Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Heat Stress Is More Damaging to Superior Spikelets than Inferiors of Rice (Oryza sativa L.) due to Their Different Organ Temperatures

In general, the fertility and kernel weight of inferior spikelets of rice (Oryza Sativa L.) are obviously lower than those of superior spikelets, especially under abiotic stress. However, different responses to heat stress are seemed to show between the superior and inferior spikelet, and this response is scarcely documented that the intrinsic factors remain elusive. In order to reveal the mechanism underlying, two rice plants with different heat tolerance were subjected to heat stress of 40°C at anthesis. The results indicated that a greater decrease in fertility and kernel weight was observed in superior spikelets compared to inferior spikelets. This decrease was primarily ascribed to their different organ temperatures, in which the temperature of the superior spikelets was significantly higher than that of inferior spikelets. We inferred the differences in canopy temperature, light intensity and panicle types, were the primary reasons for the temperature difference between superior and inferior spikelets. Under heat stress, the fertility and kernel weight of superior and inferior spikelets decreased as the panicle numbers per plant were reduced, which was accompanied by significantly increasing the canopy temperatures. Thus, it was suggested that the rice plant with characteristic features of an upright growth habit and loose panicles might be more susceptible to heat stress resulting from their higher canopy and spikelets temperatures.
A Comparison Between a Time Domain and Continuous Wave Small Animal Optical Imaging System

We present a phantom study to evaluate the performance of the eXplore Optix (Advanced Research Technologies-GE Healthcare), the first commercially available time-domain tomography system for small animal fluorescence imaging, and compare its capabilities with the widely used IVIS 200 (Xenogen Corporation-Caliper) continuous wave planar imaging system. The eXplore Optix, based on point-wise illumination and collection scheme, is found to be a log order more sensitive with significantly higher detection depth and spatial resolution as compared with the wide-area illumination IVIS 200 under the conditions tested. A time-resolved detection system allows the eXplore Optix to measure the arrival time distribution of fluorescence photons. This enables fluorescence lifetime measurement, absorption mapping, and estimation of fluorescent inclusion depth, which in turn is used by a reconstruction algorithm to calculate the volumetric distribution of the fluorophore concentration. An increased acquisition time and lack of ability to image multiple animals simultaneously are the main drawbacks of the eXplore Optix as compared with the IVIS 200.
Some modal aspects of XPath

This paper provides several examples of how modal logic can be used in studying the XML document navigation language XPath. More specifically, we derive complete axiomatizations, computational complexity and expressive power results for XPath fragments from known results for corresponding logics. A secondary aim of the paper is to introduce XPath in a way that makes it accessible to an audience of modal logicians.
Reconfigurable RF PWM PA architecture for efficiency enhancement at power back-off

A transformer-combined fully-integrated reconfigurable RF PA architecture for fully digital transmitters is proposed. The RF PA dynamically switches between several modes in order to achieve efficiency enhancement at power back-off and simultaneously producing a multi-level RF PWM signal. Multilevel RF PWM is realized by driving one or two power amplifiers (PAs) with a PWM signal, while the others are turned off or working at full power. This architecture is implemented in a 40nm standard CMOS technology where the PAE at 15dB back-off from the peak power is still 17% PAE while achieving 27% PAE at peak with 31.5 dBm peak output power. Therefore, this architecture is almost 3.5 times more efficient than a conventional class B architecture at power back-off.
Automated Design and Optimization of Low-Noise Oscillators

This paper presents a technique for automated design and optimization of low-noise oscillators. A sensitivity analysis for oscillators guides the reduction of oscillator noise intensities and improvement of oscillator's immunity to noise. A design-oriented approach to circuit analysis efficiently handles design constraints and reduces the dimensionality of the optimization problem. The perturbation projection vector based phase noise computation makes the proposed optimization technique general and applicable to all types of oscillators, independent of circuit topology. Several examples illustrate the benefits of the new optimization approach.
An approach to 2D-To-3D conversion for multiview displays

This paper proposes an approach for 2D-to-3D conversion for multiview displays. It employs an object-based approach where objects at large depth differences are first segmented by semi-automatic tools. Appropriate depth values are assigned to these objects and the missing image pixels at the background are filled in by inpainting techniques so that different views of the image can be synthesized. This approach helps to shorten the process of 2D-to-3D conversion and its performance is satisfactory for images and short video clips.
General Incremental Sliding-Window Aggregation

Stream processing is gaining importance as more data becomes available in the form of continuous streams and companies compete to promptly extract insights from them. In such applications, sliding-window aggregation is a central operator, and incremental aggregation helps avoid the performance penalty of re-aggregating from scratch for each window change. This paper presents Reactive Aggregator (RA), a new framework for incremental sliding-window aggregation. RA is general in that it does not require aggregation functions to be invertible or commutative, and it does not require windows to be FIFO. We implemented RA as a drop-in replacement for the Aggregate operator of a commercial streaming engine. Given m updates on a window of size n, RA has an algorithmic complexity of O(m + m log (n/m)), rivaling the best prior algorithms for any m. Furthermore, RA's implementation minimizes overheads from allocation and pointer traversals by using a single flat array.
Renegotiation of Financial Contracts: Evidence from Private Credit Agreements

Using a large sample of private credit agreements between U.S. publicly traded firms and financial institutions, we show that over 90% of long-term debt contracts are renegotiated prior to their stated maturity. Renegotiations result in large changes to the amount, maturity, and pricing of the contract, occur relatively early in the life of the contract, and are rarely a consequence of distress or default. The accrual of new information concerning the credit quality, investment opportunities, and collateral of the borrower, as well as macroeconomic fluctuations in credit and equity market conditions, are the primary determinants of renegotiation and its outcomes. The terms of the initial contract (e.g., contingencies) also play an important role in renegotiations; by altering the structure of the contract in a state contingent manner, renegotiation is partially controlled by the contractual assignment of bargaining power.
Chapter 2 OX-LINK : The Oxford MedicalRecord Linkage System

This paper describes the major features of the Oxford record linkage system (OX-LINK), with its use of the Oxford name compression algorithm (ONCA), the calculation of the names weights, the use of orthogonal matrices to determine the threshold acceptance weights, and the use of combinational and heuristic algebraic algorithms to select the potential links between pairs of records. The system was developed using the collection of linkable abstracts that comprise the Oxford Record Linkage Study (ORLS), which covers 10 million records for 5 million people and spans 1963 to date. The linked dataset is used for the preparation of health services statistics, and for epidemiological and health services research. The policy of the Oxford unit is to comprehensively link all the records rather than prepare links on an ad-hoc basis. The OX-LINK system has been further developed and refined for internally cross matching the whole of the National Health Service Central Register (NHSCR) against itself (57.9 million records), and to detect and remove duplicate pairs; as a first step towards the issue of a new NHS number to everyone in England and Wales. A recent development is the matching of general practice (primary care) records with hospital and vital records to prepare a file for analyzing referral, prescribing and outcome measures. Other uses of the system include ad hoc linkages for specific cohorts, academic support for the development of test programs and data for efficiently and accurately tracing people within the NHSCR, and developing methodologies for preparing registers containing a high proportion of ethnic names. he term record linkage, first used by H. L. Dunn (1946; Gill and Baldwin, 1987), expresses the concept of collating health-care records into a cumulative personal file, starting with birth and ending with death. Dunn also emphasised the use of linked files to establish the accuracy or otherwise of the recorded data. When the requirement is to link records at different times and in different places, in principle it would be possible to link such records using a unique personal identification number. In practice, a unique number has not generally been available on records in the UK of interest in medicine and therefore other methods such as the use of surnames, forenames and dates of birth, have been necessary to identify different records relating to
A logical language for expressing authorizations

A major drawback of existing access control systems is that they have all been developed with a specific access control policy in mind. This means that all protection requirements (i.e. accesses to be allowed or denied) must be specified in terms of the policy enforced by the system. While this may be trivial for some requirements, specification of other requirements may become quite complex or even impossible. The reason for this is that a single policy simply cannot capture the different protection requirements that users may need to enforce on different data. In this paper, we take a first step towards a model that is able to support different access control policies. We propose a logical language for the specification of authorizations on which such a model can be based. The Authorization Specification Language (ASL) allows users to specify, together with the authorizations, the policy according to which access control decisions are to be made. Policies are expressed by means of rules which enforce the derivation of authorizations, conflict resolution, access control and integrity constraint checking. We illustrate the power of our language by showing how different constraints that are sometimes required, but very seldom supported by existing access control systems, can be represented in our language.
An experimental GPU global memory performance estimation and optimization

The enormous computational power available in modern graphics processing units (GPUs) has enabled the widely use of them for general-purpose applications. However, manual development of high-performance parallel codes for GPUs is still very challenging. In order for improving GPGPU application performance by efficiently using GPU global memory, we extend the polyhedral model to capture memory access patterns inside the source programs. We determine the global memory accesses are coalesced or not. We also estimate the memory performance of a GPGPU kernel, with the purpose of eliminating the uncoalesced global memory accesses. Experimental results show that that the present global memory performance model can estimate the global memory performance of these two applications relative accurately and the present global memory optimization methods can significantly improve performance.
Probabilistic situation assessment framework for multiple, interacting traffic participants in generic traffic scenes

Situation recognition is a prerequisite for many advanced driver assistance systems as well as for partially and fully automated vehicles. Current situation recognition approaches focus mainly on estimating maneuvers of single scene entities. However, assessing multiple, possibly interacting, traffic participants simultaneously is crucial in complex traffic scenes and has hardly been investigated. Considering the variability and combinatorics of such scenarios, having specialized situation recognition systems covering each case directly is unrealistic. In this paper, we present a flexible framework for assessing generic traffic scenes with multiple interacting traffic participants. It is able to construct a fully interaction-respecting probabilistic situation assessment, while relying on reusable state-of-the-art single-entity-based maneuver predictions. The benefits and applicability are presented on a real-world data set. The evaluation indicates that the approach is not only able to reconstruct underlying interdependent probability distributions; it outperforms specially designed models, due to the reduced complexities of the single-entity-based recognition models.
An integrated framework for the implementation and continuous improvement of spatial data infrastructures

Development and usage of proper frameworks for implementation, evaluation and continuous improvement of spatial data infrastructures (SDIs) is currently an important research topic. A wide range of methods are being researched. In this respect, methods and techniques on performance measurement and evaluation techniques from business management literature are not yet considered. Some techniques and methodologies from business management literature could be developed based on Six Sigma, ABC (Activity Based Costing), BSC (Balanced Scorecard) and TQM (Total Quality Management). This article describes these techniques and then provides an integrated framework, based on these business management techniques, for implementation and continuous improvement of SDIs.
Resistance Training and Vibration Improve Muscle Strength and Functional Capacity in Female Patients with Multiple Sclerosis

Purpose The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of an eight-week progressive resistance training and vibration program on strength and ambulatory function in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients. Methods Twenty-Four female MS patients with the following demographics: age 27-45 years, and expanded disability status scale (EDSS) 2-4, participated in this study. The subjects were randomly allocated to one of two groups. The exercise group (n = 12) trained according to a progressive program, mainly consisting of resistance training and vibration, three times a week for eight weeks and compared with subjects in the control group (n = 12) that received no intervention. Subjects completed one set of 5-12 reps at%50-70 maximal voluntary contraction (MVC). After 5-10 minutes rest, six postures on plate vibration were done. Isotonic MVC of knee extensors, abduction of the scapula and downward rotation of the scapular girdle muscle groups were predicted by using the Brzycki formula. Right leg balance (RLB), left leg balance (LLB), and walking speed (10-Meter Walk Test) were assessed before and after the training program. Descriptive statistics and Co-variance were used for analyzing data. Results After eight weeks of training the exercise group showed significant increase in MVC of Knee extensors (32.3%), Abduction of the scapula (24.7%) and Downward Rotation Scapular (39.1%) muscle groups, RLB (33.5%), LLB (9.5%), and decrease in 10-Meter Walk Test (10MWT) (9.3%), (P<0.05). Conclusions The results of this study indicated this type of training can cause improvements in muscle strength and functional capacity in patients with multiple sclerosis.
Early use of electroconvulsive therapy in individuals with first episode psychosis: A case series

The use of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) in various neuropsychiatric disorders has been well accepted. ECT has been proven to be safe and effective in adolescents and in old age. However, only a handful of literature is available on its effectiveness in first episode psychosis (FEP). In this case series, individuals with FEP who received ECT in their 1st month of treatment for various indications were described. During follow-up, subjects showed considerable improvement in their psychopathology and functional outcomes. None of them had any adverse events during or after ECT sessions. Thus, the present case series highlights the usefulness and safety of early use of ECT in individuals with first episode psychosis and its effectiveness in reducing the acute symptoms leading to remission and better outcomes.
Cross Layer Security Protocol Using Swarm Intelligence

Security and privacy plays a vital role in wireless applications such as health monitoring, military and biometric identification systems. Due to the limited resource constraints in wireless sensor network, security in protocols is sacrificed or kept minimal. In this paper, a cross layer protocol is designed to detect denial of service attack imposed on the network by malicious nodes. The Denial of Service attack on sensor networks not only diminishes the network performance but also affects the reliability of the information. Swarm intelligence, an evolutionary algorithm is used in predicting the traffic patterns and detecting malicious nodes. This novel approach helps in keeping the network functional and self sustaining by re-routing the information. The sybil, worm-hole and jamming attacks are overcome using this protocol design with minimal resource exploitation. The performance of the network is evaluated based on the successful packet delivery, energy consumption and average percentage of threat detection.
Epigenetic Regulation of Enteric Neurotransmission by Gut Bacteria

The Human Microbiome Project defined microbial community interactions with the human host, and provided important molecular insight into how epigenetic factors can influence intestinal ecosystems. Given physiological context, changes in gut microbial community structure are increasingly found to associate with alterations in enteric neurotransmission and disease. At present, it is not known whether shifts in microbial community dynamics represent cause or consequence of disease pathogenesis. The discovery of bacterial-derived neurotransmitters suggests further studies are needed to establish their role in enteric neuropathy. This mini-review highlights recent advances in bacterial communications to the autonomic nervous system and discusses emerging epigenetic data showing that diet, probiotic and antibiotic use may regulate enteric neurotransmission through modulation of microbial communities. A particular emphasis is placed on bacterial metabolite regulation of enteric nervous system function in the intestine.
Assessing Self-Efficacy for Self-Regulation of Academic Writing

Abstract. Academic writing is a complex and demanding activity that plays an important role in self-regulated learning settings within higher education. Self-efficacy and self-regulation are crucial factors for success and failure in academic writing. Because of the lack of adequate instruments, assessment of these factors is still limited. This paper introduces a scale for the assessment of self-efficacy for self-regulation of academic writing (SSAW). We deductively developed the SSAW scale and then conducted three studies in order to test and validate the scale. The first study ( N = 121) resulted in a brief scale with good psychometric properties. The second study ( N = 660) showed the scale’s factorial validity. The third study ( N = 188) provided evidence for the convergent validity of the SSAW scale. In sum, these studies yield a reliable, valid, and economic scale. The results are discussed with regard to the usefulness of the SSAW scale for research and practice in higher education.
Top-Gated Epitaxial Graphene FETs on Si-Face SiC Wafers With a Peak Transconductance of 600 mS/mm

In this letter, we present state-of-the-art performance of top-gated graphene n-FETs and p-FETs fabricated with epitaxial graphene layers grown on Si-face 6H-SiC substrates on 50-mm wafers. The current-voltage characteristics of these devices show excellent saturation with on-state current densities (I<sub>on</sub>) of 0.59 A/mm at V<sub>ds</sub> = 1 V and 1.65 A/mm at V<sub>ds</sub> = 3 V. I<sub>on</sub>/I<sub>off</sub> ratios of 12 and 19 were measured at V<sub>ds</sub> = 1 and 0.5 V, respectively. A peak extrinsic g<sub>m</sub> as high as 600 mS/mm was measured at V<sub>ds</sub> = 3.05 V, with a gate length of 2.94 ¿m. The field-effect mobility versus effective electric field (E<sub>eff</sub>) was measured for the first time in epitaxial graphene FETs, where record field-effect mobilities of 6000 cm<sup>2</sup>/V·s for electrons and 3200 cm<sup>2</sup>/V·s for holes were obtained at E<sub>eff</sub> ~ 0.27 MV/cm .
Impact of vibration on the muscle endurance and fatigue during strengthening exercise

The use of vibration platform for improved wellness is widely accepted. While these platforms are commonly advertised to improve tone and facilitate relaxation, there appears to be little scientific evidence of the impact of these platforms on muscle contraction. This paper reports the experimental study where the effect of full body vibration platform on various parameters of muscle contraction such as maximum voluntary contraction, endurance limit and onset of muscle fatigue, along with the measure of pain index has been studied. The results indicate that there was a significant improvement in each of these categories after the use of the vibration platform.
An optimising compiler for generated tiny virtual machines

VMSCRIPT is a scripting language designed to allow small programs to be compiled for a range of generated tiny virtual machines, suitable for sensor network devices. The VMSCRIPT compiler is an optimising compiler designed to allow quick re-targeting, based on a template, code rewriting model. A compiler backend can be specified at the same time as a virtual machine, with the compiler reading the specification and using it as a code generator.
A spectrum sensing algorithm based on estimating the number of source signals

Spectrum sensing is a key technology in cognitive radio systems. The quiet period is commonly used during the sensing period to avoid the interference from the cognitive networks. In this paper, we propose a new sensing algorithm that does not need to set the quiet period. The presence or absence of the primary signal is judged by estimating the number of source signals based on the application of information theoretic criteria for model selection. The performance of the new method is validated by simulation results.
Design of a practical scheme for ultra wideband communication

In the design of a packet-oriented impulse-radio UWB communication system, the main challenge at the receiver is to have a fast synchronization to the coded pulses, along with a detection of the message. We consider schemes that are straightforward to implement in practical systems and propose two methods to realize the synchronization algorithms: a serial and a parallel method. The algorithms for synchronization and demodulation are implemented in a receiver prototype based on an FPGA
A Monte Carlo Based Procedure for Analyzing Discrete-Time, Nonstationary Simulation Responses Using Classical Time Series Models

In this paper, we propose a procedure for analyzing discrete-time, nonstationary discrete-event simulation responses based on Monte Carlo integration and the use of classical ARIMA (or SARIMA) time-series models. The procedure is illustrated with an exploding single-server queue and a bounded cyclical traffic situation. Some conclusions and recommendations for further work are stated.