Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
First Order Approximation for Texture Filtering

Texture mapping is a core technique in 3D graphics and is important for computer vision applications as well. The major challenge of texture mapping is high quality antialiasing at a reasonably high speed. Previous approaches do not address this problem adequately, since they do not precisely model the anisotropic and spatially variant nature in texture mapping. In this paper, we handle this problem using signal processing and sampling theory. We first describe an analytic framework to deduce the ideal filter and the corresponding weight distribution for texture filtering. Since the ideal filter does not have a closed-form solution, we further propose a filter that is the first order, yet of high precision, approximation of the ideal filter and makes a closed-form solution possible. This first order approximating (FOA) filter has excellent anti-aliasing capability and a reasonably high rendering speed. The comparison with some wellknown filters (box, cubic, EWA, and fast footprint MIPmapping, etc.) also testifies that our filter does have better antialiasing performance.
A Realistic 2d Drawing System

Two dimensional graphics systems are often characterized as just 3D graphics with a fixed Z value. This paper describes a graphics system built to support high quality 2D rendering by applications while taking advantage of hardware acceleration designed for 3D graphics. The system is divided into three stages: tessellation, rendering and compositing. The tessellation stage contains a novel algorithm for handling splines stroked with an elliptical pen. The rendering stage provides precise pixelization semantics and access to hardware acceleration. Image compositing is enhanced with new operators that extend the capabilities of traditional Porter/Duff composit-ing to provide a formal model that supports common incremental drawing methods.
Stellar-Dynamics of Young Star Clusters

The stellar-dynamical evolution of bound star clusters during the first few Myr is dominated by binary-binary and binary-star interactions, the rapid sinking of the most massive stars to the centre of the clusters and mass loss from evolving stars. The consequences of these processes for the binary and stellar population in clusters, and for the star clusters as a whole, are studied by following the evolution over 150 Myr of a library of compact cluster models containing up to 10^4 stars.
Invited review Neurophysiology of swallowing

Swallowing is a complex motor event that is difficult to investigate in man by neurophysiological experiments. For this reason, the characteristics of the brain stem pathways have been studied in experimental animals. However, the sequential and orderly activation of the swallowing muscles with the monitoring of the laryngeal excursion can be recorded during deglutition. Although influenced by the sensory and cortical inputs, the sequential muscle activation does not alter from the perioral muscles caudally to the cricopharyngeal sphincter muscle. This is one evidence for the existence of the central pattern generator for human swallowing. The brain stem swallowing network includes the nucleus tractus solitarius and nucleus ambiguus with the reticular formation linking synaptically to cranial motoneuron pools bilaterally. Under normal function, the brain stem swallowing network receives descending inputs from the cerebral cortex. The cortex may trigger deglutition and modulate the brain stem sequential activity. The voluntarily initiated pharyngeal swallow involves several cortical and subcortical pathways. The interactions of regions above the brain stem and the brain stem swallowing network is, at present, not fully understood, particularly in humans. Functional neuroimaging methods were recently introduced into the human swallowing research. It has been shown that volitional swallowing is represented in the multiple cortical regions bilaterally but asymmetrically. Cortical organisation of swallowing can be continuously changed by the continual modulatory ascending sensory input with descending motor output. Significance: Dysphagia is a severe symptom complex that can be life threatening in a considerable number of patients. Three-fourths of oropharyngeal dysphagia is caused by neurological diseases. Thus, the responsibility of the clinical neurologist and neurophysiologist in the care for the dysphagic patients is twofold. First, we should be more acquainted with the physiology of swallowing and its disorders, in order to care for the dysphagic patients successfully. Second, we need to evaluate the dysphagic problems objectively using practical electromyography methods for the patients’ management. Cortical and subcortical functional imaging studies are also important to accumulate more data in order to get more information and in turn to develop new and effective treatment strategies for dysphagic patients. q 2003 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.
A DENCLUE based approach to neuro-fuzzy system modeling

In order to solve the problems of difficulty to determine the number of partitions and rule redundancy in neuro-fuzzy system modeling, this paper presents a new approach based on DENCLUE using a dynamic threshold and similar rules merging (DDTSRM). By introducing DDT, which uses a dynamic threshold rather than a global one in merging density-attractors in DENCLUE, our approach is good at determining the number of partitions because DDT does not depend on input parameters. Additionally, the modeling performance is improved for DDT can find arbitrary shape and arbitrary density clusters. After structure identification we merge similar rules by considering similarity measures between fuzzy sets. Finally, BP method is used to precisely adjust the parameters of the fuzzy model. For illustration, we applied DDTSRM to a nonlinear function and Box and Jenkins system. Experimental results show that DDTSRM is effective to solve the problems with a good performance.
Evolution of a Heavy Metal Homeostasis/Resistance Island Reflects Increasing Copper Stress in Enterobacteria

Copper homeostasis in bacteria is challenged by periodic elevation of copper levels in the environment, arising from both natural sources and human inputs. Several mechanisms have evolved to efflux copper from bacterial cells, including the cus (copper sensing copper efflux system), and pco (plasmid-borne copper resistance system) systems. The genes belonging to these two systems can be physically clustered in a Copper Homeostasis and Silver Resistance Island (CHASRI) on both plasmids and chromosomes in Enterobacteria. Increasing use of copper in agricultural and industrial applications raises questions about the role of human activity in the evolution of novel copper resistance mechanisms. Here we present evidence that CHASRI emerged and diversified in response to copper deposition across aerobic and anaerobic environments. An analysis of diversification rates and a molecular clock model suggest that CHASRI experienced repeated episodes of elevated diversification that could correspond to peaks in human copper production. Phylogenetic analyses suggest that CHASRI originated in a relative of Enterobacter cloacae as the ultimate product of sequential assembly of several pre-existing two-gene modules. Once assembled, CHASRI dispersed via horizontal gene transfer within Enterobacteriaceae and also to certain members of Shewanellaceae, where the original pco module was replaced by a divergent pco homolog. Analyses of copper stress mitigation suggest that CHASRI confers increased resistance aerobically, anaerobically, and during shifts between aerobic and anaerobic environments, which could explain its persistence in facultative anaerobes and emergent enteric pathogens.
Study and Application of an Improved Clustering Algorithm

This paper, combined with the characteristics of the early warning about students' grade, represents an optimization algorithm in order to solve the random selection from the initial clustering center of results to cause major influence this volatility defects . It has integrated into the open source WEKA platform. The optimized algorithm not only guarantees the accuracy of the original algorithm, but also improves the stability of the algorithm.
A: Warring State System: an Evaluation of Balancing, Collective Security and Laissez-faire Policies the Management of Power in a Warring State System: an Evaluation of Balancing, Collective Security and Laissez-faire Policies

Realist" and "Idealist" prescriptions for the management of power in a multistate System are described and their implications for System preservation and State survival are examined. The examination of these competing or alternative foreign policy styles is carried out through an experimental study using a large-scale Computer Simulation model. The results of the analysis tend to highlight the greater relative efficacy of the "Idealist" position in terms of both State and System level objectives. ZUSAMENFASSUNG Die Regeln sowohl der Idealisten wie der Realisten zur Machtausübung in einem Vielstaatensystem werden beschrieben und deren Auswirkungen auf den Erhalt des internationalen Systems und staatliches Überleben untersucht. In einer experimentellen Studie werden mit Hilfe eines umfangreichen Computer-Simulationsmodells diese beiden konkurrierenden außenpolitischen Verhaltensstile untersucht. Aus den Ergebnissen geht hervor, daß der idealistische Ansatz vergleichsweise effektiver für das internationale System als auch für den Nationalstaat ist. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My thanks to Uwe Zimmer for his collaboration in the production of the Simulation results reported in this paper. Support for work on this report was generously supplied by of the Stiftung Weltgesselschaft and is gratefully acknowldeged.
T-Update: A tree-structured update scheme with top-down transmission in erasure-coded systems

Erasure coding has received considerable attention due to the better tradeoff between the space efficiency and reliability. However, it consumes large network traffic and long time to complete the update, involving updates of both data nodes and parity nodes. Existing solutions to this problem mainly focus on proposing new class of codes with lower update complexity to reduce the network traffic, ignoring the optimization of data transmission structure. In fact, the data transmission structure has great impact on the update. In this paper, we propose T-Update, a tree-structured update scheme with top-down transmission that minimizes the update time for erasure-coded data with no additional network traffic. Specially, we propose a rack-aware tree construction technique to construct an update tree to organize the data connections, with the data node as the root and the parity nodes as the children. To maximize the update efficiency, we propose a top-down data transmission technique to guide the data transmission and distribute the data computation for updating the parity nodes. To evaluate the performance of T-Update, we conduct experiments on HDFS-RAID under various parameter settings on both 30 physical and 200 virtual servers. Extensive experiments confirm that T-Update reduces the update time by 27% and 32% on average compared with two typical update schemes respectively.
Using model-based security analysis in component-oriented system development

We propose an integrated process for component-based system development and security risk analysis. The integrated process is evaluated in a case study involving an instant messaging component for smart phones. We specify the risk behaviour and functional behaviour of components using the same kinds of description techniques. We represent main security risk analysis concepts, such as assets, stakeholders, threats and risks, at the component level.
Conceptualization of Trust in the e-Government Context: A Qualitative Analysis

Although trust aspects have been investigated in e-commerce context, the e-government field is still significantly lacking from empirical studies that explore trust in e-government from the citizen’s perspective. The lack of trust in e-government in developing countries is another persuasive impetus for conducting this study. The few recent studies investigating citizens’ trust in e-government are conducted in developed countries. This study employed a qualitative approach (focus groups) to gain in depth understanding of the citizen’s perception of e-government adoption. E-government initiative in Saudi Arabia is the main focus of this research. Based on the literature review, the key antecedent factors that affect citizen trust in e-government are identified, and a research model is build. Based on the results of the analysis of three focus groups, managerial recommendations are provided. DOI: 10.4018/978-1-4666-0116-1.ch027
Disability in a 4-year follow-up study of people with post-polio syndrome.

OBJECTIVE To evaluate changes over time in a clinically based cohort of individuals with post-polio syndrome. DESIGN A prospective longitudinal study. SUBJECTS A total of 106 individuals with poliomyelitis sequelae were included in the study. They were self-referred or had been referred to the post-polio clinic. After 4 years subjects were called for a follow-up and underwent the same measurements as at the initial assessment. METHODS The following measurements were conducted at both the initial assessment, and the follow-up: questionnaires including Nottingham Health Profile, muscle strength and walking speed. RESULTS Minor changes in disability during a 4-year period were shown. A significant reduction in muscle strength was only seen for 60 degrees flexion in the left leg and for right and left dorsal flexion. No change could be seen in the total Nottingham Health Profile score. CONCLUSION The minor changes in disability found in this study are an indication that we still do not know which subjects are at risk for deterioration. It is difficult to say whether the small changes over time shown in this study are associated with support from the polio clinic or are an expression of the natural history of the syndrome. However, it is hoped that support from the polio clinic may result in self-selected lifestyle changes, which may positively influence the development of symptoms and functional capacity.
COVERS Neonatal Pain Scale: Development and Validation

Newborns and infants are often exposed to painful procedures during hospitalization. Several different scales have been validated to assess pain in specific populations of pediatric patients, but no single scale can easily and accurately assess pain in all newborns and infants regardless of gestational age and disease state. A new pain scale was developed, the COVERS scale, which incorporates 6 physiological and behavioral measures for scoring. Newborns admitted to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit or Well Baby Nursery were evaluated for pain/discomfort during two procedures, a heel prick and a diaper change. Pain was assessed using indicators from three previously established scales (CRIES, the Premature Infant Pain Profile, and the Neonatal Infant Pain Scale), as well as the COVERS Scale, depending upon gestational age. Premature infant testing resulted in similar pain assessments using the COVERS and PIPP scales with an r = 0.84. For the full-term infants, the COVERS scale and NIPS scale resulted in similar pain assessments with an r = 0.95. The COVERS scale is a valid pain scale that can be used in the clinical setting to assess pain in newborns and infants and is universally applicable to all neonates, regardless of their age or physiological state.
How to Recycle Shares in Secret Sharing Schemes 1

A (t, w) threshold scheme is a method for sharing a secret among w shareholders so that the collaboration of at least t shareholders is required in order to reconstruct the shared secret. This paper is concerned with the re-use of shares possessed by shareholders in threshold schemes. We propose a simple (t, w) threshold scheme based on the use of the pseudo-random function family and the universal hash function family. A remarkable advantage of the scheme is that a shareholder can use a single string in the share of many different secrets, in particular, a shareholder need not be given a new share each time a new secret is to be shared.
Maximum Entropy Approach for Named Entity Recognition in Bengali and Hindi

This paper reports about the development of a Named Entity Recognition (NER) system in two leading Indian languages, namely Bengali and Hindi using the Maximum Entropy (ME) framework. We have used the annotated corpora, obtained from the IJCNLP-08 NER Shared Task on South and South East Asian Languages 1 (NERSSEAL) and tagged with a fine-grained Named Entity (NE) tagset 2 of twelve tags. An appropriate tag conversion routine has been developed in order to convert these corpora to the forms, tagged with the four NE tags, namely Person name, Location name, Organization name and Miscellaneous name. The system makes use of the different contextual information of the words along with the variety of orthographic word-level features that are helpful in predicting the four NE classes. In this work, we have considered language independent features that are applicable to both the languages as well as the language specific features of Bengali and Hindi. Evaluation results show that the use of linguistic features can improve the performance of the system. Evaluation results of the 10-fold cross validation tests yield the overall average recall, precision, and f-score values of 88.01%, 82.63%, and 85.22%, respectively, for Bengali and 86.4%, 79.23%, and 82.66%, respectively, for Hindi.
Personal computer software vowel training aid for the hearing impaired

A vowel training aid system for hearing impaired persons which uses a Windows-based multimedia computer has been developed. The system provides two main displays which give visual feedback for vowels spoken in isolation and short word contexts. Feature extraction methods and neural network processing techniques provide a high degree of accuracy for speaker independent vowel training. The system typically provides correct classification of over 85% of steady state vowels spoken by adult male, adult female and child (both genders combined) speakers. Similar classification accuracy is also observed for vowels spoken in short words. Low cost and good performance make this system potentially useful for speech training at home.
Epileptic event detection algorithm for ambulatory monitoring platforms

Detecting epileptic electroencephalography (EEG) signals, both automatically and accurately, is significant in ambulatory long-term monitoring patients with epilepsy. In this study, it is presented a novel epileptic-like event detection algorithm based on a mixture of amplitude, frequency and spatial analysis with rule-based decision. In this work, EEG signals from 6 different subjects were searched for epileptic-like and normal data segments. The herein proposed algorithm detects putative epileptic EEG channels by comparing the RMS values of EEG activity with a hysteresis threshold, on a channel basis. The raw EEG signals are filtered with an artefact attenuation technique. The threshold is calculated on a reviewer-visually-selected baseline epoch, free of artefacts. Generalized epileptic activity detection is based on a spatial decision rule. Experimental results have shown detection rates as high as 95% with a false-negative rate as low as 1%. The algorithm seems to show a promising detection performance, even on artifact contaminated datasets. The proposed algorithm is intended to be used in real-time ambulatory monitoring of epileptic patients, with subject personalization, small size window analysis, good artefact immunity and no need for classifier training.
A family of frequency- and time-domain contrasts for blind separation of convolutive mixtures of temporally dependent signals

This paper addresses the problem of blind separation of convolutive mixtures via contrast maximization. New frequency domain contrast functions are constructed based on higher order spectra of the observations. They allow to separate mixtures of sources that are spatially independent and temporally possibly nonlinear processes. Using Parseval's formula, the former criteria yield a general class of time-domain contrasts, which extends to the convolutive case results that have been previously obtained in the context either of instantaneous mixtures or of independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) sources. A Monte Carlo simulation study is carried out for comparison between the different contrasts, thus providing a guideline about the choice of an appropriate contrast.
Learning Probabilistic Deformation Models from Image Sequences 1

In this paper, we present an approach for an unsupervisedlearning of probabilistic deformation modes of 2D moving objects from image sequences. The object r epresentation relies on a statistical description of global and local deformations applied to an a priori prototype shape. The optimal bayesian estimate of the deformation process is obtained by maximizing a nonlinear joint probability distribution using stochastic and deterministic optim ization techniques. The estimates obtained at timet are integrated in the deformation model as a priori knowledge for the segmentation at time t + 1. Deformation modes are updated on-line using a Principal Co mponent Analysis of the distorsions computed from the shapes estimated previously in the image sequence. In addition, the updated deformation modes are exploited for the segment atio of new shapes in the current image sequence. The approach yields a robust learning and is demonstrated on real-world image sequences showing the tracking of hands undergoing 2D artic ula ed movements.
An exploratory study on the issues and challenges clinicians encounter in the application of cognitive behavioural therapy with mentally disordered offender patients

Abstract Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is widely acknowledged as a treatment of choice for a range of psychological disorders, including those that affect criminal offenders and mentally disordered offenders. Meta-analyses of multiple studies provide evidence of CBT's efficacy and have led to its recommendation as a first line treatment for anti-social personality disorder (ASPD; NICE, 2009). However, there is comparatively little evidence about the effectiveness of CBT in relation to complex problems faced by offenders in prison and secure psychiatric services. The aim of this study was to examine how clinicians conceptualize and respond to complexity in the practice of CBT treatment with high-risk mentally disordered offenders. Using a qualitative methodology, semi-structured interviews were conducted with six practitioners. The interviews were analysed using thematic analysis. The first main theme was ‘critical challenges and issues’ which included subthemes addressing patient characteristics, the therapeutic context, ethical challenges, and treatment challenges. The second main theme was ‘overcoming obstacles’ which included subthemes on promoting safety, an emphasis on non-specifics, how to create an enabling space and creative practice in the application of CBT. The study emphasizes the importance of creating an enabling safe space by being ‘responsive’ to the patients’ needs and also emphasizes the importance of working to establish a baseline for ‘safety’ in all alliances wherever possible.