Reducing the window of opportunity for Android malware Gotta catch ’em all

Spotting malicious samples in the wild has always been difficult, and Android malware is no exception. Actually, the fact Android applications are (usually) not directly accessible from market places hardens the task even more. For instance, Google enforces its own communication protocol to browse and download applications from its market. Thus, an efficient market crawler must reverse and implement this protocol, issue appropriate search requests and take necessary steps so as not to be banned. From end-users?? side, having difficulties spotting malicious mobile applications results in most Android malware remaining unnoticed up to 3?months before a security researcher finally stumbles on it. To reduce this window of opportunity, this paper presents a heuristics engine that statically pre-processes and prioritizes samples. The engine uses 39 different flags of different nature such as Java API calls, presence of embedded executables, code size, URLs?? Each flag is assigned a different weight, based on statistics we computed from the techniques mobile malware authors most commonly use in their code. The engine outputs a risk score which highlights samples which are the most likely to be malicious. The engine has been tested over a set of clean applications and malicious ones. The results show a strong difference in the average risk score for both sets and in its distribution, proving its use to spot malware.     

Experimental study of a novel hybrid constructed wetland for water reuse and its application in Southern China

A new type of hybrid constructed wetland (CW), consisting of both vertical-baffled flow wetland (VBFW) and horizontal subsurface flow wetland (HSFW), has been deployed in Southern China to naturally accelerate the removal of organic matter and nitrogen. The hybrid CW system is characterised by a combination of continuous baffled flow vertical wetland and 'S' pattern horizontal subsurface flow wetland with natural aeration ditches to increase the concentration of dissolved oxygen in the HSFW bed. An internal circulatory system from the HSFW effluent back to the VBFW may optionally be operated to enhance the biological denitrification effect. Cyperus alternifolius is the main macrophyte in the wetland bed. The performance of the hybrid CW was studied with a pilot-scale system and three full-scale systems for municipal sewage treatment in Southern China. The results suggest that this new hybrid CW can achieve removal efficiencies of chemical oxygen demand, suspended solids, ammonia nitrogen, total nitrogen, and total phosphorus of better than 83.6, 95.0, 71.7, 64.5 and 68.1% respectively, with a specific wetland bed area of 0.70-0.93 m(2) PE(-1). The mean effluent concentrations of these parameters would meet the regulatory discharge limits for wastewater treatment systems (GB18918, 2002) and reuse in the context of agricultural irrigation solutions in China.     

Polarization confocal microscopy and Congo Red fluorescence: a simple and rapid method to determine the mean cellulose fibril orientation in plants

The mean or net preferential orientation of cellulose fibrils in plant cell walls is detected with polarization confocal laser scanning microscopy using the fluorescence dichroism of Congo Red. Single cells, arrays of cells in a tissue, or the epidermis of whole organs can be assayed in vivo . Aerial parts require an extra pectinase treatment because of the cuticle, which is impermeable to aqueous solutions. Peeling off the epidermis can be an elegant alternative, especially for leaves. With this method the net preferential fibril orientation can be related to the symmetry axis of the cell in quantitative terms. Data issuing from this approach are useful in current research on plant biomechanics.     

Predictor@Home: A "Protein Structure Prediction Supercomputer' Based on Global Computing

Predicting the structure of a protein from its amino acid sequence is a complex process, the understanding of which could be used to gain new insight into the nature of protein functions or provide targets for structure-based design of drugs to treat new and existing diseases. While protein structures can be accurately modeled using computational methods based on all-atom physics-based force fields including implicit solvation, these methods require extensive sampling of native-like protein conformations for successful prediction and, consequently, they are often limited by inadequate computing power. To address this problem, we developed Predictor@Home, a "structure prediction supercomputer” powered by the Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC) framework and based on the global computing paradigm (i.e., volunteered computing resources interconnected to the Internet and owned by the public). In this paper, we describe the protocol we employed for protein structure prediction and its integration into a global computing architecture based on public resources. We show how Predictor@Home significantly improved our ability to predict protein structures by increasing our sampling capacity by one to two orders of magnitude.     

Immunogenicity and tolerability of a trivalent influenza subunit vaccine (Influvac) in high-risk children aged 6 months to 4 years

The authors carried out an epidemiological survey from october 12 to december 4, 1995, at Medina's mother and Child care centre (MCC) in Dakar in order to assess chemoprophylaxis among pregnant women in Dakar. The midwife/pregnant women ratio is 0.08 The mentioned diagnosis criteria were relevant regards to the references established for most of the answers because since the latter base malaria diagnosis on the following signs: fever, chills, headaches and vomiting. 64.6% of them assume compliance to antimalarial chemoporphylaxis. Education level seems to be the main determining factor in this trend. Although chloroquine is the most widely used drug, nevertheless 11.9% of pregnant women assuming compliance use it at inappropriate posology. Besides, pyrimethamine is used by 12.3% of them. 34% of pregnant women do show chloroquine in urine. The plasmodial index is 1.4%. Only 8.1% of these women are supplied by health centres where shortages are noted.     

Un environnement de conception de systèmes distribués basé sur UML

This paper introduces a new environment for developing distributed systems. It is based on theTurtle uml profile. Analysis and design phases, described in previous papers, have been extended with an additional deployment phase. In this new step,Turtle components are deployed over hardware execution nodes, and nodes are connected together throughout links,Turtle deployment diagrams are given a formal semantics inRt-lotos, therefore following the approach used forTurtle analysis and design diagrams. Moreover, the paper presents a Java code generator which outputs appropriate Java code forTurtle deployment diagrams. This code is automatically deployable on networks because it implements node communication using network protocols such asUdp orRmi. ttool, the turtle toolkit has been extended to support these new diagrams and code generators. The attack of protected data exchanged throughout securedHttp sessions serves as example.     

Empirical surveys of frontier applications: a meta‐review

This contribution is the first attempt to systematically review all empirical surveys that so far have been made available in the broad field of efficiency and productivity analysis using frontier estimation methodologies. We provide a systematic bibliometric review on the many empirical surveys in the field of efficiency and productivity analysis, the most relevant concepts, areas, overlaps, and potentials to explore from its introduction to the most recent surveys. We combine the United Nations’ International Standard Industrial Classification (ISIC) taxonomy for the economic activity with the Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) classification system to classify the empirical surveys and to identify the current gaps in the literature. In addition to the most relevant/generic potential areas for applications (according to the United Nation's ISIC), this methodology provides a cluster analysis with the most relevant concepts that have been considered so far (according to the JEL codes). This overview brings an interesting guide for future work to develop the whole field.     

The effects of blackcurrant and strawberry powder on the physicochemical and in vitro glycaemic response of starches derived from sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) and potato (Solanum tuberosum)

Phenolic compounds have been shown to deliver numerous health benefits. Research has also shown that starch and phenolic compounds interact. This study aimed to investigate the effects of blackcurrant and strawberry powder on the physicochemical and in vitro predicted glycaemic response of sweet potato and potato starches. Sweet potato, or potato, starches were mixed with 0%, 5%, 10% and 15% (w/w) of blackcurrant, or strawberry, powder, to form blackcurrant and strawberry-enriched starch pastes. The results showed that enrichment with 5%, 10% and 15% blackcurrant or strawberry powder for sweet potato and potato starch significantly altered the pasting viscosity and colour profiles (P < 0.05), increased the phenolic content and antioxidant activities of starch pastes (P < 0.05). Blackcurrant or strawberry powders mixed with sweet potato or potato starches reduced amount of reducing sugar released during in vitro digestion. Addition of 15% blackcurrant powder for the starch exerted stronger in vitro antioxidant and hypoglycaemic properties than that of 15% strawberry powder. Collectively, these findings suggested that addition of blackcurrant or strawberry powder into sweet potato and potato starches manipulated the hypoglycaemic property of pastes.