Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Increased survival in low birth weight neonates given prophylactic surfactant.

OBJECTIVE To compare the effectiveness of a prophylactic surfactant treatment strategy (PRO) to the effectiveness of a rescue (RESC) surfactant treatment strategy in patients at high risk for developing hyaline membrane disease (HMD). STUDY DESIGN We analyzed data from a retrospective cohort consisting of all patients admitted to the neonatal intensive care units at the centers participating in the recently completed Infasurf-Survanta Comparative Trial. To be in the cohort, a patient had to be admitted during the trial, be <48 hours of age on admission, have a gestational age of <30 weeks, have a birth weight of 501 to 1250 gm, and be free of congenital anomalies. Twelve centers participated in this study. They contributed 1097 patients of whom 381 were treated with a PRO strategy. RESULTS Survival was significantly higher in the PRO-strategy patients (84% vs 72%, p < 0.05) as was survival without oxygen requirement at a postconceptional age of 36 weeks (60% vs 46%, p < 0.05). In addition, the patients with PRO had a lower prevalence of grade III and IV intraventricular hemorrhage (IVH, 9% vs 14%, p < 0.05). All analyses were controlled for birth weight and type of study center. CONCLUSION These data support the conclusion that using a PRO treatment strategy results in improved survival in patients at risk for developing HMD. A PRO treatment strategy may also decrease the likelihood of developing a severe IVH.
Variational principle for magnetisation dynamics in a temperature gradient

By applying a variational principle on a magnetic system within the framework of extended irreversible thermodynamics, we find that the presence of a temperature gradient in a ferromagnet leads to a generalisation of the Landau-Lifshitz equation with an additional magnetic induction field proportional to the temperature gradient. This field modulates the damping of the magnetic excitation. It can increase or decrease the damping, depending on the orientation of the magnetisation wave vector with respect to the temperature gradient. This variational approach confirms the existence of the magnetic Seebeck effect which was derived from thermodynamics and provides a quantitative estimate of the strength of this effect.
Identity anonymization and secure data storage using group signature in private cloud

Cloud computing is completely about productivity, economy, and corporate agility. But there raises a question how we can commercially attain those benefits if their cloud management solution becomes inefficient, incomplete, and inflexible. Even though there are many aspects in cloud environment. The data security, confidentiality and privacy plays a major role in cloud deployment model. In case of private cloud the identity anonymization and secured data storage becomes essential to address. But we as developers of cloud can maintain the cloud with perfect methods and protocols which make the cloud service delivery more efficient, productive, and agile. In this paper a method for identity anonymization and secure data storage in private cloud using GDS (Group Digital Signature) is proposed and implemented.
Assessing Neuronal Coherence with Single-Unit, Multi-Unit, and Local Field Potentials

The purpose of this study was to obtain a better understanding of neuronal responses to correlated input, in particular focusing on the aspect of synchronization of neuronal activity. The first aim was to obtain an analytical expression for the coherence between the output spike train and correlated input and for the coherence between output spike trains of neurons with correlated input. For Poisson neurons, we could derive that the peak of the coherence between the correlated input and multi-unit activity increases proportionally with the square root of the number of neurons in the multi-unit recording. The coherence between two typical multi-unit recordings (2 to 10 single units) with partially correlated input increases proportionally with the number of units in the multi-unit recordings. The second aim of this study was to investigate to what extent the amplitude and signal-to-noise ratio of the coherence between input and output varied for single-unit versus multi-unit activity and how they are affected by the duration of the recording. The same problem was addressed for the coherence between two single-unit spike series and between two multi-unit spike series. The analytical results for the Poisson neuron and numerical simulations for the conductance-based leaky integrate-and-fire neuron and for the conductance-based Hodgkin-Huxley neuron show that the expectation value of the coherence function does not increase for a longer duration of the recording. The only effect of a longer duration of the spike recording is a reduction of the noise in the coherence function. The results of analytical derivations and computer simulations for model neurons show that the coherence for multi-unit activity is larger than that for single-unit activity. This is in agreement with the results of experimental data obtained from monkey visual cortex (V4). Finally, we show that multitaper techniques greatly contribute to a more accurate estimate of the coherence by reducing the bias and variance in the coherence estimate.
On the Economics of Peer-to-Peer Content Distribution Systems for Large-volume Contents

Peer-to-Peer technology has changed the landscape of content sharing in the recent years. Among various content distribution systems, the key features of BitTorrent make it conducive to distribute files with large volume, such as multimedia contents or scientific data. In this paper, we propose two major improvements on BitTorrent so that the social welfare in the peer-to-peer network is maximized. We present the peer grouping problem and provide an integer programming solution to the problem. The peers’ individual behavior is also being studied, and we will present a cost-based incentive provisioning contribution mechanism to encourage sharing .
Virtual cursors for XML joins

Structural joins are a fundamental operation in XML query processing and a large body of work has focused on index-based algorithms for executing them. In this paper, we describe how two well-known index features -- path indices and ancestor information -- can be combined in a novel way to replace one or more of the physical index cursors in a structural join with <i>virtual cursors</i>. The position of a virtual cursor is derived from the path and ancestor information of a physical cursor. Implementation results are provided to show that, by eliminating index I/O, virtual cursors can improve the performance of structural joins by an order of magnitude or more.
Towards Adaptive User Interface Generation: One Step Closer to People

User interface generation has become a Software Engineering branch of increasing interest, probably due to the great amount of money, time and effort used to develop user interfaces and the increasing level of exigency of user requirements for usability (Nielsen, 1993) and accessibility (W3C, 2002) compliances. There are different kinds of users, and that is a fact we cannot ignore. Human society is full of diversity and that must be reflected in human-computer interaction design. Thus, we need to engage users in a new kind of interaction concept where user interfaces are tailored-made, and where user interfaces are intelligent and adaptive. A new generation of specification techniques is necessary to face these challenges successfully. Model-based design has proved to be a powerful tool to achieve these goals. A first step towards adaptive user interface generation is introduced by means of the concept of connector applied to model-based design of user interfaces.
The importance of available exploration methods for the efficiency of haptic displays.

The way of exploring a virtual object rendered with a haptic display such as the PHANToM differs from the natural way of exploring objects. The aim was to compare identification of objects in the two situations. It was found (1) that proportion correct was lower and exploration time longer for the virtual objects, (2) that two optional ways of exploring virtual objects gave similar results, (3) that the size of the object effected the result, (4) that identification of form is a more demanding task than judging textures, and (5) that the restrictions in availability of exploration methods prevents a maximum utilisation of haptic perception.
Robust Hand Pose Estimation during the Interaction with an Unknown Object

This paper proposes a robust solution for accurate 3D hand pose estimation in the presence of an external object interacting with hands. Our main insight is that the shape of an object causes a configuration of the hand in the form of a hand grasp. Along this line, we simultaneously train deep neural networks using paired depth images. The object-oriented network learns functional grasps from an object perspective, whereas the hand-oriented network explores the details of hand configurations from a hand perspective. The two networks share intermediate observations produced from different perspectives to create a more informed representation. Our system then collaboratively classifies the grasp types and orientation of the hand and further constrains a pose space using these estimates. Finally, we collectively refine the unknown pose parameters to reconstruct the final hand pose. To this end, we conduct extensive evaluations to validate the efficacy of the proposed collaborative learning approach by comparing it with self-generated baselines and the state-of-the-art method.
New client puzzle outsourcing techniques for DoS resistance

We explore new techniques for the use of cryptographic puzzles as a countermeasure to Denial-of-Service (DoS) attacks. We propose simple new techniques that permit the out-sourcing of puzzles; their distribution via a robust external service that we call a bastion. Many servers can rely on puzzles distributed by a single bastion. We show how a bastion, somewhat surprisingly, need not know which servers rely on its services. Indeed, in one of our constructions, a bastion may consist merely of a publicly accessible random data source, rather than a special purpose server. Our out-sourcing techniques help eliminate puzzle distribution as a point of compromise. Our design has three main advantages over prior approaches. First, it is more resistant to DoS attacks aimed at the puzzle mechanism itself, withstanding over 80% more attack traffic than previous methods in our experiments. Second, our scheme is cheap enough to apply at the IP level, though it also works at higher levels of the protocol stack. Third, our method allows clients to solve puzzles offline, reducing the need for users to wait while their computers solve puzzles. We present a prototype implementation of our approach, and we describe experiments that validate our performance claims.
Determinants of adherence to treatment in first-episode psychosis: a comprehensive review.

OBJECTIVE To conduct a comprehensive review of current evidence on factors for nonadherence to treatment in individuals with first-episode psychosis (FEP). METHODS MEDLINE, LILACS, PsycINFO, and SciELO databases were searched with the keywords first episode psychosis, factor, adherence, nonadherence, engagement, disengagement, compliance, and intervention. References of selected studies were consulted for relevant articles. RESULTS A total of 157 articles were screened, of which 33 articles were retained for full review. The factors related to nonadherence were: a) patient-related (e.g., lower education level, persistent substance use, forensic history, unemployment, history of physical abuse); b) environment-related (e.g., no family involved in treatment, social adjustment difficulties); c) medication-related (e.g., rapid remission of negative symptoms when starting treatment, therapeutic alliance); and d) illness-related (e.g., more positive symptoms, more relapses). Treatment factors that improve adherence include a good therapeutic alliance and a voluntary first admission when hospitalization occurs. CONCLUSION The results of this review suggest that nonadherence to treatment in FEP is multifactorial. Many of these factors are modifiable and can be specifically targeted in early intervention programs. Very few studies have assessed strategies to raise adherence in FEP.
Energy-Efficient Coordinated Beamforming Under Minimal Data Rate Constraint of Each User

Coordinated beamforming has been optimized to maximize the sum rate under the transmit power constraints or to minimize the transmit power under the data rate constraints. In this paper, we design a precoder that maximizes the energy efficiency (EE) of multicell multiantenna downlink network with coordination and, in the meantime, ensures the minimal data rate requirement of each user. To find a solution of such a nonconvex optimization problem, we construct a convex subset of the original constraint set and a quasi-concave lower bound of the EE. Then, we propose an iterative algorithm to maximize the lower bound of the EE within the convex subset, which is shown to rapidly converge to a local optimum of the original problem. We evaluate the EE of the proposed algorithm through simulations under different user locations, data rate requirements, and numbers of antennas. The results demonstrate that the proposed precoder performs closely to an upper bound derived from interference-free assumption. When the circuit power consumption is dominant, the proposed precoder is much more energy efficient than the transmit power minimization precoder, as well as a precoder, including an interference alignment (IA) beamformer and the optimized transmit power maximizing the EE.
Spatial-Temporal Weighted Pyramid Using Spatial Orthogonal Pooling

Feature pooling is a method that summarizes local descriptors in an image using spatial information. Spatial pyramid matching uses the statistics of local features in an image subregion as a global feature. However, the disadvantages of this method are that there is no theoretical guideline for selecting the pooling region, robustness to small image translation is lost around the edges of the pooling region, the information encoded in the different feature pyramids overlaps, and thus recognition performance stagnates as a greater pyramid size is selected. In this research, we propose a novel interpretation that regards feature pooling as an orthogonal projection in the space of functions that maps the image space to the local feature space. Moreover, we propose a novel feature-pooling method that orthogonally projects the function form of local descriptors into the space of low-degree polynomials. We also evaluate the robustness of the proposed method. Experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods.
Long-term outcome of late-onset schizophrenia: 5-year follow-up study

Background There is controversy about whether late-onset schizophrenia is a precursor of cognitive decline. Aims To examine the long-term outcome of a group of patients with late-onset schizophrenia. Method Patients with onset of DSM–III–R schizophrenia at age 50 years or over, but without dementia, and a healthy control group were assessed at baseline (n=27 and n=34, respectively), after 1 year and after 5 years (n=19 and n=24, respectively) on measures of psychopathology, cognition and general functioning, and compared on rates of decline and incidence of dementia. Results Nine patients with late-onset schizophrenia and none of the control group were found to have dementia (5 Alzheimer type, 1 vascular, 3 dementia of unknown type) at 5-year follow-up. There appeared to be a subgroup of late-onset schizophrenia patients without signs of dementia at baseline or at 1 year follow-up who subsequently declined. Conclusions Late-onset schizophrenia may be a prodrome of Alzheimer-type dementia. More longitudinal studies are required to determine its nosological status.
Human Organic Anion Transporting Polypeptide-C (SLC21A6) Is a Major Determinant of Rifampin-Mediated Pregnane X Receptor Activation

Rifampin, a member of the rifamycin class of antibiotics, is well known for its ability to induce drug-metabolizing enzymes and transporters, through activation of the pregnane X receptor. Available data suggest rifampin entry into hepatocytes may be transporter-mediated. Accordingly, it is therefore plausible that modulation of the achievable intracellular concentration of rifampin by drug uptake transporters would influence the degree of induction. In this study, we expressed an array of known hepatic uptake transporters to show the key hepatic rifampin uptake transporters are liver-specific members of the organic anion transporting polypeptide family (OATP). Indeed, both OATP-C and OATP8 seemed capable of mediating rifampin uptake into HeLa cells. OATP-C, however, seemed to have far greater affinity and capacity for rifampin transport. In addition, several allelic variants of OATP-C known to be present among European and African Americans were found to have markedly decreased rifampin transport activity. In cell-based, transactivation assays, OATP-C expression was associated with increased cellular rifampin retention as well as potentiation of PXR reporter gene activity. This is the first demonstration of an uptake transporter such as OATP-C, in modulating PXR function, and sheds important new insight into our understanding of the molecular determinants of PXR-mediated inductive processes.
Analytic collision anticipation technology considering agents' future behavior

This paper presents a collision anticipation method that shows when and where collisions will occur in configuration time space by considering the future behavior of agents. Previous solutions to collision anticipation have mainly focused on generating immediate reactive solutions to time-varying environments because of the high inaccuracy of sensors and a heavy computation burden. However, the recent rapid growth in sensor and estimation technology has led to a need for new systems that consider agents' future behavior explicitly. Based on this need, we formalized a mathematical approach to collision anticipation and proposed a tool, the 3-D triangular collision object(TCO), that informs a robot where and when collisions will occur over all possible heading angles. This formulation greatly reduced computation loads. Considering that this result is especially advantageous to fast moving robots, a full-speed collision-free (FSCF) motion planner is proposed based on the TCO. In real experiments, analytic solutions from the planner were modified to compensate for sensor error, and finally yielded safe motions for fast moving robots.
PLATOON IDENTIFICATION AND ACCOMMODATION SYSTEM FOR ISOLATED TRAFFIC SIGNALS ON ARTERIALS

In this project, researchers developed and field-tested an intelligent traffic control system for identifying and progressing platoons at isolated traffic signals on signalized arterials. The main focus of research are signals located downstream of other traffic signals. However, the system can also be installed at sites where an upstream signal does not exist but where platoons naturally form. This system uses advance detection to obtain real-time information about the presence and speeds of individual vehicles. Then, it uses an algorithm developed by researchers to identify if a platoon--of a user-specified size and density--is approaching the signal and estimated platoon arrival time at the stopbar. When the system identifies a platoon, it issues a low-priority preemption signal to progress the detected platoon. The duration of the initial preemption signal is based on estimated arrival and departure times for the smallest acceptable platoon. Then, the system switches to an extension mode and provides progression to any additional vehicles determined to be in the platoon. It accomplishes this by increasing preemption time until such time as no more vehicles are determined to be in the platoon or the max-timer expires. The system also ensures that the last progressed vehicle does not get trapped in its dilemma zone. This document describes research and development work conducted in this project.
Mechanism Design with Partial Revelation

Classic direct mechanisms require full utility revelation from agents, which can be very difficult in practical multi-attribute settings. In this work, we study partial revelation within the framework of one-shot mechanisms. Each agent's type space is partitioned into a finite set of partial types and agents (should) report the partial type within which their full type lies. A classic result implies that implementation in dominant strategies is impossible in this model. We first show that a relaxation to Bayes-Nash implementation does not circumvent the problem. We then propose a class of partial revelation mechanisms that achieve approximate dominant strategy implementation, and describe a computationally tractable algorithm for myopically optimizing the partitioning of each agent's type space to reduce manipulability and social welfare loss. This allows for the automated design of one-shot partial revelation mechanisms with worst-case guarantees on both manipulability and efficiency.
Interfacial reactions of Sn-Cu/Ni couples at 250 °C

Interfacial reactions of Sn-Cu alloys with Ni substrate at 250 °C have been investigated by varying the Cu contents from 0.3wt%Cu to 3.0wt%Cu. The Cu_6Sn_5 phase is not found in the Sn-0.3wt%Cu/Ni couple. The interfacial reaction sequence of the Sn-0.6wt%Cu/Ni couple is similar to that of the Sn-0.7wt%Cu/Ni. The reaction follows Cu_6Sn_5 formation stage, growth stage, detachment stage, Cu_6Sn_5 layer continuing growth stage, Ni_3Sn_4 formation stage, Cu_6Sn_5 phase dissolution stage, Ni_3Sn_4 detachment stage, and Ni_3Sn_4 phase dissolution stage. Similar results are found for the couples prepared with higher Cu contents, 0.8wt%Cu, 1.0wt%Cu, 2.0wt%Cu, and 3.0wt%Cu, but the detachment positions are different. For the couples with higher Cu-content, the layer detaches at the Cu_6Sn_5/Ni interface; however, for the 0.6wt%Cu and 0.7wt%Cu couples, the Cu_6Sn_5 phase layer fractures and detachment occurs inside the layer. Morphologies of the Cu_6Sn_5 phase are also found to change with Cu contents: the pyramidal shape in the 0.3wt%Cu couple changes to the rod-shape in the 0.8wt%Cu couple, and becomes a very fine rod shape in the 2.0wt%Cu couple.
Emerging hybrid logic circuits based on non-volatile magnetic memories

As the technology node shrinks down to 90 nm and below, high power becomes one of the major critical issues for CMOS high-speed computing circuits (e.g. logic and cache memory) due to the increasing leakage currents and data traffic. Emerging non-volatile memories are under intense investigation to bring the non-volatility into the logic circuits and then eliminate completely the standby power issue. Thanks to its quasi-infinite endurance, high speed and easy 3D integration at the back-end process of CMOS IC fabrication, Magnetic RAM (MRAM) is considered as one of the most promising candidates. A number of hybrid MRAM/CMOS logic circuits have been proposed and prototyped successfully in the last years. In this introduction paper for the invited special session at NEWCAS 2013, we present an overview and current status of these logic circuits and discuss their potential applications in the future.