Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Learning Contextualized Music Semantics from Tags via a Siamese Network

Music information retrieval faces a challenge in modeling contextualized musical concepts formulated by a set of co-occurring tags. In this paper, we investigate the suitability of our recently proposed approach based on a Siamese neural network in fighting off this challenge. By means of tag features and probabilistic topic models, the network captures contextualized semantics from tags via unsupervised learning. This leads to a distributed semantics space and a potential solution to the out of vocabulary problem which has yet to be sufficiently addressed. We explore the nature of the resultant music-based semantics and address computational needs. We conduct experiments on three public music tag collections -namely, CAL500, MagTag5K and Million Song Dataset- and compare our approach to a number of state-of-the-art semantics learning approaches. Comparative results suggest that this approach outperforms previous approaches in terms of semantic priming and music tag completion.
SINGING VOICE SEPARATION BASED ON NON-VOCAL INDEPENDENT COMPONENT SUBTRACTION AND AMPLITUDE DISCRIMINATION

Many applications of Music Information Retrieval can benefit from effective isolation of the music sources. Earlier work by the authors led to the development of a system that is based on Azimuth Discrimination and Resynthesis (ADRess) and can extract the singing voice from reverberant stereophonic mixtures. We propose an extension to our previous method that is not based on ADRess and exploits both channels of the stereo mix more effectively. For the evaluation of the system we use a dataset that contains songs convolved during mastering as well as the mixing process (i.e. “real-world” conditions). The metrics for objective evaluation are based on bss_eval.
Chandra reveals a double-sided X-ray jet in the quasar 3C9 at z=2.012

A Chandra observation of the radio-loud quasar 3C9 at redshift z=2.012 has revealed extended X-ray emission coincident with the radio jet. Of particular interest is the appearance of both jet and counterjet, which argues against the X-ray emission being highly beamed. We present the properties of the jets and discuss possible scenarios for the X-ray emission, contrasting them with the single sided jet found in PKS 0637-752, which has a similar X-ray luminosity. The jet X-ray emission in 3C9 is likely to be due to either nonthermal emission from a sheath with bulk Lorentz factor less than 1.5, or thermal emission from shocked cold gas surrounding the quasar. The thermal possibility implies a high mass for the cold gas unless it is highly clumped.
Induction of Caspase-3-Like Protease May Mediate Delayed Neuronal Death in the Hippocampus after Transient Cerebral Ischemia

Delayed neuronal death after transient cerebral ischemia may be mediated, in part, by the induction of apoptosis-regulatory gene products. Caspase-3 is a newly characterized mammalian cysteine protease that promotes cell death during brain development, in neuronal cultures, and in other cell types under many different conditions. To determine whether caspase-3 serves to regulate neuronal death after cerebral ischemia, we have (1) cloned a cDNA encoding the rat brain caspase-3; (2) examined caspase-3 mRNA and protein expression in the brain using in situ hybridization, Northern and Western blot analyses, and double-labeled immunohistochemistry; (3) determined caspase-3-like activity in brain cell extracts; and (4) studied the effect of caspase-3 inhibition on cell survival and DNA fragmentation in the hippocampus in a rat model of transient global ischemia. At 8–72 hr after ischemia, caspase-3 mRNA and protein were induced in the hippocampus and caudate-putamen (CPu), accompanied by increased caspase-3-like protease activity. In the hippocampus, caspase-3 mRNA and protein were predominantly increased in degenerating CA1 pyramidal neurons. Proteolytic activation of the caspase-3 precursor was detected in hippocampus and CPu but not in cortex at 4–72 hr after ischemia. Double-label experiments detected DNA fragmentation in the majority of CA1 neurons and selective CPu neurons that overexpressed caspase-3. Furthermore, ventricular infusion of Z-DEVD-FMK, a caspase-3 inhibitor, decreased caspase-3 activity in the hippocampus and significantly reduced cell death and DNA fragmentation in the CA1 sector up to 7 d after ischemia. These data strongly suggest that caspase-3 activity contributes to delayed neuronal death after transient ischemia.
Prevalence of Tree Regeneration by Sprouting and Seeding Along a Rainfall Gradient in Hawai'i

Drought stress in tropical dry forests is thought to result in greater asexual regeneration via vegetative sprouting (e.g., basal, root, and branch layering) than occurs in moister tropical forests. We tested this hypothesis by examining the prevalence of tree sprouting and seeding in tropical forests located along a rainfall gradient on the island of Hawai'i. Additionally, we examined the potential for novel disturbance, feral pig Sus scrofa rooting and trampling, to alter patterns in tree regeneration mode. We found greater sprouting (in terms of relative density and basal area) in dry forests than in mesic and wet forests, supporting the hypothesis. We also found that feral pig disturbance is negatively correlated with the relative density and basal area of seedlings in wet forests, but is positively correlated with the relative importance of sprouting, and the richness and diversity of sprouting species. Our results suggest rainfall regimes may be an important factor controlling broad‐scale patterns in tree regeneration mode, and that exotic ungulates can significantly modify such patterns with potential consequences for the structure and dynamics of tree populations and communities.
Role of the Anterior Cingulate Cortex in the Control Over Behavior by Pavlovian Conditioned Stimuli in Rats

To investigate the contribution of the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) to stimulus–reward learning, rats with lesions of periand postgenual ACC were tested on a variety of Pavlovian conditioning tasks. Lesioned rats learned to approach a food alcove during a stimulus predicting food, and responded normally for conditioned reinforcement. They also exhibited normal conditioned freezing and Pavlovian– instrumental transfer, yet were impaired at autoshaping. To resolve this apparent discrepancy, a further task was developed in which approach to the food alcove was under the control of 2 stimuli, only 1 of which was followed by reward. Lesioned rats were impaired, approaching during both stimuli. It is suggested that the ACC is not critical for stimulus–reward learning per se, but is required to discriminate multiple stimuli on the basis of their association with reward.
Neuropsychometric changes in patients after carotid endarterectomy.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE One hundred twelve patients undergoing elective carotid endarterectomy for symptomatic and asymptomatic carotid artery stenosis were enrolled in a prospective study to evaluate the incidence of change in postoperative cerebral function. METHODS Patients were evaluated preoperatively and postoperatively before hospital discharge and at follow-up 1 and 5 months later with a battery of neuropsychometric tests. The results were analyzed by both event-rate and group-rate analyses. For event-rate analysis, change was defined as either a decline or improvement in postoperative neuropsychometric performance by 25% or more compared with a preoperative baseline. RESULTS Approximately 80% of patients showed decline in one or more test scores, and 60% had one or more improved test scores at the first follow-up examination. The percentage of declined test scores decreased and the percentage of improved test scores increased with subsequent follow-up examinations. Group-rate analysis was similar for group performance on individual tests. However, a decline in performance was seen most commonly on verbal memory tests, and improved performance was seen most commonly on executive and motor tests. CONCLUSIONS Neuropsychometric evaluation of patients undergoing carotid endarterectomy for significant carotid artery stenosis demonstrates both declines and improvements in neuropsychometric performance. The test changes that showed decreased performance may be associated with ischemia from global hypoperfusion or embolic phenomena, and the improvement seen may be related to increased cerebral blood flow from removal of stenosis.
Restoration of Glucose Counterregulation by Islet Transplantation in Long-standing Type 1 Diabetes

Patients with long-standing type 1 diabetes (T1D) may exhibit defective glucose counterregulation and impaired hypoglycemia symptom recognition that substantially increase their risk for experiencing severe hypoglycemia. The purpose of this study was to determine whether intrahepatic islet transplantation improves endogenous glucose production (EGP) in response to hypoglycemia in T1D patients experiencing severe hypoglycemia. We studied longitudinally subjects (n = 12) with ∼30 years, disease duration before and 6 months after intrahepatic islet transplantation using stepped hyperinsulinemic-hypoglycemic and paired hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamps with infusion of 6,6-2H2-glucose and compared the results with those from a nondiabetic control group (n = 8). After islet transplantation, HbA1c was normalized, and time spent while hypoglycemic (<70 mg/dL) was nearly abolished as indicated by continuous glucose monitoring. In response to insulin-induced hypoglycemia, C-peptide (absent before transplant) was appropriately suppressed, glucagon secretion was recovered, and epinephrine secretion was improved after transplantation. Corresponding to these hormonal changes, the EGP response to insulin-induced hypoglycemia, which was previously absent, was normalized after transplantation, with a similar effect seen for autonomic symptoms. Because the ability to increase EGP is ultimately required to circumvent the development of hypoglycemia, these results provide evidence that intrahepatic islet transplantation can restore glucose counterregulation in long-standing T1D and support its consideration as treatment for patients with hypoglycemia unawareness experiencing severe hypoglycemia.
On type IIA Penrose limit and = 6 Chern-Simons theories

Recently, Aharony, Bergman, Jafferis and Maldacena proposed that the = 6 Chern-Simons gauge theories are holographically dual to the M-theory backgrounds with multiple M2-branes on orbifolds C4/Zk. When k is large, they have the type IIA string description. In this paper we analyze the Penrose limit of this IIA background and express the string spectrum as the conformal dimensions of operators in the gauge theories. For BPS operators, we can confirm the agreements between the IIA string on plane waves and the gauge theories. We point out that there exist BMN-like operators in the gauge theories, though their holographic interpretation does not seem to be simple. Also we analyze the weak coupling limit of this theory and show that the Hagedorn/deconfinement transition occurs as expected.
Possibilities and Limitations of Modeling Trust and Reputation

We all highly depend and rely on the trustworthiness of information and services provided by various parties and institutions. Reputation systems are one possibility to support individuals in distinguishing trustworthy partners from malicious and unreliable parties. In this paper, we discuss possibilities and limitations of different types of reputation systems and their underlying trust models. We address in especially the properties of trust relations, the quantification and representation of trust values as well as reasoning and computation with trust.
Engineering aesthetics and aesthetic ergonomics: Theoretical foundations and a dual-process research methodology

Although industrial and product designers are keenly aware of the importance of design aesthetics, they make aesthetic design decisions largely on the basis of their intuitive judgments and ‘educated guesses’. Whilst ergonomics and human factors researchers have made great contributions to the safety, productivity, ease-of-use, and comfort of human-machine-environment systems, aesthetics is largely ignored as a topic of systematic scientific research in human factors and ergonomics. This article discusses the need for incorporating the aesthetics dimension in ergonomics and proposes the establishment of a new scientific and engineering discipline that we can call ‘engineering aesthetics’. This discipline addresses two major questions: How do we use engineering and scientific methods to study aesthetics concepts in general and design aesthetics in particular? How do we incorporate engineering and scientific methods in the aesthetic design and evaluation process? This article identifies two special features that distinguish aesthetic appraisal of products and system designs from aesthetic appreciation of art, and lays out a theoretical foundation as well as a dual-process research methodology for ‘engineering aesthetics’. Sample applications of this methodology are also described.
Evaluating the performance impact of protocol parameters on ad-hoc network routing protocols

Routing protocols are used to discover, maintain, and repair routes between pairs of nodes in wireless ad-hoc networks. In order to handle dynamic network topologies caused by node mobility, many routing protocols are designed with multiple features and parameters to effectively discover routes and to quickly detect link breaks. In this paper, we compare the performance of four popular routing protocols, AODV, DYMO, OLSR and HWMP, in terms of the Packet Delivery Ratio (PDR) metric, and analyse the various reasons for packet loss in scenarios where nodes are mobile. We also explore key protocol parameters and how their choice impacts the protocol performance. Based on our simulation results, we find that the way in which protocols detect link breaks is critical for overall network performance. We therefore specifically explore how the choice of link break detection parameters can improve protocol performance. We further explore other protocol variations and features and their potential for performance improvements.
High-Gain Planar Antenna Arrays for Mobile Satellite Communications [Antenna Applications Corner]

Two large and low-profile panel antenna arrays, used as receiving and transmitting antennas for mobile satellite communications, are described. The receiving and transmitting arrays have overall dimensions of 120 cm × 20.7 cm × 1.3cm and 107.5 cm × 20.4 cm × 1.7 cm, respectively. They exhibit high gains and adequate efficiencies, due to integrated array designs. For the receiving panel array, a method using a number of high-efficiency subarrays, combined with a novel active integrated global feed network, is proposed. For the transmitting panel array, a number of high-efficiency subarrays, together with a novel compact waveguide feed network, is employed. Based on the above techniques, two large panel antenna arrays were successfully developed. We present the detailed designs of the subarrays, the passive and active feed networks, and the vertical transitions. Simulated and experimental results showed that the designed receiving and transmitting panel arrays achieved measured gains and efficiencies of 34.1 dBi and 48.2%, and 33.5 dBi and 36.3%, respectively, in each band. This indicated that the proposed antenna panels are good candidates for future satellite communications applications.
Pick-by-Vision comes on age: evaluation of an augmented reality supported picking system in a real storage environment

Order picking is one of the most important process steps in logistics. Because of their flexibility human beings cannot be replaced by machines. But if workers in order picking systems are equipped with a head-mounted display, Augmented Reality can improve the information visualization. In this paper the development of such a system -- called Pick-by-Vision - is presented. The system is evaluated in a user study performed in a real storage environment. Important logistics figures as well as subjective figures were measured. The results show that a Pick-by-Vision system can improve considerably industrial order picking processes.
Experience as Interpretation

Much current user experience literature in HCI presumes that experience can and should be actively controlled by HCI practitioners and passively received by users. In this paper, we argue, instead, that users are actively involved in constructing their experiences through a process of interpretation. As a consequence, experience is co-constructed between users, designers, and systems. To design for this experience, then, we need to shift HCI design strategies from control of user experience to support for flexible interpretation.
Application of weighted finite-state transducers to improve recognition accuracy for dysarthric speech

Standard speaker adaptation algorithms perform poorly on dysarthric speech because of the limited phonemic repertoire of dysarthric speakers. In a previous paper, we proposed the use of "metamodels" to correct dysarthric speech. Here, we report on an improved technique that makes use of a cascade of Weighted Finite-State Transducers (WFSTs) at the confusion-matrix, word and language levels. This approach outperforms both standard MLLR and metamodels.
Single camera based fall detection using motion and human shape features

Fall detection is important for safety for old people or patients living alone. This paper proposes a framework for indoor fall detection using single camera system. Falls are detected based on the analysis of motion orientation, motion magnitude, and human shape changes. With a deep analysis of characteristics of fall events, we propose improvements for motion orientation estimation, large motion detection and human shape detection using motion histogram images (MHI). Fall detection is then determined by analyzing the speed of changing in motion magnitude, motion orientation and human shape before, during and after the fall. Experiments have been conducted on public datasets Li2e having 221 videos of different living environments with various daily activities. The experimental results show high detection accuracies and very fast processing capability.
Rethinking Classroom Observation.

Midway through her 12th year of teaching social studies, Maria found herself reflecting on an ongoing challenge: her students' struggle to cite evidence from nonfiction texts. She was pleased that students in her United States history class regularly volunteered to share their opinions on topics the class was studying. It was obvious, however, that most of them struggled to use their reading to inform these opinions. With the district's heightened focus on literacy, Maria had spent years learning literacy strategies at schoolwide professional development days. She'd discussed these strategies at department meetings. Yet back in her classroom, with 25 pairs of tired eyes staring at her, she found that her use of the practices varied. After months of implementing the new strategies, Maria felt stalled. "How can I improve my implementation of these practices while teaching in isolation? " she wondered. "I need another colleague or two to help me examine what I'm doing in my classroom. "
Quick Convergence Mobility Control Schemes in Wireless Sensor Networks

In the near future, wireless sensor networks (WSN) performing sensing and communication tasks will be widely deployed as technology rapidly advances. Communication is one of the essential functionalities of these mobile networks while power and computation resources in each sensor are limited. Recently, attention has been drawn to using mobility control to minimize energy consumption in wireless sensor networks. In this paper, we are going to provide quick convergence mobility control schemes to achieve optimal configuration in a single data flow. The key idea of our schemes is to use the optimal location information of each relay node as a guide for node movement while maintaining the connectivity of relay nodes along the data flow. Experimental results show that our schemes can speed up the convergence process to nearly the optimal and reduce the cost of it almost to the minimum, compared with the best results known to the date.
Classical music and political sociology : A research note

We join that rare group of scholars who challenge the traditional assumptions of autonomy and insularity of art music. We demonstrate how three systems of political thought - or political ideologies - have found expression in classical music. We note that nine other systems are similarly inclined. We specify that classical music embodies such distinctly political-sociological concepts as class, status, power, mass movement, revolution, liberation, experimentation, organization, and the like.
A Cross-Sectional Study of Risk Factors for Irritable Bowel Syndrome in Children 8–13 Years of Age in Suzhou, China

To determine the prevalence and risk factors of IBS in children 8–13 years of age in Suzhou city, a cross-sectional study was conducted on children in grades 1 through 6 in public elementary schools in three districts of Suzhou. A multistage stratified random-sampling survey was conducted in a primary investigation using standardized questionnaires. Rome II criteria were used to confirm IBS and their risk factors were analyzed. Of 8,000 questionnaires 7,472 responded satisfactorily for a response rate of 93.4%. IBS was diagnosed in 10.81%. A decrease in the prevalence of IBS was significantly associated with advancing age and grade in school (trend test, P < 0.05). The prevalence of IBS in females was higher but not significantly different than males. The significant risk factors for IBS included young age (OR = 0.94), food allergy (OR = 1.53), gastroenteritis during childhood (OR = 1.29), eating fried food (OR = 1.62), anxiety (OR = 1.49), psychological insults in early childhood (OR = 1.47), and parental history of constipation (OR = 1.81; all P < 0.05). IBS prevalence of 10.81% in study population warrants preventive measures such as encouraging dietary changes, preventing gastroenteritis and childhood psychological insults.