Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) : un guide pédagogique à l'intention des décideurs dans le secteur public

Ce guide presente la methode Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), une methode d'evaluation de la performance . Il est destine aux responsables d'organisations publiques qui ne sont pas familiers avec les notions d'optimisation mathematique, autrement dit de recherche operationnelle. L'utilisation des mathematiques est par consequent reduite au minimum. Ce guide est fortement oriente vers la pratique. Il permet aux decideurs de realiser leurs propres analyses d'efficience et d'interpreter facilement les resultats obtenus. La methode DEA est un outil d'analyse et d'aide a la decision dans les domaines suivants : - en calculant un score d'efficience, elle indique si une organisation dispose d'une marge d'amelioration ; - en fixant des valeurs-cibles, elle indique de combien les inputs doivent etre reduits et les outputs augmentes pour qu'une organisation devienne efficiente ; - en identifiant le type de rendements d'echelle, elle indique si une organisation doit augmenter ou au contraire reduire sa taille pour minimiser son cout moyen de production ; - en identifiant les pairs de reference, elle designe quelles organisations disposent des best practice a analyser.
Electrode protrusions and particle chaining as factors affecting the dielectric strength of air

Electrode protrusions and free particles have been demonstrated to reduce dramatically the breakdown voltage of insulating fluids. This paper examines two factors which affect the dielectric strength of gaseous insulators: (i) shape and size of electrode protrusions; and (ii) particle chain formation. A computer program, based on the boundary element method, was employed for the computation of the electric field modified by an electrode protrusion and/or a particle chain. The results regarding field enhancement were used as input data of another program that evaluated the dielectric strength of the air-gap. Two types of protrusions were studied: hemispheres and hemispherically-ended rods. One to ten conductive spheres were considered to be attracted to such protrusions and chain at the top of them. The computations showed that the large protrusions are more harmful than the small ones and that the dielectric strength of the air-gap decreases with the number of particles in a chain.
A hot story with many tales: the qWR star HD 45166. I- Observations and system parameters

The binary star HD 45166 has been observed since 1922 but its orbital period has not yet been found. It is considered a peculiar Wolf-Rayet star, and its assigned classification varied along the years. High-resolution spectroscopic observations show that the spectrum, in emission and in absorption, is quite rich. The emission lines have great diversity of widths and profiles. The Hydrogen and Helium lines are systematically broader than the CNO lines. Assuming that HD 45166 is a double-line spectroscopic binary, it presents an orbital period of P = 1.596 days, with an eccentricity of e = 0.18. In addition, a search for periodicity using standard techniques reveals that the emission lines present at least two other periods, of 5 hours and of 15 hours. The secondary star has a spectral type of B7 V and, therefore, should have a mass of about 4.8 solar masses. Given the radial velocity amplitudes, we determined the mass of the hot (primary) star as being 4.2 solar masses and the inclination angle of the system, i = 0.77 degr. As the eccentricity of the orbit is non zero, the Roche lobes increase and decrease as a function of the orbital phase. At periastron, the secondary star fills its Roche lobe. The distance to the star has been re-determined as d = 1.3 kpc and a color excess of E(B-V)=0.155 has been derived. This implies an absolute B magnitude of -0.6 for the primary star and -0.7 for the B7 star. We suggest that the discrete absorption components (DACs) observed in the ultraviolet with a periodicity similar to the orbital period may be induced by periastron events.
Sequencing, De novo Assembly, Functional Annotation and Analysis of Phyllanthus amarus Leaf Transcriptome Using the Illumina Platform

Phyllanthus amarus Schum. and Thonn. , a widely distributed annual medicinal herb has a long history of use in the traditional system of medicine for over 2000 years. However, the lack of genomic data for P. amarus, a non-model organism hinders research at the molecular level. In the present study, high-throughput sequencing technology has been employed to enhance better understanding of this herb and provide comprehensive genomic information for future work. Here P. amarus leaf transcriptome was sequenced using the Illumina Miseq platform. We assembled 85,927 non-redundant (nr) “unitranscript” sequences with an average length of 1548 bp, from 18,060,997 raw reads. Sequence similarity analyses and annotation of these unitranscripts were performed against databases like green plants nr protein database, Gene Ontology (GO), Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COG), PlnTFDB, KEGG databases. As a result, 69,394 GO terms, 583 enzyme codes (EC), 134 KEGG maps, and 59 Transcription Factor (TF) families were generated. Functional and comparative analyses of assembled unitranscripts were also performed with the most closely related species like Populus trichocarpa and Ricinus communis using TRAPID. KEGG analysis showed that a number of assembled unitranscripts were involved in secondary metabolites, mainly phenylpropanoid, flavonoid, terpenoids, alkaloids, and lignan biosynthetic pathways that have significant medicinal attributes. Further, Fragments Per Kilobase of transcript per Million mapped reads (FPKM) values of the identified secondary metabolite pathway genes were determined and Reverse Transcription PCR (RT-PCR) of a few of these genes were performed to validate the de novo assembled leaf transcriptome dataset. In addition 65,273 simple sequence repeats (SSRs) were also identified. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first transcriptomic dataset of P. amarus till date. Our study provides the largest genetic resource that will lead to drug development and pave the way in deciphering various secondary metabolite biosynthetic pathways in P. amarus, especially those conferring the medicinal attributes of this potent herb.
Predictors of change in short-term memory span following working memory training

Computer-based working memory training exercises produce improvements in performance on ability measures that are similar to the trained tasks (near-transfer), but results have been inconsistent regarding generalization of training outcomes to other abilities and behaviors, particularly those reflecting symptoms of attentiondeficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). In contrast to the growing body of efficacy research in this area, almost no studies have systematically investigated characteristics of subjects that predict response to working memory training. This study is an investigation of subject characteristics that predicted change in near-transfer immediate memory span performance following working memory training. Children and adolescents aged 9-16 years (N=62) with a broad range of reported symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) completed working memory training for a 25-day period. Assessments of verbal and visual working memory span and ADHD symptoms were completed at the beginning and end of working memory training. Greater improvement in working memory span from baseline to post-training was predicted by poorer memory span, more hyperactivity-impulsivity symptoms, and fewer inattention symptoms at the baseline. For baseline memory span and hyperactivity-impulsivity symptoms, study results are consistent with a remediation or rehabilitation mo del in which working memory training produces more near-transfer improvement for individuals who have more baseline delay or impairment. However, the opposite relationship was found for inattention, perhaps because poor attention skills interfere with the ability to actively engage in working memory training. Clinically, this information may be useful for identifying individuals who are more likely to benefit from working memory training.
A Simple Algorithm for Data Compression in Wireless Sensor Networks

Power saving is a critical issue in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) since sensor nodes are powered by batteries which cannot be generally changed or recharged. As radio communication is often the main cause of energy consumption, extension of sensor node lifetime is generally achieved by reducing transmissions/receptions of data, for instance through data compression. Exploiting the natural correlation that exists in data typically collected by WSNs and the principles of entropy compression, in this Letter we propose a simple and efficient data compression algorithm particularly suited to be used on available commercial nodes of a WSN, where energy, memory and computational resources are very limited. Some experimental results and comparisons with, to the best of our knowledge, the only lossless compression algorithm previously proposed in the literature to be embedded in sensor nodes and with two well- known compression algorithms are shown and discussed.
Lacunar infarction due to middle cerebral artery stenosis.

To the Editor Some cases of lacunar infarction with middle cerebral artery (MCA) stenosis may be explained by the Bernoulli principle. In a constant flow system, the smaller the cross-sectional area, the greater the flow velocity, and the lower the perfusion pressure. If the flow were turbulent, the pressure would be lower still. Thus, if the origin of a lenticulostriate artery were within a stenotic segment of MCA," the perfusion pressure in this segment would be reduced, compared to that in normal MCA segments, perhaps sufficiently to produce ischemia in the supply territory of the lenticulostriate artery. Such a hemodynamic mechanism might explain progressive lacunar infarction, which until now has not been satisfactorily explained.
Convergences in the Measurement Problem in Quantum Mechanics

This paper presents arguments purporting to show that von Neumann's description of the measurement process in quantum mechanics has a modern day version in the decoherence approach. We claim that this approach and the de Broglie-Bohm theory emerges from Bohr's interpretation and are therefore obliged to deal with some obscures ideas which were antecipated, explicitly or implicitly and carefully circumvented, by Bohr.
Spatially-aware dialogue control using hierarchical reinforcement learning

This article addresses the problem of scalable optimization for spatially-aware dialogue systems. These kinds of systems must perceive, reason, and act about the spatial environment where they are embedded. We formulate the problem in terms of Semi-Markov Decision Processes and propose a hierarchical reinforcement learning approach to optimize subbehaviors rather than full behaviors. Because of the vast number of policies that are required to control the interaction in a dynamic environment (e.g., a dialogue system assisting a user to navigate in a building from one location to another), our learning approach is based on two stages: (a) the first stage learns low-level behavior, in advance; and (b) the second stage learns high-level behavior, in real time. For such a purpose we extend an existing algorithm in the literature of reinforcement learning in order to support reusable policies and therefore to perform fast learning. We argue that our learning approach makes the problem feasible, and we report on a novel reinforcement learning dialogue system that performs a joint optimization between dialogue and spatial behaviors. Our experiments, using simulated and real environments, are based on a text-based dialogue system for indoor navigation. Experimental results in a realistic environment reported an overall user satisfaction result of 89%, which suggests that our proposed approach is attractive for its application in real interactions as it combines fast learning with adaptive and reasonable behavior.
Rhythm of sexual desire in women.

Literature on the rhythm of sexual desire in women is reviewed and a preliminary study is presented. A major difficulty in past studies has been the womans seeming ignorance of her own physiology. Although there is general agreement that peaks of sexual desire do occur there is little agreement on when they occur. In a study of 30 women sexual desire was apparently strongest during the postmenstrual and early ovulatory periods. The rhythm method of birth control therefore is a source of sexual frustration for many women.
Reduced reference image quality assessment based on Weibull statistics

Theories in fragmentation have proved that the statistics of image gradient magnitude followed a Weibull distribution, with β (scale) and γ (shape) as free parameters, which are demonstrated to be strongly correlated with brain response. In this paper, we chose β extracted from the proposed strongest component map (SCM) in scale space, as the reduced reference (RR) feature, and developed a novel method for reduced reference image quality assessment (RRIQA) named βW-SCM. For each scale, the SCM was constructed by assembling coefficients with maximum amplitude among different orientations into a single map. The Weibull parameters were then estimated from the SCM. The final image quality was computed by summing the geometric mean of the defined absolute and relative deviations of β. Performance evaluation on the well-known LIVE database demonstrated an outstanding advantage of low RR feature data rate with nearly the same prediction accuracy and consistency.
Historical variations in mutation rate in an epidemic pathogen, Yersinia pestis

The genetic diversity of Yersinia pestis, the etiologic agent of plague, is extremely limited because of its recent origin coupled with a slow clock rate. Here we identified 2,326 SNPs from 133 genomes of Y. pestis strains that were isolated in China and elsewhere. These SNPs define the genealogy of Y. pestis since its most recent common ancestor. All but 28 of these SNPs represented mutations that happened only once within the genealogy, and they were distributed essentially at random among individual genes. Only seven genes contained a significant excess of nonsynonymous SNP, suggesting that the fixation of SNPs mainly arises via neutral processes, such as genetic drift, rather than Darwinian selection. However, the rate of fixation varies dramatically over the genealogy: the number of SNPs accumulated by different lineages was highly variable and the genealogy contains multiple polytomies, one of which resulted in four branches near the time of the Black Death. We suggest that demographic changes can affect the speed of evolution in epidemic pathogens even in the absence of natural selection, and hypothesize that neutral SNPs are fixed rapidly during intermittent epidemics and outbreaks.
Phytoestrogens/Flavonoids Reverse Breast Cancer Resistance Protein/ABCG2-Mediated Multidrug Resistance

Breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP), also called ABCG2, confers resistance to anticancer agents such as 7-ethyl-10-hydroxycamptothecin (SN-38), mitoxantrone, and topotecan. We found previously that sulfated estrogens are physiologic substrates of BCRP. Flavonoids with weak estrogenic activities are called phytoestrogens. In this study, we show that phytoestrogens/flavonoids, such as genistein, naringenin, acacetin, and kaempferol, potentiated the cytotoxicity of SN-38 and mitoxantrone in BCRP-transduced K562 (K562/BCRP) cells. Some glycosylated flavonoids, such as naringenin-7-glucoside, also effectively inhibited BCRP. These flavonoids showed marginal effect on the drug sensitivity of K562 cells. Genistein and naringenin reversed neither P-glycoprotein-mediated vincristine resistance nor multidrug resistance-related protein 1-mediated VP-16 resistance. Genistein and naringenin increased cellular accumulation of topotecan in K562/BCRP cells. K562/BCRP cells also accumulated less [3H]genistein than K562 cells. [3H]genistein transport in the basal-to-apical direction was greater in BCRP-transduced LLC-PK1 (LLC/BCRP) cells, which express exogenous BCRP in the apical membrane, than in parental cells. Fumitremorgin C abolished the increased transport of [3H]genistein in LLC/BCRP cells compared with parental cells. TLC analysis revealed that genistein was transported in its native form but not in its metabolized form. These results suggest that genistein is among the natural substrates of BCRP and competitively inhibits BCRP-mediated drug efflux. The results have two important clinical implications: (a) flavonoids and glycosylated flavonoids may be useful in overcoming BCRP-mediated drug resistance in tumor cells; and (b) coadministration of flavonoids with BCRP-substrate antitumor agents may alter the pharmacokinetics and consequently increase the toxicity of specific antitumor agents in cancer patients.
Automatic design of a control interface for a synthetic face

Getting synthetic faces to display natural facial expressions is essential to enhance the interaction between human users and virtual characters. Yet traditional facial control techniques provide precise but complex sets of control parameters, which are not adapted for non-expert users. In this article, we present a system that generates a simple, 2-Dimensional interface that offers an efficient control over the facial expressions of any synthetic character. The interface generation process relies on the analysis of the deformation of a real human face. The principal geometrical and textural variation patterns of the real face are detected and automatically reorganized onto a low-dimensional space. This control space can then be easily adapted to pilot the deformations of synthetic faces. The resulting virtual character control interface makes it easy to produce varied emotional facial expressions, both extreme and subtle. In addition, the continuous nature of the interface allows the production of coherent temporal sequences of facial animation.
Crustal Heating and Quiescent Emission from Transiently Accreting Neutron Stars

Nuclear reactions occurring at densities ≈ 1012 g cm-3 in the crust of a transiently accreting neutron star efficiently maintain the core at a temperature ≈ (5-10)×107 K. When accretion halts, the envelope relaxes to a thermal equilibrium set by the flux from the hot core, as if the neutron star were newly born. For the time-averaged accretion rates (≲10-10 M☉ yr-1) typical of low-mass X-ray transients, standard neutrino cooling is unimportant and the core thermally reradiates the deposited heat. The resulting luminosity is ~5×1032-5×1033 ergs s-1 and agrees with many observations of transient neutron stars in quiescence. Confirmation of this mechanism would strongly constrain rapid neutrino cooling mechanisms for neutron stars (e.g., a pion condensate). Thermal emission had previously been dismissed as a predominant source of quiescent emission since blackbody spectral fits implied an emitting area much smaller than a neutron star's surface. However, as with thermal emission from radio pulsars, fits with realistic emergent spectra will imply a substantially larger emitting area. Other emission mechanisms, such as accretion or a pulsar shock, can also operate in quiescence and generate intensity and spectral variations over short timescales. Indeed, quiescent accretion may produce gravitationally redshifted metal photoionization edges in the quiescent spectra (detectable with AXAF and XMM). We discuss past observations of Aql X-1 and note that the low-luminosity (less than 1034 ergs s-1) X-ray sources in globular clusters and the Be star/X-ray transients are excellent candidates for future study.
ECONOMIC AND MARKET PREDICTORS OF INSOLVENCIES IN THE LIFE-HEALTH INSURANCE INDUSTRY

This study identifies factors exogenous to individual insurers that are statistically related to the overall rate of life-health insurer insolvencies. This is a departure from the methodologies of prior studies, which have focused primarily on firm-specific characteristics in assessing insolvency risk. Empirical analysis is based on quarterly data from 1972 through 1994. Results indicate that life-health insurer insolvencies are positively related to increases in long-term interest rates, personal income, unemployment, the stock market, and to the number of insurers, and negatively related to real estate returns. Findings support the hypothesis that economic and market variables are important predictors of life-health insurer failure rates.
Database Program Conversion: A Framework For Research

As requirements change, database administrators come under pressure to change the schema which is a description of the database structure. Although writing a new schema is a relatively easy job and transforming the database to match the schema can be accomplished with a modest effort, transforming the numerous programs which operate on the database often requires enormous effort. This interim report describes previous research, defines the problem and proposes a framework for research on the automatic conversion of database programs to match the schema transformations. The approach is based on a precise description of the data structures, integrity constraints, and permissible operations. This work will help designers of manual and computer aided conversion facilities, database administrators who are considering conversions and developers of future database management systems, which will have ease of conversion as a design goal.
Online-Structural Testing of Routers in Network on Chip

3 Abstract: The routers are one of the critical components of Network on chip. Occurrence a failure in them causes crucial effects on communication of cores and reliability of NoC. In this paper we will propose a test wrapper for routers that testing the routers online and structurally. The proposed wrapper simulated and the results captured and showed in waveform figures.
Attaching boundary planes to irreducible open 3-manifolds

Given any connected, open 3-manifold $U$ having finitely many ends, a non-compact 3-manifold $M$ is constructed having the following properties: the interior of $M$ is homeomorphic to $U$; the boundary of $M$ is the disjoint union of finitely many planes; $M$ is not almost compact; $M$ is eventually end-irreducible; there are no proper, incompressible embeddings of $S^1 \times \bold R$ in $M$; every compact subset of $M$ is contained in a larger compact subset whose complement is anannular; there is a compact subset of $M$ whose complement is $\bold P^2$-irreducible. If $U$ is irreducible it also has the following two properties: every proper, non-trivial plane in $M$ is boundary-parallel; every proper surface in $M$ each component of which has non-empty boundary and is non-compact and simply connected lies in a collar on $\partial M$. This construction can be chosen so that $M$ admits no homeomorphisms which take one boundary plane to another or reverse orientation. For the given $U$ there are uncountably many non-homeomorphic such $M$. Two auxiliary results may be of independent interest. First, general conditions are given under which infinitely many ``trivial'' compact components of the intersection of two proper, non-compact surfaces in an irreducible 3-manifold can be removed by an ambient isotopy. Second, $n$ component tangles in a 3-ball are constructed such that every non-empty union of components of the tangle has hyperbolic exterior.