Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Multi-stage digital predistortion based on indirect learning architecture

In this paper, we propose a multi-stage indirect learning architecture (ILA) for digital predistortion. Unlike the conventional ILA, in multi-stage ILA the digital predistorter (PD) is implemented in two or more stages. We demonstrate that depending on the power amplifier (PA), multi-stage ILA can achieve same or even better performance than the conventional ILA but with significantly lower PD identification complexity. The identification complexity is measured by computing the number of multipliers needed for identification of PD. In addition to above, we also propose two algorithms for the identification of the multi-stage ILA coefficients. The performance of the multi-stage ILA is evaluated in terms of improvement in adjacent channel power ratio (ACPR) and error vector magnitude (EVM) at the output of PA when a Long Term Evolution-Advanced (LTE-Advanced) signal is applied at the input. The reference PA models used for simulation are the Wiener model and Wiener-Hammerstein model.
Paradigms Lost vs Paradigms Found

to the effect that structuration provides for ’metatheoretical and theoretical pluralism’, obviously cannot be correct, for we present structuration as the preferred metatheory. We argue that structuration, as a metatheory, leaves the daily practice of different schools relatively intact, but rejects their ontological presumptions (e.g. about causal regularity in the case of structural-functionalism). If so, structuration is the metatheory, and there is no metatheoretical pluralism. In the abstract, we should have said ’methodological and theoretical’. We spoke imprecisely here, and apologize for the confusion generated. That leads to the next issue, however: how ’largely intact’ (our words) does a structurational analysis leave the practice of traditional ’paradigmatic’ forms of inquiry? Our critics claim that structuration precludes
How to Tell Stories Using Visualization

The benefits of storytelling's are long-known and its potential to simplify concepts, create emotional connection, and capacity to help retain information has been explored in different areas, such as journalism, education, and others. The necessity to incorporate storytelling in visualizations arises from the need to share complex data in a way that is engaging. Advances in technology have enabled us to go beyond the traditional forms of storytelling and representing data, giving us more attractive and sophisticated means to tell stories.In this paper, we present the results of a focus group study that was conducted with the purpose of collecting information on the narrative elements in a collection of visualizations and the possible inclusion of storytelling elements in those. In this study information about the visualizations in terms of comprehension, navigation, and likability was also collected with the intent of identifying elements that are appealing in the visualizations. Furthermore, we suggest strategies for storytelling in visualizations.
Fluid shifts, vasodilatation and ambulatory blood pressure reduction during long duration spaceflight

Weightlessness in space induces initially an increase in stroke volume and cardiac output, accompanied by unchanged or slightly reduced blood pressure. It is unclear whether these changes persist throughout months of flight. Here, we show that cardiac output and stroke volume increase by 35–41% between 3 and 6 months on the International Space Station, which is more than during shorter flights. Twenty‐four hour ambulatory brachial blood pressure is reduced by 8–10 mmHg by a decrease in systemic vascular resistance of 39%, which is not a result of the suppression of sympathetic nervous activity, and the nightly dip is maintained in space. It remains a challenge to explore what causes the systemic vasodilatation leading to a reduction in blood pressure in space, and whether the unexpectedly high stroke volume and cardiac output can explain some vision acuity problems encountered by astronauts on the International Space Station.
Timing the Generation of Distinct Retinal Cells by Homeobox Proteins

The reason why different types of vertebrate nerve cells are generated in a particular sequence is still poorly understood. In the vertebrate retina, homeobox genes play a crucial role in establishing different cell identities. Here we provide evidence of a cellular clock that sequentially activates distinct homeobox genes in embryonic retinal cells, linking the identity of a retinal cell to its time of generation. By in situ expression analysis, we found that the three Xenopus homeobox genes Xotx5b, Xvsx1, and Xotx2 are initially transcribed but not translated in early retinal progenitors. Their translation requires cell cycle progression and is sequentially activated in photoreceptors (Xotx5b) and bipolar cells (Xvsx1 and Xotx2). Furthermore, by in vivo lipofection of “sensors” in which green fluorescent protein translation is under control of the 3′ untranslated region (UTR), we found that the 3′ UTRs of Xotx5b, Xvsx1, and Xotx2 are sufficient to drive a spatiotemporal pattern of translation matching that of the corresponding proteins and consistent with the time of generation of photoreceptors (Xotx5b) and bipolar cells (Xvsx1 and Xotx2). The block of cell cycle progression of single early retinal progenitors impairs their differentiation as photoreceptors and bipolar cells, but is rescued by the lipofection of Xotx5b and Xvsx1 coding sequences, respectively. This is the first evidence to our knowledge that vertebrate homeobox proteins can work as effectors of a cellular clock to establish distinct cell identities.
“On the Separatin' Place”: Social Class and Relocation Among Older Women

Despite the interest in the relocation experiences of the elderly, little research has focused on the meanings of relocation. Using intensive interviews with 40 women who had relocated to facilities for the elderly, this essay demonstrates substantial variation in experiences of relocation along class lines. Middle class women were likely to have moved from homes that they had ozwned and lived in for many years. Having strong attachments to place, they coped with relocation by making their new rooms into museums of their lives. Lower class women were likely to have moved many times in their lives and were unlikely to have ozwned their own homes. Moving into a facility for the elderly was experienced as one in a long succession of moves, distinguished only by increased comfort and security. Working class women were likely to begin a downward spiral after widowhood or divorce. Moving into a facility for the elderly stopped the succession of moves to progressively smaller and less comfortable residences. In commenting on Max Weber's key concept of "life chances," Dahrendorf (1979) argues that we must pay attention to both words-the "life" of individual experiences and the "chances" of social structures that mold those experiences. As Weber ([1922] 1968) noted, social class is one of the main characteristics of social structures affecting the chances of individuals. Using occupational prestige scales and large data sets, sociologists have well-documented the ways social class affects income, wealth, and mobility rates. Less well-documented are the ways class-related experiences shape the courses of individual biographies, particularly in the later phases of life. The following paper explores the individual biographies of older women who have relocated into facilities for the elderly. This experi
A Multicentre Study of Shigella Diarrhoea in Six Asian Countries: Disease Burden, Clinical Manifestations, and Microbiology

Background The burden of shigellosis is greatest in resource-poor countries. Although this diarrheal disease has been thought to cause considerable morbidity and mortality in excess of 1,000,000 deaths globally per year, little recent data are available to guide intervention strategies in Asia. We conducted a prospective, population-based study in six Asian countries to gain a better understanding of the current disease burden, clinical manifestations, and microbiology of shigellosis in Asia. Methods and Findings Over 600,000 persons of all ages residing in Bangladesh, China, Pakistan, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand were included in the surveillance. Shigella was isolated from 2,927 (5%) of 56,958 diarrhoea episodes detected between 2000 and 2004. The overall incidence of treated shigellosis was 2.1 episodes per 1,000 residents per year in all ages and 13.2/1,000/y in children under 60 months old. Shigellosis incidence increased after age 40 years. S. flexneri was the most frequently isolated Shigella species (1,976/2,927 [68%]) in all sites except in Thailand, where S. sonnei was most frequently detected (124/146 [85%]). S. flexneri serotypes were highly heterogeneous in their distribution from site to site, and even from year to year. PCR detected ipaH, the gene encoding invasion plasmid antigen H in 33% of a sample of culture-negative stool specimens. The majority of S. flexneri isolates in each site were resistant to amoxicillin and cotrimoxazole. Ciprofloxacin-resistant S. flexneri isolates were identified in China (18/305 [6%]), Pakistan (8/242 [3%]), and Vietnam (5/282 [2%]). Conclusions Shigella appears to be more ubiquitous in Asian impoverished populations than previously thought, and antibiotic-resistant strains of different species and serotypes have emerged. Focusing on prevention of shigellosis could exert an immediate benefit first by substantially reducing the overall diarrhoea burden in the region and second by preventing the spread of panresistant Shigella strains. The heterogeneous distribution of Shigella species and serotypes suggest that multivalent or cross-protective Shigella vaccines will be needed to prevent shigellosis in Asia.
Simulation & analysis of different parameters of various levels of cascaded H bridge multilevel inverter

Cascaded multilevel inverters synthesize a medium-voltage output based on a series connection of power cells which use standard low-voltage component configurations. This characteristic allows one to achieve high-quality output voltages and input currents and also outstanding availability due to their intrinsic component redundancy. Due to these features, the cascaded multilevel inverter has been recognized as an important alternative in the medium-voltage inverter market. This paper presents output voltage waveforms and total harmonic distortion (THD) for single phase and three phase cascaded multilevel inverter starting from 5-level to 15-level. Simulation results show that as the number of levels increases the % THD will be reduced.
Equipping the community to measure children's height: the reliability of portable instruments.

OBJECTIVE--To compare (1) the reliability of two expensive and two inexpensive measuring instruments, suitable for use in the community and (2) the reliability of experienced compared with inexperienced observers. DESIGN--(1) Ten children aged 5-12 years were each measured three times blindly, and in random order, by two experienced observers using four different portable instruments. (2) Four groups of four children aged 5-11 years were each measured three times blindly, and in random order by four experienced and one inexperienced measurer, using two different portable instruments. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES--The precision of height measurements made by different observers using different instruments, expressed in each case as the standard deviation of a single height measurement (SDshm). RESULTS--(1) No significant difference in precision was found between instruments, SDshm ranging from 0.22-0.34 cm. The two observers using apparently the same technique, did however record significantly different absolute heights. (2) No significant difference in precision was found between experienced and inexperienced observers. CONCLUSION--Inexpensive height measuring equipment, once accurately installed, is no less reliable than the most expensive. Inexperienced observers can, with care, measure as reliably as those with long experience. Every effort should be made, however, to ensure that the progress of individual children is monitored not only by the same observer, but on a long term basis.
Observation of the First Gravitational Microlensing Event in a Sparse Stellar Field: The Tago Event

We report the observation of the first gravitational microlensing event in a sparse stellar field, involving the brightest (V = 11.4 mag) and closest (~1 kpc) source star to date. This event was discovered by an amateur astronomer, A. Tago, on 2006 October 31 as a transient brightening, by ~4.5 mag during a ~15 day period, of a normal A-type star (GSC 3656-1328) in the Cassiopeia constellation. Analysis of both spectroscopic observations and the light curve indicates that this event was caused by gravitational microlensing rather than an intrinsically variable star. Discovery of this single event over a 30 year period is roughly consistent with the expected microlensing rate for the whole sky down to V = 12 mag stars. However, the probability for finding events with such a high magnification (~50) is much smaller, by a factor of ~1/50, which implies that the true event rate may be higher than expected. This discovery indicates the potential of all sky variability surveys, employing frequent sampling by telescopes with small apertures and wide fields of view, for finding such rare transient events, and using the observations to explore Galactic disk structure and search for exoplanets.
Development of an Autonomous Humanoid Robot, iSHA, for Harmonized Human-Machine Environment

Our research aim is to build a harmonized humanmachine environment where humans and machines can interact with each other in a natural, seamless and intuitive manner. Along the sketched scenario, we have been developing a humanoid robot "iSHA" (interactive Systems for Humanoid Agent), which is designed to behave like and interact with humans. We implemented an intelligent robotic architecture, which integrates goal-oriented subsystems by taking the flexibility and scalability of the system into consideration. iSHA has an upper body resembling a human in shape and a mobile base with two wheels. The upper body with a head and two arms has 24 degrees-of-freedom. Two wheels equipped under the body provide safe and robust locomotion. Each eye equipped with a small CCD camera, small microphones embedded in the head, and touch sensory devices on the body respectively provide binocular vision, auditory and touch sensing ability to the robot.
Inhibition of Chlamydia trachomatis replication in HEp-2 cells by human monocyte-derived macrophages

Monocytes (M) and macrophages are important components of the immune response to foreign agents. Using an in vitro system, we studied the influence of human M and M-derived macrophages (MdM) on the replication of Chlamydia trachomatis (L2/434) in HEp-2 cells. M or MdM were added to infected cells at a ratio of 4:1, and the resultant chlamydial yield was evaluated in one-step growth experiments. Chlamydial DNA production was evaluated by dot hybridization. Both M and MdM reduced chlamydial yield and DNA production, but the reductions caused by MdM were more pronounced. Electron microscopy showed that while control HEp-2 cells at 48 h postinfection contained large inclusions in which most particles were elementary bodies, the infected HEp-2 cells exposed to MdM contained small vacuoles with abnormal reticulate bodies and very few typical elementary bodies. Separation of the MdM from the HEp-2 cells by a membrane reduced the inhibitory effect of the MdM relative to that of MdM in direct contact with the infected cells. Addition of tumor necrosis factor antibodies to C. trachomatis-infected HEp-2 cells exposed to MdM (either in direct contact or separated by a membrane from the infected cells) reduced the inhibition of chlamydial DNA production. These data suggest the possibility that MdM may modulate C. trachomatis replication in vivo.
Novel application of multiscale entropy in assessment of atherosclerosis in aged and diabetic subjects

Although previous studies have shown the successful use of pressure-induced reactive hyperemia as an assessment tool of endothelial function, the sensitivity remains questionable. This study aims at investigating the feasibility and sensitivity of a novel multiscale entropy index (MEI) in detecting subtle endothelial dysfunction in healthy and diabetic subjects. Totally 66 subjects were recruited from Hualien Hospital, Taiwan, and categorized into healthy aged group (Group 1), well- (Group 2) and poorly-controlled diabetic patients (Group 3). Arterial pulse wave signals were acquired from the wrist with air pressure sensing system (APSS), followed by MEI and dilatation index (DI) analyses. The results showed that MEILS(RH) succeeded in detecting significant differences among the three groups, whereas there was no notable difference in MEISS(Baseline), MEILS(Baseline), MEISS(Baseline) and DIEEMD between Group 2 and Group 3. In conclusion, MEILS(RH) may serve as a sensitive indicator of subtle endothelial dysfunction.
Concatenating a Structured LDPC Code and An RLL Code to Preserve Soft-Decoding, Structure, and Burst Correction

Error-control codes and runlength limited codes each provide critical roles in maintain data integrity on storage devices,with ECCs doing directly by inserting redundancy via some encoding algo-rithm,and RLL codes doing indirectly by facilitating timing recovery.In this paper,we add another two requirements to the RLL-LDPC concatenation.First,we require the LDPC code possess structure to facilitate encoder and decoder. Second,the nominal H matrix of the LDPC code must be modified to accommodate both the RLL constraint and the ability to correct long bursts[6].
Cooking Up a Recipe for Self-Control: The Three Ingredients of Self-Control and its Impact on Impulse Buying

The present study investigates the three ingredients of self-control as identified by Baumeister (2002) and links these ingredients to impulse buying in a sample of U.S. adults. Study results suggest that ego depletion and goal conflicts are positively associated with self-control. Somewhat surprising, however, self-monitoring was found to be negatively associated with self-control, suggesting that care must be taken in conceptualizing and measuring this construct. Self-control was also negatively associated with impulse buying. This research not only proposes and tests a process in which impulse buying takes place, but in so doing tests and lends credence to an extant theory of self-control.
Flexible management of resource service composition in cloud manufacturing

With the development of microelectronics, computer technology, information technology, and intelligent of machinery and control equipment, the flexible manufacturing technique has become one of the key developing directions for advanced manufacturing technology. The cloud manufacturing (CMfg), which is a new generation service-oriented networked manufacturing model, can provide the users distributed in different places with the manufacturing resource and manufacturing ability services through the centralized management. In order to improve the quality of resource service optimal-allocation and cope with the flexible issues in CMfg, this paper investigated the definition and classification of flexibility in the whole life-cycle of resource service composition in CMfg, and the related factors in life-cycle of resource service composition were analyzed. The flexible management architecture for resource service composition in CMfg was designed. The key issues and their solutions in flexible management of resource service composition were preliminarily discussed.
3W SPDT antenna switch design using standard 0.18μm CMOS process

A high power SPDT antenna switch is designed and implemented using a standard 0.18um CMOS process. Multi-stack FETs structure with feed-forward capacitors in a Rx switch were chosen to achieve high power-handling capability of a Tx switch. Allowance of the negative voltage swing at either a source port or a drain port is ensured by applying the resistive body floating technique to the each switch device of multi-stack FETs. Intentional unequal division of the voltage swing level of the each NMOS device by the feed-forward capacitors helps the prevention of the channel formation of the OFF-state device. Experimental data shows that the proposed design achieves an 1 dB compression point of the input power at 34.5 dBm in 1.9 GHz. Also negative voltage supply at OFF state switch demonstrate further enhancement of power handling capability. The insertion loss of the Tx switch is 1.0 dB and 1.4 dB at 900 MHz and 1.9 GHz, respectively. The Rx switch has 1.4 dB and 1.8 dB insertion loss at 900 MHz and 1.9 GHz, respectively. Since the level of the power-handling capability achieved is close to the limitation of the device breakdown voltage, the reliability issue is studied in the case of both hard breakdown and soft breakdown.
Counterfactual reasoning and moral emotion attribution

Studies in the happy victimizer paradigm have shown that preschool children attribute positive emotions to a norm violator whereas older elementary-school children tend to attribute negative emotions. The current research explored the possibility that children's counterfactual reasoning ability (i.e., their capacity to imagine alternatives to reality) can explain this age difference in moral emotion attribution. In Study 1, 100 4- and 8-year-old children attributed significantly more negative emotions to victimizers in a counterfactual-prime condition, in which an alternative course of action was presented before the emotion attribution, than in a no-prime condition, where no counterfactual prompt was given. Counterfactual reasoning ability significantly predicted negative emotion attribution in the no-prime condition. In Study 2, the counterfactual reasoning of 143 4- and 8-year-old children significantly predicted negative emotion attribution to the victimizer. When controlling for counterfactual reasoning, focusing on the victim of a violation did not affect emotion attribution to the violator.