Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Practical Data Compression for Modern Memory Hierarchies

In this thesis, we describe a new, practical approach to integrating hardware-based data compression within the memory hierarchy, including on-chip caches, main memory, and both on-chip and off-chip interconnects. This new approach is fast, simple, and effective in saving storage space. A key insight in our approach is that access time (including decompression latency) is critical in modern memory hierarchies. By combining inexpensive hardware support with modest OS support, our holistic approach to compression achieves substantial improvements in performance and energy efficiency across the memory hierarchy. Using this new approach, we make several major contributions in this thesis. First, we propose a new compression algorithm, Base-Delta-Immediate Compression (BDI), that achieves high compression ratio with very low compression/decompression latency. BDI exploits the existing low dynamic range of values present in many cache lines to compress them to smaller sizes using Base+Delta encoding. Second, we observe that the compressed size of a cache block can be indicative of its reuse. We use this observation to develop a new cache insertion policy for compressed caches, the Size-based Insertion Policy (SIP), which uses the size of a compressed block as one of the metrics to predict its potential future reuse. Third, we propose a new main memory compression framework, Linearly Compressed Pages (LCP), that significantly reduces the complexity and power cost of supporting main memory compression. We demonstrate that any compression algorithm can be adapted to fit the requirements of LCP, and that LCP can be efficiently integrated with the existing cache compression designs, avoiding extra compression/decompression.
Cough in the community: a cross sectional survey and the relationship to gastrointestinal symptoms

Background: The prevalence and severity of chronic cough in the community is uncertain. In a large population of representative normal subjects, we explored the relationship between self-reported cough severity and frequency, and factors known to be related to the aetiology of chronic cough. In particular, we have examined the relative association between cough and symptoms of gastrointestinal disease. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was undertaken in 36 general practices with subjects randomly selected from practice computer databases. Baseline lifestyle and demographic characteristics were recorded. Participants were asked how often in the previous 2 months they had experienced bouts or spasms of coughing. Cough symptom status was dichotomised into symptomatic using a cut off of bouts or spasms of coughing at a frequency of between once a week and once a day or above. Gastrointestinal data were collected using validated methodology. Results: Questionnaires were sent to 6416 subjects and 4003 (62%) responded. The prevalence of chronic cough was 12%, and was severe in 7%. Following multivariate analysis, regurgitation (OR 1.71; 99% CI 1.20 to 2.45) and irritable bowel syndrome (OR 2.00; 99% CI 1.47 to 2.72) were strong predictors of cough. Smoking (OR 1.61; 99% CI 1.18 to 2.19), declining social class (OR 1.63; 99% CI 1.04 to 2.57), and quality of life at baseline (OR 1.63; 99% CI 1.13 to 2.35) were also significantly associated. Conclusion: Chronic cough is a common symptom in the general population. Its strong association with gastrointestinal disease may have aetiological significance.
Oriented Animal-mask Decoration Pattern Generation

Oriented Animal-mask on the bronze vessels in the Shang and Zhou dynasty is an art of abstraction and stylization from animal face. The non-photo realistic rendering technology tires to establish a system to reproduce the style after analyzing how people create artworks. In this paper, we develop a pattern generation method for the animal-mask decorations. By analyzing the structure and identifying association between animals and animal-mask decorations, we generate facial features from employing a structural matching method to find correspondence from an sample database. For pattern stylization, we propose a modified reaction-diffusion method to stylize the input image patterns and enhance the features in animal-mask decoration. And the proposed reaction-diffusion method can also simulate the diffusion alone user designated flow vectors to generate background decoration patterns. Combining the processes above, we can generate an animal-mask decoration style image. We demonstrate results with a number of animal input images.
Topological skeletons in Haskell/sub #/

Algorithmic skeletons is a powerful concept to describe patterns of concurrency in programming, abstracting from implementation. Haskell/sub #/ is a coordination based distributed extension of Haskell. In this paper, it is shown how skeletons can be introduced into Haskell/sub #/ at configuration level, by extending its notion of hierarchical composition of programs with process templates. The approach described is general enough to be applied to any configuration language. Its expressiveness, simplicity and elegance are demonstrated by examples, which also show its impact in Haskell/sub #/ programming practice and performance.
Computational Conformal Geometry Applied in Engineering Fields

Computational conformal geometry is an interdisciplinary field, combining modern geometry theories from pure mathematics with computational algorithms from computer science. Computational conformal geometry offers many powerful tools to handle a broad range of geometric problems in engineering fields. This work summarizes our research resul ts in the past years. We have introduced efficient and robust algorithms for computing conformal structures of surfaces acquired from the real life, which are based on harmonic maps , holomorphic differential forms and surface Ricci flow. We have applied conformal geometric algorithms in computer graphics, computer vision, geometric modeling and medical imaging.
Online Games: Research Perspective and Framework

Computer-based games have become an important social phenomenon of modern society. Fast-growing online games are becoming the dominant sector in computer-based games. The development of online games involves many disparate disciplines from the technology, entertainment, and behavior sciences. Attracted by the potential impact of this rapidly growing segment, there is a growing literature addressing this fascinating topic. However, the scope, perspective, and main research themes of online games study are still unclear to date. Therefore, we utilized the intellectual structure technique developed by the information scientist to help clarify the scope and themes of this research domain. We analyzed thousands of relevant literature and tentatively identified 25 main research themes to facilitate the comprehension and study of online games. A research framework is developed by synthesizing the research themes and references. The framework encompasses research areas in network infrastructure, game platform architecture, game applications, player study, ICT mediated social activities, social capital, and game business models.
A case study using the round-trip strategy for state-based class testing

A number of strategies have been proposed for state-based class testing. An important proposal made by Chow (1978), that was subsequently adapted by Binder (1999), consists in deriving test sequences covering all round-trip paths in a finite state machine (FSMs). Based on a number of (rather strong) assumptions, and for traditional FSMs, it can be demonstrated that all operation and transfer errors in the implementation can be uncovered. Through experimentation, this paper investigates this strategy when used in the context of UML statecharts. Based on a set of mutation operators proposed for object-oriented code we seed a significant number of faults in an implementation of a specific container class. We then investigate the effectiveness of four test teams at uncovering faults, based on the round-trip path strategy, and analyze the faults that seem to be difficult to detect. Our main conclusion is that the round-trip path strategy is reasonably effective at detecting faults (87% average as opposed to 69% for size-equivalent, random test cases) but that a significant number of faults can only exhibit a high detection probability by augmenting the round-trip strategy with a traditional black-box strategy such as category-partition testing. This increases the number of test cases to run -and therefore the cost of testing- and a cost-benefit analysis weighting the increase of testing effort and the likely gain in fault detection is necessary.
Third-person navigation of whole-planet terrain in a head-tracked stereoscopic environment

Navigation and interaction in virtual environments that use stereoscopic head-tracked displays and have very large data sets present several challenges beyond those encountered with smaller data sets and simpler displays. First, zooming by approaching or retreating from a target must be augmented by integrating scale as a seventh degree of freedom. Second, in order to maintain good stereoscopic imagery, the interface must: maintain stereo image pairs that the user perceives as a single 3D image, minimize loss of perceived depth since stereoscopic imagery cannot properly occlude the screen's frame, provide maximum depth information, and place objects at distances where they are best manipulated. Finally, the navigation interface must work when the environment is displayed at any scale. This paper addresses these problems for god's-eye-view or third person navigation of a specific large-scale virtual environment: a high-resolution terrain database covering an entire planet.
Pollinator Limitation, Autogamy and Minimal Inbreeding Depression in Insect-pollinated Plants on a Boreal Island

Abstract We studied the pollination biology of 18 common insect-pollinated plant species on Kent Island, a boreal island in the Bay of Fundy, New Brunswick, Canada. Under natural conditions, fruit set was relatively high in most of the species studied [although it was very low (<1%) in Maianthemum canadense]. Hand-pollination increased fruit set in five of seven species examined (71%), indicating that fruit set may commonly be limited by the availability or behavior of pollinators on Kent Island. Twelve of 17 species examined (71%) were capable of substantial autonomous self-pollination (autogamy in the absence of pollinators), although fruit set averaged higher in open-pollinated flowers (65.7%) than in flowers from which insects were experimentally excluded (49.6%). The number of seeds per fruit was also less in autonomously self-pollinated flowers in two species (Rhododendron canadense and Ledum groenlandicum). In at least one species (Iris versicolor), rates of autonomous selfing were higher on Kent Island than on the mainland. Stamen-excision experiments in I. versicolor demonstrated that fruit set required pollen transfer in the absence of pollinators (i.e., agamospermy did not occur). In hand-pollination experiments, five of six species (83%) (R. canadense, L. groenlandicum, Smilacina trifolia, S. stellata and I. versicolor) showed no evidence of inbreeding depression in terms of percent fruit set, fruit size or number of seeds per fruit. Overall, our results demonstrate that for many insect-pollinated plant species on Kent Island, pollinators are likely to be limiting, autogamy is common and inbreeding depression is negligible. Although pollinator limitation and autogamy regularly occur in mainland habitats as well, a review of the literature suggests that they may be more common on islands such as Kent Island. If such island-mainland differences are general, they may arise because genotypes and species capable of self-fertilization are more likely than obligate outcrossers to colonize and become established in isolated habitats.
Supersymmetry and Branes in M-theory Plane-waves

We study brane embeddings in M-theory plane-waves and their super- symmetry. The relation with branes in AdS backgrounds via the Penrose limit is also explored. Longitudinal planar branes are originated from AdS branes while giant gravitons of AdS spaces become spherical branes which are realized as fuzzy spheres in the massive matrix theory.
Final Project Ananth Raghunathan ? Toda ’ s Theorem : PH ⊆ P # P 1

The class NP captures the difficulty of finding certificates. However, in many contexts, one is interested not just in a single certificate, but actually counting the number of certificates. In this manuscript we look at a famous result involving #P, (pronounced “sharp p”), a complexity class that captures this notion. Counting problems arise in diverse fields, often in situations having to do with estimations of probability. Examples include statistical estimation, statistical physics, network design, and more. Counting problems are also studied in a field of mathematics called enumerative combinatorics, which tries to obtain closedform mathematical expressions for counting problems. To give an example, in the 19th century Kirchoff showed how to count the number of spanning trees in a graph using a simple determinant computation.
Plant Hormones in Wood Formation -Novel Insights into the Roles of Ethylene and Gibberellins

Bjorklund, S. 2007. Plant hormones in wood formation –Novel insights into the roles of ethylene and gibberellins. Doctor’s dissertation, ISSN 1652-6880, ISBN 978-91-576-7380-0 The role of plant hormones in wood development has been studied for decades, and their crosstalk in many biological processes is the subject of increasing focus. In this thesis, modern biological tools have been used to provide novel insights into the roles of gibberellins and ethylene in wood formation in the model tree Populus tremula x tremuloides. A new idea describing the crosstalk between gibberellins (GAs) and indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) is presented. It is demonstrated that GAs stimulate polar IAA transport in secondary stems of Populus, a stimuli likely to be caused by the enhanced expression of the auxin efflux carrier PttPIN1. Extensive crosstalk between the two hormones is also suggested from global gene transcript analysis of GA and IAA regulated genes in Populus stem tissues. Most genes that were induced by GA were similarly induced by IAA, suggesting that both hormones can regulate similar biological processes, independently or in concert. To conclusively establish the role of endogenous ethylene in wood formation, a reverse genetics approach was used. Ethylene insensitive Populus trees were produced by transgenic expression of the mutated ethylene receptor Atetr1-1. These trees showed ethylene insensitivity to several wood related responses in pharmacological experiments. More interestingly, these trees were inhibited in their eccentric stem growth pattern in response to leaning. This is one of the characteristic phenotypes in tension wood formation, hypothesized to be ethylene mediated. This is the first conclusive demonstration of the function of endogenously produced ethylene in wood development, and the first documentation of the involvement of ethylene in meristematic activity in plants. We also use a transgenic approach to modify the expression of PttACCox, which is coding for the last enzyme in ethylene biosynthesis, and thereby provide solid evidence for its importance in regulating ethylene biosynthesis in wood forming tissue. Ethylene responses are believed to be mediated via a large number of so-called ethylene response factors (ERFs). Here all ERFs in the Populus genome were identified. Putatively important ERFs in stem tissues were found by analysing their expression pattern in response to ethylene. Further, ethylene responsive genes were identified in a global gene analysis.
Advances in Shadow Removing for Motion Detection Algorithms

Detecting moving objects is very important in many application contexts such as people detection and recognition, visual surveillance, automatic generation of video effects, and so on. Motion detection algorithms are very sensible to light conditions; in particular they suffer the presence of shadows and sudden changes due to light switches. Here we propose an additional module that can be applied to a generic gray-level motion detection algorithm. The only requirement is the presence of a reference image (background model). The main idea of the proposed approach is that variations in light conditions alter the intensity values of pixels in the image, but the basic structures in the scene remain unchanged. The algorithm we propose is based on the correlation between regions selected from the reference image and the current one. The experiments have been performed on image sequences acquired both in indoor and outdoor environments with natural and artiﬁcial lights.
Semi-automatic synthetic depth map generation for video using random walks

We present a method for easily generating depth maps from monoscopic (i.e. “2D”) video footage in order to convert them into stereoscopic, or “3D”, footage. Our method uses user-defined strokes for a number of keyframes in the original footage and interpolates between the keyframes to provide a sparse labelling for each frame. We then apply the Random Walks algorithm to the footage to provide depth estimates based on the input provided by the user. These depth maps can then be used to generate novel views through depth-based image rendering.
The Role of Temporal Trends in Growing Networks

The rich get richer principle, manifested by the Preferential attachment (PA) mechanism, is widely considered one of the major factors in the growth of real-world networks. PA stipulates that popular nodes are bound to be more attractive than less popular nodes; for example, highly cited papers are more likely to garner further citations. However, it overlooks the transient nature of popularity, which is often governed by trends. Here, we show that in a wide range of real-world networks the recent popularity of a node, i.e., the extent by which it accumulated links recently, significantly influences its attractiveness and ability to accumulate further links. We proceed to model this observation with a natural extension to PA, named Trending Preferential Attachment (TPA), in which edges become less influential as they age. TPA quantitatively parametrizes a fundamental network property, namely the network’s tendency to trends. Through TPA, we find that real-world networks tend to be moderately to highly trendy. Networks are characterized by different susceptibilities to trends, which determine their structure to a large extent. Trendy networks display complex structural traits, such as modular community structure and degree-assortativity, occurring regularly in real-world networks. In summary, this work addresses an inherent trait of complex networks, which greatly affects their growth and structure, and develops a unified model to address its interaction with preferential attachment.
Conformational Toggle Switches Implicated in Basal Constitutive and Agonist-Induced Activated States of 5-Hydroxytryptamine-4 Receptors

The extended classic ternary complex model predicts that a G protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) exists in only two interconvertible states: an inactive R, and an active R*. However, different structural active R* complexes may exist in addition to a silent inactive R ground state (Rg). Here we demonstrate, in a cellular context, that several R* states of 5-hydroxytryptamine-4 (5-HT4) receptors involve different side-chain conformational toggle switches. Using site-directed mutagenesis and molecular modeling approaches, we show that the basal constitutive receptor (R*basal) results from stabilization of an obligatory double toggle switch (Thr3.36 from inactive g- to active g+ and Trp6.48 from inactive g+ to active t). Mutation of either threonine or tryptophan to alanine resulted in a lowering of the activity of the R*basal similar to the Rg. The T3.36A mutation shows that the Thr3.36 toggle switch plays a minor role in the stabilization of R* induced by 5-HT (R*-5-HT) and BIMU8 (R*-BIMU8) and is fully required in the stabilization of R* induced by (S)-zacopride, cisapride, and 1-(4-amino-5-chloro-2-methoxyphenyl)-3-(1-butyl-4-piperidinyl)-1-propanone (RS 67333) (R*-benzamides). Thus, benzamides stabilize R*-benzamides by forming a specific hydrogen bond with Thr3.36 in the active g+ conformation. Conversely, R*-BIMU8 was probably the result of a direct conformational transition of Trp6.48 from inactive g+ to active t by hydrogen bonding of this residue to a carboxyl group of BIMU8. We were surprised that the Trp6.48 toggle switch was not necessary for receptor activation by the natural agonist 5-HT. R*-5-HT is probably attained through other routes of activation. Thus, different conformational arrangements occur during stabilization of R*basal, R*-5-HT, R*-benzamides, and R*-BIMU8.
Coloring maps of period three

We investigate the color number and genus for fixed-point free maps of order three. A result that has the flavor of the Ljusternik-Schnirelmann theorem for involutions is established. The Y-sphere, the combinatorial boundary of the product of tripods, is studied in detail. Problems of coloring non-invariant subspaces are touched upon.
Prognostic significance of electrocardiographic site of infarction after correction for enzymatic size of infarction.

To assess whether the site of myocardial infarction is an independent prognostic indicator, the outcome of patients with anterior myocardial infarction was compared with that of patients with inferior infarction. A consecutive series of patients who had suffered their first myocardial infarction was analyzed (398 with anterior and 391 with inferior infarction). Patients with anterior myocardial infarction had a higher 1 year mortality than those with inferior infarction (18.3% vs 10.5%, p = .002). When patients were matched for infarct size determined by peak creatine kinase (CK) level expressed as a multiple of the upper limit of normal, those with anterior myocardial infarction tended to have a higher 1 year mortality than those with inferior infarction for all subgroups of peak CK. Early mortality (day 1 to 28 after myocardial infarction) was greater in the anterior than in the inferior myocardial infarction group (10% vs 6.4%, p = .03); this was most significant when peak CK was greater than four times normal (12.4% vs 7.0%, p = .04). Late mortality was also higher in the anterior (8.4% vs 4.1%, p = .04) than the inferior infarction group and this was most significant when peak CK was less than two times normal (15.2% vs 0%, p = .02) or greater than eight times normal (10.6% vs 4.1%, p = .04). Multivariate analysis with proportional-hazards regression confirmed the prognostic significance of location of infarction independent of peak CK level. Thus, infarct location was found to be a predictor of prognosis that is independent of infarct size based on peak CK levels.
A Morphogenetic Design Strategy Using a Composite CA Model

In this paper, we present an exploration of digital morphogenesis in architecture, using a composite Cellular Automata (CA). This model allows us to produce a vast array of different spatial topologies by evolving the boundaries of spatial units. This approach focuses on the formation of spatial patterns, where their characteristics emerge as consequence of the evolution of the system, rather than being prescribed by design. The experiment presented her investigates whether the composite CA is capable of generating aggregate spatial units to match the characteristics of specific spatial configurations.