Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Upper bounds for ternary constant weight codes from semidefinite programming and representation theory

In this thesis we use a semidefinite programming approach to find explicit upper bounds on the size of ternary constant weight codes with prescribed minimum distance d. By constructing a graph Γ = (X,E), on the set, X, of all possible ternary words of weight w letting {x, y} ∈ E ⇔ 0 < dH(x, y) < d, we can view this problem as a special case of the stable set problem. Using symmetry, the constraint matrices of the semidefinite program can be seen to belong to the algebra, A, of G0-invariant matrices. Where G0 is the subgroup of the automorphism group of Γ, stabilizing a special point of X. Using representation theory we give a general method for explicitly finding the block diagonalization of the algebra of G-invariant matrices for a finite group G. This is applied to the Terwilliger algebra of the binary Hamming scheme and makes it possible to interpret the entries of the block diagonalized matrices as Hahn polynomials. Moreover, we find a block diagonalization of the algebra A. This is used to reduce the complexity of the semidefinite program and makes it possible to explicitly calculate upper bounds on the size of ternary constant weight codes. One new bound has been obtained.
Indirect Effects of Soluble Nitrogen on Growth ofOchlerotatus triseriatus Larvae in Container Habitats

Abstract We conducted experiments in laboratory microcosms to simulate input of stemflow nutrients and flushing of metabolites in the tree hole habitats of larval Ochlerotatus triseriatus (Say). In the first experiment, we simultaneously examined the effects of nutrient additions (nitrogen, phosphorus, glucose, or combination) and flushing (removal of one-half of water volume replaced by deionized water) on mosquito production. The combination of nutrients had the greatest positive effects on mosquito production, with nitrogen (N) likely accounting for most of the increase in adult emergence and adult mass. Dilution of the nutrient pool via simulated flushing reduced mosquito growth, suggesting that the primary effect of stemflow input was nutrient addition as opposed to dilution of any latent toxic metabolites. In a second experiment, N additions were crossed with larval presence or absence to examine effects on key microbial processes. N increased leaf decay rates, soluble carbohydrate concentrations, fungal biomass and leaf-associated carbohydrase activity, but it did not stimulate bacterial productivity. Leaf decay was enhanced and bacterial production on leaves and in the water column was depressed in the presence of larvae. We conclude that the inputs of soluble N stimulated fungal growth, which made more fungal biomass available because of both its absolute increase and via the softening of the leaf particulate matter that could allow direct ingestion by larvae.
Patología bucal prevalente en niños excepcionales

espanolEste estudio establecio como propositos, identificar la patologia bucal prevalente en ninos Sindrome de Down, Sordo-Mudo, Ciego, Autista y Paralitico Cerebral y la intervencion de variables, tales como: administracion de farmacos, consistencia de los alimentos, higiene bucal y extraccion social, en la agudizacion del cuadro clinico bucal diagnosticado y aparicion de enfermedades odontologicas no consideradas intrinsecas a las alteraciones mencionadas. Para obtener la informacion se selecciono una muestra proporcional y representativa de la poblacion de ninos entre 3 y 14 anos, atendidos en los Institutos de Educacion Especial del Municipio Maracaibo, Estado Zulia, Venezuela y se utilizo en la recoleccion de datos la entrevista estructurada y la hoja de registro de datos clinicos. La entrevista se realizo a los padres y representantes y la hoja de registro recogio los referentes que permitieron diagnosticar el problema buco-dental de los ninos examinados. Los datos agrupados se presentaron en graficos y tablas de frecuencia para una o mas variables y se aplico el Test Chi Cuadrado para verificar el grado de aproximacion entre las frecuencias teoricas y las frecuencias observadas: estableciendose un nivel de significacion = o EnglishThe purpose of this investigation was the identification of buco-dental pathologies intrinsic to exceptional children such as: Down' s Syndrome, deaf-mute, Autistic, Blind and Cerebral Palsy, in a sample of 133 children between 3 and 14 years old, selected from the total of 789 children attending the Institutes of Especial Education of Maracaibo County, Zulia State, Venezuela. It was verified in the sample studied the same buco-dental pathologies reported in international studies and other reviews associated with oclusal problems. It was equally verified the relationship between bruxisim and social extraction. It was concluded date it is necessary to execute prevention projects that are able to intercept the increment in buco-dental pathologies in this group of exceptional children.
Opportunities and Challenges for Near-Field Wireless Power Transfer: A Review

Traditional power supply cords have become less important because they prevent large-scale utilization and mobility. In addition, the use of batteries as a substitute for power cords is not an optimal solution because batteries have a short lifetime, thereby increasing the cost, weight, and ecological footprint of the hardware implementation. Their recharging or replacement is impractical and incurs operational costs. Recent progress has allowed electromagnetic wave energy to be transferred from power sources (i.e., transmitters) to destinations (i.e., receivers) wirelessly, the so-called wireless power transfer (WPT) technique. New developments in WPT technique motivate new avenues of research in different applications. Recently, WPT has been used in mobile phones, electric vehicles, medical implants, wireless sensor network, unmanned aerial vehicles, and so on. This review highlights up-to-date studies that are specific to near-field WPT, which include the classification, comparison, and potential applications of these techniques in the real world. In addition, limitations and challenges of these techniques are highlighted at the end of the article.
Kasparov versus Deep Blue - computer chess comes of age

In February 1996, a chess-playing computer known as Deep Blue made history by defeating the reigning world chess champion, Gary Kasparov, in a game played under match conditions. Kasparov went on to win the six-game match 4-2 and at the end of the match announced that he believed that chess computing had come of age. This book provides an enthralling account of the match and of the story that lies behind it: the evolution of chess-playing computers and the development of Deep Blue. The story of chess-playing computers goes back a long way and the author provides a whistlestop tour of the highlights of this history. As the development comes to its culmination in Philadelphia, we meet the Deep Blue team, Garry Kasparov and each of the historic six games is provided in full with a detailed commentary. Chess grandmaster Yasser Seirawan provided a lively commentary throughout the match and here provides a Foreword about the significance of this event.
Delay-QoS-driven spectrum and energy efficiency tradeoff

This paper presents a delay-QoS-driven spectrum and energy efficiency optimization transmission technique. In particular, considering the cross-layer effective capacity (EC) model in Rayleigh fading channels, a spectrum- and energy-efficient power allocation strategy is proposed when maximum spectrum efficiency is achieved under minimum energy efficiency (EE) requirement. For this purpose, at a target delay-outage probability, the spectrum efficiency is measured by the EC. Further, the EE is formulated as the ratio of the EC to the total expenditure power. At first, the maximum achievable EE of the link at the target delay-outage probability is found. Then, the optimal power allocation strategy is obtained to maximize the EC subject to a minimum EE constraint set at a certain ratio of the maximum achievable EE. We prove that the optimization problem is a concave maximization problem and develop the global optimal solution. The analytical results show that a considerable EC-gain can be achieved with a small sacrifice in EE. This gain increases considerably as the delay constraint becomes tight.
Keynote Address - exploring, modeling, and using the web graph

The Web graph, meaning the graph induced by Web pages as nodes and their hyperlinks as directed edges, has become a fascinating object of study for many people: physicists, sociologists, mathematicians, computer scientists, and information retrieval specialists.Recent results range from theoretical (e.g.: models for the graph, semi-external algorithms), to experimental (e.g.: new insights regarding the rate of change of pages, new data on the distribution of degrees), to practical (e.g.: improvements in crawling technology). Recent results range from theoretical (e.g.: models for the graph, semi-external algorithms), to experimental (e.g.: new insights regarding the rate of change of pages, new data on the distribution of degrees), to practical (e.g.: improvements in crawling technology). The goal of this talk is to convey an introduction to the state of the art in this area and to sketch the current issues in collecting, representing, analyzing, and modeling this graph. Although graph analytic methods are essential tools in the Web IR arsenal, they are well known to the SIGIR community and will not be discussed here in any detail; instead, we will explore some challenges and opportunities for using IR methods and techniques in the exploration of the Web graph, in particular in dealing with legitimate and "spam" perturbations of the "natural" process of birth and death of nodes and links, and conversely, the challenges and opportunities of using graph methods in support of IR on the Web and in the enterprise.
Dynamic Range Extension of a SPAD Imager Using Non-Uniformity Correction Techniques

The extraordinary sensitivity of single-photon avalanche diodes (SPADs) makes these devices the ideal option for vision systems aimed at low-light applications. Nevertheless, there exist large dark count rate and photon detection probability non-uniformities, which reduce the dynamic range of the detector. As a result, the capability to create image contrast is severely damaged or even lost. This paper presents the implementation of a correction algorithm to compensate for the mentioned non-uniformities and thus extend the contrast of the generated images. To demonstrate its efficiency, the proposed technique is applied to real images obtained with a fabricated SPAD image sensor. An increase of more than 3 b of contrast is obtained.
Glycaemic responses of staple South Asian foods alone and combined with curried chicken as a mixed meal.

BACKGROUND The glycaemic responses of staples differ when eaten as mixed meals. We determined the glycaemic responses and glycaemic index (GI) values for common South Asian carbohydrate rich foods and the effect of adding curried chicken to them as mixed meals. METHODS The GI and glycaemic response to staples (basmati rice, pilau rice and chapatti) and mixed meals (pilau rice with chicken curry and chapatti with chicken curry) were measured in healthy volunteers. Paired comparisons in each subject were carried out for staples and their equivalent mixed meals (n = 9). RESULTS GI values for the mixed meals were significantly lower than the staples alone (41 and 60 for pilau rice with chicken curry and pilau rice alone, P = 0.001; 45 and 68 for chapatti with chicken curry and chapatti alone, P = 0.004). Both, pilau rice and chapatti with chicken curry had a significantly lower glycaemic response than their equivalent staples alone: incremental area under the blood glucose response curves (IAUC) 111.9 mmol min(-1 ) L(-1) for pilau rice with curry versus 162.4 mmol min(-1 ) L(-1) for pilau rice alone (P = 0.001) and IAUC 110.1 mmol min(-1 ) L(-1) for chapatti with chicken curry versus 183.6 mmol min(-1 ) L(-1) for chapatti alone (P = 0.002). CONCLUSIONS Adding fat and protein-containing curries as part of a mixed meal to carbohydrate rich staple foods reduced glycaemic responses, and also changed the GI category.
Ethylene Biosynthesis-Inducing Xylanase : II. Purification and Physical Characterization of the Enzyme Produced by Trichoderma viride.

The ethylene biosynthesis-inducing endoxylanase (EIX) from xylan-induced cultures of the fungus, Trichoderma viride, was purified to near homogeneity and compared with the EIX isolated from Cellulysin. Both enzymes migrate as 9.2 kilodalton proteins during gel filtration chromatography under nondenaturing conditions, but the mature polypeptide migrates as a 22 kilodalton band in sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The amino acid composition of the 22 kilodalton polypeptide is enriched by Gly, Ser, Thr, Trp, and Tyr, but depleted in Ala, Glx, Leu, and Lys. Both proteins lack sulfur-containing amino acids. The protein is glycosylated, and inhibition of EIX synthesis by tunicamycin suggests that at least some of the sugar moieties are linked to asparagine residues. EIX appears to be synthesized initially as a 25 kilodalton precursor protein that is processed to 22 kilodalton during secretion.
Online Reverse Auctions via Wireless Instant Message Networks

Online auctions topic has been a popular issue over recent years. However, in this paper, we proposed reverse auctions based on mobile commerce systems via Internet. The buyers can post photos and desired prices of products on the systems by handheld mobile devices or desktops. Moreover, the system also integrates the product poster and instant messenger for the mobile devices which immediately alerts the buyer for the new prices offered by the sellers. Advantages of reverse auction via Internet are the buyer not need to bargain prices with sellers. Meanwhile, it is the buyer directly "controls" the market, not the sellers, since customers do not have advertisement budgets to claim their requirements. Although reverse auction was proposed in the literature, the contribution of this paper is two-folded. First, wireless mobile networks are conducted in the e-commerce, not just using traditional Internet, where the scenario should be different. Besides, it should be noted that due to the inherent limitation of mobile instruments (not as so powerful as computers), the design to transfer the most work to be done in the agency (proxy servers), instead of the handheld mobile devices (client), is required. Further, miscellaneous instant messengers are also integrated by the mobile instant message integrator (MIMI) system in this study
An Adaptive Test Sheet Generation Mechanism Using Genetic Algorithm

For test-sheet composition systems, it is important to adaptively compose test sheets with diverse conceptual scopes, discrimination and difficulty degrees to meet various assessment requirements during real learning situations. Computation time and item exposure rate also influence performance and item bank security. Therefore, this study proposes an Adaptive Test Sheet Generation (ATSG) mechanism, where a Candidate Item Selection Strategy adaptively determines candidate test items and conceptual granularities according to desired conceptual scopes, and an Aggregate Objective Function applies Genetic Algorithm (GA) to figure out the approximate solution of mixed integer programming problem for the test-sheet composition. Experimental results show that the ATSG mechanism can efficiently, precisely generate test sheets to meet the various assessment requirements than existing ones. Furthermore, according to experimental finding, Fractal Time Series approach can be applied to analyze the self-similarity characteristics of GA’s fitness scores for improving the quality of the test-sheet composition in the near future.
Internal stresses in the electrostriction phenomenon viewed through dynamic mechanical analysis studies conducted under electric field

A model for studying the mechanical internal stresses into dielectric materials is developed in the present work. The model takes into account the formalism of inclusions in continuous media. The dielectric material is assumed to be partitioned in different cubes which form a sizeable bulk material in such a way that a given cube can be of the dipolar phase and its neighbor can be of the same phase or the matrix. The behavior of the internal stresses promoted by the electrostriction phenomenon can be monitored by studying the behavior of both the misfit coefficient related to the strain misfit and the transfer of elastic energy process. The equations obtained through the here presented model are calculable using magnitudes from mechanical tests, in particular dynamic mechanical analysis, which is very sensitive to changes in the microstructure. Dynamic mechanical analysis as a function of the electric field is reported, perhaps for the first time in literature, for the study of dielectric materials, giving rise to a useful tool for studying the behavior of internal stresses in dielectric materials.
Who moves whom during primitive streak formation in the chick embryo

Gastrulation is a critical stage in the development of all vertebrates. During gastrulation mesendoderm cells move inside the embryo to form the gut, muscles, and skeleton. In amniotes the mesendoderm cells move inside the embryo through a structure known as the primitive streak, extending from the posterior pole anterior through the midline of the embryo. Primitive streak formation involves large scale cell flows of a layer of highly polarized epithelial epiblast cells. The epiblast is separated from a lower layer of hypoblast cells through a well developed basal lamina. Recent experiments in which in vivo extracellular matrix dynamics was followed via labeling with fibronectin specific fluorescent antibodies and time‐lapse microscopy have suggested that extracellular matrix dynamics essentially coincides with the observed epiblast cell displacements (Zamir et al., 2008, PLoS Biol 6, e247). These observations raise the important question of who moves whom and where do cells derive traction. We discuss these matters and their implications for our understanding of the mechanisms underlying cell flows during primitive streak formation in the chick embryo.
Photoluminescence in pyridine-based polymers: Role of aggregates.

Abstract : We present a study of the morphology dependence of the photoluminescence (PL) properties of the pyridine-based polymers poly(p-pyridine), and poly(p-pyridyl) vinylene p-phenylene vinylene) (PPyVPV). The photoluminescence of solution samples is characterized by high quantum efficiency (> 70% in PPyVPV), weak coupling to vibrational modes (Huang-Rhys parameter ^0.5) and a single-exponential decay (radiative lifetime ^1 ns). On the other hand, film samples display strongly redshifted, featureless emission with low quantum yield (<20%) and highly nonexponential decay dynamics. Through consideration of absorption and excitation spectra, the 'site-selectivity' of the PL, and the concentration dependence of the PL spectrum, we demonstrate that the redshifted film spectra are a result of the formation of low-energy aggregate sites due to strong interchain interactions. Time-resolved measurements suggest a longer radiative lifetime for the aggregate vs. solution, leading to the lower efficiency. Aggregate formation is found to be morphology dependent, and is minimal in 'powder' samples which are precipitated after polymerization.
Banking Sector Liquidity and Financial Crisis in Nigeria

Employing a linear least square model and time series data from 1980 to 2009, this paper studies the determinants of Banking Sector liquidity in Nigeria and assesses the extent to which the recent financial crises affected liquidity in deposit money banks in the country. The paper makes some interesting findings. First, we find that only liquidity ratio, monetary policy rate and lagged loan-to-deposit ratio are significant for predicting Banking Sector liquidity. Secondly, we find that a decrease in monetary policy rates, liquidity ratios, volatility of output in relation to trend output, and the demand for cash, leads to an increase in current loan-to-deposit ratios; while a decrease in currency in circulation in proportion to Banking Sector deposits; and lagged loan-to-deposit ratios leads to a decline in current loan-to-deposit ratios. Our result suggests that during periods of economic or financial crises, deposit money banks are significantly illiquid relative to benchmarks, and getting liquidity monetary policies right during these periods is crucial in ensuring the survival of the Banking Sector.
Stellate ganglion blockade for analgesia following upper limb surgery

We report the successful use of a stellate ganglion block as part of a multi‐modal postoperative analgesic regimen. Four patients scheduled for orthopaedic surgery following upper limb trauma underwent blockade of the stellate ganglion pre‐operatively under ultrasound guidance. Patients reported excellent postoperative analgesia, with postoperative VAS pain scores between 0 and 2, and consumption of morphine in the first 24 h ranging from 0 to 14 mg. While these are preliminary findings, and must be confirmed in a clinical trial, they highlight the potential for stellate ganglion blockade to provide analgesia following major upper limb surgery.
Cryptanalysis of the Hwang-Shi Proxy Signature Scheme

Recently, Hwang and Shi proposed an efficient proxy signature scheme without using one-way hash functions. In their scheme, an original signer needn't send a proxy certificate to a proxy signer through secure channels. However, there are two public key substitution methods that can be used to attack their scheme. In this article, we show that their scheme is vulnerable to the public key substitution attacks.
Stroke care: initial data from a county-based bypass protocol for patients with acute stroke

Background Early identification and transfer of patients with acute stroke to a primary or comprehensive stroke center results in favorable outcomes. Objective To describe implementation and results of an emergency medical service (EMS)-driven stroke protocol in Lucas County, Ohio. Method All county EMS personnel (N=464) underwent training in the Rapid Arterial oCclusion Evaluation (RACE) score. The RACE Alert (RA) protocol, whereby patients with stroke and a RACE score ≥5 were taken to a facility that offered advanced therapy, was implemented in July 2015. During the 6-month study period, 109 RAs were activated. Time efficiencies, diagnostic accuracy, and mechanical thrombectomy (MT) outcomes were compared with standard ‘stroke-alert’ (N=142) patients from the preceding 6 months. Results An increased treatment rate (25.6% vs 12.6%, p<0.05) and improved time efficiency (median door-to-CT 10 vs 28 min, p<0.05; door-to-needle 46 vs 75 min, p<0.05) of IV tissue plasminogen activator within the RA cohort was achieved. The rate of MT (20.1% vs 7.7%, p=0.06) increased and treatment times improved, including median arrival-to-puncture (68 vs 128 min, p=0.04) and arrival-to-recanalization times (101 vs 205 min, p=0.001) in favor of the RA cohort. A non-significant trend towards improved outcome (50% vs 36.4%, p=0.3) in the RA cohort was noted. The RA protocol also showed improved diagnostic specificity for ischemic stroke (52.3% vs 30.1%, p<0.05). Conclusions Our results indicate that EMS adaptation of the RA protocol within Lucas County is feasible and effective for early triage and treatment of patients with stroke. Using this protocol, we can significantly improve treatment times for both systemic thrombolysis and MT.