Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
.1 Scalable Transaction Processing in Large Database Systems

Data drives knowledge which engenders innovation. Be it personalizing search results, recommending movies or friends, determining which advertisements to display or which coupon to deliver, data is central in improving customer satisfaction and providing a competitive edge. Data, therefore, generates wealth and many modern enterprises are collecting data at the most detailed level possible, resulting in massive and ever-growing data repositories. Such massive scale of data pose a number of research challenges, called big data challenges, which form the basis for my research. My research philosophy is to build database management systems (DBMSs) designed for large scale operations that expose abstractions to simplify application design while providing tools to ease system deployment and management. Using this philosophy as the cornerstone, my research has spanned the broad area of big data management encompassing both transaction processing and analytical processing systems exercising a synergy of both theoretical and practical system-oriented research.
Distributed MMSE Beamforming Design for Relay-Assisted C-RAN

In this paper, the linear minimum mean square error beamformers are designed for relay-assisted cloud radio access network (C-RAN). In C-RAN, the remote radio units are separated from the baseband units to save energy cost. To further enhance network coverage, it is a good choice to duly arrange relay nodes. Regrading the per-antenna power constraints at both the relay nodes and the remote radio heads (RRHs), the beamformer matrices at the relay nodes and RRHs are jointly optimized for the relay assisted C-RAN. Since the considered problem is a non-convex optimization problem and is with multiple variables, it is in general very hard to solve. To make the design suitable for C-RAN exploiting the problem structure, two novel decomposition algorithms are proposed. One algorithm is mainly carried out at the RRHs, another is mainly performed at the relay node. Finally in the simulations, the performance of the proposed algorithms are demonstrated.
An Analytical Router Model for Networks-On-Chip

The proposed system is based on analytical model of Router and queueing theory. This approach not only provides aggregate performance metrics such as average latency and throughput, but also feedback about the network characteristics such as buffer utilization, average latency per router and per flow at a finelevel of granularity. The proposed analytical model can predict the average packet latency faster than an accurate simulation
‘I act this way because why?’ Prior knowledges, teaching for change, imagining new masculinities

This article begins by outlining some of the prior knowledges brought by undergraduate students to an introduction to gender studies class in the Women’s and Gender Studies Department at the University of the Western Cape, South Africa. I show that, at the beginning of the course, students clearly understand gender to refer to women and femininity, imagining femininity (but not masculinity) to be responsive to social change. I suggest that, in the face of these prior knowledges, it is important to focus on masculinity as performance, as a cultural artefact and one that is deeply harmful to South African men. Student experiences of this teaching and learning suggest that it offers possibilities for imagining men as allies and beneficiaries – rather than enemies – in the struggle for gender equity.
Learning inexpensive parametric design models using an augmented genetic programming technique

Previous applications of genetic programming (GP) have been restricted to searching for algebraic approximations mapping the design parameters (e.g., geometrical parameters) to a single design objective (e.g., weight). In addition, these algebraic expressions tend to be highly complex. By adding a simple extension to the GP technique, a powerful design data analysis tool is developed. This paper significantly extends the analysis capabilities of GP by searching for multiple simple models within a single population by splitting the population into multiple islands according to the design variables used by individual members. Where members from different islands “cooperate,” simple design models can be extracted from this cooperation. This relatively simple extension to GP is shown to have powerful implications to extracting design models that can be readily interpreted and exploited by human designers. The full analysis method, GP heuristics extraction method, is described and illustrated by means of a design case study.
Statistical analysis of Caterpillar 793D haul truck engine data and through-life diagnostic information using the proportional hazards model

Physical asset management (PAM) is of increasing concern for companies in industry today. A key performance area of PAM is asset care plans (ACPs), which consist of maintenance strategies such as usage based maintenance (UBM) and condition based maintenance (CBM). Data obtained from the South African mining industry was modelled using a CBM prognostic model called the proportional hazards model (PHM). Results indicated that the developed model produced estimates that were reasonable representations of reality. These findings provide an exciting basis for the development of future Weibull PHMs that could result in huge maintenance cost savings and reduced failure occurrences.
Dynamic Operands Insertion for VLIW Architecture with a Reduced Bit-width Instruction Set

Performance, code size and power consumption are all primary concern in embedded systems. To this effect, VLIW architecture has proven to be useful for embedded applications with abundant instruction level parallelism. But due to the long instruction bus width it often consumes more power and memory space than necessary. One way to lessen this problem is to adopt a reduced bit-width instruction set architecture (ISA) that has a narrower instruction word length. This facilitates a more efficient hardware implementation in terms of area and power by decreasing bus-bandwidth requirements and the power dissipation associated with instruction fetches. Also earlier studies reported that it helps to reduce the code size considerably. In practice, however, it is impossible to convert a given ISA fully into an equivalent reduced bit-width one because the narrow instruction word, due to bit-width restrictions, can encode only a small subset of normal instructions in the original ISA. Consequently, existing processors provide narrow instructions in very limited cases along with severe restrictions on register accessibility. The objective of this work is to explore the possibility of complete conversion, as a case study, of an existing 32-bit VLIW ISA into a 16-bit one that supports effectively all 32-bit instructions. To this objective, we attempt to circumvent the bit-width restrictions by dynamically extending the effective instruction word length of the converted 16-bit operations. At compile time when a 32-bit operation is converted to a 16-bit word format, we compute how many bits are additionally needed to represent the whole 32-bit operation and store the bits separately in the VLIW code. Then at run time, these bits are retrieved on demand and inserted to a proper 16-bit operation to reconstruct the original 32-bit representation. According to our experiment, the code size becomes significantly smaller after the conversion to 16-bit VLIW code. Also at a slight run time cost, the machine with the 16-bit ISA consumes much less energy than the original machine.
The Wealth of Nations and Environmental Concern

ANDREAS DIEKMANN is a professor of methods of empirical research and social statistics and director of the Institute of Sociology at the University of Berne, Switzer land. His research interests are in statistics and game theory, with applications to so cial demography and environmental behavior. His publications in English include “Cooperation in an Asymmetric Volunteer’s Dilemma Game: Theory and Experi mental Evidence” ( International Journal of Game Theory , 1993, Vol. 22), Paradoxical Effects of Social Behavior: Essays in Honor of Anatol Rapoport (1986),Stochastic Modelling of Social Processes (1984) (both books edited with P. Mitter), “The Log Logistic Rate Model. Two Generalizations With an Application to Demographic Data” (Sociological Methods and Research , 1995, Vol. 24 [with Josef Brüderl]), and “Environmental Behavior. Discrepancies Between Aspirations and Reality” ( Rationality and Society , 1998, Vol. 10 [with Peter Preisendörfer]).
Restoration of 3D medical images with total variation scheme on wavelet domains (TVW)

The multiplicity of sensors used in medical imaging leads to different noises. Non informative noise can damage the image interpretation process and the performance of automatic analysis. The method proposed in this paper allows compensating highly noisy image data from non informative noise without sophisticated modeling of the noise statistics. This generic approach uses jointly a wavelet decomposition scheme and a non-isotropic Total Variation filtering of the transform coefficients. This framework benefits from both the hierarchical capabilities of the wavelet transform and the well-posed regularization scheme of the Total Variation. This algorithm has been tested and validated on test-bed data, as well as different clinical MR and 3D ultrasound images, enhancing the capabilities of the proposed method to cope with different noise models.
Process Variations and Noise Analysis on a Miller Capacitance Tuned 1.8_2.4-GHz Dual-Band Low Noise Amplifier

This paper discusses design of inductively source degenerated dual-band low noise amplifiers (LNA) in a standard CMOS 0.18 μm process. The dual-band LNA can be tuned to either 1.8-GHz or 2.4-GHz. The LNA is implemented both by Miller capacitance tuning and by capacitor selection using switches. In both the designs, the parasitic effects of bond wire, bond pads and ESD protection circuits are considered. Effect of process variations on LNA performance and noise analysis of LNA are also discussed.
Ozone Therapy on Cerebral Blood Flow: A Preliminary Report

Ozone therapy is currently being used in the treatment of ischemic disorders, but the underlying mechanisms that result in successful treatment are not well known. This study assesses the effect of ozone therapy on the blood flow in the middle cerebral and common carotid arteries. Seven subjects were recruited for the therapy that was performed by transfusing ozone-enriched autologous blood on 3 alternate days over 1 week. Blood flow quantification in the common carotid artery (n = 14) was performed using color Doppler. Systolic and diastolic velocities in the middle cerebral artery (n = 14) were estimated using transcranial Doppler. Ultrasound assessments were conducted at the following three time points: 1) basal (before ozone therapy), 2) after session #3 and 3) 1 week after session #3. The common carotid blood flow had increased by 75% in relation to the baseline after session #3 (P < 0.001) and by 29% 1 week later (P = 0.039). In the middle cerebral artery, the systolic velocity had increased by 22% after session #3 (P = 0.001) and by 15% 1 week later (P = 0.035), whereas the diastolic velocity had increased by 33% after session #3 (P < 0.001) and by 18% 1 week later (P = 0.023). This preliminary Doppler study supports the clinical experience of achieving improvement by using ozone therapy in peripheral ischemic syndromes. Its potential use as a complementary treatment in cerebral low perfusion syndromes merits further clinical evaluation.
The cellular response to nerve injury. II. Regeneration of the perineurium after nerve section.

When a peripheral nerve is divided, the cut ends normally retract from each other. Restoration of the continuity of the nerve depends upon outgrowths from both cut ends. The outgrowth from the distal stump, which is at least as extensive as the neuroma that grows out from the proximal stump (Young, Holmes & Sanders, 1940), has been investigated by electron microscopy in a previous study (Thomas, 1966). It was found to consist of fibrous connective tissue containing fibroblasts and other connective tissue cells within which were embedded columns of Schwann cells continuous with the Schwann cell columns (bands of Bungner) of the distal stump. From light microscope observations, Denny-Brown (1946) described a vigorous contribution of cells to the outgrowth from the distal stump arising from the perineurium as well as from the endoneurium. Normal perineurial cells display a characteristic morphology in electron microscope preparations, but Thomas (1966) was unable to recognize such cells in the outgrowth. When regeneration occurs across the gap in the nerve, groups of Schwann cells and associated axons become surrounded by perineurial cells so that the junctional region comes to consist of numerous small fascicles (Masson, 1932; Nageotte, 1932). The origin of these perineurial cells has not yet been established and has been investigated in the present study.
Different Perspectives on Global Justice: a Fusion of Horizons

Cosmopolitanism contra Statism. Non-ideal Theory, Moral Analysis, Levels of Analysis and Fusion of Horizons. The Ideal Theory/Non-ideal Theory Distinction. Interactional Moral Analysis and Institutional Moral Analysis. Levels of Analysis and Levels of Causality and Responsibility. Fusion of Horizons. Cosmopolitanism and Statism. John Rawls’ Law of Peoples. Thomas Nagel’s Problem of Global Justice. Charles Beitz’s Cosmopolitan Liberalism. Thomas Pogge’s Negative Duty. Sebastiano Maffettone’s Liberal Internationalism. Resource Curse. The Distinct Nature of Natural Resource Wealth. Natural Resource Wealth and Overlapping Curses. Resource-Cursed Sub-Saharan Africa. The Nigerian Context. The Main Economic Aspect of the Nigerian Resource Curse: The Dutch Disease. The Main Political Economy Aspect of the Nigerian Resource Curse: Rent-Seeking. Corruption. Transparency. Conflicts. Pollution. The Nigerian Resource Curse Summarised. Angola: A Rich Country with Poor People. The Democratic Republic of Congo: What Is that Ought Not To Be. George Soros’ Analysis. The ‘Individual’ Level of Analysis or Level of Causality and Responsibility. The ‘Collective’ Level of Analysis or Level of Causality and Responsibility. The ‘Corporate’ Level of Analysis or Level of Causality and Responsibility. The ‘State’ Level of Analysis or Level of Causality and Responsibility. The ‘Global Institutional Order’ Level of Analysis or Level of Causality and Responsibility. Some Moral Quandaries Concerning Contributory Roles. Some Moral Quandaries Concerning Degrees of Responsibility. The Primary and Secondary Applications of Cosmopolitanism and Statism. Is the Fusion of the Cosmopolitan and Statist Horizons Plausible? The Mutual Exclusivity Argument. The Incompatibility, Relativism, Neutrality and Aerial View Arguments. Fusion of Horizons Accommodates the Complexity of Resource Curse. Fusion of Horizons: A New Perspective on Global Justice that Negates Cosmopolitanism and Statism?
Is there Inhibition of return for isoluminant colors

In the present study we replicate experiments of Lupianez et al. (1997) who addressed the issue of inhibition of return with respect to the color of stimuli. In contrast to that study, using non-isoluminant stimuli, we employed two pairs of isoluminant colors varying along either the red-green or blue-yellow cardinal axes of a color space – deutan or tritan confusion lines in the CIE 1976. Participants (normal trichromats; n=8) were exposed successively to the color pairs; their task was to respond to the second (target) stimulus by key pressing, whereby simple reaction times were measured. In different trial stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) was varied: 100, 400, 700, 1000 and 1300 ms. At no SOA inhibition of return was found; instead, facilitation of return was demonstrated, this especially pronounced at the short SOA=100 ms. We found that participants were overall faster in the invalid condition when compared to the valid condition (F=25.986, p=0.001). We hypothesized that when isoluminants colors are employed as both cue and target, Inhibition of Return can’t be establish.
Cadre, Catch-all or Cartel?

The recently proposed (ideal) type of a modern political party, the `cartel party', evokes questions both about the conceptual clarity of the new type and about its empirical validity. The analysis of the relationship between civil society and the state, which constitutes a central element in Katz and Mair's concept of the cartel party, is considered to be too static to grasp the increased intervention by the state in society. The application of a term derived from the level of the party system (`cartel') to individual parties does not seem to be a happy choice, while the reality of western party systems does not show an effective cartel of parties. It is argued that, instead of trying to formulate (again) an alleged dominant party type for the present time, it seems more fruitful to develop a classification scheme of parties that allows for different types of parties to co-exist at the same time, without considering one of them as the most up to date.
Parallelizing multiple group-by query in share-nothing environment: a MapReduce study case

MapReduce has excellent scalability and fault-tolerance. It fits well with dominant distributed architectures of today, such as cluster or Grid, which are usually shared-nothing computing environments. However, using MapReduce for data analysis application still meets some challenges, since MapReduce is a low-level procedural programming paradigm and it does not directly support relational algebraic operators. In this work, we addressed a typical data analytic query, multiple group-by query. We parallelized the calculations involved in this type of query with MapReduce, and we introduced indexation and data partition in our work. We measured the speedup performance for implementations over both horizontally partitioned data and vertically partitioned data. We analysed the performance affecting factors from both measurement and formal estimation during this procedure.
Overexpression of groESL in Clostridium acetobutylicum Results in Increased Solvent Production and Tolerance, Prolonged Metabolism, and Changes in the Cell's Transcriptional Program

ABSTRACT DNA array and Western analyses were used to examine the effects of groESL overexpression and host-plasmid interactions on solvent production in Clostridium acetobutylicum ATCC 824. Strain 824(pGROE1) was created to overexpress the groESL operon genes from a clostridial thiolase promoter. The growth of 824(pGROE1) was inhibited up to 85% less by a butanol challenge than that of the control strain, 824(pSOS95del). Overexpression of groESL resulted in increased final solvent titers 40% and 33% higher than those of the wild type and plasmid control strains, respectively. Active metabolism lasted two and one half times longer in 824(pGROE1) than in the wild type. Transcriptional analysis of 824(pGROE1) revealed increased expression of motility and chemotaxis genes and a decrease in the expression of the other major stress response genes. Decreased expression of the dnaKJ operon upon overexpression of groESL suggests that groESL functions as a modulator of the CIRCE regulon, which is shown here to include the hsp90 gene. Analysis of the plasmid control strain 824(pSOS95del) revealed complex host-plasmid interactions relative to the wild-type strain, resulting in prolonged biphasic growth and metabolism. Decreased expression of four DNA gyrases resulted in differential expression of many key primary metabolism genes. The ftsA and ftsZ genes were expressed at higher levels in 824(pSOS95del), revealing an altered cell division and sporulation pattern. Both transcriptional and Western analyses revealed elevated stress protein expression in the plasmid-carrying strain.
Peer effects identified through social networks. Evidence from uruguayan schools

This paper provides evidence on peer effects in educational achievement exploiting for the first time a unique data set on social networks within primary schools in Uruguay. The relevance of peer effects in education is still largely debated due to the identification challenges that the study of social interactions poses. I adopt a recently developed identification method that exploits detailed information on social networks, i.e. individual-specific peer groups. This method enables me to disentangle endogenous effects from contextual effects via instrumental variables that emerge naturally from the network structure. Correlated effects are controlled, to some extent, by classroom fixed effects. I find significant endogenous effects in standardized tests for reading and math. A one standard deviation increase in peers’ test score increases the individual’s test score by 40% of a standard deviation. This magnitude is comparable to the effect of having a mother that completed college. By means of a simulation I illustrate that when schools are stratified by socioeconomic status peer effects may operate as amplifiers of educational inequalities.
INHIBITION OF SWARMING MOTILITY, BIOFILM FORMATION AND VIRULENCE FACTOR EXPRESSION OF URINARY PATHOGENS BY EUPHORBIA TRIGONA LATEX EXTRACTS

Euphorbia trigona latex has been used most effectively in the traditional Indian medicinal system of Ayurveda for the treatment of urinary tract infection (UTI). However, various organic and aqueous extracts of its latex were found not to possess any antimicrobial activity against several gram positive and gram negative organisms including Proteus mirabilis and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (selected for the present study) which are important urinary pathogens especially in patients with catheters over which they can form biofilms. The observation, that bacterial cell-cell communication or quorum-sensing (QS) is closely linked to swarming differentiation and virulence factor production in bacteria suggests that several bacterial pathogens may be prevented from establishing symptomatic disease via inhibition of their QS system by using anti-QS compounds. This is a viable alternative to the antibiotic-mediated growth inhibition or killing of pathogens, which invariably selects for multiple drug resistant cells. In order to investigate the effects of Euphorbia latex extracts on the pathogenicity of Pr. mirabilis and Ps. aeruginosa, their growth rate and some QS-controlled phenomena such as the swarming behavior, ability to form biofilm and virulence factor production, were monitored in the presence/ absence of the extracts. While growth rate was not affected adversely, a remarkable reduction in the swarm zone, virulence factor production and biofilm formation was observed which suggests that Euphorbia latex contains compounds which can potentially be developed as anti pathogenic drugs.