LFTK: Handcrafted Features in Computational Linguistics

Past research has identified a rich set of handcrafted linguistic features that can potentially assist various tasks. However, their extensive number makes it difficult to effectively select and utilize existing handcrafted features. Coupled with the problem of inconsistent implementation across research works, there has been no categorization scheme or generally-accepted feature names. This creates unwanted confusion. Also, most existing handcrafted feature extraction libraries are not open-source or not actively maintained. As a result, a researcher often has to build such an extraction system from the ground up. We collect and categorize more than 220 popular handcrafted features grounded on past literature. Then, we conduct a correlation analysis study on several task-specific datasets and report the potential use cases of each feature. Lastly, we devise a multilingual handcrafted linguistic feature extraction system in a systematically expandable manner. We open-source our system for public access to a rich set of pre-implemented handcrafted features. Our system is coined LFTK and is the largest of its kind. Find it at github.com/brucewlee/lftk.Comment: BEA @ ACL 202

Using Perspective Taking to De-Escalate Commitment to Software Product Launch Decisions

In software product development settings when things go awry and the original plan loses credibility, managers often choose to honor the originally announced product launch schedule anyway, in effect launching a product that may be seriously compromised in terms of both functionality and reliability. In this study, we draw on the perspective of escalation of commitment to investigate adherence to original product launch schedules despite negative feedback. Specifically, we use the notion of perspective taking to propose a de-escalation tactic. Through a laboratory experiment, we found strong support that taking the perspective of individuals that can be negatively influenced by a product launch can indeed effectively promote de-escalation of commitment. Furthermore, we found that the experiences of anticipated guilt mediate the relationship between perspective taking and de-escalation, and this indirect effect is significantly greater when a decision maker’s personal cost associated with de-escalation is high rather than low

A DRAINAGE SYSTEM FOR MITIGATING MOISTURE DAMAGE TO BRIDGE DECK PAVEMENTS

This study presents the development of a new drainage system that can quickly drain water that has penetrated into bridge deck pavements. The new drainage system is expected to significantly reduce potholes that typically lead to premature failure of pavements. This system can be established by applying a thin drainage layer between the waterproofing layer and top wearing course. The most important factors for this system are to meet satisfactory performance of the waterproofing layer and to develop appropriate construction technique for the thin drainage layer. The drainage layer was formulated with porous asphalt mixtures designed for the max aggregate size of 10 mm, and was validated through various physical and mechanical laboratory tests to confirm its performance characteristics. For the waterproofing layer, methyl methacrylate (MMA) – type material was introduced, and a series of mechanical tests were performed to estimate the applicability of the MMA material for waterproofing. It was observed from the tests that the MMA material satisfied all specification requirements. In addition, to evaluate the field performance of the new drainage system, a field study was conducted on a real bridge. Field performance observations on both the waterproofing and pavement materials indicated that the new drainage system performs much better than traditional methods in draining water that has penetrated into pavement layers

A Side-by-side Comparison of Transformers for English Implicit Discourse Relation Classification

Though discourse parsing can help multiple NLP fields, there has been no wide language model search done on implicit discourse relation classification. This hinders researchers from fully utilizing public-available models in discourse analysis. This work is a straightforward, fine-tuned discourse performance comparison of seven pre-trained language models. We use PDTB-3, a popular discourse relation annotated dataset. Through our model search, we raise SOTA to 0.671 ACC and obtain novel observations. Some are contrary to what has been reported before (Shi and Demberg, 2019b), that sentence-level pre-training objectives (NSP, SBO, SOP) generally fail to produce the best performing model for implicit discourse relation classification. Counterintuitively, similar-sized PLMs with MLM and full attention led to better performance.Comment: TrustNLP @ ACL 202

Characterization of the ATP transporter in the reconstituted rough endoplasmic reticulum proteoliposomes

AbstractAdenosine triphosphate (ATP) transporter from rat liver rough endoplasmic reticulum (RER) was solubilized and reconstituted into phosphatidylcholine liposomes. The RER proteoliposomes, resulting from optimizing some reconstitution parameters, had an apparent Km value of 1.5 μM and a Vmax of 286 pmol min−1 (mg protein)−1 and showed higher affinity for ATP and a lower Vmax value than intact RER (Km of 6.5 μM and Vmax of 1 nmol). ATP transport was time- and temperature-dependent, inhibited by 4,4′-diisothiocyanostilbene-2,2′-disulfonic acid, which is known as an inhibitor of anion transporters including ATP transporter, but was not affected by atractyloside, a specific inhibitor of mitochondrial ADP/ATP carrier. The internal and external effects of various nucleotides on the ATP transport were examined. ATP transport was cis-inhibited strongly by ADP and weakly by AMP. ADP-preloaded RER proteoliposomes showed a specific increase of ATP transport activity while AMP-preloaded RER proteoliposomes did not show the enhanced overshoot peak in the ATP uptake plot. These results demonstrate the ADP/ATP antiport mechanism of ATP transport in rat liver RER

Evaluation of Compressive Strength and Stiffness of Grouted Soils by Using Elastic Waves

Cement grouted soils, which consist of particulate soil media and cementation agents, have been widely used for the improvement of the strength and stiffness of weak ground and for the prevention of the leakage of ground water. The strength, elastic modulus, and Poisson’s ratio of grouted soils have been determined by classical destructive methods. However, the performance of grouted soils depends on several parameters such as the distribution of particle size of the particulate soil media, grouting pressure, curing time, curing method, and ground water flow. In this study, elastic wave velocities are used to estimate the strength and elastic modulus, which are generally obtained by classical strength tests. Nondestructive tests by using elastic waves at small strain are conducted before and during classical strength tests at large strain. The test results are compared to identify correlations between the elastic wave velocity measured at small strain and strength and stiffness measured at large strain. The test results show that the strength and stiffness have exponential relationship with elastic wave velocities. This study demonstrates that nondestructive methods by using elastic waves may significantly improve the strength and stiffness evaluation processes of grouted soils

A Study on the Thermal Characteristics of the Epoxy Insulator in the Stop Joint Box of HTS Power Cable

AbstractThe HTS power cable is cooled by the circulation of liquid nitrogen. The cooling capacity of refrigerator increases with cable length. As the length of power cable increases, a joint box should be installed to reduce the cooling capacity and pressure drop for unit cooling system. The type of joint box can be divided into two groups. There are NJB(Normal Joint Box) and SJB(Stop Joint Box). Generally, SJB can separate each cooling system. In case of long distance DC cable, it is necessary to separate the cooling line in the regular distance of cooling system so SJB should be used. However, SJB, which has a difference from the insulation method of existing joint box, uses solid electrical insulation method. At the primary cooling time, thermal stress is generated by the temperature difference between the internal and external epoxy. So to prevent the damage stress analysis is required for the electrical insulation structure of SJB. In this paper, using the FEM analysis we study the cooling method and optimal shape of SJB to reduce the thermal stress result from temperature difference during the cooling time

Fixed Drug Eruption Due to Allopurinol: Positive Oral Provocation

A fixed drug eruption (FDE) is characterized by the presence of a solitary or multiple, pruritic, well-circumscribed, erythematous plaques. These lesions have tendency to recur at same sites and heal with residual hyperpigmenation. With repeated attacks, the size and/or number of the lesions may increase. So far, more than 100 drugs have been implicated in causing FDEs, including ibuprofen, sulfonamide, naproxen, and tetracylines. FDE caused by allopurinol has been rarely reported in the literature, but there has been no confirmed case based on oral provocation test. Herein, we report a case of FDE in which the lesions recurred whenever allopurinol was administered for the treatment of gout. A 64-year-old male experienced repeated episodes of well-demarcated dusky erythematous patches on the whole body for 2 months. He took allopurinol intermittently for amelioration of his gout symptom, but denied other medication history. Pruritic erythematous edema developed on the previous lesions 12 hours after oral provocation of 200 mg of allopurinol