Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Ventilatory function as a predictor of fatal stroke.

OBJECTIVE--To investigate the relation between ventilatory function and subsequent mortality due to cerebrovascular disease. DESIGN--Prospective longitudinal study. SUBJECTS--A total of 18,403 male civil servants aged 40-64 years at entry examination for the Whitehall study. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE--Mortality from cerebrovascular disease (ICD8 430-438) after 18 years of follow up. RESULTS--In all, 262 men with sinus rhythm at entry died due to stroke during the 18 years of follow up. Compared with men with a forced expiratory volume in one second of greater than or equal to 3.5 litres those with a value of less than 3.0 litres were almost twice as likely to die of cerebrovascular disease (rate ratio adjusted for age and systolic blood pressure = 1.88, 95% confidence interval 1.32 to 2.69). This increased risk occurred within each tertile of systolic blood pressure. Nested case-control analyses were used to control precisely for confounding effects of age, height, and smoking (by matching) and employment grade and physiological risk factors (by modelling). The effect of forced expiratory volume in one second was independent of age, height, smoking habits, employment grade, blood pressure, weight, cholesterol concentration, glucose tolerance, electrocardiographic abnormalities, history of chest pain, and history of intermittent claudication. CONCLUSIONS--Measurements of ventilatory function may assist clinical decisions about whether to treat mild hypertension. Impaired ventilatory function and stroke may share common causes.
Robust Final-Round Cache-Trace Attacks Against AES

This paper describes an algorithm to attack AES using sidechannel information from the final round cache lookups performed by the encryption, specifically whether each access hits or misses in the cache, building off of previous work by Aciicmez and Koc [AK06]. It is assumed that an attacker could gain such a trace through power consumption analysis or electromagnetic analysis. This information has already been shown to lead to an effective attack. This paper interprets cache trace data available as binary constraints on pairs of key bytes then reduces key search to a constraint-satisfaction problem. In this way, an attacker is guaranteed to perform as little search as is possible given a set of cache traces, leading to a natural tradeoff between online collection and offline processing. This paper also differs from previous work in assuming a partially pre-loaded cache, proving that cache trace attacks are still effective in this scenario with the number of samples required being inversely related to the percentage of cache which is pre-loaded.
Impact of the x86 System Management Mode in Real-Time Systems

There is a tendency toward the use of personal computers (PC) in real-time systems. These computers have highprocessing capacity and reduced costs when compared to software and hardware development fordedicated platforms. However, real-time systems require latency predictability and the processors of the x86architecture have aspecial protection and correction mode known as SystemManagement Mode (SMM). This mode is not traceable by the operating system and it can cause unpredictability in thesystem. This article describes the SMM, presents tools and methods for its detection and an analysis of its impacton real-time systems.
The Cohesin Subunit Rad21 Is Required for Synaptonemal Complex Maintenance, but Not Sister Chromatid Cohesion, during Drosophila Female Meiosis

Replicated sister chromatids are held in close association from the time of their synthesis until their separation during the next mitosis. This association is mediated by the ring-shaped cohesin complex that appears to embrace the sister chromatids. Upon proteolytic cleavage of the α-kleisin cohesin subunit at the metaphase-to-anaphase transition by separase, sister chromatids are separated and segregated onto the daughter nuclei. The more complex segregation of chromosomes during meiosis is thought to depend on the replacement of the mitotic α-kleisin cohesin subunit Rad21/Scc1/Mcd1 by the meiotic paralog Rec8. In Drosophila, however, no clear Rec8 homolog has been identified so far. Therefore, we have analyzed the role of the mitotic Drosophila α-kleisin Rad21 during female meiosis. Inactivation of an engineered Rad21 variant by premature, ectopic cleavage during oogenesis results not only in loss of cohesin from meiotic chromatin, but also in precocious disassembly of the synaptonemal complex (SC). We demonstrate that the lateral SC component C(2)M can interact directly with Rad21, potentially explaining why Rad21 is required for SC maintenance. Intriguingly, the experimentally induced premature Rad21 elimination, as well as the expression of a Rad21 variant with destroyed separase consensus cleavage sites, do not interfere with chromosome segregation during meiosis, while successful mitotic divisions are completely prevented. Thus, chromatid cohesion during female meiosis does not depend on Rad21-containing cohesin.
Transesophageal echocardiography. New window to coronary arteries and coronary blood flow.

Transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) has opened a new window to the heart, as well as to the great vessels and coronary arteries. Not only the main stem but also the left circumflex, left anterior descending, and right coronary arteries can be visualized in longer lengths than by transthoracic echocardiography
Optimal Liquidity Trading

A liquidity trader wishes to trade a fixed number of shares within a certain time horizon and to minimize the mean and variance of the costs of trading. Explicit formulas for the optimal trading strategies show that risk-averse liquidity traders reduce their order sizes over time and execute a higher fraction of their total trading volume in early periods when price volatility or liquidity increases. In the presence of transaction fees, traders want to trade less often when either price volatility or liquidity goes up or when the speed of price reversion declines. In the multi-asset case, price effects across assets have a substantial impact on trading behavior.
Offline Handwriting Acquisition under Controlled and Uncontrolled Conditions

This paper gives a description of offline handwriting acquisition under controlled and uncontrolled conditions for research purposes. The data collection task is an underestimated part in the process of developing signature verification or handwriting identification systems. There is a continuous need for new, unpublished data to train and evaluate new algorithms. Handwriting samples that make up the current publicly available databases have all been collected under controlled conditions. However, good quality data is still limited. On the contrary, research databases constituted of case related biometric data in general are scarce. To suit forensic purposes, it is preferred to start building databases with forensically relevant data. When verification and identification systems are trained on this type of material, the output will be more suited for forensic examination purposes. The challenges in this area are considered. Keywords—offline data, data collection, signature verification, forensic handwriting examiner
Strategies to Prevent Preterm Birth

After several decades of research, we now have evidence that at least six interventions are suitable for immediate use in contemporary clinical practice within high-resource settings and can be expected to safely reduce the rate of preterm birth. These interventions involve strategies to prevent non-medically indicated late preterm birth; use of maternal progesterone supplementation; surgical closure of the cervix with cerclage; prevention of exposure of pregnant women to cigarette smoke; judicious use of fertility treatments; and dedicated preterm birth prevention clinics. Quantification of the extent of success is difficult to predict and will be dependent on other clinical, cultural, societal, and economic factors operating in each environment. Further success can be anticipated in the coming years as other research discoveries are translated into clinical practice, including new approaches to treating intra-uterine infection, improvements in maternal nutrition, and lifestyle modifications to ameliorate maternal stress. The widespread use of human papillomavirus vaccination in girls and young women will decrease the need for surgical interventions on the cervix and can be expected to further reduce the risk of early birth. Together, this array of clinical interventions, each based on a substantial body of evidence, is likely to reduce rates of preterm birth and prevent death and disability in large numbers of children. The process begins with an acceptance that early birth is not an inevitable and natural feature of human reproduction. Preventative strategies are now available and need to be applied. The best outcomes may come from developing integrated strategies designed specifically for each health-care environment.
Fingerprint dynamics: A novel biometrics for personal authentication

Biometric has emerged as an eminent solution to different security and privacy issue of access control applications. Recently many novel physiological and behavioral characteristics have been used as biometric identifiers. In this paper, we propose a novel approach based on behavioral characteristics, namely Fingerprint Dynamics. The technique is validated as a standalone identity verification system. For this a dataset from 19 individuals is collected in form of multi-instance fingerprint scan events. The behavioral characteristics associated with fingerprint scan events is analyzed. An acquisition setup (hardware) is also devised to capture the user data. A neural network based classifier is used for the purpose of identity verification. Aim of this paper is to assess the potential of fingerprint dynamics to uniquely epitomize a person based on his behavioral characteristics. Verification experiment in presence of zero-effort imposter attack confirms the discriminating capability of proposed technique.
How rational are people? Economic behavior based on sentiment analysis

User-generated content plays a major role on the Web. It allows community websites to prosper as people seek each other's opinions before making their own choice. In this paper, we propose a novel approach to investigate the correlation between the sentiments' scores extracted from review text and the number of likes/dislikes for restaurants reviews, we also explore how the sentiments' scores affect the rating of restaurants. We formalize our problem under the rational choice theory, in which a person would make a choice among set of alternatives that have different utility that is calculated based on some measures. We propose to use different combination of measures including the number of likes/dislikes, and different sentiments scores that are generated manually and automatically. Results show how top ten restaurants fluctuated when different utility measures were used. Based on our initial results, we encourage future research in applying economics' theories on user-generated content to help in the process of sentiment analysis and decision making.
Managing Expectations: A Case Study of Sessional Staff in Languages and Cultures Education in Australian Universities

In light of the increasing casualisation of the academic workforce in recent years, expectations of sessional staff in Australian universities from their academic employment are becoming more poignant. Following on from a previous report by Ferrari & Hajek (2012), this paper further highlights how these workers are affected by short-term, often only semester-long, contracts. We focus on how the brevity of employment affects sessional teachers’ perceptions of their role and perceived obligations to the university, and consequently the health of languages education. We present the results of an online survey conducted at the vast majority of Australian universities, which investigated sessional staff’s expectations. This study reveals that language sessional staff have expectations of their employment which are often at odds with their role as academics in the university environment.
Translumbar central venous catheters for long-term haemodialysis.

BACKGROUND Vascular access for haemodialysis is achieved by tunnelled central venous catheter (CVC) in at least 23% of prevalent patients in the UK, Canada and the USA. Use of CVCs is associated with an increased incidence of venous stenosis that can progressively limit future vascular access routes. Lack of conventional venous access routes mandates the use of alternative strategies such as the translumbar approach. METHODS We retrospectively analysed patients at our centre requiring translumbar inferior vena caval CVCs (TesioCath) for haemodialysis in the period 1999-2008. Written and electronic records capturing dialysis adequacy and complications, hospital admissions and laboratory data were examined. RESULTS Thirty-nine pairs of translumbar CVCs were inserted in 26 patients with 15 864 catheter days follow-up, mean patient age 61.9 +/- 12.1 years, 31% diabetic, 15% with ischaemic heart disease. All insertions were successful. Insertion of one CVC was associated with a self-limiting retroperitoneal haematoma. No patients died of a catheter-related cause or through lack of vascular access. Cumulative assisted primary catheter site patency was 81% at 6 months and 73% at 1 year (median 18.5 months). Good dialysis adequacy was achieved throughout (mean single-pool Kt/V 1.5 +/- 0.4). The incidence of access-related infection was 2.84/1000 catheter days (exit site infection rate 2.02/1000 catheter days; catheter-related bacteraemia rate 0.82/1000 catheter days). Catheter dysfunction (need for thrombolytic infusion or catheter change) led to 0.88 admissions per 1000 catheter days. CONCLUSION Translumbar inferior vena caval CVCs can offer relatively safe and effective long-term haemodialysis access in patients with no other options.
View invariant object recognition

This paper introduces a method for the recognition planar objects under projective geometry. Our method is based on a similarity measure invariant to projective transform. The proposed similarity measure utilizes the distribution of the projective relations between the conic section pairs, which are estimated from the object¿s shape. We conjecture that given two objects of the same type, which are viewed from different viewpoints generate similar histograms, such that their difference is smaller than the histograms generated from other object types. The proposed measure has shown promising performance on the Brown shape database.
Drawing bipartite graphs as anchored maps

A method of drawing anchored maps for bipartite graphs is presented. Suppose that the node set of a bipartite graph is divided into set A and set B. On an anchored map of the bipartite graph, the nodes in A, which are called "anchor nodes," are arranged on the circumference, and the nodes in B, which are called "free nodes," are arranged at suitable positions in relation to the adjacent anchor nodes. This article describes aesthetic criteria that are employed according to the purpose of drawing anchored maps and a method to arrange the anchor nodes so that they satisfy the criteria. The effectiveness of the proposed method is discussed in terms of the aesthetics of drawing results.
Nova Regulates GABAA Receptor γ2 Alternative Splicing via a Distal Downstream UCAU-Rich Intronic Splicing Enhancer

ABSTRACT Nova is a neuron-specific RNA binding protein targeted in patients with the autoimmune disorder paraneoplastic opsoclonus-myoclonus ataxia, which is characterized by failure of inhibition of brainstem and spinal motor systems. Here, we have biochemically confirmed the observation that splicing regulation of the inhibitory GABAA receptor γ2 (GABAARγ2) subunit pre-mRNA exon E9 is disrupted in mice lacking Nova-1. To elucidate the mechanism by which Nova-1 regulates GABAARγ2 alternative splicing, we systematically screened minigenes derived from the GABAARγ2 and human β-globin genes for their ability to support Nova-dependent splicing in transient transfection assays. These studies demonstrate that Nova-1 acts directly on GABAARγ2 pre-mRNA to regulate E9 splicing and identify an intronic region that is necessary and sufficient for Nova-dependent enhancement of exon inclusion, which we term the NISE (Nova-dependent intronic splicing enhancer) element. The NISE element (located 80 nucleotides upstream of the splice acceptor site of the downstream exon E10) is composed of repeats of the sequence YCAY, consistent with previous studies of the mechanism by which Nova binds RNA. Mutation of these repeats abolishes binding of Nova-1 to the RNA in vitro and Nova-dependent splicing regulation in vivo. These data provide a molecular basis for understanding Nova regulation of GABAARγ2 alternative splicing and suggest that general dysregulation of Nova's splicing enhancer function may underlie the neurologic defects seen in Nova's absence.
A novel similarity evaluating model based on RFCA and ICS

In this paper, a similarity evaluating model based on rough formal concept analysis and information content similarity is proposed which evaluates the similarity degree between the concepts. We use the information content approach to automatically obtain part of similarity scores of two concepts which makes up the normal featural and structural evaluating models. Then through our model, the similarity of two concepts can be directly calculated from the lower object approximations and lower attribute approximations based on the rough formal concept analysis. An extensive experimental evaluation on two real datasets shows that when adjusting the influence from the object to certain degree, it outperforms other related works.
Progressive Horizon Planning

In an earlier paper [Rymon et a1 891, we showed how domain localities and regularities can be used to reduce the complexity of finding a trauma management plan that satisfies a set of diagnostic and therapeutic goals. Here, we present another planning idea Progressive Horizon useful for optimizing such plans in domains where planning can be regarded as an incremental process, continuously interleaved with situation-goals analysis and plan execution. In such domains, planned action cannot be delayed until all essential information is available: A plan must include actions intended to gather information as well as ones intended to change the state of the world. Interleaving planning with reasoning and execution, a progressive horizon planner constructs a plan that answers all currently known needs but has only its first few actions optimized (those within its planning horizon). As the executor cames out actions and reports back to the system, the current goals and the plan are updated based on actual performance and newly discovered goals and information. The new plan is then optimized within a newly set horizon. In this paper, we describe those features of a domain that are salient for the use of a progressive horizon planning paradigm. Since we believe that the paradigm may be useful in other domains, we abstract from the exact techniques used by our program to discuss the merits of the general approach. 'This research was partially supported by the Office of Naval Research under Subcontract Grant N0012989-C-006 and under ARO Grant DAAL03-89-C0031PRI
Face Recognition with Single Training Sample per Person Using Sparse Representation

It is a great challenge for face recognition with single training sample per person. In this paper, we try to propose a new algorithm based sparse representation to solve this problem. The algorithm takes the two-dimensional training samples as the training set directly rather than image vectors. So we can obtain the dictionary of sparse representation only using one sample. The proposed algorithm includes training process and classification process. In training process all the class's dictionaries have been trained using KSVD algorithm. In classification process, the test sample has been projected to every trained dictionary, and then computes the reconstruction residual. At last the test sample is classified to the one who can get the minimum reconstruction residual. Experimental results show that the proposed method is efficient and it can achieve higher recognition accuracy than many existing schemes.
Labor Unions and Real Wages in Mexico , 1984-1998

Mexico has undergone a dramatic market liberalization since facing major debt problems in the early 1980s. The restructuring has coincided with a decline in unionization and, surprisingly, a steady increase after 1989 in the union-nonunion wage gap. I conduct an analysis using cross-sectional data from 1984 to 1998 to show that these trends are attributable to unions rather than changes in the distributions of fixed worker characteristics. I suggest three explanations for these simultaneous trends: increasing union prioritization of wages over employment, a “survival of the fittest selection effect,” and politically motivated wage increases in the public sector. I am unable to directly test the first explanation, I find no evidence in favor of the selection effect, and I find some significant evidence in favor of higher public sector wages, albeit indirectly due the lack of data on public employment. The changes in the union sector, overall, made relatively small contributions to changes in Mexico’s real wages. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to John Pencavel for the guidance and criticism he provided throughout all stages of the project. I also wish to thank David McKenzie for his valuable assistance with the data. Finally, I thank my parents for their patience and support.
Queueing-Model-Based Adaptive Control of Multi-Tiered Web Applications

Web applications have been increasingly deployed on the Internet. How to effectively allocate system resources to meet the Service Level Objectives (SLOs) is a challenging problem for Web application providers. In this article, we propose a scheme for automated performance control of Web applications via dynamic resource allocations. The scheme uses a queueing model predictor and an online adaptive feedback loop that enforces admission control of the incoming requests to ensure the desired response time target is met. The proposed Queueing-Model-Based Adaptive Control approach combines both the modeling power of queueing theory and the self-tuning power of adaptive control. Therefore, it can handle both modeling inaccuracies and load disturbances in a better way. To evaluate the proposed approach, we built a multi-tiered Web application testbed with open-source components widely adopted in industry. Experimental studies conducted on the testbed demonstrated the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.
ROOM IMPULSE RESPONSE VARIATION DUE TO THERMAL FLUCTUATION AND ITS IMPACT ON ACOUSTIC ECHO CANCELLATION

In the field of acoustic echo cancellation, it is well known that the amount of cancellation attainable in real-world systems is limited. Euphemistically this limitation has been referred to in the acoustic echo cancellation community as the “20 dB rule” [1]. This rule reflects the observation that, typically, one can obtain only about 20 to 30 dB of acoustic echo cancellation in actual physical settings. The acoustic echo cancellation problem is generally approached as a linear systems identification problem. As such, one would expect that the acoustic coupling between the loudspeaker and microphone could be well identified and therefore result in very large cancellation values. Unfortunately, this is not the case as there are practical issues that significantly limit the amount of attainable cancellation. This paper investigates the effect of room thermal fluctuations on the loudspeaker-microphone impulse response. Both a theoretical model and actual experimental measurements are given that show thermal variations on the order of tenths of a degree Centigrade can lead to surprisingly large variations in the room impulse response. Thus, small thermal variations can be a limiting physical factor in acoustic echo cancellation performance.