Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Green network technologies and the art of trading-off

In this contribution, we focus on energy-aware devices able to reduce their energy requirements by adapting their performance. We propose an analytical model to accurately represent the impact of green network technologies (i.e., low power idle and adaptive rate) on network- and energy-aware performance indexes. The model has been validated with experimental results, performed by using energy-aware software routers and real-world traffic traces. The achieved results demonstrate how the proposed model can effectively represent energy- and network-aware performance indexes. Moreover, also an optimization procedure based on the model has been proposed and experimentally evaluated. The procedure aims at dynamically adapting the energy-aware device configuration to minimize energy consumption, while coping with incoming traffic volumes and meeting network performance constraints.
Linguistic Meaning, Communicated Meaning and Cognitive Pragmatics

Within the philosophy of language, pragmatics has tended to be seen as an adjunct to, and a means of solving problems in, semantics. A cognitive-scientific conception of pragmatics as a mental processing system responsible for interpreting ostensive communicative stimuli (specifically, verbal utterances) has effected a transformation in the pragmatic issues pursued and the kinds of explanation offered. Taking this latter perspective, I compare two distinct proposals on the kinds of processes, and the architecture of the system(s), responsible for the recovery of speaker meaning (both explicitly and implicitly communicated meaning).
Motivation Factors Impacting the Civil Servant Performance in Local Public Administration in Kosovo

Motivation is defined as the willingness to exert high level of effort to reach organizational goals, conditioned by the ability of these efforts to satisfy some individual needs. As motivating factors are: wage increase in career, work place safety, work contracts, working conditions, organizational culture, leadership in working organizations, the level of responsibility at work, and rewards. All these factors have different scale in motivating employee performance. Based on the theory of many authors in the field of human resources, the conclusion is that the salary is one of the most important motivating factors for employee performance level. Research questions are: Which is unsatisfactory level within worker’s salary? What is the salary structure? What is actual legal framework? The paper used combined methodology: collection of primary data, secondary data, and interviews, with the objective to draw scientific conclusions of this research. The purpose of this research is to come out with recommendations for institutions to develop policies, help human resource and executives managers at all levels, but also for its employees to develop policies and apply procedures which will enable management technology to increase the salary management system as a key influential factor for higher performance level within public sector in Kosovo.
Innovating with Integrity: How Local Heroes Are Transforming American Government

"Innovating with Integrity" presents a comprehensive portrait of the local heroes - front-line public servants and middle managers - who are reinventing state and local government, and it offers practical recommendations for innovating successfully. Based on a study of more than 200 successful government innovations, this book is the first large-scale, systematic analysis of innovation in American government. Sandford Borins identifies the components of integrity that he finds in successful innovators, including the intellectual discipline to plan rigorously and to establish measurable goals; the ability to collaborate with others and accommodate criticism; and a willingness to mobilize both the private sector and the community. In addition to analyzing the common traits driving new initiatives, Borins shows the distinctive differences among six areas of innovation: information technology, organizational redesign, environmental and energy management, policing and community development, social services, and education. This trenchant analysis of what initiatives actually work and why contributes to both the practice and theory of public management. Its practical advice will be especially valuable for front-line government workers, public managers, union leaders, agency heads, politicians, and all concerned with reforming government.
Sleep and sleep electroencephalogram in depressed patients treated with phenelzine.

BACKGROUND The beneficial effect of antidepressant interventions has been proposed to depend on suppression of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep or inhibition of electroencephalographic (EEG) slow-wave activity (SWA) in non-REM sleep. Use of the monoamine oxidase inhibitor phenelzine sulfate can eliminate REM sleep. We studied the relation between REM sleep suppression and antidepressant response and the effect of phenelzine therapy on sleep EEG power spectra. METHODS Open-labeled prescriptions of 30 to 90 mg of phenelzine were given to 11 patients with major depressive disorder (6 men and 5 women; mean age, 41.4 years); all were physically healthy. Mood, dream recall, sleep, sleep EEG, and ocular and muscular activity during sleep were studied before treatment and during the third and fifth weeks of pharmacotherapy. RESULTS Six patients remitted from depression, 2 responded partially, and 3 showed no antidepressant response. Independent from clinical response, REM sleep was dramatically suppressed. On average, only 4.9 minutes of REM sleep was observed in treatment week 5, and it was completely absent in 6 patients. This effect was compensated for by increased stage 2 sleep. In non-REM sleep, EEG power was higher than at baseline between 16.25 and 25 Hz. Slow-wave activity (power within 0.75-4.5 Hz) and the exponential decline of SWA during sleep were not affected. CONCLUSIONS Antidepressant response to phenelzine treatment does not depend on elimination of REM sleep or inhibition of SWA in non-REM sleep. In depressed patients, REM sleep is regulated independently from non-REM sleep and can be manipulated without altering the dynamics of SWA.
FPGA-based reliable TMR controller design for S2A architectures

Fault-tolerance is becoming an essential feature in the design of Networked Control Systems (NCSs). Furthermore, Sensor-to-Actuator (S2A) architectures have shown some advantages over conventional In-Loop architectures. This paper focuses on fault-tolerant controllers in the context of S2A systems. It proposes the use of Triple Modular Redundancy at the controller level. The fault-tolerant controller will be hosted in an FPGA that has a spare location. The voter in this TMR scheme is fault-secure to guarantee that the controllers never produce an undetected incorrect control action. Finally, system reliability is calculated using Markov models to quantitatively show, via case studies, the advantage of the proposed technique in terms of extended lifetime.
Controllers for unicycle-type wheeled robots: Theoretical results and experimental validation

Mobile robots offer a typical example of systems with nonholonomic constraints. Several controllers have been proposed in the literature for stabilizing these systems. However, few experimental studies have been reported comparing the characteristics and the performance of these controllers with respect to neglected dynamics, quantization, noise, delays, etc. In this paper, we use a Khepera mobile robot to perform experimental comparison of several control laws. Khepera has two dc motor-powered wheels and introduces many realistic difficulties, such as different motor dynamics for the two wheels, time delay, quantization, sensor noise, and saturation. We emphasize the implementation difficulties of two discontinuous controllers proposed herein, and we compare their performance with several other controllers reported in the literature. Ways to improve the performance of each controller are also discussed.
Confusing cortical columns

The late developmental neurobiologist, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences, Victor Hamburger told me during one of our discussions about the distinction between boring data and exciting concepts, “one can spend an entire lifetime correcting a flawed paper published in reputable journal and still loose the battle if people like the basic idea” (V. Hamburger, personal communication). An example of the longevity of basically incorrect information is the phenomenon of “The basic uniformity in structure of the neocortex,” published in 1980 by Rockel, Hiorns, and Powell (1). This highly influential paper had obvious problems at almost every level: The authors selected an arbitrary 30-μm-wide, 25-μm-deep vertical cortical “column” between the pia and the bottom of the cortex, because the ruler in the graticule of the oil-immersion eyepiece on their microscope had a 30-μm marker and their histological sections were 25 μm thick; then, they estimated that the number of neurons within this “minicolumn” is 110 in all cytoarchitectonic areas examined, without any correction for the cell size; and finally, based on this dubious finding, they made a broad generalization that the magic number of 110 is constant in all mammalian species (rodents, carnivore, and primates, including human) in all cytoarchitectonic areas (except the primary visual cortex in primates). This finding led them to conclude that, “the intrinsic structure of the neocortex is basically more uniform than has been thought and that differences in cytoarchitecture and function reflects differences in connections. ”
Long tethers provide high-force coupling of the Dam1 ring to shortening microtubules

Microtubule kinetochore attachments are essential for accurate mitosis, but how these force-generating connections move chromosomes remains poorly understood. Processive motion at shortening microtubule ends can be reconstituted in vitro using microbeads conjugated to the budding yeast kinetochore protein Dam1, which forms microtubule-encircling rings. Here, we report that, when Dam1 is linked to a bead cargo by elongated protein tethers, the maximum force transmitted from a disassembling microtubule increases sixfold compared with a short tether. We interpret this significant improvement with a theory that considers the geometry and mechanics of the microtubule–ring–bead system. Our results show the importance of fibrillar links in tethering microtubule ends to cargo: fibrils enable the cargo to align coaxially with the microtubule, thereby increasing the stability of attachment and the mechanical work that it can do. The force-transducing characteristics of fibril-tethered Dam1 are similar to the analogous properties of purified yeast kinetochores, suggesting that a tethered Dam1 ring comprises the main force-bearing unit of the native attachment.
Adaptive Construction of Surrogates for the Bayesian Solution of Inverse Problems

The Bayesian approach to inverse problems typically relies on posterior sampling approaches, such as Markov chain Monte Carlo, for which the generation of each sample requires one or more evaluations of the parameter-to-observable map or forward model. When these evaluations are computationally intensive, approximations of the forward model are essential to accelerating sample-based inference. Yet the construction of globally accurate approximations for nonlinear forward models can be computationally prohibitive and in fact unnecessary, as the posterior distribution typically concentrates on a small fraction of the support of the prior distribution. We present a new approach that uses stochastic optimization to construct polynomial approximations over a sequence of distributions adaptively determined from the data, eventually concentrating on the posterior distribution. The approach yields substantial gains in efficiency and accuracy over prior-based surrogates, as demonstrated via application to inverse .
LcVc: Low-complexity vector-core for executing scalar/vector instructions

This paper proposes a low-complexity vector-core called LcVc for executing both scalar and vector instructions on the same execution datapath. A unified register file in the decode stage is used for storing both scalar operands and vector elements. The execution stage accepts a new set of operands each cycle and produces a new result. Rather than issuing vector instruction (1-D operations) as a whole, each vector operation is issued sequentially with the existing scalar issue hardware. All loads and stores of registers take place from the data cache in the memory access stage in a rate of one element per clock cycle. The hardware required to support the enhanced vector capability is insignificant (few incrementers and multiplexers), which results in reducing the area per core and increasing the number of cores available in a given chip area. Three key features distinguish LcVc architecture: a unified ISA to scalar and vector processing, low cost, and simplicity of organization. The use of LcVc approximately doubles the speedup of executing vector/matrix kernels such as vector addition, vector scaling, SAXPY, dot-product, matrix-vector multiplication, and matrix-matrix multiplication.
Customers as Resource Integrators: Styles of Customer Co-creation

Research Paper Purpose Drawing from S-D logic this paper builds on the proposition of customers as resource integrators, identifying six styles of customer co-creation, and linking customer cocreation styles to outcomes. Design/methodology/approach A theoretical framework is proposed linking customer co-creation styles to outcomes. The research is based on twenty in-depth interviews and four focus groups of patients across a wide range of cancers, gender and length of treatment with oncology patients at two different clinics. Findings Six styles of co-creation are identified. They are “Team Manager”, “Isolate Controller”, “Partner”, “Spiritualist”, “Adaptive Realist” and “Passive Compliant”. Individuals who exhibit an “Adaptive Realist” style tend to demonstrate high quality of life, on psychological, existential and support dimensions. In contrast, the lowest quality of life was evidenced by those exhibiting “Passive Compliant” and “Isolate Controller” styles. Practicality Our findings provide insights into which customer co-creation styles offer greatest patient outcomes. Research limitations/implications The present research provides a starting point for further research on modelling the relationship between customer co-creation styles and outcomes. Originality/value This is the first study to operationalize co-creation, relating co-creation to coproduction, and demonstrating a direct relationship between co-creation activities, cocreation styles and outcomes. Furthermore, the research develops theory, building on S-D logic.
Sensitivity analysis of multi-scroll chaotic oscillators at circuit level

In this paper a sensitivity analysis in the electronic design of a chaos generator with n-scrolls in one direction (1-D) is reported. The chaotic oscillator is modeled by using state variables and a piecewise linear function. From this model, a circuit synthesis is carried out to get an electronic circuit based on voltage operational amplifiers. This circuit is analyzed by applying the Monte Carlo method embedded in the T-Spice simulator. Two cases are studied, the first one is related with the sensitivity of the number of scrolls in the chaotic oscillator as a function of the variations in the passive elements. Later, a non ideal macro-model is introduced to analyze the impact of the second order effects of the operational amplifiers against the number of scrolls. Several Spice simulations are given to demonstrate the usefulness of this approach.
Pathogenesis of thyroid eye disease: review and update on molecular mechanisms

Orbital changes in thyroid orbitopathy (TO) result from de novo adipogenesis, hyaluronan synthesis, interstitial oedema and enlargement of extraocular muscles. Cellular immunity, with predominantly CD4+ T cells expressing Th1 cytokines, and overexpression of macrophage-derived cytokines, perpetuate orbital inflammation. Orbital fibroblasts appear to be the major effector cells. Orbital fibroblasts express both thyrotropin receptor (TSHR) and insulin-like growth factor-1 receptor (IGF-1R) at higher levels than normal fibroblasts. TSHR expression increases in adipogenesis; TSHR agonism enhances hyaluronan production. IGF-1R stimulation leads to adipogenesis, hyaluronan synthesis and production of the chemokines, interleukin (IL)-16 and Regulated on Activation, Normal T Cell Expression and Secreted, which facilitate lymphocyte trafficking into the orbit. Immune activation uses a specific CD40:CD154 molecular bridge to activate orbital fibroblasts, which secrete pro-inflammatory cytokines including IL-1β, IL-1α, IL-6, IL-8, macrophage chemoattractant protein-1 and transforming growth factor-β, to perpetuate orbital inflammation. Molecular pathways including adenylyl cyclase/cyclic adenosine monophosphate, phophoinositide 3 kinase/AKT/mammalian target of rapamycin, mitogen-activated protein kinase are involved in TO. The emergence of a TO animal model and a new generation of TSHR antibody assays increasingly point towards TSHR as the primary autoantigen for extrathyroidal orbital involvement. Oxidative stress in TO resulting from imbalances of the oxidation-reduction state provides a framework of understanding for smoking prevention, achieving euthyroidism and the use of antioxidants such as selenium. Progress has been made in the understanding of the pathogenesis of TO, which should advance development of novel therapies targeting cellular immunity, specifically the CD40:CD40 ligand interaction, antibody-producing B cells, cytokines, TSHR and IGF-1R and its signalling pathways. Further studies in signalling networks and molecular triggers leading to burnout of TO will further our understanding of TO.
A formula retrieval method based on hierarchical structure clusters

Focusing on the issue that formula retrieval could not be realized with traditional full-text retrieval technology because of the spatial features of formulae, this paper proposed a formulae retrieval method with the full considerations of the hierarchical structures of formulae. The index was constructed according to the clusters of formulae with their baseline level structures. Based on the index, the math retrieval algorithm was designed with different query modes, such as precision matching and structural matching. The experimental results show the average query response times in accurate retrieval mode and structural mode are acceptable, which indicates the practicability of proposed method.
Prostate cancer stem cells

Despite the discovery over 60 years ago by Huggins and Hodges 1 that prostate cancers respond to androgen deprivation therapy, hormone‐refractory prostate cancer remains a major clinical challenge. There is now mounting evidence that solid tumours originate from undifferentiated stem cell‐like cells coexisting within a heterogeneous tumour mass that drive tumour formation, maintain tumour homeostasis and initiate metastases. This review focuses upon current evidence for prostate cancer stem cells, addressing the identification and properties of both normal and transformed prostate stem cells. Copyright © 2008 Pathological Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
64 channel acquisition system for recording biomedical signals

This paper presents the design and preliminary measurements of the 64 channel electronic chip for neurobiology experiments. Chip is designed in the 180nm technology and operates with ±0.9 V supply voltage. Preliminary measurements show the low and the high cut off frequencies may be tuned in 9 – 90 Hz and in the 1.6 – 24 kHz range respectively while the gain of the amplifier may be set either to 700 V/V or 350 V/V. To decrease the number of wires and make designed chip convenient for the experiments it is equipped with the analogue multiplexer. The single channel consumes 200 µW of power and this together with other parameters make the chip suitable for recording neurobiology signals.
Pipeline-based scheduling for heterogeneous multi-core systems

This paper proposes a pipeline-based scheduling algorithm to improve the throughput for heterogeneous multi-core processors. The algorithm decreases the communication and idle time by assigning most parent-child task pairs on the same processor, and balances the work time of processors through a balance condition. The experimental results show that, on average, this algorithm with the above two techniques achieves 113.99% improvement in throughput compared to some existing algorithms.
Mice Lacking Central Serotonergic Neurons Show Enhanced Inflammatory Pain and an Impaired Analgesic Response to Antidepressant Drugs

A large body of literature has implicated serotonin [5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT)] in descending modulation of nociceptive transmission. Here, we have studied the pain behavior of Lmx1b conditional knock-out mice (Lmx1bf/f/p), which lack 5-HT neurons in the CNS. Lmx1bf/f/p mutant mice showed normal thermal and visceral pain responses but were less sensitive to mechanical stimuli and exhibited enhanced inflammatory pain compared with their littermate control mice. Importantly, the analgesic effect of several antidepressant drugs, including selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs), and tricyclic antidepressants, was either abolished or greatly attenuated in Lmx1bf/f/p mice. Moreover, in the acute versus persistent pain settings, the analgesic actions of the SNRI duloxetine and the SSRI fluoxetine were differentially affected. Together, our results provide in vivo genetic evidence demonstrating that although the predominant role of the central 5-HT system in inflammatory pain is inhibitory, its role in acute mechanical pain is facilitatory. The findings that the analgesic effects of various antidepressant drugs are differentially dependent on the central 5-HT system should help us to understand the mechanism of the analgesic action of different classes of antidepressants in the management of persistent pain.