Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Aging-Aware Design of Microprocessor Instruction Pipelines

As complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor technologies enter nanometer scales, microprocessors become more vulnerable to transistor aging, mainly due to bias temperature instability and hot carrier injection. These phenomena lead to increasing device delays during the operational lifetime, which result in growing delays of the instruction pipeline stages. However, the aging rates of different stages are different. Hence, a previously delay-balanced pipeline becomes increasingly imbalanced resulting in a non-optimized design in terms of lifetime [i.e., mean time to failure (MTTF)], frequency, area, and power consumption. In this paper, we propose an aging-aware, MTTF-balanced pipeline design, in which the pipeline stage delays are balanced at the desired lifetime rather than at design time. This can lead to significant MTTF (lifetime) improvements as well as additional performance, area, and power benefits. Our experimental results show that for two different microprocessors, MTTF can be extended by at least 2.3 times while achieving an additional 10% energy improvement with no penalty on delay and area. If the demand for performance is higher than that for a longer MTTF, it is also possible to improve the clock frequency by 2%.
Trace-DC Hierarchical Supervisory

We present a hierarchical control theory for supervisory automata based on state aggregation. Conditions are determined on state partitions which ensure that the control of transitions between blocks in a high-level (i.e. aggregated) model, combined with local state-dependent controls, is eeective in the sense of achieving speciications given either for the high-level model or for the low-level system. A design methodology is proposed for the construction of the necessary partitions. We show this formulation of hierarchical supervision satisses the consistency conditions in the existing language-based hierarchical supervisory control theory. Examples are presented including a material transfer line with re-entrant ow and a double queue.
Falling snow motion estimation based on a semi-transparent and particle trajectory model

This paper presents a motion estimation method for semitransparent objects with a long-range displacement between frames, i.e., falling snow in video. Previous optical flow based methods have been treated with non-transparent, rigid, and fluid-like moving objects in a short-range displacement. However, they fail to match between frames when moving objects are transparent/homogenoeous color in a long-range displacement. To meet with such objects' properties, a two-step algorithm is proposed from rough to refined motion estimation via an energy minimization. First, rough motion of every snow particles is extracted from video using a novel “time filter” method in order to obtain/update a quasi-stationary background in every 30 fps. Second, using such rough optical flow from the first step, the long-range snowflakes' trajectories are estimated and refined by propagation, linking, pruning, and optimization. Experimental results using real falling snow videos show that the proposed method is more effective than a previous optical flow method. Our proposed method is useful for the analysis of natural environment changes.
Enter the dragon – China's journey to the hearing world

Abstract Context China's population of 1.3 billion represents nearly 20% of the world's population. The current live birth rate in China is 17 million per year, compared with 4.1 million in the USA in 2009. Ministry of Health figures from China identify 115 000 children under the age of 7 years with severe-to-profound deafness and 30 000 babies born each year with hearing impairment. Newborn screening Universal Newborn Hearing Screening (UNHS) has been implemented in China since 1999. By 2010 UNHS was implemented in 20 of the 32 Chinese provinces. In large cities 95% of babies are screened in hospital-based programs. In more remote areas babies with high-risk factors for hearing loss are referred to screening centers within 1 month of birth and leaflets about identifying deafness are distributed. Cochlear implants Since 1995 more than 10 000 people in China have received cochlear implants (CIs) and 85% of these implant recipients have been children under the age of 7 years. Financing of CIs China is in the process of developing a national reimbursement scheme for medical care. The first multichannel implant was performed in 1995. In 2005, a private financier provided more than 1500 implants for children under the age of 5 years. In 2009, the Chinese government set up a project to implant 1500 children aged 1–5 years over the next 3 years, with provision of the equivalent of US$65.4 million to pay for the devices, surgery, mapping, and rehabilitation. By 2011, the government had agreed to fund implants for an additional 17 000 children over 4 years. Training of professionals Schemes have been developed to train surgeons, Audiologists, and those involved in rehabilitation of implanted children in China. Outcome assessment Standardized outcome tests are being developed for CI recipients. There are two large-scale ongoing outcome studies in progress. CI penetration in China is currently less than 5% of potential pediatric candidates, but cochlear implantation is continuing to expand at great speed, and it is hoped that the infrastructure and capacity will continue to grow and develop.
Context Effects in the Evaluation of Bodily Symptoms: Comparing Three Versions of the Health Norms Sorting Task

The illness-related evaluation of bodily symptoms is considered to be an important maintaining factor in somatoform disorders. However, little is known about context variables that could influence this evaluation process. In the current study, participants completed three versions of the Health Norms Sorting Task (HNST) and evaluated bodily symptoms in different contexts (i.e., different evaluation perspectives and time frames of evaluation). Additionally, the three HNST versions were presented in different orders. Bodily symptoms were evaluated more often as a sign of illness when a specific time frame (i.e., one week) was given. However, this context effect was only large when participants had previously evaluated symptoms existing without a concrete duration. Thus, previously completed symptom evaluations appear to represent an important frame of reference in terms of a cue that makes specific context variables salient. The results further suggested that these cueing effects might be less relevant for participants with elevated somatic symptom reports.
Measuring Alienation among College Teachers

The primary concern of this measurement report on aliena tion is methodological and validational. It is not directly concer ned with substantive aspects of the alienation phenomenon per se. Constructing and validating acceptable measures of alienation by taking a particular formulation of the'concept that has gained wide currency in the social science literature is the sole and immediate focus of this paper. Thus, conceptual and definitional problems become peripheral to our narrow concern with measure ment aspects. However, conceptual and definitional problems may figure in this report indirectly to the extent that they are inci den'al to the primary measurement objectives of the paper. In operational terms, the paper proceeds by simply taking for granted Seeman's five dimensional formulation of the concept of aliena tion (Seeman 1959 : 783-91). The five major components of alien ation, according to Seeman, are : powerlessness, meaninglessness, normlessness, self-estrangement, and cultural isolation. Alienation theory and research as it developed in the social tradition is con sidered deficient as it has not progressed beyond the cataloguing of the various dimensions. The elucidation of the nexus of inter dimensional relationships has not advanced very far. The episte mic and nomological inter-connections of these dimensions as well as their substantive and constitutive significance for the under lying construct of alienation are not yet well investigated. As a consequence, researchers are constantly groping and exploring, struggling to figure out how best to organise and order the five dimensions of the concept and whether specific dimensions of alienation are important to characterise the concept usefully and meaningfully. Other questions that need tackling are the varia bility and inconsistencies in the articulation of the five compo nents of this multi-dimensional concept, how such variations are to be theoretically and substantively interpreted, and what their implications would be for the multi-dimensional conceptualization
Global estimate of submarine groundwater discharge based on an observationally constrained radium isotope model

Along the continental margins, rivers and submarine groundwater supply nutrients, trace elements, and radionuclides to the coastal ocean, supporting coastal ecosystems and, increasingly, causing harmful algal blooms and eutrophication. While the global magnitude of gauged riverine water discharge is well known, the magnitude of submarine groundwater discharge (SGD) is poorly constrained. Using an inverse model combined with a global compilation of 228Ra observations, we show that the SGD integrated over the Atlantic and Indo‐Pacific Oceans between 60°S and 70°N is (12 ± 3) × 1013 m3 yr−1, which is 3 to 4 times greater than the freshwater fluxes into the oceans by rivers. Unlike the rivers, where more than half of the total flux is discharged into the Atlantic, about 70% of SGD flows into the Indo‐Pacific Oceans. We suggest that SGD is the dominant pathway for dissolved terrestrial materials to the global ocean, and this necessitates revisions for the budgets of chemical elements including carbon.
Survival of the Un-fittest: Why the Worst Infrastructure Gets Built - and What We Can Do about It

The article first describes characteristics of major infrastructure projects. Second, it documents a much neglected topic in economics: that ex ante estimates of costs and benefits are often very different from actual ex post costs and benefits. For large infrastructure projects the consequences are cost overruns, benefit shortfalls, and the systematic underestimation of risks. Third, implications for cost--benefit analysis are described, including that such analysis is not to be trusted for major infrastructure projects. Fourth, the article uncovers the causes of this state of affairs in terms of perverse incentives that encourage promoters to underestimate costs and overestimate benefits in the business cases for their projects. But the projects that are made to look best on paper are the projects that amass the highest cost overruns and benefit shortfalls in reality. The article depicts this situation as 'survival of the unfittest'. Fifth, the article sets out to explain how the problem may be solved, with a view to arriving at more efficient and more democratic projects, and avoiding the scandals that often accompany major infrastructure investments. Finally, the article identifies current trends in major infrastructure development. It is argued that a rapid increase in stimulus spending, combined with more investments in emerging economies, combined with more spending on information technology is catapulting infrastructure investment from the frying pan into the fire. Copyright 2009, Oxford University Press.
Executive functioning in early childhood: etiology and developmental significance

iv ACKOWLEDGEMENTS The present research was support by grant HD068435 awarded to Dr. Saudino. In addition to this financial support, this work would not have been possible without the support of my colleagues, family, and friends. First and foremost, I am grateful to my mentor, Dr. Kimberly Saudino, not only for allowing me to work with the Boston University Twin Project sample, but also for her thoughtful guidance. I am very fortunate to have had the opportunity to learn from Kim's skilled expertise and am thankful for the support that she has provided me. In addition to Dr. Saudino, I am deeply appreciative of my dissertation committee, Drs. Lyons, Tarullo, and Corriveau and committee chair Dr. Peter Blake for their skilled direction. I would also like to express sincere gratitude to the staff, students, and volunteers of the Boston University Twin Project for their assistance in recruiting, collecting, entering and checking data for this project. This team has gone above and beyond the call of duty and I am eternally grateful for their support and friendship. Further, I am appreciative to the Boston University Twin Project families for their continued involvement in the project. Finally, I would like to extend my sincerest thanks to all of my family, who have expressed continual pride and reassurance throughout my years as a graduate student. I am exceptionally lucky to have so many wonderful people in my life. I cannot thank you enough. ABSTRACT Executive functioning (EF) facilitates a wide range of purposeful actions and plays a significant role in adaptive functioning. Despite considerable variability in EF, little is known about the factors underlying individual differences in EF in early childhood. The aims of the present research were to explore the genetic and environmental influences on individual differences in EF and the factors underlying the relations between EF and developmentally-significant outcomes. The sample comprised 209 4-year-old twin pairs (79 monozygotic, 130 dizygotic). EF was assessed with the NIH Toolbox: Early Childhood Cognitive Battery, a computerized battery of multidimensional measures. Both observers and parents provided ratings of temperament and parents evaluated behavior problems. School readiness was assessed with a standardized test of basic skills. Model-fitting procedures revealed that variability in set-shifting and inhibitory control could be attributed to both genetic (i.e., 36% and 46%, respectively) and nonshared environmental (i.e., 64% and 54%, respectively) influences. A moderate phenotypic association (r=.30) was found between set-shifting and …
Comparison of three different epidural solutions in off-pump cardiac surgery: pilot study.

BACKGROUND Immediate extubation using thoracic epidural analgesia (TEA) has become more popular after off-pump coronary artery bypass grafting (OPCAB). In this randomized prospective double-blind study, we present the first comparison of preoperative and postoperative haemodynamics during different regimens of TEA for immediate extubation after cardiac surgery. METHODS Sixty patients undergoing OPCAB were enrolled in this study. TEA was installed >1 h before application of heparin at levels T2-T4. Analgesia was provided by bupivacaine 0.25%, 8 ml, 15 min before surgery and extubation, and at 10 ml h(-1) during surgery and up to 72 h afterwards using one of the following regimens: bupivacaine 0.125% alone, bupivacaine 0.125% with fentanyl 3 microg ml(-1) or bupivacaine 0.125% with clonidine 0.6 microg ml(-1). Patients were block-randomized for one of the three treatments. Pain scores and infusion rates of TEA were assessed up to 48 h after surgery. Respiratory function was assessed by Pa(o2) and Pa(o2) immediately after surgery, and haemodynamic stability was recorded in the form of heart rate and diastolic and systolic blood pressure. RESULTS Patient characteristics, respiratory function and haemodynamic stability did not vary between the three groups. Pain control was very good and was not significantly different between the groups using similar infusion rates after surgery. Paraesthesia in dermatomes T1 or C8 occurred equally in all three groups. There was no neurological complication related to TEA in this study. CONCLUSIONS We conclude that immediate extubation after OPCAB using TEA is feasible with different TEA regimens. Respiratory function, haemodynamic stability and pain control are not different between TEA with bupivacaine alone, bupivacaine with fentanyl or bupivacaine with clonidine.
The Research on the Application of an Improved Algorithm in the Zigbee Network

An improved AntNet algorithm is put forward to overcome the shortcomings of the nodes around the Sink node excessive energy consumption in AntNet algorithm. This improved algorithm is based on the thought of cluster structure routing, when the Zigbee network carries out for a period of time, the algorithm re-select sub-Sink node. The NS2 simulation platform has been built to simulate a Zigbee wireless sensor network, the simulation results prove that the improved AntNet algorithm compared to the two existing wireless routing algorithm: the LEACH algorithm and the AntNet algorithm, has several notable improvements among the energy consumption in the network, node mortality and Some degree of network congestion. Keywords-improved AntNet algorithm, Zigbee network, wireless routing.
RECENT EVIDENCE OF PHYSICAL ABNORMALITY IN CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DISABILITIES

The idea that the difficulties of "learning-disabled" children have a physical explanation rather than a purely psychological one has been in prolonged abeyance. but has recently experienced a powerful resurgence. Pihl reviews recent findings from a number of fields in physiology, and adds to them an account of his own discovery that these disabilities appear to be strongly related to the presence in the body of above-normal levels of certain elements - not only lead, but also lithium and others. These developments point to the clear prospect of our developing forms of intervention by nutrition and other physical means that may bring success where purely educational interventions have faced apparently intractable problems.
Security issues of black hole attacks in MANET

MANETS are the temporary networks which are dynamic and self-maintainable. As being dynamic in nature and without any fixed infrastructure security becomes a great concern in MANETs. In MANETS we have different types of security attacks like black hole, worm hole and grey hole but in this paper we are only focusing on the black hole attacks. These black hole attacks poses a serious security threat to the routing services by attacking the reactive routing protocols resulting in drastic drop of data packets. AODV (Ad hoc On-demand Distance Vector) routing being one of the many protocols often becomes an easy victim to such attacks. In such kind of attacks a node advertise a shortest path for the given route request and redirects the data path through itself getting an easy access to all the data being transferred. Such nodes are called as malicious nodes.
Context-sensitive filtering for the web

This paper proposes a filtering method on Web browsing. Some papers have reported that a user's interests shift continuously during browsing. To facilitate the user's browsing, a filtering system must adapt to the user's shift of interests. On the assumption that the user's interests are reflected in browsing page content and order, we have proposed Context-Sensitive Filtering (CSF) for a hypertext CD-ROM encyclopedia. In the encyclopedia, the entire hypertext is controlled to have one topic per page. We confirmed effectiveness of CSF for the encyclopedia. However, effectiveness of CSF for the Web was not confirmed. We inferred that the reason of failure is the difference in page properties of the Web and the encyclopedia. This paper describes modeling and CSF improvements. Main improvements include dividing a Web page to approximate an encyclopedia page and augmenting model calculation with TF-IDF. We confirmed effectiveness of proposed CSF through comparing several filtering methods.
Proactive integrated handoff management in CR-MANETs: A conceptual model

In cognitive radio (CR), CR users or also known as secondary users (SUs) are considered as “visitors” to the licensed spectrum. During the case when the primary user (PU) claims the band of the spectrum that is occupied by the SU, the SU's ongoing call must be transferred to another unused spectrum band. The variation in spectrum band is called spectrum mobility. Spectrum mobility leads to a new handoff in cognitive radio networks, namely spectrum handoff, in which the SUs handover their spectrum band and continue their ongoing calls on an unused spectrum band with different frequency upon the appearance of the PU. In this paper, we investigate a new concept of integrated handoff management in mobile cognitive radio Ad hoc networks (CR-MANET), along with a conceptual framework, its connections and related handoff algorithm.
A vision for the innovative study of fungal biology in China: Presidential address

I am proud to be elected as the sixth president of the Mycological Society of China, and highly pleased to have a chance to share my personal opinion here with my fellow mycologists and students regarding the innovative performance of fungal biology studies in China. A stepwise buildup of knowledge and sharp scientific vision is the prerequisite for innovative studies. Taken together with the most advanced techniques and elegant experimental designs, the scholars would have a better chance to acquire novel and conceptual results rather than the “me too” stories by focusing on the mechanisms related with fungal unique biology.
Visualizing lifelog data for different interaction platforms

Today we are witnessing diverse forms and styles of interactive platforms and devices quickly penetrating to people's everyday lives. New applications and services for smartphones, tablets, game consoles connected to TVs, and other embedded appliances are constantly appearing and diversifying the way we interact with technology. Thus when we design visualization and interaction strategies for the emerging lifelogging activity, it is important to consider affordances and contexts for these emerging interactive devices: by the time the lifelogging activity becomes truly ubiquitous, we will be interacting with even more diverse set of devices to support the activity. In this paper, we describe an early stage of our on-going project where we sketched a series of interactive visualization and their corresponding usage scenarios for three different interactive platforms: (1) smartphone, (2) tablet, and (3) desktop. Our sketch was rendered on these corresponding devices in such a way as to maximize the special interaction characteristics of each device and provides three very different lifelog data usage scenarios.