Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Adaptive beamforming for 60 GHz radios: challenges and preliminary solutions

Beamforming is a critical and natural solution component for 60 GHz radios due to the increased signal attenuation that occurs as a consequence of the very small wavelength (mm-length) at these frequencies. In this paper, we discuss two practical challenges for 60 GHz beamforming that are likely to arise in most real-world antenna implementations, namely the infeasibility of (a) explicit channel estimation, and (b) generating isotropic antenna patterns. To overcome these challenges, we design a novel iterative training algorithm for antenna weight vectors (AWVs) that uses relatively coarse-grained feedback to obtain the optimal transmit and receive AWVs. We also propose a simple, but effective technique to identify the best transmit and receive sectors that serve to initialize our AWV training algorithm - without these well-chosen initial AWVs, the convergence time of our algorithm can be significantly longer.
Testing the Correctness of MPI Implementations

This paper introduces an MPI test suite to thoroughly test the correctness of an MPI-implementation. Scientific applications require stable tools and libraries for portable and efficient programming, e. g. when depending on the single-sided communication on multiple platforms. This test suite was originally used to check the correct transmission of data in the PACX-MPI implementation, but has been mainly used and extended to test the development of the new Open MPI implementation. The tool has been designed to be easily extendible in order to integrate new tests using the underlying functionality
Insight toward Early Diagnosis of Leprosy through Analysis of the Developing Antibody Responses of Mycobacterium leprae-Infected Armadillos

ABSTRACT Leprosy is a debilitating chronic disease caused by infection with Mycobacterium leprae. A World Health Organization-directed control strategy based upon the identification and treatment of patients has resulted in a marked reduction in the number of registered worldwide leprosy cases over the last 20 years. Despite these efforts, the number of new leprosy cases detected each year now remains relatively stable, and M. leprae infection continues to pose a health problem. It is suggested that earlier diagnosis is required to strengthen control programs. In this study, we have examined the development of antigen-specific immunoglobulin responses within armadillos experimentally infected with M. leprae to identify those responses that develop most rapidly and robustly following infection. Antibody responses to the M. leprae-specific phenolic glycolipid I and several protein antigens previously demonstrated to have diagnostic potential were assessed. Our results identify several antigens that can provide early diagnosis of M. leprae infection but also indicate considerable variability in the development of antigen-specific antibodies. Our data suggest that a combination of antigens is likely required to provide accurate and early leprosy diagnosis.
Dialectical behaviour therapy with adolescents.

BACKGROUND Dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT) is the first empirically validated treatment for chronically suicidal patients diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD). Numerous randomised clinical trials conducted with adults with BPD have demonstrated that DBT is effective in reducing suicidal and non-suicidal self-injurious (NSSI) behaviours. Other research on the use of DBT for adults has shown that the treatment is effective in reducing a variety of problem behaviours in a range of therapeutic settings. In the last decade, a number of studies have evaluated DBT as a promising treatment for adolescents with different psychological disorders and behaviours, including borderline personality disorder (BPD), eating disorders, externalising disorders, and suicidal and NSSI behaviours. This article reviews the literature on the use of DBT with adolescents. RESULTS Overall findings indicate some empirical support for the conclusion that DBT is a promising treatment for adolescents with BPD symptomatology, suicidal ideation and comorbid depression, bipolar disorder, disordered eating behaviours and aggressive and impulsive behaviours. Adolescents in these studies were also hospitalised less frequently when treated with DBT. Moreover, studies conducted with these populations suggest that DBT may be adapted for use in outpatient, inpatient, community, and residential treatment settings. CONCLUSIONS The authors conclude that DBT may be effective in treating adolescents with additional disorders and dysfunctional behaviours not yet examined. Data from soon to be completed randomised controlled trials need to be published.
Evidence-Based Review on the Effect of Normal Dietary Consumption of Fructose on Blood Lipids and Body Weight of Overweight and Obese Individuals

Although some investigators have hypothesized that ingestion of fructose from foods and beverages is responsible for the development of hyperlipidemia or obesity, a recent evidence-based review demonstrated that there was no relationship between the consumption of fructose in a normal dietary manner and the development of hyperlipidemia or increased weight in normal weight individuals. Because overweight and obese individuals may exhibit metabolic abnormalities such as insulin resistance, impaired glucose tolerance, hyperlipedemia, and/or alterations in gut hormones involved in appetite regulation, the findings of fructose studies performed in normal weight subjects may not be particularly relevant for overweight or obese subjects. A systematic assessment of the strength and quality of the studies and their relevance for overweight or obese humans ingesting fructose in a normal dietary manner has not been performed. The purpose of this review was to critically evaluate the existing database for a causal relationship between the ingestion of fructose in a normal, dietary manner and the development of hyperlipidemia or increased body weight in overweight or obese humans, using an evidence-based approach. The results of the analysis indicate that there is no evidence which shows that the consumption of fructose at normal levels of intake causes biologically relevant changes in triglycerides (TG) or body weight in overweight or obese individuals.
Performance enhancement of contention-based bandwidth request mechanism in IEEE 802.16 WiMAX networks

The IEEE 802.16 standard is a promising technology for 4G mobile networks. Though supporting versatile service classes, best effort (BE) service class is expected to dominate WiMAX networks, due to operational simplicity. One of bandwidth request mechanisms that subscriber stations (SS) can utilize to issue bandwidth requests (BW-REQ) for BE connections is contention-based random access. An SS starts a timer T16 when transmitting a BW-REQ. If getting a grant before timer expiration, the SS transmits data packets at the allocated time slots; otherwise it performs truncated binary exponential backoff process for BW-REQ retransmission. The default value of T16 is one frame time. However, T16 impacts on contention and request collision significantly. In the paper, we develop an analytical model for T16 timer setting. Besides, we derive analytical expressions for the average number of tries per BW-REQ and the average packet delay. We compare the theoretical results of fixed and adjustable timers. The results show that adjusting timer reduces both the number of collision and the average packet delay.
Formation of lipoxins and leukotrienes during receptor-mediated interactions of human platelets and recombinant human granulocyte/macrophage colony-stimulating factor-primed neutrophils

The generation of lipoxygenase products of arachidonic acid is considered an important event in inflammation. This study demonstrates the levels of both lipoxins and leukotrienes (LTC4, LTD4, LTB4, and omega-oxidized LTB4) generated from endogenous sources of arachidonate by PMN primed with recombinant human granulocyte/macrophage colony- stimulating factor and in coincubations with platelets (1:1 to 1:100 ratio). Upon exposure to receptor-mediated stimuli (FMLP and thrombin), the levels of lipoxins generated were within the range of both LTB4 and LTC4. Co-incubation of [1-14C]arachidonate-labeled platelets with primed polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN) followed by addition of thrombin and FMLP led to the formation of both 5- and 15-LO products that carried 14C label. Thus, in addition to the transcellular conversion of LTA4 to platelet-derived lipoxins and LTC4, PMN can use platelet-derived arachidonate to generate lipoxygenase products. These results are the first to document the relationship between the levels of lipoxins and leukotrienes generated by receptor-mediated activation of cytokineprimed PMN interacting with platelets. Moreover, they indicate that PMN-platelet interactions utilize bidirectional transcellular routes to contribute to lipoxin formation.
Measuring Socioeconomic Inequality in Obesity: Looking Beyond the Obesity Threshold

Abstract We combine two of the most widely used measures in the inequality and poverty literature, the concentration index and Foster–Greer–Thorbecke metric to the analysis of socioeconomic inequality in obesity. This enables us to describe socioeconomic inequality not only in obesity status but also in its depth and severity. We apply our method to 1971–2012 US data and show that while the socioeconomic inequality in obesity status has now almost disappeared, this is not the case when depth and severity of obesity are considered. Such socioeconomic gradient is found to be greatest among non‐Hispanic whites, but decomposition analysis also reveals an inverse relationship between income and obesity outcomes among Mexican Americans once the effect of immigrant status has been accounted for. The socioeconomic gradient is also greater among women with marital status further increasing it for severity of obesity while the opposite is true among men. Overall, the socioeconomic gradient exists as poorer individuals lie further away from the obesity threshold. Our study stresses the need for policies that jointly consider obesity and income to support those who suffer from the double burden of poverty and obesity‐related health conditions. © 2016 The Authors. Health Economics Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
Expression of Umbelopsis ramanniana DGAT2A in Seed Increases Oil in Soybean1[OA]

Oilseeds are the main source of lipids used in both food and biofuels. The growing demand for vegetable oil has focused research toward increasing the amount of this valuable component in oilseed crops. Globally, soybean (Glycine max) is one of the most important oilseed crops grown, contributing about 30% of the vegetable oil used for food, feed, and industrial applications. Breeding efforts in soy have shown that multiple loci contribute to the final content of oil and protein stored in seeds. Genetically, the levels of these two storage products appear to be inversely correlated with an increase in oil coming at the expense of protein and vice versa. One way to overcome the linkage between oil and protein is to introduce a transgene that can specifically modulate one pathway without disrupting the other. We describe the first, to our knowledge, transgenic soy crop with increased oil that shows no major impact on protein content or yield. This was achieved by expressing a codon-optimized version of a diacylglycerol acyltransferase 2A from the soil fungus Umbelopsis (formerly Mortierella) ramanniana in soybean seed during development, resulting in an absolute increase in oil of 1.5% (by weight) in the mature seed.
On metronomic chemotherapy: Modulation of angiogenesis mediated by VEGE-A

Tumors are angiogenesis dependent. Preclinical studies have shown that well-tolerated continuous low dose, i.e. metronomic, chemotherapy can exert significant antiangiogenic effects pe rse and thereby a greater antitumor influence than conventional chemotherapy with high, spaced-out bolus doses. There are however, no means of quantitatively assessing the antiangiogenic effect of chemotherapy in tumors. We therefore used a surrogate tumor-free, non-surgical rat mesentery model and quantitatively studied the dose effect of metronomic treatment with cisplatin, cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, fluorouracil and paclitaxel on VEGF-A-mediated angiogenesis, a characteristic of tumors. Cyclophosphamide and paclitaxel treatment exerted significant dose-dependent antiangiogenic effects, whereas doxorubicin treatment produced insignificant effects. By contrast, metronomic cisplatin and fluorouracil treatment occasionally significantly stimulated angiogenesis in a dose-dependent, non-linear manner. To our knowledge, this is the first report of metronomic chemotherapy stimulating angiogenesis in vivo. The data suggest that the angiogenic response to cisplatin, cyclophosphamide, fluorouracil and paclitaxel was significantly influenced by the presence of antioxidants in the vehicles or when co-treated with N-acetylcystein, a widely used free-radical scavenger. The data relating to the metronomic scheduling were compared with bolus treatment data for the identical agent formulations in the same experimental model. Cisplatin, cyclophosphamide and paclitaxel caused approximately the same overall, agent-specific angiogenesis-modulating effects following metronomic and bolus treatments. Moreover, apparently secondary delayed effects of chemotherapy affected capillary sprouting.
Memorização de sentenças com construção específica de uma das línguas de bilíngues

Neste trabalho revisitamos a Hipotese da Regeneracao, que traz uma proposta sobre a natureza do mecanismo psicolinguistico que da suporte a rememoracao imediata de sentencas ouvidas ou lidas, em memoria de curta duracao. O artigo apresenta hipoteses especificas sobre a memorizacao de sentencas por bilingues derivadas dos pressupostos da Hipotese da Regeneracao, e relata um estudo no qual se buscou examinar a acessibilidade de representacoes sintaticas licenciadas em apenas uma das linguas dos bilingues no processamento da outra. Os resultados apontam para tal acessibilidade durante a producao
Learning to play games using a PSO-based competitive learning approach

A new competitive approach is developed for learning agents to play two-agent games. This approach uses particle swarm optimizers (PSO) to train neural networks to predict the desirability of states in the leaf nodes of a game tree. The new approach is applied to the TicTacToe game, and compared with the performance of an evolutionary approach. A performance criterion is defined to quantify performance against that of players making random moves. The results show that the new PSO-based approach performs well as compared with the evolutionary approach.
From descriptor to boosting: Optimizing the k-NN classification rule

The k-nearest neighbor (K-NN) framework was successfully used for tasks of computer vision. In image categorization, k-NN is an important and significant rule. However, two major problems usually affect this rule: the NN classifier vote and the metric employed to compute the distance between neighbors. This paper deals with both. First, a boosting k-NN algorithm learns the coefficients of weak classifiers, hence allowing to assign weights for k-NN votes. Second, we have recourse to metric learning: a function is trained on sets of similar and dissimilar samples to increase inter-class distances and reduce intra-class ones.
Experiences of cognitive behavioural therapy formulation in clients with depression

Abstract While clinicians have described the benefits of using formulations within therapy, little is understood about the client's experience of the formulation process. Cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) is currently the treatment of choice for many adult mental health difficulties. However, research exploring clients’ experiences of CBT formulation is very limited. The present study set out to explore experiences of CBT formulation in clients with depression. Seven participants were interviewed and the data analysed using Thematic Analysis. The analysis identified key themes such as: ‘Feeling trapped or restricted by depression’, ‘The development of the formulation – from coming to my own conclusions to something the therapist developed’, ‘From negative to mixed feelings: emotional reactions to the formulation during the therapeutic process’ and ‘A new journey: towards making a new sense of oneself’. The results of the study highlight the personal and emotional challenge of the formulation process for clients.
A Fast and Robust Automatic Face Alignment System

We present an automatic face alignment system, whose objective is to localize the facial feature points in images. Our system is robust against bad initialization, facial expression and pose variation. It can converge from inaccurate initialization by the face detector or feature-pt detector. And as our system is tolerant of expression and pose variation, the alignment results can be used to estimate expression and pose information. Besides, our system is also fast enough for real-time processing.
Feasibility and Efficacy of an mHealth Game for Managing Anxiety: "Flowy" Randomized Controlled Pilot Trial and Design Evaluation.

OBJECTIVE Meeting the complex needs of patients with chronic common mental health disorders (CMHDs) may be the greatest challenge facing organized medical practice. On the basis of a well-established and proven theoretical foundation for controlled respiration as a behavioral intervention for CMHDs, as well as preliminary evidence that gamification can improve health outcomes through increasing patient engagement, this randomized controlled pilot study evaluated the feasibility and clinical efficacy of a mobile health game called "Flowy" ( www.flowygame.com ) that digitally delivered breathing retraining exercises for anxiety, panic, and hyperventilation symptom management. MATERIALS AND METHODS We designed an unblinded, Web-based, parallel-group randomized controlled trial focusing on feasibility, clinical efficacy, and design proof of concept. In the intervention condition (n = 31), participants received free access to "Flowy" for 4 weeks. In the control condition (n = 32), participants were placed on a waitlist for 4 weeks before being offered free access to "Flowy. " Online measurements using psychological self-report questionnaires were made at 2 and 4 weeks post-baseline. RESULTS At trial conclusion, participants found "Flowy" acceptable as an anxiety management intervention. "Flowy" engaged participants sufficiently to endorse proactive gameplay. Intent-to-treat analysis revealed a reduction in anxiety, panic, and self-report hyperventilation scores in both trial arms, with the intervention arm experiencing greater quality of life. Participants perceived "Flowy" as a fun and useful intervention, proactively used "Flowy" as part of their care, and would recommend "Flowy" to family and friends. CONCLUSIONS Our results suggest that a digital delivery of breathing retraining exercises through a mobile health game can manage anxiety, panic, and hyperventilation symptoms associated with CMHDs.
Dynamic surface topography and its application to the evaluation of adolescent idiopathic scoliosis

Dynamic surface topography is a method to quantify the surface and locations of features acquired from moving and distorting shapes against time. This thesis describes the application of the technique to the potential evaluation of adolescent idiopathic scoliosis patients. Scoliosis or curvature of the spine is one of the major skeletal diseases in adolescents where in the majority of cases the cause is unknown or idiopathic. The progression of the disease occurs in three dimensions with the spine simultaneously curving towards the arms and rotating as it collapses with the first indications usually being changes in body symmetry and back surface shape. Following diagnosis, most children do not exhibit any significant worsening of their condition and are routinely monitored using radiography as frequently as every three months whilst vertebral growth potential remains. In a small number of patients, the lateral curvature can unpredictably worsen requiring, in some cases, surgical intervention to prevent further deterioration and to diminish the deformity. Earlier work by many researchers concentrated on attempting to reduce patient exposure to ionizing radiation by investigating if there was a reliable correlation between progression of the scoliosis and changes in surface topography. The techniques have not gained acceptance as the relational algorithms were found to be insufficiently robust in all cases and measurements acquired from available technologies were prone to artefacts introduced by stance, breathing, 'posture and sway. For many patients the motivation in seeking treatment is for the improvement of their appearance rather than to correct the underlying deformity, so cosmetic concerns and an understanding of the psychosocial and physical impacts of the disease and treatments remain important factors in the clinical decision-making process. In the current environment of evidence based medicine there is a growing need to quantify back surface shape, general body asymmetry and patient capability with the objective of producing an agreed scoring to be used in developing treatment plans and assessing outcomes but to date many clinics continue to rely on qualitative methods to describe cosmetic deformity and ability. The aim of the research was to develop an original, low cost and inherently safe apparatus using well u~derstood video based motion capture technology that overcame the disadvantages of earlier work by simultaneously acquiring multiple samples of back surface shape and the locations of bony landmarks to provide averaged results for a quantitative and reliable analysis of cosmetic defect and physical impairment. 172,650 data samples were acquired from thirty skeletally mature subjects not exhibiting any musculoskeletal disease to define normality limits for
Image latent semantic analysis based face recognition with ensemble extreme learning machine

To overcome the shortcomings of the traditional methods, this paper proposes a novel face recognition method based on the image latent semantic features and ensemble extreme learning machine. The image latent semantic analysis is to acquire the high-level features from the face image, which has good robustness to illumination and expression changes. The image latent features are extracted as fellows: firstly, we obtain the low-level features of face image by the feature extraction methods of Gabor filter, local ternary pattern (LTP), and invariant moments. Then, we build the feature-image matrix based on the low-level features, and decompose the matrix with two dimension matrix decomposition to get the image latent semantic features. Finally, the ensemble extreme learning machine is used to classify the latent semantic features, which combines lots of extreme learning machine to obtain a stable classifier. The experimental results show that our proposed algorithm is more effective when compared with other algorithms.
Bidirectional antagonistic variable stiffness actuation: Analysis, design & Implementation

The variable stiffness actuation concept is considered to provide a human-friendly robot technology. This paper examines a joint concept called the bidirectional antagonistic joint which is a extension of antagonistic joints. A new operating mode called the helping mode is introduced, which increases the joint load range. Although the joint can not be pretensioned in the helping mode, it is shown that a stiffness variation is possible, assuming a suitable torque-stiffness characteristic of the elastic elements. A methodology to design such characteristics is presented along with several example cases interpreted in a torque-stiffness plot. Furthermore, a stiffness adaptation control scheme which ensures mechanism safety is described. Finally, the design methodology and the control are evaluated on an implementation of a bidirectional antagonistic joint.