Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
T3: On Mapping Text To Time Series

We investigate if the mapping between text and time series data is feasible such that relevant data mining problems in text can find their counterparts in time series (and vice versa). As a preliminary work, we present the T (Text To T ime series) framework that utilizes different combinations of granularity (e.g., character or word level) and n-grams (e.g., unigram or bigram). To assign appropriate numeric values to each character, T adopts different space-filling curves (e.g., linear, Hilbert, Z orders) based on the keyboard layout. When we applied T approach to the “record linkage” problem, despite the lossy transformation, T achieved comparable accuracy with considerable speed-up.
Plastic Degradation and Its Environmental Implications with Special Reference to Poly(ethylene terephthalate)

With increasing global consumption and their natural resistance to degradation, plastic materials and their accumulation in the environment is of increasing concern. This review aims to present a general overview of the current state of knowledge in areas that relate to biodegradation of polymers, especially poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET). This includes an outline of the problems associated with plastic pollution in the marine environment, a description of the properties, commercial manufacturing and degradability of PET, an overview of the potential for biodegradation of conventional polymers and biodegradable polymers already in production.
Myths and Misconceptions of Exchange Rates

This paper examines and dissects ten popular "suspect" conjectures about exchange rates. The conjectures are the following: (1) Economists know what determines the exchange rate (2) Flexible exchange rates are unstable due to destabilising speculation (3) Flexible exchange rates are excessively volatile (4) The foreign exchange market is efficient (5) Purchasing Power Parity holds (6) There is no risk in foreign exchange (7) Volatile exchange rates are harmful to trade (8) Depreciating exchange rates trigger a "vicious" inflationary circle (9) Countries with current account deficits have depreciating exchange rates and (10) Low exchange rate pass-through provides a "free lunch". The main message is that there is weak or no theoretical or empirical support for the majority of the conjectures (myths 3, 4, 6, 7, 8 and 9). Only one proposition, relative PPP, has strong empirical support but its policy relevance is weakened by the difficulty of interpreting departures from PPP. The remaining group for which there is inconclusive support presents the greatest challenge to research and policy as it includes conjecture (1).
Correction: Hyphal Development in Candida albicans Requires Two Temporally Linked Changes in Promoter Chromatin for Initiation and Maintenance

Dataset S1 and Dataset S2 were erroneously omitted from the list of Supporting Information. Please view Dataset S1 here: http://www.plosbiology. org/corrections/pbio.1001105. s007.tif and Dataset S2 here: http://www.plosbiology. org/corrections/pbio.1001105. s008.tif .
Transitioning from lab studies to large-scale studies : Emerging results from a literal replication

Replication of studies in Software Engineering is considered important, but is largely neglected. Because of the lack of published replicated literature, there are few established guidelines for researchers wanting to conduct replicated studies. Specifically, guidelines for transitioning from laboratory studies to large-scale studies are nonexistent. Previously, we conducted a laboratory study in the banking domain, in Canada, which we replicated by conducting an extended, large-scale case study on an innovative rail project in Germany, investigating the role of an existing systems architecture on requirements decisions. In this short paper, we present a preliminary analysis of our transitioning experiences from conducting these two studies. From our experiences, we derive a set of lessons learnt and recommendations that can be used by other researchers wanting to transition from lab studies to studies in industrial settings.
Inhomogeneous reionization of the intergalactic medium regulated by radiative and stellar feedbacks

We study the inhomogeneous reionization in a critical density CDM universe resulting from stellar sources, including Population III objects. The spatial distribution of the sources is obtained from high-resolution numerical N-body simulations. We calculate the source properties, taking into account a self-consistent treatment of both radiative (i.e. ionizing and H2-photodissociating photons) and stellar (i.e. SN explosions) feedbacks regulated by massive stars. This allows us to describe the topology of the ionized and dissociated regions at various cosmic epochs, and to derive the evolution of H, He and H2 filling factors, soft UV background, cosmic star formation rate and the final fate of ionizing objects. The main results are: (i) galaxies reionize the intergalactic medium by z≈10 (with some uncertainty related to the gas clumping factor), whereas H2 is completely dissociated already by z≈25; (ii) reionization is mostly caused by the relatively massive objects which collapse via H line cooling, while objects the formation of which relies on H2 cooling alone are insufficient for this purpose; (iii) the diffuse soft UV background is the major source of radiative feedback effects for z≤15; at higher z direct flux from neighbouring objects dominates; (iv) the match of the calculated cosmic star formation history with that observed at lower redshifts suggests that the conversion efficiency of baryons into stars is ≈1 per cent; (v) we find that a very large population of dark objects which failed to form stars is present by z≈8. We discuss and compare our results with similar previous studies.
Acute mesenteric ischemia caused by isolated dissection of the superior mesenteric artery and thrombotic occlusion of its major branches: treatment by systemic thrombolysis with recombinant tissue plasminogen activator (rtPA)

Introduction. Isolated superior mesenteric artery (SMA) dissection, without associated aortic dissection, is relatively uncommon. Therefore, there are insufficient data to support a particular therapeutic option in the specific setting of isolated SMA dissection associated with thrombotic complications. Case report. In this article we describe the diagnosis and treatment of a patient who presented to the Emergency Department with the clinical picture of an acute abdomen and signs suggestive of acute occlusion of the SMA. Diagnostic studies showed an isolated SMA dissection with acute thrombotic occlusion of its main branches. The patient was successfully treated with systemic recombinant tissue plasminogen activator (rtPA) thrombolysis. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first description of a case of isolated SMA dissection associated with thrombotic occlusion of its main branches. Conclusion. In patients presenting with persistent abdominal pain and unspecific clinical findings, rare causes should be considered because of their life threatening complications. Systemic thrombolysis is a feasible technique for the treatment of isolated SMA dissection associated with thrombotic complications in the absence of bowel necrosis. CASE REPORT SIGNA VITAE 2010; 5(2): 40 42
Integer programming as a framework for optimization and approximability

Structural approximation theory seeks to provide a framework for expressing optimization problems, and isolating structural or syntactic conditions that explain the (apparent) difference in the approximation properties of different NP-optimization problems. In this paper, we initiate a study of structural approximation using integer programming (an optimization problem in its own right) as a general framework for expressing optimization problems. We isolate three classes of constant-approximable maximization problems, based on restricting appropriately the syntactic form of the integer programs expressing them. The first of these classes subsumes MAX /spl Sigma//sub 1/, which is the syntactic version of the well-studied class MAX NP. Moreover, by allowing variables to take on not just 0/1 values but rather values in a polylogarithmic or polynomial range, we obtain syntactic maximization classes that are polylog-approximable and poly-approximable, respectively. The other two classes contain problems, such as MAX MATCHING, for which no previous structural explanation of approximability has been found.
An Iris Biometric System for Public and Personal Use

Much work in the emerging field of biometrics has focused on identification applications. Biometrics offers the means to identify individuals without requiring that they carry ID cards and badges or memorize passwords. A leading concern in the development of such applications, however, is how to avoid rejecting valid users or approving imposters. The iris of the eye may provide a solution by offering a much more discriminating biometric than fingerprint or face recognition. The authors have designed and implemented an iris biometric system for personal electronic identification. Further, their system solves problems associated with public use devices such as automated teller machines, where habituated use is not the norm. The system also addresses personal-use arenas, such as home banking, and other Internet and network applications, such as secure business logons. The article describes the public- and personal-use systems, as well as relating statistical analysis and field trials to gauge the effectiveness of their system.
Determinants of Stock Market Prices in Namibia

This paper investigates the macroeconomic determinants of stock market prices in Namibia. The investigation was conducted using a VECM econometric methodology and revealed that Namibian stock market prices are chiefly determined by economic activity, interest rates, inflation,money supply and exchange rates. An increase in economic activity and the money supply increases stock market prices, while increases in inflation and interest rates decrease stock prices. The results suggest that equities are not a hedge against inflation in Namibia, and contractionary monetary policy generally depresses stock prices. Increasing economic activity promotes stock market price development
Testing for software reliability

This paper presents a formulation of a novel methodology for evaluation of testing in support of operational reliability assessment and prediction. The methodology features an incremental evaluation of the representativeness of a set of development and validation test cases together with definition of additional test cases to enhance those qualities. If test cases are derived in typical fashion (i.e., to find and remove bugs, to investigate software performance under off-nominal conditions, to exercise structural elements and functional capabilities of the software, and to demonstrate satisfaction of software requirements), then the complete set of test cases is not necessarily representative of anticipated operational usage. The paper reports on initial research into formulation of valid measures of testing representativeness. Several techniques which permit specification of expected operational usage are described, and a technique for evaluating the correlation between actual testing accomplished and expected operational usage is defined. An unbiased estimator for operational usage reliability is proposed and justified as a function of a specified operational profile; confidence in the estimate is derived from a measure of the degree to which testing is representative of expected operational application. An experimental application of the techniques to a small program is provided as an illustration of the proposed use of the methodology for operational software reliability estimation. The relationship between structural exercise testing thoroughness and operational usage representativeness is discussed; the specification of a quantified reliability requirement and an explicit, required representativeness measure (or confidence) is identified as integral to effective application of the proposed reliability testing methodology; efforts to extend, formalize and generalize the methodology are described; and expected benefits, as well as potential problems and limitations are identified.
Dynamics synchronization of the running of planar biped robots with SLIP model in stance phase

In this work a control law is derived to synchronize dynamics of multibody biped robots and the spring loaded inverted pendulum (SLIP) model in stance phase of running. The goal is to use the vast literature on the SLIP model dynamics for the control of real multibody robots. Three kneed biped robot models are considered in this work: with springs parallel to motors, with springs series to motors, and without springs. Dynamic equations of the multibody biped models are derived using Lagrange equation and then the applicability of the derived control law to these models are investigated using simulation. The initial state of the multibody robot is found such that its center of mass (CoM) has the same initial condition as SLIP model. Then the trajectory of its CoM is compared to SLIP model. Also motor torque profiles are compared for the models with and without springs and also for the motors with and without rotor inertias. The results show that the effect of rotor inertia is a big challenge in implementing fast biped running on real robots.
Toxoplasmosis seroprevalence in urban rodents: a survey in Niamey, Niger

A serological survey of Toxoplasma gondii was conducted on 766 domestic and peridomestic rodents from 46 trapping sites throughout the city of Niamey, Niger. A low seroprevalence was found over the whole town with only 1.96% of the rodents found seropositive. However, differences between species were important, ranging from less than 2% in truly commensal Mastomys natalensis, Rattus rattus and Mus musculus, while garden-associated Arvicanthis niloticus displayed 9.1% of seropositive individuals. This is in line with previous studies on tropical rodents - that we reviewed here - which altogether show that Toxoplasma seroprevalence in rodent is highly variable, depending on many factors such as locality and/or species. Moreover, although we were not able to decipher statistically between habitat or species effect, such a contrast between Nile grass rats and the other rodent species points towards a potentially important role of environmental toxoplasmic infection. This would deserve to be further scrutinised since intra-city irrigated cultures are extending in Niamey, thus potentially increasing Toxoplasma circulation in this yet semi-arid region. As far as we are aware of, our study is one of the rare surveys of its kind performed in Sub-Saharan Africa and the first one ever conducted in the Sahel.
Improvement of Mutual Information based on TF-CA-CI algorithm

Mutual Information algorithm for text feature selection usually tends to select the rare terms. In allusion to this limitation, this paper makes use of the term frequency, the coupling factor among classes and the cohesion degree inside a class to the MI algorithm, and proposes an improved MI approach based on TFCA-CI algorithm. The experimental result shows that the improved method can effectively control the randomness of the MI method appeared in the process of feature selection when the dimension is low, and achieve a better classified results. So the effectiveness and feasibility of the improved method is achieved.
Communication Costs and Agro-Food Trade in OECD Countries

The paper analyses the effects of communication costs for agro-food trade in OECD countries between 1995 and 2003 using gravity model. We find that the link between the communication costs and agro-food trade flows in developed countries is significantly stronger for agricultural than for food products. The improved communication services reduce trade transaction costs. The estimations also confirmed importance of the economy size, level of development in importer countries, and trade distance. The other traditional gravity variables like contiguity, language and regional free trade agreements have significant impacts in the majority of specifications
Revealing Protein Structures by Co-Occurrence Clustering of Aligned Pattern Clusters

Proteins can be represented in several ways, including primary protein sequence, where the protein is represented as a string of amino acids, and three-dimensional structure, where the sequence is folded into a structure. By analyzing proteins from the same protein family, we can find conserved protein regions that are common within that protein family, gaining biological knowledge. Compared to the amount of protein three-dimensional structures available, there is an abundance of protein sequences, hence, making analysis of protein sequence to find characteristics in its three-dimensional structures crucial. Through sequence pattern discovery and alignment, statistically significant sequence patterns in protein families are found and represented as Aligned Pattern Clusters (APCs). When two or more APCs occur frequently together on the same protein, this implies that they together have important relationship in the protein. A co-occurrence score is used to quantify such relationship between the APCs, which are further used to cluster APCs into APC clusters. The purpose of this paper is to examine the validate of the proposed method by applying our method to two protein families, triosephosphate isomerase and G-alpha. The results are then verified using three-dimensional structures to check both to examine whether the results comply with the structure and how often with different known structures. The results for both protein families comply in majority with the known structures, and their APCs were close in three-dimensional distance. We found three characteristics that are common in the resulting APC clusters from both sets of protein data: the APC cluster forming a complete graph, the APC cluster having a high co-occurrence score, and the APC cluster containing APCs with more than one patterns. Furthermore, our method and results are currently being verified by important proteins crystallized from an immunology lab.
Unconscious Processing of Facial Emotional Valence Relation: Behavioral Evidence of Integration between Subliminally Perceived Stimuli

Although a few studies have investigated the integration between some types of unconscious stimuli, no research has yet explored the integration between unconscious emotional stimuli. This study was designed to provide behavioral evidence for the integration between unconsciously perceived emotional faces (same or different valence relation) using a modified priming paradigm. In two experiments, participants were asked to decide whether two faces in the target, which followed two subliminally presented faces of same or different emotional expressions, were of the same or different emotional valence. The interstimulus interval (ISI) between the prime and the target was manipulated (0, 53, 163 ms). In Experiment 1, prime visibility was assessed post-experiment. In Experiment 2, it was assessed on each trial. Interestingly, in both experiments, unconsciously processed valence relation of the two faces in the prime generated a negative priming effect in the response to the supraliminally presented target, independent of the length of ISI. Further analyses suggested that the negative priming was probably caused by a motor response incongruent relation between the subliminally perceived prime and the supraliminally perceived target. The visual feature incongruent relation across the prime and target was not found to play a role in the negative priming. Because the negative priming was found at short ISI, an attention mechanism as well as a motor inhibition mechanism were proposed in the generation of the negative priming effect. Overall, this study indicated that the subliminal valence relation was processed, and that integration between different unconsciously perceived stimuli could occur.
Countering Terrorism: The Reagan Record

Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980 at least in part because of President Carter's perceived failure to deal effectively with the Iranian hostages issue that had plagued the final months of his single-term presidency. Zbigniew Brzezinski, Carter's National Security Advisor, conceded in his memoirs that, "largely because of the economy and the Iranian issue, the public lost confidence in Carter's leadership. " Theodore White, the noted chronicler of presidential campaigns, concluded that Carter's political future "probably died on the desert sands of Iran with the eight brave soldiers who gave their lives trying to free the American Hostages. "
Antioxidant status and risk of cancer in the SU.VI.MAX study: is the effect of supplementation dependent on baseline levels?

The SUpplementation en VItamines et Mineraux AntioXydants (SU.VI.MAX) study, a randomised double-blind, primary-prevention trial showed that after 7·5 years, low-dose antioxidant supplementation lowered the total cancer incidence in men, but not in women. To explain this difference in the impact of antioxidant supplementation in men and women, we hypothesised that the effect of supplementation is dependent on initial antioxidant status; 12 741 French adults (7713 females aged 35–60 years; 5028 males aged 45–60 years) received daily antioxidant supplementation (120 mg vitamin C, 30 mg vitamin E, 6 mg β-carotene, 100 μg Se, 20 mg Zn daily) or a matching placebo. Cut-off limits for baseline serum concentrations of the different antioxidant vitamins and minerals were defined as follows for both men and women: 0·3 μmol/l for β-carotene, 11·4 μmol/l for vitamin C, 15 μmol/l for vitamin E, 0·75 μmol/l for Se and 10·7 μmol/l for Zn. The percentage of men with serum concentrations under cut-off limits was higher for vitamins C and E and β-carotene in those who developed a cancer than in those who did not. The risk of cancer was higher in men with baseline concentrations of serum vitamin C or vitamin E under cut-off limits, but not in women. The effect of supplementation was greater in men with baseline serum concentrations of vitamin C, vitamin E and β-carotene below the cut-off limits compared with those above it. This effect was maintained only for vitamin E after adjustment for age, tobacco, and alcohol consumption and BMI. No effect of supplementation could be seen in women. Baseline antioxidant status is related to the risk of cancer in men but not in women and therefore does not entirely explain the differences observed in the effect of antioxidant supplementation on cancer risk between sexes in the SU.VI. MAX study.
Cognitive Impairment in Children of Alcoholics

Excessive alcohol consumption can be associated with cognitive impairment not only in drinkers but also in their offspring. Studies of children of alcoholics (COA’s), and particularly of sons of male alcoholics (SOMA’s), have identified a characteristic cognitive profile. COA’s frequently have deficits in verbal skills, classification of verbal and visual stimuli, abstract thinking, and goal-directed planning. SOMA’s show additional deficits in visuospatial abilities, perceptual motor skills, and learning and memory. A model is described that explains how the observed cognitive deficits may contribute to the behavioral problems frequently observed in COA’s and to their risk of becoming alcoholic themselves. However, only some, but not all, COA’s exhibit a cognitive profile predictive of behavioral problems.