bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
A Sorting Network on Trees
Authors: Banerjee Avah , Richards Dana
Published: December 2019

Sorting networks are a class of parallel oblivious sorting algorithms. Not only do they have interesting theoretical properties but they can be fabricated. A sorting network is a sequence of parallel compare-exchange operations using comparators which are grouped into stages. This underlying graph defines the topology of the network. The majority of results on sorting networks concern the unrestricted case where the underlying graph is the complete graph. Prior results are also known for paths, hypercubes, and meshes. In this paper we introduce a sorting network whose underlying topology is a tree and formalize the concept of sorting networks on a restricted graph topology by introducing a new parameter for graphs called its sorting number. The main result of the paper is a description of an [Formula: see text] depth sorting network on a tree with maximum degree [Formula: see text].
On the model dependence of fiducial cross-section measurements
Authors: Facini Gabriel , Merkotan Kyrylo , Schott Matthias , Sydorenko Alexander
Published: December 2019

Fiducial production cross-section measurements of Standard Model processes, in principle, provide constraints on new physics scenarios via a comparison of the predicted Standard Model cross-section and the observed cross-section. This approach received significant attention in recent years, both from direct constraints on specific models and the interpretation of measurements in the view of effective field theories. A generic problem in the reinterpretation of Standard Model measurements is the corrections application of to data to account for detector effects. These corrections inherently assume the Standard Model to be valid, thus implying a model bias of the final result. In this work, we study the size of this bias by studying several new physics models and fiducial phase–space regions. The studies are based on fast detector simulations of a generic multi-purpose detector at the Large Hadron Collider. We conclude that the model bias in the associated reinterpretations is negligible only in specific cases, however, typically on the same level as systematic uncertainties of the available measurements.
A systematic study of the ground state properties of W, Os and Pt isotopes using HFB theory
Authors: Ashok Nithu , Joseph Antony
Published: December 2019

A systematic study of the ground state properties of transitional nuclei W, Os and Pt is conducted with the help of Skyrme–Hartree–Fock–Bogoliubov theory. Different Skyrme interactions are employed in the study. Two different bases, harmonic oscillator and transformed harmonic oscillator, are used in our investigation. 2[Formula: see text]-separation energy, charge radii, neutron and proton rms radii, neutron skin thickness and deformation parameter have been estimated. The results obtained are in good agreement with the available experimental values.
The Euler–Poincaré characteristic of joint reductions and mixed multiplicities
Authors: Thanh Truong Thi Hong , Viet Duong Quoc
Published: December 2019

This paper defines the Euler–Poincaré characteristic of joint reductions of ideals which concerns the maximal terms in the Hilbert polynomial; characterizes the positivity of mixed multiplicities in terms of minimal joint reductions; proves the additivity and other elementary properties for mixed multiplicities. The results of the paper together with the results of [Thanh and Viet, Mixed multiplicities of maximal degrees, J. Korean Math. Soc. 55(3) (2018) 605–622] seem to show a natural and nice picture of mixed multiplicities of maximal degrees.
On coseparable and 𝔪-coseparable modules
Authors: Ech-chaouy Rachid , Idelhadj Abdelouahab , Tribak Rachid
Published: December 2019

A module [Formula: see text] is called coseparable ([Formula: see text]-coseparable) if for every submodule [Formula: see text] of [Formula: see text] such that [Formula: see text] is finitely generated ([Formula: see text] is simple), there exists a direct summand [Formula: see text] of [Formula: see text] such that [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] is finitely generated. In this paper, we show that free modules are coseparable. We also investigate whether or not the ([Formula: see text]-)coseparability is stable under taking submodules, factor modules, direct summands, direct sums and direct products. We show that a finite direct sum of coseparable modules is not, in general, coseparable. But the class of [Formula: see text]-coseparable modules is closed under finite direct sums. Moreover, it is shown that the class of coseparable modules over noetherian rings is closed under finite direct sums. A characterization of coseparable modules over noetherian rings is provided. It is also shown that every lifting (H-supplemented) module is coseparable ([Formula: see text]-coseparable).
Building Blocks of Successful Digital Transformation: Complementing Technology and Market Issues
Authors: Lichtenthaler Ulrich
Published: December 2019

Strategic transformation is the primary reason why digitalization, artificial intelligence and related changes are on the top of most corporate agendas. Currently, many firms have completed the stage of strategy formulation for their digital transformation and are in the phase of strategy implementation. Here, many firms face major difficulties, which often result from an emphasis on technology issues at the expense of market-related issues. Following the innovation-based view and a conceptual framework of technology push and market pull effects, this conceptual paper presents important building blocks of successful digital transformation. On this basis, it illustrates the typical focus of most firms at present and highlights the limitations of these approaches. To overcome these limitations, several implementation steps are presented. As such, this paper contributes to research into digital transformation and artificial intelligence as well as into managing strategic renewal in light of technological change.
Facile Synthesis of MoS2 Hierarchical Nanostructures as Electrodes for Capacitor with Enhanced Pseudocapacitive Property
Authors: Luo Shiting , Xu Limei , Li Jinshan , Yang Wenjing , Liu Minli , Ma Lin
Published: December 2019

In this work, the 3D porous hierarchical MoS2 nanostructures were prepared via a simple hydrothermal deposition method only utilizing titanium (Ti) mesh as a substrate. The as-synthesized uniform MoS2 flower-like nanostructures were assembled by nanosheets composed of several stacking layers. The curved and rough surface of cylindrical Ti wire was beneficial to assembly of MoS2 nanosheets into hierarchical architectures. Moreover, the electrochemical performance of the as-prepared MoS2 nanostructured electrodes for capacitors was also investigated. The structural advantages lead to a remarkably improved pseudocapacitive property including high capacitance and durable cycling ability.
Rewritable Spiropyran/Polyacrylonitrile Hybrid Nanofiber Membrane Prepared by Electrospinning
Authors: Bao Bingwei , Fan Ji , Xu Rui , Wang Wei , Yu Dan
Published: December 2019

Photochromic materials aroused enormous interest due to their potential application for rewritable paper, smart labeling and sensor devices. In this paper, we proposed to dissolve spiropyran (SP, photochromic material) and polyacrylonitrile (PAN, polymer matrix) in dimethyl fumarate (DMF) to prepare photochromic nanofibers by electrospinning. The target SP compounds were featured by FTIR, ultraviolet (UV) and 1HNMR, and the nanofibers were characterized by FTIR, UV-vis spectra, scanning electron microscope (SEM), thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) and contact angle (CA). The test results demonstrated that photochromic SP was synthesized successfully, and the nanofiber membrane possesses extraordinary color-converting properties including obvious color change from white to purple, reversible fast switching between two colors when exposed to UV light and achieve maximum color change in 1[Formula: see text]min, and switchable hydrophilic and hydrophobic properties as well as excellent photo-fatigue resistance over 20 cycles. In addition, it has good thermal stability allowing it to be used under harsh conditions. In view of the above characteristics, we believe that the as-prepared nanofiber film will be a promising reusable writing substrate.
High-resolution carbon isotope stratigraphy of the Lower and Middle Ordovician succession of the Yangtze Platform, China: implications for global correlation
Authors: Wu Rongchang , Liu Jianbo , Calner Mikael , Gong Fangyi , Lehnert Oliver , Luan Xiaocong , Li Lixia , Zhan Renbin
Published: December 2019

The Lower and Middle Ordovician of the Yangtze Platform, China, is characterized by a sedimentary succession dominated by carbonate rocks. Three sections spanning the Nantsinkuan/Lunshan, Fenhsiang, Hunghuayuan, and Dawan/Zitai formations, corresponding to the Tremadocian–Dapingian in age, have been sampled for high-resolution δ
13
C chemostratigraphy (542 samples in total). Our new δ
13
C data reveal five tie-points with the potential for global correlation: (1) a positive δ
13
C excursion in the lower Nantsinkuan Formation within the Tremadocian
Rossodus manitouensis
Zone; (2) an excursion with two peaks roughly within the late Tremadocian
Paltodus
‘
deltifer
’ Zone; (3) a positive δ
13
C shift in the lower Hunghuayuan Formation, within the early Floian
Serratognathus diversus
Zone; (4) a gradual positive δ
13
C shift in the late Floian, ranging from the uppermost
S. diversus
Zone to the basal
Oepikodus evae
Zone; (5) a minor negative shift in the lower Dawan/Zitai Formation, within the early Dapingian
Baltoniodus triangularis
Zone. These excursions are herein used for correlation of the Yangtze Platform strata with successions from South China, North China, the Argentine Precordillera, North America and Baltica. From a palaeogeographical perspective the Gudongkou, Xiangshuidong and Daling sections represent depositional environments along an inner to outer ramp profile. δ
13
C data from these sections show successively heavier (higher) δ
13
C values with increasing depositional depth. This is interpreted as due to remineralization of organic carbon within the carbonate rocks.

Supplementary material:
Carbon and oxygen isotope data are available at:
https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.4767080
Algorithm 999
Authors: Speleers Hendrik
Published: December 2019

Multi-degree splines are smooth piecewise-polynomial functions where the pieces can have different degrees. We describe a simple algorithmic construction of a set of basis functions for the space of multi-degree splines with similar properties to standard B-splines. These basis functions are called
multi-degree B-splines
(or
MDB-splines
). The construction relies on an extraction operator that represents all MDB-splines as linear combinations of local B-splines of different degrees. This enables the use of existing efficient algorithms for B-spline evaluations and refinements in the context of multi-degree splines. A M
ATLAB
implementation is provided to illustrate the computation and use of MDB-splines.
Algorithm 1000
Authors: Davis Timothy A.
Published: December 2019

SuiteSparse:GraphBLAS is a full implementation of the GraphBLAS standard, which defines a set of sparse matrix operations on an extended algebra of semirings using an almost unlimited variety of operators and types. When applied to sparse adjacency matrices, these algebraic operations are equivalent to computations on graphs. GraphBLAS provides a powerful and expressive framework for creating graph algorithms based on the elegant mathematics of sparse matrix operations on a semiring. An overview of the GraphBLAS specification is given, followed by a description of the key features and performance of its implementation in the SuiteSparse:GraphBLAS package.
Learning Discriminative Sentiment Representation from Strongly- and Weakly Supervised CNNs
Authors: She Dongyu , Sun Ming , Yang Jufeng
Published: December 2019

Visual sentiment analysis is attracting increasing attention with the rapidly growing amount of images uploaded to social networks. Learning rich visual representations often requires training deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) on massive manually labeled data, which is expensive or scarce especially for a subjective task like visual sentiment analysis. Meanwhile, a large quantity of social images is quite available yet noisy by querying social networks using the sentiment categories as keywords, where various types of images related to the specific sentiment can be easily collected. In this article, we propose a multiple kernel network for visual sentiment recognition, which learns representation from strongly- and weakly supervised CNNs. Specifically, the weakly supervised deep model is trained using the large-scale data from social images, whereas the strongly supervised deep model is fine tuned on the affecitve datasets with manual annotation. We employ the multiple kernel scheme on the multiple layers of CNNs, which can automatically select the discriminative representation by learning a linear combination from a set of pre-defined kernels. In addition, we introduce a large-scale dataset collected from popular comics of various countries, such as America, Japan, China, and France, which consists of 11,821 images with various artistic styles. Experimental results show that the multiple kernel network achieves consistent improvements over the state-of-the-art methods on the public affective datasets, as well as the newly established Comics dataset. The Comics dataset can be found at http://cv.nankai.edu.cn/projects/Comic.
High-Performance Derivative Computations using CoDiPack
Authors: Sagebaum Max , Albring Tim , Gauger Nicolas R.
Published: December 2019

There are several AD tools available that all implement different strategies for the reverse mode of AD. The most common strategies are primal value taping (implemented e.g. by ADOL-C) and Jacobian taping (implemented e.g. by Adept and dco/c++). Particulary for Jacobian taping, recent advances using expression templates make it very attractive for large scale software. However, the current implementations are either closed source or miss essential features and flexibility. Therefore, we present the new AD tool CoDiPack (Code Differentiation Package) in this paper. It is specifically designed for minimal memory consumption and optimal runtime, such that it can be used for the differentiation of large scale software. An essential part of the design of CoDiPack is the modular layout and the recursive data structures which not only allow the efficient implementation of the Jacobian taping approach but will also enable other approaches like the primal value taping or new research ideas. We will finally present the performance values of CoDiPack on a generic PDE example and on the SU2 code.
A Hierarchical CNN-RNN Approach for Visual Emotion Classification
Authors: Li Liang , Zhu Xinge , Hao Yiming , Wang Shuhui , Gao Xingyu , Huang Qingming
Published: December 2019

Visual emotion classification is predicting emotional reactions of people for the given visual content. Psychological studies show that human emotions are affected by various visual stimuli from low level to high level, including contrast, color, texture, scene, object, and association, among others. Traditional approaches regarded different levels of stimuli as independent components and ignored to effectively fuse different stimuli. This article proposes a hierarchical convolutional neural network (CNN)-recurrent neural network (RNN) approach to predict the emotion based on the fused stimuli by exploiting the dependency among different-level features. First, we introduce a dual CNN to extract different levels of visual stimulus, where two related loss functions are designed to learn the stimuli representation under a multi-task learning structure. Further, to model the dependency between the low- and high-level stimulus, a stacked bi-directional RNN is proposed to fuse the preceding learned features from the dual CNN. Comparison experiments on one large-scale and three small scale datasets show that the proposed approach brings significant improvement. Ablation experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of different modules from our model.
Replicated Computational Results (RCR) Report for “Code Generation for Generally Mapped Finite Elements”
Authors: Lindquist Neil
Published: December 2019

“Code Generation for Generally Mapped Finite Elements” includes performance results for the finite element methods discussed in that manuscript. The authors provided a Zenodo archive with the Firedrake components and dependencies used, as well as the scripts that generated the results. The software was installed on two similar platforms; then, new results were gathered and compared to the original results. After completing this process, the results have been deemed replicable by the reviewer.
On Kummer Lines with Full Rational 2-torsion and Their Usage in Cryptography
Authors: Hisil Huseyin , Renes Joost
Published: December 2019

A paper by Karati and Sarkar at Asiacrypt’17 has pointed out the potential for Kummer lines in genus 1, by observing that their SIMD-friendly arithmetic is competitive with the status quo. A more recent preprint explores the connection with (twisted) Edwards curves. In this article, we extend this work and significantly simplify the treatment of Karati and Sarkar. We show that their Kummer line is the
x
-line of a Montgomery curve translated by a point of order two, and exhibit a natural isomorphism to the
y
-line of a twisted Edwards curve. Moreover, we show that the Kummer line presented by Gaudry and Lubicz can be obtained via the action of a point of order two on the
y
-line of an Edwards curve. The maps connecting these curves and lines are all very simple. As a result, a cryptographic implementation can use the arithmetic that is optimal for its instruction set at negligible cost.
AI education matters
Authors: Neumann Marion
Published: December 2019

Traditionally artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) courses are taught at the senior and graduate level in higher-education computer science curricula following the
mastery learning
strategy, cf. Figure 1. This makes sense, since most AI and ML models and the theory behind them require a substantial understanding of probability and statistics, as well as advanced calculus and matrix algebra. To understand Logistic Regression as a probabilistic classifier performing maximum-likelihood or maximum-a-posteriori estimation, for example, students need to understand joint and conditional probability distributions. In order to derive the back propagation algorithm to train Neural Networks students need to understand partial derivatives and inner and outer tensor products. These are just two of many examples where substantial mathematical background - typically taught at the junior level in a computer science major program - is required. With AI and ML algorithms being used more widely by enterprises across domains, as well as, in applications and services we use in our daily lives, it makes sense to raise awareness about what AI is, what it can and cannot do, and how it is used to solve problems to a broader audience. Very much in the same spirit as the "CS for all" idea (https://www.csforall.org), we have to extend our curricula to include introductory courses to AI and ML on the early undergraduate level (or even in high-school) to expose students to the ideas and working principles of AI technology. One way to achieve this is to introduce the principles of working with data, modeling, and learning through the data science workflow.
Advancing non-convex and constrained learning
Authors: Yang Tianbao
Published: December 2019

As data gets more complex and applications of machine learning (ML) algorithms for decision-making broaden and diversify, traditional ML methods by minimizing an unconstrained or simply constrained convex objective are becoming increasingly unsatisfactory. To address this new challenge, recent ML research has sparked a
paradigm shift
in learning predictive models into non-convex learning and heavily constrained learning. Non-Convex Learning (NCL) refers to a family of learning methods that involve optimizing non-convex objectives. Heavily Constrained Learning (HCL) refers to a family of learning methods that involve constraints that are much more complicated than a simple norm constraint (e.g., data-dependent functional constraints, non-convex constraints), as in conventional learning. This paradigm shift has already created many promising outcomes: (i) non-convex deep learning has brought breakthroughs for learning representations from
large-scale structured data
(e.g., images, speech) (LeCun, Bengio, & Hinton, 2015; Krizhevsky, Sutskever, & Hinton, 2012; Amodei et al., 2016; Deng & Liu, 2018); (ii) non-convex regularizers (e.g., for enforcing sparsity or low-rank) could be more effective than their convex counterparts for learning
high-dimensional structured models
(C.-H. Zhang & Zhang, 2012; J. Fan & Li, 2001; C.-H. Zhang, 2010; T. Zhang, 2010); (iii) constrained learning is being used to learn predictive models that satisfy various constraints to
respect social norms
(e.g., fairness) (B. E. Woodworth, Gunasekar, Ohannessian, & Srebro, 2017; Hardt, Price, Srebro, et al., 2016; Zafar, Valera, Gomez Rodriguez, & Gummadi, 2017; A. Agarwal, Beygelzimer, Dudík, Langford, & Wallach, 2018), to
improve the interpretability
(Gupta et al., 2016; Canini, Cotter, Gupta, Fard, & Pfeifer, 2016; You, Ding, Canini, Pfeifer, & Gupta, 2017), to
enhance the robustness
(Globerson & Roweis, 2006a; Sra, Nowozin, & Wright, 2011; T. Yang, Mahdavi, Jin, Zhang, & Zhou, 2012), etc. In spite of great promises brought by these new learning paradigms, they also bring emerging challenges to the design of computationally efficient algorithms for
big data
and the analysis of their statistical properties.
Making Aging Useful by Recycling Aging-induced Clock Skew
Authors: Tseng Tien-Hung , Chou Chung-Han , Wu Kai-Chiang
Published: December 2019

Device aging, which causes significant loss on circuit performance and lifetime, has been a primary factor in reliability degradation of nanoscale designs. In this article, we propose to take advantage of aging-induced clock skews (i.e., make them useful for aging tolerance) by manipulating and recycling these time-varying skews to compensate for the performance degradation of logic networks. The goal is to assign achievable/reasonable aging-induced clock skews in a circuit, such that its effective performance degradation due to aging can be tolerated. On average, 21.21% aging tolerance can be achieved with insignificant design overhead. Moreover, we employ
V

th

assignment on clock buffers to further tolerate the aging-induced degradation of logic networks. When
V

th

assignment is applied on top of aforementioned aging manipulation, the average aging tolerance can be enhanced to 29.15%.
Affective Computing for Large-scale Heterogeneous Multimedia Data
Authors: Zhao Sicheng , Wang Shangfei , Soleymani Mohammad , Joshi Dhiraj , Ji Qiang
Published: December 2019

The wide popularity of digital photography and social networks has generated a rapidly growing volume of multimedia data (i.e., images, music, and videos), resulting in a great demand for managing, retrieving, and understanding these data. Affective computing (AC) of these data can help to understand human behaviors and enable wide applications. In this article, we survey the state-of-the-art AC technologies comprehensively for large-scale heterogeneous multimedia data. We begin this survey by introducing the typical emotion representation models from psychology that are widely employed in AC. We briefly describe the available datasets for evaluating AC algorithms. We then summarize and compare the representative methods on AC of different multimedia types, i.e., images, music, videos, and multimodal data, with the focus on both handcrafted features-based methods and deep learning methods. Finally, we discuss some challenges and future directions for multimedia affective computing.
Skype & Type
Authors: Cecconello Stefano , Compagno Alberto , Conti Mauro , Lain Daniele , Tsudik Gene
Published: December 2019

Voice-over-IP (VoIP) software are among the most widely spread and pervasive software, counting millions of monthly users. However, we argue that people ignore the drawbacks of transmitting information along with their voice, such as keystroke sounds—as such sound can reveal what someone is typing on a keyboard.

In this article, we present and assess a new keyboard acoustic eavesdropping attack that involves VoIP, called
Skype & Type
(
S&T
). Unlike previous attacks,
S&T
assumes a weak adversary model that is very practical in many real-world settings. Indeed,
S&T
is very feasible, as it does not require (i) the attacker to be physically close to the victim (either in person or with a recording device) and (ii) precise profiling of the victim’s typing style and keyboard; moreover, it can work with a very small amount of leaked keystrokes. We observe that leakage of keystrokes during a VoIP call is likely, as people often “multi-task” during such calls. As expected, VoIP software acquires and faithfully transmits all sounds, including emanations of pressed keystrokes, which can include passwords and other sensitive information. We show that one very popular VoIP software (Skype) conveys enough audio information to reconstruct the victim’s input—keystrokes typed on the remote keyboard. Our results demonstrate that, given some knowledge on the victim’s typing style and keyboard model, the attacker attains top-5 accuracy of 91.7% in guessing a random key pressed by the victim. This work extends previous results on
S&T
, demonstrating that our attack is effective with many different recording devices (such as laptop microphones, headset microphones, and smartphones located in proximity of the target keyboard), diverse typing styles and speed, and is particularly threatening when the victim is typing in a known language.
In-Route Task Selection in Spatial Crowdsourcing
Authors: Costa Camila F. , Nascimento Mario A.
Published: December 2019

Consider a city’s road network and a worker who is traveling on a given path from a starting point
s
to a destination
d
(e.g., from school or work to home) in said network. Consider further that there is a set of tasks in the network available to be performed, where each such task takes a certain amount of time to be completed and yields a positive reward if completed, and, finally, that the worker is willing to deviate from his/her path as long as the travel time to the selected tasks plus the time taken for completing them does not exceed a given time budget. We call this problem the
In-Route Task Selection
(IRTS) problem and consider two variants thereof. In the first one, named IRTS-SP, we assume that the worker only specifies
s
and
d
and he/she wants to consider alternative paths that deviate (cost-wise) as little as possible from the cost of the
shortest path
connecting
s
and
d
. In the second variant, named IRTS-PP, we assume that the worker has a
preferred path
from
s
to
d
and wants to travel along that one path for as long as possible. The latter is practically relevant in cases where the worker has a path other than the shortest one that is more desirable for non-objective reasons, e.g., availability of public transit, bicycle-friendliness or perceived safety. Common to both variants though, we assume that the worker wants to maximize the rewards collected by completing tasks. Clearly, there are now two conflicting criteria for the worker to contemplate when considering which tasks to perform: minimizing path deviation and maximizing collected reward. In this context, we investigate both IRTS variants using the
skyline paradigm
in order to obtain the set of non-dominated solutions w.r.t. the tradeoffs between earned rewards and deviation from either the cost of the shortest path, in the case of IRTS-SP, or the actual preferred path, in the case of IRTS-PP. Returning the skyline set of solutions to workers is of practical interest as it empowers them, e.g., it allows them to decide, at query time, which tasks suit them better. We propose exact and heuristic approaches in order to solve both variants of the IRTS problem. Our experiments, using real city-scale datasets, show that while the exact approaches serve as benchmarks, they do not scale due to the NP-hardness of the problems. The overall best heuristic approach, on the other hand, can solve relatively large instances of the IRTS problems within practical query processing time, e.g., at par with less effective greedy heuristics, while still producing very good approximate skyline sets, e.g., often yielding less than 10% relative error w.r.t. the exact solution.
Emotional Conversation Generation Based on a Bayesian Deep Neural Network
Authors: Sun Xiao , Li Jia , Wei Xing , Li Changliang , Tao Jianhua
Published: December 2019

The field of conversation generation using neural networks has attracted increasing attention from researchers for several years. However, traditional neural language models tend to generate a generic reply with poor semantic logic and no emotion. This article proposes an emotional conversation generation model based on a Bayesian deep neural network that can generate replies with rich emotions, clear themes, and diverse sentences. The topic and emotional keywords of the replies are pregenerated by introducing commonsense knowledge in the model. The reply is divided into multiple clauses, and then a multidimensional generator based on the transformer mechanism proposed in this article is used to iteratively generate clauses from two dimensions: sentence granularity and sentence structure. Subjective and objective experiments prove that compared with existing models, the proposed model effectively improves the semantic logic and emotional accuracy of replies. This model also significantly enhances the diversity of replies, largely overcoming the shortcomings of traditional models that generate safe replies.
Tsunami Modeling for the Deep Sea and Inside Focal Areas
Authors: Saito Tatsuhiko , Kubota Tatsuya
Published: December 2019

This article reviews tsunami modeling and its relation to recent developments of deep-ocean observations. Unlike near-coast observations, deep-ocean observations have enabled the capture of short-wavelength dispersive tsunamis and reflected waves from the coast. By analyzing these waves, researchers can estimate tsunami sources and earthquake slip distributions more reliably with higher spatial resolution. In addition, fractional tsunami speed reduction due to the elasticity of the Earth medium is now clearly detected. Densely and widely distributed tsunami sensors make it possible to observe tsunamis inside the earthquake focal area, and understanding tsunami generation mechanisms is increasingly important. In order to describe the generation field, we should consider seismic waves overlapping tsunami signals in addition to vertical and horizontal displacements at the sea bottom. The importance of elastic dynamics, in addition to fluid dynamics, is increasing in order for researchers to fully understand tsunami phenomena using the new offshore and inside focal area observations. ▪  Deep-ocean observations have advanced tsunami propagation modeling. ▪  New deep-ocean observations in earthquake focal areas are expected to detect in situ tsunami generation caused by megathrust earthquakes. ▪  The importance of elastic dynamics, in addition to fluid dynamics, is increasing to help researchers fully understand mechanics in tsunami generation and propagation. ▪  Tsunami modeling including earthquake rupture and seismic waves contributes to mega-thrust earthquake investigation and disaster mitigation.
Effect of sex differences in treatment response to angioplasty in a murine arteriovenous fistula model
Authors: Cai Chuanqi , Zhao Chenglei , Kilari Sreenivasulu , Sharma Amit , Singh Avishek K. , Simeon Michael L. , Misra Avanish , Li Yiqing , Misra Sanjay
Published: December 2019

Failure to mature and venous neointimal hyperplasia formation are the two major causes of hemodialysis arteriovenous fistula (AVF) vascular access failure. Percutaneous transluminal angioplasty (PTA) is the firstline treatment for both of these conditions, but, clinically, women have decreased patency rates compared with men. The hypothesis to be tested in the present study was that female mice after PTA of venous areas of higher intimal thickening have increased gene expression of transforming growth factor-β1 (TGF-β1) and TGF-β receptor 1 (TGFβ-R1) accompanied with histological changes of fibrosis compared with male mice. Seventeen male and eighteen female C57BL/6J mice were used in this study. Chronic kidney disease was induced by partial nephrectomy, and, 28 days later, an AVF was created to connect the left carotid artery to the right jugular vein. Two weeks later, the higher intimal thickening area was treated with PTA, and mice were euthanized 3 days later for gene expression analysis or 14 days later for histopathological analysis. Doppler ultrasound was performed weekly after AVF creation. At day 3, female AVF had significantly higher average gene expression of TGF-β1 and TGFβ-R1 compared with male AVF. At day 14, female outflow veins had a smaller venous diameter, lumen vessel area, decreased wall shear stress, lower average peak systolic velocity, and an increased neointima area-to-media area ratio. Moreover, female outflow veins showed a significant increase in α-smooth muscle actin and fibroblast-specific protein-1. There was a decrease in M1/M2 with an increase in CD68.
Protein arginine methyltransferase 1 mediates renal fibroblast activation and fibrogenesis through activation of Smad3 signaling
Authors: Zhu Yu , Yu Chao , Zhuang Shougang
Published: December 2019

Protein arginine methyltransferase 1 (PRMT1), which primarily causes asymmetric arginine methylation of histone and nonhistone proteins, has been found to activate gene expression and mediate multiple pathological processes. Its role in renal fibrosis, however, remains unclear. In the present study, we observed that PRMT1 and its specific epigenetic marker, asymmetric di-methylated histone 4 arginine 3 (H4R3Me2a), were highly expressed in cultured renal interstitial fibroblasts. Treatment of PRMT1 with AMI-1, a selective inhibitor of PRMT1, or silencing PRMT1 with siRNA inhibited serum-induced and transforming growth factor (TGF)-β1-induced expression of α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) and collagen type I, two hallmarks of renal fibroblast activation, in a dose-dependent and time-dependent manner. In a murine model of renal fibrosis induced by unilateral ureteral obstruction, PRMT1 expression and H4R3Me2a were also upregulated, which was coincident with increased expression of α-SMA, collagen type I, and fibronectin. Administration of AMI-1 reduced PRMT1 and H4R3Me2a expression, attenuated extracellular matrix protein deposition, and inhibited renal fibroblast activation and proliferation. Moreover, AMI-1 treatment inhibited Smad3 phosphorylation and TGF-β receptor I expression but prevented Smad7 downregulation both in the kidney after unilateral ureteral obstruction injury and in cultured renal interstitial fibroblasts exposed to TGF-β1. Collectively, these results demonstrate that PRMT1 may mediate renal fibroblast activation and renal fibrosis development through activation of the TGF-β/Smad3 signaling pathway. They also suggest that PRMT1 inhibition may be a potential therapeutic approach for the treatment of fibrotic kidney disease.
TAK1 deficiency attenuates cisplatin-induced acute kidney injury
Authors: Zhou Jun , An Changlong , Jin Xiaogao , Hu Zhaoyong , Safirstein Robert L. , Wang Yanlin
Published: December 2019

Cisplatin can cause acute kidney injury (AKI), but the molecular mechanisms are not well understood. The objective of the present study was to examine the role of transforming growth factor-β-activated kinase-1 (TAK1) in the pathogenesis of cisplatin-induced AKI. Wild-type mice and proximal tubule TAK1-deficient mice were treated with vehicle or cisplatin. Compared with wild-type control mice, proximal tubule TAK1-deficient mice had less severe kidney dysfunction, tubular damage, and apoptosis after cisplatin–induced AKI. Furthermore, conditional disruption of TAK1 in proximal tubular epithelial cells reduced caspase-3 activation, proinflammatory molecule expression, and JNK phosphorylation in the kidney in cisplatin-induced AKI. Taken together, cisplatin activates TAK1-JNK signaling pathway to promote tubular epithelial cell apoptosis and inflammation in cisplatin-induced AKI. Targeting TAK1 could be a novel therapeutic strategy against cisplatin-induced AKI.
Effects of the New Lift-Thrust Operation in Laser Acupuncture Investigated by Thermal Imaging
Authors: Lan Kun-Chan , Wang Chih-Yu , Kuo Che-Chang , Chang Shu-Chen , Lin Hsi-An , Wu Xin-Yu , Ding Jia-Yu , Litscher Gerhard
Published: December 2019

Acupuncture manipulation is one of the key factors affecting the performance of acupuncture in Traditional Chinese Medicine. Lift-thrust and twirl-twist are two of the most commonly used manipulation methods for needle acupuncture. We previously have developed a novel laser acupuncture model that emulates lift-thrust operation. In this study, we intend to show the effectiveness of such a model by applying it on the Neiguan acupoint (PC6). Stimulation was reported to be beneficial for improving cardiac output and peripheral circulation. Therefore, we hypothesized that the stimulation of laser acupuncture may increase the temperature of the subjects’ fingertip due to increased peripheral blood flow. A thermal imager was used to measure the temperature change of subjects’ fingertips. Through regression analysis, it has been shown that while PC6 is stimulated, laser acupuncture with lift-thrust operation caused a more rapid, stable, and lasting temperature rise of fingertip than that without lift-thrust operation. On the contrary, we observe no significant temperature change when a sham point nearby PC6 (a point which is not traditionally defined as the acupoint) was stimulated. Our results suggest the emulation of manipulation methods such as the lift-thrust operation could be a potential direction for the future development of laser acupuncture.
Exploring Critical Success Factors for Green Housing Projects: An Empirical Survey of Urban Areas in China
Authors: Sang Peidong , Yao Haona
Published: December 2019

The trend of China’s construction industry has gradually shifted from traditional high‐consumption to efficient green development mode to achieve the new goals of energy conservation, emission reduction, and sustainable development. The successful development of green housing (GH) has become a major strategic choice. Given the smooth implementation and delivery of GH projects, this study aimed to assess the impact of critical success factors (CSFs) on GH development by identifying controllable CSFs. Firstly, 20 controllable CSFs were identified through literature review. Secondly, the data collected by the questionnaire were used for principal component analysis (PCA). The factor analysis showed that the CSFs can be summarised into five important principal components, namely, (1) project management factors, (2) personnel ability factors, (3) teamwork‐oriented factors, (4) human resource factors, and (5) financial and constraint factors. Finally, multiple regression analysis was used to assess the importance of CSFs. Results showed that project management factors, personnel capacity factors, and financial and constraint factors exerted positive impact on the successful development of the projects, with project management factors having the greatest impact. This work provides not only useful information and practical guidance for enterprises in GH development practice but also certain reference value for building a sustainable development society in China.
Combination of Erlotinib and Naproxen Employing Pulsatile or Intermittent Dosing Profoundly Inhibits Urinary Bladder Cancers
Authors: Mohammed Altaf , Miller Mark Steven , Lubet Ronald A. , Suen Chen S. , Sei Shizuko , Shoemaker Robert H. , Juliana Margaret M. , Moeinpour Fariba L. , Grubbs Clinton J.
Published: December 2019

Daily dosing of either NSAIDs or EGFR inhibitors has been shown to prevent bladder cancer development in a N-butyl-(4-hydroxybutyl)nitrosamine (OH-BBN)-induced rat model. However, these inhibitors cause gastrointestinal ulceration and acneiform rash, respectively, limiting their continuous use in a clinical prevention setting. We studied chemopreventive efficacy of pulsatile dosing of EGFR inhibitor erlotinib (42 mg/kg BW, once/week) combined with intermittent or continuous low doses of the NSAID naproxen (30 mg/kg BW/day, 3 weeks on/off or 128 ppm daily in diet) in the OH-BBN induced rat bladder cancer model. The interventions were started either at 1 or 4 weeks (early intervention) or 3 months (delayed intervention) after the last OH-BBN treatment, by which time the rats had developed microscopic bladder lesions. All combination regimens tested as early versus late intervention led to the reduction of the average bladder tumor weights (54%–82%; P < 0.01 to P < 0.0001), a decrease in tumor multiplicity (65%–85%; P < 0.01 to P < 0.0001), and a decrease in the number of rats with large palpable tumors (>200 mg; 83%–90%; P < 0.01 to P < 0.0001). Levels of signal transduction markers, Ki-67, cyclin D1, IL1β, pSTAT3, and pERK, were significantly (P < 0.05 to P < 0.001) reduced in the treated tumors, demonstrating their potential utility as predictive markers for efficacy. These findings demonstrate that significant chemopreventive efficacy could be achieved with alternative intervention regimens designed to reduce the toxicity of agents, and that starting erlotinib and/or naproxen treatments at the time microscopic tumors were present still conferred the efficacy.
Auswirkungen der Rebiopsie auf die Prognose von Patienten mit fortgeschrittenem nicht kleinzelligem Bronchialkarzinom nach Behandlung mit epidermalem Wachstumsfaktor-Rezeptor-Tyrosinkinase-Hemmer: ein systematischer Überblick
Authors: Imakita Takuma , Matsumoto Hirotaka , Hirano Katsuya , Morisawa Toshiyuki , Sakurai Azusa , Kataoka Yuki
Published: December 2019

Hintergrund: Osimertinib, ein epidermaler Wachstumsfaktorrezeptor-Tyrosinkinasehemmer (Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor-Tyrosine-kinase Inhibitor, EGFR-TKI) der 3. Generation, ist mittlerweile die Standardtherapie in Fällen, in denen die Rebiopsie nach der Erstlinienbehandlung mit EGFR-TKI eine T790M-Mutation ergibt. Die Prognose der Patienten nach Rebiopsie, dem wichtigsten Outcome bei Krebspatienten, wurde bislang jedoch nicht ausreichend beschrieben. Die vorliegende systematische Übersichtsarbeit sollte klären, ob die Rebiopsie bei Patienten, die gegenüber den EGFR-TKI der 1. und 2. Generation refraktär sind, zu einer verbesserten Prognose beiträgt. Methoden: Mithilfe freier Wort- und Kontrollbegriffe im Zusammenhang mit «nicht kleinzelligem Bronchialkarzinom» und «Rebiopsie» suchten wir Studien aus dem Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System Online über PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials und die World Health Organization International Clinical Trials Registry Platform. Eingeschlossen wurden Kohortenstudien und Fallberichte in englischer Sprache und es erfolgte eine Beurteilung, ob die jeweilige Studie unsere wissenschaftliche Fragestellung beantwortete. Ergebnisse: Von den 144 eingeschlossenen Studien enthielt nur eine Studie Angaben zur Prognose von Patienten mit/ohne Rebiopsie und zeigte, dass bei EGFR-TKI-refraktären Patienten mit nicht kleinzelligem Bronchialkarzinom das Überleben nach Krankheitsprogression (post-progression survival, PPS) bei Patienten, die eine Rebiopsie sowie eine Behandlung entsprechend dem Resistenzmechanismus erhalten hatten, signifikant länger war (medianes PPS: 24,2 Monate) als bei Patienten die eine Rebiopsie und Salvage-Therapie erhalten hatten (medianes PPS: 15,2 Monate, p = 0,002) und solchen ohne Rebiopsie (medianes PPS: 9,7 Monate, p < 0,001). Die meisten anderen Studien berichteten über die Nachweisrate von T790M-Mutationen oder das Rebiopsieverfahren. Schlussfolgerungen: Nur wenige der bisher durchgeführten Studien untersuchten die Wirksamkeit der Rebiopsie. Daher sind weitere Untersuchungen erforderlich, um die Prognose oder Nebenwirkungen der Rebiopsie zu ermitteln.
Clinical Findings and Follow-Up of 46,XY and 45,X/46,XY Testicular Dysgenesis
Authors: Andrade Juliana G.R. , Fabbri-Scallet Helena , dos Santos Ana P. , Cools Martine , Werner Ralf , Hiort Olaf , de Mello Maricilda P. , Guerra-Júnior Gil , Maciel-Guerra Andrea T.
Published: December 2019

Historically, the terms partial (PGD) and mixed gonadal dysgenesis (MGD) have been used to describe incomplete testicular differentiation in individuals with 46,XY or 45,X/46,XY karyotypes, respectively. However, it is currently unclear to what extent clinical features actually differ between these individuals. The aim of this study was to compare clinical, laboratory, and histological findings in these 2 groups. Patients with testicular dysgenesis seen in our service between 1989 and 2013 were selected. Sixty-one patients met the inclusion criteria. Individuals with 46,XY and 45,X/46,XY karyotypes were compared regarding genital features, gonadal histology and function, growth, and associated conditions. Twenty-five had mosaicism with a 45,X cell line (MGD), while a 46,XY karyotype (PGD) was found in 36 cases belonging to 32 families. Mutations in NR5A1, WT1, and SRY genes associated with testicular dysgenesis were found in 12 families. There were no significant differences regarding parental consanguinity, degree of external androgenization, gonadal location, histology, and function, and associated conditions. However, in the MGD group, the presence of a uterus, lower birth weight and length, and short stature were more often observed. Therefore, the use of histological features to classify PDG and MGD should be abandoned and replaced by classification based on karyotype.
Imatinib-Induced Tremor in a Patient with Chronic Myeloid Leukemia in Chronic Phase
Authors: Obeidat Khaldun , Alsaud Arwa , Ashour Amr , Azrieh Bahjat , Abu-Tineh Mohammad , Mohamed Shehab Fareed , Yassin Mohamed A.
Published: December 2019

Chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) is a myeloproliferative neoplasm characterized by three phases: chronic, accelerated, and blast phase. However; first- and second-generation tyrosine kinase inhibitors are used for the treatment of CML with common and uncommon adverse events. Here, we report a 24-year-old male with CML in chronic phase started on imatinib as upfront medication who developed tremor and recovered spontenously after 3 years.