Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A COMPARISON OF TRACKING ALGORITHM STATISTICS IN MULTITEMPORAL SAR IMAGES

The performance of a tracking algorithms considering remotely sensed data strongly depends on a correct statistical description of the data, i.e., its noise model. In [1], a new tracking algorithm which takes into account that SAR images are characterized by multiplicative noise structure is proposed. The objective of this paper is to compare the accuracy of recently proposed new tracking algorithm called as maximum likelihood (ML) texture tracking with the well-known tracking algorithms described in [2], [3]. Tracking algorithms define the displacement as the shift that yields the best fit between different images in time. However, the most common one, known as cross correlation, is not a maximum likelihood approach for SAR intensity images. It is the ML solution for optical data with an additive noise model and for complex SAR data following circular Gaussian statistics. For SAR intensity data, which follow the gamma distribution, cross correlation is not ML estimation. Therefore, traditional incoherent cross correlation is not optimal for SAR intensity images regarding its multiplicative speckle/noise model. The tree statistics, which are ML intensity tracking, coherent cross correlation and incoherent cross correlation, are compared on both simulated and real data for their efficacy in tracking. Even though a new intensity based tracking algorithm, which has been proposed in [1] especially for incoherent data sets, the analysis of the proposed techniques was also performed for correlated and partly correlated data sets. Therefore, this paper discuss the accuracy assessment of tracking algorithms, which mainly has two parts: the first, image processing including imagining geometry, signal theory, and etc., and the second, estimation theory. The accuracy assessment with real data is discussed regarding the measurement of glacier velocities. It will be demonstrated that the proposed technique is capable of robustly and precisely detecting the surface velocity field and velocity changes in time. [1] E. Erten, A. Reigber, O. Hellwich and P. Prats, ” Glacier Velocity Monitoring by Maximum Likelihood texture Tracking ”, IEEE Trans. Geoscience and Remote Sensing, vol. 47, Feb. 2008, accepted to be published. [2] R. Bamler and M. Eineder, ” Accuracy of differential shift estimation by correlation and split-band interferometry for wideband and delta-k SAR systems ”, IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Letters, vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 151-155, April 2005. [3] T. Strozzi, A. Luckman, T. Murray, U. Wegmuller, and C. Werner, ” Glacier motion estimation using SAR offset-tracking procedures ”, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sensing, vol. 40, no. 11, pp. 23842391, Nov. 2002.
Simulation Model and Instrument to Evaluate Replication Techniques

Fault tolerance in distributed systems relies heavily on some form of replication. Replication can also be used to reduce the access latency and the bandwidth consumption in large scale distributed systems. However, in case of large volumes of data, the replica placing strategy and the consistency algorithms become key factors for the performance of the data replication strategy. We present a simulation model designed to realistically evaluate replication solutions for large scale distributed systems. The model was implemented as an extension of the MONARC simulator. In this context, we present a scalable architecture designed to facilitate the adoption of data replication strategies in large scale distributed systems. The solution combines a hybrid replication model with a proposed fault tolerant strategy for data consistency. We present evaluation results of this strategy using the MONARC simulator.
A ribozyme that ligates RNA to protein

We have used a combination of in vitro selection and rational design to generate ribozymes that form a stable phosphoamide bond between the 5′ terminus of an RNA and a specific polypeptide. This reaction differs from that of previously identified ribozymes, although the product is analogous to the enzyme–nucleotidyl intermediates isolated during the reactions of certain proteinaceous enzymes, such as guanyltransferase, DNA ligase, and RNA ligase. Comparative sequence analysis of the isolated ribozymes revealed that they share a compact secondary structure containing six stems arranged in a four-helix junction and branched pseudoknot. An optimized version of the ribozyme reacts with substrate-fusion proteins, allowing it to be used to attach RNA tags to proteins both in vitro and within bacterial cells, suggesting a simple way to tag a specific protein with amplifiable information.
Two Distinct Ipsilateral Cortical Representations for Individuated Finger Movements

Movements of the upper limb are controlled mostly through the contralateral hemisphere. Although overall activity changes in the ipsilateral motor cortex have been reported, their functional significance remains unclear. Using human functional imaging, we analyzed neural finger representations by studying differences in fine-grained activation patterns for single isometric finger presses. We demonstrate that cortical motor areas encode ipsilateral movements in 2 fundamentally different ways. During unimanual ipsilateral finger presses, primary sensory and motor cortices show, underneath global suppression, finger-specific activity patterns that are nearly identical to those elicited by contralateral mirror-symmetric action. This component vanishes when both motor cortices are functionally engaged during bimanual actions. We suggest that the ipsilateral representation present during unimanual presses arises because otherwise functionally idle circuits are driven by input from the opposite hemisphere. A second type of representation becomes evident in caudal premotor and anterior parietal cortices during bimanual actions. In these regions, ipsilateral actions are represented as nonlinear modulation of activity patterns related to contralateral actions, an encoding scheme that may provide the neural substrate for coordinating bimanual movements. We conclude that ipsilateral cortical representations change their informational content and functional role, depending on the behavioral context.
An Active Learning System Using Smartphone for Improving Students Learning Concentration

In our previous work, it has been shown that the students can improve the learning process by using smartphones. For the professors of the university, it is difficult to offer all necessary information to the students. In addition, they cannot provide the information to satisfy all students because the quantity of knowledge of each student attending a lecture is different. Therefore, for the lectures of a higher level than intermediate level, the students should study the learning materials by themselves. In the previous work, it was presented an interactive learning process in order to improve the students learning motivation and the self-learning time. However, the progress speed of a lecture was not good. In this paper, to solve this problem, we propose an active learning system for student's self-learning.
The Propagation of Technology Management Taxonomies for Evaluating Investments in Information Systems

The management of Information Technology (IT) and Information Systems (IS) is considered a complex exercise by academics and practitioners alike. The reason for this is that there are ubiquitous portfolios of tangible and intangible benefits that are offered to an organization following the adoption of IT/IS that, in turn, all need managing to ensure realization. Organizations also have to take into account the direct and often larger indirect costs that are typically associated with IT/IS deployments. To provide managers with a critical insight into the management of new technology, this paper uses a case study research strategy to examine the technology management experiences of a leading U.K. manufacturing organization during its adoption of a vendor-supplied Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRPII) information system. Following the lack of attention given to human and organizational technology management factors while implementing MRPII, the vendor-based information system was later abandoned and deemed a failure. In addressing those technology management factors that were later identified as important, it was found that key employees were able to overcome a number of organizational barriers and develop and implement a bespoke MRPII system that significantly improved the organization's competitive position. Technology management taxonomies that contributed to the failure and later successful implementation of MRPII are identified and discussed. The organization's experiences in solving the problems associated with the implementation of their IS offers a learning opportunity for those companies that are seeking a competitive advantage through technology management.
11q13 is a susceptibility locus for hormone receptor positive breast cancer

A recent two‐stage genome‐wide association study (GWAS) identified five novel breast cancer susceptibility loci on chromosomes 9, 10, and 11. To provide more reliable estimates of the relative risk associated with these loci and investigate possible heterogeneity by subtype of breast cancer, we genotyped the variants rs2380205, rs1011970, rs704010, rs614367, and rs10995190 in 39 studies from the Breast Cancer Association Consortium (BCAC), involving 49,608 cases and 48,772 controls of predominantly European ancestry. Four of the variants showed clear evidence of association (P ≤ 3 × 10−9) and weak evidence was observed for rs2380205 (P = 0.06). The strongest evidence was obtained for rs614367, located on 11q13 (per‐allele odds ratio 1.21, P = 4 × 10−39). The association for rs614367 was specific to estrogen receptor (ER)‐positive disease and strongest for ER plus progesterone receptor (PR)‐positive breast cancer, whereas the associations for the other three loci did not differ by tumor subtype. Hum Mutat 33:1123–1132, 2012. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Twentieth century climate model response and climate sensitivity

Climate forcing and climate sensitivity are two key factors in understanding Earth's climate. There is considerable interest in decreasing our uncertainty in climate sensitivity. This study explores the role of these two factors in climate simulations of the 20th century. It is found that the total anthropogenic forcing for a wide range of climate models differs by a factor of two and that the total forcing is inversely correlated to climate sensitivity. Much of the uncertainty in total anthropogenic forcing derives from a threefold range of uncertainty in the aerosol forcing used in the simulations.
Embedding change rate estimation based on ensemble learning

In order to achieve higher estimation accuracy of the embedding change rate of a stego object, an ensemble learning-based estimation method is presented. First of all, a framework of embedding change rate estimation based on estimator ensemble is proposed. Then an algorithm of building the estimator ensemble, the core of the framework, is concretely described. Finally, a pruning method for estimator ensemble is proposed in consideration of both the diversity among the base estimators and accuracy of each of them. The experimental results for three modern steganographic algorithms (nsF5, PQ and PQt) indicate that the proposed method acquired better performance than the existed typical method. Furthermore, the pruned estimator ensemble with less base estimators maintained, even slightly improved the estimation accuracy, compared to the one without purning.
A Chronic Technical Disaster And The Irrelevance of Religious Meaning: The Case of Centralia, Pennsylvania*

lasted a long time, was caused by human beings, and required sophisticated technical apparatus to detect and abate. In addition, the patterns of victimization associated with the chronic technical disaster are different from those resulting from immediate impact natural disasters. These differences resulted in the acceptance of a technical, not moral or religious, definition of the problem. Implications of this for religion's response to other chronic technical disaster situations are discussed. People have been coping with natural disasters for millenia. It is not surprising that the word "disaster" is associated with catastrophies that strike swiftly and disappear, leaving in their wake destruction, injury and perhaps death. Natural disasters are part of our commonsense thinking about catastrophic events. A hard rain causes a "flash" flood, a hurricane "pounds" a shoreline, a tornado "strikes. " The language of the immediate impact disaster typifies these events as discrete, relatively quick and devastating interruptions of the normal course of affairs. Research on the preparedness of religion to respond to natural disasters and catastrophic events has shown that local religious organizations and personal faith have been instrumental in providing physical, emotional and spiritual aid to victims and their communities (Ross, 1980; Smith, 1978). A considerable portion of this research has focused on survivors' use of religious meaning to interpret their experiences of disaster events. Dynes and Yutzy, for example, have suggested how natural disasters are readily
A Framework for Modelling Residential Prosumption Devices and Electricity Tariffs for Residential Demand Response

In this paper, we propose a unified framework for inclusion of different electricity tariff components and residential prosumption devices in a residential energy management system (REMS). This framework allows REMS to use flexible modelling with respect to devices and price components applicable to an individual house, without requiring unique models for each device and tariff. The significance of this work is that the proposed framework facilitates the process for investigating how dwellings may respond to various tariffs when energy prosumption is optimally scheduled. In this work, we include six cost components and four response classes to illustrate the usage of this framework.
Hypercomplex manifolds with trivial canonical bundle and their holonomy

Let (M,I,J,K) be a compact hypercomplex manifold admitting an HKT-metric. Assume that the canonical bundle of (M,I) is trivial as a holomorphic line bundle. We show that the holonomy of Obata connection on M is contained in SL(n,H). In Appendix we apply these arguments to compact nilmanifolds equipped with abelian hypercomplex structures, showing that such manifolds have holonomy in SL(n,H).
Sleep Disorders over the Full Range of Chronic Kidney Disease

Sleep disorders are common and underrecognized in patients at all stages of chronic kidney disease. They include sleep apnea, insomnia, excessive sleepiness, restless legs syndrome and periodic limb movement disorder. They can be related to underlying uremia or comorbidities. Sleep disorders can affect the quality of life, and some are associated with increased morbidity and mortality. Clinical assessment, polysomnography and other standardized assessments are required for diagnosis. Therapeutic approaches include improvement in uremia management, treatment of comorbidities or specific interventions directed at individual sleep disorders. Diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders in this population may improve quality of life and patient survival.
Molecular characterization of CDC42, a Saccharomyces cerevisiae gene involved in the development of cell polarity

The Saccharomyces cerevisiae CDC42 gene product is involved in the morphogenetic events of the cell division cycle; temperature-sensitive cdc42 mutants are unable to form buds and display delocalized cell- surface deposition at the restrictive temperature (Adams, A. E. M., D. I. Johnson, R. M. Longnecker, B. F. Sloat, and J. R. Pringle. 1990. J. Cell Biol. 111:131-142). To begin a molecular analysis of CDC42 function, we have isolated the CDC42 gene from a yeast genomic DNA library. The use of the cloned DNA to create a deletion of CDC42 confirmed that the gene is essential. Overexpression of CDC42 under control of the GAL10 promoter was not grossly deleterious to cell growth but did perturb the normal pattern of selection of budding sites. Determination of the DNA and predicted amino acid sequences of CDC42 revealed a high degree of similarity in amino acid sequence to the ras and rho (Madaule, P., R. Axel, and A. M. Myers. 1987. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 84:779-783) families of gene products. The similarities to ras proteins (approximately 40% identical or related amino acids overall) were most pronounced in the regions that have been implicated in GTP binding and hydrolysis and in the COOH-terminal modifications leading to membrane association, suggesting that CDC42 function also involves these biochemical properties. The similarities to the rho proteins (approximately 60% identical or related amino acids overall) were more widely distributed through the coding region, suggesting more extensive similarities in as yet undefined biochemical properties and functions.
Predicting Influential Papers CS 224 W Final Project Autumn 2012

Length ! Contrary to expectation, the weight for abstract length was a large positive number in our training runs, suggesting that long abstracts correlate with more influence for the paper in the long run. Perhaps, longer abstracts usually correspond to papers with more important content. Given the above findings, it appears that one could produce comparable performance by just using the basic features which are much faster to produce with larger datasets compared to computing the PageRank scores or TFIDFs. Furthermore, at least with the above data, it appears that network data alone (basic features capture essentially just network information) without content of the papers can be used to recognize influential papers, but it cannot discriminate well between influential and noninfluential papers.
DIFFERENCES OF INTERPERSONAL CONFLICT MANAGEMENT STYLES PRACTICED BY ACADEMIC ADMINISTRATORS AT ISLAMIC HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTION, MALAYSIA

The study aims to analyze the differences of interpersonal conflict management styles practiced by the academic administrators at Islamic higher education institution. The study involved 152 academic administrators of International Islamic University Malaysia from seven kulliyyah or faculties. They comprised of Professors, Associate Professors and Assistant Professors. The study used instrument Rahim Organizational Conflict Inventory-II (2001, 2008) to measure five interpersonal conflict management styles consisting 28 items and the data were analyzed using the SPSS program version 17. The result of the study reveals that academic administrators had varying levels of practice of each style. In integrating style the mean score was 4.22 which fall into a very highly practiced style by the academic administrators. This is followed by compromising style with mean 3.85, obliging style mean 3.38, and, avoiding style mean 3.32. The study provide key results and interpretations of the research questions which were analyzed with descriptive, independent sample T-test and one way ANOVA tests in terms of gender, age, job position, work experience and academic status. The research findings are essential to the development of interpersonal conflict management competencies in achieving the National Key Result Area (NKRA), Vision 2020, and, the Malaysian Higher Education Development Plan 2015-2025.
Age and duration of ultrahigh‐temperature metamorphism in the Anápolis–Itauçu Complex, Southern Brasília Belt, central Brazil – constraints from U–Pb geochronology, mineral rare earth element chemistry and trace‐element thermometry

Integrated petrographic and chemical analysis of zircon, garnet and rutile from ultrahigh‐temperature (UHT) granulites in the Anápolis–Itauçu Complex, Brazil, is used to constrain the significance of zircon ID‐TIMS U–Pb geochronological data. Chondrite‐normalized rare earth element (REE) profiles of zircon cores have positive‐sloping heavy‐REE patterns, commonly inferred to be magmatic, whereas unambiguous metamorphic grains and overgrowths have flat to slightly negatively sloping heavy‐REE patterns. However, in one sample, a core of zircon interpreted as having formed prior to garnet crystallization and a metamorphic zircon formed within microstructures involving garnet breakdown both display elevated heavy‐REE (and Y) with positive‐sloping patterns. DREE(zrc/grt) partition coefficients suggest an approximation to equilibrium between zircon and garnet cores, although progressive enrichment in heavy REE towards garnet rims occurs in two of the samples investigated. Titanium‐in‐zircon thermometry indicates zircon growth during both the prograde and post‐peak evolution, but not at peak temperatures of the UHT metamorphism. By contrast, zirconium‐in‐rutile thermometry of inclusions armoured by garnet records crystallization temperatures, based on the upper end of the interquartile range of the data, of ∼890 to 870 °C and maximum temperature around 980 °C, indicating prograde and retrograde growth close to and after peak conditions. Rutile located in retrograde microstructures records crystallization temperatures of 850 to 820 °C. Rutile intergrown with ilmenite and included within orthopyroxene, which is associated with exsolved zircon, records temperatures ∼760 °C, consistent with Ti‐in‐zircon crystallization temperatures. ID‐TIMS U–Pb geochronological data from two of the four samples investigated define upper intercept ages of 641.3 ± 8.4 Ma (MSWD 0.91) and 638.8 ± 2.5 Ma (MSWD 1.03) that correlate with periods of zircon growth along the prograde segment of the P–T path. Individual zircon U–Pb dates retrieved from all samples range from 649 to 634 Ma, indicating a maximum duration of c. 15 Myr for the UHT event. This period is interpreted as recording modest thickening of hot backarc lithosphere located behind the Arenópolis Arc at the edge of the São Francisco Craton consequent upon terminal collision of the Parána Block with the arc during the amalgamation of West Gondwana.
Beyond Ethnicity and Racism: Teaching in Multi-Sectoral Classes

According to Robertson (2000), globalization has changed the human texture in classrooms at universities and colleges. The need to acquire knowledge, and the importance of higher education have contributed to the diversity. The 21st century has made teaching a challenging task, in which the teacher is a major player in the arena. Political struggles about and through education occur in university campuses, different groups of students participate actively or passively in political activity. This complex situation requires new methods of teaching and guidance. Teachers should expand their teaching methods, sharpen their awareness and sensitivity to the sociocultural forces in class, and often use creative means, in order to ensure a pleasant learning environment that promotes the didactic goals.