Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
OmniStream : using centralized tree management for incentives-compatible peer-to-peer media streaming

The ability to exploit Internet infrastructure to support the live delivery of streaming media to large audiences would be of significant practical value. Existing approaches to this problem, however, based on the use of P Multicast, commercial content distribution networks, or costly bandwidth provisioning, are severely limited: IP Multicast has seen only sparse deployment, while the latter two options are prohibitively expensive for many content providers. In recent work, peer-to-peer media streaming has been explored as an interesting alternative solution. Here, a server peer forwards a stream to a number of client peers using basic unicast transmission. Clients receiving the stream can then contribute their unused upstream bandwidth to forward the stream to additional clients, who in turn can do the same and so on. In effect, the bandwidth demands of a streaming session are distributed over the set of receivers; although each of these collaborative end-hosts may have a low-capacity access link, together they essentially “pooi” their upstream bandwidth to support large-scale streaming sessions. Unfortunately, this cooperative approach to media streaming is vulnerable to the inherent tension between selfish interests and collective welfare characteristic of peer-topeer systems. The potential prevalence of free-riding, whereby a peer consumes bandwidth without adequate reciprocity, is of particular concern. Given the highly sensitive throughput requirements of media streaming, the scalability of any peer-to-peer approach would be severely limited by such uncooperative behavior. Although a handful of mechanisms have been proposed to address this issue, they are limited either by their reliance on “tamper-proof’ software whereby they unrealistically assume that peers will correctly follow a prescribed protocol even though it may be in their selfish interest to deviate, or other practical considerations (e.g. slow responsiveness, instability). In this thesis, OmniStream, a solution based on the centralized management of multicast trees, is proposed to address the issue of free-riding in peer-to-peer media streaming, without these limitations. The proposed protocol is evaluated through simulation experiments representative of typical operational scenarios. The results obtained suggest the viability of the proposed approach.
Prototyping with junk

i n t e r a c t i o n s / j a n u a r y + f e b r u a r y 2 0 0 6 Interaction designers typically work with digital prototyping tools that have 2D (or at best 2.5D) visualization capability, e.g. Prototyping encourages interaction designers , irrespective of artistic training or confidence in sketching, to use paper and markers to mock up screens [1]. She promotes these artifacts for their speed, low cost, ability to make ideas tangible, and lets users respond to them. Industrial designers often make rough 3D models simply to play out ideas in low-cost but physically tangible form. Likewise, three-dimensional modeling is employed by architects, structural engineers, and industrial designers both in training and in practice. We take paper prototyping one step further. We bring the materials of kindergarten to the world of design to achieve at least four goals. Prototyping with junk. • makes you talk: encourages communication both within a team, and between the team and other stake-holders • makes design tangible: gives a product concept or workflow a physical instantiation • costs little: quickly visualizes proposed solutions with little investment of time or money • promotes fun at work: The playful attitudes that are associated with these materials allow creativity to blossom. This technique has been successfully used for team-building and at design workshops. The challenge for planners is determining how much (or how little) structure to give in the design problem. The amount of abstraction can also be adjusted to focus on product, service delivery, or workflow, as just three examples. With a corporate reorganization, 60 senior engineering staff and managers had recently become a single divisional unit. As a team-building exercise, we divided the group into eight teams, matching the number of workgroups in the division. Each team had at least (and often at most) one person from each featured work-group, while the other team members were from the other departments. All teams had a time limit and a table full of starting materials (with additional extras in a common area). Their task was to " describe the workgroup's mission and function in our division and the company. " Results: We ended up with eight highly distinctive models, made of paper plates, pipecleaners, cornstarch " peanuts, " and a variety of playful materials that represented the organizational chart, the workflow, the …
Ras target proteins in eukaryotic cells

The 21 kDa Ras proteins are well known for their regulatory role in oncogenic, mitogenic, and developmental signaling pathways. Less well understood are the downstream signal transduction cascades initiated by Ras in response to external stimuli. Only recently have many diverse studies in lower eukaryotes and vertebrates converged to demonstrate that Ras directly regulates multiple signaling pathways. In most eukaryotes, Ras functions as a positive regulator of an ERK/MAPK signal transduction cascade through the activation of a MEKK. In mammalian cells the primary Ras‐responsive MEKK is the protein kinase Raf. Although Raf remains the most significant mediator of Ras signaling in most model systems, it does not explain all the biochemical responses observed in cells with activated Ras proteins. Yeast two hybrid and GST‐fusion protein binding studies have identified new proteins distinct from Raf that could interact with Ras in other signaling pathways. In addition to Raf, other potential Ras target proteins include MEKK1, PI(3)K, p120GAP, ralGDS, and PKCζ. This review will attempt to sum‐marize the current literature of accepted and potential Ras‐dependent signaling proteins in both lower eukaryotes and vertebrates. —Marshall, M. S. Ras target proteins in eukaryotic cells. FASEB J. 9, 1311‐1318(1995)
Still with Us after All of These Years: Trends in Youth Labour Market Entry, Home-Leaving and Human Capital Accumulation in Italy 1993-2003

In this paper I examine a number of issues related to the Italian youth labour market and, in particular, youth labour market entry, over the last decade or so. The Italian youth labour market has a number of characteristics, present to a degree in other countries, but which by by their pronounced character mark it apart from other European Countries. The analysis presented here is essentially motivated by concern with two of these: a) the very high youth unemployment rate, and, above-all high ratio of youth to adult unemployment rates; and, b) the strong and increasing tendency for youngish Italians to remain in the parental home. The paper takes a broad approach to the analysis of these questions looking first at time trends in labour market entry, human capital accumulation, home leaving and family formation on the basis of information contained in the Italian Labour Force Survey using also the Bank of ItalyAÂ¢AÂAÂs Survey on Household Income and Wealth. The analysis also employs a broad definition of young people which is extended to include young people up to 34 years old rather than the conventional definition using only 15-24 year olds. Reduced form panel estimates of the determinants of the behavioural variables are derived. The approach adopted is close in spirit and methodology to the work undertaken by Card & Lemieux (2000) in the North American context, OAÂ¢AÂAÂHiggins (2003) on global trends and OAÂ¢AÂAÂHiggins (2005) in the Italian context. It is complementary to the recent studies of home leaving and labour market entry in the Italy which tend to concentrate on single specific determinants of, for example, home-leaving such as in Becker at al. (2004) on the impact of job uncertainty or Mannacorda & Moretti (2004) on the impact of parental income. The analysis identifies a substantial impact of labour market conditions in shaping young peopleAÂ¢AÂAÂs choices. The results also highlight the importance of distinguishing the effects of these aggregates by age and throw some light on the interrelationship between the phenomena under study. It may be seen as a first step in a broader research programme aimed at identifying the central factors driving young peopleAÂ¢AÂAÂs transition choices in recent years
Immanuel Kant und die Öffentlichkeit der Vernunft

Even today, prominent voices accuse Kant's philosophy of implying the individual to be subjectivist and monologic. However nothing could actually be further removed from Kant's position than subjectivism of this kind. Kant's reason is public through and through. Its very existence depends on public argumentation. This work looks at "public reason" in the three critiques and other works and shows how closely Kant's theoretical philosophy is bound up with his political writings.
Severe Type 2 Diabetes Induces Reversible Modifications of Endothelial Progenitor Cells Which are Ameliorate by Glycemic Control

Background Circulating endothelial progenitors cells (EPCs) play a critical role in neovascularization and endothelial repair. There is a growing evidence that hyperglycemia related to Diabetes Mellitus (DM) decreases EPC number and function so promoting vascular complications. Aim of the Study This study investigated whether an intensive glycemic control regimen in Type 2 DM can increase the number of EPCs and restores their function. Methods Sixty-two patients with Type 2 DM were studied. Patients were tested at baseline and after 3 months of an intensive regimen of glycemic control. The Type 2 DM group was compared to control group of subjects without diabetes. Patients with Type 2 DM (mean age 58.2±5.4 years, 25.6% women, disease duration of 15.4±6.3 years) had a baseline HgA1c of 8.7±0.5% and lower EPC levels (CD34+/KDR+) in comparison to healthy controls (p<0.01). Results The intensive glycemic control regimen (HgA1c decreased to 6.2±0.3%) was coupled with a significant increase of EPC levels (mean of 18%, p<0.04 vs. baseline) and number of EPCs CFUs (p<0.05 vs. baseline). Conclusion This study confirms that number and bioactivity of EPCs are reduced in patients with Type 2 DM and, most importantly, that the intensive glycemic control in Type 2 DM promotes EPC improvement both in their number and in bioactivity.
Significant Local-Scale Plant-Insect Species Richness Relationship Independent of Abiotic Effects in the Temperate Cape Floristic Region Biodiversity Hotspot

Globally plant species richness is a significant predictor of insect richness. Whether this is the result of insect diversity responding directly to plant diversity, or both groups responding in similar ways to extrinsic factors, has been much debated. Here we assess this relationship in the Cape Floristic Region (CFR), a biodiversity hotspot. The CFR has higher plant diversity than expected from latitude (i.e., abiotic conditions), but very little is known about the diversity of insects residing in this region. We first quantify diversity relationships at multiple spatial scales for one of the dominant plant families in the CFR, the Restionaceae, and its associated insect herbivore community. Plant and insect diversity are significantly positively correlated at the local scales (10–50 m; 0.1–3 km), but not at the regional scales (15–20 km; 50–70 km). The local scale relationship remains significantly positively correlated even when accounting for the influence of extrinsic variables and other vegetation attributes. This suggests that the diversity of local insect assemblages may be more strongly influenced by plant species richness than by abiotic variables. Further, vegetation age and plant structural complexity also influenced insect richness. The ratio of insect species per plant species in the CFR is comparable to other temperate regions around the world, suggesting that the insect diversity of the CFR is high relative to other areas of the globe with similar abiotic conditions, primarily as a result of the unusually high plant diversity in the region.
EM and Stochastic EM algorithms for reliability mixture models under random censoring

We present in this paper several iterative methods based on EM and Stochastic EM methodology, that allow to estimate parametric or semiparametric mixture models for randomly right censored lifetime data, provided they are identifiable. We consider different levels of completion for the (incomplete) observed data, and provide genuine or EM-like algorithms for several situations. In particular, we show that in censored semiparametric situations, a stochastic step is the only practical solution allowing computation of nonparametric estimates of the unknown survival function. The effectiveness of the new proposed algorithms is demonstrated in simulation studies.
Galvanic coupling Intra-Body Communication link for real-time channel assessment

The emerging field of Intra-Body Communication (IBC) will result in the innovation of many health care applications by allowing in-situ monitoring and mobility for the human subjects. We use a technique called Galvanic Coupling (GC) that uses weak electrical currents for the intra-body links, instead of RF, as this is two orders of magnitude superior when comparing energy efficiency. In this work, we demonstrate an experimental setup that can be used to implement and validate physical layer communication schemes and link layer protocols using off-the-shelf hardware and commercially procured synthetic human tissue. Our setup uses Universal Software Radio Peripherals (USRPs) as the transmitter and receiver nodes, with additional interfacing electronics, to allow flexible transmission of signals in the 100 kHz - 1 MHz frequency range. Furthermore, we provide a visual GUI-based configuration as well as demonstration of link quality based results. The complete hardware and software design, as well as an instructional video, are made available license-free for public consumption to stimulate further research in this field.
Robust visual odometry for vehicle localization in urban environments

SUMMARY This paper describes a new approach for estimating the vehicle motion trajectory in complex urban environments by means of visual odometry. A new strategy for robust feature extraction and data post-processing is developed and tested on-road. Images from scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT) features are used in order to cope with the complexity of urban environments. The obtained results are discussed and compared to previous works. In the prototype system, the ego-motion of the vehicle is computed using a stereo-vision system mounted next to the rear view mirror of the car. Feature points are matched between pairs of frames and linked into 3D trajectories. The distance between estimations is dynamically adapted based on re-projection and estimation errors. Vehicle motion is estimated using the non-linear, photogrametric approach based on RAndom SAmple Consensus (RANSAC). The final goal is to provide on-board driver assistance in navigation tasks, or to provide a means of autonomously navigating a vehicle. The method has been tested in real traffic conditions without using prior knowledge about the scene or the vehicle motion. An example of how to estimate a vehicle's trajectory is provided along with suggestions for possible further improvement of the proposed odometry algorithm.
Discriminant Analysis for Fast Multiclass Data Classification Through Regularized Kernel Function Approximation

In this brief we have proposed the multiclass data classification by computationally inexpensive discriminant analysis through vector-valued regularized kernel function approximation (VVRKFA). VVRKFA being an extension of fast regularized kernel function approximation (FRKFA), provides the vector-valued response at single step. The VVRKFA finds a linear operator and a bias vector by using a reduced kernel that maps a pattern from feature space into the low dimensional label space. The classification of patterns is carried out in this low dimensional label subspace. A test pattern is classified depending on its proximity to class centroids. The effectiveness of the proposed method is experimentally verified and compared with multiclass support vector machine (SVM) on several benchmark data sets as well as on gene microarray data for multi-category cancer classification. The results indicate the significant improvement in both training and testing time compared to that of multiclass SVM with comparable testing accuracy principally in large data sets. Experiments in this brief also serve as comparison of performance of VVRKFA with stratified random sampling and sub-sampling.
Application of "the Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA) score" in predicting outcome in ICU patients with SIRS.

BACKGROUND Various scoring systems have been developed to prioritize patient admission and management in ICU. The objective of this prospective, observational cohort study was to evaluate application of one such system, the Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA) Score in predicting outcome in ICU patients with SIRS. PATIENTS AND METHODS Fifty patients admitted to a six bed multidisciplinary ICU with SIRS were consecutively enrolled in the study and SOFA scores were calculated at zero hour, after 48 hrs, and after 96 hrs and patients followed till discharge from hospital. RESULTS When compared to outcome, the non survivors had high initial, mean and highest SOFA scores as compared to survivors. (p value = 0.002, <0.001, <0.001 respectively). Delta SOFA was not significantly associated with outcome. (p value= 0.117). The initial SOFA score > 11 predicted a mortality of 90%. (OR 23.72, 95%CI2.68-209.78, p=0.004). Similarly, mean SOFA score of > 7 predicted a mortality of 73.9% (OR 22.7, 95%CI 5.0 - 103.5, p<0.001) and high SOFA score > 11 predicted a mortality of 87.5% (OR 32.66, 95%CI 5.82-183.179, p< 0.001). Area under receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve for mean SOFA was 0.825, for high SOFA was 0.817 and for initial SOFA was 0.708. Thus mean, high and initial SOFA scores were helpful in predicting between the survivors and the non survivors. CONCLUSION The SOFA scoring system is useful in predicting outcomes in ICU and thus help in proper utilization of ICU resources.
Beta-Adrenergic Receptor 1 Selective Antagonism Inhibits Norepinephrine-Mediated TNF-Alpha Downregulation in Experimental Liver Cirrhosis

Background Bacterial translocation is a frequent event in cirrhosis leading to an increased inflammatory response. Splanchnic adrenergic system hyperactivation has been related with increased bacterial translocation. We aim at evaluating the interacting mechanism between hepatic norepinephrine and inflammation during liver damage in the presence of bacterial-DNA. Animals and Methods Forty-six mice were included in a 16-week protocol of CCl4-induced cirrhosis. Laparotomies were performed at weeks 6, 10, 13 and 16. A second set of forty mice injected with a single intraperitoneal dose of CCl4 was treated with saline, 6-hydroxidopamine, Nebivolol or Butoxamine. After 5 days, mice received E. coli-DNA intraperitoneally. Laparotomies were performed 24 hours later. Liver bacterial-DNA, norepinephrine, TNF-alpha, IL-6 and beta-adrenergic receptor levels were measured. Results Bacterial-DNA translocation was more frequent in CCl4-treated animals compared with controls, and increased as fibrosis progressed. Liver norepinephrine and pro-inflammatory cytokines were significantly higher in mice with vs without bacterial-DNA (319.7±120.6 vs 120.7±68.6 pg/g for norepinephrine, 38.4±6.1 vs 29.7±4.2 pg/g for TNF-alpha, 41.8±7.4 vs 28.7±4.3 pg/g for IL-6). Only beta-adrenergic receptor-1 was significantly increased in treated vs control animals (34.6±7.3 vs 12.5±5.3, p = 0.01) and correlated with TNF-alpha, IL-6 and norepinephrine hepatic levels in animals with bacterial-DNA. In the second set of mice, cytokine levels were increased in 6-hydroxidopamine and Nebivolol (beta-adrenergic receptor-1 antagonist) treated mice compared with saline. Butoxamine (beta-adrenergic receptor-2 antagonist) didn’t inhibit liver norepinephrine modulation of pro-inflammatory cytokines. Conclusions Beta-adrenergic receptor-1 mediates liver norepinephrine modulation of the pro-inflammatory response in CCl4-treated mice with bacterial-DNA.
Chronic Morphine Sensitizes the Brain Norepinephrine System to Corticotropin-Releasing Factor and Stress

Chronic opiate use produces persistent changes in brain neurons that are expressed as adverse effects, including physical dependence and compulsive drug-seeking behavior. Dysregulation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal response to stress also occurs with chronic opiate administration and has been implicated as a contributing factor to continued substance abuse. This study provides the first evidence for dysregulation of the central noradrenergic response to stress by chronic opiates. Chronic morphine selectively sensitized locus ceruleus (LC)-norepinephrine (NE) neurons to corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF), an integral mediator of the stress response. CRF doses that were inactive in vehicle-treated rats produced a near-maximal activation of LC neurons of rats chronically administered morphine. LC sensitization to CRF was not solely a pharmacological phenomenon but was expressed as hyperresponsivity to physiological stress. Finally, opiate-induced LC sensitization translated to a change in the behavioral repertoire in response to environmental stress (swim stress) such that NE-mediated hyperactive behaviors predominated. The opiate-induced sensitization of the central NE response to stress predicts that chronic opiate administration increases vulnerability to certain stress-related symptoms (e.g., hyperarousal, attentional dysfunction), and this may contribute to the maintenance of opiate-seeking behavior.
An overview of mobile ad hoc networks: applications and challenges

In the past few years, we have seen a rapid expansion in the field of mobile computing due to the proliferation of inexpensive, widely available wireless devices. However, current devices, applications and protocols are solely focused on cellular or wireless local area networks (WLANs), not taking into account the great potential offered by mobile ad hoc networking. A mobile ad hoc network is an autonomous collection of mobile devices (laptops, smart phones, sensors, etc.) that communicate with each other over wireless links and cooperate in a distributed manner in order to provide the necessary network functionality in the absence of a fixed infrastructure. This type of network, operating as a stand-alone network or with one or multiple points of attachment to cellular networks or the Internet, paves the way for numerous new and exciting applications. Application scenarios include, but are not limited to: emergency and rescue operations, conference or campus settings, car networks, personal networking, etc. This paper provides insight into the potential applications of ad hoc networks and discusses the technological challenges that protocol designers and network developers are faced with. These challenges include routing, service and resource discovery, Internet connectivity, billing and security.