HyFL: A Hybrid Framework For Private Federated Learning

Federated learning (FL) has emerged as an efficient approach for large-scale distributed machine learning, ensuring data privacy by keeping training data on client devices. However, recent research has highlighted vulnerabilities in FL, including the potential disclosure of sensitive information through individual model updates and even the aggregated global model. While much attention has been given to clients' data privacy, limited research has addressed the issue of global model privacy. Furthermore, local training at the client's side has opened avenues for malicious clients to launch powerful model poisoning attacks. Unfortunately, no existing work has provided a comprehensive solution that tackles all these issues. Therefore, we introduce HyFL, a hybrid framework that enables data and global model privacy while facilitating large-scale deployments. The foundation of HyFL is a unique combination of secure multi-party computation (MPC) techniques with hierarchical federated learning. One notable feature of HyFL is its capability to prevent malicious clients from executing model poisoning attacks, confining them to less destructive data poisoning alone. We evaluate HyFL's effectiveness using an open-source PyTorch-based FL implementation integrated with Meta's CrypTen PPML framework. Our performance evaluation demonstrates that HyFL is a promising solution for trustworthy large-scale FL deployment.Comment: HyFL combines private training and inference with secure aggregation and hierarchical FL to provide end-to-end protection and to facilitate large-scale global deploymen

New fossil hominids from Laetolil, Tanzania

New fossil hominid specimens from the Laetolil fossil locality in Tanzania are described. The material includes mandibles and teeth derived from reliably-dated deposits of Pliocene age. Preliminary descriptions, measurements and illustrations are presented.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/37572/1/1330460203_ftp.pd

Predicting Winning Regions in Parity Games via Graph Neural Networks

Solving parity games is a major building block for numerous applications in reactive program verification and synthesis. While they can be solved efficiently in practice, no known approach has a polynomial worst-case runtime complexity. We present a incomplete polynomial-time approach to determining the winning regions of parity games via graph neural networks. Our evaluation on 900 randomly generated parity games shows that this approach is effective and efficient in practice. It correctly determines the winning regions of ∼60% of the games in our data set and only incurs minor errors in the remaining ones. We believe that this approach can be extended to efficiently solve parity games as well

Crystal structure of rhodopsin in complex with a mini-G_o sheds light on the principles of G protein selectivity

Selective coupling of G protein (heterotrimeric guanine nucleotide–binding protein)–coupled receptors (GPCRs) to specific Gα-protein subtypes is critical to transform extracellular signals, carried by natural ligands and clinical drugs, into cellular responses. At the center of this transduction event lies the formation of a signaling complex between the receptor and G protein. We report the crystal structure of light-sensitive GPCR rhodopsin bound to an engineered mini-Go protein. The conformation of the receptor is identical to all previous structures of active rhodopsin, including the complex with arrestin. Thus, rhodopsin seems to adopt predominantly one thermodynamically stable active conformation, effectively acting like a “structural switch,” allowing for maximum efficiency in the visual system. Furthermore, our analysis of the well-defined GPCR–G protein interface suggests that the precise position of the carboxyl-terminal “hook-like” element of the G protein (its four last residues) relative to the TM7/helix 8 (H8) joint of the receptor is a significant determinant in selective G protein activation

Die Entwicklung der Lesekompetenz von der frühen Kindheit bis zum Jugendalter. Empirische Befunde aus den Bamberger BiKS-Längsschnittstudien

The BiKS research group (“Educational processes, competence development, and selection decisions in preschool- and school age”) founded in 2005 and financed by the German Research Foundation (DFG), was established by a consortium of researchers combining expertise from the disciplines of psychology, education, and sociology. Two longitudinal studies were being conducted by the BiKS research group and followed until 2012. In the first study, a cohort of preschool children was traced until grade 4 in primary school. The second study comprises a cohort of primary school children who were followed until their 9th grade in secondary school. Besides the multidisciplinary perspective, the studies can be well characterized by their broad use of different methods, such as test data, interviews, questionnaires, and live observations of behaviour as well as a consideration of different agents, i.e. students, parents, and teachers. The book focuses on empirical research findings concerning the development of reading literacy from a longitudinal perspective and the chapters cover findings from both longitudinal studies of the BiKS research group. As authors from different academic disciplines have contributed, this volume covers a range of psychological, educational as well as sociological perspectives on causes and effects of stability and interindividual differences in the development of reading literacy.Die DFG-finanzierte Bamberger Forschergruppe BiKS („Bildungsprozesse, Kompetenzentwicklung und Selektionsentscheidungen im Vorschul- und Schulalter“) wurde im Jahr 2005 gegründet und setzt sich aus einer Gruppe von Wissenschaftlern aus der Psychologie, der Erziehungswissenschaft und der Soziologie zusammen. Die Forschergruppe hat zwei Längsschnitte etabliert. Die Startstichprobe des ersten Längsschnittes umfasst Kinder, die zu Beginn der Studie den Kindergarten besuchten und überwiegend im Schuljahr 2008/2009 eingeschult wurden. Die zweite Längsschnittkohorte von Schülerinnen und Schülern besuchte zu Beginn der Studie die dritte Klasse der Grundschule und wechselte im Regelfall zum Schuljahr 2007/2008 in die Sekundarstufe. Ein charakteristisches Merkmal der Studien ist, neben ihrer interdisziplinären Ausrichtung, ein breites Spektrum an Erhebungsinstrumenten - unter anderem Verhaltensbeobachtungen, Leistungstests und Fragebögen - und Perspektiven. Das vorliegende Buch fasst empirische Ergebnisse zum Erwerb schriftsprachlicher Kompetenzen aus beiden Längsschnitten zusammen. Die Analysen umfassen Befunde zur Rolle der Vorschule und Schule für die Entwicklung der Lesekompetenz ebenso wie Auswertungen zu den Einflüssen der Eltern und der familiären Lernumwelten sowie der individuellen Interessen der Schülerinnen und Schüler

Upper limits on a stochastic gravitational-wave background using LIGO and Virgo interferometers at 600-1000 Hz

A stochastic background of gravitational waves is expected to arise from a superposition of many incoherent sources of gravitational waves, of either cosmological or astrophysical origin. This background is a target for the current generation of ground-based detectors. In this article we present the first joint search for a stochastic background using data from the LIGO and Virgo interferometers. In a frequency band of 600–1000 Hz, we obtained a 95% upper limit on the amplitude of ΩGW(f)=Ω3(f/900  Hz)3, of Ω3<0.32, assuming a value of the Hubble parameter of h100=0.71. These new limits are a factor of seven better than the previous best in this frequency band. © 2012 The American Physical Societ

All-sky search for gravitational-wave bursts in the second joint LIGO-Virgo run

We present results from a search for gravitational-wave bursts in the data collected by the LIGO and Virgo detectors between July 7, 2009 and October 20, 2010: data are analyzed when at least two of the three LIGO-Virgo detectors are in coincident operation, with a total observation time of 207 days. The analysis searches for transients of duration ≲1  s over the frequency band 64–5000 Hz, without other assumptions on the signal waveform, polarization, direction or occurrence time. All identified events are consistent with the expected accidental background. We set frequentist upper limits on the rate of gravitational-wave bursts by combining this search with the previous LIGO-Virgo search on the data collected between November 2005 and October 2007. The upper limit on the rate of strong gravitational-wave bursts at the Earth is 1.3 events per year at 90% confidence. We also present upper limits on source rate density per year and Mpc3 for sample populations of standard-candle sources. As in the previous joint run, typical sensitivities of the search in terms of the root-sum-squared strain amplitude for these waveforms lie in the range ∼5×10−22  Hz−1/2 to ∼1×10−20  Hz−1/2. The combination of the two joint runs entails the most sensitive all-sky search for generic gravitational-wave bursts and synthesizes the results achieved by the initial generation of interferometric detectors. © 2012 The American Physical Societ

Search for gravitational waves from low mass compact binary coalescence in LIGO's sixth science run and Virgo's science runs 2 and 3

We report on a search for gravitational waves from coalescing compact binaries using LIGO and Virgo observations between July 7, 2009, and October 20, 2010. We searched for signals from binaries with total mass between 2 and 25M⊙; this includes binary neutron stars, binary black holes, and binaries consisting of a black hole and neutron star. The detectors were sensitive to systems up to 40 Mpc distant for binary neutron stars, and further for higher mass systems. No gravitational-wave signals were detected. We report upper limits on the rate of compact binary coalescence as a function of total mass, including the results from previous LIGO and Virgo observations. The cumulative 90% confidence rate upper limits of the binary coalescence of binary neutron star, neutron star-black hole, and binary black hole systems are 1.3×10−4, 3.1×10−5, and 6.4×10−6  Mpc−3 yr−1, respectively. These upper limits are up to a factor 1.4 lower than previously derived limits. We also report on results from a blind injection challenge. © 2012 The American Physical Societ

All-sky search for periodic gravitational waves in the full S5 LIGO data

We report on an all-sky search for periodic gravitational waves in the frequency band 50–800 Hz and with the frequency time derivative in the range of 0 through −6×10−9  Hz/s. Such a signal could be produced by a nearby spinning and slightly nonaxisymmetric isolated neutron star in our Galaxy. After recent improvements in the search program that yielded a 10× increase in computational efficiency, we have searched in two years of data collected during LIGO’s fifth science run and have obtained the most sensitive all-sky upper limits on gravitational-wave strain to date. Near 150 Hz our upper limit on worst-case linearly polarized strain amplitude h0 is 1×10−24, while at the high end of our frequency range we achieve a worst-case upper limit of 3.8×10−24 for all polarizations and sky locations. These results constitute a factor of 2 improvement upon previously published data. A new detection pipeline utilizing a loosely coherent algorithm was able to follow up weaker outliers, increasing the volume of space where signals can be detected by a factor of 10, but has not revealed any gravitational-wave signals. The pipeline has been tested for robustness with respect to deviations from the model of an isolated neutron star, such as caused by a low-mass or long-period binary companion. © 2012 The American Physical Societ

Search for gravitational waves from compact binary coalescence in LIGO and Virgo data from S5 and VSR1

We report the results of the first search for gravitational waves from compact binary coalescence using data from the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory and Virgo detectors. Five months of data were collected during the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory’s S5 and Virgo’s VSR1 science runs. The search focused on signals from binary mergers with a total mass between 2 and 35M⊙. No gravitational waves are identified. The cumulative 90%-confidence upper limits on the rate of compact binary coalescence are calculated for nonspinning binary neutron stars, black hole-neutron star systems, and binary black holes to be 8.7×10−3  yr−1 L10−1, 2.2×10−3  yr−1 L10−1, and 4.4×10−4  yr−1 L10−1, respectively, where L10 is 1010 times the blue solar luminosity. These upper limits are compared with astrophysical expectations. © 2010 The American Physical Societ