Neural networks and support vector machines based bio-activity classification

Classification of various compounds into their respective biological activity classes is important in drug discovery applications from an early phase virtual compound filtering and screening point of view. In this work two types of neural networks, multi layer perceptron (MLP) and radial basis functions (RBF), and support vector machines (SVM) were employed for the classification of three types of biologically active enzyme inhibitors. Both of the networks were trained with back propagation learning method with chemical compounds whose active inhibition properties were previously known. A group of topological indices, selected with the help of principle component analysis (PCA) were used as descriptors. The results of all the three classification methods show that the performance of both the neural networks is better than the SVM

On the Response of Economic Aggregates to Monetary Policy Shocks

This study empirically investigates how shocks to monetary policy measures (short-term nominal interest rate and broad money supply) affect economic aggregates: output growth, price levels and nominal exchange rate. The study is carried out for Pakistan using quarterly data covering the period from 1980 to 2009. In doing this, Johansen’s (1988) co integration technique and vector error correction model are applied to explore the long-run relationship among the variables. We find significant evidence on the existence of a long-run stable relationship between our monetary measures and economic aggregates. The impulse response functions (IRFs) are computed to examine the response of each macroeconomic variable to a standard deviation shock to monetary measures. The IRF graphs reveal a price puzzle in closed as well as in open economy model. However, an initial appreciation of exchange rate is observed, indicating the overshooting hypothesis phenomenon for Pakistan.Monetary Policy, Economic Aggregates, VECM, Impulse Response Function.

The Music Streaming Sessions Dataset

At the core of many important machine learning problems faced by online streaming services is a need to model how users interact with the content. These problems can often be reduced to a combination of 1) sequentially recommending items to the user, and 2) exploiting the user's interactions with the items as feedback for the machine learning model. Unfortunately, there are no public datasets currently available that enable researchers to explore this topic. In order to spur that research, we release the Music Streaming Sessions Dataset (MSSD), which consists of approximately 150 million listening sessions and associated user actions. Furthermore, we provide audio features and metadata for the approximately 3.7 million unique tracks referred to in the logs. This is the largest collection of such track metadata currently available to the public. This dataset enables research on important problems including how to model user listening and interaction behaviour in streaming, as well as Music Information Retrieval (MIR), and session-based sequential recommendations.Comment: 3 pages, introducing a new large scale datase

High order explicit symplectic integrators for the Discrete Non Linear Schr\"odinger equation

We propose a family of reliable symplectic integrators adapted to the Discrete Non-Linear Schr\"odinger equation; based on an idea of Yoshida (H. Yoshida, Construction of higher order symplectic integrators, Physics Letters A, 150, 5,6,7, (1990), pp. 262.) we can construct high order numerical schemes, that result to be explicit methods and thus very fast. The performances of the integrators are discussed, studied as functions of the integration time step and compared with some non symplectic methods

Measuring the Cost of International Trade in Services

We present a new dataset of international trade costs in services sectors. Using a theory-based methodology combined with data on domestic shipments and cross-border trade, we find that trade costs in services are much higher than in goods sectors: a multiple of two to three times in many cases. Trade costs in services have remained relatively steady over the last ten years, whereas trade costs in goods have fallen overall at an impressive rate. We also present two examples of the ways in which our dataset could be used in future work. First, we examine the impact of regional trade agreements on trade costs in services. Although we find that intra-bloc trade costs are lower than those facing outside countries, the differential is usually quite small for services, and in some cases has even been narrowing over time. This finding accords with the observation that because service sector reform is about re-regulation, “preferential” agreements tend to involve less discrimination than in goods markets. Second, we show for the first time that services sectors with lower trade costs tend to be more productive, and experience faster productivity growth. This result lines up well with the evidence from goods markets.Trade policy; Trade in services; Regional integration; Productivity.

Hyphenated Australia : putting intercultural identity on the conceptual map

Interculturality and intercultural identity is a local effect of the global movement and mixing of people, and those of intercultural identities constitute the fastest growing sector of the Australian population. In an age of globalisation and diversification, what does identity mean for those situated in-between governing notions of racial/ethnic formations, and how is intercultural identity experienced? For those informed by (at least) two cultures, what does multiculturalism, ethnicity and \u27Australianness\u27 mean, and where are these individuals positioned in relation to these structures? These questions have critical implications for the Australian nation. Within Australian discourses, interculturality and intercultural identity, in particular, has historically been excluded, rendered invisible. This dissertation is, therefore, one of facilitating visibility. Using the hyphens as a conceptual tool, I argue that in this age of accelerating globalisation the hyphens both makes visible and is made visible by interculturality. The hyphens is that grey and fluid site of intersection between structures of identity and is characterised by liminality - contestation, uncertainty, fundamentally ambivalence. Experiences of liminality, however, dissolve in any given time, opening up new terrain for creativity. Some of these emerging and creative forms of identity, as instigated by interculturality, are explored. Based on interviews with 20 daughters (and their mothers) from intercultural unions, this dissertation places intercultural identity on the Australian conceptual map and analyses the unique position occupied by those with an intercultural identity in their relationship with governing discursive formations of race/ethnicity, embodiment, nation and culture. In essence, the dissertation is concerned with examining the ways in which discursive identity structures intersect with subjective experience, and with the ways in which those with an intercultural identity negotiate those structures and their social relations. This examination raises the fundamental question: is the modernist notion of the material realities of individual lives reconcilable with the poststructural notion of identity as always located in discourse. This modernist/postmodernist tension permeates the dissertation

Resin Infusion Strategy For Wind Turbine Blade

This report explains about the project entitled Resin Infusion Strategy for Wind Turbine Blade. One of the most important parameter in Resin Infusion process is the strategy of filling. The location of the resin start to penetrate and the vacuum will be applied is much depends on the design to infused. There are several strategies, namely point feeding, edge feeding, line feeding and multiple line feeding. As the design getting more and more complex, the complete wetting of the fiber by resin will become increasingly difficult and the resin flow front progression will become slower. The proper infusion strategy and good technique is needed to achieve a better fiber-to-resin ratio for the final product and good filling time taken for infusion process to complete. Trial and error experiments need to be conducted several times to learn the technique and familiarize with the resin infusion process and thus can decrease unsuccessful experiments later on. The proposed design for this project is wind turbine blade which will be infused later. The goal of this project is to investigate and determine the effective infusion strategy for the wind turbine blade in order to achieve uniform resin distribution in shortest time throughout the wind turbine blade design