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Quantum circuit optimization is an inevitable task with the current noisy quantum backends. This task is considered non-trivial due to the varying circuits' complexities in addition to hardware-specific noise, topology, and limited connectivity. The currently available methods either rely on heuristics for circuit optimization tasks or reinforcement learning with complex unscalable neural networks such as transformers. In this paper, we are concerned with optimizing the initial logical-to-physical mapping selection. Specifically, we investigate whether a reinforcement learning agent with simple scalable neural network is capable of finding a near-optimal logical-to-physical mapping, that would decrease as much as possible additional CNOT gates, only from a fixed-length feature vector. To answer this question, we train a Maskable Proximal Policy Optimization agent to progressively take steps towards a near-optimal logical-to-physical mapping on a 20-qubit hardware architecture. Our results show that our agent coupled with a simple routing evaluation is capable of outperforming other available reinforcement learning and heuristics approaches on 12 out of 19 test benchmarks, achieving geometric mean improvements of 2.2% and 15% over the best available related work and two heuristics approaches, respectively. Additionally, our neural network model scales linearly as the number of qubits increases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current quantum processing technology is generally noisy with a limited number of qubits, stressing the importance of quantum state fidelity estimation. The complexity of this problem is mainly due to not only accounting for single gates and readout errors but also for interactions among which. Existing methods generally rely on either reconstructing the given circuit state, ideal state, and computing the distance of which; or forcing the system to be on a specific state. Both rely on conducting circuit measurements, in which computational efficiency is traded off with obtained fidelity details, requiring an exponential number of experiments for full information. This paper poses the question: Is the mapping between a given quantum circuit and its state fidelity learnable? If learnable, this would be a step towards an alternative approach that relies on machine learning, providing much more efficient computation. To answer this question, we propose three deep learning models for 1-, 3-, and 5-qubit circuits and experiment on the following real-quantum processors: ibmq_armonk (1-qubit), ibmq_lima (5-qubit) and ibmq_quito (5-qubit) backends, respectively. Our models achieved a mean correlation factor of 0.74, 0.67 and 0.66 for 1-, 3-, and 5-qubit random circuits, respectively, with the exponential state tomography method. Additionally, our 5-qubit model outperforms simple baseline state fidelity estimation method on three quantum benchmarks. Our method, trained on random circuits only, achieved a mean correlation factor of 0.968 while the baseline method achieved 0.738. Furthermore, we investigate the effect of dynamic noise on state fidelity estimation. The correlation factor substantially improved to 0.82 and 0.74 for the 3- and 5-qubit models, respectively. The results show that machine learning is promising for predicting state fidelity from circuit representation and this work may be considered a step towards efficient end-to-end learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Isolated cleft of the anterior mitral leaflet (ICAML) in dogs without a septal defect is a rare pathological condition. Until now, only one paper has contributed to the detailed understanding of canine ICAML. Reports have confirmed that 3-dimensional echocardiography (3-DE) is a simple and fast imaging technique that is useful for the diagnosis of ICAML and morphological evaluation of the mitral valve in humans. However, to our knowledge, no studies have provided details about the effectiveness of 3-DE in ICAML diagnosis in dogs. Thus, we aimed to determine the usefulness of a diagnostic technique using 3-DE in a 2-year-old Cavalier King Charles Spaniel with ICAML that exhibited mild mitral valve regurgitation. ICAML was initially assessed by transthoracic two-dimensional echocardiography. A diagnosis of congenital mitral regurgitation due to ICAML and understanding of the morphological structure of the valve was established based on the 3-DE findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LMNtal (pronounced 'elemental') is a language model based on hierarchical graph rewriting that uses point-to-point links to represent connectivity and membranes to represent hierarchy. LMNtal was designed to be a substrate language of various computational models, especially those addressing concurrency, mobility and multiset rewriting. Although point-to-point links and membranes could be used together to represent multipoint connectivity, our experiences with LMNtal showed that hyperlinks would be an important and useful extension to the language. We have accordingly expanded LMNtal into a hierarchical hypergraph rewriting language model, HyperLMNtal. HyperLMNtal enabled concise description of computational models involving flexible and diverse forms of references between data; in particular, it enabled efficient encoding of a constraint processing language CHR in terms of both performance and computational complexity. This paper describes the design and implementation of HyperLMNtal as a case study of language evolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a bounded model checking tool called $${\texttt{Hydlogic}}$$ for hybrid systems. It translates a reachability problem of a nonlinear hybrid system into a predicate logic formula involving arithmetic constraints and checks the satisfiability of the formula based on a satisfiability modulo theories method. We tightly integrate (i) an incremental SAT solver to enumerate the possible sets of constraints and (ii) an interval-based solver for hybrid constraint systems (HCSs) to solve the constraints described in the formulas. The HCS solver verifies the occurrence of a discrete change by using a set of boxes to enclose continuous states that may cause the discrete change. We utilize the existence property of a unique solution in the boxes computed by the HCS solver as (i) a proof of the reachability of a model and (ii) a guide in the over-approximation refinement procedure. Our $${\texttt{Hydlogic}}$$ implementation successfully handled several examples including those with nonlinear constraints. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drosophila rely entirely on an innate immune response to combat microbial infection. Diaminopimelic acid–containing peptidoglycan, produced by Gram-negative bacteria, is recognized by two receptors, PGRP-LC and PGRP-LE, and activates a homolog of transcription factor NF-κB through the Imd signaling pathway. Here we show that full-length PGRP-LE acted as an intracellular receptor for monomeric peptidoglycan, whereas a version of PGRP-LE containing only the PGRP domain functioned extracellularly, like the mammalian CD14 molecule, to enhance PGRP-LC-mediated peptidoglycan recognition on the cell surface. Interaction with the imd signaling protein was not required for PGRP-LC signaling. Instead, PGRP-LC and PGRP-LE signaled through a receptor-interacting protein homotypic interaction motif–like motif. These data demonstrate that like mammals, drosophila use both extracellular and intracellular receptors, which have conserved signaling mechanisms, for innate immune recognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A potent inhibitor of a dual-specificity protein phosphatase, VHR (vaccinia H1 related), was isolated during a screening of microbial metabolites. This inhibitor was identified as 4-isoavenaciolide (4-iA), and was determined to irreversibly inhibit VHR phosphatase activity with a 50% inhibitory concentration of 1.2 μM. Detailed tandem mass spectrometry analyses of proteolysed fragments revealed that two molecules of 4-iA bound a molecule of VHR at the two different fragments: one containing the catalytic domain and the other containing the α6 helix positioned surface domain. As 4-iA possesses a reactive exo-methylene moiety, it is possible that 4-iA inhibits VHR through the direct binding to the cysteine residue in the catalytic site (Cys124). Furthermore, 4-iA inhibited dual-specificity protein phosphatases and tyrosine phosphatases, but did not inhibit serine/threonine phosphatases. These results suggest that 4-iA is a cysteine-targeting inhibitor of protein phosphatases with a common HCX5RS/T motif in the catalytic site. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

We have implemented Kima, an automated error correction system for concurrent logic programs. Kima corrects near-misses such as wrong variable occurrences in the absence of explicit declarations of program properties. Strong moding/typing and constraint-based analysis are turning out to play fundamental roles in debugging concurrent logic programs as well as in establishing the consistency of communication protocols and data types. Mode/type analysis of Moded Flat GHC is a constraint satisfaction problem with many simple mode/type constraints, and can be solved efficiently. We proposed a simple and efficient technique which, given a non-well-moded/typed program, diagnoses the “reasons” of inconsistency by finding minimal inconsistent subsets of mode/type constraints. Since each constraint keeps track of the symbol occurrence in the program, a minimal subset also tells possible sources of program errors. Kima realizes automated correction by replacing symbol occurrences around the possible sources and recalculating modes and types of the rewritten programs systematically. As long as bugs are near-misses, Kima proposes a rather small number of alternatives that include an intended program. Search space is kept small because the minimal subset confines possible sources of errors in advance. This paper presents the basic algorithm and various optimization techniques implemented in Kima, and then discusses its effectiveness based on quantitative experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Concurrent processes can be used both for programming computation and for programming storage. Previous implementations of Flat GHC, however, have been tuned for computation-intensive programs, and perform poorly for storage-intensive programs (such as programs implementing reconfigurable data structures using processes and streams) and demand-driven programs. This paper proposes an optimization technique for programs in which processes are almost always suspended. The technique compiles unification for data transfer into message passing. Instead of reducing the number of process switching operations, the technique optimizes the cost of each process switching operation and reduces the number of cons operations for data buffering. The technique is based on a mode system which is powerful enough to analyze bidirectional communication and streams of streams. The mode system is based on mode constraints imposed by individual clauses rather than on global dataflow analysis, enabling separate analysis of program modules. The introduction of a mode system into Flat GHC effectively subsets Flat GHC; the resulting language is called Moded Flat GHC. Moded Flat GHC programs enjoy two important properties under certain conditions: (1) reduction of a goal clause retains the well-modedness of the clause, and (2) when execution terminates, all the variables in an initial goal clause will be bound to ground terms. Practically, the computational complexity of all-at-once mode analysis can be made almost linear with respect to the size n of the program and the complexity of the data structures used, and the complexity of separate analysis is higher only by O(log n) times. Mode analysis provides useful information for debugging as well. Benchmark results show that the proposed technique well improves the performance of storage-intensive programs and demand-driven programs compared with a conventional native-code implementation. It also improves the performance of some computation-intensive programs. We expect that the proposed technique will expand the application areas of concurrent logic languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We proposed in Ref. 5) a new, message-oriented implementation technique for Moded Flat GHC that compiled unification for data transfer into message passing. The technique was based on constraint-based program analysis, and significantly improved the performance of programs that used goals and streams to implement reconfigurable data structures. In this paper we discuss how the technique can be parallelized. We focus on a method for shared-memory multiprocessors, called the shared-goal method, though a different method could be used for distributed-memory multiprocessors. Unlike other parallel implementations of concurrent logic languages which we call process-oriented, the unit of parallel execution is not an individual goal but a chain of message sends caused successively by an initial message send. Parallelism comes from the existence of different chains of message sends that can be executed independently or in a pipelined manner. Mutual exclusion based on busy waiting and on message buffering controls access to individual, shared goals. Typical goals allow last-send optimization, the message-oriented counterpart of last-call optimization. We have built an experimental implementation on Sequent Symmetry. In spite of the simple scheduling currently adopted, preliminary evaluation shows good parallel speedup and good absolute performance for concurrent operations on binary process trees. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a technique for compiling a Horn-clause program intended for exhaustive search into a GHC (Guarded Horn Clauses) program. The technique can be viewed also as a transformation technique for Prolog programs which compiles away the 'bagof' primitive and non-determinate bindings. The class of programs to which our technique is applicable is shown with a static checking algorithm; it is nontrivial and could be extended. An experiment on a compiler-based Prolog system showed that our technique improved the efficiency of exhaustive search by 6 times for a permutation generator program. This compilation technique is important also in that it exploits the AND-parallelism of GHC for parallel search. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Bacillus cereus is a gram-positive rod bacterium that is responsible for food poisoning. It is naturally widely distributed, and thus often contaminates cultures. Although it is rarely considered responsible, it can cause serious infections under certain conditions. However, lethal infections, especially in immunocompetent patients, are rare.Case Presentation: A healthy 60-year-old man developed community-acquired B. cereus pneumonia and alveolar hemorrhage unveiled by abrupt chest pain and hemoptysis with no other advance symptoms. B. cereus induced silent alveolar destruction without any local or systemic inflammatory response. Although the lesion resembled lung anthrax, there was no evidence of Bacillus anthracis toxin.Conclusions: Some isolates of B. cereus can cause anthrax-like fulminant necrotizing pneumonia in immunocompetent patients. If this type of B. cereus were used as a means of bioterrorism, it may be quite difficult to recognize as bioterrorism. We should keep B. cereus in mind as a potential pathogen of fulminant human infectious disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special issue contains selected papers from the Eighth Asian Symposium on Programming Languages and Systems (APLAS 2010), held from 28 November – 1 December 2010, in Shanghai, China. The symposium was sponsored by the Asian Association for Foundation of Software (AAFS) and Shanghai Jiao Tong University. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]