Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Using soft-hard fusion for misinformation detection and pattern of life analysis in OSINT

Today’s battlefields are shifting to “denied areas”, where the use of U.S. Military air and ground assets is limited. To succeed, the U.S. intelligence analysts increasingly rely on available open-source intelligence (OSINT) which is fraught with inconsistencies, biased reporting and fake news. Analysts need automated tools for retrieval of information from OSINT sources, and these solutions must identify and resolve conflicting and deceptive information. In this paper, we present a misinformation detection model (MDM) which converts text to attributed knowledge graphs and runs graph-based analytics to identify misinformation. At the core of our solution is identification of knowledge conflicts in the fused multi-source knowledge graph, and semi-supervised learning to compute locally consistent reliability and credibility scores for the documents and sources, respectively. We present validation of proposed method using an open source dataset constructed from the online investigations of MH17 downing in Eastern Ukraine.
A new approach to bracket prediction in the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament based on a dual-proportion likelihood

Abstract The widespread proliferation of and interest in bracket pools that accompany the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament have created a need to produce a set of predicted winners for each tournament game by people without expert knowledge of college basketball. Previous research has addressed bracket prediction to some degree, but not nearly on the level of the popular interest in the topic. This paper reviews relevant previous research, and then introduces a rating system for teams using game data from that season prior to the tournament. The ratings from this system are used within a novel, four-predictor probability model to produce sets of bracket predictions for each tournament from 2009 to 2014. This dual-proportion probability model is built around the constraint of two teams with a combined 100% probability of winning a given game. This paper also performs Monte Carlo simulation to investigate whether modifications are necessary from an expected value-based prediction system such as the one introduced in the paper, in order to have the maximum bracket score within a defined group. The findings are that selecting one high-probability “upset” team for one to three late rounds games is likely to outperform other strategies, including one with no modifications to the expected value, as long as the upset choice overlaps a large minority of competing brackets while leaving the bracket some distinguishing characteristics in late rounds.
The Great Depression and the Great Recession in Interwar Greece and Today: A comparison

Abstract The past Greek crisis experience is more or less terra incognita. In all historical empirical studies Greece is systematically neglected or included only sporadically in their cross-country samples. In the national literature too there is little on this topic. In this paper we use the 1930s crisis as a useful testing ground to compare the two crises episodes, ‘then’ and ‘now’; to detect differences and similarities and discuss the policy facts with the ultimate aim to draw some ‘policy lessons’ from history. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt to study the Greek crisis experience across the two historical episodes. Comparisons with the interwar period show that the recent economic downturn was faster, larger and more severe than during the early 1930s. More importantly, analysing the determinants of the two crises, we conclude that Greece’s problems arose from its inability to credibly adhere to a nominal anchor.
Helicobacter pylori–induced matrix metallopeptidase-10 promotes gastric bacterial colonization and gastritis

Matrix metallopeptidase-10 fosters Helicobacter pylori gastric bacterial colonization and Helicobacter pylori–induced gastritis. The interaction between gastric epithelium and immune response plays key roles in H. pylori–associated pathology. We demonstrated a procolonization and proinflammation role of MMP-10 in H. pylori infection. MMP-10 is elevated in gastric mucosa and is produced by gastric epithelial cells synergistically induced by H. pylori and IL-22 via the ERK pathway. Human gastric MMP-10 was correlated with H. pylori colonization and the severity of gastritis, and mouse MMP-10 from non–BM-derived cells promoted bacteria colonization and inflammation. H. pylori colonization and inflammation were attenuated in IL-22−/−, MMP-10−/−, and IL-22−/−MMP-10−/− mice. MMP-10–associated inflammation is characterized by the influx of CD8+ T cells, whose migration is induced via MMP-10–CXCL16 axis by gastric epithelial cells. Under the influence of MMP-10, Reg3a, E-cadherin, and zonula occludens–1 proteins decrease, resulting in impaired host defense and increased H. pylori colonization. Our results suggest that MMP-10 facilitates H. pylori persistence and promotes gastritis.
Causes of The Outbreak of the Eurozone Crises: The Role of the Usa and the European Central Bank Monetary Policy

Abstract This paper argues that the loose monetary policy of two of the world’s most important financial institutions-the U.S. Federal Reserve Board and the European Central Bank-were ultimately responsible for the outburst of global financial crisis of 2008-09. Unusually low interest rates in 2001- 05 compelled investors to engage in high risk endeavors. It also encouraged some governments to finance excessive domestic consumption with foreign loans. Emerging financial bubbles burst first in mortgage markets in the U.S. and subsequently spread to other countries. The paper also reviews other causes of the crisis as discussed in literature. Some of them relate directly to weaknesses inherent in the institutional design of the European Monetary Union (EMU) while others are unique to members of the EMU. It is rather striking that recommended remedies tend not to take into account the policies of the European Central Bank.
Design and fabrication of functional polycaprolactone

Abstract Functional polycaprolactone (PCL) has great potential for applications in biomedical areas. This review summarizes the recent progress in the chemical synthesis of functional PCL. The functional PCL can be synthesized by (a) homopolymerization or copolymerization of functional ε-caprolactone (ε-CL), (b) copolymerization of 2-methylene-1-3-dioxepane with functional vinyl monomers, or (c) copolymerization of ε-CL with functional carbonate monomers. This review presents the recent trends in the synthesis of functional PCL and its biomedical applications.
Coase on the Coase Theorem, “The Social Cost Controversy”

Abstract What did Coase teach about “The Social Cost Controversy” in the classroom? In 1972, an important year in the development of the economic approach to law, Coase taught “The Problem of Social Cost” and some important critiques of it, making his classroom a model of the market for ideas. Coase stressed the importance of his proposal for a new welfare economics, in which the opportunity cost of alternateve proposals would be examined, taking transaction costs into account. He used court cases to provide real world examples where transaction costs could be considered. He also presented a comprehensive critique of Pigou and his followers. Coase demonstrated that the nineteenth Century in Britain was not a period of unregulated laissez faire but a time when harmful effects were governed by the common law of nuisance. Accordingly, he advocated neither laissez faire nor government regulation in principle as a solution to problems of harmful effects. Instead, he proposed that problems of harmful effects be examined in their institutional settings considering the cost of transactions, examining the costs and benefits of alternative institutional arrangements. The cases he chose generally involved technical innovation which produced new benefits as well as harmful effects, producing many insights into how society responds to innovation. Coase taught “The Social Cost Controversy” in order to propose his new welfare economics. However, the content of this portion of his course had many practical applications for his students.
A recursive structure of sand pile model and its applications

Abstract The Sand Pile Model (SPM) and its generalization, the Ice Pile Model (IPM), originate from physics and have various applications in the description of the evolution of granular systems. In this article, we deal with the enumeration and the exhaustive generation of the accessible configuration of the system. Our work is based on a new recursive decomposition theorem for SPM configurations using the notion of staircase bases. Based on this theorem, we provide a recursive formula for the enumeration of SPM(n) and a constant amortized time (CAT) algorithm for the generation of all SPM(n) configurations. The extension of the same approach to the Ice Pile Model is also discussed.
Sinn in der Arbeit von Kontrollkräften am Flughafen – soziologische und psychologische Reflexionen einer empirischen Studie

Zusammenfassung Sinnstiftung in der Arbeit ist ein vielschichtiges Phänomen. Sowohl in der Soziologie als auch der Psychologie wird es als verschiedene Bedeutungsordnungen - von der Handlungsebene bis hin zu institutionellen Strukturen - verbindend betrachtet. Wie diese Ebenen zusammenspielen und welcher Zusammenhang zwischen Sinnstiftung, Berufsidentität und Arbeitsmotivation besteht, diskutiert dieser Beitrag. Anhand empirischer Daten zum Arbeitsalltag von Kontrollkräften - dem Personal, das täglich mit den Zugangskontrollen zu den Sicherheitsbereichen am Flughafen betraut ist - wird die These erarbeitet, dass in Kontexten von Hochzuverlässigkeitsorganisationen die übergeordnete Bedeutsamkeit und der subjektiv empfundene gesellschaftliche Nutzen der Arbeitsaufgabe für die Sinnstiftung maßgeblich entscheidend wird und Konflikte auf der Interaktionsebene überblendet. Hierzu führen wir Überlegungen aus der soziologischen Theorie und der Arbeitspsychologie zusammen und reflektieren die Studienergebnisse in Bezug auf Aspekte sinnvoller Arbeit. Abstract Sensemaking in the context of work is a multi-layered phenomenon: a phenomenon which sociology and psychology typically conjunctively view through various systems of meaning; from the level of human action all the way to institutional structures. This article will examine how these different levels interact with one another whilst also discussing which connections exist between sensemaking, occupational identity, and job motivation. The main thesis of the article is developed by taking advantage of empirical data from the everyday working experiences of airport security personnel who are entrusted with carrying out safety inspections and have access to secure locations in airports. The thesis is namely that - in the context of high reliability organizations - the overarching significance and the subjectively felt societal utility of the working task at hand are significantly pivotal in the successful construction of identity and meaning. Furthermore, sensemaking then overrides conflicts that exist at the level of interaction. In developing this thesis, we combine considerations from sociological theories together with psychological theories of work and reflect upon the results of the study in connection to the various aspects of meaningful work.
Qualitative research and implementation science: Informing the acceptability and implementation of a trial of a conditional cash transfer intervention designed to reduce drug use and HIV risk

HIV risk remains high among Cambodian female entertainment and sex workers, driven by amphetamine-type substance use and sexual risk. Conditional cash transfer is an evidence-based approach to reduce stimulant use and optimize HIV/AIDS prevention, but questions remain regarding implementation in resource-limited settings. We conducted formative qualitative research to enhance acceptability of a conditional cash transfer intervention aimed at reducing amphetamine-type substance use and HIV risk among female entertainment/sex workers and inform implementation as part of a large cluster randomized trial. We conducted in-depth interviews with 30 female entertainment/sex workers. Interviews were digitally recorded and conducted and transcribed in Khmer. English transcripts were read for emerging themes and an initial coding scheme was developed. Data were coded using open and axial coding to clarify and consolidate initial themes. While most participants expressed enthusiasm for the intervention, financial and transportation issues emerged as key barriers to participation. The proposed incentive of USD$1 per screen was regarded as unacceptable and participants identified a need for transportation assistance. Participants also expressed concerns about directly observed urine specimen collection. Finally, while most participants found the 4-week aftercare program acceptable, the need for enjoyable as well as educational content was emphasized. Revisions to the protocol taking these data into account were made to optimize the acceptability of the intervention and the implementation of the trial. Findings identified key concerns and preferences that were taken into account in the final trial protocol. In particular, financial and transportation issues were identified as critical barriers to participation, with the potential to impact both intervention uptake and trial feasibility. Results demonstrate the value of formative qualitative research for clinical trial planning and implementation, particularly in settings where little is known about acceptability of interventions or willingness to participate.
Magnetic-Geared Motor in Side-by-Side Arrangement - Optimization

Light weight and high power density are contemporary demands on electrical motors in a lot of industrial and transportation applications. By designing high-speed devices, the output power can be increased without affecting construction volume and weight. If an application requires low output speeds, a gearing function has to be added. In this paper, the optimization of a new topology comprising a high speed motor and a magnetic gear is discussed. Also, first measurements of a prototype are presented.
Time-Optimal Path Tracking for Jerk Controlled Robots

This letter presents a new approach to solve the time-optimal path tracking under limited joint range and bounds on velocity, acceleration, and jerk. To obtain smooth and continuous accelerations, with beneficial effects for the load and wear on the actuators but a limited impact on performance, we state the minimum-time path tracking problem with the jerk as the control input. The main contribution of this letter is a formulation that includes the jerk constraints in the optimization problem and that, even if the resulting non-linear programming problem is non-convex, allows to perform an efficient and reliable convex relaxation using McCormick envelopes. Simulations and experimental tests on two 7-DoF manipulators have been carried out to show the benefits of the proposed approach and to compare it to state-of-the-art techniques.
Performance Comparison and Analysis of Wireless Communication Network based on MAC Protocols

In wireless networks, MAC protocols determines the use of wireless channels, which is used to allocate limited communication resources among nodes. In traditional networks, nodes can continuously obtain energy. Sometimes they can be supplied at any time when they are interrupted, and the topology of the network is relatively stable. Hence the researches on MAC protocols are generally carried out in the ideal state and focus on the performance of data transmission to improve the utilization of bandwidth and increase the real-time performance of the network. However, in some specific networks, the energy of nodes is limited and the network topology is dynamic. It can be seen that the differences of network structure make it necessary to design suitable MAC protocols to control the transmission process of data. This paper mainly introduces the back-off algorithm of the MAC layer protocols in the ideal state, and makes some comparative analyses between the binary exponential back-off algorithm and the related improved mechanisms. Then it introduces the S-MAC protocols for wireless sensor networks and the methods of calculating the throughput, delay and energy loss of the network. Finally the conclusions are drawn from the analyses of the network performance based on the main factors that affect the networks.
Camera Pose Estimation Based on PnL With a Known Vertical Direction

In this letter, we address the problem of camera pose estimation using two-dimensional (2D) and 3-D line features, also known as PnL (Perspective-n-Line) with a known vertical direction. The minimal number of line correspondences required to estimate the complete camera pose is 3 (P3L) in the general case, yielding to a minimum of eight possible solutions. Prior knowledge of the vertical direction, such as provided by common sensors (e.g., inertial measurement unit, or IMU), reduces the problem to a 4 DoF problem and outputs a single solution. We benefit this fact to decouple the remaining rotation estimation and the translation estimation and we present a twofold contribution: First, we present a linear formulation of the PnL problem in Plücker lines coordinates with a known vertical direction, including a Gauss–Newton-based orientation and location refinement to compensate IMU sensor noise. Second, we propose a new efficient RANdom SAmple Consensus (RANSAC) scheme for both feature pairing and outliers rejection based solely on rotation estimation from two line pairs. This greatly diminishes the computational cost compared to a RANSAC3 or RANSAC4 scheme. We evaluate our algorithms on synthetic data and on our own real dataset. Experimental results show the state-of-the-art results in term of accuracy and runtime, when facing 2-D noise, 3-D noise, and vertical direction sensor noise.
Experimental and Simulation Based Study of Vibration Prediction in Fractional Slot Permanent Magnet Synchronous Machines

This research aims at experimental determination of modal damping ratios in fractional slot concentrated winding (FSCW) permanent magnet synchronous machines (PMSM) and utilizing that information to refine finite element analysis (FEA) based structural simulations for better prediction of vibration behavior. 12 slot-10 pole (12s10p) surface mounted PMSM configuration is considered for study in this work. Two different structural design based vibration reduction techniques are worked on, to characterize their impact on damping and subsequent vibration performance is analyzed through simulation and experimentation. Good agreement is seen between experimental and simulation results when the simulations are updated with experimentally determined damping ratios.
Enabling Communication Networks for Water Quality Monitoring Applications: A Survey

This paper considers newly emerging wireless technologies that can be explored for potential exploitation in the future wireless sensor network solutions for water quality monitoring applications. The reviewed technologies promise to address long-standing issues that confront existing wireless sensor network solutions devoted to the monitoring of water quality parameters. Such issues include energy efficiency and long-range water quality data communication. These issues can be attributed to the shortcomings of legacy communication networks commonly combined with wireless sensor network solutions, due to a discrepancy caused by traditionally powering the sensors nodes using batteries. In particular, some of the legacy communication networks suffer from short communication range, while others are limited by high power consumption. These shortcomings provide scope for the utilization of newly emerging solutions identified in this study to advance the field of a wireless sensor network for water quality monitoring. To achieve this, three key categories of communication networks have been recommended in this paper, including their architectural design and network deployment for water quality monitoring applications. Also, this paper provides future directions on the identified communication networks to enhance their performance for the next-generation of wireless sensor network solutions for water quality monitoring applications.
Adversarial Similarity Metric Learning for Kinship Verification

Given a pair of facial images, it is an interesting yet challenging problem to determine if there is a kin relation between them. Recent research on that topic has made encouraging progress by learning a kin similarity metric from kinship data. However, most of the existing metric learning algorithms cannot handle hard samples very well, i.e., some ambiguous test pairs cannot be well classified due to some compounding factors, such as the large age gap or gender difference between the parents and children. To address this, we propose an Adversarial Similarity Metric Learning (ASML) method in this paper. More specifically, ASML consists of two adversarial phases: confusion and discrimination. In confusion phase, ambiguous adversarial pairs are automatically generated to challenge the learned similarity metric; while in discrimination phase, the learned metric tries its best to adjust itself to distinguish both the original pairs and the generated adversarial pairs. Consequently, a robust and discriminative similarity metric can be learned by iteratively performing the two adversarial phases. Experiments on the two widely used kinship datasets demonstrate the efficacy of our proposed ASML method in comparison with the state-of-the-art metric learning solutions to kinship verification.
Radar Waveform Recognition Based on Multiple Autocorrelation Images

Radar signal waveform recognition, as a key component of radar target recognition, has always been a research topic of great concern in the field of electronic countermeasures. In this paper, aiming at the contradiction between improving recognition rate and reducing the sample size, we propose a multiple autocorrelation joint decision models, which achieves higher waveform recognition rate while requires lower data volume for the original sampled data. The key point of the model is to perform multiple autocorrelations on the signal and use time-frequency transform for each times autocorrelation result to obtain multiple time-frequency feature images that can characterize the same signal. Then, the model adapts to the input of multiple feature images and gets the pre-classification results of each feature image. Finally, using the pre-classification results, this paper designs an inference machine module based on a fully connected structure to achieve a better signal classification result. This paper simulates six types of the signals and generates training sets and test sets, using two data sets to achieve hyper parameter optimization, training, and testing of the model. The simulation results compared with the literature show that the proposed model not only has a high recognition rate at a high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) but also better adapts to waveform recognition at low SNR environment. At −9dB SNR, the recognition rate of six types of signals is more than 74%.