Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
LEAD-FREE PV MODULES: INDUSTRIAL REALIZATION AND EVALUATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT

: With the large amount of photovoltaic (PV) modules required for a more renewable energy sector, strategies to avoid the toxic material lead, which is still present in most conventional modules today, becomes more and more relevant. This work presents the result of the government-funded research project “BermUDa”, in which the industrial realization and environmental impact of lead-free modules was investigated. The herein chosen approach was to directly replace lead-containing module materials (namely metallization paste and solder cell connectors) with lead-free alternatives, while leaving the industrial production process as unchanged as possible. For this, a large number of pre-processed silicon wafers underwent cell (PERC) and module production, where the processability was tested and compared with conventional lead-containing materials. Subsequently, the performance of the products (cells and PV modules) was tested and compared in terms of electrical performance and reliability in power measurements and accelerated aging tests, respectively. The project thereby demonstrated the feasibility to work with lead-free technologies and adapt currently established industrial processes to produce completely lead-free PV modules that can compete with their lead-containing counterparts in terms of sustainability and costs (LCOE). The work also suggests focus on cell metallization pastes, driven by future market demand, to develop lead-free pastes that can achieve better fine line printing capabilities to allow greater flexibility when converting an existing production line to produce lead-free PV modules.
Formal correctness, safety, dependability, and performance analysis of a satellite

This paper reports on the usage of a broad palette of formal modeling and analysis techniques on a regular industrial-size design of an ultra-modern satellite platform. These efforts were carried out in parallel with the conventional software development of the satellite platform. The model itself is expressed in a formalized dialect of AADL. Its formal nature enables rigorous and automated analysis, for which the recently developed COMPASS toolset was used. The whole effort revealed numerous inconsistencies in the early design documents, and the use of formal analyses provided additional insight on discrete system behavior (comprising nearly 50 million states), on hybrid system behavior involving discrete and continuous variables, and enabled the automated generation of large fault trees (66 nodes) for safety analysis that typically are constructed by hand. The model's size pushed the computational tractability of the algorithms underlying the formal analyses, and revealed bottlenecks for future theoretical research. Additionally, the effort led to newly learned practices from which subsequent formal modeling and analysis efforts shall benefit, especially when they are injected in the conventional software development lifecycle. The case demonstrates the feasibility of fully capturing a system-level design as a single comprehensive formal model and analyze it automatically using a toolset based on (probabilistic) model checkers.
Revision of the Genus Miridiba Reitter, 1901 (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae, Melolonthinae)

Abstract The genus Miridiba is here reviewed on the basis of external morphological and genital characters. This genus now contains 27 species, eight of which are new transfers from Holotrichia Hope, 1837; Holotrichia (Pledina) Reitter, 1901; Melolontha Fabricius, 1775; and Neodontocnema Arrow, 1948. A type series of thirteen species is designed. Hippotrichia Arrow, 1948 and Neodontocnema are described in detail.
Eﬀect of diﬀerent parameters on caustic magnesia hydration and magnesium hydroxide rheology: a review

Magnesium oxide and magnesium hydroxide are two compounds that show favorable properties, leading to their use in many industrial applications. This review discusses the methods of synthesizing magnesium oxide and magnesium hydroxide from dolomite, magnesite, brines and sea water using the conventional methods of precipitation and hydration. Nanoparticle preparation is via precipitation using sonochemical, sol–gel and electrochemical methods or via hydration using solvothermal and hydrothermal methods. Moreover, the application of both magnesium oxide and magnesium hydroxide is discussed in this review. This review article also provides extensive information on the hydration process of magnesium oxide and the effect of different parameters including the pH, temperature, surface area, particle size, hydrating agents, etc. , which affect the rheological behavior of Mg(OH) 2 . This review is a source of scientific as well as practical information on the applications of Mg(OH) 2 and MgO at the present time and on the methods of obtaining them, in the light of available and applied research techniques and discoveries made so far in the field of advanced powder technology.
The PT1-Ca2+ Gla domain binds to a membrane through two dipalmitoylphosphatidylserines. A computational study.

Binding of vitamin K-dependent proteins to cell membranes containing phosphatidylserine (PS) via gamma-carboxyglutamic acid (Gla) domains is one of the essential steps in the blood coagulation pathway. During activation of the coagulation cascade, prothrombin is converted to thrombin by prothrombinase, a complex consisting of serine protease FXa and cofactor FVa, anchored to anionic phospholipids on the surface of activated platelets in the presence of calcium ions. To investigate the binding of the Gla domain of prothrombin fragment 1 (PT1) to anionic lipids in the presence of Ca2+, we have conducted MD simulations of the protein with one and two dipalmitoylphosphatidylserines (DPPS) in a dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine (DPPC) bilayer membrane. The results show a well-defined phosphatidylserine binding site, which agrees generally with crystallographic studies [Huang, M. , et al. (2003) Nat. Struct. Biol. 10, 751-756]. However, in the presence of the lipid membrane, some of the interactions observed in the crystal structure adjust during the simulations possibly because in our system the PT1-Ca2+ complex is embedded in a DPPC lipid membrane. Our simulations confirm the existence of a second phospholipid headgroup binding site on the opposite face of the PT1-Ca2+ complex as suggested by MacDonald et al. [(1997) Biochemistry 36, 5120-5127]. The serine headgroup in the second site binds through a Gla domain-bound calcium ion Ca1, Gla30, and Lys11. On the basis of free energy simulations, we estimate the energy of binding of the PT1-Ca2+ complex to a single DPPS to be around -11.5 kcal/mol. The estimated free energy of binding of a DPPS lipid to the second binding site is around -8.8 kcal/mol and is in part caused by the nature of the second site and in part by entropic effects.
The Thai

To determine normal cardiac values for two-dimensional, M-mode and Doppler echocardiography because standard echocardiographic values have not been adequately studied in small-breed rabbits. Data was collected from 40 healthy small-breed rabbits. The results of complete physical examination, thoracic radiography, electrocardiography and echocardiography were collected and analysed as descriptive statistics. The correlation between weight and age and echocardiographic parameters was evaluated. A t-test was performed to compare the parameters between males and females. Most parameters were normally distributed and could be reliably used as standard values of echocardiographic parameters. Weight and age correlated positively with several echocardiographic parameters. However, there was no statistically significant difference between male and female rabbits. The normal value of echocardiographic parameters was established for small-breed rabbits.
Comparative study of vegetation phenology extraction methods based on digital images

: Vegetation phenology is an effective index that reflects the growth condition of vegetation and their response to climate change. Analyzing vegetation phenology at landscape or smaller scale will be a powerful supplement to remote-sensing based and artificial observed phenological studies. In this study, we applied the time series digital images from typical observation stations in camera-based phenology network (PhenoCam) to fit the seasonal growth curves at region of interest (ROI) and pixel scales. Key vegetation phenological parameters on the growth curve were extracted using multiple methods. First, we realized the custom definition of ROI by arbitrarily drawing polygons on the image and growth curve fitting based on the greenness index in the ROI. The results indicate that double logistic method is adapted for modeling the vegetation growing process at middle-high latitude that have a single growth peak. The spline method shows a good performance for fitting growth curves of vegetation that has multiple growth seasons. Second, based on the fitted curve, we used four models (Klosterman, Gu, TRS, and Derivatives) to derive the key phenological parameters for vegetation having single growth season. MODIS EVI-based phenological parameters were extracted as a comparison with camera based phenological parameters. We found that their capabilities in detecting phenological parameters in forest and cropland were consistent. For the vegetation with more than one growth season, the growth curve was fitted with spline method, then the change point detection method was applied to determine growth seasons on the curve and extract the key phenological parameters. The uncertainty of the fitting methods and phenology methods were estimated, with all of the RMSE less than 0.005. Klosterman method is identified as the most robust. Vegetation greenup date was extracted for each pixel in the ROI that can be useful for distinguishing the phonological diversity between different species. Pixel level vegetation phenology analysis could be used to identify biodiversity at landscape scale in the future.
Clinical Value of Exfoliative Cytology in Neoplasia of the Lung

The examination of various body fluids and secretions for malignant cells has now become a well recognized procedure in clinical laboratories. The method certainly has its supporters and enthu-siasts, who are obviously encouraged by the frequent finding of positive cases. In neoplasia of the lung, however, the published figures of positive results vary from 20.1 % (Bamforth and Osborn, 1958) to 83.2% (Williams, 1961) for sputum, and 21 % (Boucot and Sokoloff, 1955) to 88.8% (Clerf and Herbut, 1950) for bronchial secretions, although higher figures have been recorded where sputum-inducing agents have been employed. The wide variation in these figures must be explained, at least partially, by the selection of patients and by differences in technique, especially variation in the number of specimens examined.
Will more tree diversity bring back more income from timber? A case study from Alabama of USA

At a large scale the diversity of tree species in forests lead to high productivity and multiple ecosystem services. However, from a small forest landowner’s perspective, it is not clear whether more diversity of tree species will bring back more potential income from timber sales. In this study, a case study was conducted at a mixed southern pine and hardwood forest near Birmingham, Alabama, USA. The results indicated that more tree species in a secondary natural forest would not necessarily contribute to more potential timber income at the local scale. The total timber value is strongly correlated to sawtimber value. There is a positive relationship between total basal area at each plot and total timber value. The results provide important information for small forest landowners and forest management for biodiversity conservation in the southern region of USA. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Towards automated and in-situ, near-real time 3-D reconstruction of coral reef environments

Coral reefs are biologically complex ecosystems that support a wide variety of marine organisms. These are fragile communities under enormous threat from natural and human-based influences. Properly assessing and measuring the growth and health of reefs is essential to understanding impacts of ocean acidification, coastal urbanisation and global warming. In this paper, we present an innovative 3-D reconstruction technique based on visual imagery as a non-intrusive, repeatable, in situ method for estimating physical parameters, such as surface area and volume for efficient assessment of longterm variability. The reconstruction algorithms are presented, and benchmarked using an existing data set. We validate the technique underwater, utilising a commercial-off-the-shelf camera and a piece of staghorn coral, Acropora cervicornis. The resulting reconstruction is compared with a laser scan of the coral piece for assessment and validation. The comparison shows that 77% of the pixels in the reconstruction are within 0.3 mm of the ground truth laser scan. Reconstruction results from an unknown video camera are also presented as a segue to future applications of this research.
CarGene: Characterisation of sets of genes based on metabolic pathways analysis

The great amount of biological information provides scientists with an incomparable framework for testing the results of new algorithms. Several tools have been developed for analysing gene-enrichment and most of them are Gene Ontology-based tools. We developed a Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (Kegg)-based tool that provides a friendly graphical environment for analysing gene-enrichment. The tool integrates two statistical corrections and simultaneously analysing the information about many groups of genes in both visual and textual manner. We tested the usefulness of our approach on a previous analysis (Huttenshower et al.). Furthermore, our tool is freely available (http://www.upo.es/eps/bigs/cargene.html).
A Neonatal Piglet Model for Investigating Brain and Cognitive Development in Small for Gestational Age Human Infants

The piglet was investigated as a potential model for studying brain and cognitive deficits associated with being born small for gestational age (SGA). Naturally farrowed SGA (0.7–1.0 kg BW) and average for gestational age (AGA, 1.3–1.6 kg BW) piglets were obtained on postnatal day (PD) 2, placed in individual cages, and provided a nutritionally adequate milk replacer diet (285 ml/kg/d). Beginning at PD14, performance in a spatial T-maze task was assessed. At PD28, piglets were anesthetized for magnetic resonance (MR) imaging to assess brain structure (voxel-based morphometry), connectivity (diffusion-tensor imaging) and metabolites in the hippocampus and corpus callosum (proton MR spectroscopy). Piglets born SGA showed compensatory growth such that BW of SGA and AGA piglets was similar (P>0.05), by PD15. Birth weight affected maze performance, with SGA piglets taking longer to reach criterion than AGA piglets (p<0.01). Total brain volume of SGA and AGA piglets was similar (P<0.05), but overall, SGA piglets had less gray matter than AGA piglets (p<0.01) and tended to have a smaller internal capsule (p = 0.07). Group comparisons between SGA and AGA piglets defined 9 areas (≥ 20 clusters) where SGA piglets had less white matter (p<0.01); 2 areas where SGA piglets had more white matter (p<0.01); and 3 areas where SGA piglets had more gray matter (p<0.01). The impact of being born SGA on white matter was supported by a lower (p<0.04) fractional anisotropy value for SGA piglets, suggesting reduced white matter development and connectivity. None of the metabolites measured were different between groups. Collectively, the results show that SGA piglets have spatial learning deficits and abnormal development of white matter. As learning deficits and abnormalities in white matter are common in SGA human infants, the piglet is a tractable translational model that can be used to investigate SGA-associated cognitive deficits and potential interventions.
CProb: a computational tool for conducting conditional probability analysis.

Conditional probability is the probability of observing one event given that another event has occurred. In an environmental context, conditional probability helps to assess the association between an environmental contaminant (i.e., the stressor) and the ecological condition of a resource (i.e., the response). These analyses, when combined with controlled experiments and other methodologies, show great promise in evaluating ecological conditions from observational data and in defining water quality and other environmental criteria. Current applications of conditional probability analysis (CPA) are largely done via scripts or cumbersome spreadsheet routines, which may prove daunting to end-users and do not provide access to the underlying scripts. Combining spreadsheets with scripts eases computation through a familiar interface (i.e., Microsoft Excel) and creates a transparent process through full accessibility to the scripts. With this in mind, we developed a software application, CProb, as an Add-in for Microsoft Excel with R, R(D)com Server, and Visual Basic for Applications. CProb calculates and plots scatterplots, empirical cumulative distribution functions, and conditional probability. In this short communication, we describe CPA, our motivation for developing a CPA tool, and our implementation of CPA as a Microsoft Excel Add-in. Further, we illustrate the use of our software with two examples: a water quality example and a landscape example. CProb is freely available for download at http://www.epa. gov/emap/nca/html/regions/cprob.
Computational Geometry: Generalized (or Colored) Intersection Searching

Michiel Smid Carleton University, Ottawa 1.1 Geometric intersection searching problems . 1-1 Generalized intersection searching 1.2 Summary of known results . 1-3 Axes-parallel objects • Arbitrarily-oriented objects • Problems on the grid • Single-shot problems • External memory and word-RAM algorithms 1.3 Techniques . 1-5 A transformation-based approach • A sparsification-based approach • A persistence-based approach • A general approach for reporting problems • Adding range restrictions • Exploiting the output size • A reverse transformation 1.4 Conclusion and future directions . 1-20 1.5 Acknowledgement . 1-20
Systemic Monocytic-MDSCs Are Generated from Monocytes and Correlate with Disease Progression in Breast Cancer Patients

Myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) are highly immunosuppressive myeloid cells, which increase in cancer patients. The molecular mechanism behind their generation and function is unclear. Whereas granulocytic-MDSCs correlate with poor overall survival in breast cancer, the presence and relevance of monocytic-MDSCs (Mo-MDSCs) is unknown. Here we report for the first time an enrichment of functional blood Mo-MDSCs in breast cancer patients before they acquire a typical Mo-MDSC surface phenotype. A clear population of Mo-MDSCs with the typical cell surface phenotype (CD14+HLA-DRlow/-CD86low/-CD80low/-CD163low/-) increased significantly first during disease progression and correlated to metastasis to lymph nodes and visceral organs. Furthermore, monocytes, comprising the Mo-MDSC population, from patients with metastatic breast cancer resemble the reprogrammed immunosuppressive monocytes in patients with severe infections, both by their surface and functional phenotype but also at their molecular gene expression profile. Our data suggest that monitoring the Mo-MDSC levels in breast cancer patients may represent a novel and simple biomarker for assessing disease progression.
Dynamic interaction of lakes, climate and vegetation over northern Africa during the mid-Holocene

During the early to mid-Holocene, about 11 , 500 to 5 , 500 years ago, lakes expanded across the Sahel and Sahara in response to enhanced summer monsoon precipitation. To investigate the effect of these lakes on the West African summer monsoon, previous simulation studies prescribed mid-Holocene lakes from reconstructions. By prescribing mid-Holocene lakes, however, the terrestrial water balance is inconsistent with the size of the lakes. In order to close the terrestrial water cycle, we construct 5 a dynamic endorheic lake (DEL) model and implement it into the atmosphere-land model ICON-JSBACH4. For the first time, this allows us to investigate the dynamic interaction between climate, lakes and vegetation over northern Africa. Additionally, we investigate the effect of lake depth changes on the mid-Holocene precipitation, which was neglected in previous simulation studies. A pre-industrial control simulation shows that the DEL model realistically simulates the lake extent over northern Africa. 10 Only in the Ahnet and Chotts Basin is the lake area slightly overestimated, which likely relates to the coarse resolution of the simulations. The mid-Holocene simulations reveal that both, the lake expansion and the vegetation expansion cause a precipitation increase over northern Africa. The sum of these individual contributions on the precipitation is however larger than the combined effect, when lake and vegetation dynamics interact. Thus, the lake-vegetation interaction causes a relative drying response over the entire Sahel. The main reason for this drying response is that the simulated vegetation expansion 15 cools the land surface more strongly than the lake expansion, mainly the expansion of the Lake Chad area. The resulting warming response over the larger lake area causes local changes in meridional surface-temperature gradient that decelerate the inland moisture transport from the tropical Atlantic into the Sahel, which causes a drying response in the Sahel. An idealized mid-Holocene experiment shows that a similar drying response is induced when the depth of Lake Chad is decreased by about 1-5 m, without changing the horizontal lake area. By reducing the depth of Lake Chad the heat storage capacity of the 20 lake decreases and the lakes warms faster during the summer months. Thus, in the ICON-JSBACH4 model, the lake depth significantly influences the simulated surface temperature and the simulated meridonal surface-temperature gradient between the simulated lakes and vegetation and thus, the mid-Holocene precipitation over northern Africa