Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Efficient Coding of Natural Images Outline: Abstract Introduction Efficient for What Task? Defining Efficiency A. Representational Efficiency Correlation and Decorrelation Optimal Information Transfer beyond Correlations: Sparseness and Independence Optimality with Nonlinear Systems B. Metabolic Eff

A wide variety of studies over the last twenty years have demonstrated that our sensory systems are remarkably efficient at coding the sensory environment. Much of this work has focused on the visual system and it has demonstrated that many properties of the early visual system are extremely well matched to the statistical structure of the visual world. However, there remain many questions regarding how far this approach can be taken in understanding the full visual system, especially higher levels of visual processing. Basic theories of efficiency (e.g., decorrelation, sparseness, independence, etc.) are likely to be insufficient to account for the more complex nonlinear representations found in higher levels. In this chapter, we take a closer look at how efficiency might be defined. In particular, we consider three forms of efficiency: representational efficiency, metabolic efficiency, and learning efficiency. Although the majority of studies have focused on representational and metabolic efficiency, we argue that a complete account of visual processing must consider all three forms of efficiency.
IN ADAPTIVE SERVICE-BASED SYSTEMS

Service-based systems that are dynamically composed at runtime to provide complex, adaptive functionality are currently one of the main development paradigms in software engineering. However, the Quality of Service (QoS) delivered by these systems remains an important concern, and needs to be managed in an equally adaptive and predictable way. To address this need, we introduce a novel, tool-supported framework for the development of adaptive servicebased systems called QoSMOS (QoS Management and Optimization of Service-based systems). QoSMOS can be used to develop service-based systems that achieve their QoS requirements through dynamically adapting to changes in the system state, environment, and workload. QoSMOS service-based systems translate high-level QoS requirements specified by their administrators into probabilistic temporal logic formulae, which are then formally and automatically analyzed to identify and enforce optimal system configurations. The QoSMOS self-adaptation mechanism can handle reliability and performance-related QoS requirements, and can be integrated into newly developed solutions or legacy systems. The effectiveness and scalability of the approach are validated using simulations and a set of experiments based on an implementation of an adaptive service-based system for remote medical assistance.
Linguistic validation of the Spanish version of the Good Death Inventory / Validación lingüística de la versión española del Good Death Inventory

Abstract This article outlines the linguistic validation of the Good Death Inventory (GDI) translation into Spanish, used to assess the quality of care at the end of a patient’s life. A standardized procedure was followed to do this that included a blind back translation process and an exploration of the conceptual adaptation of the scale into Spanish through six cognitive interviews with relatives of deceased patients. The translation of the scale (54 items) showed indicators of low difficulty. Six items required syntactic changes, 12 required semantic changes and only one item required syntactic and semantic changes. All items were considered applicable to the Spanish context. The degree of difficulty was higher for the back translation than for the translation itself. The cognitive interviews highlighted the difficulty of choosing between seven answers, especially those that were formulated as negative. Five items were difficult to understand. The Spanish version of the GDI has been adapted well to the Spanish context.
Expression and Prognostic Significance of Wnt7a in Human Endometrial Carcinoma

Introduction. Wnt7a is a secreted glycoprotein that regulates normal cellular proliferation and differentiation as well as tumorigenesis and progression. However, less is understood about the role of Wnt7a in human endometrial carcinoma. The aim of this study is to investigate the expression and prognostic significance of Wnt7a in endometrial carcinoma. Methods. Wnt7a expression was immunohistochemically examined in 35 normal endometrium, 33 hyperplastic endometrium and 70 endometrial carcinomas. Results. Wnt7a expression was lower in endometrial carcinomas compared with that in normal and hyperplastic endometrium (P < 0.001). Wnt7a was inversely correlated with FIGO stage (P = 0.001), grade (P = 0.001), lymph node metastasis (P = 0.002), depth of myometrial invasion (P = 0.006), lymph vascular space involvement (P = 0.001) and peritoneal cytology (P = 0.013). There was a negative correlation between estrogen receptor (ER) and Wnt7a (r = −0.281, P = 0.019), and a positive correlation between progestogen receptor (PR) and Wnt7a (r = 0.249, P = 0.037). Patients with lost or reduced Wnt7a expression had poorer progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) (P = 0.005 and P = 0.042, resp.) on univariate analysis. But on multivariate analysis, Wnt7a expression was not an independent prognostic factor for PFS or OS. Conclusions. Our results indicate that Wnt7a expression may serve as an important prognostic marker.
Strong thread migration in heterogeneous environment

This paper provides a complete framework for thread migration using JPDA. In our framework neither we lose portability nor do we insert any artificial code. The system developed based on our framework needs no extra involvement of programming to continue the whole migration system. It is a powerful autonomous system for heterogeneous environment maintaining its portability since Java Virtual Machine (JVM) is not modified.
In aged mice, low surrogate light chain promotes pro-B-cell apoptotic resistance, compromises the PreBCR checkpoint, and favors generation of autoreactive, phosphorylcholine-specific B cells

In aged mice, new B‐cell development is diminished and the antibody repertoire becomes more autoreactive. Our studies suggest that (i) apoptosis contributes to reduced B lymphopoiesis in old age and preferentially eliminates those B‐cell precursors with higher levels of the surrogate light chain (SLC) proteins (λ5/VpreB) and (ii) λ5low B‐cell precursors generate new B cells which show increased reactivity to the self‐antigen/bacterial antigen phosphorylcholine (PC). Pro‐B cells in old bone marrow as well as pro‐B cells from young adult λ5‐deficient mice are resistant to cytokine‐induced apoptosis (TNFα; TGFβ), indicating that low λ5 expression in pro‐B cells is sufficient to cause increased survival. Transfer of TNFα‐producing ‘age‐associated B cells’ (ABC; CD21/35− CD23−) or follicular (FO) B cells from aged mice into RAG‐2 KO recipients led to preferential loss of λ5high pro‐B cells, but retention of λ5low, apoptosis‐resistant pro‐B cells. In old mice, there is increased reactivity to PC in both immature bone marrow B cells and mature splenic FO B cells. In young mice, absence of λ5 expression led to a similar increase in PC reactivity among bone marrow and splenic B cells. We propose that in old age, increased apoptosis, mediated in part by TNFα‐producing B cells, results in preferential loss of SLChigh pro‐B cells within the bone marrow. Further B‐cell development then occurs via an ‘SLClow’ pathway that not only impairs B‐cell generation, but promotes autoreactivity within the naïve antibody repertoires in the bone marrow and periphery.
Inexpensive Computation of the Inverse of the Genomic Relationship Matrix in Populations with Small Effective Population Size

Many computations with SNP data including genomic evaluation, parameter estimation, and genome-wide association studies use an inverse of the genomic relationship matrix. The cost of a regular inversion is cubic and is prohibitively expensive for large matrices. Recent studies in cattle demonstrated that the inverse can be computed in almost linear time by recursion on any subset of ∼10,000 individuals. The purpose of this study is to present a theory of why such a recursion works and its implication for other populations. Assume that, because of a small effective population size, the additive information in a genotyped population has a small dimensionality, even with a very large number of SNP markers. That dimensionality is visible as a limited number of effective SNP effects, independent chromosome segments, or the rank of the genomic relationship matrix. Decompose a population arbitrarily into core and noncore individuals, with the number of core individuals equal to that dimensionality. Then, breeding values of noncore individuals can be derived by recursions on breeding values of core individuals, with coefficients of the recursion computed from the genomic relationship matrix. A resulting algorithm for the inversion called “algorithm for proven and young” (APY) has a linear computing and memory cost for noncore animals. Noninfinitesimal genetic architecture can be accommodated through a trait-specific genomic relationship matrix, possibly derived from Bayesian regressions. For populations with small effective population size, the inverse of the genomic relationship matrix can be computed inexpensively for a very large number of genotyped individuals.
To Accept One’s Fate or Be Its Master: Culture, Control, and Workplace Choice

Utilizing three student (Study 1) and non-student samples (Study 2), we examined cultural differences in workplace choice for North Americans, Germans, and Japanese. We focused on the desire for control as a potential mediator (i.e., the underlying mechanism) to explain cultural differences in this important life decision. Given culturally divergent embodiments of independent vs. interdependent models of agency, we expected and found that, compared to North Americans and Germans, Japanese were more likely to prefer a workplace with a payment system that maintains social order rather than one that rewards individual achievement. Furthermore, we found that Japanese tend to give greater consideration to family opinions in their choice of workplace. As predicted, desire for control (i.e., the motivation to have control over various events) was stronger for North Americans and Germans than Japanese, and explained cultural differences in choice of workplace.
Document indexing for automatic semantic annotation support

Nowadays, capturing the knowledge in ontological structures is one of the primary focuses of the knowledge management research. To exploit the knowledge from the vast quantity of existing unstructured texts available in natural languages in ontologies, tools for automatic semantic annotation (ASA) are heavily needed. In this paper, we present an approach to ASA and a method for documents content indexing and we describe how the rules mining from the indexed collection of documents can be beneficial for ASA. We use the statistical values obtained from indexed documents mining to estimate the accuracy of new instances of ontological concepts created by ASA. We evaluate this approach on a collection of domain specific documents and present preliminary results.
Task model-driven realization of interactive application functionality through services

The Service-Oriented Computing (SOC) paradigm is currently being adopted by many developers, as it promises the construction of applications through reuse of existing Web Services (WSs). However, current SOC tools produce applications that interact with users in a limited way. This limitation is overcome by model-based Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) approaches that support the development of applications whose functionality is realized with WSs and whose User Interface (UI) is adapted to the user's context. Typically, such approaches do not consider various functional issues, such as the applications' semantics and their syntactic robustness in terms of the WSs selected to implement their functionality and the automation of the service discovery and selection processes. To this end, we propose a model-driven design method for interactive service-based applications that is able to consider the functional issues and their implications for the UI. This method is realized by a semiautomatic environment that can be integrated into current model-based HCI tools to complete the development of interactive service front-ends. The proposed method takes as input an HCI task model, which includes the user's view of the interactive system, and produces a concrete service model that describes how existing services can be combined to realize the application's functionality. To achieve its goal, our method first transforms system tasks into semantic service queries by mapping the task objects onto domain ontology concepts; then it sends each resulting query to a semantic service engine so as to discover the corresponding services. In the end, only one service from those associated with a system task is selected, through the execution of a novel service concretization algorithm that ensures message compatibility between the selected services.
Period 2 Mutation Accelerates ApcMin/+ Tumorigenesis

Colorectal cancer risk is increased in shift workers with presumed circadian disruption. Intestinal epithelial cell proliferation is gated throughout each day by the circadian clock. Period 2 (Per2) is a key circadian clock gene. Per2 mutant (Per2m/m) mice show an increase in lymphomas and deregulated expression of cyclin D and c-Myc genes that are key to proliferation control. We asked whether Per2 clock gene inactivation would accelerate intestinal and colonic tumorigenesis. The effects of PER2 on cell proliferation and β-catenin were studied in colon cancer cell lines by its down-regulation following RNA interference. The effects of Per2 inactivation in vivo on β-catenin and on intestinal and colonic polyp formation were studied in mice with Per2 mutation alone and in combination with an Apc mutation using polyp-prone ApcMin/+ mice. Down-regulation of PER2 in colon cell lines (HCT116 and SW480) increases β-catenin, cyclin D, and cell proliferation. Down-regulation of β-catenin along with Per2 blocks the increase in cyclin D and cell proliferation. Per2m/m mice develop colonic polyps and show an increase in small intestinal mucosa β-catenin and cyclin D protein levels compared with wild-type mice. ApcMin/+Per2m/m mice develop twice the number of small intestinal and colonic polyps, with more severe anemia and splenomegaly, compared with ApcMin/+ mice. These data suggest that Per2 gene product suppresses tumorigenesis in the small intestine and colon by down-regulation of β-catenin and β-catenin target genes, and this circadian core clock gene may represent a novel target for colorectal cancer prevention and control. (Mol Cancer Res 2008;6(11):1786–93)
Factoring Wavelet Transforms into Lifting Steps Honours Thesis ( 1997 )

This paper is essentially tutorial in nature. We show how any discrete wavelet transform or two band subband filtering with finite filters can be decomposed into a finite sequence of simple filtering steps, which we call lifting steps but that are also known as ladder structures. This decomposition corresponds to a factorization of the polyphase matrix of the wavelet or subband filters into elementary matrices. That such a factorization is possible is well-known to algebraists (and expressed by the formula ); it is also used in linear systems theory in the electrical engineering community. We present here a self-contained derivation, building the decomposition from basic principles such as the Euclidean algorithm, with a focus on applying it to wavelet filtering. This factorization provides an alternative for the lattice factorization, with the advantage that it can also be used in the biorthogonal, i.e, non-unitary case. Like the lattice factorization, the decomposition presented here asymptotically reduces the computational complexity of the transform by a factor two. It has other applications, such as the possibility of defining a wavelet-like transform that maps integers to integers.
Her-2/neu gene amplification and response to paclitaxel in patients with metastatic breast cancer.

BACKGROUND HER-2/neu overexpression appears to be associated with improved response to anthracycline-based chemotherapy, but its association with response to taxane-based chemotherapy is unclear. In this retrospective subset analysis of patients with metastatic breast cancer enrolled in a randomized treatment trial, we investigated the response of patients with known HER-2/neu status to treatment with taxane-based epirubicin-paclitaxel (ET) chemotherapy compared with treatment with epirubicin-cyclophosphamide (EC) chemotherapy. METHODS HER-2/neu status (positive [i.e., HER-2/neu amplification] or negative [i.e., no HER-2/neu amplification]) of archival specimens of primary tumors from 297 patients with metastatic breast cancer was determined by use of fluorescence in situ hybridization. Associations between HER-2/neu status and the efficacy of randomly assigned chemotherapy (ET versus EC) were investigated. All statistical tests were two-sided. RESULTS Patients with HER-2/neu-positive tumors had a statistically significantly greater objective response rate than patients with HER-2/neu-negative tumors to treatment with ET (76% versus 50%, respectively; P =.005) but not to treatment with EC (46% versus 33%; P =.130). The objective response rate associated with ET was greater than that associated with EC for both HER-2/neu-positive tumors (76% versus 46%; P =.004) and HER-2/neu-negative tumors (50% versus 33%; P =.002). However, the improvement in the objective response rate associated with ET, compared with that associated with EC, was greater for patients with HER-2/neu-positive tumors (adjusted odds ratio [OR] = 3.64, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.48 to 8.92; P=.005) than for patients with HER-2/neu-negative tumors (adjusted OR = 1.92, 95% CI = 1.01 to 3.64; P=.046). Among patients with HER-2/neu-positive tumors, those who received ET had better progression-free survival and overall survival than those who received EC (for progression-free survival, adjusted relative risk [RR] = 0.65, 95% CI = 0.42 to 1.02; P=.062; for overall survival, adjusted RR = 0.60, 95% CI = 0.36 to 1.02; P=.059). However, among patients with HER-2/neu-negative tumors, those who received ET and those who received EC had similar progression-free survival and overall survival. CONCLUSIONS HER-2/neu amplification does not adversely influence response to first-line chemotherapy with either ET or EC. Furthermore, a taxane-containing regimen such as ET may provide a preferential benefit to patients with HER-2/neu-positive tumors.
A robot with cockroach inspired actuation and control

Robot V has been constructed with inspiration from the death head cockroach, Blaberus discoidalis. Its relative leg segment lengths, joint degrees of freedom, exoskeleton structure, relatively light legs, and location of its center of mass are all similar to those of the cockroach. In an attempt to take further advantage of the neuromechanics of the animal, actuators with muscle-like properties have been employed. The robot's controller includes biologically inspired gait generation and inverse kinematics components. An actuator tensioning reflex which approximates the function of muscle tone is introduced, and resulting improvements to system response are shown
Angiogenesis and Melanoma

Angiogenesis occurs in pathological conditions, such as tumors, where a specific critical point in tumor progression is the transition from the avascular to the vascular phase. Tumor angiogenesis depends mainly on the release by neoplastic cells of growth factors specific for endothelial cells, which are able to stimulate the growth of the host’s blood vessels. This article summarizes the literature concerning the relationship between angiogenesis and human melanoma progression. The recent applications of antiangiogenic agents which interfere with melanoma progression are also described.
Randomizing Religion: The Impact of Protestant Evangelism on Economic Outcomes

We study the causal impact of religiosity through a randomized evaluation of an evangelical Protestant Christian values and theology education program delivered to thousands of ultrapoor Filipino households. Six months after the program ended, treated households have higher religiosity and income; no statistically significant differences in total labor supply, consumption, food security, or life satisfaction; and lower perceived relative economic status. Exploratory analysis suggests that the income treatment effect may operate through increasing grit. Thirty months after the program ended, significant differences in the intensity of religiosity disappear, but those in the treatment group are less likely to be Catholic and more likely to be Protestant, and there is some mixed evidence that their consumption and perceived relative economic status are higher.
The Sclerotinia sclerotiorum Mating Type Locus (MAT) Contains a 3.6-kb Region That Is Inverted in Every Meiotic Generation

Sclerotinia sclerotiorum is a fungal plant pathogen and the causal agent of lettuce drop, an economically important disease of California lettuce. The structure of the S. sclerotiorum mating type locus MAT has previously been reported and consists of two idiomorphs that are fused end-to-end as in other homothallics. We investigated the diversity of S. sclerotiorum MAT using a total of 283 isolates from multiple hosts and locations, and identified a novel MAT allele that differed by a 3.6-kb inversion and was designated Inv+, as opposed to the previously known S. sclerotiorum MAT that lacked the inversion and was Inv-. The inversion affected three of the four MAT genes: MAT1-2-1 and MAT1-2-4 were inverted and MAT1-1-1 was truncated at the 3’-end. Expression of MAT genes differed between Inv+ and Inv- isolates. In Inv+ isolates, only one of the three MAT1-2-1 transcript variants of Inv- isolates was detected, and the alpha1 domain of Inv+ MAT1-1-1 transcripts was truncated. Both Inv- and Inv+ isolates were self-fertile, and the inversion segregated in a 1∶1 ratio regardless of whether the parent was Inv- or Inv+. This suggested the involvement of a highly regulated process in maintaining equal proportions of Inv- and Inv+, likely associated with the sexual state. The MAT inversion region, defined as the 3.6-kb MAT inversion in Inv+ isolates and the homologous region of Inv- isolates, was flanked by a 250-bp inverted repeat on either side. The 250-bp inverted repeat was a partial MAT1-1-1 that through mediation of loop formation and crossing over, may be involved in the inversion process. Inv+ isolates were widespread, and in California and Nebraska constituted half of the isolates examined. We speculate that a similar inversion region may be involved in mating type switching in the filamentous ascomycetes Chromocrea spinulosa, Sclerotinia trifoliorum and in certain Ceratocystis species.
A Multiagent system for Navigation Assistance and Information Finding

A multiagent framework has been developed to address distributed multimedia information management. Our particular interest is information management within organisations, where information is a vital resource and locating the right information at the right time is a critical problem. Hence our focus is navigation assistance, and we are pursuing the idea that information acquired by one user navigating the information space is something that can be utilised to assist other users. The design of the system we present builds on the experiences of an earlier project which provided navigation assistance based on information about which documents other users had visited; our system has an improved architecture and extends the functionality, focusing on bookmarks instead of 'trails'. We have also integrated additional services including handling of multimedia documents and integration with other open hypermedia systems. The system is being evaluated within commercial organisations.