bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The neurofibromin 1 type I isoform predominance characterises female population affected by sporadic breast cancer: preliminary data
Authors: Marrero Daniel , Peralta Raúl , Valdivia Alejandra , De la Mora Antonio , Romero Pablo , Parra Miriam , Mendoza Nayeli , Mendoza Monica , Rodriguez Dalila , Camacho Ernesto , Duarte Armando , Castelazo German , Vanegas Enrique , Garcia Israel , Vargas Claudia , Arenas Diego , Jimenez Florinda , Salcedo Mauricio
Published: March 2012

Aims

Neurofibromin 1 (NF1) as a tumour suppressor gene can give rise to several transcripts by an alternative splicing event, generated at least for CELF cofactors. At present, the NF1 isoforms and CELF splicing transcripts in sporadic breast cancer are unknown. The aim of the authors was to detect NF1 gene expression, the NF1 isoform ratio and the CELF transcripts present in sporadic breast cancer.

Methods

Neurofibromin and RAS expression were analysed on tissue microarrays containing sporadic breast cancer (n=22), benign lesions (n=18, including six fibroadenomas, six fibrocystic changes and six ductal hyperplasias) and normal breast tissue (n=6) by immunohistochemistry assay. NF1 and CELF 3–6 RNA expression was performed by end point reverse transcription-PCR in the breast samples.

Results

NF1 and RAS expression in breast tissues showed no differential expression by immunohistochemistry results. Interestingly, the authors observed a shift transition in the isoform transcripts, from type II in normal breast tissue to type I isoform in breast carcinomas. CELF cofactor expression failed to be related with the shift transition of NF1 in breast tissues.

Conclusions

These data suggest that there is a tendency for an NF1 expression shift transition from type II to type I isoform, which could comprise a significant event in the development and progression of sporadic breast cancer. This shift transition may not be related with CELF cofactors.
The Role of Acupuncture in Cancer Supportive Care
Authors: Lin Jaung-Geng , Chen Yi-Hung
Published: March 2012

Acupuncture has many beneficial effects during cancer therapy and has proven efficacy in the management of side effects induced by chemotherapy and radiotherapy. In this review, we discussed the benefits of acupuncture on cancer patients. In cancer pain management, acupuncture is effective for head and neck pain, waist pain, abdominal and chest pain. Many studies confirm the excellent efficacy of acupuncture against symptoms of vomiting and nausea, including those induced by chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Head and neck cancer patients receiving radiotherapy may develop xerostomia, which may be relieved by acupuncture. Acupuncture may also cause sedative and hypnotic effects in cancer patients for treating nervousness and insomnia.
Comprehension of the Unique Characteristics of Traditional Chinese Medicine
Authors: Xutian Stevenson , Cao Dongyi , Wozniak JoAnn , Junion John , Boisvert Johanne
Published: March 2012

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has made great contributions to human history, especially in China, as has been recorded for thousands of years. The characteristics of TCM in both theory and practice make it different from Conventional Western Medicine (CWM). The characteristics of TCM include phenomenological, philosophical, and methodological aspects. This paper briefly discusses some historical turning points and innovations in TCM development in China, explores human body enigmas such as the heart, compares different aspects of TCM and CWM, and identifies the unique characteristics of TCM treatment, as compared to other medical systems.
In Vitro Antioxidant and Antimicrobial Activity of Extracts from Morus alba L. Leaves, Stems and Fruits
Authors: Wang Wei , Zu Yuangang , Fu Yujie , Efferth Thomas
Published: March 2012

In this study, the aqueous and ethanolic extracts (leaves, stems and fruits) from Morus alba L., a traditional Chinese medicine, were evaluated for their antioxidant and antimicrobial properties. Ethanolic extracts showed higher contents of both total phenolics and flavonoids than aqueous extracts. The total phenolic content was in the order of: leaf extracts > fruit extracts > stem extracts, whereas the total flavonoids was: leaf extracts > stem extracts > fruit extracts. Using DPPH assays, the concentrations providing 50% inhibition (IC50) values of aqueous extracts from leaves, stems and fruits were 7.11 ± 1.45 mg/ml, 86.78 ± 3.21 mg/ml and 14.38 ± 2.83 mg/ml, respectively, whereas the IC50 values of ethanolic extracts were 3.11 ± 0.86 mg/ml, 14.62 ± 2.45 mg/ml and 12.42 ± 2.76 mg/ml, respectively. In sum, the antioxidant activities of ethanolic extracts from M. alba L. were stronger than the aqueous extracts, and in the order of: leaf extracts > fruit extracts > stem extracts. The ethanolic extracts exhibited moderate antimicrobial activities, whereas the aqueous extracts showed poor antimicrobial properties in our test system. This study validated the medicinal potential of M. alba L.
Ethanol Extract ofGraptopetalum paraguayenseUpregulates Paraoxonase 1 Gene Expression via an AKT/NF-κB-Dependent Pathway
Authors: Cheng Chi-Chih , Wu Li-Chen , Lai Jin-Mei , Chen Chen-Ting , Hsueh Chi-Mei , Hsu Shih-Lan
Published: March 2012

Human serum paraoxonase 1 (PON1), a calcium-dependent ester hydrolase, protects against the oxidative modification of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and is a major anti-atherosclerotic component of high-density lipoprotein (HDL). Graptopetalum paraguayense, a folk herbal medicine commonly used in Taiwan, has antioxidative, anti-inflammatory, anti-hypertensive, and anti-atherogenic properties. The effects of G. paraguayense on the activity and/or expression of PON1 were examined using various extracts of the plant; extracts were made in water (GPWE), 50% ethanol (GP50E), and 95% ethanol (GP95E). Of these extracts, GP50E was found to be the most effective at increasing the function and expression of PON1 in a human hepatoma HepG2 cell line. Data from electrophoretic mobility shift assays and promoter-reporter luciferase analyses demonstrated that the DNA binding activity and transactivation ability of NF-κB were enhanced by GP50E. Treatment with NF-κB inhibitors, pyrrolidine dithiocarbamate, and BAY 11-7082 significantly attenuated GP50E-induced PON1 production and NF-κB transactivation activity. In addition, GP50E increased the levels of phosphorylated protein kinase B (PKB/AKT). Pharmacological inhibition of AKT by LY294002 effectively suppressed NF-κB activation and PON1 gene expression, suggesting that AKT was an upstream regulator of GP50E-mediated biological events. Overall, the results show that GP50E up-regulated PON1 gene expression via an AKT/NF-κB-dependent signaling pathway in human hepatoma HepG2 cells. This observation led to the conclusion that the anti-atherogenic characteristics of G. paraguayense are modulated, at least in part, via the up-regulation of hepatocyte PON1 gene expression.
CHAOTIC INFLATIONARY SCENARIO IN BIANCHI TYPE I SPACETIME
Authors: BALI RAJ
Published: March 2012

Chaotic inflationary model of the early universe proposed by Linde7 is investigated in the frame work of Bianchi type I spacetime. To determine inflationary scenario, we assume that scale factor [Formula: see text], λ being a constant, m the mass, V(ϕ) the potential energy density. It is shown that chaotic model leads to an inflationary phase which also helps in isotropization process. The Higg's field (ϕ) is initially large but decreases due to lapse of time in both cases. The assumption R3 = ABC~e3Ht does not lead to FRW model immediately but for large values of t, it reduces to FRW model since shear σ = 0 in FRW model and shear σ ≠ 0 in Bianchi type I model. The physical aspects of the model are also discussed.
PRODUCTION OF THERMAL PHOTONS IN VISCOUS FLUID DYNAMICS WITH TEMPERATURE-DEPENDENT SHEAR VISCOSITY
Authors: PERALTA-RAMOS J. , NAKWACKI M. S.
Published: March 2012

We compute the spectrum of thermal photons created in Au+Au collisions at [Formula: see text], taking into account dissipative corrections in production processes corresponding to the quark–gluon plasma and hadronic phases. To describe the evolution of the fireball, we use a viscous fluid dynamic model with different parametrizations for the temperature-dependence of η/s. We find that the spectrum significantly depends on the values of η/s in the QGP phase, and is almost insensitive to the values in the hadronic phase. We also compare the influence of the temperature-dependence of η/s on the spectrum of thermal photons to that of using different equations of state in the fluid dynamic simulations, finding that both effects are of the same order of magnitude.
$\cN$-FOLD SUPERSYMMETRY IN QUANTUM MECHANICAL MATRIX MODELS
Authors: TANAKA TOSHIAKI
Published: March 2012

We formulate [Formula: see text]-fold supersymmetry in quantum mechanical matrix models. As an example, we construct general two-by-two Hermitian matrix two-fold supersymmetric quantum mechanical systems. We find that there are two inequivalent such systems, both of which are characterized by two arbitrary scalar functions, and one of which does not reduce to the scalar system. The obtained systems are all weakly quasi-solvable.
A PARTIAL MATCHING FRAMEWORK BASED ON SET EXCLUSION CRITERIA
Authors: VILLAMAYOR-VENIALBO WALDEMAR , LEGAL-AYALA HORACIO , JUSTINO EDSON J. R. , FACON JACQUES
Published: March 2012

This article introduces a partial matching framework, based on set theory criteria, for the measurement of shape similarity. The matching framework is described in an abstract way because the proposed scheme is independent of the selection of a segmentation method and feature space. This paradigm ensures the high adaptability of the algorithm and brings the implementer a wide control over the robustness, the ability to balance between selectivity and sensitivity, and the freedom to deal with more general and arbitrary image transformations required for some particular problem. A strategy to establish a descriptor set obtained from components segmented from the main shape is expounded, and two exclusion measure functions are formulated. Proofs are given to show that it is not required to match the entire descriptor sets to determine that two shapes are similar. The methodology provides a dissimilarity score that may be used for shape-based retrieval and object recognition; this is demonstrated applying the proposed approach in a cattle brand identification system.
WHY ARE BASIC COLOR NAMES "BASIC"?
Authors: MUKHERJEE ANIMESH , LORETO VITTORIO , TRIA FRANCESCA
Published: March 2012

It is widely known that color names across the world's languages tend to be organized into a neat hierarchy with a small set of "basic names" featuring in a comparatively fixed order across linguistic societies. However, to date, the basic names have only been defined through a set of linguistic principles. There is no statistical definition that quantitatively separates the basic names from the rest of the color words across languages. Here we present a rigorous statistical analysis of the World Color Survey database hosting color word information from 110 non-industrialized languages. The central result is that those names for which a population of individuals show a larger overall agreement across languages turn out to be the basic ones exactly reproducing the color name hierarchy and, thereby, providing, for the first time, an empirical definition of the basic color names.
UNDERSTANDING THE ORIGINS OF MORPHOLOGICAL DIVERSITY: THE LINGUISTIC NICHE HYPOTHESIS
Authors: DALE RICK , LUPYAN GARY
Published: March 2012

Human language is unparalleled in both its expressive capacity and its diversity. What accounts for the enormous diversity of human languages [13]? Recent evidence suggests that the structure of languages may be shaped by the social and demographic environment in which the languages are learned and used. In an analysis of over 2000 languages Lupyan and Dale [25] demonstrated that socio-demographic variables, such as population size, significantly predicted the complexity of inflectional morphology. Languages spoken by smaller populations tend to employ more complex inflectional systems. Languages spoken by larger populations tend to avoid complex morphological paradigms, employing lexical constructions instead. This relationship may exist because of how language learning takes place in these different social contexts [44, 45]. In a smaller population, a tightly-knit social group combined with exclusive or almost exclusive language acquisition by infants permits accumulation of complex inflectional forms. In larger populations, adult language learning and more extensive cross-group interactions produce pressures that lead to morphological simplification. In the current paper, we explore this learning-based hypothesis in two ways. First, we develop an agent-based simulation that serves as a simple existence proof: As adult interaction increases, languages lose inflections. Second, we carry out a correlational study showing that English-speaking adults who had more interaction with non-native speakers as children showed a relative preference for over-regularized (i.e. morphologically simpler) forms. The results of the simulation and experiment lend support to the linguistic niche hypothesis: Languages may vary in the ways they do in part due to different social environments in which they are learned and used. In short, languages adapt to the learning constraints and biases of their learners.
CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM FREE MOTIONS IN THE TOMOGRAPHIC PROBABILITY REPRESENTATION
Authors: MAN'KO V. I. , VENTRIGLIA F.
Published: March 2012

Based on a geometric picture, the example of free particle motion for both classical and quantum domains is considered in the tomographic probability representation. Wave functions and density operators as well as optical and symplectic tomograms are obtained as solutions of kinetic classical and quantum equations for the state tomograms. The difference of tomograms of free particle for classical and quantum states is discussed.
ENTANGLEMENT FRUSTRATION IN MULTIMODE GAUSSIAN STATES
Authors: LUPO COSMO , MANCINI STEFANO , FACCHI PAOLO , FLORIO GIUSEPPE , PASCAZIO SAVERIO
Published: March 2012

Bipartite entanglement between two parties of a composite quantum system can be quantified in terms of the purity of one party and there always exists a pure state of the total system that maximizes it (and minimizes purity). When many different bipartitions are considered, the requirement that purity be minimal for all bipartitions gives rise to the phenomenon of entanglement frustration. This feature, observed in quantum systems with both discrete and continuous variables, can be studied by means of a suitable cost function whose minimizers are the maximally multipartite-entangled states (MMES). In this paper we extend the analysis of multipartite entanglement frustration of Gaussian states in multimode bosonic systems. We derive bounds on the frustration, under the constraint of finite mean energy, in the low- and high-energy limits.
THE GEOMETRY OF THE QUANTUM ZENO EFFECT
Authors: FACCHI PAOLO , PASCAZIO SAVERIO
Published: March 2012

The quantum Zeno effect is described in geometric terms. The quantum Zeno time (inverse standard deviation of the Hamiltonian) and the generator of the quantum Zeno dynamics are both given a geometric interpretation.
ON THE GEOMETRY OF QUANTUM MECHANICS
Authors: ERCOLESSI ELISA , MORANDI GIUSEPPE
Published: March 2012

We will present a short review of some work we have done in the last ten years with Giuseppe Marmo, on the attempt to formulate some interesting physical problems — such as the Quantum Inverse Problem, Alternative Structures and Berry Phase — in a geometrical setting.
GEOMETRIC STRUCTURES IN PHYSICS
Authors: BOYA L. J.
Published: March 2012

Geometry and Physics developed independently, until the past twentieth century, where physicists realized geometry is rather flexible and can adapt itself to the needs and characteristics of modern physics. Besides the use of Riemannian manifolds to describe General Relativity, classical mechanics encounters symplectic geometry, not to speak of the bundle connection ingredient of modern gauge theories; even Quantum Mechanics, after the initial Hilbert space period, is seeking nowadays to adapt itself better to a geometrical interpretation, by imperatives of the path integral description and also to incorporate more clearly the symplectic aspects of its classical antecedent.
Molecular geometries and spectra of methyl pyropheophorbide-a pyrazole derivatives: a density functional theory study
Authors: Choe Sang Joon , Shim Young Key , Galindev Oyunbieg
Published: March 2012

Density functional theory (DFT) electronic structure calculations were performed to predict the geometries of the chlorin macrocycle core in methyl pyropheophorbide-a pyrazole derivatives (e.g. HPMPPa and PPMPPa). These compounds are new photosensitizer materials that possess the dual function activity in photodynamic therapy. We found that the geometries of the two compounds were nearly the same, and that substitution of the pyrazole moieties at C31 -position of methyl pyropheophorbide-a did not have significant effects on the geometries of the chlorin macrocycle core. Excitation energies and oscillator strengths were computed by time-dependent DFT. The time-dependent DFT spectrum of HPMPPa and PPMPPa were not affected by the pyrazole substituent. To determine the hydrophilic effect of photosensitizers, we calculated the interaction energy between photosensitizer and water, and observed that the interaction energy of HPMPPa was higher than that of PPMPPa. We found that the interaction energy with specific wavelength (Q-bands) is an important factor to consider in the development of photodynamic therapy.
PARTIAL TRANSPOSITION OF RANDOM STATES AND NON-CENTERED SEMICIRCULAR DISTRIBUTIONS
Authors: AUBRUN GUILLAUME
Published: March 2012

Let W be a Wishart random matrix of size d2 × d2, considered as a block matrix with d × d blocks. Let Y be the matrix obtained by transposing each block of W. We prove that the empirical eigenvalue distribution of Y approaches a non-centered semicircular distribution when d → ∞. We also show the convergence of extreme eigenvalues towards the edge of the expected spectrum. The proofs are based on the moments method.

This matrix model is relevant to Quantum Information Theory and corresponds to the partial transposition of a random induced state. A natural question is: "When does a random state have a positive partial transpose (PPT)?". We answer this question and exhibit a strong threshold when the parameter from the Wishart distribution equals 4. When d gets large, a random state on Cd ⊗ Cd obtained after partial tracing a random pure state over some ancilla of dimension αd2 is typically PPT when α > 4 and typically non-PPT when α < 4.
Research with a hacker ethos
Authors: Williams Amanda , Gibb Alicia , Weekly David
Published: March 2012

The boundaries between 'the digital' and our everyday physical world are dissolving as we develop more physical ways of interacting with computing. This forum presents some of the topics discussed in the colorful multidisciplinary field of tangible and embodied interaction.

Eva Hornecker, Editor
Socialbots
Authors: Hwang Tim , Pearce Ian , Nanis Max
Published: March 2012

The Social Mediator forum was created to bridge the gaps between the theory and practice of social media research and development. The articles are intended to promote greater awareness of new insights and experiences in the rapidly evolving domain of social media, some of which may influence perspectives and approaches in the more established areas of human-computer interaction. Each article in the forum is made up of several short contributions from people representing different perspectives on a particular topic. Previous installments of this forum have woven together diverse perspectives on the ways that social media is transforming relationships among different stakeholders in the realms of healthcare and government.

The current article highlights some of the ways
social robots (socialbots)
---programs that operate autonomously on social networking sites---are transforming relationships within those sites, and how these transformations may more broadly influence relationships among people and organizations in the future. A recent article in
Communications of the ACM
called "The Social Life of Robots" reported that "researchers have started to explore the possibilities of 'social' machines capable of working together with minimal human supervision" [1]. That article illuminates recent developments involving interactions between humans and robots in the physical world; this article focuses on the interactions between humans and robots in the virtual world.

Our authors are exploring and expanding the frontiers of designing, deploying, and analyzing the behavior and impact of robots operating in online social networks, and they have invited a number of other frontierspeople to share some of their insights, experiences, and future expectations for social robotics.
Because deep down, we are not the same
Authors: Kamppuri Minna
Published: March 2012

This forum looks at how the fields of interaction design and HCI can extend to cover "developing" communities around the world, ones that are gaining access to digital technology for the first time.

Gary Marsden, Editor
An approach for scalability-bottleneck solution
Authors: Horikawa Takashi
Published: March 2012

ACID-compliant DBMSs are said to be difficult to scale their performance by using many more processors, which means that they are difficult to enjoy the benefits of recent manycore systems that wide-spread use of multi-core processors has made practicable. Since DBMSs are indispensable in most of IT systems, scalability issues should be addressed to fulfill the demand of handling large quantity of data. This paper proposes a viable approach for solving scalability issue, in which lock-related bottleneck will be identified from event trace based measurements and scalability will be improved by replacing the bottleneck-lock with fine-grained locks. This paper also describes a case study on the application of the proposed method, in which the scalability of a many-core system in executing DBT-1 transactions with MySQL adopting the InnoDB storage engine has been successfully improved. Since applying the proposed method produced the increase in maximum throughput of the 16- CPU system by 1.6 times, the method is promising, as long as lock-related bottlenecks are of concern.
Experience building non-functional requirement models of a complex industrial architecture (abstracts only)
Authors: Gouvêa Daniel Dominguez , Assis D. Muniz Cyro de A. , Pinto Gilson A. , Avritzer Alberto , Meri Leäo Rosa Maria , e Silva Edmundo de Souza , Diniz Morganna Carmem , Berardinelli Luca , Leite Julius C.B. , Mossé Daniel , Cai Yuanfang , Dalton Mike , Kapova Lucia , Koziolek Anne
Published: March 2012

In this paper, we report on our experience with the application of validated models to assess performance, reliability, and adaptability of a complex mission critical system that is being developed to dynamically monitor and control the position of an oil-drilling platform. We present real-time modeling results that show that all tasks are schedulable. We performed stochastic analysis of the distribution of tasks execution time as a function of the number of system interfaces. We report on the variability of task execution times for the expected system configurations. In addition, we have executed a system library for an important task inside the performance model simulator. We report on the measured algorithm convergence as a function of the number of vessel thrusters. We have also studied the system architecture adaptability by comparing the documented system architecture and the implemented source code. We report on the adaptability findings and the recommendations we were able to provide to the system's architect. Finally, we have developed models of hardware and software reliability. We report on hardware reliability results based on the evaluation of the system architecture. As a topic for future work, we report on an approach that we recommend be applied to evaluate the system under study software reliability.
Fluid analysis of energy consumption using rewards in massively parallel Markov models (abstracts only)
Authors: Stefanek Anton , Hayden Richard A. , Bradley Jeremy T.
Published: March 2012

Capturing energy consumption directly from a stochastic behavioural model is a computationally expensive process. Using a so-called fluid analysis technique we are able to access accumulated reward measures in much larger scale stochastic systems than has been previously possible.These accumulated rewards are ideal for deriving energy and power consumption from stochastic process models. In previous work, it has been shown how to derive a set of ordinary differential equations (ODEs) whose solutions approximate the moments of component counts in a continuous-time Markov chain(CTMC) described in a stochastic process algebra. In this paper, we show how to extend the method to provide rapid access to moments of accumulated rewards in CTMCs. In addition to measuring the amount of energy used by a system, we are also interested in the time taken to reach a particular level of energy consumption. In reward terms, this is a so-called completion time. In this paper, we are able to use higher moments of rewards to give us access to completion time distributions.

We demonstrate the technique on a model of energy consumption in a client-server system with server failure and hibernation. Moreover, we are able to use these new and rapid techniques to capture the trade-off between energy consumption and service level agreement (SLA) compliance. We use a standard optimisation approach to find the precise configuration of the system which minimises the energy consumption while satisfying an operational response-time quantile.
Metric-based selection of timer methods for accurate measurements (abstracts only)
Authors: Kuperberg Michael , Krogmann Martin , Reussner Ralf
Published: March 2012

Performance measurements are often concerned with accurate recording of timing values, which requires timer methods of high quality. Evaluating the quality of a given timer method or performance counter involves analysing several properties, such as accuracy, invocation cost and timer stability. These properties are metrics with platform-dependent values, and ranking and selecting timer methods requires comparisons using multidimensional metric sets, which make the comparisons ambiguous and unnecessary complex. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a new unified metric that allows for a simpler comparison. The one-dimensional metric is designed to capture fine-granular differences between timer methods, and normalises accuracy and other quality attributes by using CPU cycles instead of time units. The proposed metric is evaluated on all timer methods provided by Java and .NET platform APIs.
Performance sensitive self-adaptive service-oriented software using hidden Markov models (abstracts only)
Authors: Perez-Palacin Diego , Merseguer José
Published: March 2012

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is a paradigm where applications are built on services offered by third party providers. Behavior of providers evolves and makes a challenge the performance prediction of SOA applications. A proper decision about when a provider should be substituted can dramatically improve the performance of the application. We propose hidden Markov models (HMM) to help service integrators to foretell the current state of third-parties. The paper leverages different algorithms that change providers based on predictions about their states. We also integrate these algorithms and HMMs in an architectural solution to coordinate them with other challenges in the SOA world.
A new business model for massively multiplayer online games (abstracts only)
Authors: Nae Vlad , Prodan Radu , Iosup Alexandru , Fahringer Thomas
Published: March 2012

Today, highly successfulMassivelyMultiplayer Online Games (MMOGs) have millions of registered users and hundreds of thousands of active concurrent players. To sustain their highly variable load, game operators over-provision a large static infrastructure capable of sustaining the game peak load, even though a large portion of the resources is unused most of the time. This inefficient resource utilisation has negative economic impacts by preventing any but the largest hosting centres from joining the market and dramatically increases prices.

In this paper, we propose a new business model of hosting and operating MMOGs based on Cloud computing principles involving four actors: resource provider, game operator, game provider, and client. Our model efficiently provisions on-demand virtualised resources to game sessions based on their dynamic client load, which dramatically decreases prices and gives small and medium enterprises the opportunity of joining the market through zero initial investment.

We validate our new model and its underlying business relationships through trace-based simulations utilising six months worth of monitoring data from a real-life MMOG using emulated resources from 16 of the largest Cloud resource providers currently on the market. We demonstrate that our model can operate state-of-the-art MMOGs with an average monthly gross profit of nearly $6 million excluding game purchase prices, overheads and taxation, while being able to maintain and control the QoS offered to all clients. Finally, we show how our approach is capable of operating next generation very highly interactive MMOGs with a small increase of 5.8% in the subscription price.
Virt-LM
Authors: Huang Dawei , Ye Deshi , He Qinming , Chen Jianhai , Ye Kejiang
Published: March 2012

Virtualization technology has been widely applied in data centers and IT infrastructures, with advantages of server consolidation and live migration. Through live migration, data centers could flexibly move virtual machines among different physical machines to balance workloads, reduce energy consumption and enhance service availability. Today's data centers can grow to a huge scale. This implies that frequent live migration would be desirable for the economic use of hardware resources. Then, the performance of the live migration strategy will be an issue. So, we need a reliant evaluation method to choose the software and hardware environments that will produce the best live migration performance.

However, there is not a complete live migration benchmark available currently. In addition, the existing evaluation methodologies select different metrics, different workloads and different test means. Thus, it is difficult to compare their results.

In this paper we first survey the current research and their evaluation methods on live migration. We then summarize the critical issues for the live migration evaluation and also raise other unreported potential problems.

We propose our solutions and present an implementation in our live migration benchmark -- Virt-LM. This is a benchmark for comparing live migration performance among different software and hardware environments in a data center scenario. We detail its design and provide some experimental results to validate its effectiveness.
Instrumentation-based tool for latency measurements (abstracts only)
Authors: Pääkkönen Pekka , Prokkola Jarmo , Lattunen Ali
Published: March 2012

Software has to be tested from functional and performance viewpoints in order to create products, which fulfill customer demands. The need for testing has led to the development of a plethora of testing tools. Performance measurement of SW latencies on local and distributed SW platforms hasn't yet been completely solved, which is the research problem of this paper. In particular, GPS-based time synchronization and performance of the proof-of-concept has been concentrated on. The approach is to instrument the SW implementation under study, and to collect measurement data with the presented tool. The results indicate a resolution of 590 ns, which can be achieved with high performance reference clocks. CPU processing can be kept lower than 5% even with a high event transmission rate. In addition, the presented GPS synchronization method can be used for other purposes such as data packet time-stamping in network monitoring solutions.
Path-vector routing stability analysis
Authors: Papadimitriou Dimitri , Coras Florin , Cabellos Albert
Published: March 2012

In this paper, we define a set of metrics that characterize the local stability properties of path-vector routing protocols such as BGP (Border Gateway Protocol). By means of these stability metrics, we propose a method to analyze the effects of BGP policy- and protocol-induced instability on local routers.
An analysis of power reduction in datacenters using heterogeneous chip multiprocessors
Authors: Gupta Vishal , Nathuji Ripal , Schwan Karsten
Published: March 2012

Power and design constraints have forced the semiconductor industry to look at alternate solutions like heterogeneous chip multiprocessors to continue application performance scaling and improve energy efficiency of multicore processors. In this paper, we present an opportunity analysis of heterogeneous chip multiprocessors in the context of datacenter environments where applications often have latency SLAs. Specifically, we define three use cases of heterogeneous processors for datacenter applications and adopt an analytical approach to quantify relative energy savings of using heterogeneous processors over area-equivalent homogeneous configurations. Based upon our findings, we discuss the practical merits of heterogeneous chip multiprocessors in datacenters, including the issues that must be addressed in order to realize the theoretical benefits.
Usage centric green performance indicators
Authors: Chen Doron , Henis Ealan , Kat Ronen I. , Sotnikov Dmitry , Cappiello Cinzia , Ferreira Alexandre Mello , Pernici Barbara , Vitali Monica , Jiang Tao , Liu Jia , Kipp Alexander
Published: March 2012

Energy effciency of data centers is gaining importance as energy consumption and carbon footprint awareness are rising. Green Performance Indicators (GPIs) provide measurable means to assess the energy effciency of a resource or system. Most of the metrics commonly used today measure the energy effciency potential of a resource, system or application usage, rather than the energy effciency of the actual usage. In this paper, we argue that the way that the resources and systems are actually used in a given data center configuration is at least as important as the effciency potential of the raw resources or systems. Hence, for data center energy effciency, we suggest to both select energy effcient components (as done today), as well as optimize the actual usage of the components and systems in the data center. To achieve the latter, optimization of usage centric GPI metrics should be employed and targeted as a primary green goal. In this paper we identify and present usage centric metrics, which should be monitored and optimized for improving energy effciency, and hence, reduce the data center carbon footprint.
Investigating MapReduce framework extensions for efficient processing of geographically scattered datasets
Authors: Gadre Hrishikesh , Rodero Ivan , Parashar Manish
Published: March 2012

In this paper, we investigate real-world scenarios in which MapReduce programming model and specifically Hadoop framework could be used for processing large-scale, geographically scattered datasets. We propose an Adaptive Reduce Task Scheduling (ARTS) algorithm and evaluate it on a distributed Hadoop cluster involving multiple datacenters as well as the on a shared Hadoop cluster. The evaluation demonstrates that the ARTS algorithm outperforms the default Reduce phase scheduling algorithm in Hadoop framework.
Exploring distributed hash tables in HighEnd computing
Authors: Li Tonglin , Verma Raman , Duan Xi , Jin Hui , Raicu Ioan
Published: March 2012

Over the last decade, storage systems have experienced a 10-fold increase between their capacity and bandwidth. This gap is predicted to grow faster with exponentially growing concurrency levels, with future exascales delivering millions of nodes and billions of threads of execution. A critical component of future file systems for high-end computing is metadata management. This extended abstract presents ZHT, a zero-hop distributed hash-table, which has been tuned for the specific requirements of high-end computing. The primary goal of ZHT is excellent availability, fault tolerance, high throughput, and low latencies.
The Current and Future Therapies of Bone Regeneration to Repair Bone Defects
Authors: Jimi Eijiro , Hirata Shizu , Osawa Kenji , Terashita Masamichi , Kitamura Chiaki , Fukushima Hidefumi
Published: March 2012

Bone defects often result from tumor resection, congenital malformation, trauma, fractures, surgery, or periodontitis in dentistry. Although dental implants serve as an effective treatment to recover mouth function from tooth defects, many patients do not have the adequate bone volume to build an implant. The gold standard for the reconstruction of large bone defects is the use of autogenous bone grafts. While autogenous bone graft is the most effective clinical method, surgical stress to the part of the bone being extracted and the quantity of extractable bone limit this method. Recently mesenchymal stem cell-based therapies have the potential to provide an effective treatment of osseous defects. In this paper, we discuss both the current therapy for bone regeneration and the perspectives in the field of stem cell-based regenerative medicine, addressing the sources of stem cells and growth factors used to induce bone regeneration effectively and reproducibly.
Prevalence of Anemia and Related Deficiencies in the First Year following Laparoscopic Gastric Bypass for Morbid Obesity
Authors: Aarts E. O. , van Wageningen B. , Janssen I. M. C. , Berends F. J.
Published: March 2012

Background. Anemia associated with deficiencies in iron, folic acid, and vitamin B12 are very common after Laparoscopic Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass (LRYGB) surgery for morbid obesity. This study was conducted to evaluate the prevalence of anemia after LRYGB.Patients and Methods. A total of 377 morbid obese patients were included in our study. All patients underwent a LRYGB. Hematologic parameters were obtained prior to and after surgery on standardized time intervals.Results. Anemia was present in 21 (P=0.02) patients after surgery. Iron, folic acid, and vitamin B12 deficiencies were diagnosed in 66%, 15%, and 50% of patients, respectively. In 86% of patients, anemia was accompanied by one of these deficiencies.Conclusion. These results show that anemia and deficiencies for iron, folic acid deficiency, and vitamin B12 are very common within the first year after LRYGB. We advise a minimal daily intake of 65 mg of iron in male and 100 mg in female patients, 350 μg of vitamin B12, and 400 μg of folic acid. Patients undergoing LRYGB must be closely monitored for deficiencies pre- and postoperative and supplemented when deficiencies occur.
Modified HPMs Inspired by Homotopy Continuation Methods
Authors: Vázquez-Leal Héctor , Filobello-Niño Uriel , Castañeda-Sheissa Roberto , Hernández-Martínez Luis , Sarmiento-Reyes Arturo
Published: March 2012

Nonlinear differential equations have applications in the modelling area for a broad variety of phenomena
and physical processes; having applications for all areas in science and engineering. At the present
time, the homotopy perturbation method (HPM) is amply used to solve in an approximate or exact manner
such nonlinear differential equations. This method has found wide acceptance for its versatility and ease
of use. The origin of the HPM is found in the coupling of homotopy methods with perturbation
methods. Homotopy methods are a well established research area with applications, in particular, an applied
branch of such methods are the homotopy continuation methods, which are employed on the numerical
solution of nonlinear algebraic equation systems. Therefore, this paper presents two modified versions of
standard HPM method inspired in homotopy continuation methods. Both modified HPMs deal
with nonlinearities distribution of the nonlinear differential equation. Besides, we will use a calcium‐induced
calcium released mechanism model as study case to test the proposed techniques. Finally, results
will be discussed and possible research lines will be proposed using this work as a starting point.
Pulmonary Hypertension in Pulmonary Langerhans Cell Granulomatosis
Authors: Held Matthias , Schnabel Philipp , Warth Arne , Jany Berthold
Published: March 2012

Introduction. Pulmonary Langerhans cell granulomatosis is a rare disease with a variable course. In pulmonary Langerhans cell granulomatosis pulmonary hypertension is frequent and has an independent prognostic impact. A vasculopathy which ist not related to ventilatory disturbance and fibrosis has been identified. An arteriopathy and even a venulopathy have been described. Due to this possible venulopathy vasodilators carry a significant risk for pulmonary congestion and edema. No drugs have been approved until now.Case Presentation. One female with PLCG developed severe PH four years after primary diagnosis of pulmonary Langerhans cell granulomatosis. Retrospective analysis of lung biopsies revealed an arterial vasculopathy at the time of primary diagnosis without clinical signs of PH at this time. Sildenafil led to a sustained improvement of hemodynamic features and exercise capacity.Conclusion. This paper underlines that patients with PLCG with an arterial vasculopathy-related PH might improve under sildenafil. Further trials addressing treatment of PH and vasculopathy are needed.
Area‐Based COI‐Referred Rotor Angle Index for Transient Stability Assessment and Control of Power Systems
Authors: Abdul Wahab Noor Izzri , Mohamed Azah
Published: March 2012

This paper describes an index for judging the severity of transient events of power systems in simulation. The proposed transient stability index, known as the area‐based COI‐referred rotor angle index, is developed by considering the fact that a large‐sized power system is divided into several areas according to the coherency of generators in a particular area. It can be assumed that an equivalent single large machine can represent all the generators in that area. Thus, the assessment of rotor angles for all generators can be simplified by only assessing the index of areas in a power system. The effectiveness of the proposed index in assessing the stability of power systems and its ability in pinpointing the weakest area in the power system is analyzed. Furthermore, this paper developed an emergency control scheme known as the combined UFLS and generator tripping in order to stabilize the system when unstable faults occurred in a power system. The proposed index is used to identify the generator to be tripped when the developed emergency control scheme operates. The performance of the proposed index and the combined UFLS and generator tripping scheme are evaluated on the IEEE 39‐bus test system.
Numerical and Analytical Study of Bladder-Collapse Flow
Authors: Tziannaros M. , Smith F. T.
Published: March 2012

Understanding and quantifying more of the workings of the human bladder motivates the present industry-supported study. The bladder performance in terms of the urinary velocities produced tends to be dominated by the internal fluid dynamics involved, in the sense that the bladder wall moves in a body-prescribed way. The enclosed urine flow responds to this wall movement, and there is relatively little feedback on the wall movement. Combined computational work and special-configuration analysis are applied over a range of configurations including computational and analytical results for the circle and sphere as basic cases; models of more realistic bladder shapes; the end stage of the micturition process where the bladder is relatively squashed down near the urethral sphincter and localised peak speeds arise. The combination of approaches above can be extended to allow for interaction between wall shape and flow properties such as internal pressure if necessary.
Plasmonic Modes and Optical Properties of Gold and Silver Ellipsoidal Nanoparticles by the Discrete Dipole Approximation
Authors: Alsawafta Mohammed , Wahbeh Mamoun , Truong Vo-Van
Published: March 2012

The discrete dipole approximation (DDA) is used to model the absorption efficiency of isolated gold (Au) and silver (Ag) ellipsoidal nanoparticles. The characteristics of the plasmonic bands of those nanostructures depend strongly on the size and orientation of the particles in both the lab and target frames. At specific rotation and incident angles, the desired plasmonic mode can be excited. The result of the simulation shows the possibility of excitation of three plasmonic modes—one longitudinal mode (LM) and two transverse modes (TM)—corresponding to the redistribution of the polarization charges along each principal axis. At oblique incidence of the incoming light, both the Au LM and a hybrid Au TM are observed whereas three more distinct plasmonic modes can be found in the case of the Ag particle. The effect of length distribution on the characteristics of the plasmonic bands is also examined for the three principal axes. The band position of the plasmonic bands associated with the electronic oscillation along each principal axis is found to vary linearly with the axis length. The linear variation of the band position of the LM is steeper as compared with the one found for the other modes.
Global Stability of an Epidemic Model with Incomplete Treatment and Vaccination
Authors: Huo Hai-Feng , Feng Li-Xiang
Published: March 2012

An epidemic model with incomplete treatment and vaccination for the newborns and susceptibles
is constructed. We establish that the global dynamics are completely determined by the basic
reproduction number R0. If R0 ≤ 1, then the disease‐free equilibrium is globally asymptotically
stable. If R0 > 1, the endemic equilibrium is globally asymptotically stable. Some numerical
simulations are also given to explain our conclusions.
PET/CT Imaging in Mouse Models of Myocardial Ischemia
Authors: Gargiulo Sara , Greco Adelaide , Gramanzini Matteo , Petretta Maria Piera , Ferro Adele , Larobina Michele , Panico Mariarosaria , Brunetti Arturo , Cuocolo Alberto
Published: March 2012

Different species have been used to reproduce myocardial infarction models but in the last years mice became the animals of choice for the analysis of several diseases, due to their short life cycle and the possibility of genetic manipulation. Many techniques are currently used for cardiovascular imaging in mice, including X-ray computed tomography (CT), high-resolution ultrasound, magnetic resonance imaging, and nuclear medicine procedures. Cardiac positron emission tomography (PET) allows to examine noninvasively, on a molecular level and with high sensitivity, regional changes in myocardial perfusion, metabolism, apoptosis, inflammation, and gene expression or to measure changes in anatomical and functional parameters in heart diseases. Currently hybrid PET/CT scanners for small laboratory animals are available, where CT adds high-resolution anatomical information. This paper reviews mouse models of myocardial infarction and discusses the applications of dedicated PET/CT systems technology, including animal preparation, anesthesia, radiotracers, and images postprocessing.