Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
nCDN: CDN enhanced with NDN

Content Delivery Network (CDN) improves large scale data delivery with widely distributed data replicas; But the fundamental goal of IP is to connect two hosts. As a consequence, request routing, which selects the best server to serve the requested data, is introduced to meet the mismatch between CDN and IP. In contrast to IP, Named Data Networking (NDN) makes content the first-class citizen of the network. Its specialties, such as multicast, content multihoming, cache and content-oriented security, are designed for large scale data delivery. Due to the essential consistency between CDN and NDN, we propose Named Content Delivery Network, or nCDN, which embeds NDN into existing CDN framework to simplify the implementation and improve the efficiency. nCDN supports existing running CDN infrastructure, by setting up NDN over UDP/TCP. NDN takes charge of request routing and content delivery only; While other components of CDN, such as billing, accounting, data analysis, data management etc, remain changeless. The advantages of nCDN include: 1) As NDN's routing plane holds content distribution information, requests are routed to the best data copies straightforward. 2) NDN's stateful forwarding plane detects the network state in real time, and responses to congestion, link or node failure quickly. 3) NDN naturally supports multicast and content multihoming. Multicast eliminates identical requests, while content multihoming fully utilizes redundant resources, such as bandwidth and storage.
Neuropsychological Studies of Linguistic and Affective Facial Expressions in Deaf Signers

For deaf users of American Sign Language (ASL), facial behaviors function in two distinct ways: to convey affect (as with spoken languages) and to mark certain specific grammatical structures (e.g., relative clauses), thus subserving distinctly linguistic functions in ways that are unique to signed languages. The existence of two functionally different classes of facial behaviors raises questions concerning neural control of language and nonlanguage functions. Examining patterns of neural mediation for differential functions of facial expressions, linguistic versus affective, provides a unique perspective on the determinants of hemispheric specialization. This paper presents two studies which explore facial expression production in deaf signers.1 An experimental paradigm uses chimeric stimuli of ASL linguistic and affective facial expressions (photographs of right vs. left composites of posed expressions) to explore patterns of productive asymmetries in brain-intactsigners. A second study examines facial expression production in left and right brain lesioned deaf signers, specifying unique patterns of spared and impaired functions. Both studies show striking differences between affective and linguistic facial expressions. The data indicate that for deaf signing individuals, affective expressions appearto be primarily mediated by the right-hemisphere. In contrast, these studies provide evidence that linguistic facial expressions involve left hemisphere mediation. This represents
The physician of Packingtown: the life and impact of Dr Caroline Hedger

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to illustrate the instrumental role of physician Caroline Hedger during the first half of the twentieth century, with her emphasis on worker health, which influenced American society and helped to improve working and living conditions of people across the USA. Design/methodology/approach – Drawing on archival newspaper clippings, original journal articles and books written by the subject, historical manuscripts and other labor history resources, this manuscript pulls together information on this topic in a unique way to give a broad view of the impact of Hedger and her important role not only for the city of Chicago, but the nation as a whole. Findings – This research concludes that Hedger was an instrumental force and tireless advocate for the improvement of public health and social change. She was a constant driver for the creation of better living and working conditions of poor laborers, especially immigrants and women, desired the enhancement of child welfare, and wa.
A novel 64-point FF/IFFT processor for IEEE 802.11(a) standard

A novel 64-point FFT/IFFT processor is presented in this article, named TURB064, developed primarily for the application for the IEEE 802.11 (a) standard. The processor does not use any digital multiplier or RAM. It has been fabricated and tested successfully. Its core area is 6.8 mm/sup 2/ and the average power consumption is 41 mW at 1.8 V @ 20 MHz frequency. Compared to some other existing IP cores and ASIC chips TURB064 needs a smaller number of clock cycles and consumes less power.
Contour point tracking by enforcement of rigidity constraints

The aperture problem is one of the omnipresent issues in computer vision. Its local character constrains point matching to high textured areas, so that points in gradient-oriented regions (such as straight lines) can not be reliably matched. We propose a new method to overcome this problem by devising a global matching strategy under the factorization framework. We solve the n-frame correspondence problem under this context by assuming the rigidity of the scene. To this end, a geometric constraint is used that selects the matching solution resulting in a rank-4 observation matrix. The rank of the observation matrix is a function of the matching solutions associated to each image and as such a simultaneous solution for all frames has to be found. An optimization procedure is used in this text in order to find the solution.
Effects of Weighted Rope Jump Training on Power Performance Tests in Collegians

The purpose of this investigation was to determine the efficacy of weighted jump ropes as an alternative to core plyometic exercises in developing explosive-reactive power and anaerobic capacity. Thirty-six university students served as subjects for the study and were divided into three groups. Group 1 received the weighted rope jumping regime. Group 2 underwent a traditional form of training: maximal vertical jumps. Group 3, the control group, participated only in stretching exercises. Subjects participated in the exercise program three times a week for 10 weeks. The effects of these exercise programs on subjects' performance on the 50-yard dash, the Sargent jump, the Wingate ergometer test, bench press, and leg press were explored. Results indicated that Group 1 made significant improvements between all pre- and posttreatment measures except the 50-yard dash and Wingate peak power test at the 0.01 level of significance. However, the pre- to posttreatment assessments for the other two groups showed no improvement at the 0.01 level of significance. These findings suggest that weighted rope jumping is a viable alternative to high impact plyometric exercises.
So much to learn, so little time…: pre-service physical education teachers' interpretations and development of subject knowledge as they learn to teach

Abstract This paper explores the development of pre-service teachers during a one-year programme of initial teacher training and education (ITTE) of secondary physical education (PE) in England. It concentrates in particular on the interpretation and development of different dimensions of subject knowledge during different phases of their ITTE programme. Interviews conducted at the beginning, middle and end of their ITTE programme with a total of 18 pre-service teachers over the period of three academic years were analysed using a grounded theory methodology. The analysis revealed that a combination of contextual and personal factors influenced the pre-service teachers' approach and strategies towards the development of their subject knowledge. Notably, many pre-service teachers demonstrated a shift in the perception of their own roles, marking a transition from a more content-focused predisposition at the beginning of their course towards a more learner-centred one at the end. Pre-service teachers' learning experience was enriched through the accumulation of subject knowledge in a variety of settings and communities of practice. Recommendations for those involved in designing and delivering ITTE experiences are offered.
A study on criteria for extracting key terms in document clustering

Document clustering is the process to partition a set of unlabelled documents into some clusters. To analyze the documents efficiently and effectively, it is expected that all documents in each cluster have some shared concept. The shared concept is most conveniently represented using some key terms. Many methods have been studied for selecting important key terms. However, most of them belong to the category of supervised learning. That is, the teacher signals must be provided in advance in order to measure the importance of the key terms. In this paper, we study un-supervised learning only. Specifically, we study three criteria for extracting important key terms through clustering. The first one is the mean squared error (MSE) function. It is well known that clusters obtained based on MSE are good in the sense that all documents in each cluster are similar. In addition to MSE, we introduce two new criteria. Both criteria encourage each cluster to use a different set of key terms. Experimental results with three databases show that MSE, although simple, is surprisingly good for generating representative key terms. One advantage of the proposed criteria is that they can generate more balanced clusters.
No Evidence for Xenotropic Murine Leukemia-Related Virus Infection in Sweden Using Internally Controlled Multiepitope Suspension Array Serology

ABSTRACT Many syndromes have a large number of differential diagnoses, a situation which calls for multiplex diagnostic systems. Myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), also named chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), is a common disease of unknown etiology. A mouse retrovirus, xenotropic murine leukemia-related virus (XMRV), was found in ME/CFS patients and blood donors, but this was not corroborated. However, the paucity of serological investigations on XMRV in humans prompted us to develop a serological assay which cover many aspects of XMRV antigenicity. It is a novel suspension array method, using a multiplex IgG assay with nine recombinant proteins from the env and gag genes of XMRV and 38 peptides based on known epitopes of vertebrate gammaretroviruses. IgG antibodies were sought in 520 blood donors and 85 ME/CFS patients and in positive- and negative-control sera from animals. We found no differences in seroreactivity between blood donors and ME/CFS patients for any of the antigens. This did not support an association between ME/CFS and XMRV infection. The multiplex serological system had several advantages: (i) biotinylated protein G allowed us to run both human and animal sera, which is essential because of a lack of XMRV-positive humans; (ii) a novel quality control was a pan-peptide positive-control rabbit serum; and (iii) synthetic XMRV Gag peptides with degenerate positions covering most of the variation of murine leukemia-like viruses did not give higher background than nondegenerate analogs. The principle may be used for creation of variant tolerant peptide serologies. Thus, our system allows rational large-scale serological assays with built-in quality control.
Cardiac resynchronization therapy and atrial overdrive pacing for the treatment of central sleep apnoea

The combined therapeutic impact of atrial overdrive pacing (AOP) and cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) on central sleep apnoea (CSA) in chronic heart failure (CHF) so far has not been investigated. We aimed to evaluate the effect of CRT alone and CRT + AOP on CSA in CHF patients and to compare the influence of CRT on CHF between CSA positive and CSA negative patients.
Guiding a docking mode by phage display: selection of correlated mutations at the staphylokinase-plasmin interface.

During co-evolution of interacting proteins, functionally disruptive mutations on one side of the interface may be compensated by local amino acid changes on the other to restore binding affinity. This information can be useful for geometry-based docking approaches by reducing the translational and rotational space available to the proteins. Here, we demonstrate that correlated mutations at a protein-protein interface can be rapidly identified by selecting a phage-displayed library of a randomly mutated component of the complex for complementation of mutations that decreased binding in the interacting partner. This approach was used to deduce the binding mode of staphylokinase (Sak), a 15.5 kDa "indirect" plasminogen activator on microplasmin (microPli), the 28 kDa serine protease domain of plasmin. Biopanning indicated that residues Arg94 and Gly174 in microPli are located in close proximity to Glu75 and the Glu88:Ile128 pair in Sak, respectively. The coupled mutations Glu94<-->Lys75 reversed and Gly174<-->Lys88:Val128 introduced a salt bridge, whereby the binding affinities (with coupling energies of 1.8 to 2.3 kcal mol-1, respectively) and the plasminogen activation ability of the mutated complexes were partially restored. These findings suggested a unique docking mode of Sak at the western rim of the active-site cleft of microPli, that is in agreement with the structure of the Sak-microPli complex as recently derived by other methods.
Prepregnancy obesity as a risk factor for structural birth defects.

OBJECTIVE To describe the relation between maternal obesity, overweight and underweight status, and 16 categories of structural birth defects. DESIGN An ongoing multisite, case-control study. Clinical geneticists reviewed all of the cases, excluding those that had or were strongly suspected to have a single-gene disorder or chromosomal abnormality. Mothers with preexisting diabetes were also excluded. Body mass index was based on maternal report of height and weight prior to pregnancy. SETTING Eight participating states in the United States. PARTICIPANTS Mothers enrolled in the National Birth Defects Prevention Study who had index pregnancies between October 1, 1997, and December 31, 2002. MAIN EXPOSURE Maternal obesity. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Crude and adjusted odds ratios. RESULTS Mothers of offspring with spina bifida, heart defects, anorectal atresia, hypospadias, limb reduction defects, diaphragmatic hernia, and omphalocele were significantly more likely to be obese than mothers of controls, with odds ratios ranging between 1.33 and 2.10. Mothers of offspring with gastroschisis were significantly less likely to be obese than mothers of controls. CONCLUSIONS To our knowledge, this is the first population-based study of its scale to examine prepregnancy obesity and a range of structural birth defects. These results suggest a weak to moderate positive association of maternal obesity with 7 of 16 categories of birth defects and a strong inverse association with gastroschisis. The mechanisms underlying these associations are not yet understood but may be related to undiagnosed diabetes.
Evaluating Pair Programming with Respect to System Complexity and Programmer Expertise

A total of 295 junior, intermediate, and senior professional Java consultants (99 individuals and 98 pairs) from 29 international consultancy companies in Norway, Sweden, and the UK were hired for one day to participate in a controlled experiment on pair programming. The subjects used professional Java tools to perform several change tasks on two alternative Java systems with different degrees of complexity. The results of this experiment do not support the hypotheses that pair programming in general reduces the time required to solve the tasks correctly or increases the proportion of correct solutions. On the other hand, there is a significant 84 percent increase in effort to perform the tasks correctly. However, on the more complex system, the pair programmers had a 48 percent increase in the proportion of correct solutions but no significant differences in the time taken to solve the tasks correctly. For the simpler system, there was a 20 percent decrease in time taken but no significant differences in correctness. However, the moderating effect of system complexity depends on the programmer expertise of the subjects. The observed benefits of pair programming in terms of correctness on the complex system apply mainly to juniors, whereas the reductions in duration to perform the tasks correctly on the simple system apply mainly to intermediates and seniors. It is possible that the benefits of pair programming will exceed the results obtained in this experiment for larger, more complex tasks and if the pair programmers have a chance to work together over a longer period of time
Sex differences in valgus knee angle during a single-leg drop jump.

CONTEXT Sex differences in lower extremity landing mechanics and muscle activation have been identified as potential causative factors leading to the increased incidence of anterior cruciate ligament injuries in female athletes. Valgus knee alignment places greater strain on the anterior cruciate ligament than a more neutral alignment. Gluteus medius (GM) activation may stabilize the leg and pelvis during landing, limiting valgus knee motion and potentially preventing anterior cruciate ligament injury. OBJECTIVE To determine if frontal-plane knee angle and GM activation differ between the sexes at initial contact and maximal knee flexion during a single-leg drop landing. DESIGN Between-groups design. SETTING Motion analysis laboratory. PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS Thirty-two healthy subjects between the ages of 18 and 30 years. INTERVENTION(S) The independent variables were sex (male or female) and position (initial contact or maximal knee flexion). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S) Frontal-plane knee angle and GM average root mean square (aRMS) amplitude. RESULTS At initial contact, women landed in knee valgus and men landed in knee varus (P < .025). At maximal knee flexion, both men and women were in a position of knee varus, but the magnitude of varus was less in women than in men (P < .025). The GM aRMS amplitude was greater at maximal knee flexion than at initial contact (P < .025); however, male GM aRMS did not differ from female GM aRMS amplitude at either position (P > .025). CONCLUSIONS Women tended to land in more knee valgus before and at impact than men. The GM muscle activation did not differ between the sexes and, thus, does not appear to be responsible for the sex differences in knee valgus. The excessive valgus knee angles displayed in women may help to explain the sex disparity in anterior cruciate ligament injury.
Semantic contexts and face recognition

The present study investigated the effects of the new context reinstatement procedure on recognition memory for faces. All faces were portrayed in distinctive background contexts which were pretested to induce a negative emotion, a positive emotion or no emotion at all. These contexts were, at test, either the same (e.g. the same concentration camp), changed (e.g. concentration camp→road accident) or changed but of the same type (e.g. 'semantic context': two different concentration camps). Results provided evidence of considerable improvement of recognition performance with semantic context. Moreover, a context inducing a negative emotion was shown to impair face recognition, but semantic context was found to counteract such an impairment. The implications of these findings are discussed in terms of their relevance for theories of recognition memory and practical contributions to eyewitness identification. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Language: en
Modeling and analysis of bandwidth-inhomogeneous swarms in BitTorrent

A number of analytical models exists that capture various properties of the BitTorrent protocol. However, until now virtually all of these models have been based on the assumption that the peers in the system have homogeneous bandwidths. As this is highly unrealistic in real swarms, these models have very limited applicability. Most of all, these models implicitly ignore BitTorrent's most important property: peer selection based on the highest rate of reciprocity. As a result, these models are not suitable for understanding or predicting the properties of real BitTorrent networks. Furthermore, they are hardly of use in the design of realistic BitTorrent simulators and new P2P protocols. In this paper, we extend existing work by presenting a model of a swarm in BitTorrent where peers have arbitrary upload and download bandwidths. In our model we group peers with (roughly) the same bandwidth in classes, and then analyze the allocation of upload slots from peers in one class to peers in another class. We show that our model accurately predicts the bandwidth clustering phenomenon observed experimentally in other work, and we analyze the resulting data distribution in swarms. We validate our model with experiments using real BitTorrent clients. Our model captures the effects of BitTorrent's well-known ‘tit-for-tat’ mechanism in bandwidth-inhomogeneous swarms and provides an accurate mathematical description of the resulting dynamics.
Living with severe aphasia: Tracking social exclusion

Background: Little is known about what happens to people with severe aphasia in the years after stroke when rehabilitation comes to an end, or about day‐to‐day life for this group. Aims: This study aimed to track the day‐to‐day life and experiences of people with severe aphasia, and to document levels of social inclusion and exclusion as they occurred in mundane settings. Methods and Procedures: Ethnography was chosen as the qualitative methodology most suitable for studying the experience of people with profoundly compromised language. 20 people who were judged to have severe aphasia following stroke agreed to be visited and observed three times in different domestic and care settings. The observer documented environments, protagonists, events, and interactions. Field notes were elaborated with personal, methodological, and interpretative notes. Written material (for example information leaflets) was also documented and described. Data were subject to thematic analysis. Outcomes and Results: The study revealed how social exclusion is a common experience for this group, played out in a variety of ways in a range of domestic and care settings. Social exclusion occurs at infrastructural, interpersonal, and personal levels. Conclusions: The study suggests that the social exclusion of people who struggle to communicate could be addressed through training, for professional and lay carers, that promotes support for communication; opportunity and access; respect and acknowledgment; and attention to the environment.
Progress towards the prevention and treatment of norovirus infections

Noroviruses are now recognized as the major cause of acute gastroenteritis in the developed world, yet our ability to prevent and control infection is limited. Recent work has highlighted that, while typically an acute infection in the population, immunocompromised patients often experience long-term infections that may last many years. This cohort of patients and those regularly exposed to infectious material, for example, care workers and others, would benefit greatly from the development of a vaccine or antiviral therapy. While a licensed vaccine or antiviral has yet to be developed, work over the past 10 years in this area has intensified and trials with a vaccine candidate have proven promising. Numerous antiviral targets and small molecule inhibitors that have efficacy in cell culture have now been identified; however, further studies in this area are required in order to make these suitable for clinical use.