Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Higher-Order Geodesic Voronoi Diagrams in a Polygonal Domain with Holes

We investigate the higher-order Voronoi diagrams of n point sites with respect to the geodesic distance in a simple polygon with h > 0 polygonal holes and c corners. Given a set of n point sites, the kth-order Voronoi diagram partitions the plane into several regions such that all points in a region share the same k nearest sites. The nearest-site (first-order) geodesic Voronoi diagram has already been well-studied, and its total complexity is O(n+c). On the other hand, Bae and Chwa [3] recently proved that the total complexity of the farthest-site ((n -- 1)st-order) geodesic Voronoi diagram and the number of faces in the diagram are Θ(nc) and Θ(nh), respectively. It is of high interest to know what happens between the first-order and the (n -- 1)st-order geodesic Voronoi diagrams. In this paper we prove that the total complexity of the kth-order geodesic Voronoi diagram is Θ(k(n -- k) + kc), and the number of faces in the diagram is Θ(k(n -- k) + kh). Our results successfully explain the variation from the nearest-site to the farthest-site geodesic Voronoi diagrams, i.e., from k = 1 to k = n -- 1, and also illustrate the formation of a disconnected Voronoi region, which does not occur in many commonly used distance metrics, such as the Euclidean, L1, and city metrics. We show that the kth-order geodesic Voronoi diagram can be computed in O(k2(n+c) log(n+c)) time using an iterative algorithm.
Breadth first algorithms for APP detectors over MIMO channels

For iterative decoding of multiple antenna systems concatenated with an outer error correcting code, it is important to use an a posteriori probability detector for the MIMO detection to achieve near capacity performance. To avoid full APP detection, we propose a reduced complexity detector based on breadth first algorithms. Although these algorithms are sub-optimal, we show that they can provide a good list of candidates for the APP calculation. Furthermore, by exploiting the a priori information delivered from the outer decoder, it is possible to decrease the MIMO detector complexity at each iteration. Using simulation results, we will compare the performance of the proposed detectors with the list sphere detector.
QoS-based service composition algorithm in service oriented networks

Service Composition provides a flexible framework for new service construction by integrating atomic services developed independently. Algorithms are needed to select atomic service and service instances with various QoS levels according to some application-dependent performance requirements. Our objective of service selection is to maximize a QoS function under the end-to-end QoS constraints, as well as reducing the complexity and computing cost. In this paper the problem is modeled as a multi-dimension multi-choice 0–1 knapsack problem (MMKP). A novel efficient heuristic algorithm for service selection is presented. This algorithm takes the priority of service components and the priority of QoS attributes. These priorities are useful in promoting the efficiency and reducing the complexity of service selection algorithm. The simulation results show that the improvement on efficiency is obvious and increasing with the number of service components.
Os impactos regionais da reforma agrária. Um estudo sobre áreas selecionadas

O artigo procura apontar processos de mudanca de curto, medio e longo prazo, desencadeados pela criacao de assentamentos rurais no Brasil. Buscou-se captar transformacoes operadas na vida dos assentados, nos assentamentos e na regiao onde eles se inserem. A pesquisa que deu origem ao artigo tomou como foco algumas regioes do pais com elevada concentracao de projetos de assentamento e alta densidade de familias assentadas por unidade territorial (manchas), tendo como suposto que essa concentracao e efeito de lutas e de que a proximidade de varios projetos potencializa seus efeitos.
Applying a Multi-paradigm Approach to Implementing Wireless Sensor Network Based River Monitoring

This paper describes the application of the DisSeNT middleware to implement Wireless Sensor Network based river monitoring. DisSeNT provides LooCI, an efficient run-time reconfigurable component model, PMA, a lightweight policy-based management framework and QARI, a declarative quality-aware deployment framework. Using a river monitoring case-study, this paper analyses how these distinct software development paradigms can be used in a complimentary fashion to develop efficient wireless sensor network applications. The resulting system has been deployed and evaluated in a real-world river monitoring scenario in the city of São Carlos, Brazil.
A Canonical Model for the Interoperability Among Object-Oriented and Relational Databases

In the interoperability context, autonomous pre-existing databases are fed-erated at some degree in order to share their data. The growing importance that the interoperability among object-oriented and relational databases is gaining, makes essential the development of adequate data models that serve as canonical models for the federation. The canonical model constitutes the basic building block for methodologies and tools for the detection of interdatabase semantic relationships that is required to access the federation in an integrated way. This paper presents one such canonical model and points out its usage for coupling relational and object-oriented databases thru a semantic enrichment process.
Structure and motion from silhouettes

This paper addresses the problem of recovering structure and motion from silhouettes. Silhouettes are projections of contour generators which are viewpoint dependent, and hence do not readily provide point correspondences for exploitation in motion estimation. Previous works have exploited correspondences induced by epipolar tangencies, and a successful solution has been developed in the special case of circular motion (turnable sequences). However, the main drawbacks are (1) new views cannot be added easily at a later time, and (2) part of the structure will always remain invisible under circular motion. In this paper we overcome the above problems by incorporating arbitrary general views and estimating the camera poses using silhouettes alone. We present a complete and practical system which produces high quality 3D models from 2D uncalibrated silhouettes. The 3D models thus obtained can be refined incrementally by adding new arbitrary views and estimating their poses. Experimental results on various objects are presented, demonstrating the quality of the reconstructions.
Neutrophil activation by fMLP regulates FOXO (forkhead) transcription factors by multiple pathways, one of which includes the binding of FOXO to the survival factor Mcl‐1

Activation signals from bacterial stimuli set into motion a series of events that alter the abbreviated lifespan of neutrophils. These studies show that the bacterial chemoattractant, formyl‐Met‐Leu‐Phe (fMLP), promotes the phosphorylation/inactivation of the FOXO subfamily of forkhead transcription factors (FKHR, FKHR‐L1, and AFX) through the phosphatidylinositol‐3‐kinase/Akt (protein kinase B) and the RAS mitogen‐activated protein kinase pathways. Furthermore, fMLP stimulation causes the inducible expression of the prosurvival Bcl‐2 family member Mcl‐1, which then binds to a complex containing FKHR. These studies show that fMLP‐stimulated neutrophils coordinate the regulation of FOXO transcription factors and the survival factor Mcl‐1, a mechanism that may allow neutrophils to alter their survival.
A Comparison of Feature and Semantic-Based Summarization Algorithms for Turkish

In this paper we analyze the performances of a feature-based and two semantic-based text summarization algorithms on a new Turkish corpus. The feature-based algorithm uses the statistical analysis of paragraphs, sentences, words and formal clues found in documents, whereas the two semanticbased algorithms employ Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) approach which enables the selection of the most important sentences in a semantic way. Performance evaluation is conducted by comparing automatically generated summaries with manual summaries generated by a human summarizer. This is the first study that applies LSA based algorithms to Turkish text summarization and its results are promising.
Sleep-active neuron specification and sleep induction require FLP-11 neuropeptides to systemically induce sleep

Sleep is an essential behavioral state. It is induced by conserved sleep-active neurons that express GABA. However, little is known about how sleep neuron function is determined and how sleep neurons change physiology and behavior systemically. Here, we investigated sleep in Caenorhabditis elegans, which is induced by the single sleep-active neuron RIS. We found that the transcription factor LIM-6, which specifies GABAergic function, in parallel determines sleep neuron function through the expression of APTF-1, which specifies the expression of FLP-11 neuropeptides. Surprisingly FLP-11, and not GABA, is the major component that determines the sleep-promoting function of RIS. FLP-11 is constantly expressed in RIS. At sleep onset RIS depolarizes and releases FLP-11 to induce a systemic sleep state. DOI: http://dx.doi. org/10.7554/eLife.12499. 001
Bacterial lacL Gene as a Highly Sensitive Marker to Detect Micrometastasis Formation during Tumor Progression 1

During tumor progression, micrometastases at their earliest stages have been difficult to analyze qualitatively or quantitatively because of a lack of suitably sensitive markers to discriminate small numbers of tumor cells from normal tissue cell populations. To overcome this problem, the EscherÃ¬chia coli /3-galactosidase (lue/.} gene was introduced into human EJ \\i\-rus oncogene-transfected BALB/c 3T3 cells with subsequent injection of transfected cells into athymic nude mice. Using a chromogenic substrate (5-bromo-4-chloro-3-indoyl-/9-D-gaIactopyranoside), the lacLbearing tumor cells at primary tumor sites as well as at secondary organs stain intensely blue and can be easily distinguished from the host tissue cells hours, days, or weeks postinjection. Staining of /acZ-bearing tumor cells is specific and extremely sensitive in detecting micrometastatic foci in lungs and other organs, including brain and kidney for the first time. Stable integration of the /Â«<â€¢/ and ra.v genes into cultured cells and subsequent tumor cells was verified by Southern blot analyses. The lacL gene appears to be a stable marker during tumor progression in vivo based both on phenotypic (S-bromo^-chloro-J-indoyl-^-D-galactopyranoside staining) and on genotypic (Southern blot analysis) evidence. Furthermore, 5-bromo-4-chloro-3-indoyl-|9-D-galactopyranoside staining of tumor cells can also be used together with alkaline phosphatase staining relatively specific for endothelial cells to relate the topographies of metastatic cells and host blood vessels in embedded sections. By using the lac/, gene as a sensitive quantitative marker, analyses of micrometastasis development in the lung indicate that the ras oncogene contributes to the metastatic phenotype in this EJ I la-ra.v model system, although further genetic and/or phenotypic alterations appear to be necessary for long-term growth and development into overt mÃ©tastases. These findings demonstrate the effectiveness and sensitivity of the bacterial /Â«<â€¢/. gene as a phenotypic marker in tumor progression studies, providing both a qualitative and a quantitative tool in virtually any tumor system for examining micrometastasis formation in target organs and the relation ship of tumor cells to host organ microenvironments.
An Overview of a New European Consortium: Integrated Three-Dimensional Television - Capture, Transmission and Display (3DTV)

A new European consortium is formed as a Network of Excellence to integrate the research works of 19 institutions in the field of 3DTV. The consortium is funded by EC under the FP6 thematic area Information Society Technologies within the strategic objective Cross-media Content for Leisure and Entertainment. The project will last 48 months, but the collaboration among the partners is expected to be longer. The technical focus of the consortium is 3DTV with all its aspects except audio. Various techniques of 3D scene capture will be investigated and compared. Representation of captured 3D content in abstract form using mainly computer graphics approaches is the key feature which decouples user from the input. Compression of 3D scene information, and forming the bitstream structure for effective streaming are parts of the project. The user may interact with the captured scene and get a visual display based on the choice of display technology. A rich variety of different display techniques, including stereoscopy and holographic displays are among the main focus of the consortium. The plan covers various integration and dissemination activities.
Navigation method using fuzzy line tracking for the transportation robot

In the paper, we propose a navigation method using fuzzy line tracking and D*Lite algorithm based on a QR code map. Path planning using D*Lite is implemented on the server. Fuzzy line tracking is developed by using image processing technique. At first, we design a virtual map which is composed of QR code nodes. We generate an optimized path for navigation on the map. Accuracy of the navigation is enhanced by fuzzy line tracking method. The proposed method is verified by simulation study as well as experiment on a real environment.
Resource Load Based Stochastic DAGs Scheduling Mechanism for Grid Environment

The dynamic feature is one of the most important differences between Grid and traditional heterogeneous distributed systems, thus the most significant challenge for task scheduling in Grid environment is how to relieve the resource performance dynamism effectively. However, the existing schedule algorithms usually suppose that computation or communication times are deterministic and static, thus they will lead to bad performance in the practical Grid environment. To address this problem, a mechanism which is used to estimate the probability distribution of task execution time based on resource load is proposed. And then a Resource Load based Stochastic DAGs Scheduling algorithm for Grid environments is introduced. The simulation results show that our mechanism can achieve a significant improvement in several metrics (such as normalized real schedule length) and can relieve the influence brought by the dynamic nature of Grid effectively.
A Survey of Attacks, Security Mechanisms and Challenges in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless Sensor networks (WSN) is an emerging technology and have great potential to be employed in critical situations like battlefields and commercial applications such as building, traffic surveillance, habitat monitoring and smart homes and many more scenarios. One of the major challenges wireless sensor networks face today is security. While the deployment of sensor nodes in an unattended environment makes the networks vulnerable to a variety of potential attacks, the inherent power and memory limitations of sensor nodes makes conventional security solutions unfeasible. The sensing technology combined with processing power and wireless communication makes it profitable for being exploited in great quantity in future. The wireless communication technology also acquires various types of security threats. This paper discusses a wide variety of attacks in WSN and their classification mechanisms and different securities available to handle them including the challenges faced.
Concilier cantine bio et agriculture locale, les voies possibles

Les cantines bio peinent souvent a concilier produits bio et circuits courts. Face au risque de « dilution de l’esprit pionnier », des experiences recentes montrent que le recours a des intermediaires dans la chaine agroalimentaire peut constituer une voie de diffusion du bio dans les cantines.
Adaptive Route Timeout for On-Demand Routing Protocols in MANETs

Mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) are multi-hop wireless networks where all nodes cooperatively maintain network connectivity. When the nodes are highly mobile and the size of the network is large the frequency of link failure is increasing. Link failure is identified only during the transmission of data packets. Due to this, latency and control load of the network is increasing. In this paper, an adaptive timeout mechanism based on hop count is introduced for the removal of stale routes in MANETS using on-demand routing. This mechanism is applied on ad hoc on-demand vector (AODV) routing protocol to make it as adaptive AODV (AAODV). The simulation was carried out using GloMoSim-2.03 simulator. The simulation results show that the proposed mechanism is decreasing the number of control packets and increasing the packet delivery ratio.
accuracy: Tools for Accurate and Reliable Statistical Computing

Most empirical social scientists are surprised that low-level numerical issues in software can have deleterious effects on the estimation process. Statistical analyses that appear to be perfectly successful can be invalidated by concealed numerical problems. We have developed a set of tools, contained in accuracy, a package for R and S-PLUS, to diagnose problems stemming from numerical and measurement error and to improve the accuracy of inferences. The tools included in accuracy include a framework for gauging the computational stability of model results, tools for comparing model results, optimization diagnostics, and tools for collecting entropy for true random numbers generation.
RFXFreeze: A non-queriable compressor for RFX storage structure

XML has gained wide popularity for specifying and exchanging data on the WWW. XML is also used to store large amounts of bibliographic and scientific data. However, XML is by nature verbose and this contributes to the fact that XML databases are much large in size, thus increasing the cost for storing and retrieving data in smaller handheld devices which do not have large memory capacity. In order to address this problem, many XML-specific compression systems, such as XMill, XGrind, XQueC, XMLPPM, etc, have been developed. Recently, a work on storing the XML compactly has been developed, which proposes a non-tree based structure called RFX (redundancy free XML). In this paper, we propose a non-queriable compressor for the existing RFX structure which attains a high compression ratio at the cost of time for efficient retrieval of data.
Model following adaptive control for a robot with flexible joints

In this paper we introduce a method based on model following adaptive control for non-linear flexible joint robots with time-varying parameters. A dynamic model of a manipulator with flexible joint is derived to establish the control law. Under the assumption of weak joint elasticity, a singular perturbation argument is used to show that recent adaptive control results for flexible-joint robots. In this strategy a plant should follow a suitable model reference. Despite of imprecise parameters of the manipulator and presence of joints flexibility, the tracking error will converge to zero and the robot stability is guaranteed. A 5 bar linkage robot with three revolute flexible joints is considered as a case study. Simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.
Yale Working Papers on Economic Applications and Policy Farm Productivity and Market Structure: Evidence from Cotton Reforms in Zambia * Farm Productivity and Market Structure: Evidence from Cotton Reforms in Zambia

This paper investigates the impacts of cotton marketing reforms on farm productivity, a key element for poverty alleviation, in rural Zambia. The reforms comprised the elimination of the Zambian cotton marketing board that was in place since 1977. Following liberalization, the sector adopted an outgrowing scheme, whereby firms provided extension services to farmers and sold inputs on loans that were repaid at the time of harvest. There are two distinctive phases of the reforms: a failure of the outgrowing scheme, and a subsequent period of success of the scheme. Our findings indicate that the reforms led to interesting dynamics in cotton farming. During the phase of failure, farmers were pushed back into subsistence and productivity in cotton declined. With the improvement of the outgrowing scheme of later years, farmers devoted larger shares of land to cash crops, and farm productivity significantly increased.
Fashionable Technology, Fashion Waves, and Post-Adoption Regret and Satisfaction

This research attempts to understand user adoption of fashionable technologies (e.g., iPhone or iPad) and the influence of fashion waves on adopters of both fashionable and non-fashionable technologies. A research model was developed based on the regret theory. We tested the model by examining 20,122 customer reviews collected from Amazon.com. A theory-driven naive Bayes classifier was developed to analyze the regret elements of customer reviews automatically. The data largely supported the research model. Specifically, we found that adopters of non-fashionable phones experience higher levels of regret and lower satisfaction during the fashion wave, i.e., when a new fashionable phone was released. In contrast, adopters of earlier editions of fashionable phones welcomed the new fashionable phone, displaying lower levels of regret and higher satisfaction during the fashion wave period. The findings have significant implications for information systems research and practices.
Experiment on the removal of soot emissions from diesel engine with non-thermal plasma assisted catalyst technology

Based upon the principle of dielectric barrier discharge theory, a non-thermal plasma (NTP) reactor was designed, and the bench test system of the NTP assisted catalyst (NPAC) technology was established with the La0.8K0. 2Co0.5Mn0. 5O3 catalyst system. The experiment was carried out, and the discharge parameters of the NTP reactor were investigated, which had remarkable effect on the removal of soot emissions from diesel engine under the treatment of NTP technology. Meanwhile, in the same discharge condition, the exhaust temperature was also investigated on the removal of soot emissions under the treatment of the NTP technology. The results showed that the NTP technology was favorable towards the removal of soot emissions, and the soot emissions were decreased with the increase of the energy density and the exhaust temperature; But compared with the NTP technology, the effect of the NPAC technology on the removal of soot emissions was relatively better. Under the discharge frequency of 12.5 kHz, the soot emissions would be reduced more effectively by the NTP technology.
An optimized first-order method for image restoration

First-order methods are used widely for large scale optimization problems in signal/image processing and machine learning, because their computation depends mildly on the problem dimension. Nesterov's fast gradient method (FGM) has the optimal convergence rate among first-order methods for smooth convex minimization; its extension to non-smooth case, the fast iterative shrinkage-thresholding algorithm (FISTA), also satisfies the optimal rate; thus both algorithms have gained great interest. We recently introduced a new optimized gradient method (OGM) (for smooth convex functions) having a theoretical convergence speed that is 2× faster than Nesterov's FGM. This paper further discusses the convergence analysis of OGM and explores its fast convergence on an image restoration problem using a smoothed total variation (TV) regularizer. In addition, we empirically investigate the extension of OGM to nonsmooth convex minimization for image restoration with l1-sparsity regularization.