Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A constant-factor approximation algorithm for packet routing, and balancing local vs. global criteria

We present the first constant-factor approximation algorithm for a fundamental problem: the store-and-forward packet routing problem on arbitrary networks. Furthermore, the queue sizes required at the edges are bounded by an absolute constant. Thus, this algorithmbalances a global criterion (routing time) with a local criterion (maximum queue size) and shows how to get simultaneous good bounds for both. For this particular problem, approximating the routing time well, even without considering the queue sizes, was open. We then consider a class of such local vs. global problems in the context of covering integer programs and show how to improve the local criterion by a logarithmic factor by losing a constant factor in the global criterion.
Sixty years of onchocerciasis vector control: a chronological summary with comments on eradication, reinvasion, and insecticide resistance.

The historical events leading to the recognition of the vectors of onchocercia­ sis in Africa and the Americas were summarized in 1991 by Nelson (59). Blacklock (6) in 1926 was the first to incriminate a species of Simuliidae as a vector when he described the development of the larval stages of the causative filarial parasite, Onchocerca volvulus, in the common African blackfly Simulium damnosum. As O. volvulus can live in humans for 10-15 years, vector control seeks to break the human-fIy-human transmission cycle, or failing that, to reduce its intensity to an unsustainable level. In the absence of any acceptable mass chemotherapy, vector control must be maintained until the adult parasites have died from natural causes; therefore the aim must be to achieve eradication or sustainable control for 15 or more years. Six years after Blacklock's discovery, and only two years after the vector species had been incriminated in Mexico, field workers attempted to reduce the numbers of blackflies in coffee plantations by clearing vegetation from the streams and drainage ditches in which the larvae of the flies could be found (24, 54). They were only partially successful. The first documented
Clinical Trials in Pediatric Autosomal Dominant Polycystic Kidney Disease

Autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) is the most common hereditary kidney disease and is associated with concerning long-term implications for kidney function and cardiovascular health. Early intervention is needed in order to mitigate these long-term complications. Herein, we review important findings from recent clinical trials in ADPKD and their relevance to affected children and young adults and consider future directions for intervention. Recent clinical trials support aggressive control of blood pressure with blockade of the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system as well as potential benefit of pravastatin therapy in children and young adults with ADPKD. There are several other candidate therapies, some of which have shown benefit in adult ADPKD, which require further investigation in affected children.
Multi-object active shape model construction for abdomen segmentation: Preliminary results

The automatic segmentation of abdominal organs is a pre-requisite for many medical applications. Successful methods typically rely on prior knowledge about the to be segmented anatomy as it is for instance provided by means of active shape models (ASMs). Contrary to most previous ASM based methods, this work does not focus on individual organs. Instead, a more holistic approach that aims at exploiting inter-organ relationships to eventually segment a complex of organs is proposed. Accordingly, a flexible framework for automatic construction of multi-object ASMs is introduced, employed for coupled shape modeling, and used for co-segmentation of liver and spleen based on a new coupled shape/separate pose approach. Our first results indicate feasible segmentation accuracies, whereas pose decoupling leads to substantially better segmentation results and performs in average also slightly better than the standard single-object ASM approach.
PKS: An Ontology-based Learning Construct for Lifelong Learners

This paper addresses adult lifelong learners, i.e., persons interested in learning or compelled to learn during their working life but not able to, or not interested in participating in formal learning. These learners are motivated and self-aware enough to self-direct their learning, are presumed to be novices with respect to the needed knowledge and have a limited technological uptake. This paper will outline their main differences from regular learners, in particular, for the use of social media to improve learning skills. The reference pedagogical model is andragogy. A Service-Oriented Architecture, named Personal Knowledge Space (PKS), is proposed to support our lifelong learners in selecting, organizing, and retrieving information; in streamlining interaction processes among learners, services and resources and finally in empowering control and trust of personal relationships born during the learning processes. The PKS is mainly based on the exploitation of semantic tools (ontologies) and web services. Use cases describing the PKS architecture and one scenario of PKS use are presented.
Anti-Foaming Admixture (AFA) and its Influences on the Properties of a Fresh Self-Compacting Concrete Mix

Abstract The properties of a concrete mix should secure the self-elimination of needless air bubbles from its volume. What is interesting, these properties are not taken into consideration in commonly used self-compacting tests. On the basis of different tests concerning self-compacting concrete mixes, it has been discovered that too high air content in their volume was a result of a superplasticiser, in spite of meeting the self-compactibility criteria. To decrease too high air volume in SCC, the use of an anti-foaming admixture (AFA) is proposed by the authors. Because of an AFA introduced into a self-compacting mix, air-content in this mix is decreased, mix flow diameter is increased and flow time is decreased. In case of a mix incorporating an AFA, its high flowability does not cause segregation of the mix, which is possible in case of SCC incorporating only a superplasticiser. However, time of introduction of an AFA is essential to get higher flowability degree, but is not important in achieving low .
Modeling of internet traffic: internet access influence, user interference, and TCP behavior

Satz Reproduktionsfähige Vorlage vom Autor. Contents 1 Introduction 1 2 Internet Traffic and Protocol Characteristics 3 2. The Internet has evolved in the last 30 years from a scientists network to a communication and information media for everybody. This rapid development was enabled by the open and modular standards the Internet is based on. With the exponential growth of the Internet with regard to users and carried traffic, the econonomic dimension became an important factor of commercial relevance. Technical innovation is the main driver for the growth of the Internet. A good example for technology driven growth is the development of the hyper link technology behind the WWW in 1990 and the first WWW browser in 1993. These technologies opened the Internet for people that were not that familiar with computers – which enabled a wider range of users to participate in the Internet. The main technological trends seen today are: steady growing bandwidth in the core and access network, user mobility, wireless access networks, convergence of telecommunication and data networks, and Quality of Service (QoS) differentiation. These trends are driven by economical interests of the network and service providers. Before implementing, performance analysis is applied for the development and dimensioning of these novel Internet protocols and services. The analysis depends often on the traffic characteristics and the user behavior. To improve the accuracy of this analysis, flexible and realistic traffic models are needed as input .
Frequency offset amplify-and-forward relay in OFDM system

In the fourth generation mobile communication system, the frequency band higher than the bands already used for IMT-2000 has been assigned. However, the higher radio frequency increases the propagation loss. To cope with the propagation loss, relay transmission has been investigated. In this paper, a transmission diversity scheme with frequency offset in amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying is proposed. In this scheme, the frequency of the OFDM signal is shifted at the relay station. A different amount of frequency offset is given in each relay station and the signals from the relay stations are separated and combined by MMSE detection at the base station. The numerical results obtained through computer simulation show that diversity is realized and the BER performance is improved by 1-2 dB at the BER of 10-2. When the number of the RSs increases, more BER improvement is achieved.
Delayed neurological deficits detected by an ischemic pattern in the extracellular cerebral metabolites in patients with aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage.

OBJECT In the treatment of patients with aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH), early occlusion of the aneurysm is necessary as well as monitoring and treatment of complications following the primary bleeding episode. Monitoring with microdialysis has been studied for its ability to indicate and predict the occurrence of delayed ischemic neurological deficits (DINDs) in patients with SAH. METHODS In 42 patients with aneurysmal SAH microdialysis monitoring of metabolites was performed using a 0.3-microl/minute perfusion flow over several days, and the results were correlated to clinical events and to brain infarction observed on computerized tomography scans. The microdialysis probe was inserted into the territory of the parent artery of the aneurysm. The authors defined an ischemic pattern as increases in the lactate/glucose (L/G) and lactate/pyruvate (L/P) ratios that were greater than 20% followed by a 20% increase in glycerol concentration. This ischemic pattern was found in 17 of 18 patients who experienced a DIND and in three of 24 patients who did not experience a delayed clinical deterioration. The ischemic pattern preceded the occurrence of a DIND by a mean interval of 11 hours. Maximum L/G and L/P ratios did not correlate with the presence of DIND or outcome, and there was no association between the glycerol level and subsequent brain infarction. CONCLUSIONS Microdialysis monitoring of the cerebral metabolism in patients with SAH may predict with high sensitivity and specificity the occurrence of a DIND. Whether an earlier diagnosis results in better treatment of DINDs and, therefore, in overall better outcomes remains to be proven, as it is linked to an efficacious treatment of cerebral vasospasm.
Channel Study for Medium-Voltage Power Network

In this paper, we presented our latest measurement results of both channel attenuation and noise within the frequency range of 1-40 MHz. Results show both attenuation and noise characteristic are quite stable, not changing drastically with time. The attenuation increases with the increase of frequency while the noise level drops with the increase of frequency. This means the channel can naturally provide certain balance on signal-to-noise ratio to facilitate the system design. Theoretical channel capacity is calculated using water-filling algorithm, which is also helpful in the system design
Contributions of early adversity to pro-inflammatory phenotype in infancy: the buffer provided by attachment security

ABSTRACT Adversity early in life is associated with systemic inflammation by adolescence and beyond. At present, few studies have investigated the associations between different forms of adversity and inflammation during infancy, making it difficult to specify the origins of disease vulnerability. This study examined the association between multiple forms of early adversity – socioeconomic status disadvantage, familial stress, maternal depression, and security of attachment – and individual differences in a composite measure of pro-inflammatory cytokines (IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8, and tumor necrosis factor-alpha) and the inflammatory protein C-reactive protein that were collected via saliva when (n = 49) children were 17 months old. In addition to gauging the direct effects of adversity, we also tested the hypothesis that infants’ attachment relationship with their mother might buffer infants against the immunologic effects of early adversity. Results show that familial stress, maternal depression, and security of attachment were directly associated with infant salivary inflammation and that attachment status moderated the effect of maternal depression. The findings suggest that exposure to certain forms of adversity very early in life may engender a pro-inflammatory phenotype with possible life-long implications for health.
DoubleDip: leveraging thermoelectric harvesting for low power monitoring of sporadic water use

We present DoubleDip, a low power monitoring system for enabling non-intrusive water flow detection. DoubleDip taps into minute thermal gradients in pipes for both replenishing energy reserves and performing low power wakeup. One of the remaining issues with wireless water monitoring in residences and offices is that current solutions require installing sensor nodes with access to electrical wiring or replacing batteries frequently. DoubleDip (DD) significantly extends the lifetime of vibration-based non-intrusive water flow sensors by harvesting thermal energy from hot pipes wherever accessible. DoubleDip requires less than an inch of exposed metal pipe to attach a coupler for gathering sufficient energy to power itself, in some cases, into perpetuity. We observe that water use in homes and offices is incredibly sporadic, making continuous monitoring both impractical and wasteful. Instead, DD puts a thermoelectric harvester into double duty. It uses thermal gradients not only for gathering energy but also for extremely low power (< 1μA) wakeup. In this paper, we describe the DoubleDip design and demonstrate that thermoelectric wakeup is essential for longevity and accuracy. Since DD wakes up from its low power state only when there is a water flow event, it replenishes the energy it uses in sensing and transmitting data by the energy it harvests from the corresponding heat gradient. While DD nodes installed on cold water pipes harvest far less than those installed on hot water pipes, our pilot deployment over four weeks and five locations suggests that thermoelectric wake up is only slightly worse in latency for cold water monitoring and there is sufficient energy harvested from the hot water that it can be shared to extend the lifetime of nearby cold water nodes too.
SNDR sensitivity analysis for cascaded /spl Sigma//spl Delta/ modulators

Cascade, single and multi-bit, /spl Sigma//spl Delta/ architectures provide stable, high order quantization noise shaping used in high resolution A/D conversion. One major disadvantage of cascaded /spl Sigma//spl Delta/ topologies is the extreme SNDR sensitivity to gain mismatch between the analog modulator and the digital error correction logic. This paper will investigate this SNDR sensitivity phenomenon for a 6th order, 1-bit quantizer and 4th order, 5-bit quantizer cascaded /spl Sigma//spl Delta/ A/D system. Circuit parameters of the switched capacitor integrator such as amplifier open loop gain, integrator gain, and amplifier offsets and layout parasitics are characterized.
Rapid Tooling by Laminated Object Manufacturing of Metal Foil

The technology of Laminated Object Manufacturing (LOM) is not very new. For hundreds of years wooden parts are built by stacking layers together. Nowadays also paper, plastic, ceramic composite and metal sheets are treated in layers. For the manufacture of prototypes and especially technical tools, e. g. moulds for gravity casting, die casting or injection molding, out of metallic foil however the low self stiffness of this material is a great challenge. In this case it is useful to produce the parts in a two step process. The first subprocess is the stacking of the layers, which can be realised by laser beam spot welding to determine the position of the layer in combination with generating the defined contour by a laser beam cutting process. This procedure is done in a fully automated machine where the CAD-file of the desired part and the building parameters like the laser parameters and the cutting velocity are needed as input. However the stability of the produced green part is insufficient for most kind of application. Hence, a second sub-process to enhance the mechanical properties of the part is necessary. This can for example be realised by high temperature soldering or by diffusion welding in a furnace with inert gas or vacuum. During these kinds of joining processes the green part is homogeneously pressed with the help of a powder bed and at the same time it is tempered for a defined term. In this paper the principle of sheet metal LOM is described as well as the process chain of Laminated Object Manufacturing of metal foil. For each sub-process of metal foil LOM the results of the experimental work for qualifying and optimizing the sub-process are shown. Finally some examples of possible applications especially in the field of Rapid Tooling and Rapid Manufacturing are discussed.
Asynchronous Transmission Over Single-User State-Dependent Channels

Several channels with asynchronous side information are introduced. We first consider single-user state-dependent channels with asynchronous side information at the transmitter. It is assumed that the state information sequence is a possibly delayed version of the state sequence, and that the encoder and the decoder are aware of the fact that the state information might be delayed. It is additionally assumed that an upper bound on the delay is known to both the encoder and the decoder, but other than that, they are ignorant of the actual delay. We consider both the causal and the noncausal cases and present achievable rates for these channels, and the corresponding coding schemes. We find the capacity of the asynchronous Gel'fand-Pinsker channel with feedback. Finally, we consider a memoryless state-dependent channel with asynchronous side information at both the transmitter and the receiver, and establish a single-letter expression for its capacity.
A Comparative Study on Information Security Risk Analysis Practices

Information is a key asset for organizations, and reducing the risk of information compromise is a high priority. There are a lot of risk analysis methods available today, some of which are qualitative while others are more quantitative in nature. They all have the same fundamental target to estimate the overall value of risk, but most attempts to hit the target from very different approaches. Some approaches can be applied to all types of risk, while others are specific to particular risks. This work addresses some of the methodologies used currently to analyze information security risks. The main task for an organization is to determine which one to use. Since the organization will spend money on whichever method they choose, it is vital that the chosen methodology meet the requirements. The purpose of the study is to compare and clarify the different activities, inputs, and outputs required by each model of information security risk assessment and the analysis that effectively addresses the risks of information security.
Smoking and the Young

W Clarke (Chairman), Consultant Physician, Royal Free Hospital, London; Ashley A Woodcock (Honorary Secretary), Consultant Respiratory Physician, Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester; Beulah R Bewley, Senior Lecturer in Public Health Medicine, St George's Hospital Medical School, London; John C Catford, Professor of Health Promotion, University of Wales College of Medicine, Cardiff; Kevin S Channer, Consultant Physician and Cardiologist, Royal Hallamshire Hospital, Sheffield; Anne Charlton, Director, CRC Education
Reliability of a questionnaire on substance use among adolescent students, Brazil.

OBJECTIVE To analyze reliability of a self-applied questionnaire on substance use and misuse among adolescent students. METHODS Two cross-sectional studies were carried out for the instrument test-retest. The sample comprised male and female students aged 1119 years from public and private schools (elementary, middle, and high school students) in the city of Salvador, Northeastern Brazil, in 2006. A total of 591 questionnaires were applied in the test and 467 in the retest. Descriptive statistics, the Kappa index, Cronbach's alpha and intraclass correlation were estimated. RESULTS The prevalence of substance use/misuse was similar in both test and retest. Sociodemographic variables showed a "moderate" to "almost perfect" agreement for the Kappa index, and a "satisfactory" (>0.75) consistency for Cronbach's alpha and intraclass correlation. The age which psychoactive substances (tobacco, alcohol, and cannabis) were first used and chronological age were similar in both studies. Test-retest reliability was found to be a good indicator of students' age of initiation and their patterns of substance use. CONCLUSIONS The questionnaire reliability was found to be satisfactory in the population studied.
The Meaning Factory at SemEval-2016 Task 8: Producing AMRs with Boxer

We participated in the shared task on meaning representation parsing (Task 8 at SemEval-2016) with the aim of investigating whether we could use Boxer, an existing open-domain semantic parser, for this task. However, the meaning representations produced by Boxer, Discourse Representation Structures, are considerably different from Abstract Meaning Representations, AMRs, the target meaning representations of the shared task. Our hybrid conversion method (involving lexical adaptation as well as post-processing of the output) failed to produce state-of-the-art results. Nonetheless, F-scores of 53% on development and 47% on test data (50% unofficially) were obtained.
Preverbal infants expect members of social groups to act alike

Significance Adults and children conform to members of their social groups and expect others to do the same, but the earlier development of this expectation is unknown. Through looking-time experiments with 7- to 12-month-old infants, we show that preverbal infants expect members of social groups to act alike. Our findings further reveal that this expectation is specific to social groups, as infants did not expect similar actions from socially unrelated individuals or from groups of inanimate objects. Thus, an expectation that social affiliates will share behaviors arises early in human development, prior to language or to extensive experience with different social groups. The short ontogenetic time courses of conformity and stereotyping, both evident in the preschool years, point to the possibility that a central component of human social cognition is an early developing expectation that social group members will engage in common behaviors. Across a series of experiments, we show that by 7 months of age preverbal infants differentiate between actions by individuals that are and are not consistent with the actions of their social group members. Infants responded to group-inconsistent actions only in a social context: they failed to distinguish the same behavioral differences when presented with collections of nonsocial agents or inanimate objects. These results suggest that infants expect social group membership and behavior to covary, before extensive intergroup experience or linguistic input. This expectation is consistent with the socially motivated imitation and stereotyping evident in toddlers and preschoolers, and may play a role in the early emergence of one or both of these aspects of social behavior and cognition.