Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
SPARQL for Networks of Embedded Systems

In the Internet of Things (IoT), small-scale embedded devices monitor and control real-world objects with different kinds of sensors and actuators. Often, devices communicate measurements and states using proprietary encodings, with the benefit of having all data stored in a central location, e.g., the Cloud. The drawbacks are that all data needs to be collected in advance, even if it is not used afterwards, and that nonstandard protocols make it hard to extend existing networks with new devices. In contrast, the Semantic Web (or Web of Data) represents the successful efforts towards linking and sharing data over the Web. The cornerstones of the Web of Data are RDF as data format and SPARQL as de-facto standard query language. Recent trends show the evolution of the integration of these two efforts into the Web of Things. We propose to elevate embedded devices to first-class citizens of the Web of Things by allowing storage and processing of RDF data. Our framework abstracts from individual deployments to represent them as common data sources in line with the ideas behind the Semantic Web. This includes the execution of SPARQL queries over the data from a pool of embedded devices and/or external data sources. Handling verbose RDF data and executing SPARQL queries in an embedded network pose major challenges to minimize the involved processing and communication cost. We therefore present an in-network query processor aiming to push processing steps onto devices. We demonstrate the practical application and the potential benefits of our framework in an evaluation using a real-world deployment and a range of SPARQL queries stemming from common use cases of the Web of Things.
Tax systems and tax reforms in south and East Asia: Overview of the tax systems and main policy tax issues

South and East Asia are a particularly fast developing world economic areas, and are becoming increasingly more economically integrated. These countries, however, are not homogenous, and are lacking in any supra - national Authority. The total fiscal pressure of South and East Asian countries looks somewhat low when compared to that of countries with a similar per-capita income, pertaining to other economic world areas. However, a smooth Wagner law is confirmed by the data so that fiscal pressure is destined somewhat to increase as growth continues. With regards to similar experiences of developing and transition countries, indirect taxes prevail over direct ones. Low tax wedges on labor improve efficiency, by inducing both the supply and demand of labor. The heavy burden on consumption lessens equity and increases welfare losses. Any further uniform analysis of South and East Asian countries’ tax policy issues would be however quite fruitless. It is far better to consider tax policies issues which rise inside the whole area separately to those more specific to each cluster made up by similar countries. Intra-regional economic integration poses severe challenges to the tax structure in the Asian area. Three tax policy issues seem most problematic: the building of intra-countries’ agreements on reducing trade tariffs; the sequential revenue consequences of reduction in foreign trade taxes; the increasing tax competition for FDI. Intra-countries clusters’ tax policy issues differ from each other. In Japan and in S. Korea different choices have been made regarding the comprehensiveness of the PIT’s basis, whose burden as a consequence ends up being more fairly distributed in S. Korea. The two countries are facing the common problem of an ageing population and consequentially, social contributions, and eventually VAT are being raised. Malaysia’s direct taxes look higher than Thailand’s, but this is only because of the taxation of oil companies. Thailand has adopted VAT, while Malaysia has not changed its traditional sales tax. Both the countries are engaged in the recovery of revenue by improving tax administration. Both in China and in India income tax is small and poorly redistributing. Also, India has just moved from a schedular to a comprehensive tax basis. VAT is well established in China, while it is just arriving in India, as a consequence of a long waited but challenging reform, especially regarding the tax relationships among levels of government. Taxing power is now more centralized in China, but this needs to be corrected in order to avoid a lack of accountability on the part of the provinces.
A Uniied Framework for Exceptions in Workkow and Process Models { an Approach Based on Persistent Objects

The need for exibility in workkows and the problem of unanticipated exceptions are well recognized, and in fact a number of solutions have already been proposed in areas such as computer-supported collaborative work and software process modeling. On the other hand, workkow systems frequently maintain forms and other information in databases, and there is also strong evidence for the need to consider exceptions to the constraints imposed by the schema on the data in databases. This paper presents a framework for treating both kinds of exceptions uniformly by applying ideas from programming language exception handling (but where the responsible agents of workkows are allowed to handle exceptions on-line) to a situation where most aspects of workkows have been reiied as persistent objects in special classes and with special attributes. As a result, only a small number of new constructs need to be introduced, and power is achieved through orthogonality. Unlike most previous work, the framework pays particular attention to the consequences of permitting deviations from the norm to persist, in part by deening exceptions as violations of constraints and then developing a taxonomy of constraints. Also as a departure from prior eeorts, the paper takes the view that the evolution of the schema (workkow or data) is a diierent problem from that of individual exceptions, but that a limited form of incremental evolution { providing exception handlers ahead of time { is a useful abstraction mechanism to help organize the details of complex workkows.
The Structure and Significance of Strategic Episodes: Social Systems Theory and the Routine Practices of Strategic Change

In this paper we draw on Niklas Luhmann's social systems theory, and in particular his concept of an 'episode', to guide research into strategic practice and its relationship to the operating routines of an organization. Episodes, in Luhmann's theory, provide a mechanism by which a system can suspend its routine structures and so initiate a reflection on and change of these structures. Applying this theory to the organizational process of strategic change, we draw attention to the routine nature of strategic episodes and to their organizational role as the effective locus of strategic practice and the interaction between strategic and operating routines. We continue to develop a framework for the systematic analysis of different kinds of episode in terms of key aspects of their initiation, conduct and termination.
The Generalized Random Energy Model of Spin Glasses and its Application to the Statistical Physics of Code Ensembles with Hierarchical Structures

In an earlier work, the statistical physics associated with finite–temperature decoding of code ensembles, along with the relation to their random coding error exponents, were explored in a framework that is analogous to Derrida’s random energy model (REM) of spin glasses, according to which the energy levels of the various spin configurations are independent random variables. The generalized REM (GREM) extends the REM in that it introduces correlations between energy levels in an hierarchical structure. In this paper, we explore some analogies between the behavior of the GREM and that of code ensembles which have parallel hierarchical structures. In particular, in analogy to the fact that the GREM may have different types of phase transition effects, depending on the parameters of the model, then the above–mentioned hierarchical code ensembles behave substantially differently in the various domains of the design parameters of these codes. We make an attempt to explore the insights that can be imported from the statistical mechanics of the GREM and be harnessed to serve for code design considerations and guidelines.
Study on the UHF technique applied in PD detection

Partial discharge can cause a high risk for the dielectric stability of high voltage equipment. In order to detect PD activity while equipment is operating, the ultra high frequency (UHF) detection technique is introduced. On-site PD measurements are made at cable connectors by means of log periodic dipole antenna housed outside the equipment. Thus a sensitive PD measurement even in noisy environment is possible. On-site measurements during operation showed the great potential for condition assessment [1]. This paper tries to explore the spectral distribution characteristic of electrical discharge in electric transmission and transformation equipment by using UHF technique. These researches include simulate PD sources and then use the contact-less way to discover the characteristic frequency of each type within and without the faraday cage, thereby establish the correspondence between certain characteristic frequency components of electromagnetic radiation and specific equipment deficiency. All these results showed that either radiation signal in time domain waveform or amplitude frequency diagram transformed by FFT has certain distinction and provided a basis for fault pattern recognition applied on PD detection of electrical equipment.
The imperial city-state and the national state form

This contribution argues, first, that pre-national forms of state were not displaced or supplanted by a new, national form. What we call the nation-state was not the successor to imperial or city-states but was itself a form of the European imperial city-states that had driven the expansion of capitalism in previous centuries. It argues, second, that national states emerged only after 1945 and only in a handful of states where, through welfare reforms and market and industry regulation, investment and production were made to serve the expansion and integration of national markets. Third, with the dismantling of Keynesian policies in these states, pre-national (pre-Keynesian) structures are resurfacing. What scholars describe as the emergence of ‘post-national spatialities’ and of ‘global cities’ and city regions represents the resurgence of a durable and historically dominant form of state: the imperial city-state form. The ‘re-scaling’ of nation-states and growing prominence of ‘global cities’ and ‘city regions’ are heralding the end of the brief history of actually existing nation-states and the re-deployment of the imperial city-state model.
COMPATIBILITY IN ISLAMIC AND WESTERN TRADITIONS : THE CASE OF SOCIAL CAPITAL

We might predict a decline in faith as a result of material progress, actually has been resurgence in the religion and faith especially in Islam. We view social capital as an essential component of both western and Islamic societies. In Islam Zakat embodies social capital rather than Islamic and western Values (Modernism and Postmodernism) being irreconcilable opposite we see them as having common core embedding in social capital and Zakat.
Diversity mapping scheme for defect and fault tolerance in nanoelectronic crossbar

The bottom-up self-assembly fabrication process of nanoelectronic results in higher defect density. Furthermore, transient and permanent faults could also occur during operation due to the sensitivity. Thus, defect and fault tolerance techniques are urgently needed. In this paper, we propose a concept of diversity mapping and three corresponding algorithms for defect-tolerance logic mapping in nanoelectronic crossbar. As the results show, our algorithms can achieve several or ten times higher logic mapping success rates compared to the best recently published technique over a set of samples with various problem sizes, especially superior in large scale problems. What's more, our algorithms can offer a set of different mapping schemes as by-products which we can utilize for accelerating online self-repair from the faults.
Real-time State of Vigilance Detection for Probing Seizure Mechanisms and Seizure Control

States of consciousness in the brain offer a metric for explaining and predicting behaviors. There is a well-known correlation between epileptic seizure susceptibility and state of vigilance. Our goal is to design a system for detecting state of vigilance in real time using invasive electroencephalography and measurements of head movement. We will use this to probe the relationship between state of vigilance and seizure mechanisms. This system has potential clinical applications for state-based seizure prediction and control.
255 to 330 GHz active frequency tripler MMIC

An active frequency tripler MMIC achieving an output frequency of 330 GHz is presented. With the use of integrated post- amplification the frequency tripler generates an average output power of -0.4 dBm in the output frequency range from 255 to 330 GHz, corresponding to an absolute bandwidth of 75 GHz. At 288 GHz the measured output power is 0.6 dBm with an input power of 10 dBm and with an input power of 1 dBm the conversion gain is -2.7 dB. The MMIC is realized in a metamorphic HEMT technology with 35 nm gate-length and uses 1.25 × 0.5 mm2 of chip space for convenient integration into multifunctional MMIC circuits.
Potential Game Convergence of Cognitive Radio Ad Hoc Networks

Development of a system in which several unlicensed users strive to access the vacant licensed bands is a highly challenging task, especially in ad hoc networks where no centralized infrastructure exists. These unlicensed users, also called cognitive radios, must compete for the available frequency slots. The convergence of this system is difficult to achieve if nodes perform no information exchange and solely depend on their individual actions. In this paper, we analyze the cognitive radio networks for distributed channel allocation. It is observed that convergence is easier to establish in cooperative systems or systems where users perform information exchange. This kind of cooperative behavior can be enforced by providing incentives to nodes. The cooperation leads to an improvement in overall network performance as compared to the selfish users who are concerned only with their individual benefits.
Real-time multisensor people tracking for human-robot spatial interaction

All currently used mobile robot platforms are able to navigate safely through their environment, avoiding static and dynamic obstacles. However, in human populated environments mere obstacle avoidance is not sufficient to make humans feel comfortable and safe around robots. To this end, a large community is currently producing human-aware navigation approaches to create a more socially acceptable robot behaviour. Amajorbuilding block for all Human-Robot Spatial Interaction is the ability of detecting and tracking humans in the vicinity of the robot. We present a fully integrated people perception framework, designed to run in real-time on a mobile robot. This framework employs detectors based on laser and RGB-D data and a tracking approach able to fuse multiple detectors using different versions of data association and Kalman filtering. The resulting trajectories are transformed into Qualitative Spatial Relations based on a Qualitative Trajectory Calculus, to learn and classify different encounters using a Hidden Markov Model based representation. We present this perception pipeline, which is fully implemented into the Robot Operating System (ROS), in a small proof of concept experiment. All components are readily available for download, and free to use under the MIT license, to researchers in all fields, especially focussing on social interaction learning by providing different kinds of output, i.e. Qualitative Relations and trajectories.
Cellular Morphine Tolerance Produced by βArrestin-2-Dependent Impairment of μ-Opioid Receptor Resensitization

Chronic morphine treatment produces behavioral and cellular opioid tolerance that has been proposed to be caused by attenuated μ-opioid receptor (MOR) recovery from desensitization (resensitization). The process of MOR resensitization is thought to require βarrestin-2 (βarr-2)-dependent trafficking of desensitized receptors to endosomal compartments, followed by recycling of resensitized receptors back to the plasma membrane. However, there is little direct evidence for this, particularly in native neurons. This study used whole-cell patch-clamp recording in locus ceruleus (LC) neurons from wild-type (w.t.) and βarr-2 knock-out (k.o.) mice to examine whether βarr-2/dynamin-dependent trafficking is required for MOR resensitization in neurons from opioid-naive and morphine-treated mice. Surprisingly, recovery of MOR from acute desensitization in LC neurons does not require βarr-2- or dynamin-dependent trafficking. To the contrary, MOR resensitization was accelerated by disruption of either βarr-2 or dynamin function. Chronic morphine treatment caused cellular MOR tolerance and concurrently impaired MOR resensitization in neurons from w.t. mice, as expected from previous studies, but neither occurred in neurons from βarr-2 k.o. mice. Moreover, the impairment of MOR resensitization caused by chronic morphine was reversed in w.t. neurons when G-protein-coupled receptor kinase-2 (GRK2) or dynamin function was disrupted. Together, these results establish that βarr-2/dynamin-dependent receptor regulation is not required for MOR resensitization in LC neurons. Furthermore, chronic morphine treatment modifies GRK2–βarr-2–dynamin-dependent MOR trafficking to impair receptor resensitization, thereby contributing to opioid tolerance in LC neurons by reducing the number of functional receptors on the surface membrane.
Psychomotor profiling with Bayesian neworks

A high level of psychomotor abilities often is essential for successfully operating many technical systems and especially medical and rehabilitation devices. This paper introduces an approach to enable a technical system to automatically assess its user's level of psychomotor abilities, so that it can adapt its level of automation and provide the user with more or less assistance depending on the individual user profile. For this purpose, a study has been conducted during which the motor abilities of the participants have been assessed and their wheelchair control behavior recorded. Bayesian networks (BN) and structural equation models (SEM) have been applied to model the relationships between the wheelchair control behavior and the motor abilities of the participants. The BN demonstrate usefulness and magnificent advantages compared to the SEM for modeling uncertainty in structure and parameter dependencies, which are shown by validation experiments. Although only a small amount of data samples (23 participants) was available for model generation, a target variable reflecting the user's precision ability was successfully classified based on real data input in more than 82% of cases.
Molecular control of seasonal flowering in rice, arabidopsis and temperate cereals.

BACKGROUND Rice (Oryza sativa) and Arabidopsis thaliana have been widely used as model systems to understand how plants control flowering time in response to photoperiod and cold exposure. Extensive research has resulted in the isolation of several regulatory genes involved in flowering and for them to be organized into a molecular network responsive to environmental cues. When plants are exposed to favourable conditions, the network activates expression of florigenic proteins that are transported to the shoot apical meristem where they drive developmental reprogramming of a population of meristematic cells. Several regulatory factors are evolutionarily conserved between rice and arabidopsis. However, other pathways have evolved independently and confer specific characteristics to flowering responses. SCOPE This review summarizes recent knowledge on the molecular mechanisms regulating daylength perception and flowering time control in arabidopsis and rice. Similarities and differences are discussed between the regulatory networks of the two species and they are compared with the regulatory networks of temperate cereals, which are evolutionarily more similar to rice but have evolved in regions where exposure to low temperatures is crucial to confer competence to flower. Finally, the role of flowering time genes in expansion of rice cultivation to Northern latitudes is discussed. CONCLUSIONS Understanding the mechanisms involved in photoperiodic flowering and comparing the regulatory networks of dicots and monocots has revealed how plants respond to environmental cues and adapt to seasonal changes. The molecular architecture of such regulation shows striking similarities across diverse species. However, integration of specific pathways on a basal scheme is essential for adaptation to different environments. Artificial manipulation of flowering time by means of natural genetic resources is essential for expanding the cultivation of cereals across different environments.
Antecedents of Turnover Intentions: A Study of Karachi Business Schools

Purpose: This study mainly investigates the factors, like job satisfaction, affective commitment, perceived organizational support and distributive justice as antecedents of turnover intentions. Methodolgy: This study utilized the quantitative approach by distributing questionnaires to 200 employees working in leading business schools of Karachi, Pakistan. The correlation and regression analyses have been performed. Findings: The results of the study revealed that, all the predictors negatively correlated and influenced turnover intention. Practical Implitation: The findings and framework of this study will be useful to the university organizations, in identifying the factors making the employees working with them to quit. Pakistan is believed to be the potential Market for Investment in Education. This empirical attempt can be used as kick start for investment in this sector. By taking corrective measures the university organizations can retain knowledge workers, and avoid the anguishes of new hiring. Keywords: Turnover intention, affective commitment, distributive justice, Job Satisfaction, POS, Business Schools, Karachi, Pakistan