NOMAD: Non-locking, stOchastic Multi-machine algorithm for Asynchronous and Decentralized matrix completion

We develop an efficient parallel distributed algorithm for matrix completion, named NOMAD (Non-locking, stOchastic Multi-machine algorithm for Asynchronous and Decentralized matrix completion). NOMAD is a decentralized algorithm with non-blocking communication between processors. One of the key features of NOMAD is that the ownership of a variable is asynchronously transferred between processors in a decentralized fashion. As a consequence it is a lock-free parallel algorithm. In spite of being an asynchronous algorithm, the variable updates of NOMAD are serializable, that is, there is an equivalent update ordering in a serial implementation. NOMAD outperforms synchronous algorithms which require explicit bulk synchronization after every iteration: our extensive empirical evaluation shows that not only does our algorithm perform well in distributed setting on commodity hardware, but also outperforms state-of-the-art algorithms on a HPC cluster both in multi-core and distributed memory settings

Acute Viral Hepatitis C-Induced Jaundice in Pregnancy

SummaryObjectiveAcute viral hepatitis C-induced jaundice in pregnancy is very rare and may be fatal. Here, we report a complicated case with acute hepatitis C-induced jaundice in pregnancy with successful managementCase ReportA 27-year-old pregnant woman, gravida 2, para 1, with gestational age of 36 weeks and 5 days, was referred to our hospital due to jaundice and elevated liver enzymes of undetermined cause. She had been suffering from general weakness, diarrhea and vomiting for 1 week, and jaundice with tea-colored urine for 3 days. At our medical center, acute viral hepatitis C-induced jaundice was suspected. Since her general condition deteriorated at 36 weeks and 6 days of gestation, we decided to induce labor. A male baby was born smoothly via the vaginal route, with birth weight 2,857 g, birth length 48.6 cm, and 1- and 5-minute Apgar scores of 7 and 9, respectively. Maternal condition improved dramatically after delivery and her serum liver enzymes and bilirubin levels gradually approached normal ranges.ConclusionMothers and fetuses with acute viral hepatitis C-induced jaundice during pregnancy are at great risk of mortality and morbidity. Timely termination may be one of the choices of treatment when fetal maturity has been reached and the maternal condition has deteriorated

Vec2Gloss: definition modeling leveraging contextualized vectors with Wordnet gloss

Contextualized embeddings are proven to be powerful tools in multiple NLP tasks. Nonetheless, challenges regarding their interpretability and capability to represent lexical semantics still remain. In this paper, we propose that the task of definition modeling, which aims to generate the human-readable definition of the word, provides a route to evaluate or understand the high dimensional semantic vectors. We propose a `Vec2Gloss' model, which produces the gloss from the target word's contextualized embeddings. The generated glosses of this study are made possible by the systematic gloss patterns provided by Chinese Wordnet. We devise two dependency indices to measure the semantic and contextual dependency, which are used to analyze the generated texts in gloss and token levels. Our results indicate that the proposed `Vec2Gloss' model opens a new perspective to the lexical-semantic applications of contextualized embeddings

Lexical Retrieval Hypothesis in Multimodal Context

Multimodal corpora have become an essential language resource for language science and grounded natural language processing (NLP) systems due to the growing need to understand and interpret human communication across various channels. In this paper, we first present our efforts in building the first Multimodal Corpus for Languages in Taiwan (MultiMoco). Based on the corpus, we conduct a case study investigating the Lexical Retrieval Hypothesis (LRH), specifically examining whether the hand gestures co-occurring with speech constants facilitate lexical retrieval or serve other discourse functions. With detailed annotations on eight parliamentary interpellations in Taiwan Mandarin, we explore the co-occurrence between speech constants and non-verbal features (i.e., head movement, face movement, hand gesture, and function of hand gesture). Our findings suggest that while hand gestures do serve as facilitators for lexical retrieval in some cases, they also serve the purpose of information emphasis. This study highlights the potential of the MultiMoco Corpus to provide an important resource for in-depth analysis and further research in multimodal communication studies