Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An Efficient ADMM-Based Algorithm to Nonconvex Penalized Support Vector Machines

Support vector machines (SVMs) with sparsityinducing nonconvex penalties have received considerable attentions for the characteristics of automatic classification and variable selection. However, it is quite challenging to solve the nonconvex penalized SVMs due to their nondifferentiability, nonsmoothness and nonconvexity. In this paper, we propose an efficient ADMM-based algorithm to the nonconvex penalized SVMs. The proposed algorithm covers a large class of commonly used nonconvex regularization terms including the smooth clipped absolute deviation (SCAD) penalty, minimax concave penalty (MCP), log-sum penalty (LSP) and capped-'1 penalty. The convergence of the proposed algorithm is guaranteed. Extensive experimental evaluations on five benchmark datasets demonstrate the superior performance of the proposed algorithm to other three state-of-the-art approaches.
Comparative evaluation of efficacy of Murraya koenigii and chlorhexidine gluconate in the treatment of gingivitis: A randomized controlled clinical trial

Background: Herbal products are widely substituting synthetic antimicrobials due to their minimal adverse effects and cost-effectiveness. Murraya koenigii (curry leaf) is an easily available green leafy vegetable, which is known for their antimicrobial, antioxidative, and cytotoxic activity. However, no published literature available evaluates their effectiveness in treating gingival inflammation. This study was aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of M. koenigii mouthwash in reduction of plaque and gingivitis in comparison with commercially available chlorhexidine (CHX) mouthwash. Materials and Methods: This single-center, parallel-arm, randomized controlled clinical trial was carried out among individuals reported to the institution. A total of 45 participants with mild-to-moderate gingivitis were selected and divided into three groups. Group A and B participants undergone scaling and were instructed to use M. koenigii and CHX mouthwashes, respectively. Group C participants have received only scaling. All the participants were recalled after 14 days of prescribed mouthwash use and clinical parameters were recorded. One-way analysis of variance test and Student's paired t-test were used for inter- and intra-group comparison of parameters, respectively. Results: On intragroup comparison of clinical parameters, all the three groups showed a statistically significant difference with P ≤ 0.05. On pairwise comparison, it showed a significant difference for Group B versus Group C and Group A versus Group C, while between Group A and Group B showed no significant difference. Conclusion: M. koenigii mouthwash is equally effective as CHX, in treating plaque-induced gingivitis.
On Minimum Spanning Tree Streaming for Image Analysis

This work addresses minimum spanning tree (MST) construction in streaming for images. We study the problem of computation a MST on streaming in which image columns from a continuous stream are processed in blocks of a given size. The correctness of proposed algorithm is proved and confirmed in the case of morphological segmentation of remote sensing images.
Exploring How Phone Classification Neural Networks Learn Phonetic Information by Visualising and Interpreting Bottleneck Features

Neural networks have a reputation for being “black boxes”, which it has been suggested that techniques from user interface development, and visualisation in particular, could help lift. In this paper, we explore 9-dimensional bottleneck features (BNFs) that have been shown in our earlier work to well represent speech in the context of speech recognition, and 2-dimensional BNFs directly extracted from bottleneck neural networks. The 9-dimensional BNFs obtained from a phone classiﬁcation neural network are visualised in 2-dimensional spaces using linear discriminant analysis (LDA) and t-distributed stochastic neighbour embedding (t-SNE). The 2-dimensional BNF space is analysed with regard to phonetic features. A back-propagation method is used to create “cardi-nal” features for each phone under a particular neural network. Both the visualisations of 9-dimensional and 2-dimensional BNFs show distinctions between most phone categories. Particularly, the 2-dimensional BNF space seems to be a union of phonetic category related subspaces that preserve local structures within each subspace where the organisations of phones appear to correspond to phone production mechanisms. By applying LDA to the features of higher dimensional non-bottleneck layers, we observe a triangular pattern which may indicate that silence, friction and voicing are the three main properties learned by the neural networks.
Assessing the Impact of the Deceived Non Local Means Filter as a Preprocessing Stage in a Convolutional Neural Network Based Approach for Age Estimation Using Digital Hand X-Ray Images

In this work we analyze the impact of denoising, contrast and edge enhancement using the Deceived Non Local Means (DNLM) filter in a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) based approach for age estimation using digital X-ray images from hands. The DNLM filter presents two parameters which control edge enhancement and denoising. Increasing levels were tested to assess the impact of both contrast enhancement and denoising in the CNN based model regression accuracy. Results obtained showed that contrast enhancement was important for preprocessing in a CNN based approach, given a statistically significant 42% lower root mean squared error, with comparable to previous state of the art results, using larger publicly available dataset. The obtained results suggest that both image enhancement and denoising can significantly improve results in a CNN based model.
Plasma Retinol Levels and High-Sensitivity C-Reactive Protein in Prepubertal Children

The relationship between C-reactive protein (CRP) levels and plasma antioxidants has been established in adults. However, the association has been rarely investigated in healthy children. Thus, we examined the cross-sectional association of high-sensitivity CRP (hs-CRP) levels with fat-soluble plasma antioxidant concentrations in a cohort of healthy prepubertal children. We determined hs-CRP levels in 543 healthy six–eight-year-old children using a high-sensitivity CRP enzyme-linked immuno sorbent assay (ELISA) kit. The plasma concentrations of lipids, apolipoproteins and lipid-soluble antioxidants (α-tocopherol, γ-tocopherol, lycopene, α-carotene, β-carotene and retinol) were determined using standardized methods. Pearson correlation analysis showed significant correlations between plasma hs-CRP and α-carotene and retinol concentrations. After adjusting by sex, body mass index (BMI) and lipid levels, only the association with retinol remains significant, with children in the highest hs-CRP tertile group (hs-CRP ≥ 0.60 mg/dL) showing significantly lower levels of retinol than those from the tertiles 1 and 2. A stepwise linear regression selected retinol, BMI, apo A-I and sex as predictors of hs-CRP levels, in a model explaining 19.2% of the variability of hs-CRP. In conclusion, in healthy prepubertal children, after adjusting by sex, BMI and lipid levels, hs-CRP concentrations were highly associated with plasma retinol, which is transported in blood bound to retinol-binding protein but were not associated with the lipoprotein-bound antioxidants.
Code-switching in Indic Speech Synthesisers

Most Indians are inherently bilingual or multilingual owing to the diverse linguistic culture in India. As a result, code-switching is quite common in conversational speech. The objective of this work is to train good quality text-to-speech (TTS) synthesisers that can seamlessly handle code-switching. To achieve this, bilingual TTSes that are capable of handling phonotactic variations across languages are trained using combinations of monolingual data in a uniﬁed framework. In addition to segmenting Indic speech data using signal processing cues in tandem with hidden Markov model-deep neural network (HMM-DNN), we propose to segment Indian English data using the same approach after NIST syllabiﬁ-cation. Then, bilingual HTS-STRAIGHT based systems are trained by randomizing the order of data so that the systematic interactions between the two languages are captured better. Experiments are conducted by considering three language pairs: Hindi+English, Tamil+English and Hindi+Tamil. The code-switched systems are evaluated on monolingual, code-mixed and code-switched texts. Degradation mean opinion score (DMOS) for monolingual sentences shows marginal degradation over that of an equivalent monolingual TTS system, while the DMOS for bilingual sentences is signiﬁcantly better than that of the corresponding monolingual TTS systems.
Qiskit Backend Specifications for OpenQASM and OpenPulse Experiments

As interest in quantum computing grows, there is a pressing need for standardized API's so that algorithm designers, circuit designers, and physicists can be provided a common reference frame for designing, executing, and optimizing experiments. There is also a need for a language specification that goes beyond gates and allows users to specify the time dynamics of a quantum experiment and recover the time dynamics of the output. In this document we provide a specification for a common interface to backends (simulators and experiments) and a standarized data structure (Qobj --- quantum object) for sending experiments to those backends via Qiskit. We also introduce OpenPulse, a language for specifying pulse level control (i.e. control of the continuous time dynamics) of a general quantum device independent of the specific hardware implementation.
Ag@SiO2 Core-shell Nanoparticles Embedded in a TiO2 Mesoporous Layer Substantially Improve the Performance of Perovskite Solar Cells

In this study, Ag@SiO2 nanoparticles were synthesized by a modified Stöber method for preparing the TiO2 mesoporous layer of carbon counter electrode-based perovskite solar cells (PSCs) without a hole transporting layer. Compared with normal PSCs (without Ag@SiO2 incorporated in the TiO2 mesoporous layer), PSCs with an optimal content of Ag@SiO2 (0.3 wt. % Ag@SiO2-TiO2) show a 19.46% increase in their power conversion efficiency, from 12.23% to 14.61%, which is mainly attributed to the 13.89% enhancement of the short-circuit current density, from 20.23 mA/cm2 to 23.04 mA/cm2. These enhancements mainly contributed to the localized surface Plasmon resonance effect and the strong scattering effect of Ag@SiO2 nanoparticles. However, increasing the Ag@SiO2 concentration in the mesoporous layer past the optimum level cannot further increase the short-circuit current density and incident photon-to-electron conversion efficiency of the devices, which is primarily ascribed to the electron transport pathways being impeded by the insulating silica shells inside the TiO2 network.
Variation in Essential Oil Composition, Bioactive Compounds, Anatomical and Antioxidant Activity of Achillea aucheri, an Endemic Species of Iran, at Different Phenological Stages

In the present research, the essential oil composition, bioactive compounds, anatomical and antioxidant activity of Achillea aucheri were investigated at four phenological stages. The yield of essential oil ranged from 0.1 % (five leaves appearance stage) to 0.7 % (full flowering stage). So, the oils from the plants harvested at the full flowering stage provided higher essential oil contents than those at other stages. The analysis of the essential oils by GC/MS revealed the presence of a large number of components represented mainly by oxygenated monoterpenes (24.36–77.81 %). The compounds revealed high variation at different phenological stages. The major constituents of A. aucheri were carvacrol (1.07–19.17 %), camphor (5.44–9.99 %), δ‐cadinene (0.20–13.88 %), thymol (2.15–7.80 %), germacrene D (4.50–7.24 %), 1,8‐cineole (1.62–5.54 %) and α‐terpineol (1.71–3.42 %). The total phenolic (51.63 mg tannic acid/g DW) and flavonoid (10.88 mg quercetin/g W) contents were more accumulated at the 50 % flowering stage than others. The results revealed that the accumulation of essential oil in A. aucheri increased as the plant grew from the five leaves appearance stage to the 100 % flowering stage with increasing the size and number of secretory structures. Finally, the extracts collected at the 50 % flowering stage showed the highest antioxidant activity as measured based on FTC and DPPH method with the IC50 values ranging from 719.65 μg/mL to 1039.17 μg/mL for the samples.
Detection of Glottal Excitation Epochs in Speech Signal Using Hilbert Envelope

A technique, suitable for real-time processing, is presented for detection of glottal excitation epochs in voiced speech. It uses Hilbert envelope to enhance saliency of the glottal excitation epochs and to reduce the ripples due to the vocal tract filter. The processing comprises the steps of dynamic range compression, calculation of the Hilbert envelope, and epoch marking. The first step reduces amplitude variation by applying A-law on the signal envelope. The second step calculates the Hilbert envelope using the output of an FIR filter-based Hilbert transformer and the delay-compensated signal. The third step uses a dynamic peak detector with fast rise and slow fall and nonlinear smoothing using a two-step median-mean filter to further enhance the saliency of the epochs, followed by a differentiator to mark them. The technique is tested using the CMU-ARCTIC database with simultaneously recorded speech and EGG signals. The results showed a good match in the performance of the proposed technique with those of the state-of-the-art techniques and its robustness against highpass filtering. It may be useful for diagnosis of voice disorders and high-quality voice conversion.
The Synergistic Effects of Orthokeratology and Atropine in Slowing the Progression of Myopia

Atropine and orthokeratology (OK) are both effective in slowing the progression of myopia. In the current study, we studied the combined effects of atropine and OK lenses on slowing the progression of myopia. This retrospective study included 84 patients who wore OK lenses and received atropine treatment (OA) and 95 patients who wore OK lenses alone (OK) for 2 years. We stratified patients into low (<6 D, LM) and high (≥6 D, HM) myopia groups, as well as two different atropine concentrations (0.125% and 0.025%). Significantly better LM control was observed in OA1 patients, compared with OK1 patients. Axial length was significantly shorter in the OA1 group (24.67 ± 1.53 mm) than in the OK1 group (24.9 ± 1.98 mm) (p = 0.042); similarly, it was shorter in the OA2 group (24.73 ± 1.53 mm) than in the OK2 group (25.01 ± 1.26 mm) (p = 0.031). For the HM patients, OA3 patients compared with OK3 patients, axial length was significantly shorter in the OA3 group (25.78 ± 1.46 mm) than in the OK3 group (25.93 ± 1.94 mm) (p = 0.021); similarly, it was shorter in the OA4 patients (25.86 ± 1.21 mm) than in the OK4 patients (26.05 ± 1.57 mm) (p = 0.011). Combined treatment with atropine and OK lenses would be a choice of treatment to control the development of myopia.
Serum Interleukin-33 as a Biomarker in Predicting Neonatal Sepsis in Premature Infants.

BACKGROUND Neonatal sepsis is considered as the most frequent cause of death in newborns. Early diagnosis is important to reduce mortality and morbidity. The rapid progression of the disease requires proper use of biomarkers specific for prompt diagnosis and intervention. OBJECTIVE We aimed to evaluate the benefit of interleukin-33 serum levels in the diagnosis and treatment of neonatal sepsis. METHOD We included 51 infants with neonatal sepsis as the main study group and 50 neonates without sepsis as the control group. Serum levels of interleukin-6, interleukin-33 and C-reactive protein were measured on the 1st, 3rd and 7th days of sepsis in the study group and on the 3rd postpartum day in the control group, respectively. RESULTS Serum levels of interleukin-6, interleukin-33 and C-reactive protein were significantly higher in the first day of sepsis. Serum levels of interleukin-6, interleukin-33 and C-reactive protein decreased significantly on the 3rd and the 7th days of antibiotic treatment. We found a significant relationship between interleukin-33 and C-reactive protein and between interleukin-6 and C-reactive protein on the first day of sepsis. CONCLUSION Serum interleukin-33 level is up-regulated in neonatal sepsis, which might be used as a novel diagnostic marker and also a useful tool to predict prognosis in early neonatal sepsis.
Prediction of Subjective Listening Effort from Acoustic Data with Non-Intrusive Deep Models

The effort of listening to spoken language is a highly important perceptive measure for the design of speech enhancement algorithms and hearing-aid processing. In previous research, we proposed a model that quantiﬁes the phoneme output probabilities obtained from a deep neural net (DNN), which resulted in accurate predictions for unseen speech samples. However, high correlations between subjective ratings and model output were observed in known noise types, which is an unrealistic assumption in real-life scenarios. This paper explores non-intrusive listening effort prediction in unseen noisy environments. A set of different noise types are used for training a standard automatic speech recognition (ASR) system. Model predictions are produced by measuring the mean temporal distances of phoneme vectors from the DNN. These are compared to subjective ratings of hearing-impaired and normal-hearing listener responses from three databases that cover a variety of noise types and signal enhancement algorithms. We obtain an average correlation of 0 . 88 and outperform three baseline measures in most conditions.
LDL-Cholesterol Lowering of Plant Sterols and Stanols—Which Factors Influence Their Efficacy?

The LDL-cholesterol (LDL-C) lowering effect of plant sterols/stanols (PSS) is summarized in several meta-analyses showing a dose-response relationship with intakes of 1.5 to 3 g/day lowering LDL-C by 7.5% to 12%. This review summarizes evidence for the impact of various factors potentially influencing the LDL-C-lowering efficacy of PSS. PSS are efficacious in all food formats and in food supplements. Some factors related to food format, e.g., solid vs. liquid foods, seem to impact efficacy, while there is no difference between free PSS and esters. Compared to multiple daily intakes, once-a-day intake of PSS, especially in the morning with light breakfast, leads to a sub-optimal LDL-C lowering. However, intake frequency seems influenced by intake occasion, i.e., with or without a meal, and time of day. Meal intake is a critical factor for an optimal LDL-C lowering efficacy of PSS. While age has no impact, gender is suggested to influence the LDL-C lowering effect of PSS with greater reductions reported for men than women; but overall evidence is inconclusive and larger studies show no gender by treatment interaction. In conclusion, PSS are efficacious in all foods and food supplements; for optimal efficacy they should be consumed with a (main) meal and twice daily.
A Two-Headed Monster to Avert Disaster: HBS1/SKI7 Is Alternatively Spliced to Build Eukaryotic RNA Surveillance Complexes

The cytosolic RNA exosome, a 3′→5′ exoribonuclease complex, contributes to mRNA degradation in eukaryotes, limiting the accumulation of poorly-translated, improperly translated, or aberrant mRNA species. Disruption of cytosolic RNA exosome activity allows aberrant RNA species to accumulate, which can then be detected by host antiviral immune systems as a signature of pathogen infection, activating antiviral defenses. SKI7 is a critical component of the cytosolic RNA exosome in yeast, bridging the catalytic exoribonuclease core with the SKI2/SKI3/SKI8 adaptor complex that guides aberrant RNA substrates into the exosome. The ortholog of SKI7 was only recently identified in humans as an alternative splice form of the HBS1 gene, which encodes a decoding factor translational GTPase that rescues stalled ribosomes. Here, we identify the plant orthologs of HBS1/SKI7. We found that HBS1 and SKI7 are typically encoded by alternative splice forms of a single locus, although some plant lineages have evolved subfunctionalized genes that apparently encode only HBS1 or only SKI7. In all plant lineages examined, the SKI7 gene is subject to regulation by alternative splicing that can yield unproductive transcripts, either by removing deeply conserved SKI7 coding sequences, or by introducing premature stop codons that render SKI7 susceptible to nonsense-mediated decay. Taking a comparative, evolutionary approach, we define crucial features of the SKI7 protein shared by all eukaryotes, and use these deeply conserved features to identify SKI7 proteins in invertebrate lineages. We conclude that SKI7 is a conserved cytosolic RNA exosome subunit across eukaryotic lineages, and that SKI7 is consistently regulated by alternative splicing, suggesting broad coordination of nuclear and cytosolic RNA metabolism.
Fistula-tract Laser Closure (FiLaC™) for complex urethroperineal fistula

Abstract Background: Fistula formation in hidradenitis suppurativa follows an uncontrolled infection with subcutaneous tracts leading to ‘watering-can’ or ‘pus-pot’ perineum. Closure of this type of fistula implies major surgery and is bound to fail in refractory inflammatory environment. Minimally invasive techniques have become the first line of choice in every type of surgery. Methods: Fistula-tract Laser Closure (FiLaC™, Biolitec, Germany) is a novel technique already reported to have been used in the treatment of fistula-in-ano and pilonidal sinus. It consists of blind cauterization and obliteration of the fistula tract from the inside by means of a radial-emitting laser probe. We present two patients who underwent surgery for urethroperineal fistula using this technique. Results: In both cases, the fistula tracts were completely closed after 3 months of follow-up. The wounds had healed smoothly and complete resolution of symptoms was noted. Conclusions: The use of FiLaC™ for the treatment of urethroperineal fistula is feasible and safe. The minimally invasive nature of the technique and limited postoperative pain permit daycare surgery.
A Study of Objective Measurement of Comprehensibility through Native Speakers' Shadowing of Learners' Utterances

While learners desire to acquire so comprehensible pronunciations as to make themselves understood smoothly, acquisition often becomes difficult because, outside of classrooms, it is not rare that learners can hardly find chances to talk in the target language. Even when they talk to native speakers, they may receive only lenient or superficial suggestions from native speakers. How can learners know native speakers’ honest perception on their utterances? In this paper, shadowing is introduced not to learners but to native listeners, who are asked to shadow learners’ utterances. Since shadowing is as simultaneous repetition as possible, it is expected that native listeners’ perceived comprehensibility can be measured objectively as smoothness of natives’ shadowings. Experiments show that 1) shadowers’ subjective assessment of learners’ speech and that of their shadowings are highly correlated and that 2) the former is more correlated with the GOP scores of natives’ shadowings than those of learners’ speech. These results suggest it is valid to regard comprehensible pronunciation as shadowable pronunciation.