pinecone/core-2020-05-10-deduplication huggingface dataset:
Speech to sign language translation system for Spanish

This paper describes the development of and the first experiments in a Spanish to sign language translation system in a real domain. The developed system focuses on the sentences spoken by an official when assisting people applying for, or renewing their Identity Card. The system translates official explanations into Spanish Sign Language (LSE: Lengua de Signos Espan¿ola) for Deaf people. The translation system is made up of a speech recognizer (for decoding the spoken utterance into a word sequence), a natural language translator (for converting a word sequence into a sequence of signs belonging to the sign language), and a 3D avatar animation module (for playing back the hand movements). Two proposals for natural language translation have been evaluated: a rule-based translation module (that computes sign confidence measures from the word confidence measures obtained in the speech recognition module) and a statistical translation module (in this case, parallel corpora were used for training the statistical model). The best configuration reported 31.6% SER (Sign Error Rate) and 0.5780 BLEU (BiLingual Evaluation Understudy). The paper also describes the eSIGN 3D avatar animation module (considering the sign confidence), and the limitations found when implementing a strategy for reducing the delay between the spoken utterance and the sign sequence animation
An identification procedure for woolly soft-flesh peaches by instrumental assessment

Woolliness in peaches, a negative attribute of sensory texture characterized by the lack of crispness and juiciness, also known as mealiness in other fruits, has been identified fruit-by fruit by instrumental means. The use of a non-supervised clustering data analysis procedure, studying crispness and juiciness, enables four instrumental degrees of texture degradation to be defined, of which woolliness appears to be the last stage. This procedure also provides some information on several experimental factors (ripeness stages, storage time and storage temperature) with regard to the onset of woolliness. It is confirmed through this study that, in Maycrest peaches, woolliness starts to appear after 2 weeks of storage at 5°C. Fruits classified at harvest in 'first' and 'second' ripeness stages are more susceptible to woolliness than those in the third ripeness stage. This clustering procedure may also be effective for studying other species, varieties and quality attributes of fruit
Genetic control of sterol esterification in developing wheat endosperm

1. 1. The action of gene Pln, previously characterized by the sterol ester patterns of mature whole wheat kernels, has been found to be restricted to the endosperm and not to affect the embryo, the pericarp or the seed coat.\ud
2. 2. The dominant allele Pln, which determines a sterol ester pattern with palmitate as the main ester, is also responsible for a low level of free sterol at maturity. A high level of free sterol is associated with the recessive allele pln, which determines an ester pattern with linoleate as the main ester.\ud
3. 3. Divergence between the two phenotypes starts at about 21 days after anthesis, when cell proliferation has been completed, the aleurone layer has differentiated, and only cell enlargement is taking place. A marked increase in esterification, mainly by palmitate, which is controlled by the dominant allele, is concomitant with a sharp decrease in free sterol.\ud
4. 4. The increased net esterification is non-specific with respect to 4-demethyl sterols, because it affects the four main ones, namely sitosterol, stigmasterol, campesterol and cholester
Instrumentation for accelerated life tests of concentrator solar cells

Concentrator photovoltaic is an emergent technology that may be a good economical and efficient alternative for the generation of electricity at a competitive cost. However, the reliability of these new solar cells and systems is still an open issue due to the high-irradiation level they are subjected to as well as the electrical and thermal stresses that they are expected to endure. To evaluate the reliability in a short period of time, accelerated aging tests are essential. Thermal aging tests for concentrator photovoltaic solar cells and systems under illumination are not available because no technical solution to the problem of reaching the working concentration inside a climatic chamber has been available. This work presents an automatic instrumentation system that overcomes the aforementioned limitation. Working conditions have been simulated by forward biasing the solar cells to the current they would handle at the working concentration (in this case, 700 and 1050 times the irradiance at one standard sun). The instrumentation system has been deployed for more than 10 000 h in a thermal aging test for III-V concentrator solar cells, in which the generated power evolution at different temperatures has been monitored. As a result of this test, the acceleration factor has been calculated, thus allowing for the degradation evolution at any temperature in addition to normal working conditions to be obtained
Remote Effects of Hippocampal Sclerosis on Effective Connectivity during Working Memory Encoding: A Case of Connectional Diaschisis?

Accumulating evidence suggests a role for the medial temporal lobe (MTL) in working memory (WM). However, little is known concerning its functional interactions with other cortical regions in the distributed neural network subserving WM. To reveal these, we availed of subjects with MTL damage and characterized changes in effective connectivity while subjects engaged in WM task. Specifically, we compared dynamic causal models, extracted from magnetoencephalographic recordings during verbal WM encoding, in temporal lobe epilepsy patients (with left hippocampal sclerosis) and controls. Bayesian model comparison indicated that the best model (across subjects) evidenced bilateral, forward, and backward connections, coupling inferior temporal cortex (ITC), inferior frontal cortex (IFC), and MTL. MTL damage weakened backward connections from left MTL to left ITC, a decrease accompanied by strengthening of (bidirectional) connections between IFC and MTL in the contralesional hemisphere. These findings provide novel evidence concerning functional interactions between nodes of this fundamental cognitive network and sheds light on how these interactions are modified as a result of focal damage to MTL. The findings highlight that a reduced (top-down) influence of the MTL on ipsilateral language regions is accompanied by enhanced reciprocal coupling in the undamaged hemisphere providing a first demonstration of “connectional diaschisis.
Pedestrian wind comfort: feasibility study of criteria homogenisation

One of the aims of COST C14 action is the assessment and evaluation of pedestrian wind comfort. At present there is no general rule available that is applied across Europe. There are several criteria that have been developed and applied in different countries. These criteria are based on the definition of two independent parameters, a threshold effective wind speed and a probability of exceedence of this threshold speed. The difficulty of the criteria comparison arises from the two-dimensional character of the criteria definition. An effort is being made to compare these criteria, trying both to find commonalities and to clearly identify differences, in order to build up the basis for the next step: to try to define common criteria (perhaps with regional and seasonal variations). The first point is to define clearly the threshold effective wind speed (mean velocity definition parameters: averaging interval and reference height) and equivalence between different ways of defining the threshold effective wind speed (mean wind speed, gust equivalent mean, etc.) in comparable terms (as far as possible). It can be shown that if the wind speed at a given location is defined in terms of a probability distribution, e.g. Weibull function, a given criterion is satisfied by an infinite set of wind conditions, that is, of probability distributions. The criterion parameters and the Weibull function parameters are linked to each other, establishing a set called iso-criteria lines (the locus of the Weibull function parameters that fulfil a given criterion). The relative position of iso-criteria lines when displayed in a suitable two-dimensional plane facilitates the comparison of comfort criteria. The comparison of several wind comfort criteria, coming from several institutes is performed, showing the feasibility and limitations of the method
Ann: a domain-specific language for the effective design and validation of Java annotations

This paper describes a new modelling language for the effective design and validation of\ud
Java annotations. Since their inclusion in the 5th edition of Java, annotations have grown\ud
from a useful tool for the addition of meta-data to play a central role in many popular\ud
software projects. Usually they are not conceived in  isolation, but in groups, with\ud
dependency and integrity constraints between them. However, the native support provided by Java for expressing this design is very limited.\ud
To over\ud
come\ud
its\ud
deficiencies\ud
and\ud
make\ud
explicit\ud
the\ud
rich\ud
conceptual  model which lies\ud
behind a set of annotations,we propose a domain-specific modelling language.The proposal has been implemented as an Eclipse plug-in, including an editor and an integrated\ud
code generator  that synthesises annotation processors. The environmental so integrates a model finder,able to detectun satisfiable constraints between different annotations, and to provide examples of correct annotation usages for validation. The language has been tested\ud
using a real set of annotations from the Java Persistence API(JPA).Within this subset we have found enough rich semantics expressible with Ann and omitted nowadays by the Java language, which shows the benefits of Ann in are levant field of application
Typical integration of emotion cues from bodies and faces in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Contextual cues derived from body postures bias how typical observers categorize facial emotion; the same facial expression may be perceived as anger or disgust when aligned with angry and disgusted body postures. Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are thought to have difficulties integrating information from disparate visual regions to form unitary percepts, and may be less susceptible to visual illusions induced by context. The current study investigated whether individuals with ASD exhibit diminished integration of emotion cues extracted from faces and bodies. Individuals with and without ASD completed a binary expression classification task, categorizing facial emotion as ‘Disgust’ or ‘Anger’. Facial stimuli were drawn from a morph continuum blending facial disgust and anger, and presented in isolation, or accompanied by an angry or disgusted body posture. Participants were explicitly instructed to disregard the body context. Contextual modulation was inferred from a shift in the resulting psychometric functions. Contrary to prediction, observers with ASD showed typical integration of emotion cues from the face and body. Correlation analyses suggested a relationship between the ability to categorize emotion from isolated faces, and susceptibility to contextual influence within the ASD sample; individuals with imprecise facial emotion classification were influenced more by body posture cues
Defining "Development".

Is it possible, and in the first place is it even desirable, to define what "development" means and to determine the scope of the field called "developmental biology"? Though these questions appeared crucial for the founders of "developmental biology" in the 1950s, there seems to be no consensus today about the need to address them. Here, in a combined biological, philosophical, and historical approach, we ask whether it is possible and useful to define biological development, and, if such a definition is indeed possible and useful, which definition(s) can be considered as the most satisfactory
The Argument from Surprise

I develop an account of productive surprise as an epistemic virtue of scientific investigations which does not turn on psychology alone. On my account, a scientific investigation is potentially productively surprising when (1) results can conflict with epistemic expectations, (2) those expectations pertain to a wide set of subjects. I argue that there are two sources of such surprise in science. One source, often identified with experiments, involves bringing our theoretical ideas in contact with new empirical observations. Another, often identified with simulations, involves articulating and bringing together different parts of our knowledge. Both experiments and simulations, then, can surprise
An adaptive noise removal approach for restoration of digital images corrupted by multimodal noise

Data smoothing algorithms are commonly applied to reduce the level of noise and eliminate the weak textures contained in digital images. Anisotropic diffusion algorithms form a distinct category of noise removal approaches that implement the smoothing process locally in agreement with image features such as edges that are typically determined by applying diverse partial differential equation (PDE) models. While this approach is opportune since it allows the implementation of feature-preserving data smoothing strategies, the inclusion of the PDE models in the formulation of the data smoothing process compromises the performance of the anisotropic diffusion schemes when applied to data corrupted by non-Gaussian and multimodal image noise. \ud
\ud
In this paper we first evaluate the positive aspects related to the inclusion of a multi-scale edge detector based on the generalisation of the Di Zenzo operator into the formulation of the anisotropic diffusion process. Then, we introduce a new approach that embeds the vector median filtering into the discrete implementation of the anisotropic diffusion in order to improve the performance of the noise removal algorithm when applied to multimodal noise suppression. To evaluate the performance of the proposed data smoothing strategy, a large number of experiments on various types of digital images corrupted by multimodal noise were conducted.Keywords — Anisotropic diffusion, vector median filtering, feature preservation, multimodal noise, noise removal
Superpositions of the cosmological constant allow for singularity resolution and unitary evolution in quantum cosmology

A novel approach to quantization is shown to allow for superpositions of the cosmological constant in isotropic and homogeneous mini-superspace models. Generic solutions featuring such superposi- tions display unitary evolution and resolution of the classical singularity. Physically well-motivated cosmological solutions are constructed. These particular solutions exhibit characteristic features of a cosmic bounce including universal phenomenology that can be rendered insensitive to Planck-scale physics in a natural manner
Quantification of hepatic transaldolase exchange activity and its effects on tracer measurements of indirect pathway flux in humans

Exchange of hepatic glucose-6-phosphate (G6P) and glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate via transaldolase modifies hepatic G6P enrichment from glucose or gluconeogenic tracers. Transaldolase exchange was quantified in five healthy, fed subjects following an oral bolus of [1,2,3-13C3]glycerol (25-30 mg/kg) and paracetamol (10-12 mg/kg). 13C Isotopomers of hepatic G6P were quantified by 13C NMR spectroscopy of urinary glucuronide. [1,2,3-13C3]- and [4,5,6-13C3]glucuronide isotopomers, representing the conversion of [1,2,3-13C3]glycerol to G6P via dihydroxyacetone phosphate, were resolved from [1,2-13C2]- and [5,6-13C2]glucuronide 13C-isotopomers, derived from metabolism of [1,2,3-13C3]glycerol via pyruvate and phosphoenolpyruvate. Enrichment of [1,2,3-13C3]glucuronide was significantly less than that of [4,5,6-13C3]glucuronide (1.30 ± 0.57% versus 1.67 ± 0.42%, P < 0.05). Also, [1,2-13C2]glucuronide enrichment was significantly less than that of [5,6-13C2]glucuronide (0.28 ± 0.08% versus 0.36 ± 0.03%, P < 0.05). Transaldolase and triose phosphate isomerase exchange activities were estimated by applying the 13C-isotopomer data to a model of hepatic sugar phosphate metabolism. Triose phosphate isomerase exchange was ~99% complete and did not contribute significantly to the unequal 13C-isotopomer distributions of the glucuronide triose halves. Instead, this was attributable to 25 ± 23% of hepatic G6P flux undergoing transaldolase exchange. This results in substantial overestimates of indirect pathway contributions to hepatic glycogen synthesis with tracers such as [5-3H]glucose and 2H2O. Magn Reson Med, 2008. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc.http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/mrm.2145
Improvement of a frictional contact algorithm for strongly curved contact problems

One of the challenges in contact problems is the prediction of the actual contact surface and the kind of contact that is established in each region. In numerical simulation of deep drawing problems the contact conditions change continuously during the forming process, increasing the importance of a correct evaluation of these parameters at each load step. In this work a new contact search algorithm devoted to contact between a deformable and a rigid body is presented. The rigid body is modelled by parametric Bézier surfaces, whereas the deformable body is discretized with finite elements. The numerical schemes followed rely on a frictional contact algorithm that operates directly on the parametric Bézier surfaces.The algorithm is implemented in the deep drawing implicit finite element code DD3IMP. This code uses a mechanical model that takes into account the large elastoplastic strains and rotations. The Coulomb classical law models the frictional contact problem, which is treated with an augmented Lagrangian approach. A fully implicit algorithm of Newton-Raphson type is used to solve within a single iterative loop the non-linearities related with the frictional contact problem and the elastoplastic behaviour of the deformable body.The numerical simulations presented demonstrate the performance of the contact search algorithm in an example with complex tools geometry. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/nme.84
Fluorescence Study of Dehydroabietic Acid-Based Bipolar Arylamine-Quinoxalines

The absorption and fluorescence spectra, lifetimes and quantum yields of a series of triarylaminequinoxaline bipolar compounds, with and without the bulky dehydroabietic acid group, have been studied in toluene solution. This bulky group is introduced to improve solubility and thermal properties of these systems. It is shown that this does not affect their spectral or photophysical behavior. The compounds show relatively strong fluorescence, with the emission maximum strongly dependent upon the substituents present. Oxidation potentials have also been determined in acetonitrile solution, and again indicate that introduction of the resin acid moiety has no effect on these properties.http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10895-005-0048-
An adaptive multi-level simulation algorithm for stochastic biological
  systems

Discrete-state, continuous-time Markov models are widely used in the modeling
of biochemical reaction networks. Their complexity often precludes analytic
solution, and we rely on stochastic simulation algorithms to estimate system
statistics. The Gillespie algorithm is exact, but computationally costly as it
simulates every single reaction. As such, approximate stochastic simulation
algorithms such as the tau-leap algorithm are often used. Potentially
computationally more efficient, the system statistics generated suffer from
significant bias unless tau is relatively small, in which case the
computational time can be comparable to that of the Gillespie algorithm. The
multi-level method (Anderson and Higham, Multiscale Model. Simul. 2012) tackles
this problem. A base estimator is computed using many (cheap) sample paths at
low accuracy. The bias inherent in this estimator is then reduced using a
number of corrections. Each correction term is estimated using a collection of
paired sample paths where one path of each pair is generated at a higher
accuracy compared to the other (and so more expensive). By sharing random
variables between these paired paths the variance of each correction estimator
can be reduced. This renders the multi-level method very efficient as only a
relatively small number of paired paths are required to calculate each
correction term. In the original multi-level method, each sample path is
simulated using the tau-leap algorithm with a fixed value of $\tau$. This
approach can result in poor performance when the reaction activity of a system
changes substantially over the timescale of interest. By introducing a novel,
adaptive time-stepping approach where $\tau$ is chosen according to the
stochastic behaviour of each sample path we extend the applicability of the
multi-level method to such cases. We demonstrate the efficiency of our method
using a number of examples.Comment: 23 page
Variational approach to thermal masses in compactified models

We investigate by means of a variational approach the effective potential of
a 5D U(1) scalar model at finite temperature and compactified on S^1 and
S^1/Z_2 as well as the corresponding 4D model obtained through a trivial
dimensional reduction. We are particularly interested in the behaviour of the
thermal masses of the scalar field with respect to the Wilson line phase and
the results obtained are compared with those coming from a one-loop effective
potential calculation. We also explore the nature of the phase transition
Contemporary use and practice of electroconvulsive therapy worldwide

To explore contemporary (from 1990) utilization and practice of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) worldwide. Systematic search (limited to studies published 1990 and after) was undertaken in the databases Medline, Embase, PsycINFO, SveMed, and EBSCO/Cinahl. Primary data-based studies/surveys with reported ECT utilization and practice in psychiatric institutions internationally, nationally, and regionally; city were included. Two reviewers independently checked study titles and abstracts according to inclusion criteria, and extracted ECT utilization and practice data from those retrieved in full text. Seventy studies were included, seven from Australia and New Zealand, three Africa, 12 North and Latin America, 33 Europe, and 15 Asia. Worldwide ECT differences and trends were evident, average number ECTs administered per patient were eight; unmodified (without anesthesia) was used in Asia (over 90%), Africa, Latin America, Russia, Turkey, Spain. Worldwide preferred electrode placement was bilateral, except unilateral at some places (Europe and Australia/New Zealand). Although mainstream was brief-pulse wave, sine-wave devices were still used. Majority ECT treated were older women with depression in Western countries, versus younger men with schizophrenia in Asian countries. ECT under involuntary conditions (admissions), use of ambulatory-ECT, acute first line of treatment, as well as administered by other professions (geriatricians, nurses) were noted by some sites. General trends were only some institutions within the same country providing ECT, training inadequate, and guidelines not followed. Mandatory reporting and overall country ECT register data were sparse. Many patients are still treated with unmodified ECT today. Large global variation in ECT utilization, administration, and practice advocates a need for worldwide sharing of knowledge about ECT, reflection, and learning from each other's experiences