1,172 research outputs found
Augmented ant colony algorithm for virtual drug discovery
Docking is a fundamental problem in computational biology and drug discovery that seeks to predict a ligand’s binding mode and affinity to a target protein. However, the large search space size and the complexity of the underlying physical interactions make docking a challenging task. Here, we review a docking method, based on the ant colony optimization algorithm, that ranks a set of candidate ligands by solving a minimization problem for each ligand individually. In addition, we propose an augmented version that takes into account all energy functions collectively, allowing only one minimization problem to be solved. The results show that our modification outperforms in accuracy and efficiency
Effects of municipal smoke-free ordinances on secondhand smoke exposure in the Republic of Korea
ObjectiveTo reduce premature deaths due to secondhand smoke (SHS) exposure among non-smokers, the Republic of Korea (ROK) adopted changes to the National Health Promotion Act, which allowed local governments to enact municipal ordinances to strengthen their authority to designate smoke-free areas and levy penalty fines. In this study, we examined national trends in SHS exposure after the introduction of these municipal ordinances at the city level in 2010.MethodsWe used interrupted time series analysis to assess whether the trends of SHS exposure in the workplace and at home, and the primary cigarette smoking rate changed following the policy adjustment in the national legislation in ROK. Population-standardized data for selected variables were retrieved from a nationally representative survey dataset and used to study the policy action’s effectiveness.ResultsFollowing the change in the legislation, SHS exposure in the workplace reversed course from an increasing (18% per year) trend prior to the introduction of these smoke-free ordinances to a decreasing (−10% per year) trend after adoption and enforcement of these laws (β2 = 0.18, p-value = 0.07; β3 = −0.10, p-value = 0.02). SHS exposure at home (β2 = 0.10, p-value = 0.09; β3 = −0.03, p-value = 0.14) and the primary cigarette smoking rate (β2 = 0.03, p-value = 0.10; β3 = 0.008, p-value = 0.15) showed no significant changes in the sampled period. Although analyses stratified by sex showed that the allowance of municipal ordinances resulted in reduced SHS exposure in the workplace for both males and females, they did not affect the primary cigarette smoking rate as much, especially among females.ConclusionStrengthening the role of local governments by giving them the authority to enact and enforce penalties on SHS exposure violation helped ROK to reduce SHS exposure in the workplace. However, smoking behaviors and related activities seemed to shift to less restrictive areas such as on the streets and in apartment hallways, negating some of the effects due to these ordinances. Future studies should investigate how smoke-free policies beyond public places can further reduce the SHS exposure in ROK
Unveiling the frontiers of deep learning: innovations shaping diverse domains
Deep learning (DL) enables the development of computer models that are
capable of learning, visualizing, optimizing, refining, and predicting data. In
recent years, DL has been applied in a range of fields, including audio-visual
data processing, agriculture, transportation prediction, natural language,
biomedicine, disaster management, bioinformatics, drug design, genomics, face
recognition, and ecology. To explore the current state of deep learning, it is
necessary to investigate the latest developments and applications of deep
learning in these disciplines. However, the literature is lacking in exploring
the applications of deep learning in all potential sectors. This paper thus
extensively investigates the potential applications of deep learning across all
major fields of study as well as the associated benefits and challenges. As
evidenced in the literature, DL exhibits accuracy in prediction and analysis,
makes it a powerful computational tool, and has the ability to articulate
itself and optimize, making it effective in processing data with no prior
training. Given its independence from training data, deep learning necessitates
massive amounts of data for effective analysis and processing, much like data
volume. To handle the challenge of compiling huge amounts of medical,
scientific, healthcare, and environmental data for use in deep learning, gated
architectures like LSTMs and GRUs can be utilized. For multimodal learning,
shared neurons in the neural network for all activities and specialized neurons
for particular tasks are necessary.Comment: 64 pages, 3 figures, 3 table
Analytical validation of innovative magneto-inertial outcomes: a controlled environment study.
peer reviewe
Performance Evaluation of Ingenious Crow Search Optimization Algorithm for Protein Structure Prediction
Protein structure prediction is one of the important aspects while dealing with critical diseases. An early prediction of protein folding helps in clinical diagnosis. In recent years, applications of metaheuristic algorithms have been substantially increased due to the fact that this problem is computationally complex and time-consuming. Metaheuristics are proven to be an adequate tool for dealing with complex problems with higher computational efficiency than conventional tools. The work presented in this paper is the development and testing of the Ingenious Crow Search Algorithm (ICSA). First, the algorithm is tested on standard mathematical functions with known properties. Then, the application of newly developed ICSA is explored on protein structure prediction. The efficacy of this algorithm is tested on a bench of artificial proteins and real proteins of medium length. The comparative analysis of the optimization performance is carried out with some of the leading variants of the crow search algorithm (CSA). The statistical comparison of the results shows the supremacy of the ICSA for almost all protein sequences
Book of cases on public and non-profit marketing: trends and responsible approaches in tourism
Debates around the negative impacts on natural and social environments are increasingly gaining relevance
in marketing strategies in different sectors, requiring the development of responsible approaches. Under
the theme “Trends and Responsible Approaches in Tourism”, the International Association of Public and
Non-Profit Marketing (AIMPN / IAPNM), together with the Faculty of Economics and the Research Centre in
Tourism, Sustainability and Well-being (CinTurs), University of Algarve, Portugal, organized the XIV
International Congress on Teaching Cases Related to Public and Non-profit Marketing.
The Congress took place on December 16, 2022, at the Faculty of Economics, University of Algarve, Portugal,
virtually. The objective of this annual Congress is to disseminate case studies referring to activities of non-
profit organizations, public institutions or companies.
This book presents 53 cases peer-reviewed by a scientific committee and selected from the presentations
performed by over 100 participants from diverse nationalities during this event. The Congress aims to
disseminate best practices referring to activities of non-profit organizations, public institutions and
companies and is addressed to students, teachers and professionals. Based on topics around non-profit,
social and public marketing, examples of good practices carried out by third-sector organizations,
companies and public organizations emerge. This approach, which is aligned with the United Nations’
Sustainable Development Goals, offers discussions supporting future marketing strategies that can
contribute to a better society.
The cases have been organized into seven main areas: 1) senior cases, 2) green marketing, 3) well-being,
marketing and tourism, 4) public and non-profit marketing, 5) responsible consumer behaviour trends and
tourism management, 6) social responsibility and sustainability, and 7) social marketing.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
University of Windsor Graduate Calendar 2023 Spring
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Quantum Algorithm for Maximum Biclique Problem
Identifying a biclique with the maximum number of edges bears considerable
implications for numerous fields of application, such as detecting anomalies in
E-commerce transactions, discerning protein-protein interactions in biology,
and refining the efficacy of social network recommendation algorithms. However,
the inherent NP-hardness of this problem significantly complicates the matter.
The prohibitive time complexity of existing algorithms is the primary
bottleneck constraining the application scenarios. Aiming to address this
challenge, we present an unprecedented exploration of a quantum computing
approach. Efficient quantum algorithms, as a crucial future direction for
handling NP-hard problems, are presently under intensive investigation, of
which the potential has already been proven in practical arenas such as
cybersecurity. However, in the field of quantum algorithms for graph databases,
little work has been done due to the challenges presented by the quantum
representation of complex graph topologies. In this study, we delve into the
intricacies of encoding a bipartite graph on a quantum computer. Given a
bipartite graph with n vertices, we propose a ground-breaking algorithm qMBS
with time complexity O^*(2^(n/2)), illustrating a quadratic speed-up in terms
of complexity compared to the state-of-the-art. Furthermore, we detail two
variants tailored for the maximum vertex biclique problem and the maximum
balanced biclique problem. To corroborate the practical performance and
efficacy of our proposed algorithms, we have conducted proof-of-principle
experiments utilizing IBM quantum simulators, of which the results provide a
substantial validation of our approach to the extent possible to date
University of Windsor Graduate Calendar 2023 Winter
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