Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Spectrum agile radios: utilization and sensing architectures

Today, the largest and most desirable portion of the radio spectrum is allocated to licensed services, which has resulted in the well-known profound scarcity of this resource for emerging applications. With the rapid growth of wireless technologies, current spectrum scarcity has become a serious problem as more and more wireless applications compete for very little spectrum. On the other hand, the licensed spectrum allocated to applications such as television, cellular telephony and public safety show very little usage over time at different geographical locations. This has, therefore, seriously impaired the evolution of newer technologies because of current regulatory constraints on the operation in licensed spectrum, such as TV bands, and is being addressed by FCC through recent rule makings. With the goal of ubiquitous communication in mind, we look into spectrum agile radios as a new technology enabled by such emerging regulatory rulings and study its advantages over conventional radios. Initially, we provide a simple mathematical modeling to understand the utilization that is achievable by spectrum agile radios. Next, we investigate several issues related to spectrum sensing, as it is one of the key pillars to realize spectrum agile radios. Through sensing, the spectrum agile radio identifies the so-called "white-spaces" in the spectrum and then decides whether to occupy those white spaces opportunistically to transmit data. We also discuss the concept of interference temperature introduced by the FCC, and propose a spectrum-aware sensor network as a way to address it Finally, we extend this spectrum-aware sensor networks to introduce a new sensing architecture to identify and locate white spaces in the spectrum
Slow-light Photonic Crystal Devices for High-Speed Optical Signal Processing

This book discusses design, modeling, and the characterization of slow-light photonic crystal waveguides. Guidelines are developed to obtain slow-light waveguides with broadband characteristics and with low disorder-induced losses. Three functional devices are proposed and studied: A tunable dispersion compensator, a tunable optical delay line, and a high-speed electro-optic modulator. Optical and microwave measurements confirm the designs.
Scale adaptive supervoxel segmentation of RGB-D image

Superpixels are perceptually meaningful atomic regions that can effectively capture image features. We propose a novel scale adaptive supervoxel segmentation algorithm for RGB-D images, i.e., small supervoxels in content-dense regions (e.g., with high intensity or color variation) and large supervoxels in content-sparse regions. Among various methods for computing uniform superpixels, simple linear iterative clustering (SLIC) is popular due to its simplicity and high performance. We extend SLIC to generate small evenly distributed supervoxels in 3D space as PDS-SLIC, reducing the numbers of nodes. Then we use supervoxels as the nodes to construct a graph and setting the adaptive threshold for supervoxel merging. Experiments on NYU Depth Dataset V2 show that our proposed method outperforms state-of-the-art methods.
Protocol sequences for mobile ad hoc networks

Protocol sequences offer a promising alternative for media access control of mobile ad hoc networks, because they do not require any coordination among the users nor any centralized synchronization. We show that by using suitably designed deterministic scheduling, the delay performance can indeed be much better than using random and pseudo-random sequences. The reported results indicate that protocol sequences can offer practical solutions to complicated multiple-access problems in ad hoc networks, such as vehicular ad hoc networks (VANET). The cumulative distribution function of delay and an upper bound of the individual delay in the cases of protocol sequences are derived.
A Parallel Dual Matrix Method for Blind Signal Separation

A parallel dual matrix method that considers all cases of numerical relations between a mixing matrix and a separating matrix is proposed in this letter. Different constrained terms are used to construct cost function for every subalgorithm. These constrained terms reflect numerical relation. Therefore, a number of undesired solutions are excluded, the search region is reduced, and the convergence efficiency of the algorithm is ultimately improved. Moreover, any parallel subalgorithm is proven to converge to a desired separating matrix only if its cost function converges to zero. Computer simulations indicate that the algorithm efficiently performs blind signal separation.
On FPGA-based implementations of Gröstl

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has started a competition for a new secure hash standard. To make a significant comparison between the submitted candidates, third party implementations of all proposed hash functions are needed. This is one of the reasons why the SHA-3 candidate Grostl has been chosen for a FPGA-based implementation. Mainly our work is motivated by actual and future developments of the automotive market (e.g. car-2-car communication systems), which will increase the necessity for a suitable cryptographic infrastructure in modern vehicles (cf. AUTOSAR project) even further. One core component of such an infrastructure is a secure cryptographic hash function, which is used for a lot of applications like challenge-response authentication systems or digital signature schemes. Another motivation to evaluate Grostl is its resemblance to AES. The automotive market demands, like any mass market, low budget and therefore compact implementations, hence our evaluation of Grostl focuses on area optimizations. It is shown that, while Grostl is inherently quite large compared to AES, it is still possible to implement the Grostl algorithm on small and low budget FPGAs like the second smallest available Spartan-3, while maintaining a reasonable high throughput.
Affine connections for the Cartesian stiffness matrix

We study the 6/spl times/6 Cartesian stiffness matrix. We show that the stiffness of a rigid body subjected to conservative forces and moments is described by a (0,2) tensor which is the Hessian of the potential function. The key observation of the paper is that since the Hessian depends on the choice of an affine connection in the task space, so will the Cartesian stiffness matrix. Further, the symmetry of the Hessian and thus of the stiffness matrix depends on the symmetry of the connection. The connection that is implicit in the definition of the Cartesian stiffness matrix through the joint stiffness matrix (Salisbury, 1980) is made explicit and shown to be symmetric. In contrast, the direct definition of the Cartesian stiffness matrix in Griffis (1993), Ciblak and Lipkin (1994) and Howard et al. (1996) is shown to be derived from an asymmetric connection. A numerical example is provided to illustrate the main ideas of the paper.
SoundGuides: Adapting Continuous Auditory Feedback to Users

We introduce SoundGuides, a user adaptable tool for auditory feedback on movement. The system is based on a interactive machine learning approach, where both gestures and sounds are first conjointly designed and conjointly learned by the system. The system can then automatically adapt the auditory feedback to any new user, taking into account the particular way each user performs a given gesture. SoundGuides is suitable for the design of continuous auditory feedback aimed at guiding users' movements and helping them to perform a specific movement consistently over time. Applications span from movement-based interaction techniques to auditory-guided rehabilitation. We first describe our system and report a study that demonstrates a 'stabilizing effect' of our adaptive auditory feedback method.
Towards Oil Slick Monitoring in the Arctic Environment

We investigate the potential of multi-polarization and multi-frequency SAR systems to discriminate oil-in-sea-ice mixtures from newly frozen and young sea ice. The dielectric properties of oil emulsions, for a range of oil volume fractions, and theoretical co-polarization ratios for relevant media are modeled and discussed. We also compare the co-polarization ratios computed from actual detected oil spills in the Gulf of Mexico and the North Sea with available collections of sea ice data from the Arctic region. The results show promise for the purpose of SAR being used to separate oilin-sea-ice emulsions from newly frozen ice-covered Arctic sea water.
Discharge Behavior of Water-Activated Magnesium Battery

Water-activated magnesium batteries possess several favorable attributes for energy storage and lighting sources. In this chapter, a portable-sized magnesium battery which consisted of MnO 2 cathodes and magnesium alloy anodes, being activated by drops of water, was investigated. The anode and cathode potential as well as their electrochemical impedance under a constant current load was monitored to evaluate the effect of water content, cell stacking, and discharging cycles. It was revealed that the discharge behavior was initially controlled by the depletion of water, followed by the cease of cathode reac - tion and the accumulation of Mg(OH) 2 at anode. The problem of low anode efficiency caused by stacking cells was analyzed, and its countermeasure was proposed. Several approaches to improve the battery performance were also presented.
Influence of precipitate-assisted nucleation on the microstructure and mechanical properties of Al-Mg-Si-Cu-Zn alloys

ABSTRACT The influence of precipitation on the recrystallization nucleation and mechanical properties of Al-Mg-Si-Cu-Zn alloys was investigated by means of tensile tests, SEM, TEM, XRD and EBSD. The results reveal that there are distinct contributions from the various precipitates that form during annealing and that these critically influence the evolution of microstructure and its associated texture, as well as mechanical behaviour. In contrast to alloy sheets A, B, and C annealed at a lower temperature or for a shorter time, the T4P alloy sheet D with an annealing at 450°C for 3 h not only possesses almost identical strength and elongation, but also a higher average r (0.659) and n (0.313) values, and also a lower Δr (0.091) value. After solution treatment, the four alloy sheets are comprised of equiaxed grains with somewhat different grain sizes and different textures, but texture volume fraction and grain size in alloy sheet D both are decreased due to the effect of precipitate-assisted nucleation during solution treatment. The corresponding nucleation and growth mechanisms of recrystallization grains were established and the relationship between textures and r value in the four alloy sheets was also analyzed on the basis of a Visco-plastic self-consistent (VPSC) model.
Chicken MDA5 Senses Short Double-Stranded RNA with Implications for Antiviral Response against Avian Influenza Viruses in Chicken

Mammalian melanoma differentiation-associated gene-5 (MDA5) and retinoic acid-inducible gene-I (RIG-I) selectively sense double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) according to length, as well as various RNA viruses to induce an antiviral response. RIG-I, which plays a predominant role in the induction of antiviral responses against influenza virus infection, has been considered to be lacking in chicken, putting the function of chicken MDA5 (chMDA5) under the spotlight. Here, we show that chMDA5, unlike mammalian MDA5, preferentially senses shorter dsRNA synthetic analogues, poly(I:C), in chicken DF-1 fibroblasts. A requirement for caspase activation and recruitment domains for chMDA5-mediated chicken interferon beta (chIFNβ) induction and its interaction with mitochondrial antiviral signaling proteins were demonstrated. We also found that chMDA5 is involved in chIFNβ induction against avian influenza virus infection. Our findings imply that chMDA5 compensates in part the function of RIG-I in chicken, and highlights the importance of chMDA5 in the innate immune response in chicken.
PRMT5 restricts hepatitis B virus replication through epigenetic repression of covalently closed circular DNA transcription and interference with pregenomic RNA encapsidation

Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection remains a major health problem worldwide. The covalently closed circular DNA (cccDNA) minichromosome, which serves as the template for the transcription of viral RNAs, plays a key role in viral persistence. While accumulating evidence suggests that cccDNA transcription is regulated by epigenetic machinery, particularly the acetylation of cccDNA‐bound histone 3 (H3) and H4, the potential contributions of histone methylation and related host factors remain obscure. Here, by screening a series of methyltransferases and demethylases, we identified protein arginine methyltransferase 5 (PRMT5) as an effective restrictor of HBV transcription and replication. In cell culture–based models for HBV infection and in liver tissues of patients with chronic HBV infection, we found that symmetric dimethylation of arginine 3 on H4 on cccDNA was a repressive marker of cccDNA transcription and was regulated by PRMT5 depending on its methyltransferase domain. Moreover, PRMT5‐triggered symmetric dimethylation of arginine 3 on H4 on the cccDNA minichromosome involved an interaction with the HBV core protein and the Brg1‐based human SWI/SNF chromatin remodeler, which resulted in down‐regulation of the binding of RNA polymerase II to cccDNA. In addition to the inhibitory effect on cccDNA transcription, PRMT5 inhibited HBV core particle DNA production independently of its methyltransferase activity. Further study revealed that PRMT5 interfered with pregenomic RNA encapsidation by preventing its interaction with viral polymerase protein through binding to the reverse transcriptase–ribonuclease H region of polymerase, which is crucial for the polymerase–pregenomic RNA interaction. Conclusion: PRMT5 restricts HBV replication through a two‐part mechanism including epigenetic suppression of cccDNA transcription and interference with pregenomic RNA encapsidation; these findings improve the understanding of epigenetic regulation of HBV transcription and host–HBV interaction, thus providing new insights into targeted therapeutic intervention. (Hepatology 2017;66:398–415).
On F5 Steganography in Images

Steganalysis is the reasonable method to detect whether the transmitted media content contains secret messages (e.g. business secrecy). This paper proposes two steganalysis methods to estimate the modification ratio of F5 steganography and its improved version that are popularly used to hide secrecy in images. The proposed methods measure the distance between the coefficient histogram of a given image and that of an estimated stego image. The distance is measured based on relative entropy that has the superiority of measuring the distance between two distributions. The estimated modification ratio can be used to distinguish the stego images marked by F5 steganography or its improved version from the original images. Experimental results are given to show that the proposed methods outperform the existing quantitative steganalysis methods against F5 steganography and its improved version.
Student self-assessment in a programming course using bloom's revised taxonomy

This study presents a simple student self-assessment tool that can be used to motivate learning and to follow a student's progress. The tool is a survey questionnaire that uses Bloom's Revised Taxonomy as the base for its scale. The results show that students can place their knowledge along the taxonomy-based scale quite well, and they feel that it could help their learning. It also provides the teacher with a more objective basis for measuring the level of knowledge gained than the general scales. The scale is designed for a programming course, but with modifications it can be used in other classes too.
Telepresence robot conveying pre-motions for avoiding speech collisions in teleconference

In this paper, we propose a telepresence robot for avoiding speech collisions occurred in remote conversa- tions. In face-to-face conversations, humans predict who will speak in next by referring other participants' motions. These motions are called pre-motions. However, pre-motions are likely to be unperceived in teleconferences such as video chat conversations using two-dimensional video. The failure of the prediction causes speech collisions. It undermines the participants' motivation and wastes time. To solve this problem, we propose a telepresence robot conveying gestures including pre-motions. We use Kinect for the gesture perception device and humanoid robot for conveying unconscious gestures.
Population structure of Streptococcus oralis

Streptococcus oralis is a member of the normal human oral microbiota, capable of opportunistic pathogenicity; like related oral streptococci, it exhibits appreciable phenotypic and genetic variation. A multilocus sequence typing (MLST) scheme for S. oralis was developed and the resultant data analysed to examine the population structure of the species. Analysis of 113 isolates, confirmed as belonging to the S. oralis/mitis group by 16S rRNA gene sequencing, characterized the population as highly diverse and undergoing inter- and intra-species recombination with a probable clonal complex structure. ClonalFrame analysis of these S. oralis isolates along with examples of Streptococcus pneumoniae, Streptococcus mitis and Streptococcus pseudopneumoniae grouped the named species into distinct, coherent populations and did not support the clustering of S. pseudopneumoniae with S. mitis as reported previously using distance-based methods. Analysis of the individual loci suggested that this discrepancy was due to the possible hybrid nature of S. pseudopneumoniae. The data are available on the public MLST website (http://pubmlst.org/soralis/).
GLP-1 based therapeutics: simultaneously combating T2DM and obesity

Glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) enhances meal-related insulin secretion, which lowers blood glucose excursions. In addition to its incretin action, GLP-1 acts on the GLP-1 receptor (GLP-1R) in the brain to suppress feeding. These combined actions of GLP-1R signaling cause improvements in glycemic control as well as weight loss in type II diabetes (T2DM) patients treated with GLP-1R agonists. This is a superior advantage of GLP-1R pharmaceuticals as many other drugs used to treat T2DM are weight neutral or actual cause weight gain. This review summarizes GLP-1R action on energy and glucose metabolism, the effectiveness of current GLP-1R agonists on weight loss in T2DM patients, as well as GLP-1R combination therapies.
The role of gap junctions in inflammatory and neoplastic disorders (Review)

Gap junctions are intercellular channels made of connexin proteins, mediating both electrical and biochemical signals between cells. The ability of gap junction proteins to regulate immune responses, cell proliferation, migration, apoptosis and carcinogenesis makes them attractive therapeutic targets for treating inflammatory and neoplastic disorders in different organ systems. Alterations in gap junction profile and expression levels are observed in hyperproliferative skin disorders, lymphatic vessel diseases, inflammatory lung diseases, liver injury and neoplastic disorders. It is now recognized that the therapeutic effects mediated by traditional pharmacological agents are dependent upon gap junction communication and may even act by influencing gap junction expression or function. Novel strategies for modulating the function or expression of connexins, such as the use of synthetic mimetic peptides and siRNA technology are considered.
Impact of Prehospital Delay in Treatment Seeking on In-Hospital Complications After Acute Myocardial Infarction

Background:Rapid arrival to the hospital for treatment of acute myocardial infarction (AMI) improves long-term outcomes. Whether prehospital delay time is associated with short-term, in-hospital complications remains unknown. Objective:The purpose of this study was to evaluate the fit of a theoretical model where prehospital delay time was indirectly associated with hospital length of stay through in-hospital complications after AMI considering simultaneously for demographic, clinical, and psychosocial factors using structural equation modeling. Methods:Acute myocardial infarction patients (N = 536; 66% men; mean age, 62 [SD, 14] years) were enrolled in this prospective study. Demographic and clinical data were obtained by patient interview and medical record review. After patient discharge, complications were abstracted from the medical record. Results:Prehospital delay, admission Killip class, and in-hospital anxiety were the best predictors of in-hospital complications, including recurrent ischemia, reinfarction, sustained ventricular tachycardia or fibrillation, and cardiac death, after AMI (P = .019). The occurrence of in-hospital complications was related to length of stay in the hospital (P < .001). Conclusion:Prehospital delay in promptly seeking hospital treatment for AMI symptoms, together with state anxiety and worse heart failure, was associated with the occurrence of more frequent serious complications during the hospital stay. It is essential that research and clinical efforts focus on the complex and dynamic issue of improving prehospital delay in AMI patients.
Sparse representation for face recognition based on constraint sampling and face alignment

Sparse Representation based Classification (SRC) has emerged as a new paradigm for solving recognition problems. This paper presents a constraint sampling feature extraction method that improves the SRC recognition rate. The method combines texture and shape features to significantly improve the recognition rate. Tests show that the combined constraint sampling and facial alignment achieves very high recognition accuracy on both the AR face database (99.52%) and the CAS-PEAL face database (99.54%).
Energy-aware lossless data compression

Wireless transmission of a single bit can require over 1000 times more energy than a single computation. It can therefore be beneficial to perform additional computation to reduce the number of bits transmitted. If the energy required to compress data is less than the energy required to send it, there is a net energy savings and an increase in battery life for portable computers. This article presents a study of the energy savings possible by losslessly compressing data prior to transmission. A variety of algorithms were measured on a StrongARM SA-110 processor. This work demonstrates that, with several typical compression algorithms, there is a actually a net energy increase when compression is applied before transmission. Reasons for this increase are explained and suggestions are made to avoid it. One such energy-aware suggestion is asymmetric compression, the use of one compression algorithm on the transmit side and a different algorithm for the receive path. By choosing the lowest-energy compressor and decompressor on the test platform, overall energy to send and receive data can be reduced by 11% compared with a well-chosen symmetric pair, or up to 57% over the default symmetric zlib scheme.