Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
SogouT-16: A New Web Corpus to Embrace IR Research

Web collection is essential for many Web based researches such as Web Information Retrieval (IR), Web data mining, Corpus linguistics and so on. However, it is usually expensive and time-consuming to collect a large scale of Web pages in lab-based environment and public-available collection becomes a necessity for these researches. In this study, we present a Chinese Web collection, SogouT-16, which is the largest free-of-charge public Chinese Web collection so far. We provide a variety of descriptive characteristics of SogouT-16 and discuss its adoption in a newly-designed ad-hoc retrieval task in NTCIR-13, We Want Web. SogouT-16 also provides online retrieval service and contains a number of auxiliary resources including hyperlink structure graph, query logs, word embedding, and etc. We believe that SogouT-16 will provide new opportunities for novel investigations and applications in IR and other related communities.
Crossflow Microfiltration in the Dairy Industry

Since their introduction in the 1960s, pressure driven, crossflow or tangential filtration membrane technologies have become important in the food processing industries. The dairy industry currently uses crossflow membrane technologies for applications such as fractionation of the casein and whey proteins, whey protein concentration, demineralization of whey, removal of somatic cells and bacteria from milk, and milk concentration to save transport costs (Pouliot, 2008; Gésan-Guiziou, 2010). Membranes are also used alone or with the evaporation step in the manufacture of milk powders, and are increasingly being used in the development of new dairy-based beverages, fermented milk beverages and yogurt products. They are also finding a place in clean-in-place (CIP) processes to recover cleaning agents or to recover water used in processing (Alvarez et al., 2007; Luo et al., 2012). Four types of membranes are used by the dairy industry: reverse osmosis (RO), nanofiltration (NF), ultrafiltration (UF) and microfiltration (MF). The operating parameters for crossflow filtration membranes are shown in Figure 1.1. The pressure-driven feed, with flow rate, QF, flows through themembrane channel parallel to the surface of the membrane. The applied pressure, PF, must overcome the osmotic pressure, πF, of the feed solution (Cheryan, 1998). The crossflow velocity (CFV), the velocity of the feed as it flows parallel to the membrane through the channel, has a sweeping effect thatminimizes build-up of the feed particles on themembrane surface. Some of the feed stream containing the smaller molecules flows through the walls of the membrane leaving as the permeate, with flow rate, QP, and pressure PP. QP is often reported as the permeate flux, J, defined as the volume of permeate per unit membrane surface area per time. PP has a gauge pressure reading of 0.0 if the stream
Taint Dependency Sequences: A Characterization of Insecure Execution Paths Based on Input-Sensitive Cause Sequences

Numerous software vulnerabilities can be activated only with dedicated user inputs. Taint analysis is a security check which consists in looking for possible dependency chains between user inputs and vulnerable statements (like array accesses). Most of the existing static taint analysis tools produce some warnings on potentially vulnerable program locations. It is then up to the developer to analyze these results by scanning the possible execution paths that may lead to these locations with unsecured user inputs. We present a Taint Dependency Sequences Calculus, based on a fine-grain data and control taint analysis, that aims to help the developer in this task by providing some information on the set of paths that need to be analyzed. Following some ideas introduced in [1], [2], we also propose some metrics to characterize these paths in term of "dangerousness". This approach is illustrated with the help of the Verisec Suite [3] and by describing a prototype, called STAC.
Fever and Antipyretic Use in Children

Fever in a child is one of the most common clinical symptoms managed by pediatricians and other health care providers and a frequent cause of parental concern. Many parents administer antipyretics even when there is minimal or no fever, because they are concerned that the child must maintain a “normal” temperature. Fever, however, is not the primary illness but is a physiologic mechanism that has beneficial effects in fighting infection. There is no evidence that fever itself worsens the course of an illness or that it causes long-term neurologic complications. Thus, the primary goal of treating the febrile child should be to improve the child's overall comfort rather than focus on the normalization of body temperature. When counseling the parents or caregivers of a febrile child, the general well-being of the child, the importance of monitoring activity, observing for signs of serious illness, encouraging appropriate fluid intake, and the safe storage of antipyretics should be emphasized. Current evidence suggests that there is no substantial difference in the safety and effectiveness of acetaminophen and ibuprofen in the care of a generally healthy child with fever. There is evidence that combining these 2 products is more effective than the use of a single agent alone; however, there are concerns that combined treatment may be more complicated and contribute to the unsafe use of these drugs. Pediatricians should also promote patient safety by advocating for simplified formulations, dosing instructions, and dosing devices.
Structure – ADME relationship : still a long way to go ?

Expert Opinion on Drug Metabolism & Toxicology colour figure order form All figures will appear in colour online free of charge. Print issue colour reproduction will only be available if the author contributes to the associated costs. Please complete this form if you require any figures in your manuscript to be printed in colour. Completed forms should be returned to the Production Editor. Article title:
Analysis of printed patch antenna array for 37 GHz point-to-point wireless links

In this article, a printed patch antenna array for 37 GHz point-to-point wireless links is analyzed. The antenna array consists of five elements with rectangular patch and uniform distribution. It has a compact size of 30.25 × 9.5 mm with operating frequency at 37 GHz that covers future 5G applications. The designed antenna using a substrate with a relative dielectric permittivity of 2.2 and a thickness of 0.508 mm with 50 Ω Sub Miniature version A (SMA) connector as a feeding. The proposed antenna provides a wide bandwidth, directional radiation pattern and high gain.
Cost-Effectiveness of Intravenous Thrombolysis With Alteplase Within a 3-Hour Window After Acute Ischemic Stroke

Background and Purpose— The aim of this study was to assess the costs and cost-effectiveness of intravenous thrombolysis treatment with alteplase (Actilyse) of acute ischemic stroke with 24-hour in-house neurology coverage and use of magnetic resonance imaging. Methods— A health economic model was designed to calculate the marginal cost-effectiveness ratios for time spans of 1, 2, 3 and 30 years. Effect data were extracted from a meta-analysis of six large-scale randomized and placebo-controlled studies of thrombolytic therapy with alteplase. Cost data were extracted from thrombolysis treatment at Aarhus Hospital, Denmark, and from previously published literature. Results— The calculated cost-effectiveness ratio after the first year was $55 591 US per quality-adjusted life-year (base case). After the second year, computation of the cost-effectiveness ratio showed that thrombolysis was cost-effective. The long-term computations (30 years) showed that thrombolysis was a dominant strategy compared with conservative treatment given the model premises. Conclusions— A high-quality thrombolysis treatment with 24-hour in-house neurology coverage and magnetic resonance imaging might not be cost-effective in the short term compared with conservative treatment. In the long term, there are potentially large-scale health economic cost savings.
Scrub Typhus: An Emerging Threat

Scrub typhus is caused by Orientia tsutsugamushi (formerly Rickettsia) and is transmitted to humans by an arthropod vector of the Trombiculidae family (Leptotrombidium deliense and L. akamushi). It is the most common re-emerging Rickettsial infection in India and many other South East Asian countries. In fact, scrub typhus is confined geographically to the Asia Pacific region, a billion people are at risk and nearly a million cases are reported every year. Scrub typhus appears particularly to be distributed in the tsutsugamushi triangle which is distributed over a very wide area of 13 million km2 bound by Japan in the east, through China, the Philippines, tropical Australia in the south, and west through India, Pakistan, possibly to Tibet to Afghanistan, and southern parts of the USSR in the north. Eschar is the characteristic lesion that starts as a vesicular lesion at the site of mite feeding. Later, an ulcer forms with black necrotic center and an erythematous border along with regional lymphadenopathy. Other features are fever, maculopapular rash starting from the trunk, and spreading to the limbs. It may affect the central nervous system, cardiovascular system, renal, respiratory, and gastrointestinal systems. Serious complication in the form of myocarditis, pneumonia, meningoencephalitis, acute renal failure, gastrointestinal bleeding, and even acute respiratory distress syndrome may develop. Tetracycline or chloramphenicol remains the main stay of therapy.
Molecular Diagnosis of Surgical Margins and Local Recurrence in Head and Neck Cancer Patients

Purpose: Approximately 10–30% of surgically treated head and neck cancer patients develop local recurrences while the resection margins are histologically tumor free. These recurrences may arise from cancer cells left behind but not detected by the pathologist, or they may develop from precursor lesions adjacent to the tumor that were not completely resected. We have investigated whether TP53-mutated DNA in the surgical margins is suitable to identify patients with head and neck squamous cell carcinoma at risk for local and locoregional recurrence. Experimental Design: In a prospective cohort study of 76 patients with histologically tumor-free margins, the presence of TP53-mutated DNA was determined in the surgical margins using the phage plaque assay and correlated to clinical outcome. Immunostaining of the molecular-positive margins for mutated p53 protein was used to identify whether unresected precursor lesions or residual tumor cells were left behind. Results: The absence of TP53-mutated DNA in surgical margins was significantly associated with remaining free of local and locoregional recurrence (P = 0.027 and P = 0.028, respectively). Moreover, the presence of TP53-mutated DNA in the surgical margins was an independent prognosticator for locoregional recurrence (relative risk = 7.1; P = 0.021; 95% confidence interval, 0.9–56). In 20% of the cases, the presence of TP53-mutated DNA in the surgical margins was found to be related to the presence of tumor-related precursor lesions. Conclusions: This study shows the value of TP53-mutated DNA as a molecular marker to predict locally recurrent head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. The observation that all patients who were negative for TP53-mutated DNA in the surgical margins remained free of local recurrence raises hope that molecular analysis of histologically tumor-free surgical margins can be exploited to decide on postoperative radiotherapy. Furthermore, our data provide evidence that local recurrences originate mainly from tumor cells left behind but also originate, in part, from unresected precursor lesions.
A Novel Method for Blind Extraction of Signals using Empirical Mode Decomposition of Chaotic Energy Accumulation Zone in Underdetermined Systems

Starting from wavelet analysis of chaotic signals’ time-frequency characteristic, we propose a new harmonic signals extraction method using Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD). We analyze features of chaotic signals using wavelet transform to determine the parameters of harmonic signals and interference signals. The harmonic signals as source signals are hidden within chaotic energy accumulation zone. We use analog Gaussian channel noise generator on the observed signals according to the system requirement. We make empirical mode analysis of observed signals to establish virtual accepting arrays which implement the desired signal extracted from the accumulation zone in underdetermined system. This will reduce the additive effects of the channel noise on the extracted signals. Simulations verified the validity and general application of the method.
HDR Video Coding based on a temporally constrained Tone Mapping Operator

Given its potential for more realistic rendering and enhanced user experience, High Dynamic Range (HDR) imaging is raising a lot of interest both in industry and academia. In this context, efficient representation and coding techniques are needed, as HDR video entails significantly higher raw data rate. In this paper, we present a temporally constrained content-adaptive Tone Mapping Operator (TMO) in order to convert the input HDR video into a reduced bit depth video sequence which is then encoded using High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC). As the proposed TMO simultaneously takes into account the statistical characteristics of the input frame while better preserving temporal coherence of the tone mapped video sequence, it leads to improved coding efficiency. Experimental results show that the proposed technique compares favorably with existing methods in terms of rate-distortion when using the HDR-VDP-2.2. 1 quality metric.
Mapping Robinia Pseudoacacia Forest Health Conditions by Using Combined Spectral, Spatial, and Textural Information Extracted from IKONOS Imagery and Random Forest Classifier

The textural and spatial information extracted from very high resolution (VHR) remote sensing imagery provides complementary information for applications in which the spectral information is not sufficient for identification of spectrally similar landscape features. In this study grey-level co-occurrence matrix (GLCM) textures and a local statistical analysis Getis statistic (Gi), computed from IKONOS multispectral (MS) imagery acquired from the Yellow River Delta in China, along with a random forest (RF) classifier, were used to discriminate Robina pseudoacacia tree health levels. Specifically, eight GLCM texture features (mean, variance, homogeneity, dissimilarity, contrast, entropy, angular second moment, and correlation) were first calculated from IKONOS NIR band (Band 4) to determine an optimal window size (13 × 13) and an optimal direction (45°). Then, the optimal window size and direction were applied to the three other IKONOS MS bands (blue, green, and red) for calculating the eight GLCM textures. Next, an optimal distance value (5) and an optimal neighborhood rule (Queen’s case) were determined for calculating the four Gi features from the four IKONOS MS bands. Finally, different RF classification results of the three forest health conditions were created: (1) an overall accuracy (OA) of 79.5% produced using the four MS band reflectances only; (2) an OA of 97.1% created with the eight GLCM features calculated from IKONOS Band 4 with the optimal window size of 13 × 13 and direction 45°; (3) an OA of 93.3% created with the all 32 GLCM features calculated from the four IKONOS MS bands with a window size of 13 × 13 and direction of 45°; (4) an OA of 94.0% created using the four Gi features calculated from the four IKONOS MS bands with the optimal distance value of 5 and Queen’s neighborhood rule; and (5) an OA of 96.9% created with the combined 16 spectral (four), spatial (four), and textural (eight) features. The most important feature ranked by RF classifier was GLCM texture mean calculated from Band 4, followed by Gi feature calculated from Band 4. The experimental results demonstrate that (a) both textural and spatial information was more useful than spectral information in determining the Robina pseudoacacia forest health conditions; and (b) the IKONOS NIR band was more powerful than visible bands in quantifying varying degrees of forest crown dieback.
Generalized Decision Scoring Rules: Statistical, Computational, and Axiomatic Properties

We pursue a design by social choice, evaluation by statistics and computer science paradigm to build a principled framework for discovering new social choice mechanisms with desirable statistical, computational, and social choice axiomatic properties. Our new framework is called generalized decision scoring rules (GDSRs), which naturally extend generalized scoring rules [Xia and Conitzer 2008] to arbitrary preference space and decision space, including sets of alternatives with fixed or unfixed size, rankings, and sets of rankings. We show that GDSRs cover a wide range of existing mechanisms including MLEs, Chamberlin and Courant rule, and resolute, irresolute, and preference function versions of many commonly studied voting rules. We provide a characterization of statistical consistency for any GDSR w.r. t. any statistical model and asymptotically tight bounds on the convergence rate. We investigate the complexity of winner determination and a wide range of strategic behavior called vote operations for all GDSRs, and prove a general phase transition theorem on the minimum number of vote operations for the strategic entity to succeed. We also characterize GDSRs by two social choice normative properties: anonymity and finite local consistency.
A Theory of Feature Learning

Feature Learning aims to extract relevant information contained in data sets in an automated fashion. It is driving force behind the current deep learning trend, a set of methods that have had widespread empirical success. What is lacking is a theoretical understanding of different feature learning schemes. This work provides a theoretical framework for feature learning and then characterizes when features can be learnt in an unsupervised fashion. We also provide means to judge the quality of features via rate-distortion theory and its generalizations.
[POSTER] Toward Enhancing Robustness of DR System: Ranking Model for Background Inpainting

A method for blindly predicting inpainted image quality is proposed for enhancing the robustness of diminished reality (DR), which uses inpainting to remove unwanted objects by replacing them with background textures in real time. The method maps from inpainted image features to subjective image quality scores without the need for reference images. It enables more complex background textures to be applied to DR.
Financial Structure and Corporate Growth, Evidence From Italian Panel Data

We study the relationships between firm financial structure and growth for a large sample of Italian firms observed from 1998 to 2003. We expand upon existing analyses testing whether liquidity constraints affect firm performance by considering among growth determinants also firm debt structure. Panel regression analyses show that more liquid firms tend to grow more. However, firms do not use their capital to expand, but rather to increase debt. We also find that firm growth is highly fragile as it is positively correlated with non financial liabilities and it is not sustained by a long term debt maturity. Finally, quantile regressions suggest that fast growing firms are characterized by higher growth cashflow sensitivities and heavily rely on external debt, but seem to be less bank backed than the rest of the sample. Overall, our findings suggest that the link between firms investment and expansion decisions is far more complicated than postulated by standard tests of investment cashflow sensitivities.
An empirical study of critical success factors of project governance in China

It is important to have a better understanding of “what is effective project governance” and “how to govern the project effectively”. The paper aims to clarify the definition of project governance, identify the effective project governance standards, and explore critical success factors based on project governance models. A questionnaire survey was conducted in China and a list of critical success factors of project governance was quantitatively prioritized. The empirical results indicated that stakeholder management is the most important factor of project governance success, which provides a reference for further research and project practice.
Formal verification at higher levels of abstraction

Most formal verification tools on the market convert a high-level register transfer level (RTL) design into a bit-level model. Algorithms that operate at the bit-level are unable to exploit the structure provided by the higher abstraction levels, and thus, are less scalable. This tutorial surveys recent advances in formal verification using high-level models. We present word-level verification with predicate abstraction and satisfiability modulo theories (SMT) solvers. We then describe techniques for term-level modeling and ways to combine word-level and term-level approaches for scalable verification.
HOX Gene Aberrant Expression in Skin Melanoma: A Review

The homeobox family and its subset of HOX gene products represent a family of transcription factors directing DNA-protein and protein-protein interactions. In the embryo, they are central regulators in cell differentiation during morphogenesis. A series of genes of the four HOX gene clusters A, B, C, and D were reported to show aberrant expressions in oncogenesis, particularly in cutaneous malignant melanoma (CMM). They are involved in cell proliferation and progression in the CMM metastatic path. We present relevant peer-reviewed literature findings about the aberrant expression of HOX genes in CMM. The number of CMM cell nuclei exhibiting aberrant HOX protein expression appears correlated with tumour progression.