Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Multiplexing Schemes in Single-Electron Technology

This paper investigates multiplexing schemes in single-electron technology (SET). The study focuses on the behavior of two multiplexing schemes in combination with gates subject to geometric variations affecting their elementary components (capacitors). The two schemes under investigation are MAJORITY- and NANDmultiplexing. First, the elementary gates are compared in terms of their intrinsic probability of failure with respect to variations. Secondly, the two multiplexing schemes are weighted against the reliability enhancements they are able to bring into the system. This study gives a deeper insight into the behavior of fault-tolerant multiplexing schemes. It also shows how the logic styles, as well as the technology, could affect the overall reliability of a multiplexed system. Such aspects have been normally neglected, but should be carefully considered in the design of future nanoarchitectures.
Evaluation of malaria control programme in three selected districts of Assam, India.

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES To ensure that the activities of Malaria Control Programme were taking place in effective and judicious manner, an intensive monitoring and supervision of various activities of the programme were carried out in Karbi-Anglong, Cachar and Nagaon districts of Assam, India during July-October 2007. METHODS Questionnaire-based protocol prepared by the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme was used to evaluate the activities. Sixteen villages belonging to five different Primary Health Centres (PHCs) of three districts were selected for investigations. RESULTS Results of monitoring of indoor residual spraying (IRS) revealed inadequate spraying coverage. Although recorded to be about 69-99%, but apparently it was 17-43% in the districts investigated. Cross-examination of 180 blood smears (90 positive and negative each) in the laboratories of the study PHCs, revealed discrepancy in the results of 67 blood smears. Maximum (44%) discrepancy was observed in positive blood smears and 30% in negative blood smears. Out of 22 Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHA) interrogated, none was found involved in antimalaria activities. However, out of 13 fever treatment depots monitored, one was found partially functional. Criteria laid down for preparation of micro action plan were not followed properly in any of the districts sruveyed. Various important components of the programme like constitution of Village Health Sanitation Committee, information education communication (IEC) activities, capacity building, use of larvivorous fishes, supervision, etc. were not exercised properly. However, 100% community acceptance was recorded for insecticide-treated bed nets in the villages surveyed. Indiscriminate use of rapid diagnostic test kits yielded poor and unsatisfactory response. Declining trend of malaria was observed during 2002-06 in Districts Nagaon and Karbi-Anglong (up to 2005). In District Cachar, however, a little increasing trend was observed during 2002-04. CONCLUSION The results of this investigation revealed that the malaria control programme had been jeopardized seriously due to improper implementation of vector control measures, lack of adequate professional support and varied commitment on the part of the State Government. It can be concluded that long-term malaria control strategy should be based on generation of increased awareness on the disease and various methods of its control, health care access and administrative commitment for increased prosperity in resource-poor settings. The observation also necessitates further in-depth evaluation with appropriate regular active surveillance round the year with prompt detection and treatment facilities in order to control malaria effectively in these districts.
An iterative hard thresholding algorithm with improved convergence for low-rank tensor recovery

Recovering low-rank tensors from undercomplete linear measurements is a computationally challenging problem of great practical importance. Most existing approaches circumvent the intractability of the tensor rank by considering instead the multilinear rank. Among them, the recently proposed tensor iterative hard thresholding (TIHT) algorithm is simple and has low cost per iteration, but converges quite slowly. In this work, we propose a new step size selection heuristic for accelerating its convergence, relying on a condition which (ideally) ensures monotonic decrease of its target cost function. This condition is obtained by studying TIHT from the standpoint of the majorization-minimization strategy which underlies the normalized IHT algorithm used for sparse vector recovery. Simulation results are presented for synthetic data tensor recovery and brain MRI data tensor completion, showing that the performance of TIHT is notably improved by our heuristic, with a small to moderate increase of the cost per iteration.
Assessing the sociology of sport: On utopianism and pragmatism

On the 50th anniversary of the ISSA and IRSS, an influential scholar on sport participation, development and governance, Bart Vanreusal, considers the research project of the sociology of sport in light of the dynamics between uptopianism and pragmatism. Reflecting on Thomas More’s work Utopia, published in 1516, Vanreusal notes that, in contrast to other fields, utopianism has not had a significant impact on the sociology of sport; rather, opposing viewpoints using critical perspectives have had sometimes dystopian views on sport cultures. In considering the challenges and future of the sociology of sport, it is argued that utopian views and ideologies of human harmony and a better world have supported major social movements in sport such as Olympism and Sport for All. Indeed, utopian-based practices such as Olympism and Sport for All did result in a proliferation of pragmatic, and often functionalist, research. While sociology of sport over the last 50 years has managed to scrutinize present social realities, its resistance to pragmatism has hindered building new research upon its findings to address new and future social realities. Neoutopianism, featuring reality-based beliefs in large and small scale models for social change and a better world through sport, can drive the research agenda in the future and help rebuild sport cultures.
A standardised protocol for measuring phenoloxidase and prophenoloxidase in the honey bee, Apis mellifera

The prophenoloxidase activating system (ProPO-AS) is an integral part of the constitutive innate immune response in insects, the products of which are commonly assayed to assess an individual’s ability to respond to immune challenges. However, there is considerable variation in the methodologies associated with these assays, and as such, it is not always clear how to interpret results. We have optimised assays for measuring phenoloxidase in its active (PO) and zymogen (ProPO) forms in the honey bee, Apis mellifera. Contrary to results for other insects, we found that the activator α-chymotrypsin, when used at a low concentration (0.5 mg mL−1), combined with a minimal activation time (5 min), provided optimal conditions for assaying ProPO. In addition, a saturated L-dopa solution was required for assaying both PO and ProPO. The results highlight the importance of defining the working parameters of each assay to be species-specific.
Retention of dopamine 2 receptor mRNA and absence of the protein in craniospinal and extracranial metastasis of a malignant prolactinoma: a case report.

OBJECTIVES The case presented here describes the clinical evolution of a malignant prolactinoma with occurrence of intra- and extra-cranial metastases. In this case, the presence of dopamine 2 receptor (D2R) was studied at the mRNA and protein level, in order to understand the pathological background of the resistance to treatment with different dopamine agonists. DESIGN Together with an extensive description of the clinical history of this case, a combination of in vitro and in vivo techniques was performed to provide the basis of the dopamine resistance developed in the course of the disease. METHOD A comparison of the D2R was performed in specimens obtained at presentation of the disease compared with autoptic specimens derived from local invasion and metastasis using in situ hybridization and immunohistochemical techniques. RESULTS Intact D2R mRNA was found in the primitive tumor and metastatic tissues, whereas protein for the same receptor was present only in the tissues derived from neurosurgical operations and not in the metastases obtained post-mortem. CONCLUSION This is the first report of the absence of D2R protein despite the retention of the transcript in an advanced stage of a malignant prolactinoma. The findings of this single case suggest the hypothesis that postranscriptional mechanisms may contribute to the development of dopamine resistance in prolactinomas.
Fuzzy Rough Set and Information Entropy Based Feature Selection for Credit Scoring

As the credit industry has been growing rapidly, huge number of consumers’ credit data are collected by the credit department of the bank and credit scoring has become a very important issue. Usually, a large amount of redundant information and features are involved in the credit dataset, which leads to lower accuracy and higher complexity of the credit scoring model, so, effective feature selection methods are necessary for credit dataset with huge number of features. In this paper, a novel approach to credit scoring feature selection based on fuzzy-rough model and information entropy is proposed. Three UCI credit datasets are selected to demonstrate the competitive performance of the presented method comparing with some other methods. Experiments show the proposed method get a better performance comparing with the classical rough set approaches.
Major malformations of the central nervous system in Hungary.

Data on all major central nervous system mal formations which occurred in children born in Budapest in the years 1963-67 were collected. They were divided into four categories? anencephaly, spina bifida cystica, encephalo-meningocele, and congenital hydrocephalus. During the period of the survey, 99*7 % of Budapest deliveries took place in hospital; in Hungary the proportion was 97-8%. Data were compiled from the following sources: (1) all of the 31 maternity hospitals of Budapest, where the personal data and obstetric histories of malformed infants were abstracted from the obstetric registers; (2) all of the 26 departments of pathological ana tomy in Budapest, where data relating to infants who had died of CNS malformations were taken from the necropsy records; (3) the register of Heim Pal Paediatric Hospital, which lists congenital malformations reported from the whole of Hungary including Budapest. This register was set up by directive of the Ministry of Health (40.827/1962); (4) all of the eight surgical paediatric departments in Budapest, where data of infants treated surgically for CNS malformations were obtained. The distribution of cases from the different sources is shown in Figure 1. The collected data of 'index patients' were listed on 'personal cards' in order to avoid duplication of records. While planning the survey, several ways of forming an adequate control group were explored and eventually it was decided to use data of the general population of births reported in demographic y arbooks. In a dition to the Budapest births, for which fairly complete data were obtained, details of 963 country cases were also collected, mainly from the register of congenital malformations, but these were not included in the incidence studies and served only as additional material for examining the epidemio logical characteristics of malformations and the type of inheritance. A questionnaire with reply envelope and stamp attached was sent to the mothers of affected infants
The Structure of Glycosaminoglycans and their Interactions with Proteins

Glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) are important complex carbohydrates that participate in many biological processes through the regulation of their various protein partners. Biochemical, structural biology and molecular modelling approaches have assisted in understanding the molecular basis of such interactions, creating an opportunity to capitalize on the large structural diversity of GAGs in the discovery of new drugs. The complexity of GAG–protein interactions is in part due to the conformational flexibility and underlying sulphation patterns of GAGs, the role of metal ions and the effect of pH on the affinity of binding. Current understanding of the structure of GAGs and their interactions with proteins is here reviewed: the basic structures and functions of GAGs and their proteoglycans, their clinical significance, the three‐dimensional features of GAGs, their interactions with proteins and the molecular modelling of heparin binding sites and GAG–protein interactions. This review focuses on some key aspects of GAG structure–function relationships using classical examples that illustrate the specificity of GAG–protein interactions, such as growth factors, anti‐thrombin, cytokines and cell adhesion molecules. New approaches to the development of GAG mimetics as possible new glycotherapeutics are also briefly covered.
Citrate-Permeable Channels in the Plasma Membrane of Cluster Roots from White Lupin1

White lupin (Lupinus albus) is well adapted to phosphorus deficiency by developing cluster roots that release large amounts of citrate into the rhizosphere to mobilize the sparingly soluble phosphorus. To determine the mechanism underlying citrate release from cluster roots, we isolated protoplasts from different types of roots of white lupin plants grown in phosphorus-replete (+P) and phosphorus-deficient (−P) conditions and used the patch-clamp technique to measure the whole-cell currents flowing across plasma membrane of these protoplasts. Two main types of anion conductance were observed in protoplasts prepared from cluster root tissue: (1) an inwardly rectifying anion conductance (IRAC) activated by membrane hyperpolarization, and (2) an outwardly rectifying anion conductance (ORAC) that became more activated with membrane depolarization. Although ORAC was an outward rectifier, it did allow substantial inward current (anion efflux) to occur. Both conductances showed citrate permeability, with IRAC being more selective for citrate3− than Cl− (PCit/PCl = 26.3), while ORAC was selective for Cl− over citrate (PCl/PCit = 3.7). Both IRAC and ORAC were sensitive to the anion channel blocker anthracene-9-carboxylic acid. These currents were also detected in protoplasts derived from noncluster roots of −P plants, as well as from normal (noncluster) roots of plants grown with 25 μm phosphorus (+P). No differences were observed in the magnitude or frequency of IRAC and ORAC currents between the cluster roots and noncluster roots of −P plants. However, the IRAC current from +P plants occurred less frequently than in the −P plants. IRAC was unaffected by external phosphate, but ORAC had reduced inward current (anion efflux) when phosphate was present in the external medium. Our data suggest that IRAC is the main pathway for citrate efflux from white lupin roots, but ORAC may also contribute to citrate efflux.
A simple 3D face tracking method based on depth information

3D face tracking is useful in many applications such as face recognition, analysis of facial expressions and entertainment. Most existing 3D face tracking methods employ multiple cameras and all cameras need to be calibrated first before tracking. The complexity of these methods restricts the applications of them. This paper presents a new simple face tracking method which is based on a stereo vision camera system. All cameras in this stereo vision camera system are pre-calibrated and the system can provide accurate depth information of the scene. The proposed tracking method adopts KLT and template matching to track 2D facial features. Then the stereo vision camera system is used to obtain corresponding depth information of these features. In order to achieve robust tracking, some spatial constraints of these features are employed. Experiment results indicate that the proposed method can achieve robust and accurate 3D face tracking.
Instance or Prototype Selection for Function Approximation using Mutual Information

The problem of selecting the patterns to be learned by any model is usually not considered by the time of designing the concrete model but as a preprocessing step. Information theory provides a robust theoretical framework for performing input variable selection thanks to the concept of mutual information. The computation of the mutual information for regression tasks has been recently proposed providing good results in feature selection. This paper presents a new application of the concept of mutual information not to select the variables but to decide which prototypes should belong to the training data set in regression problems. The proposed methodology consists in deciding if a prototype should belong or not to the training set using as criteria the estimation of the mutual information between the variables. The novelty of the approach is to focus in prototype selection for regression problems instead of classification as the majority of the literature deals only with the last one. Other element that distinguish this work from others is that it is not proposed as an outlier identificator but as algorithm that determine the best subset of input vectors by the time of building a model to approximate it. As the experiment section shows, this new method is able to identify a high percentage of the real data set when it is applied to a highly distorted data sets.
X-Ray Observations of the Galactic Center with Suzaku(Chapter 5. The Galactic Center and Ridge Emissions, The Extreme Universe in the Suzaku Era)

The diffuse X-ray emissions from the Galactic center (GCDX) are observed with the X-ray Imaging Spectrometer (XIS) on Suzaku. The high-energy resolution and the lowbackground orbit provide excellent spectra of the GCDX. The results of the Galactic center (GC) observations are; (1) the origin of the 6.7/7.0 keV lines is not a charge exchange process, but is collisional excitation in hot plasma, (2) the majority of the X-ray emission is not an integrated flux of unresolved point sources, but is diffuse, (3) new SNR candidates are found and (4) the 6.4 keV line is not fluorescence by electrons but by X-rays.
Kinematic model to control the end-effector of a continuum robot for multi-axis processing

SUMMARY This paper presents a novel kinematic approach for controlling the end-effector of a continuum robot for in-situ repair/inspection in restricted and hazardous environments. Forward and inverse kinematic (IK) models have been developed to control the last segment of the continuum robot for performing multi-axis processing tasks using the last six Degrees of Freedom (DoF). The forward kinematics (FK) is proposed using a combination of Euler angle representation and homogeneous matrices. Due to the redundancy of the system, different constraints are proposed to solve the IK for different cases; therefore, the IK model is solved for bending and direction angles between (−π/2 to +π/2) radians. In addition, a novel method to calculate the Jacobian matrix is proposed for this type of hyper-redundant kinematics. The error between the results calculated using the proposed Jacobian algorithm and using the partial derivative equations of the FK map (with respect to linear and angular velocity) is evaluated. The error between the two models is found to be insignificant, thus, the Jacobian is validated as a method of calculating the IK for six DoF.
A hybrid finite-element method for the modeling of microcoils

This paper presents an original method for the modeling of microcoils at high frequency dedicated for different applications: radio frequency, nuclear magnetic resonance, nondestructive testing, etc. The aim of the modeling is to determine the elements of an electric equivalent circuit. A magneto-dynamic three-dimensional (3-D) finite-element formulation is used to calculate the resistance and the inductance of the microcoil at high frequency. Using the previous results, an electrostatic 3-D finite-element field analysis is then used to determine the capacitance. The method was tested by using an example of nuclear magnetic resonance microcoil. Numerical results obtained by the proposed method are compared with measurements and analytical results.
An investigation of vocal arousal dynamics in child-psychologist interactions using synchrony measures and a conversation-based model

Researchers from various disciplines are concerned with the study of affective phenomena, especially arousal. Expressed affective modulations, which reflect both an individual’s internal state and external factors, are central to the communicative process. Bone et al. (2012) developed a robust, unsupervised (rule-based) method which provides a scale-continuous, bounded arousal rating from the vocal signal. In this study, we investigate the joint-dynamics of child and psychologist vocal arousal in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) diagnostic interactions. Arousal synchrony is assessed with multiple methods. Results indicate that children with higher ASD severity tend to lead the arousal dynamics more, seemingly because the children aren’t as responsive to the psychologist’s affective modulations. A vocal arousal model is also proposed which incorporates social and conversational constructs. The model captures conversational signal relations, and is able to distinguish between high and low ASD severity at accuracies well-above chance.
Diversity of Nitrogen-Fixing Bacteria Associated with Switchgrass in the Native Tallgrass Prairie of Northern Oklahoma

ABSTRACT Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.) is a perennial C4 grass native to North America that is being developed as a feedstock for cellulosic ethanol production. Industrial nitrogen fertilizers enhance switchgrass biomass production but add to production and environmental costs. A potential sustainable alternative source of nitrogen is biological nitrogen fixation. As a step in this direction, we studied the diversity of nitrogen-fixing bacteria (NFB) associated with native switchgrass plants from the tallgrass prairie of northern Oklahoma (United States), using a culture-independent approach. DNA sequences from the nitrogenase structural gene, nifH, revealed over 20 putative diazotrophs from the alpha-, beta-, delta-, and gammaproteobacteria and the firmicutes associated with roots and shoots of switchgrass. Alphaproteobacteria, especially rhizobia, predominated. Sequences derived from nifH RNA indicated expression of this gene in several bacteria of the alpha-, beta-, delta-, and gammaproteobacterial groups associated with roots. Prominent among these were Rhizobium and Methylobacterium species of the alphaproteobacteria, Burkholderia and Azoarcus species of the betaproteobacteria, and Desulfuromonas and Geobacter species of the deltaproteobacteria.
Using Sequence Alignments to Predict Protein Structure and Stability With High Accuracy

We present a sequence-based probabilistic formalism that directly addresses co-operative effects in networks of interacting positions in proteins, providing significantly improved contact prediction, as well as accurate quantitative prediction of free energy changes due to non-additive effects of multiple mutations. In addition to these practical considerations, the agreement of our sequence-based calculations with experimental data for both structure and stability demonstrates a strong relation between the statistical distribution of protein sequences produced by natural evolutionary processes, and the thermodynamic stability of the structures to which these sequences fold.