Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Second Language Accent and Pronunciation Teaching: A Research- Based Approach.

Empirical studies are essential to improving our understanding of the relationship between accent and pronunciation teaching. However, the study of pronunciation has been marginalized within the field of applied linguistics. As a result, teachers are often left to rely on their own intuitions with little direction. Although some instructors can successfully assist their students under these conditions, many others are reluctant to teach pronunciation. In this article we call for more research to enhance our knowledge of the nature of foreign accents and their effects on communication. Research of this type has much to offer to teachers and students in terms of helping them to set learning goals, identifying appropriate pedagogical priorities for the classroom, and determining the most effective approaches to teaching. We discuss these possibilities within a framework in which mutual intelligibility is the primary consideration, although social ramifications of accent must also be taken into account. We describe several problem areas and identify some misconceptions about pronunciation instruction. In addition, we make suggestions for future research that would address intelligibility, functional load, computer-assisted language learning, and the role of the listener. Finally, we recommend greater collaboration between researchers and practitioners, such that more classroomrelevant research is undertaken.
Improved Recommendation Systems ∗ Extended

We consider a model of competitive recommendation systems proposed by Drineas et al. [4]. In recommendation systems (e.g., for books or movies), the system tracks which product each user chose in the past, and tries to deduce which other products an asking user is likely to be satisfied with. Obviously, recommendation systems can be effective only for users who share preferences with many other users. Such users are said to belong to a “dominant type. ” Current approaches to on-line recommendation systems involve using Singular Value Decomposition (SVD), which is computationally intensive and, more important, often applicable only under additional strong conditions. Specifically, correctness is guaranteed in [4] only if users of different dominant types essentially do not share a product they like (“type separability”), and only if the number of users in non-dominant types is significantly smaller than the number of users in dominant types (“gap assumption”). The complexity of that algorithm is O(mn), where m and n denote the number of users and products, respectively. In this paper, we show that in fact, very simple combinatorial algorithms can make good recommendations without using SVD. Our algorithms require neither the type separability nor the gap assumption, they are naturally amenable to distibuted computation, and their complexity is lower. In particular, the paper presents an O(m + n) time centralized algorithm and a distributed algorithm that can be implemented in a peer-to-peer model even in the presence of adaptively colluding malicious players, with only logarithmic overhead. ∗Research conducted at Hewlett-Packard Cambridge Research Laboratory, One Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142. †Computer Science Department, Johns Hopkins University, 3400 N. Charles St., Baltimore, MD 21218. Email: baruch@acm.org. ‡Dept. of Electrical Engineering, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 69978, Israel. Email: boaz@eng.tau. ac.il. §Dept. of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics, The Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel. Email: david.peleg@weizmann.ac.il. ¶Cambridge Research Laboratory, HP Labs, One Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142. Email: mark.tuttle@hp.com.
Effects of Supplementation of Branched-Chain Amino Acids to Reduced-Protein Diet on Skeletal Muscle Protein Synthesis and Degradation in the Fed and Fasted States in a Piglet Model

Supplementation of branched-chain amino acids (BCAA) has been demonstrated to promote skeletal muscle mass gain, but the mechanisms underlying this observation are still unknown. Since the regulation of muscle mass depends on a dynamic equilibrium (fasted losses–fed gains) in protein turnover, the aim of this study was to investigate the effects of BCAA supplementation on muscle protein synthesis and degradation in fed/fasted states and the related mechanisms. Fourteen 26- (Experiment 1) and 28-day-old (Experiment 2) piglets were fed reduced-protein diets without or with supplemental BCAA. After a four-week acclimation period, skeletal muscle mass and components of anabolic and catabolic signaling in muscle samples after overnight fasting were determined in Experiment 1. Pigs in Experiment 2 were implanted with carotid arterial, jugular venous, femoral arterial and venous catheters, and fed once hourly along with the intravenous infusion of NaH13CO3 for 2 h, followed by a 6-h infusion of [1-13C]leucine. Muscle leucine kinetics were measured using arteriovenous difference technique. The mass of most muscles was increased by BCAA supplementation. During feeding, BCAA supplementation increased leucine uptake, protein synthesis, protein degradation and net transamination. The greater increase in protein synthesis than in protein degradation resulted in elevated protein deposition. Protein synthesis was strongly and positively correlated with the intramuscular net production of α-ketoisocaproate (KIC) and protein degradation. Moreover, BCAA supplementation enhanced the fasted-state phosphorylation of protein translation initiation factors and inhibited the protein-degradation signaling of ubiquitin-proteasome and autophagy-lysosome systems. In conclusion, supplementation of BCAA to reduced-protein diet increases fed-state protein synthesis and inhibits fasted-state protein degradation, both of which could contribute to the elevation of skeletal muscle mass in piglets. The effect of BCAA supplementation on muscle protein synthesis is associated with the increase in protein degradation and KIC production in the fed state.
Assessing the mock viva: the experiences of British doctoral students

Many postgraduate students in Britain experience a ‘mock’ viva some time before their ‘real’ one, but little has been published on this aspect of gaining a Ph.D. or professional doctorate. In this study questionnaire data on the experiences and feelings of 29 UK postgraduate students concerning their mock vivas are summarized. The results suggest that there are considerable disparities in procedures within and across institutions, and that students are frequently asked different questions in the mock and the real viva. Nonetheless, these mock vivas were judged to be helpful by 26 (90%) of the students concerned. The implications of these findings for institutions, departments and doctoral students are discussed.
Internet traffic clustering with constraints

Due to the limitations of the traditional port-based and payload-based traffic classification approaches, the past decade has seen extensive work on utilizing machine learning techniques to classify network traffic based on packet and flow level features. In particular, previous studies have shown that the unsupervised clustering approach is both accurate and capable of discovering previously unknown application classes. In this paper, we explore the utility of side information in the process of traffic clustering. Specifically, we focus on the flow correlation information that can be efficiently extracted from packet headers and expressed as instance-level constraints, which indicate that particular sets of flows are using the same application and thus should be put into the same cluster. To incorporate the constraints, we propose a modified constrained K-Means algorithm. A variety of real-world traffic traces are used to show that the constraints are widely available. The experimental results indicate that the constrained approach not only improves the quality of the resulted clusters, but also speeds up the convergence of the clustering process.
Reference‐Free Damage Classification Based on Cluster Analysis

Abstract: Fiber‐reinforced polymer (FRP) composite materials have been widely used for retrofitting civil infrastructure systems. The ultimate goal of this study was to develop an in‐site non‐destructive testing (NDT) technique that can continuously and autonomously inspect the bonding condition between a carbon FRP (CFRP) layer and a host reinforced concrete (RC) structure, when the CRFP layer is used for strengthening the RC structure. The uniqueness of this reference‐free NDT is two‐fold: First, features, which are sensitive to CFRP debonding but insensitive to operational and environmental variations of the structure, have been extracted only from current data without direct comparison with previously obtained baseline data. Second, damage classification is performed instantaneously without relying on predetermined decision boundaries. The extraction of the reference‐free features is accomplished based on the concept of time reversal acoustics, and the instantaneous decision‐making is achieved using cluster analysis. Monotonic and fatigue load tests of large‐scale CFRP‐strengthened RC beams are conducted to demonstrate the potential of the proposed reference‐free debonding monitoring technique. Based on the experimental studies, it has been shown that the proposed reference‐free NDT technique may minimize false alarms of debonding and unnecessary data interpretation by end users.
Support vector machines and dynamic time warping for time series

Effective use of support vector machines (SVMs) in classification necessitates the appropriate choice of a kernel. Designing problem specific kernels involves the definition of a similarity measure, with the condition that kernels are positive semi-definite (PSD). An alternative approach which places no such restrictions on the similarity measure is to construct a set of inputs and let each example be represented by its similarity to all the examples in this set and then apply a conventional SVM to this transformed data. Dynamic time warping (DTW) is a well established distance measure for time series but has been of limited use in SVMs since it is not obvious how it can be used to derive a PSD kernel. The feasibility of the similarity based approach for DTW is investigated by applying the method to a large set of time-series classification problems.
Noninvasive fetal QRS detection using Echo State Network

The proposed method combines established cardiology-specific techniques based more on domain knowledge with powerful supervised general-purpose machine learning approaches that are more data-driven. After filtering and normalization, maternal QRS complexes are detected and averaged maternal ECG is removed. The key task of detecting fetal QRS complexes is performed by an Echo State recurrent neural Network (ESN) trained by supervised machine learning. The training of the model is made possible by the availability of correctly annotated training data. Finally, fetal QRS annotations are obtained by a statistics-based dynamic programming approach interpreting the outputs of the ESN. The proposed approach is quite generic and can be extended to other type of signals and annotations.
Genetic Organization of the Escherichia coli K10 Capsule Gene Cluster: Identification and Characterization of Two Conserved Regions in Group III Capsule Gene Clusters Encoding Polysaccharide Transport Functions

ABSTRACT Analysis of the Escherichia coli K10 capsule gene cluster identified two regions, regions 1 and 3, conserved between different group III capsule gene clusters. Region 1 encodes homologues of KpsD, KpsM, KpsT, and KpsE proteins, and region 3 encodes homologues of the KpsC and KpsS proteins. An rfaH mutation abolished K10 capsule production, suggesting that expression of the K10 capsule was regulated by RfaH in a manner analogous to group II capsule gene clusters. An IS3 element and a φR73-like prophage, both of which may have played a role in the acquisition of group III capsule gene clusters, were detected flanking the K10 capsule genes.
Choosing Method of the Most Effective Nested Loop Shearing for Parallelism

Our loop parallelizing method of compiler for SIMD architecture enables SIMD instructions to be generated from loops which include complicated data dependency. The characteristic of our method is in choosing the more optimising method for parallelization from two shearing conversions by inner and outer loop carried data dependences. One of them is novel and involves shearing horizontally along the inner loop index and the other is well-established shearing vertically along the outer loop index. These loop transformations are formalized by matrix operations. They enable the original loop indexes to be expressed using new loop indexes so that compiler does not need to make any change in loop body. At this point, simple templates suffice to generate optimal code. To conclude we summarize the conditions for choosing suitable shearing method and the requirements for conversion.
Analysis of WMN-SA andWMN-GA Simulation Results: A Comparison Performance for Wireless Mesh Networks

Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs) are attracting a lot of attention from wireless network researchers. Node placement problems have been investigated for a long time in the optimization field due to numerous applications in location science. In our previous work, we evaluated WMN-SA and WMN-GA systems which are based respectively on Simulated Annealing (SA) and Genetic Algorithms (GAs) to find an optimal location assignment for mesh routers. In this paper, we evaluate the performance of optimal distribution of router nodes for two different algorithms. As evaluation metrics, we used packet delivery ratio, end-to-end delay, beacon received and packet dropped. For simulations, we used QualNet and Hybrid Wireless Mesh Protocol (HWMP). We compare the performance of the optimized network topologies for event site environment of mesh clients by sending multiple constant bit rate flows in the network. The simulation results show that for GA scenario, the average PDR is higher than the results of SA. Comparing the results of WMN-SA and WMN-GA scenario, the number of packets dropped due to retransmission of WMN-GA is smaller than WMN-SA.
The American Dream Revisited: Is It What You Want or Why You Want It That Matters?

Previous research found that aspirations to financial success related inversely to self-actualization and that aspirations to community involvement related positively to self-actualization. We argue that diverse reasons can underlie both of these aspirations, leading to more complex predictions. In a sample of 246 participants, we assessed both self-determining and controlling reasons for each class of aspiration, along with endorsements of the aspirations themselves. Initial regression analyses replicated the earlier findings. Subsequent analyses found that endorsement of self-determining reasons for either class of aspiration related positively to self-actualization and that endorsement of controlling reasons for either class of aspiration related inversely to self-actualization. In the analysis involving community involvement, the aspiration itself no longer retained predictive power after the other variables were taken into account. In the analysis involving financial success, however, the aspiration retained an independent predictive role.
Uncovering the Formation of Triadic Closure in Social Networks

The triad is one of the most basic human groups in social networks. Understanding factors affecting the formation of triads will help reveal the underlying mechanisms that govern the emergence and evolution of complex social networks. In this paper, we study an interesting problem of decoding triadic closure in social networks. Specifically, for a given closed triad (a group of three people who are friends with each other), which link was created first, which followed, and which link closed. The problem is challenging, as we may not have any dynamic information. Moreover, the closure processes of different triads are correlated with each other. Our technical contribution lies in the proposal of a probabilistic factor graph model (De-Triad). The model is able to recover the dynamic information in the triadic closure process. It also naturally models the correlations among closed triads. We evaluate the proposed model on a large collaboration network, and the experimental results show that our method improves the accuracy of decoding triadic closure by up to 20% over that of several alternative methods.
Police Response to Domestic Violence

This article explores the neglected question of why victims of domestic violence call the police, and how useful the police response is to them. We found that many women do not seek criminal sanctions because sanctions are unlikely to help to end the violence. This calls into question the value, to victims, of mandatory arrest policies which require prosecution decisions to be based on evidential concerns alone. These policies are based (naively, we argue) on assumptions about the interests of victims. Policies which give effect to victim preferences are also naive in ignoring the circumstances which shape victim preferences. We therefore argue for an approach which would empower victims to make choices which are less coerced (by their circumstances) than is usual at present. Elements of this approach can be found in the practices of some domestic violence units.
Comparison of CMIP5 cloud cover simulation with remote sensing data for African cordex domain

In this work, a comparison between cloud cover data obtained from ISCCP database and different simulation results from GCMs included in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) has been conducted, to evaluate the skills of these models to reproduce the climatological behaviour of cloud cover over the African continent during approximately two decades, 1984 to 2005. The behaviour of all the models is very similar, they underestimate the total cloud cover but show a good space-time correlation with satellite data. However, the separate analysis of low, mid and high cloud cover produces worse results. One of the areas that show important differences correspond to marine boundary layer clouds near the coast of Namibia.
The Baetylus Theorem—the central disconnect driving consumer behavior and investment returns in Wearable Technologies

The Wearable Technology market may increase fivefold by the end of the decade. There is almost no academic investigation as to what drives the investment hypothesis in wearable technologies. This paper seeks to examine this issue from an evidence-based perspective. There is a fundamental disconnect in how consumers view wearable sensors and how companies market them; this is called The Baetylus Theorem where people believe (falsely) that by buying a wearable sensor they will receive health benefit; data suggest that this is not the case. This idea is grounded social constructs, psychological theories and marketing approaches. A marketing proposal that fails to recognize The Baetylus Theorem and how it can be integrated into a business offering has not optimized its competitive advantage. More importantly, consumers should not falsely believe that purchasing a wearable technology, improves health.
WHO SHOULD PLACE PERITONEAL DIALYSIS CATHETERS?

♦ Background: Nephrologists are often thwarted in their attempts to grow their peritoneal dialysis programs because of suboptimal surgeon performance in placing catheters. A rallying call is heard among nephrologists to step up to the role of dialysis access providers. ♦ Objective: What factors influence the practicability of nephrologists becoming primary dialysis access providers? Why have surgeons failed their task and can anything motivate them to change their performance and improve outcomes? ♦ Methods: While the issues are universal, this analysis focuses on current practice data from the United States. Evidence reviewed includes dialysis center size and annual new starts, profile of specialties performing catheter placement, nephrology workforce capacity, catheter implantation methodology, resource utilization for peritoneal access, and surgeon performance. ♦ Results: The current nephrology workforce is running at maximum capacity and fellowship training programs will struggle to meet additional demands. Nephrology training programs are often deficient in providing adequate experience in peritoneal dialysis management. Only 2.3% of peritoneal catheters are placed by nephrologists. The best catheter outcomes are produced by laparoscopic methods used by surgeons. Compared to other catheter placement techniques, laparoscopy enables a larger candidate pool of patients. Nonetheless, suboptimal surgical performances are related to inadequate training, low procedure volume, and poor reimbursement. ♦ Conclusions: It is improbable that nephrologists can expand the scope of their practice to assume the additional role of dialysis access providers. The performance of the existing surgical workforce can be enhanced through medical society-sponsored educational activities, channeling access procedures to designated surgeons, and improved remuneration through outcomes-based incentive programs.
Problem-oriented policing in violent crime places: A randomized controlled experiment

Over the past decade, problem-oriented policing has become a central strategy for policing. In a number of studies, problem-oriented policing has been found to be effective in reducing crime and disorder. However, very little is known about the value of problem-oriented interventions in controlling violent street crime. The National Academy of Sciences' Panel on the Understanding and Control of Violent Behavior suggests that sustained research on problem-oriented policing initiatives that modify places, routine activities, and situations that promote violence could contribute much to the understanding and control of violence. This study evaluates the effects of problem-oriented policing interventions on urban violent crime problems in Jersey City, New Jersey. Twenty-four high-activity, violent crime places were matched into 12 pairs and one member of each pair was allocated to treatment conditions in a randomized block field experiment. The results of the impact evaluation support the growing body of research that asserts focused police efforts can reduce crime and disorder at problem places without causing crime problems to displace to surrounding areas.