MCD patients (P < 0.05) than that in the HC group. Furthermore, the percentages of circulating CD4+CXCR5+ TFH cells were negatively correlated with the values of eGFR (r = −0.4849, P < 0.05) and the percentages of CD4+CXCR5+PD-1+ TFH cells were correlated positively with the levels of serum IL-21 (r = 0.6137, P < 0.05) and 24 h urinary protein (r = 0.1410, P < 0.05) in those patients. Also, the percentages of CD4+CXCR5+ICOS+ TFH cells were correlated positively with the levels of serum IL-21 (r = 0.6201, P < 0.05) and 24 h urinary protein (r = 0.7519, P < 0.05). Following standard therapies, the percentages of circulating CD4+CXCR5+, CD4+CXCR5+PD-1+, and CD4+CXCR5+ICOS+ TFH cells and the levels of serum IL-21 were significantly reduced, but the levels of serum IL-4 and IL-10 were increased (P < 0.05). Conclusions. A higher frequency of CD4+CXCR5+ TFH cells that existed in adult patients with MCD could be new target for intervention of MCD.
Combining Heritance AdaBoost and Random Forests for face detection

AdaBoost has proved to be an effective method to improve the performance of base classifiers both theoretically and empirically. However, previous studies have shown that AdaBoost might suffer from the overfitting problem, especially for noisy data. In addition, it still needs much time to train the classifier using AdaBoost. In this paper, we focus on designing an algorithm named Heritance AdaBoostRF to solve the two problems. We use Heritance AdaBoost to enhance the detection speed instead of AdaBoost, and Random Forests as the weak learners of Heritance AdaBoost to deal with the overfitting problem. Experiments clearly show the superiority of the proposed method over MIT-CBCL face database and a highest detection rate of 98.94% is obtained, and experimental results based on unbalanced data sets of MIT+CMU face database showed that the overfitting problem has been improved effectively.
Software agents and market (in) efficiency: a human trader experiment

This paper studies how software agents influence the market behavior of human traders. Software agents with a passive arbitrage-seeking strategy are introduced in a double auction market experiment with human subjects in the laboratory. As a treatment variable, the influence of information on the existence of software agents is investigated. We found that common knowledge about the presence of software agents triggers more efficient market prices when the programmed strategy was employed, whereas an effect of the information condition on behavioral variables could not be observed. When controlling for information on software agents' participation, the introduction of software agents results in lower market efficiency
Spoken Language Translation with the ITSVox System

This paper describes the ITSVox speech-to-speech translation prototype currently under development at LATL in collaboration with IDIAP. The ITSVox project aims at a general, interactive, multimodal translation system with the following characterics : (i) it is not restricted to a particular subdomain, (ii) it can be used either as a fully automatic system or as an interactive system, (iii I it can translate either written or spoken inputs into either written or spoken outputs, and (iv) it is speaker independent. ITSVox is currently restricted to (some subsets of) French , English in the speech-to-speech mode, French , , English in the written mode with speech output. We will first give a quick description of the system and then discuss in more details the speech modules and their interfaces with other components of the system.
Laparoscopic nerve-sparing complete excision of deep endometriosis: is it feasible?

BACKGROUND Little is known about the morbidity associated with laparoscopic complete excision of endometriosis in terms of urinary, digestive and sexual function. METHODS We performed a prospective non-randomized study in 45 patients with laparoscopic complete excision of all detectable foci of endometriosis with segmental bowel resection using a non nerve-sparing technique (control group-group A n=20) and a nerve-sparing technique (case group-group B n=25). At initial gynaecological evaluation, and at follow-up details on dysmenorrhoea, pelvic pain, dyspareunia and dyschezia were evaluated using an interview-based questionnaire (10-point analogue rating scale: 0=absent, 10=unbearable). RESULTS The mean (+/-SD) follow-up period was 15.3+/-10 months (range, 8.8-23 months) for group A and 3.5+/-2.1 months (range, 0.3-5.2 months) for group B. In the immediate postoperative course, in group A three women required blood transfusion vs seven women in group B (P=0.003). The median time to resume the voiding function was significantly shorter in group B (12.5 vs 3.0 days; P<0.01). At the time of follow-up a higher proportion of patients in group B were 'very satisfied' than those in group A (87.7% vs 59.0%, P=0.013). CONCLUSIONS Laparoscopic nerve-sparing complete excision of endometriosis seems to be feasible and offers good results in terms of bladder morbidity reduction with apparently higher satisfaction than classical technique. Larger series with longer follow-up are needed to confirm our results.
Psychological Operations and Political Warfare in Long-term Strategic Planning

Introduction to Psyops by Janos Radvanyl Psychological Operations and Political Warfare in Long-term U.S. Strategic Planning by William E. Odom U.S. Military Psychological Operations: Past, Present, and Future by Alfred H. Paddock Soviet Active Measures and Propaganda: "New Thinking" and Influence Activities in the Gorbachev Era by Herbert Romerstein Terrorism as a Psychological Strategy by Maurice Tugwell Soviet Diplomacy and Public Opinion: The Case of West Germany by Josef Joffe Communist Regimes' Psychological Warfare Against Their Societies: The Case of Poland by Teresa Rakowska-Harmstone The French Army and Psychological Warfare by Pierre Lacoste Contemporary Insurgent Political and Psychological Warfare by Michael Radu Selected Bibliography Index
Summary, General Discussion and a Future Perspective Validation Studies

Grey matter (GM) integrity changes and GM atrophy are both potentially important MRI GM pathology measures in multiple sclerosis (MS). However, the underlying tissue changes reflected by the MRI measures are unknown and are investigated in the validation studies described in chapter 2. In addition, we gained more detailed insight into the nature of GM pathology in these studies. The results of the studies, described in chapter 2, raised some important questions, like is neurodegeneration (an important part of GM pathology) independent of GM demyelination in chronic MS? And what kind of pathological mechanisms are a in the NAGM, where we observed only subtle neurodegenerative changes? These and other questions will be addressed below. Chapter 2.1–In MS, Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI) has frequently been used to measure white matter (WM) integrity changes, but recently a few in-vivo studies have also reported DTI changes in MS cortex. The results of these studies are inconclusive. Some studies report an increase in fractional anisotropy (FA) in MS cortex compared to controls, but others found a decrease in FA. However, all studies have reported an FA increases in GM lesions compared to NAGM. The pathological process that reflects an increased FA is unknown, but Filippi et al. 3 suggested that an increased FA reflects an increase of microglia in GM lesions that form micro-columns, which renders the diffusion within the tissue micro-structure more anisotropic. Our results in chapter 2.1, demonstrate that the increase in FA is probably not due to an increase of activated microglia density in GM lesions compared to normal appearing grey matter (NAGM). As Haider et al4 observed an increase of microglia in deep GM lesions, using anti-Iba-1 and NADPH oxidase antibodies, we decided to perform an additional analysis for the MS cortex in an independent group of patients, using these specific antibodies. Although this is still ongoing work, our preliminary results still showed no increase of microglia in GM lesions compared to NAGM (Figure 1). It might be that microglia density is patient dependent rather than lesion dependent. Some patients had substantially more microglial activation than others, suggesting different MS populations. The heterogeneity of MS has been reported by a number of studies, 5-8 and is nicely illustrated by Kooi et al. for the cortex. 7 They observed MS patients with a lot of cortical lesions and patients with relatively small numbers of cortical lesions. Interestingly, a subset of the …
Agile Methods for Large Organizations - Building Communities of Practice

Agile development practices respect tacit knowledge, makes communication more effective, and thus fosters the knowledge creation process. However the current agile methods, like XP, are focused on practices that individual teams or projects need, and the use of the methods in organizations consisting of multiple cooperating teams is difficult. The community of practice theory suggests that large agile organizations should have various overlapping, informal cross-team communities. This paper studies three agile methods developed at Nokia that use facilitated workshops to solve multiteam issues. The paper explains using communities of practices theory - why these methods work in multiteam settings. The results of this paper suggest that workshop practices that amass people from different parts of organizations to perform a specific well-defined task can be used effectively to solve issues that span over multiple teams and to build up communities of practice. This result suggests that the community of practice concept could provide a basis for adapting agile methods for the needs of large organizations.
Rule Britannia! British Stock Market Returns, 1825-1870

This article presents a new series of monthly equity returns for the British stock market for the period 1825-1870. In addition to calculating capital appreciation and dividend yields, the article also estimates the effect of survivorship bias on returns. Three notable findings emerge from this study. First, stock market returns in the 1825-1870 period are broadly similar for Britain and the United States, although the British market is less risky. Second, real returns in the 1825-1870 period are higher than in subsequent epochs of British history. Third, unlike the modern era, dividends are the most important component of returns.
Motor unit discharge rate in dynamic movements of the aging soleus

Aging is related to a variety of changes at the muscular level. It seems that the age-related changes in motor unit activation are muscle- and intensity dependent. The purpose of this study was to examine the motor unit discharge rate (MUDR) in both isometric and dynamic contractions of the aging soleus muscle. Eight elderly males participated in the study. The subjects performed isometric and dynamic plantar flexions while seated in an ankle dynamometer. The force levels studied were 10, 20, 40, 60, 80 and 100% of the isometric (ISO) maximal voluntary contractions (MVC) in ISO and 10, 20 and 40% in concentric (CON) and eccentric (ECC) contractions. Soleus intramuscular EMG was recorded with bipolar fine-wire electrodes and decomposed to individual trains of motor unit discharges. In ISO the MUDR increased with each force level from 40 to 100% MVC. In dynamic contractions the descriptive analysis showed a higher MUDR in CON compared to ISO or ECC. The difficulties of recording single motor units in dynamic contractions, especially in the elderly is discussed.
A High-Performance Model for a Transparent Classifier

Building fast and accurate classifier for large scale databases is an important task in data mining. There is growing evidence that integrating classification and association rules mining approach is outperforming traditional classification approaches based on heuristic/greedy search like decision tree induction. Emerging associative classification algorithms have shown good promises on producing accurate classifiers. In this paper we focus on performance of associative classification and present a parallel model for classifier building.