Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
INFLUENCE OF CHEMICAL SURFACE MODIFICATION ON MICRO-WEAR CHARACTERISTICS OF SUGARCANE NANOCELLULOSE EPOXY NANOCOMPOSITES

The waste sugarcane bagasse is the primary agricultural biomass of sugarcane industry and its main constituents is cellulose. These waste sugarcane bagasse can also be applied as reinforcement material in polymer matrix composites. In this present work, the nanocellulose fibers extracted from sugarcane bagasse using salt solution and alkaline treatment process. Sugarcane nanocellulose fiber reinforced epoxy nanocomposites were manufactured by wet layup method. This investigation has been conducted to exhibit the utilization of plant cellulose fiber as the potential reinforcement of synthetic fibers in tribo-composites. The dry sliding wear experiments designed and carried out as per central composite design to determine influence of 3 variable factors such as sliding velocity, sliding distance and load on the wear characteristics of epoxy nanocomposites. From ANOVA (Analysis of variance), it is observed that all three independent parameters plays an important role in the wear characteristics of epoxy nanocomposites, as proven from scanning electron microscope. Simultaneously minimize these tribological characteristics, desirable values of the parameters were depicted to be 5.94 m/s, 5 km and 5 N for sliding velocity, distance and load respectively. From normal probability curves, it is signified that there is a good agreement within the RSM models and experimental results. Article DOI: https://dx.doi. org/10.20319/mijst.2019. 43.157178 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-commercial 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, PO Box 1866, Mountain View, CA 94042, USA.
The Influence of Frame Length on Speaker Identification Performance

Speaker recognition/identification is a challenge for the implementation of security applications. Unfortunately, degradation in performance is usually observed for high pitched speakers and also whenever average pitch varies significantly between enrolment and testing. In this paper, a study on the impact of the frame length used to extract features from speech signal on the performance of speaker identification is presented. Tests have been carried out on a text-dependent database. Results show that a combination of different frame sizes between the training and the recognition phases can cope with the degradation. A reduction between 40% and 65% in false rejections has been generally observed.
Automated Knowledge Discovery from Simulators

A computational method, SimLearn, has been devised to facilitate efficient knowledge discovery from simulators. Simulators are complex computer programs used in science and engineering to model diverse phenomena such as fluid flow, gravitational interactions, coupled mechanical systems, and nuclear, chemical, and biological processes. SimLearn uses active-learning techniques to efficiently address the "landscape characterization problem. " In particular, SimLearn tries to determine which regions in "input space" lead to a given output from the simulator, where "input space" refers to an abstraction of all the variables going into the simulator, e.g., initial conditions, parameters, and interaction equations. Landscape characterization can be viewed as an attempt to invert the forward mapping of the simulator and recover the inputs that produce a particular output. Given that a single simulation run can take days or weeks to complete even on a large computing cluster, SimLearn attempts to reduce costs by reducing the number of simulations needed to effect discoveries. Unlike conventional data-mining methods that are applied to static predefined datasets, SimLearn involves an iterative process in which a most informative dataset is constructed dynamically by using the simulator as an oracle. On each iteration, the algorithm models the knowledge it has gained through previous simulation trials and then chooses which simulation trials to run next. Running these trials through the simulator produces new data in the form of input-output pairs. The overall process is embodied in an algorithm that combines support vector machines (SVMs) with active learning. SVMs use learning from examples (the examples are the input-output pairs generated by running the simulator) and a principle called maximum margin to derive predictors that generalize well to new inputs. In SimLearn, the SVM plays the role of modeling the knowledge that has been gained through previous simulation trials. Active learning is used to determine which new input points would be most informative if their output were known. The selected input points are run through the simulator to generate new information that can be used to refine the SVM. The process is then repeated. SimLearn carefully balances exploration (semi-randomly searching around the input space) versus exploitation (using the current state of knowledge to conduct a tightly focused search). During each iteration, SimLearn uses not one, but an ensemble of SVMs. Each SVM in the ensemble is characterized by different hyper-parameters that control various aspects of the learned predictor - for example, whether the predictor is constrained to be very smooth (nearby points in input space lead to similar output predictions) or whether the predictor is allowed to be "bumpy. " The various SVMs will have different preferences about which input points they would like to run through the simulator next. SimLearn includes a formal mechanism for balancing the ensemble SVM preferences so that a single choice can be made for the next set of trials.
Material for Efficient Online Local Metric Adaptation via Negative Samples for Person Re-Identification

Feature descriptors used in PRID are generally high dimensional in order to handle the complex appearance variations. In practice, most existing methods apply PCA blindly to reduce the feature dimension without clear justification and effectiveness. In contrast, our OL-MANS can be performed in the original high dimensional space while allowing the selection of a low rank local metric. The effectiveness of the low rank metric is also verified in [8] and [6]. As described in the paper, in our proposed OL-MANS, we solve the original time-consuming positive semidefinite (PSD) problem by solving an efficient kernel SVM instead, as in Eqn. 1.
Comparative efficacy and safety of anticoagulant strategies for acute coronary syndromes

Summary International guidelines differ in strengths of recommendation for anticoagulation strategies in acute coronary syndromes (ACS). We performed a comprehensive network meta-analysis (NMA) of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) to investigate the comparative efficacy and safety of parenteral anticoagulants in ACS. MEDLINE, Cochrane, EM-BASE, Google Scholar, major cardiology websites, and abstracts/presentations were searched. Six treatments were identified: 1) unfractionated heparin (UFH) + glycoprotein IIb/IIIa inhibitor (GPI) [UFH+GPI], 2) UFH±GPI, 3) bivalirudin, 4) low-molecular-weight heparins (LMWHs), 5) otamixaban, and 6) fondaparinux. Prespecified outcomes (death, myocardial infarction [MI], revascularisation, major bleeding [MB], minor bleeding, and stent thrombosis [ST]) were evaluated up to 30 days. Forty-two RCTs involving 117,353 patients were included. No significant differences in mortality rates were found among strategies. Compared to UFH+GPI, bivalirudin reduced the odds of MB but increased the odds of ST and MI. LMWHs vs bivalirudin reduced MI risk at the price of MB excess. UFH±GPI significantly increased the odds of MI vs LMWHs, of ST vs UFH+GPI, and of MB vs bivalirudin. Reduced ST risk with otamixaban vs UFH±GPI and vs bivalirudin was offset by a marked 2.5- to four-fold MB excess. Fondaparinux showed an intermediate profile. Results for ST-segment elevation MI were consistent with the overall findings. Early anticoagulant strategies for ACS differ in efficacy and safety, with UFH+GPI and LMWHs reducing ischaemic but increasing bleeding risk, and bivalirudin reducing MB but increases MI and ST. The findings support individualised therapy based on patients´ bleeding and ischaemic risks.
Categorical and Coordinate Spatial Processing: More on Contributions of the Transient/Magnocellular Visual System

Observers were presented with stimuli consisting of a line and two horizontally separated dots. A categorical spatial task required observers to indicate whether the dots were above or below the line and a coordinate spatial task required observers to indicate whether the line could fit into the space between the two dots. Coordinate (but not categorical) spatial processing was less accurate and took longer with stimuli presented on a red background than with stimuli presented on a green background, even though the background color varied randomly from trial to trial and the viewing screen remained gray between trials. Because the color red attenuates processing in the transient/magnocellular visual system, these results suggest that coordinate spatial processing is dependent on that pathway. Furthermore, such effects do not involve mechanisms of perceptual adaptation that depend on the same color background being present throughout an experiment or for a prolonged period of time. As in earlier experiments, the effects of color condition were the same regardless of which visual field (and hemisphere) received the stimulus information. However, in contrast to the results of earlier experiments, there was no significant interaction of task and visual field.
A New View on Biodynamic Feedthrough Analysis: Unifying the Effects on Forces and Positions

When performing a manual control task, vehicle accelerations can cause involuntary limb motions, which can result in unintentional control inputs. This phenomenon is called biodynamic feedthrough (BDFT). In the past decades, many studies into BDFT have been performed, but its fundamentals are still only poorly understood. What has become clear, though, is that BDFT is a highly complex process, and its occurrence is influenced by many different factors. A particularly challenging topic in BDFT research is the role of the human operator, which is not only a very complex but also a highly adaptive system. In literature, two different ways of measuring and analyzing BDFT are reported. One considers the transfer of accelerations to involuntary forces applied to the control device (CD); the other considers the transfer of accelerations to involuntary CD deflections or positions. The goal of this paper is to describe an approach to unify these two methods. It will be shown how the results of the two methods relate and how this knowledge may aid in understanding BDFT better as a whole. The approach presented is based on the notion that BDFT dynamics can be described by the combination of two transfer dynamics: 1) the transfer dynamics from body accelerations to involuntary forces and 2) the transfer dynamics from forces to CD deflections. The approach was validated using experimental results.
Source separation in structured nonlinear models

This paper discusses several issues related to blind source separation in nonlinear models. Specifically, separability results show that separation in the general case is impossible, however, for specific nonlinear models the problem does have a solution. A specific set of parametric nonlinear mixtures is considered; this set has the Lie group structure. In the parameter set, a group operation is defined and a relative gradient is defined. The latter is applied to design stochastic algorithms for which the equivariance property is shown.
Oxidative stress and cardiovascular complications in sleep apnea.

2005;127;2294 Chest Barnes G. E. Carpagnano, M. P. Foschino-Barbaro, O. Resta and Peter J. Complications in Sleep Apnea Oxidative Stress and Cardiovascular http://chestjournal.chestpubs. org/content/127/6/2294.1. full.html services can be found online on the World Wide Web at: The online version of this article, along with updated information and ISSN:0012-3692 ) http://chestjournal.chestpubs. org/site/misc/reprints.xhtml ( written permission of the copyright holder. this article or PDF may be reproduced or distributed without the prior Dundee Road, Northbrook, IL 60062. All rights reserved. No part of Copyright2005by the American College of Chest Physicians, 3300 Physicians. It has been published monthly since 1935. is the official journal of the American College of Chest Chest
FPGA implementation of a nonlinear two dimensional fuzzy filter

Nonlinear filtering has found many practical applications in digital signal and image processing. The computation complexity of these filtering algorithms make them difficult for real-time hardware implementation. One of these nonlinear filters, which is based on fuzzy classification of each pixel to subgroups of its neighboring pixels, is considered hen for hardware implementation. The criteria of this filter are based on the local context which form the basis of the fuzzy rule. The filtering algorithm is slightly modified for implementation into a Xilinx Virtex series of FPGA for real-time processing of image sequences. Implementation details and recommendations for further improvement are discussed. Result of a simulation example from the proposed hardware implementation is also presented.
The Binary Nucleus in VCC 128: A Candidate Supermassive Black Hole in a Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy

Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) images of the Virgo Cluster dwarf elliptical galaxy VCC 128 reveal an apparently double nucleus. The two components, which are separated by ~32 pc in projection, have the same magnitude and color. We present a spectrum of this double nucleus and show that it is inconsistent with one or both components being emission-line background objects or foreground stars. The most likely interpretation is that, as suggested by Lauer et al. for the double nucleus in NGC 4486B, we are seeing a nuclear disk surrounding a supermassive black hole. This is only the second time an early-type dwarf (dE/dSph) galaxy has been suggested to host a supermassive black hole.
Control of Glycosylation-Related Genes by DNA Methylation: the Intriguing Case of the B3GALT5 Gene and Its Distinct Promoters

Glycosylation is a metabolic pathway consisting of the enzymatic modification of proteins and lipids through the stepwise addition of sugars that gives rise to glycoconjugates. To determine the full complement of glycoconjugates that cells produce (the glycome), a variety of genes are involved, many of which are regulated by DNA methylation. The aim of the present review is to briefly describe some relevant examples of glycosylation-related genes whose DNA methylation has been implicated in their regulation and to focus on the intriguing case of a glycosyltransferase gene (B3GALT5). Aberrant promoter methylation is frequently at the basis of their modulation in cancer, but in the case of B3GALT5, at least two promoters are involved in regulation, and a complex interplay is reported to occur between transcription factors, chromatin remodelling and DNA methylation of typical CpG islands or even of other CpG dinucleotides. Transcription of the B3GALT5 gene underwent a particular evolutionary fate, so that promoter hypermethylation, acting on one transcript, and hypomethylation of other sequences, acting on the other, cooperate on one gene to obtain full cancer-associated silencing. The findings may also help in unravelling the complex origin of serum CA19.9 antigen circulating in some patients.
Field trial results for CoMP downlink transmissions in cellular systems

This paper presents measurement results for coordinated multi-point downlink transmissions as Long Term Evolution - Advanced concept from a cellular test bed in Dresden, Germany. At first, a description of the real-time prototyping system and its signal processing introduces the major modifications from the existing 3GPP-LTE standard. Then, the cellular propagation and measurement environment of the test bed is characterized. Various spatial setups are compared in conjunction with cooperative and non-cooperative base stations as well as cell-center and cell-edge scenarios. Finally, results concerning the geometry factor, time difference of arrivals and spectral efficiencies complete this field trial.
Decreased survival among sedentary patients undergoing dialysis: results from the dialysis morbidity and mortality study wave 2.

BACKGROUND Sedentary behavior is associated with an increased risk for death in the general population. However, the association between inactivity and mortality has not been studied in a large cohort of dialysis patients despite the high prevalence of sedentary behavior in this group. METHODS We used the Dialysis Morbidity and Mortality Study Wave 2, a prospective study of a national sample of 4,024 incident peritoneal dialysis and hemodialysis patients from 1996 to 1997, to determine whether sedentary behavior is associated with increased mortality during a 1-year period in this group after adjusting for confounding variables. RESULTS The study population consisted of the 2,837 patients with accurate survival data who were able to ambulate and transfer. Eleven percent of the sedentary patients died during the study period compared with 5% of nonsedentary patients. In a survival analysis, sedentary behavior (hazard ratio, 1.62; 95% confidence interval, 1.16 to 2.27) was associated with an increased risk for death at 1 year after adjusting for all variables that we postulated might be associated with survival and for differences between sedentary and nonsedentary patients. CONCLUSION Sedentary behavior is associated with an increased risk for mortality among dialysis patients similar in magnitude to that of other well-established risk factors, such as a one-point reduction in serum albumin concentration. More attention should be given to exercise behavior in dialysis patients, and controlled clinical trials are needed to further define the association of sedentary behavior with mortality.
Abscisic acid perception and signaling transduction in strawberry: A model for non-climacteric fruit ripening

On basis of fruit differential respiration and ethylene effects, climacteric and non-climacteric fruits have been classically defined. Over the past decades, the molecular mechanisms of climacteric fruit ripening were abundantly described and found to focus on ethylene perception and signaling transduction. In contrast, until our most recent breakthroughs, much progress has been made toward understanding the signaling perception and transduction mechanisms for abscisic acid (ABA) in strawberry, a model for non-climacteric fruit ripening. Our reports not only have provided several lines of strong evidences for ABA-regulated ripening of strawberry fruit, but also have demonstrated that homology proteins of Arabidopsis ABA receptors, including PYR/PYL/RCAR and ABAR/CHLH, act as positive regulators of ripening in response to ABA. These receptors also trigger a set of ABA downstream signaling components, and determine significant changes in the expression levels of both sugar and pigment metabolism-related genes that are closely associated with ripening. Soluble sugars, especially sucrose, may act as a signal molecular to trigger ABA accumulation through an enzymatic action of 9-cis-epoxycarotenoid dioxygenase 1 (FaNCED1). This mini-review offers an overview of these processes and also outlines the possible, molecular mechanisms for ABA in the regulation of strawberry fruit ripening through the ABA receptors.
A JTAG-based configuration circuit applied in SerDes chip

In this paper, a design of JTAG-based configuration circuit applied in 2.5 Gbps SerDes (Serializer & Deserializer) mixed digital-analog chip is implemented with SMIC 0.13um technology. The configuration circuit mainly involves two functional components: CR control port and JTAG interface module. The control signals of the whole chip are incorporated in a group of control registers (CRs), which can be accessed through CR control port. The JTAG architecture with 5 standard pins is adopted to load a stream of override data bits into CR port. By applying this combinational configuration methodology, the amount of pinout of the chip has been largely reduced, thus resulting in an efficient saving of chip area. The testing result shows the configuration circuit works perfectly in actual system.
Computer Network and Information Security , 2015 , 9 , 10-18

In this paper a few methods for anomaly detection in computer networks with the use of time series methods are proposed. The special interest was put on Brown's exponential smoothing, seasonal decomposition, naive forecasting and Exponential Moving Average method. The validation of the anomaly detection methods has been performed using experimental data sets and statistical analysis which has shown that proposed methods can efficiently detect unusual situations in network traffic. This means that time series methods can be successfully used to model and predict a traffic in computer networks as well as to detect some unusual or unrequired events in network traffic.
Co-Stimulation through 4-1BB/CD137 Improves the Expansion and Function of CD8+ Melanoma Tumor-Infiltrating Lymphocytes for Adoptive T-Cell Therapy

Adoptive T-cell therapy (ACT) using tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) can induce tumor regression in up to 50% or more of patients with unresectable metastatic melanoma. However, current methods to expand melanoma TIL, especially the “rapid expansion protocol” (REP) were not designed to enhance the generation of optimal effector-memory CD8+ T cells for infusion. One approach to this problem is to manipulate specific co-stimulatory signaling pathways to enhance CD8+ effector-memory T-cell expansion. In this study, we determined the effects of activating the TNF-R family member 4-1BB/CD137, specifically induced in activated CD8+ T cells, on the yield, phenotype, and functional activity of expanded CD8+ T cells during the REP. We found that CD8+ TIL up-regulate 4-1BB expression early during the REP after initial TCR stimulation, but neither the PBMC feeder cells in the REP or the activated TIL expressed 4-1BB ligand. However, addition of an exogenous agonistic anti-4-1BB IgG4 (BMS 663513) to the REP significantly enhanced the frequency and total yield of CD8+ T cells as well as their maintenance of CD28 and increased their anti-tumor CTL activity. Gene expression analysis found an increase in bcl-2 and survivin expression induced by 4-1BB that was associated with an enhanced survival capability of CD8+ post-REP TIL when re-cultured in the absence or presence of cytokines. Our findings suggest that adding an agonistic anti-4-1BB antibody during the time of TIL REP initiation produces a CD8+ T cell population capable of improved effector function and survival. This may greatly improve TIL persistence and anti-tumor activity in vivo after adoptive transfer into patients.
Maintenance of genome stability in plants: repairing DNA double strand breaks and chromatin structure stability

Plant cells are subject to high levels of DNA damage resulting from plant’s obligatory dependence on sunlight and the associated exposure to environmental stresses like solar UV radiation, high soil salinity, drought, chilling injury, and other air and soil pollutants including heavy metals and metabolic by-products from endogenous processes. The irreversible DNA damages, generated by the environmental and genotoxic stresses affect plant growth and development, reproduction, and crop productivity. Thus, for maintaining genome stability, plants have developed an extensive array of mechanisms for the detection and repair of DNA damages. This review will focus recent advances in our understanding of mechanisms regulating plant genome stability in the context of repairing of double stand breaks and chromatin structure maintenance.