Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
SAR ATR of Ground Vehicles Based on LM-BN-CNN

In recent studies, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) automatic target recognition (ATR) algorithms based on convolutional neural network (CNN) have achieved high recognition rates in the moving and stationary target acquisition and recognition (MSTAR) data set. However, the correlation between clutter in the training and test data sets is ignored in these algorithms, although most of them used only the center part of the images by removing a lot of the clutter but not everything, which may result in better performance than what would be achieved in the operational scenarios. To tackle this problem, we propose a target segmentation method based on morphological operations to generate data sets without clutter. Then, we design the large-margin softmax (LM-softmax) batch-normalization CNN (LM-BN-CNN) structure, which utilizes the LM-softmax classifier in the last layer to increase the separability of samples after clutter removal. In addition, this structure performs BN with constant mean and variance to increase the convergence speed and reduce overfitting. Experiments on the MSTAR data set have shown that LM-BN-CNN obtains better performance than the available CNNs designed for SAR ATR of ground vehicles, and it has robustness to large depression angle variation, configuration variants, and version variants.
Single-Element Remote-PPG

Camera-based remote photoplethysmography (remote-PPG) technology has shown great potential for contactless pulse-rate monitoring. However, remote-PPG systems typically analyze face images, which may restrict applications in view of privacy-preserving regulations such as the recently announced General Data Protection Regulation in the European Union. In this paper, we investigate the case of using single-element sensing as an input for remote-PPG extraction, which prohibits facial analysis and thus evades privacy issues. It also improves the efficiency of data storage and transmission. In contrast to known remote-PPG solutions using skin-selection techniques, the input signals in a single-element setup will contain a non-negligible degree of signal components associated with non-skin areas. Current remote-PPG extraction methods based on physiological and optical properties of skin reflections are therefore no longer valid. A new remote-PPG method, named Soft Signature based extraction (SoftSig), is proposed to deal with this situation by softening the dependence of pulse extraction on prior knowledge. A large-scale experiment validates the concept of single-element remote-PPG monitoring and shows the improvement of SoftSig over general purpose solutions.
Manipulation planning for empirical backprojections

A method of computing manipulation plans is introduced. The empirical backprojection method uses observed state transitions to derive predictions of action effects and links these predictions to form manipulation plans. The data-intensive approach is in contrast to manipulation planning approaches that uses analysis of task mechanics to generate predictions. The empirical backprojection method is described, and three example tasks are used to illustrate the method. The assumptions underlying the method are then compared to the assumptions required by previously published analytical techniques. <<ETX>>
Dual-Channel Single Sideband Transmitter in 45 Nm CMOS SOI for a 70 GHz OFDM Radar

The advances in digital modulations for radar, like OFDM, show promising results. These modulation concepts benefit from high integration of analog and digital CMOS technology, as they rely on digital signal generation and processing. In this paper, a two-channel OFDM single sideband transmitter in CMOS SOI technology is presented. The chip performance is evaluated and broadband sideband suppression of the OFDM symbols using digital predistortion is demonstrated.
Programming design and object-oriented development paradigms of an Android-based distributed social game system

The present work demonstrates the mechanisms, programming design choices and paradigms of developing an Android-backed online turn-based social game application. Each step of theprogramming process is detailed, and the underlying implemented concepts and reasonings for the different modules are explained using the Model – View – Controller architectural pattern. Software engineering design choices are compared and exemplified at each stage of the development phases, givingsuggestions for improving the logic behind such a distributed service. This paper also shortly presents insights on the usage of an online cloud database (Firebase, from Google) in order to handle player data in real-time using JSON format.
Experimental results on large vocabulary continuous speech understanding

System performance is presented for a continuous speech understanding system. The system accepts natural-language queries, with a lexicon of 1000 words. Recognition and understanding work in cascade, a speaker-dependent hidden Markov model (HMM)-based word hypothesizer, generates a lattice of word candidates that is given to a grammar-based understanding stage that extracts the correct word sequence together with its meaning. The authors focus on recent improvements added at the understanding level, consisting of a new statistical modeling of correct word adjacency and function-word losses. Such modeling permits the main problems of interword coarticulation to be dealt with and produces substantial advances in terms of recognition accuracy at a low computational cost. System performance with a language model of perplexity 25 results in 87% correct sentence understanding. <<ETX>>
Modulatory effect of linoleic and oleic acid on cell proliferation and lipid metabolism gene expressions in primary bovine satellite cells

ABSTRACT This study was performed to elucidate the effects of linoleic acid (LA), oleic acid (OA) and their combination (LA + OA) on cell proliferation, apoptosis, necrosis, and the lipid metabolism related gene expression in bovine satellite cells (BSCs), isolated from bovine muscles. Cell viability was significantly increased with the OA and LA treatment. Furthermore, LA + OA enhanced cell proliferation in a dose-dependent manner (10 to 100 µM), whereas it lowered at 250 µM. In addition, a cell-cycle analysis showed that 100 µM of LA and OA markedly decreased the G0/G1 phase proportion (62.58% and 61.33%, respectively), compared to controls (68.02%), whereas the S-phase cells’ proportion was increased. The ratio of G2/M phase cells was not significantly different among the groups. Moreover, analyses with AO/EtBr staining showed that no apoptosis occurred. Necrosis were determined by flow cytometry using Annexin V-FITC/PI staining which revealed no early apoptosis in the cells pretreated with LA or OA, but occurred in the LA + OA group. We also analyzed the mRNA expression of lipid metabolizing genes such as peroxisome proliferator receptor alfa (PPARα), peroxisome proliferator receptor gamma (PPARγ), acyl-CoA oxidase (ACOX), lipoprotein lipase (LPL), carnitine palmitoyl transferase (CPT-1), and fatty-acid binding protein4 (FABP4), which were upregulated in LA or OA treated cells compared to the control group. In essence, LA and OA alone promote the cell proliferation without any apoptosis and necrosis, which might upregulate the lipid metabolism related gene expressions, and increase fatty-acid oxidation in the BSCs’ lipid metabolism.
Google timeline accuracy assessment and error prediction

Abstract Google Location Timeline, once activated, allows to track devices and save their locations. This feature might be useful in the future as available data for evidence in investigations. For that, the court would be interested in the reliability of these data. The position is presented in the form of a pair of coordinates and a radius, hence the estimated area for tracked device is enclosed by a circle. This research focuses on the assessment of the accuracy of the locations given by Google Location History Timeline, which variables affect this accuracy and the initial steps to develop a linear multivariate model that can potentially predict the actual error with respect to the true location considering environmental variables. The determination of the potential influential variables (configuration of mobile device connectivity, speed of movement and environment) was set through a series of experiments in which the true position of the device was recorded with a reference Global Positioning System (GPS) device with a superior order of accuracy. The accuracy was assessed measuring the distance between the Google provided position and the de facto one, later referred to as Google error. If this Google error distance is less than the radius provided, we define it as a hit. The configuration that has the largest hit rate is when the mobile device has GPS available, with a 52% success. Then the use of 3G and 2G connection go with 38% and 33% respectively. The Wi-Fi connection only has a hit rate of 7%. Regarding the means of transport, when the connection is 2G or 3G, the worst results are in Still with a hit rate of 9% and the best in Car with 57%. Regarding the prediction model, the distances and angles from the position of the device to the three nearest cell towers, and the categorical (non-numerical) variables of Environment and means of transport were taking as input variables in this initial study. To evaluate the usability of a model, a Model hit is defined when the actual observation is within the 95% confidence interval provided by the model. Out of the models developed, the one that shows the best results was the one that predicted the accuracy when the used network is 2G, with 76% of Model hits. The second model with best performance had only a 23% success (with the mobile network set to 3G).
Food insecurity, mental distress and suicidal ideation in rural Africa: Evidence from Nigeria, Uganda and Ghana

Background: In sub-Saharan Africa, mental and substance-related disorders account for 19% of all years lived with disability, yet the intersection between poverty and mental distress is poorly understood since most psychiatric research is conducted in high-income countries. Aims: To examine the prevalence of and associations between food insecurity, mental distress and suicidal ideation in three rural village clusters in sub-Saharan Africa. Method: Cross-sectional multivariate analysis of sociodemographic variables associated with mental distress and suicidal ideation in three countries. The sample included 1,142 individuals from three rural village clusters in Nigeria (n = 380), Uganda (n = 380) and Ghana (n = 382). Food insecurity was measured based on the number of months in the previous year that the respondent’s family reported being ‘unable to eat two square meals per day’. Mental distress was assessed using the Kessler non-specific psychological distress scale (K6) and suicidal ideation was measured using an item from PRIME-MD. Other sociodemographic variables included gender, age, literacy and occupation. Results: The prevalence of individuals with moderate or severe mental distress in Nigeria, Uganda and Ghana were higher than previously reported in the literature: 35.5%, 30.8% and 30.4%, respectively, and suicidal ideation rates were 29.7%, 21.3% and 10.9%. No differences were observed in mental distress between men and women in any of the sites. Being a farmer (vs student or other) was protective for mental distress in two sites (Uganda and Ghana) but no other social indicators, such as age, gender, literacy and food insecurity, were significantly associated with mental distress. Risk for suicidal ideation differed across sites: it was associated with food insecurity in Nigeria, female gender in Uganda, and older age in Uganda. Conclusions: Mental distress and suicidal ideation were highly prevalent in three settings of extreme poverty across all groups, in ways that were not always consistent with the global literature. These findings suggest that more research is needed in to better understand the social etiology of mental distress in sub-Saharan Africa.
Understanding and responding to earthquake hazards

Understanding the earthquake cycle and assessing earthquake hazards is a topic of both increasing potential for scientific advancement and social urgency. A large portion of the world's population inhabits seismically-active regions, including the megacities of Los Angeles and Mexico City, and heavily populated regions in Asia. Population growth will exacerbate the potential for huge earthquake-related casualties. However, powerful new tools to observe tectonic deformation have been developed and are being deployed with encouraging results for improving knowledge of fault system behavior and earthquake hazards. In the future, the coupling of complex numerical models and orders of magnitude increase in observing power promises to lead to accurate targeted, short-term earthquake forecasting. Dynamic earthquake hazard assessments resolved for a range of spatial scales (large and small fault systems) and time scales (months to decades) will allow a more systematic approach to prioritizing the retrofitting of vulnerable structures, relocating populations at risk, protecting lifelines, preparing for disasters, and educating the public. The suite of spaceborne observations needed to achieve this vision has been studied, and the derived requirements have defined a set of mission architectures and enabling technologies that will accelerate progress in achieving the goal of improved earthquake hazard assessments.
Roles of the inflammasome in the gut-liver axis

The gut-liver axis connects the liver with the intestine via bile acid metabolism. Bile acid dysregulation leads to intestinal dysbiosis, that allows enterogenous pathogenic bacteria, including Gram-negative bacteria and their products lipopolysaccharide (LPS), into the liver via the portal vein, triggering inflammation in the liver. The inflammasome serves as an intracellular pattern recognition receptor that detects pathogens or danger signals and mediates innate immunity in the liver or gut. Specifically, the NACHT, LRR and PYD domains-containing protein (NLRP)6 inflammasome maintains intestinal microbial balance, by promoting interleukin (IL)-18-dependent antimicrobial peptide synthesis and mucus secretion from goblet cells. The NLRP3 inflammasome, in contrast, primarily induces IL-1β and aggravates inflammatory liver injury. Furthermore, the NLRP3 inflammasome affects the epithelial integrity of cholangiocytes by inducing the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines. In addition, bile acids, including deoxycholic acid and chenodeoxycholic acid, are able to activate the NLRP3 inflammasome in macrophages; however, bile acids have the potential to exert the opposite role by interacting with the membrane-bound Takeda G-protein receptor 5 or by activating nuclear farnesoid-X receptor. Therefore, further investigation of the molecular mechanisms underlying the inflammasome, involved in the gut-liver axis, may provide important insights into the identification of a potential therapeutic target for the treatment of liver and gut diseases. The present review discusses the roles of the inflammasome in the gut-liver axis, and the emerging associations between the inflammasome and the intestinal microbiota or the bile acids in the gut-liver axis.
Anxiety and Depression after Myocardial Infarction: Can Inflammatory Factors be Involved?

Mailing Address: João Manoel Theotonio dos Santos • Universidade Anhembi Morumbi Laureate International Universities Av. Deputado Benedito Matarazzo, 4050. Postal Code 12242-210, Parque Residencial Aquarius, São José dos Campos, SP – Brazil E-mail: joao.theotonio@cardiovale.com. br
The condition for contact grasp stability

The author distinguishes between two types of grasp stability, called spatial grasp stability and contact grasp stability. The former is the tendency of the grasped object to return to an equilibrium location in space; the latter is the tendency of the points of contact to return to an equilibrium position on the object's surface. It is shown, via examples, that spatial stability cannot capture certain intuitive concepts of grasp stability, and hence that any full understanding of grasp stability must include contact stability. A model of how the positions of the points of contact evolve in time on the surface of the grasped object in the absence of any external force or active feedback is derived. From this model, a condition is obtained which determines whether or not a two-fingered grasp is contact stable. <<ETX>>
Decentralized vibration control for fast and precise light-weight robots

A substantial increase in the robot velocity can only be achieved by introducing light-weight composite materials for the mechanics and gearless motor drives in order to substantially reduce the joint inertia, However, a light-weight robot carcass results in structural oscillations which have to be removed by the additional introduction of advanced model-based control structures and concepts. A new mechatronics concept is presented in which structural end-point oscillations are damped by means of a decentrally controlled vibration absorber. Representative simulation results applied to a high-precision SCARA robot confirm the efficiency of the concept. <<ETX>>
Teams and surgery

It is a privilege to be able to document this address here, the more so because on 19 January 2005 the late Mr Hugh Phillips demonstrated in a humbling and stirring presidential address the wonders of a career in surgery, commitment, the value of training, the future and, in particular, teamwork. His address eloquently referred to many of the issues in the discussion that follows.
A Continuous $2\pi$ Phase Shifter for Ka-Band Applications

A Ka-band continuous phase shifter is presented in this paper. A grounded co-planar wave (GCPW) transmission line loaded with a high dielectric ceramic slab is employed to achieve continuous phase shift over the operating frequency band (28–31 GHz) for high performance phased-array applications. A piezoelectric transducer (PET) is used to precisely control the gap between the slab and the GCPW; hence, the phase state of the phase shifter is controlled. More than $2\pi$ phase shift can be achieved by the proposed phase shifter, which is implemented in $\mathbf{3x3mm}^{\mathbf{2}}$ area size by employing a meander shaped GCPW line. Extensive measurements have been performed showing a high figure of merit (FOM) 180°/dB at 28 GHz with high repeatability at room temperature.
ConsiDroid: A Concolic-based Tool for Detecting SQL Injection Vulnerability in Android Apps

In this paper, we present a concolic execution technique for detecting SQL injection vulnerabilities in Android apps, with a new tool we called ConsiDroid. We extend the source code of apps with mocking technique, such that the execution of original source code is not affected. The extended source code can be treated as Java applications and may be executed by SPF with concolic execution. We automatically produce a DummyMain class out of static analysis such that the essential functions are called sequentially and, the events leading to vulnerable functions are triggered. We extend SPF with taint analysis in ConsiDroid. For making taint analysis possible, we introduce a new technique of symbolic mock classes in order to ease the propagation of tainted values in the code. An SQL injection vulnerability is detected through receiving a tainted value by a vulnerable function. Besides, ConsiDroid takes advantage of static analysis to adjust SPF in order to inspect only suspicious paths. To illustrate the applicability of ConsiDroid, we have inspected randomly selected 140 apps from F-Droid repository. From these apps, we found three apps vulnerable to SQL injection. To verify their vulnerability, we analyzed the apps manually based on ConsiDroid's reports by using Robolectric.
Interleukin-27 as a candidate diagnostic biomarker for bacterial infection in immunocompromised pediatric patients

Background Immunocompromised pediatric patients constitute a growing population that is particularly vulnerable to bacterial infection, necessitating prompt recognition and treatment. This study assessed the utility of interleukin-27 (IL-27) and procalcitonin (PCT) as biomarkers of bacterial infection among immunocompromised pediatric subjects. Methods This is a single-center prospective cohort study conducted from July 2016 through September 2017, drawing subjects from the inpatient units at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center (CCHMC), a large, tertiary care children’s hospital. Patients were included if they fit the definition of immunocompromised and were under clinical suspicion for infection, defined by the acquisition of a blood culture at any point during the admission. The primary analysis assessed the accuracy of IL-27 to diagnose bacterial infection in immunocompromised pediatric patients, using PCT as a comparator. Results 293 patients were recruited, representing 400 episodes of suspected bacterial infection. The median age was 7.8 years (IQR 3.1–13.8 years). Fifty-three percent (n = 213) of the population had a primary oncologic diagnosis, 24% (n = 95) had received a bone marrow transplant, and 21% (n = 85) had received a solid organ transplant. The overall infection rate was 37%, with 70% of those patients having some form of culture positivity. Twenty-eight-day mortality was 5%, 60-day mortality was 9%, with 87% of patients surviving to hospital discharge. The AUC’s of the ROC curve to diagnose bacterial infection were 0.62 (0.5–0.68) for IL-27 and 0.65 (0.6–0.73) for PCT. Using the previously determined cutoff of 5.0 ng/mL, the specificity of IL-27 to diagnose bacterial infection reached 94%, with a negative predictive value of 64%. Conclusions Despite prior work demonstrating IL-27 and PCT as possible biomarkers of bacterial infection in immunocompromised pediatric patients, we were unable to validate these findings. This illustrates the challenges associated with developing reliable biomarkers of bacterial infection in this vulnerable population.
Visconti: multi-VLIW image recognition processor based on configurable processor [obstacle detection applications]

An 18-GOPS multi-VLIW image recognition processor, "Visconti" (vision based sensing, control, and intelligence), for intelligent vehicle applications is described. Three 3-way VLIW processors are integrated into a single chip with peripheral modules such as an SDRAM controller, video I/Os and a Flash ROM controller. The VLIW processor is designed based on Toshiba's configurable processor known as MeP (media embedded processor) and includes the customized VLIW coprocessor extension which can execute SIMD instructions. Visconti's architecture can exploit multi-grain parallelism, data level, instruction level and task level, effectively for its target applications. The chip is fabricated using 0.13 /spl mu/m CMOS technology and integrates 21 M transistors on a 48.7-mm/sup 2/ die. It operates at 150 MHz in the worst case and consumes 1 W during front observation application using the stereo camera-based vision system at video rate.