Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Finite/Fixed-Time Stabilization for Nonlinear Interconnected Systems With Dead-Zone Input

The decentralized control problem is considered for a class of nonlinear time-varying interconnected systems. Each subsystem is with the dead-zone input and unmodeled dynamics. The interconnections are bounded by time-varying nonlinear functions, which relaxes the commonly used linear condition or time-invariant condition. Based on the recursive method, we design a new decentralized finite-time controller such that all the state variables reach zero in finite time. The reaching time is based on the design parameters and initial value of system state. Furthermore, the fixed time stability conditions are given and the constructed controller can guarantee the fixed-time stabilization of the system, in which the reaching time only depends the control design parameters. Finally, simulation results are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of proposed method.
Effect of Primary Health Care Orientation on Chronic Care Management

PURPOSE It has been suggested that the best way to improve chronic illness care is through a redesign of primary care emphasizing comprehensive, coordinated care as espoused by the Chronic Care Model (CCM). This study examined the relationship between primary care orientation and the implementation of the CCM in physician organizations. METHODS The relationship between measures of primary care orientation and the CCM was examined in a sample of 957 physician organizations from the National Study of Physician Organizations, a cross-sectional telephone survey of all US medical groups and independent practice associations with 20 or more physicians (response rate, 70%). RESULTS After adjusting for potential confounders, 6 of 8 measures of primary care orientation were associated with physician organizations’ adoption of 11 elements of CCM chronic care management. These 6 measures were severity of chronic illness treated in primary care, health promotion activity, health education activity, any accepted financial risk for hospitalization, required reporting, and presence of an electronic standardized problem list. Presence of an electronic medical record and the 5-year primary care physician turnover rate were not associated. CONCLUSIONS Organizations that have adopted 6 core attributes of primary care, representing comprehensive health service delivery and a commitment to overall patient health, appear to use more chronic care management practices. Policy makers and other stakeholders may wish to focus on creating an improved primary care home in their quest to close the “quality chasm” in chronic illness care.
Innovative Work Practices and Sickness Absence: What Does a Nationally Representative Employee Survey Tell?

The paper examines the effect of innovative work practices on the prevalence of sickness absence and accidents at work. We focus on several different aspects of workplace innovations (self-managed teams, information sharing, employer-provided training and incentive pay) along with the “bundles” of those practices. We use nationally representative individual-level data from the Finnish Quality of Work Life Survey from 2008. Using single equation models, we find that innovative work practices increase short-term sickness absence for blue-collar and lower white-collar employees. In two-equation models that treat innovative workplace practices as endogenous variables we do not find relationship between innovative work practices and sickness absence or accidents at work.
A mathematical analysis of TCR serial triggering and down‐regulation

Despite the increasing knowledge on the pathways involved in TCR signal transduction and T cell activation, the molecular mechanism of TCR triggering by ligand, MHC‐peptide complexes, is still elusive and controversial. The present paper addresses the controversy on the early events of TCR engagement and triggering. Mathematical modelling techniques are applied to experimental data to infer plausible molecular mechanisms of TCR triggering and down‐regulation. A similar approach has been followed by Bachmann et al. (Eur. J. Immunol. 1998, 28: 2571 – 2579), who concluded that the TCR triggering requires the formation of MHC‐TCR dimers or trimers. We report here the failure to generalize this conclusion to the data reported by Valitutti et al. (Nature 1995, 375: 148 – 151). We show that there are several kinetic features in these experimental curves of TCR down‐regulation that cannot be explained by the simple model proposed by Bachmann et al. unless some phenomenological extensions are considered. These extensions are: (1) a ligand independent turnover of the TCR; (2) a transient accumulation of triggered TCR; (3) a high order of TCR triggering kinetics; and (4) two pools of membrane TCR in dynamic equilibrium.
Mobile broadcasting: Advanced services using innovative electronic service guides

This paper introduces an extended signaling data structure for mobile broadcast handheld terminals. Existing bearer specifications such as DVB-H already support the transmission of IP-based broadcast data to the terminal. On higher layers, further specifications are necessary which define mechanisms such as signaling structures and transmission protocols. For DVB-H, the standards DVB IP Datacast and OMA Broadcast Service Enabler may be used. They enable broadcast services such as mobile TV or basic interactivity. The signaling extensions introduced in this paper are designed to extend the existing signaling mechanisms of the mentioned specifications and enable entirely new types of use cases by following a module-based approach which allows to define complex signaling structures consisting of numerous stream-based or file-based broadcast packages with explicit interrelations. At first, a detailed description of possible future use cases are given in the paper. Based on that, the existing signaling mechanisms are validated and possible extensions are defined and illustrated by using a complex signaling example. Finally, the software components which are necessary on the terminal to manage and operate the extended signaling structure, are described.
The Rhetoric/Syntax Split: Designing a Curriculum for ESL Students.

Any college writing teacher who has read even a moderate number of essays can attest to the fact that writing proficiency exists on several different planes independently. For example, one paper can provide insightful commentary on a substantive topic while replete with problems in spelling and punctuation. Another paper can exhibit a wide range of sentence structures, flawless syntax, adherence to mechanics, yet lack development and support of its central thesis. Still another paper may be hard to read because it lacks a sense of purpose and shows no awareness of audience yet seems to be about an unusual personal experience which the reader is most curious to learn more about. In fact, empirical data from native writers of English show that the level of a student writer's proficiency in one component of writing does not necessarily correlate with his or her proficiency in a different component. For example, George Hillocks discusses the repertoire of knowledge bases that a writer has, e.g., knowledge of lexical, syntactic, and rhetorical forms, and then reviews the findings of several first language studies comparing syntactic features and quality of writing
Modeling the healthcare assistance process for comorbidity patients compliant with prEN12967

The increment of life expectancy in our society, and the consequent population ageing, anticipate that the health sector must face the challenges associated with a growing population group of elderly patients with numerous disorders, generally chronic. In this work we introduce a framework to support the communication and information management tasks involved in a coordinated care of this kind of patients. This framework has been developed in the European context, it is compliant with CEN's prEN12967, and follows ITU-T's ODP methodology, that facilitates its integration in any system following this standard
Factors related to Israeli lesbian women's intention to be vaccinated against human papillomavirus

Summary Lesbian women's susceptibility to human papillomavirus infection and, as a consequence, to cervical cancer, is similar to that of heterosexual women. However, little is known about factors related to lesbian women's intention to be vaccinated against human papillomavirus. The aim of the study was to identify factors related to Israeli lesbian women's intention to be vaccinated, using the Health Belief Model. The study has a cross-sectional design. A convenience sample of 207 lesbian women recruited at clubs in central Israel's lesbian community completed a questionnaire, based on the Health Belief Model. Thirty-two percent of the respondents reported having a high intention to be vaccinated. Perceived susceptibility to cervical cancer and perceived benefits of human papillomavirus vaccination were found to be related to intention to be vaccinated. The findings offer insights that can inform health care providers of strategies to promote vaccination against human papillomavirus in this unique population.
Robust estimation of sinusoidal signal with colored noise using decentralized processing

We develop a new technique for the estimation of the number of signals and their central frequencies by using the decentralized processing, when it is known a priori that the observations consist of a finite number of source signals corrupted by additive colored random noise process. Our decentralized processing scheme is that each sensor estimates the frequency and the covariance matrix of the observations, and sends the estimated results to the fusion center. For the parameter estimation at each sensor, we use the earlier work of [1]. At the fusion center, we utilize the Robust estimation technique to combine the estimates obtained from individual sensors. The overall performance does not deteriorate very quickly even if some of the sensors are destroyed.
2.4-GHz 0.18-µm CMOS highly linear Power Amplifier

A Class-AB Power Amplifier (PA) integrated circuit for 2.4GHz is presented. It is designed in SMIC 0. 18µm RF CMOS process. The PA adopts two-stage differential structure. The driver-stage uses cascode structure. In the output-stage common-source structure is employed. The proposed PA provides 24.8dBm output power with a power-added efficiency (PAE) of 21.2% at 1dB compression point. It has a small signal gain of 20.6dB. The simulation results show that under a single 3.3V supply voltage, the maximum output power reaches to 26.2dBm. It can be used in IEEE 802.11b/g WLAN. The layout size is 1.4×0.75mm2.
Optimal joint decoding/deblurring method for optical images

Imaging systems involves blur and the coder reduces the binary rate for transmission or storage. These operations remove pertinent information contained by the image, and introduce annoying artifacts. Removing these artifacts allows higher visual quality for the reconstructed data. Unlike usual techniques, which made separately decoding and post-processing, we propose an optimal joint decoding/deblurring method for image reconstruction The goal of this work is to overcome the introduction of these negative effects by taking into account all the acquisition chain model.
Radiofrequency Ablation for Unresectable Tumors of the Liver

Surgical resection of primary or metastatic tumors of the liver offers patients the best long-term survival. Liver resections may not be appropriate in patients with bilobar metastases, liver dysfunction, or severe comorbidities. Radiofrequency ablation (RFA) is a technique used to destroy unresectable hepatic tumors through thermocoagulation. We retrospectively reviewed a consecutive series of patients undergoing RFA with unresectable hepatic tumors for local recurrence and overall survival. Under an Institutional Review Board-approved protocol, all patients treated with RFA at the University of Alabama at Birmingham from September 1, 1998, to June 15, 2005, were identified. During this time period, 189 lesions in 107 patients were treated with RFA. Patients’ charts were retrospectively reviewed. Data is presented as mean ± SEM. Significance is defined as P < 0.05. Patient demographics revealed 62 per cent males and 38 per cent females with a mean age of 59 (±1) years. Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) represented 54 per cent of the tumors treated. Metastatic colorectal cancer represented 22 per cent and the remaining 24 per cent were other metastatic tumors. Overall recurrence rates for all tumors after RFA was 53 per cent. Local recurrence rates for HCC, colorectal cancer, and other metastatic lesions were 27.6 per cent, 29.1 per cent, and 52 per cent, respectively. The morbidity rate for the procedure was 11 per cent. There was one mortality (0.9%) related to RFA. Laparoscopic RFA for HCC in Childs-Pugh Class C cirrhotics (n = 6) resulted in 50 per cent of patients being transplanted with no evidence of disease at a mean follow-up period of 14 months. RFA is a safe and effective way for treating HCC and other unresectable tumors in the liver that are not eligible for hepatic resection. More effective control of systemic recurrence will dictate survival in the majority of patients with metastatic cancers. Local ablation for HCC in cirrhotic patients may be an effective bridge to transplantation. Liver transplantation may still be the most effective long-term treatment for localized HCC.
Miniaturized bandpass filter with wide stopband using complementary spiral resonator

In this paper complementary spiral resonators are used in the design of compact planar bandpass filters with wide upper stopband. Based on an inductively loaded transmission line model for the complementary spiral resonators it is shown that the ratio of the spurious resonant frequency to the fundamental resonant frequency can be increased. Comparing two filters realized by conventional open-loop resonators and complementary spiral resonators it is shown that the utilization of complementary spiral resonators not only results in a more compact filter but also that a wide upper stopband is achieved.
MÉTODOS DE MOTIVAÇÃO ATRAVÉS DE AULAS PRÁTICAS PARA ESTUDANTES DE ENGENHARIA DA COMPUTAÇÃO

Tradicionalmente, o primeiro ano de estudantes de Engenharia e composto por uma serie de disciplinas exclusivamente teoricas, que apesar de fundamentais na formacao de um Engenheiro, podem se tornar um pouco tediosas, muitas vezes desmotivando os estudantes e aumentando a evasao. Com o objetivo de exercitar uma nova abordagem, com uma metodologia de ensino-aprendizagem focada na pratica, este artigo apresenta uma experiencia aplicada aos alunos ingressantes de Engenharia da Computacao da Universidade Positivo em 2012. A ideia principal e a de resolver experimentos de problemas reais durante as aulas e motivar os alunos atraves de projetos macro, procurando desta maneira aumentar o interesse dos mesmos, apresentando conceitos fundamentais de maneira um pouco mais informal, e auxiliando a diminuir a taxa de evasao. Ao final da disciplina que adotou esta metodologia, foi aplicado um questionario testando a absorcao dos conceitos aprendidos e a efetividade da metodologia adotada. Os resultados obtidos mostram uma forte tendencia que a metodologia adotada possa ser utilizada como motivadora, especialmente para alunos ingressantes, ja que menos de 5% dos alunos respondeu que a disciplina nao auxiliou na compreensao de conceitos basicos e na construcao da fundamentacao teorica necessaria, e menos de 10% dos alunos respondeu que a disciplina nao os motivou a permanecer no curso.
A fast calculation static voltage stability index based on wide area measurement system

With the fact that voltage stability indexes commonly used in power system have vague physical significance and poor linearity which cannot be applied on online monitoring of system voltage stability, this paper proposes a fast calculation voltage stability index of Lfci based on the feasible solution domain of branch voltage. It can be obtained by simple algebraic computation with the measuring information of PMU and can satisfy online application. This index is also derived from a more accurate model with the consideration of capacitance of branches. Moreover, we demonstrate that Lfci is still accurate with the consideration of voltage characteristic of loads. Finally, simulations of IEEE 14-bus system and New England 39-bus system are made to compare Lfci with other voltage stability indexes. The simulation result proves that Lfci is an ideal voltage stability index with good accuracy and linearity which can be applied on online monitoring of voltage stability.
Fusion of dead-reckoned positions with a workspace model for a mobile robot by Bayesian inference

Estimation of the position based on a conventional dead-reckoning for a mobile robot intrinsically contains cumulative errors. In relation to this, large nonzero probability of its error distribution is occasionally found even outside the workspace, because the dead-reckoning takes no account of the unreachability outside the workspace. This paper presents a new fusion algorithm for dead-reckoning, in which both the dead-reckoned position and the knowledge of the closed workspace are fused by means of Bayesian inference. This algorithm produces zero probability outside the workspace theoretically. Through a computer simulation, the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is confirmed. <<ETX>>
Modelo de Arquitectura de Algoritmos para la Determinación de Procesos de negocio.

Se presentan en esta comunicacion algunos resultados provisionales de un proyecto de investigacion en curso entre la UCLM y Labradio y Chorro, empresas del grupo Guardian, cuyo objetivo es la intensificacion de la relacion con el cliente. Para eso, se ha construido una herramienta basada en un modelo de arquitectura de algoritmos que permite determinar los procesos de negocio relevantes. Del inventario de estos procesos de negocio se deriva una nueva estructuracion. Con posterioridad, se ha dotado al sistema de un modulo de control del ciclo de pedido como instrumento clave para medir su efectividad.
Transient Performance Improvement of Wind Turbines With Doubly Fed Induction Generators Using Nonlinear Control Strategy

This paper first discusses dynamic characteristics of wind turbines with doubly fed induction generator (DFIG). Rotor back electromotive force (EMF) voltages in DFIG reflect the effects of stator dynamics on rotor current dynamics, and have an important role on rotor inrush current during the generator voltage dip. Compensation of these voltages can improve DFIG ride-through capability and limit the rotor current transients. It is found that the electrical dynamics of the DFIG are in nonminimum phase for certain operating conditions. Also, it is shown that the dynamics of DFIG, under compensation of rotor back EMF and grid voltages, behave as a partially linearizable system containing internal and external dynamics. The internal and external dynamics of DFIG include stator and rotor dynamics, respectively. It is found that under certain operating conditions, the internal dynamics, and thus, the entire DFIG system becomes unstable. This phenomenon deteriorates the DFIG postfault behavior. Since the DFIG electrical dynamics are nonlinear; the linear control scheme cannot properly work under large voltage dips. We address this problem by means of a nonlinear controller. The proposed approach stabilizes the internal dynamics through rotor voltage control, and improves the dynamic behavior of the DFIG after clearing the fault.
Observations on receptor specific proteins. II. Haemagglutination and haemagglutination-inhibition reactions of Clostridium botulinum types A, C, D and E haemagglutinins.

The haemagglutinins of Clostridium botulinum types A, C and D have been studied. A haemagglutinin of Cl. botulinum type E could not be demonstrated. Haemagglutination (H) tests, using normal and enzyme-treated cells, and haemagglutination—inhibition (H/I) tests, with a panel of sugars, amino-acids, sera and other biological substances were performed. The haemagglutinins fall into two distinct categories (i) type A and (ii) types C and D. Whereas type C or D haemagglutinins were only inhibited by certain biological substances, type A haemagglutinin was also weakly inhibited by D-galactose and more strongly by Pneumococcus type XIV polysaccharide, which contains D-galactose as a terminal sugar. Types C and D could be distinguished from each other by H and H/I tests.
Main pathological findings in hydrocephalic children treated by ventriculo-atrial shunt.

Insertion of valved tubes connecting the cerebral ventricles and the heart is now the method of choice for dealing with progressive hydrocephalus in children. About 1,000 of these operations are performed yearly in the United Kingdom. The general results of this treatment are being studied in a number of centres and it is too early to express conclusions about it. It seems useful, however, to present here some of the pathological findings in a relatively large series of treated cases.
Development of the blood‐nerve barrier in neonatal rats

The blood‐nerve barrier (BNB) is constituted by the perineurium and the endothelium of endoneurial microvessels. We investigated the age at which the vascular component of BNB function is established in the rat and the ultrastructural modifications accompanying changes in permeability. BNB permeability was assessed with injections of Evans blue albumin (EBA) and horseradish peroxidase (HRP) in rats of different ages. Sciatic nerve sections were studied using fluorescence and electron microscopy. Nerves from animals injected with EBA indicated that the BNB is not functional before 13 days of life but that its function is established by 16 days. These results were confirmed by electron microscope examination of nerve sections from animals injected with HRP, which showed clefts between the endothelial cells of endoneurial vessels in young rats. In rats over 18 days, these clefts were occluded by tight junctions, which prevented HRP from leaving the vessel lumen and conferred BNB function. Systematic morphometric analysis of nerves from different age groups allowed the establishment of baseline normal histologic neural development with age. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc. MICROSURGERY 21:290–297 2001
Planning Multimodal Discourse (Invited Talks Abstract)

In this talk, we will, show how techniques for planning text and discourse can be generalized to plan the structure and content of multimodal communications, that integrate natural language, pointing, graphics, and animations. The central claim of this talk is that the generation of multimodal discourse can be considered as an incremental planning process that aims to achieve a given communicative goal.
Letter to the editor regarding Disciglio et al.: Interstitial 22q13 deletions not involving SHANK3 gene: A new contiguous gene syndrome

Letter to the Editor Regarding Disciglio et al.: Interstitial 22q13 Deletions not Involving SHANK3 Gene: A New Contiguous Gene Syndrome Katy Phelan,* Luigi Boccuto, R. Curtis Rogers, Sara M. Sarasua, and Heather E. McDermid Department of Pediatrics, Hayward Genetics Center, Tulane University School of Medicine, New Orleans, Louisiana Greenwood Genetic Center, Greenwood, South Carolina Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada