LSGNN: Towards General Graph Neural Network in Node Classification by Local Similarity

Heterophily has been considered as an issue that hurts the performance of Graph Neural Networks (GNNs). To address this issue, some existing work uses a graph-level weighted fusion of the information of multi-hop neighbors to include more nodes with homophily. However, the heterophily might differ among nodes, which requires to consider the local topology. Motivated by it, we propose to use the local similarity (LocalSim) to learn node-level weighted fusion, which can also serve as a plug-and-play module. For better fusion, we propose a novel and efficient Initial Residual Difference Connection (IRDC) to extract more informative multi-hop information. Moreover, we provide theoretical analysis on the effectiveness of LocalSim representing node homophily on synthetic graphs. Extensive evaluations over real benchmark datasets show that our proposed method, namely Local Similarity Graph Neural Network (LSGNN), can offer comparable or superior state-of-the-art performance on both homophilic and heterophilic graphs. Meanwhile, the plug-and-play model can significantly boost the performance of existing GNNs. Our code is provided at https://github.com/draym28/LSGNN.Comment: The first two authors contributed equally to this work; IJCAI2

Functional piezocrystal characterisation under varying conditions

Piezocrystals, especially the relaxor-based ferroelectric crystals, have been subject to intense investigation and development within the past three decades, motivated by the performance advantages offered by their ultrahigh piezoelectric coefficients and higher electromechanical coupling coefficients than piezoceramics. Structural anisotropy of piezocrystals also provides opportunities for devices to operate in novel vibration modes, such as the d36 face shear mode, with domain engineering and special crystal cuts. These piezocrystal characteristics contribute to their potential usage in a wide range of low- and high-power ultrasound applications. In such applications, conventional piezoelectric materials are presently subject to varying mechanical stress/pressure, temperature and electric field conditions. However, as observed previously, piezocrystal properties are significantly affected by a single such condition or a combination of conditions. Laboratory characterisation of the piezocrystal properties under these conditions is therefore essential to fully understand these materials and to allow electroacoustic transducer design in realistic scenarios. This will help to establish the extent to which these high performance piezocrystals can replace conventional piezoceramics in demanding applications. However, such characterisation requires specific experimental arrangements, examples of which are reported here, along with relevant results. The measurements include high frequency-resolution impedance spectroscopy with the piezocrystal material under mechanical stress 0–60 MPa, temperature 20–200 °C, high electric AC drive and DC bias. A laser Doppler vibrometer and infrared thermal camera are also integrated into the measurement system for vibration mode shape scanning and thermal conditioning with high AC drive. Three generations of piezocrystal have been tested: (I) binary, PMN-PT; (II) ternary, PIN-PMN-PT; and (III) doped ternary, Mn:PIN-PMN-PT. Utilising resonant mode analysis, variations in elastic, dielectric and piezoelectric constants and coupling coefficients have been analysed, and tests with thermal conditioning have been carried out to assess the stability of the piezocrystals under high power conditions

Negative Factor: Improving Regular-Expression Matching in Strings

Conference paper version 2013, SIGMOD '13 Proceedings of the 2013 ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2463676.2465289</p

Negative Factor: Improving Regular-Expression Matching in Strings

Conference paper version 2013, SIGMOD '13 Proceedings of the 2013 ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2463676.2465289</p

Improving the performance of IPMCs with a gradient in thickness

Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province of China [2011J05140]; Fundamental Research Funds for Central Universities of Xiamen University [2011121045]An ionic polymer metal composite (IPMC) is a kind of electro-active polymer. Due to the properties of low driving voltage, large deformation, flexibility and lightness, it is becoming one of the more popular from a diversity of smart materials. In this study, a novel structure of Nafion (R) film is proposed to improve the performance of an IPMC. IPMC samples with a gradient structure in thickness are fabricated and their performance is investigated to confirm the validity of the gradient structure. The deformation displacement and the blocking force are compared under AC and DC voltage by experiments. The results indicate that the structure of gradient in thickness would improve the performance both in deformation displacement and blocking force

Investment Case for a Comprehensive Package of Interventions Against Hepatitis B in China: Applied Modeling to Help National Strategy Planning.

BACKGROUND content: In 2016, the first global viral hepatitis elimination targets were endorsed. An estimated one-third of the world's population of individuals with chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection live in China and liver cancer is the sixth leading cause of mortality, but coverage of first-line antiviral treatment was low. In 2015, China was one of the first countries to initiate a consultative process for a renewed approach to viral hepatitis. We present the investment case for the scale-up of a comprehensive package of HBV interventions. METHODS content: A dynamic simulation model of HBV was developed and used to simulate the Chinese HBV epidemic. We evaluated the impact, costs, and return on investment of a comprehensive package of prevention and treatment interventions from a societal perspective, incorporating costs of management of end-stage liver disease and lost productivity costs. RESULTS content: Despite the successes of historical vaccination scale-up since 1992, there will be a projected 60 million people still living with HBV in 2030 and 10 million HBV-related deaths, including 5.7 million HBV-related cancer deaths between 2015 and 2030. This could be reduced by 2.1 million by highly active case-finding and optimal antiviral treatment regimens. The package of interventions is likely to have a positive return on investment to society of US$1.57 per US dollar invested. CONCLUSIONS content: Increases in HBV-related deaths for the next few decades pose a major public health threat in China. Active case-finding and access to optimal antiviral treatment are required to mitigate this risk. This investment case approach provides a real-world example of how applied modeling can support national dialog and inform policy planning

Probing the Behaviors of Gold Nanorods in Metastatic Breast Cancer Cells Based on UV-vis-NIR Absorption Spectroscopy

In this work, behaviors of positively-charged AuNRs in a highly metastatic tumor cell line MDA-MB-231 are examined based on UV-vis-NIR absorption spectroscopy in combination with inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and dark-field microscopic observation. It is found that characteristic surface plasmon resonance (SPR) peaks of AuNRs can be detected using spectroscopic method within living cells that have taken up AuNRs. The peak area of transverse SPR band is shown to be proportionally related to the amount of AuNRs in the cells determined with ICP-MS, which suggests a facile and real time quantification method for AuNRs in living cells. The shape of longitudinal SPR band in UV-vis-NIR spectrum reflects the aggregation state of AuNRs in the cells during the incubation period, which is proved by TEM and microscopic observations. Experimental results reveal that AuNRs are internalized by the cells rapidly; the accumulation, distribution and aggregation of AuNRs in the cells compartments are time and dose dependent. The established spectroscopic analysis method can not only monitor the behaviors of AuNRs in living cells but may also be helpful in choosing the optimum laser stimulation wavelength for anti-tumor thermotherapy

Optimization of a Focusable and Rotatable Shear-Wave Periodic Permanent Magnet Electromagnetic Acoustic Transducers for Plates Inspection

Due to the symmetry of conventional periodic-permanent-magnet electromagnetic acoustic transducers (PPM EMATs), two shear (SH) waves can be generated and propagated simultaneously in opposite directions, which makes the signal recognition and interpretation complicatedly. Thus, this work presents a new SH wave PPM EMAT design, rotating the parallel line sources to realize the wave beam focusing in a single-direction. The theoretical model of distributed line sources was deduced firstly, and the effects of some parameters, such as the inner coil width, adjacent line sources spacing and the angle between parallel line sources, on SH wave focusing and directivity were studied mainly with the help of 3D FEM. Employing the proposed PPM EMATs, some experiments are carried out to verify the reliability of FEM simulation. The results indicate that rotating the parallel line sources can strength the wave on the closing side of line sources, decreasing the inner coil width and the adjacent line sources spacing can improve the amplitude and directivity of signals excited by transducers. Compared with traditional PPM EMATs, both the capacity of unidirectional excitation and directivity of the proposed PPM EMATs are improved significantly