Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Clause Alignment for Bilingual Hong Kong Legal Texts with Available Lexical Resources * Chunyu Kit

This paper reports on our recent work in clause alignment for English-Chinese legal texts using available bilingual lexical resources, for the purpose of acquiring examples at various linguistic levels for EBMT. It formulates similarity measures for candidate clause pairs in terms of matched lexical items and presents the implementation of a clause alignment algorithm using these measures. Experimental results show that this approach achieves a performance of 94.6% alignment accuracy. It confirms that lexical information gives a reliable indication of correct alignment. The significance of this lexical-based approach lies in both its simplicity and effectiveness.
Detection of the first X-ray selected large AGN group

We have examined the spatial distribution of 856 AGN detected by the ROSAT All-Sky Survey (RASS) using a direct search for structures with the minimal spanning tree. The AGNs were compiled from an area of ∼7000 deg2, in which optical identifications of RASS sources were made with the help of the digitized objective prism plates of the Hamburg Quasar Survey (HQS). Redshifts were taken from the literature or from own follow-up observations. The sample probes the spatial distribution at low redshifts, because the redshift distribution peaks at z∼0.1. The application of the minimal spanning tree led to a 1. 8σ discovery of an AGN group with seven members in a volume V∼140×75×75 h−3 Mpc3 in the Pisces constellation. With a mean redshift z=0.27 this group is only the third discovered group at redshifts z<0.5. The RASS offers excellent possibilities to study large-scale structure with AGNs at low redshifts, once these redshifts are determined.
A look inside a key economic debate: how should monetary policy respond to price increases driven by supply shocks?

The debate I’d like to focus on today is the one over the likely impact of recent increases in the prices of food and energy, and how monetary policy should respond. The Fed’s policy stance, as you know, is currently very accommodative – a stance that I believe is appropriate given the tentative recovery and still-high unemployment. But with food and energy prices rising, some observers think the Fed should shift its stance to less accommodation – slowing economic growth now to ensure we don’t have undesirably high inflation in the future – even though current measures of core inflation (that is, inflation omitting volatile food and energy prices) remain low by historical standards.
How European Protest Transforms Institutions of the Public Sphere

Abstract Against the background of the alleged democratic deficit of EU institutions, this case study explores how politicization and emerging transnational public spaces in European protest movements innovate existing practices of discursive or grassroots deliberative democracy in national social movements. I studied the European Social Forum (ESF) process, a transnational participatory democracy platform created by civil society groups and social movement organizations. I explored discourse and decision-making in the small-scale European Assemblies in which hundreds of activists have met six times a year since 2002 to organize the ESFs, and form campaigns on issues such as global and social justice, peace, climate change, migration, health, or education. Comparing activists’ democratic norms and discourse practices in these frequently occurring European Assemblies with social forum assemblies at the national level in Germany, Italy and the UK, I arrived at a surprising result: European Assemblies reflect a higher degree of discursive inclusivity, dialogue and transparency in decision-making and discussion compared to national social forum assemblies. In this paper I discuss structural, strategic and cultural changes that occur in the process of a Europeanization “from below”, that is, when social movement activists work together transnationally across a certain time period. I argue that European protest as a form of contentious Europeanization has developed new social practices and actors that innovate existing practices of participatory democracy at the national level, showing the relevance of social movements to democratize European integration.
An approach to analyzing the information content of existing databases

Traditionally, application databases have been developed for efficiency of computer operations. The logical structure of the data is buried in the database schemas, application programs, and users' and programmers' minds. To manage information as a corporate resource the logical data structures must be made explicit. In this way organizational databases can be conceptually integrated. The magnitude and complexity of corporate databases makes a manual approach to this task infeasible. We propose a computer aided approach. The approach is based on extracting implicit functional dependencies from existing database schemas and forming an Entity-Relationship representation. Where the semantics of the schema are unclear, rules are applied and additional input sought from the Data Administrator. Because of its widespread use in production systems, we focus on CODASYL Network DBMSs in this paper. The approach also has applications in databases from one DBMS to another.
Pay It Backward: Per-Task Payments on Crowdsourcing Platforms Reduce Productivity

Paid crowdsourcing marketplaces have gained popularity by using piecework, or payment for each microtask, to incentivize workers. This norm has remained relatively unchallenged. In this paper, we ask: is the pay-per-task method the right one? We draw on behavioral economic research to examine whether payment in bulk after every ten tasks, saving money via coupons instead of earning money, or material goods rather than money will increase the number of completed tasks. We perform a twenty-day, between-subjects field experiment (N=300) on a mobile crowdsourcing application and measure how often workers responded to a task notification to fill out a short survey under each incentive condition. Task completion rates increased when paying in bulk after ten tasks: doing so increased the odds of a response by 1.4x, translating into 8% more tasks through that single intervention. Payment with coupons instead of money produced a small negative effect on task completion rates. Material goods were the most robust to decreasing participation over time.
Original Paper

Green fluorescent protein (GFP) is used extensively in detecting internal tissue colonization by endo-phytes of various genera, but our knowledge about the effects of GFP tagging is very limited. We wanted to determine if a GFP-labeled derivative of Paenibacillus polymyxa P2b-2R (P2b-2Rgfp) would fix N and promote growth of two important crop species, canola and tomato, in ways similar to the wild-type P2b-2R. To evaluate this, canola and tomato seeds were inoculated with P2b-2R or P2b-2Rgfp and grown for 40 days in sterile conditions inside a growth chamber. P2b-2Rgfp-inoculated seedlings were compared with uninoculated controls and P2b-2R-inoculated seedlings, after 20, 30, and 40 days of inoculation for biological N fixation (15 N dilution) and growth response (length and biomass). The entire experiment was repeated to confirm the treatment effects. It was found that canola seedlings inoculated with P2b-2Rgfp had 118 % more biomass than controls and 69 % more biomass than P2b-2R-treated seedlings; were 69 % longer than controls and 37 % longer than seedlings inoculated with P2b-2R; and derived 22 % of their N from the atmosphere (6 % more than P2b-2R-treated canola seedlings). This shows that canola seedlings responded remarkably to P2b-2Rgfp inoculation, even better than wild-type P2b-2R inoculation. But, in the case of tomato, P2b-2Rgfp-inoculated seedlings were statistically analogous to the P2b-2R-inoculated seedlings in terms of growth promotion and N fixation. Seedlings inoculated with either P2b-2Rgfp or P2b-2R were nearly 40 % longer than controls, assimilated nearly 90 % more biomass than controls, and fixed nearly 17 % of N from the atmosphere. To the best of our knowledge, results of canola represent the very first evidence that transformation of an endophyte by GFP can significantly enhance its plant growth-promoting efficacy. Contrasting results of tomato suggest that the positive effects of GFP tagging of P2b-2R might vary depending on the host plant.
Pricing of gas swing options using Monte Carlo methods

Motivated by the changing nature of the natural gas industry in the European Union driven by the liberalization process, we focus on pricing of gas swing options. These options are embedded in typical gas sales agreements in the form of offtake flexibility concerning volume and time. The gas swing option is actually a set of several American puts on a spread between prices of two or more energy commodities. This fact together with the fact that the energy markets are fundamentally different from traditional financial security markets is important for our choice of valuation technique. Due to the specific features of the energy markets, the existing analytic approximations for spread option pricing are hardly applicable to our framework. That is why we employ Monte Carlo methods to model the spot price dynamics of the underlying commodities. The price of an arbitrarily chosen gas swing option is then computed in accordance with the concept of risk-neutral expectations. Finally, our result is compared with the real payoff from the option realized at time of the option execution and the maximum ex-post payoff the buyer could generate in case he knew the future, discounting to the original time of the option pricing.
HLA-DQ B1*0201 and A1*0102 Alleles Are Not Responsible for Antituberculosis Drug-Induced Hepatotoxicity Risk in Spanish Population

Aims To evaluate the role of human leukocyte antigen (HLA) class II DQB1*0201 and DQA1*0102 in the risk of antituberculosis drug (ATD)-induced hepatotoxicity (ATDH) in a cohort of tuberculosis patients of Caucasian origin from Spain. Methods Matched case-control study including active tuberculosis (TB) patients from Spain (Caucasian) treated with first-line ATD (Isoniazid, Rifampin, and Pyrazinamide). Presence or absence of HLA class II DQB1*0201 and DQA1*0102 alleles were compared between cases and controls. Results We included 110 TB patients, 55 ATDH cases, and 55 sex-matched controls. The analysis of the presence of HLA-DQB1*0201 and HLA-DQA*0102 did not show significative differences between both groups [presence of HLA-DQB1*0201 53.6% of the cases vs. 45.4% of the controls, OR: 1.63 95% CI (0.62–4.52) p = 0.38; presence of HLA-DQA*0102 7.5% of cases vs. 20% of controls, OR: 0.36 95% CI (0.08–1.23) p = 0.12]. After multivariate logistic regression analysis including in the model, other potential risk factors of hepatotoxicity HLA class II DQB1*0201 and DQA1*0102 alleles were not found significantly associated with the risk of development ATDH. We could not demonstrate an association between HLA-DQA1*0102 and HLA-DQB1*0201 with the risk of ATDH in this Caucasian population of Spanish origin.
A Global Union for Global Workers: Collective Bargaining and Regulatory Politics in Maritime Shipping

1. Global Union Strategies for a Global Industry 2. The Maritime Shipping Industry and Maritime Industrial Relations 3. Surveying the Literature 4. How to Catch the Capitalist on the Move: Implementing a Global Uniform Wage Scale on Flag of Convenience Ships 5. Bargaining Globally and Boycotting Locally: Transnational Networks and Global Unionism in Maritime Shipping 6. Seafarer Qualifications, Labor Market Power, and Global Regulatory Politics: Union and Employer Political Strategies for Shaping Access to Global Maritime Labor Markets 7. Dock Unions' Collective Self Defense and the FOC Campaign 8. Breaking No Eggs and Making No Omelettes: Transnational Union Strategies in the Global World Economy 9. Conclusion
What Drives the Swiss Franc

This paper analyzes the behavior of the Swiss franc (CHF) over the past 35 years. It relates the evolution of the CHF exchange rates to economic fundamentals like the relative competitiveness of the Swiss export sector, accumulated current accounts, interest rate differentials and oil prices. Some factors like the introduction of the euro, a relative increase in Swiss domestic productivity and higher oil prices seem to have modified the CHF behavior in the last decade, but more data will be needed to draw definitive conclusions. The paper relies on different data sources and assesses potential exchange rate determinants under different angles. Overall, measurement and econometric issues would make it difficult to determine a unique econometric specification or specific values for equilibrium exchange rates.
Enough! Electoral Fraud, Collective Action Problems, and Post-Communist Colored Revolutions

In countries where citizens have strong grievances against the regime, attempts to address these grievances in the course of daily life are likely to entail high costs coupled with very low chances of success in any meaningful sense; consequently, most citizens will choose not to challenge the regime, thus reflecting the now well-known collective action problem. When a regime commits electoral fraud, however, an individual's calculus regarding whether to participate in a protest against the regime can be changed significantly. This argument yields important implications for how we interpret the wave of “colored revolutions” that swept through Serbia, Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan in the first half of this decade. Applying the collective action framework to the colored revolutions also yields a parsimonious contribution to the political science literature on social protest: electoral fraud can be a remarkably useful tool for solving the collective action problems faced by citizens in countries where governments are not, to use Barry Weingast's language, appropriately restrained by the populace. While modest, such an observation actually can speak to a wide-ranging number of questions in the literature, including why people choose to protest when they do, how protests at one place and time can affect the likelihood for future protests, and new aspects of the relationship between elections and protest.Joshua A. Tucker is Associate Professor of Politics at New York University (joshua.tucker@nyu.edu). He would like to thank participants in the First and Second Danyliw Research Seminars in Contemporary Ukrainian Studies hosted by the Chair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa and the Kennan Institute Workshop on Ukrainian Civil Society for many helpful comments and suggestions on developing the arguments contained in this article. He would also like to thank Dominique Arel, Jessica Allina-Pisano, Mark Beissinger, Valerie Bunce, Paul D'Anieri, Jerry Hough, Jason Lyall, Grigore Pop-Eleches, Lucan Way, and William Zimmerman for their time in commenting on earlier drafts of the paper, as well as the anonymous reviewers at Perspective on Politics. Marc Berenson and Matthew Berner provided excellent research assistance.
Project Zonnon: A Compositional Language for Distributed Computing

In a recent project on top of . net we have developed a new programming language whose computing model promotes a unified view of programs as collections of self-active interoperating objects. As the compositional model of the language is based on aggregation (instead of inheritance) and on syntax-controlled dialogs (instead of method calls), it is not bound to any specific runtime system and therefore it naturally generalizes to distributed programming. In principle, the new computing model also covers logical objects of arbitrary complexity whose implementation is distributed across different machines.
Dietary fatty acids and the 10-year incidence of age-related macular degeneration: the Blue Mountains Eye Study.

OBJECTIVE To assess the relationship between baseline dietary fatty acids and 10-year incident age-related macular degeneration (AMD). METHODS In an elderly Australian cohort, 3654 participants were examined at baseline and 2454 were examined 5 and/or 10 years later. We assessed AMD from retinal photographs. Participants completed a semiquantitative food frequency questionnaire. RESULTS After adjusting for age, sex, and smoking, 1 serving of fish per week was associated with reduced risk of incident early AMD (relative risk, 0.69 [95% confidence interval, 0.49-0.98]), primarily among participants with less than the median linoleic acid consumption (0.57 [0.36-0.89]). Findings were similar for intake of long-chain omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids. One to 2 servings of nuts per week was associated with reduced risk of incident early AMD (relative risk, 0.65 [95% confidence interval, 0.47-0.91]). Protective associations between the intake of nuts and reduced risk of pigmentary abnormalities were seen among nonsmokers, participants with less than the median ratio of serum total to high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and those with beta carotene intake greater than the median level. CONCLUSIONS This study provides evidence of protection against early AMD from regularly eating fish, greater consumption of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, and low intakes of foods rich in linoleic acid. Regular consumption of nuts may also reduce AMD risk. Joint effects from multiple factors are suggested.
Band-limited frequency efficient orthogonal pulse shape modulation for UWB communications

This paper addresses the design of an equally frequency limited set of orthogonal pulses adequate for an impulse radio (IR) ultra wideband (UWB) communication system employing M-ary pulse shape modulation (PSM). UWB systems have to face many spectrum restrictions due to potential interference to sensitive existing systems, comply with maximum bandwidth regulations or fit into spectrum masks like the one emitted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Then, UWB systems have to restrict their bandwidth and maximize its usage efficiency. Additionally, future narrowband communication systems can be allocated in portions of the spectrum where UWB systems operate, and they may not tolerate possible interference from UWB emissions, this would lead to the mandatory use of a stop-band filter in the UWB transmitters. The proposed set of orthogonal pulse-shapes provides both pulses equally limited in frequency and robustness against such a narrowband interference canceller filter.
Design and Realization of Wireless Sensor Network for Vegetable Greenhouse Information Acquisition

Temperature, humidity and light condition of greenhouses is related to the growth of vegetables. How to adjust temperature, humidity and light conditions is scientifically and rationally. It's benefit for vegetables are mature, high-quality and efficiency. Therefore, obtain timely and accurate information will improve the yield and quality of vegetables. Greenhouses vegetable environmental characteristics, sensor networks were designed which the data collection accurately and long working of greenhouses. Tracking and monitoring environmental factors of grow influence and the production process in real time or continuous. Wireless sensor network nodes communication circuit was designed by ATmega128L MCU and CC2420 RF, monitor environmental parameters with air temperature and humidity sensors and light intensity sensors. Software system of the sensor monitoring system was designed. Experimental results show: a 20 (m) * 5 (m) of vegetable greenhouse spatial arrangement of 20 nodes in the network, the 30-minute sampling period, the node can to work continue effectively 180 days, the sensor network monitoring system can meet the actual needs.
Spark: A navigational paradigm for genomic data exploration

Biologists possess the detailed knowledge critical for extracting biological insight from genome-wide data resources, and yet they are increasingly faced with nontrivial computational analysis challenges posed by genome-scale methodologies. To lower this computational barrier, particularly in the early data exploration phases, we have developed an interactive pattern discovery and visualization approach, Spark, designed with epigenomic data in mind. Here we demonstrate Spark's ability to reveal both known and novel epigenetic signatures, including a previously unappreciated binding association between the YY1 transcription factor and the corepressor CTBP2 in human embryonic stem cells.
A Collaborative Nonlocal-Means Super-resolution Algorithm Using Zernike Monments

Super-resolution (SR) with probabilistic motion estimation is a successful algorithm to circumvent the limitation of motion estimation upon conventional super-resolution methods. However, the algorithm can’t match similar patches with rotation or scale. This paper presents an efficient improved algorithm by introducing Zernike moments as representation of image invariant features into similarity measure. A collaborative strategy is proposed combining the moment based proximity and the bilateral proximity of nonlocal means (NL-means) algorithm for joint determination of weights. For the invariant property of Zernike moments, structure-similar pixels with rotation or scale can also be matched for computation of weights. Furthermore, the collaborative mechanism ensures higher accuracy of weights for a better estimation for each pixel of SR images. Experimental results indicate the proposed method is able to handle general video sequences with superior performance in SR reconstruction.
Is chronic kidney disease an adverse factor in lung cancer clinical outcome? A propensity score matching study

Comorbidity has a great impact on lung cancer survival. Renal function status may affect treatment decisions and drug toxicity. The survival outcome in lung cancer patients with coexisting chronic kidney disease (CKD) has not been fully evaluated. We hypothesized that CKD is an independent risk factor for mortality in patients with lung cancer.
Monetary Exit Strategy and Fiscal Spillovers

The paper models strategic monetary-fiscal interactions in the aftermath of the global financial crisis - in a single country as well as a monetary union. It depicts both the short-term (stabilization) perspective and the long-term (sustainability) perspective, and the link between them. This is done in a game theoretic framework that allows for revisions of actions, deterministic or stochastic. In addition, we consider incomplete information about economic conditions, and different types of government. We find that, under ambitious fiscal policies, a legislated long-term monetary commitment may: (i) reduce the risk of a double-dip recession and deflation in the short-term, and at the same time (ii) facilitate the ‘exit strategy’ of monetary policy, ie prevent sub-optimally high future inflation caused by fiscal spillovers. Our analysis thus implies that an explicit numerical target for average inflation may play the role of a monetary ‘credibility insurance’ over all phases of the business cycle, and is beneficial especially in countries facing fiscal stress.
Efficient Risk Simulations for Linear Asset Portfolios

We consider the problem of calculating tail probabilities of the returns of linear asset portfolios. As flexible and accurate model for the logarithmic returns we use the $t$-copula dependence structure and marginals following the generalized hyperbolic distribution. Exact calculation of the tail-loss probabilities is not possible and even simulation leads to challenging numerical problems. Applying a new numerical inversion method for the generation of the marginals and importance sampling with carefully selected mean shift we develop an efficient simulation algorithm. Numerical results for a variety of realistic portfolio examples show an impressive performance gain. (author´s abstract)