Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Some Notes About Decentralization Process Implications on Public Administration Corruption In Romania

The paper investigates some features of the corruption in the public administration in a country, which is in the process of integrating into the new structures of the European Union. We estimated the parameters of a regression model that analyses factors like political system pressure, administration transparency, and service quality provided by civil servants using data sets for a representative civil servants sample. Using the regression model and ANOVA we came to the conclusion, that the perception of the corruption has significant differences at the level of the four types of public administration institutions analysed in this paper. The main result is that the corruption level in the public administration is negatively influenced by the stability of the remuneration system, by the lack of transparency and by the political system pressure. On the other hand, church, media, and schools have a positive influence on the reduction of the corruption level.
Alightment of Spotted Wing Drosophila (Diptera: Drosophilidae) on Odorless Disks Varying in Color

Abstract Methods for trapping spotted wing drosophila, Drosophila suzukii (Matsmura) (Diptera: Drosophilidae), have not yet been optimized for detecting this devastating pest of soft-skinned fruits. Here, we report outcomes of choice and no-choice laboratory bioassays quantifying the rates of spotted wing drosophila alightment on 5-cm-diameter sticky disks of various colors, but no fruit odors. Red, purple, and black disks captured the most spotted wing drosophila when presented against a white background. Male and female spotted wing drosophila responded identically in these tests. Significantly more D. suzukii were captured on the red and yellow disks than those presenting the corresponding grayscale for that color, proving that D. suzukii perceives colors and not just the level of target brightness. Fluorescent red is the best candidate for trap color, while clear and white are the least desirable. However, when the background was switched to black, all nonfluorescent colors were equally acceptable to spotted wing drosophila, suggesting that background must be specified when reporting spotted wing drosophila color preference. Additional spotted wing drosophila research is justified on the effects of target color against natural backgrounds.
Yazılım Hata Tahmininin Web Uygulamalarında Kullanılabilirliği

Ozet Yazilim testinde uygulanabilecek en basit yaklasim verilen bir kod parcasindaki butun olasiliklari test etmektir. Bu durum zaman ve butce kisitlari nedeniyle pratikte imkansizdir. Yazilim hata tahmini yontemleri proje yoneticileri tarafindan, test asamasinda, kisitli olan kaynaklari efektif bir sekilde dagitmak icin kullanilmaktadir. Bu alandaki calismalar ozellikle 2005 yilindan itibaren artarak devam etmektedir. Bu calismada literaturde var olan metriklerin web uygulamalari icin yeterli olup olmadigi sorgulanmistir. Web uygulamalari uzerinde yaptigimiz deneyler hata tahmininin web uygulamalari uzerinde optimum sonuclar vermekten uzakta oldugunu gostermektedir. Bu tip uygulamalari gelistirmede kullanilan yasam dongusu, diger uygulamalar icin kullanilanlarla ayni olsa da teknik bakimdan ayristiklari bazi noktalar bulunmaktadir. Bu nedenle yazilim hata tahmini alaninda web uygulamalarina ozel metrikler olusturulmasini onermekteyiz.
Risk Analysis 101 : Robust-Optimization — the elephant in the robust-satisficing room ∗

In 2001, info-gap decision theory re-invented the then 40-year old model of local robustness, known universally as radius of stability (circa 1960). Since then, this model of local robustness has been promoted by info-gap scholars as a reliable tool for the management of a severe uncertainty that is characterized by a vast (e.g. unbounded) uncertainty space, a poor point estimate of the uncertainty parameter, and a likelihood-free quantification of uncertainty. Inexplicably, this absurd proposition has managed to pass muster in the review processes of academic books and journals. Small wonder then that info-gap’s robustness model was subsequently proposed, in a peer-reviewed article, as a framework for dealing with Taleb’s Black Swans and even . Unknown Unknowns? More recently, the promotion of info-gap decision theory from the pages of peer-reviewed journals, has been conducted under the more general banner of the great merit of the robustsatisficing approach in decision-making, to the effect that advocates of this theory are now engaged in re-inventing the well-established field of Robust Optimization. The trouble in all this is that the misguided rhetoric on robust-satisficing coming out of the info-gap literature, specifically the misguided rhetoric on the advantage of satisficing over optimizing that ends obscuring the obvious connection of robust-satisficing to Robust Optimization, had not been recognized for what it is, in the review process of peer-reviewed journals, such as Risk Analysis. In view of this state-of affairs, my objective in this discussion is to make it abundantly clear that the suggestion to use info-gap’s robust-satisficing approach as a framework for decision-making under severe uncertainty is in fact a step backwards to the early days of Robust Optimization, a step that completely ignores the tremendous progress over the past forty years or so, in this highly active area of research.
Influence of physico-chemical, mechanical and morphological fingerpad properties on the frictional distinction of sticky/slippery surfaces

This study investigates how the fingerpad hydrolipid film, shape, roughness and rigidity influence the friction when it rubs surfaces situated in the slippery psychophysical dimension. The studied counterparts comprised two ‘real’ (physical) surfaces and two ‘virtual’ surfaces. The latter were simulated with a tactile stimulator named STIMTAC. Thirteen women and 13 men rubbed their right forefingers against the different surfaces as their arms were displaced by a DC motor providing constant velocity and sliding distance. Tangential and normal forces were measured with a specific tribometer. The fingerpad hydrolipid film was characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. The shape and roughness of fingers were extrapolated from replicas. Indentation measurements were carried out to determine fingerpad effective elastic modulus. A clear difference was observed between women and men in terms of friction behaviour. The concept of tactile frictional contrast (TFC) which was introduced quantifies an individual's propensity to distinguish two surfaces frictionally. The lipids/water ratio and water amount on the finger skin significantly influenced the TFC. A correlation was observed between the TFC and fingerpad roughness, i.e. the height of the fingerpad ridges. This is essentially owing to gender differences. A significant difference between men's and women's finger topography was also noted, because our results suggested that men have rougher fingers than women. The friction measurements did not correlate with the fingerpad curvature nor with the epidermal ridges' spatial period.
Molecular Genetic Analysis of p53 Intratumoral Heterogeneity in Human Astrocytic Brain Tumors

We investigated genetic heterogeneity of astrocytic gliomas using p53 gene mutations as a marker. Different parts of morphologically heterogeneous astrocytic gliomas were microdissected, and direct DNA sequencing of p53 gene exons 5 through 8 was performed. Thirty-five glioma samples and tumor-adjacent normal-appearing brain tissue from 11 patients were analyzed. Sixteen different p53 gene mutations were found in 7 patients. We found that some tumors were devoid of p53 gene mutations, whereas other tumors carried 1 or often several (up to 3) different mutations. The mutations were present in grade II, III, and IV astrocytic glioma areas. Both severe functionally dead mutants and mutants with remaining transcriptional activity could be observed in the same tumor. We observed that morphologically different parts of a glioma could carry different or similar mutations in the p53 gene and could be either associated or not associated with the locus of heterozygosity at the mutant site. Coexistence of p53 gene mutations and the locus of heterozygosity was common, at least in astrocytomas grade III and in glioblastomas, and also occurred in astrocytoma grade II areas. These results support the notion that intratumoral heterogeneity in brain tumors originates from different molecular defects. Our results are of importance for a further understanding of the molecular mechanisms behind failure to treat glioma patients.
3rd Workshop on Dependable Embedded Systems

Microkernels and microhypervisors, which we understand to be small hypervisors providing microkernel-like abstractions to build minimal-complex and de-privileged virtual-machine monitors, have become very attractive operating-system alternatives for PCand embedded platforms. This paper highlights initial thoughts towards verifying microkernel-based operating systems and in particular systems running on top of the L4.Sec microkernel.
AIS Electronic

Enterprise architecture frameworks can be used to guide the development process of an information system (IS). While these frameworks cover a comprehensive approach to IS development, most of them essentially proclaim a linear, stepwise development process. In the field of computer science, such linear, waterfall-based approaches have been replaced by so-called agile methods proclaiming an iterative development process. As these approaches are naturally only concerned with software engineering, they do not consider the business processes the software is supposed to support or the organizational structures the software is supposed to be employed in. The purpose of this paper is to propose an iterative information systems development method called iARIS. It combines the “best of both worlds” in joining the comprehensive approach to IS development of common EA frameworks with the iterative software engineering paradigm. The paper contributes to the research on enterprise transformation in proposing a method tailored to support IS development in a rapidly changing environment. The paper furthermore reports on an on-going IS development project providing insights into how iARIS can be applied. The paper thus contributes to the research on enterprise transformation in suggesting how an IS development method can be used in practice.
Emerging Meta-Governance as a Regulation Framework for Public-Private Partnerships: An Examination of the European Union's Approach

This article extends previous research on public-private partnerships (PPPs), which has primarily been case study or national context oriented, by examining how these PPPs are regulated in the framework of the European Union (EU). While a number of partnership models have been identified in the academic literature, this study focuses on three significant types of PPP: the contract-PPP, the concession-PPP, and the institutional-PPP. Based on a notion of the EU as a meta-governance framework that guides, steers, and controls PPP activity at national, sector, and project level, the article draws a number of lessons on the EU’s role in regulating the formation phase of PPP. The research demonstrates that this meta-governance framework provides the EU with no direct regulations for the use of the PPP model in the 27 member states, but two sets of regulations which apply if a public authority decides to sign a PPP deal. As the EU hitherto has engaged in regulation of PPP at a somewhat abstract and conceptual level, national and local public administrations are given considerable room for manoeuvre to craft regulations and policies to support or hinder uptake of PPPs. More recently, however, the Commission has raised its stakes by launching a European Partnership Excellence Centre to support policy learning, the spread of best practice, and PPP expert networks.
TR-CS-1203 Generation of Hard Solvable Planning Problems

Existing models for sampling the space of all planning problems produce both solvable and unsolvable instances. In particular, when attempting to identify very hard ones, one encounters both, as the hardness in the standard models is accompanied by the possibility of an instance being solvable or unsolvable. This is a disadvantage of the standard models, because of the strong asymmetry of planning algorithms in handling solvable and unsolvable instances, and the preference to have solvable instances for the performance evaluation of planners. We look at the generation of hard problem instances that are guaranteed to have a plan. The basic method generates a state sequence which induces a valid plan. The main issue to be solved in this setting is the choice of the effects and the preconditions of the actions in the plan so that finding the plan becomes difficult. We provide solutions to this problem, and demonstrate its strength in terms of an experimental study with different types of planners. We argue that our methods are better suited to planner performance evaluation than the ones proposed by Bylander and Rintanen.
Randomized, placebo-controlled trial of mixed amphetamine salts for symptoms of comorbid ADHD in pediatric bipolar disorder after mood stabilization with divalproex sodium.

OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to determine whether adjunctive use of a psychostimulant (mixed amphetamine salts) was safe and efficacious for treatment of symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in pediatric outpatients with bipolar I or bipolar II disorder and concurrent ADHD whose manic symptoms had been stabilized through treatment with divalproex sodium. METHOD An 8-week open-label trial of divalproex sodium to control manic symptoms and to discern the effect of divalproex sodium on ADHD was followed by a 4-week randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled crossover trial to determine if mixed amphetamine salts was safe and effective for treatment of ADHD symptoms. Patients in the crossover trial continued to receive divalproex sodium. Diagnoses, made by clinical interview, were confirmed with the Washington University in St. Louis Kiddie Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia. The Young Mania Rating Scale (for manic symptoms) and the Clinical Global Impression of improvement (for ADHD symptoms) were the primary outcome measures. RESULTS Forty subjects ages 6-17 years with bipolar I disorder (77.5%) or bipolar II disorder (22.5%) and a Young Mania Rating Scale score > or =14 entered open treatment with divalproex sodium. With divalproex sodium, 32 subjects achieved > or =50% reduction in Young Mania Rating Scale baseline scores, but only three participants had significant improvement in ADHD symptoms. For the 30 subjects who entered the placebo-controlled crossover trial, mixed amphetamine salts was significantly more effective than placebo for ADHD symptoms. No significant side effects or worsening of manic symptoms was observed. CONCLUSIONS Pediatric patients with bipolar disorder and concurrent ADHD can be safely and effectively treated with mixed amphetamine salts after their manic symptoms are stabilized with divalproex sodium. Divalproex sodium alone (8-week trial) is not an effective treatment for ADHD in the context of bipolar disorder.
APVP: An Aggregate-Based Path Verification Routing Protocol for the Ad Hoc Networks

A mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a collection of mobile nodes that forms a provisional network dynamically without the aid of any predetermined infrastructure. In particular, the route security is more important. In order to solve the problem several route discovery protocols have been proposed such as ARAN and SRP ect. But those protocols suffer from two problems: (1) difficult in operation, (2) lacked the sufficient security guarantee. In the paper, an aggregate-based path verification protocol (APVP) is proposed, which adopts the identity-based cryptography (IBC) and aggregate signatures algorithm for verifying the nodes validity. Compared with ARAN, APVP can verify all nodes, with lower computational complication, higher security and efficiency. APVP could be more easily implemented and deployed across ad hoc network. Security proofs according to the corresponding security definitions and under appropriate computational assumptions are provided for the proposed scheme.
Convergence Rates for Runlength Constrained Capacities

Convergence results are given for the number of binary arrays with at least d and at most k zeros between ones, along any coordinate axis, asymptotically for fixed d as k ! 1. C. Pomerance is with Bell Laboratories, Lucent Technologies, 600 Mountain Ave., Murray Hill, NJ 07974-0636 (carlp@bell-labs.com). K. Zeger is with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California, San Diego, CA 92093-0407 (zeger@ucsd.edu). The research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation.
Nucleus Accumbens μ-Opioid Receptors Mediate Social Reward

Positive social interactions are essential for emotional well-being and proper behavioral development of young individuals. Here, we studied the neural underpinnings of social reward by investigating the involvement of opioid neurotransmission in the nucleus accumbens (NAc) in social play behavior, a highly rewarding social interaction in adolescent rats. Intra-NAc infusion of morphine (0.05–0.1 μg) increased pinning and pouncing, characteristic elements of social play behavior in rats, and blockade of NAc opioid receptors with naloxone (0.5 μg) prevented the play-enhancing effects of systemic morphine (1 mg/kg, s.c.) administration. Thus, stimulation of opioid receptors in the NAc was necessary and sufficient for morphine to increase social play. Intra-NAc treatment with the selective μ-opioid receptor agonist [d-Ala2,N-MePhe4,Gly5-ol]enkephalin (DAMGO) (0.1–10 ng) and the μ-opioid receptor antagonist Cys-Tyr-d-Trp-Arg-Thr-Pen-Thr-NH2 (CTAP) (0.3–3 μg) increased and decreased social play, respectively. The δ-opioid receptor agonist DPDPE ([d-Pen2,d-Pen5]-enkephalin) (0.3–3 μg) had no effects, whereas the κ-opioid receptor agonist U69593 (N-methyl-2-phenyl-N-[(5R,7S,8S)-7-(pyrrolidin-1-yl)-1-oxaspiro[4.5]dec-8-yl]acetamide) (0.01–1 μg) decreased social play. Intra-NAc treatment with β-endorphin (0.01–1 μg) increased social play, but met-enkephalin (0.1–5 μg) and the enkephalinase inhibitor thiorphan (0.1–1 μg) were ineffective. DAMGO (0.1–10 ng) increased social play after infusion into both the shell and core subregions of the NAc. Last, intra-NAc infusion of CTAP (3 μg) prevented the development of social play-induced conditioned place preference. These findings identify NAc μ-opioid receptor stimulation as an important neural mechanism for the attribution of positive value to social interactions in adolescent rats. Altered NAc μ-opioid receptor function may underlie social impairments in psychiatric disorders such as autism, schizophrenia, or personality disorders.
Optimal design of high speed mechanical systems

The trend towards higher performance mechanical systems has naturally led to the need to design such systems in an optimal fashion. Lighter components and higher operating speeds both demand a level of design a step above that provided conventionally. This paper describes a research effort aimed at developing the methodology for such system design. The methodology is based on accurate computer modeling, experimental validation, and robust optimal design strategies along with a parallel computing environment to produce optimal mechanical systems. As an example, a valve train mechanism used in high speed racing engines is analyzed and optimized. Experimental validation of the optimized designs is also presented.
Effective tool choice by chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes): Learning and flexibility

Chimpanzees are proficient tool users and have been shown to use properties of weight and length to select effective tools. Researchers have, however, neglected to investigate whether chimpanzees utilize other tool properties. This study investigated whether chimpanzees use other properties to choose effective tools, how feedback influences their ability to select effective tools, and whether or not chimpanzees are flexible in effective tool selection. Sixty-one chimpanzees, ages 17-52 years, underwent four probing tasks requiring tools of differing physical properties. The results demonstrate that chimpanzees are able to utilize properties of length, surface area, and shape to select effective probing tools. Though exploration of the environment is suggested to facilitate learning and/or performance, it did not have an effect as measured through looking. Together, these results support prior research concerning effective tool selection by chimpanzees, as well as expand current knowledge and understanding of what may underlie effective tool selection. INDEX WORDS: Tool use, Tool effectiveness, Flexibility, Learning, Optimal foraging, Cognition EFFECTIVE TOOL CHOICE BY CHIMPANZEES (PAN TROGLODYTES): LEARNING AND FLEXIBILITY
Melioration Learning in Two-Person Games

Melioration learning is an empirically well-grounded model of reinforcement learning. By means of computer simulations, this paper derives predictions for several repeatedly played two-person games from this model. The results indicate a likely convergence to a pure Nash equilibrium of the game. If no pure equilibrium exists, the relative frequencies of choice may approach the predictions of the mixed Nash equilibrium. Yet in some games, no stable state is reached.
Long-term outcomes of imatinib in patients with FIP1L1/PDGFRA associated chronic eosinophilic leukemia: experience of a single center in China

Background The FIP1L1/PDGFRA (F/P) fusion gene is the most common clonal genetic abnormality of chronic eosinophilic leukemia (CEL). Tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKI), such as imatinib, have been demonstrated to be effective therapies for F/P mutated disease. The aim of this study was to analyze the treatment response and long term prognosis in patients with F/P mutated CEL. Methods The clinical features and treatment responses of 33 consecutive patients with F/P mutated CEL between August 2006 and October 2014 were analyzed. The 33 cases received imatinib therapy at an initial dose of 100 mg/day (30 patients) or 200 mg/day (3 patients); the maintenance dose depended on the response condition and patient willingness. Through the follow up, the molecular responses were regularly monitored. Results With a median follow up of 64 months, 94% of the 33 patients with F/P mutated CEL achieved a complete hematologic remission (CHR), and 97% achieved a complete molecular remission (CMR) after a median of 3 (1.5-12) months. Twenty-four cases received maintenance therapy, with a median CMR duration of 43 (5-88) months. Imatinib therapy was discontinued in 8 cases, including 4 cases who experienced relapse, and 4 patients who maintained CHR or CMR after discontinuing therapy with a median time of 47 (2-74) months. One case exhibited primary resistance with a PDGFRA T674I mutation. Conclusions F/P mutated CEL has an excellent long-term prognosis following imatinib therapy. A 100 mg daily dose of imatinib is sufficient to induce remission, and a single 100 mg weekly dose maintains a durable remission. A subgroup of patients may maintain a durable remission after discontinuing therapy with a CMR.