Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Comparative study on the effect of current density on Ni and Ni–Al2O3 nanocomposite coatings produced by electrolytic deposition

Abstract Nickel was deposited galvanostatically at 0·23, 0·77, 1·55, 3·1 and 5·4 A dm−2 current densities at room temperature. An XRD technique was employed for evaluating the grain size and preferred orientation of the nickel deposit. The cross-sections of the nickel deposits were subjected to microhardness and microstructure analysis. Nanosize alumina was prepared by a solution combustion technique, and the powder was characterised by XRD and particle size analysis. The particle size of Al2O3 powder synthesised by the combustion process was 30 nm. XRD confirmed the presence of pure α-Al2O3. Combustion synthesised alumina (CSA) powder was codeposited in the nickel matrix at various current densities, as in the case of nickel. Similarly, commercially available 0·05 μm Al2O3 containing a mixture of α and β phases was codeposited in nickel matrix. The Ni–Al2O3 nanocomposite coatings were characterised by XRD, microhardness measurement and image analysis. The results obtained with nickel and Ni–Al2O3 composite coatings are compared.
Dynamic Feature Description in Human Action Recognition

This work aims to present novel description methods for human action recognition. Generally, a video sequence can be represented as a collection of spatial temporal words by detecting space-time interest points and describing the unique features around the detected points (Bag of Words representation). Interest points as well as the cuboids around them are considered informative for feature description in terms of both the structural distribution of interest points and the information content inside the cuboids. Our proposed description approaches are based on this idea and making the feature descriptors more discriminative.
Hardened Properties of Lime Based Mortars Produced from Kaolin Wastes

Many studies have been developed about the use of wastes as construction materials. The higher volume of waste generated by many types of industries has caused many environmental problems. Most of these wastes have not been placed in adequate sites, or even been reused. In Brazil the industries that produces kaolin generates a lot of wastes. Studies have been carried out on the use of kaolin wastes as replacement material for Portland cement concretes and mortars; and only few ones have studied it in hydraulic mortars for restoration of historical buildings. In this work kaolin wastes were studied as pozzolanic and inert material in lime mortars. Two lime/metakaolin ratios and different proportions of kaolin wastes as replacement of river sand were studied. Hardened properties of these mortars like compressive and tensile strength and water absorbed by capillarity were evaluated up to 180 days of curing. Microstructural characteristics also were assessed using thermal analysis (TG/DTG) and x-rays diffraction (XRD). Some mortars presented the highest strengths at 90 days of curing, and at 180 days their resistances dropped. The major phases found by microstructural analysis were monocarboaluminate (C4ACH11) and calcium carbonate (CaCO3).
UvA-DARE ( Digital Academic Repository ) Laboratory-based grain-shape models for simulating dust infrared spectra

Context. Analysis of thermal dust emission spectra for dust mineralogy and physical grain properties depends on comparison spectra, which are either laboratory-measured infrared extinction spectra or calculated extinction cross sections based on certain grain models. Often, the agreement between these two kinds of spectra, if available, is not yet satisfactory because of the strong influence of the grain morphology on the spectra. Aims. We investigate the ability of the statistical light-scattering model with a distribution of form factors (DFF) to reproduce measured infrared dust extinction spectra for particles that are small compared to the wavelength, i.e. in the size range of 1 μm and smaller. Methods. We take advantage of new experimental spectra measured for free particles dispersed in air with accompanying information on the grain morphology. For the calculations, we used DFFs that were derived for aggregates of spherical grains, as well as for compact grain shapes corresponding to Gaussian random spheres. In addition we used a fitting algorithm to obtain the best-fit DFFs for the various laboratory samples. In this way we can independently derive information on the shape of the grains from their infrared spectra. Results. With the DFF model, we achieve an adequate fit of the experimental IR spectra. The differences in the IR band profiles between the spectra of particulates with different grain shapes are simply reflected by different DFFs. Irregular particle shapes require a DFF similar to that of a Gaussian Random Sphere with σ = 0.3, whereas roundish grain shapes are best fitted with that of a fractal aggregate of Df = 2.4–1.8. The fitted DFFs generally reproduce the measured spectral shapes quite well. For anisotropic materials, different DFFs are needed for the different crystallographic axes. The implications of this finding are discussed. Conclusions. The use of this model could be a step forward toward more realistic comparison data in infrared spectral analysis of thermal dust emission spectra, provided that these spectra are dominated by emission from submicron grains.
Tighter time analysis for real-time traffic in on-chip networks with shared priorities

The Network-on-Chip (NoC) is the preferred interconnection medium for massively parallel platforms. Targeting real-time applications, fixed-priority based NoCs with virtual channels have been proposed as a promising solution. In order to verify if specific time requirements can be satisfied, schedulability tests are typically used. Several analysis approaches have been proposed targeting priority-based NoCs. However, due to the approximation considered in the analyses, the results may involve a large amount of pessimism. The applicability of the analyses is thus limited in practice. In this paper, we identify a number of properties of NoCs with shared priorities. An improved time analysis is proposed where pessimism can be significantly reduced for many cases. In order to evaluate the proposed analysis, a number of experiments have been generated along with a case study based on an automotive application. The improvement can be clearly observed from the evaluation results.
Inhibition of Histone Deacetylation and DNA Methylation Improves Gene Expression Mediated by the Adeno-Associated Virus/Phage in Cancer Cells

Bacteriophage (phage), viruses that infect bacteria only, have become promising vectors for targeted systemic delivery of genes to cancer, although, with poor efficiency. We previously designed an improved phage vector by incorporating cis genetic elements of adeno-associated virus (AAV). This novel AAV/phage hybrid (AAVP) specifically targeted systemic delivery of therapeutic genes into tumors. To advance the AAVP vector, we recently introduced the stress-inducible Grp78 tumor specific promoter and found that this dual tumor-targeted AAVP provides persistent gene expression, over time, in cancer cells compared to silenced gene expression from the CMV promoter in the parental AAVP. Herein, we investigated the effect of histone deacetylation and DNA methylation on AAVP-mediated gene expression in cancer cells and explored the effect of cell confluence state on AAVP gene expression efficacy. Using a combination of AAVP expressing the GFP reporter gene, flow cytometry, inhibitors of histone deacetylation, and DNA methylation, we have demonstrated that histone deacetylation and DNA methylation are associated with silencing of gene expression from the CMV promoter in the parental AAVP. Importantly, inhibitors of histone deacetylases boost gene expression in cancer cells from the Grp78 promoter in the dual tumor-targeted AAVP. However, cell confluence had no effect on AAVP-guided gene expression. Our findings prove that combination of histone deacetylase inhibitor drugs with the Grp78 promoter is an effective approach to improve AAVP-mediated gene expression in cancer cells and should be considered for AAVP-based clinical cancer gene therapy.
The Effect of Entrepreneurial Orientation and Competitive Advantage on SMEs ’ Growth : A Structural Equation Modeling Study

The aim of this research is to analyze factors affecting on SMEs’ growth and to develop the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) of SMEs’ growth. The samples sized consist331 entrepreneurs in Lao PDR, instrument of research was the questionnaires 5 levels of Likert Rating Scale, the variables were Entrepreneurial Orientation, Competitive Advantages and SMEs’ growth. The result of this research were as follow: The factors Entrepreneurial Orientation has positively affecting on Competitive Advantages and the factors Competitive Advantages and Entrepreneurial Orientation has positively affecting towards SME’s growth with statistical significance.
The value of relatives with phenotypes but missing genotypes in association studies for quantitative traits

The additional statistical power of association studies for quantitative traits was derived when ungenotyped relatives with phenotypes are included in the analysis. It was shown that the extra power is a simple function of the coefficient of additive genetic relationship and the phenotypic correlation coefficient between the genotyped and ungenotyped relatives. For close relatives, such as pairs of fullsibs and identical twin pairs, gains in power in the range of 10 to 30% are achieved if only one of the pair is genotyped. The theoretical results were verified by simulations. It was shown that ignoring the error in estimating the genotype of the ungenotyped relative has little impact on the estimates and on statistical power, consistent with results from quantitative trait loci (QTL) linkage studies. For genome‐wide association studies in which not all relatives with phenotypes can be genotyped, our study provides a prediction of the additional power of an analysis that includes phenotypes on ungenotyped individuals, and can be used in experimental design. We show that a two‐step procedure, in which missing genotypes are imputed and subsequently an association analysis is performed, is efficient and powerful. Genet. Epidemiol. 30:30–36, 2006. © 2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Seabed Segmentation Using Optimized Statistics of Sonar Textures

In this paper, we propose and compare two supervised algorithms for the segmentation of textured sonar images, with respect to seafloor types. We characterize seafloors by a set of empirical distributions estimated on texture responses to a set of different filters. Moreover, we introduce a novel similarity measure between sonar textures in this feature space. Our similarity measure is defined as a weighted sum of Kullback-Leibler divergences between texture features. The weight setting is twofold. First, each filter is weighted according to its discrimination power: The computation of these weights are issued from a margin maximization criterion. Second, an additional weight, evaluated as an angular distance between the incidence angles of the compared texture samples, is considered to take into account sonar-image acquisition process that leads to a variability of the backscattered value and of the texture aspect with the incidence-angle range. A Bayesian framework is used in the first algorithm where the conditional likelihoods are expressed using the proposed similarity measure between local pixel statistics and the seafloor prototype statistics. The second method is based on a variational framework as the minimization of a region-based functional that involves the similarity between global-region texture-based statistics and the predefined prototypes.
A Case–Control Study of Occupational Exposure to Trichloroethylene and Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma

Background Previous epidemiologic findings suggest an association between exposure to trichloroethylene (TCE), a chlorinated solvent primarily used for vapor degreasing of metal parts, and non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL). Objectives We investigated the association between occupational TCE exposure and NHL within a population-based case–control study using detailed exposure assessment methods. Methods Cases (n = 1,189; 76% participation rate) and controls (n = 982; 52% participation rate) provided information on their occupational histories and, for selected occupations, on possible workplace exposure to TCE using job-specific interview modules. An industrial hygienist assessed potential TCE exposure based on this information and a review of the TCE industrial hygiene literature. We computed odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) relating NHL and different metrics of estimated TCE exposure, categorized using tertiles among exposed controls, with unexposed subjects as the reference group. Results We observed associations with NHL for the highest tertiles of estimated average weekly exposure (23 exposed cases; OR = 2.5; 95% CI, 1.1–6.1) and cumulative exposure (24 exposed cases; OR = 2.3; 95% CI, 1.0–5.0) to TCE. Tests for trend with these metrics surpassed or approached statistical significance (p-value for trend = 0.02 and 0.08, respectively); however, we did not observe dose–response relationships across the exposure levels. Overall, neither duration nor intensity of exposure was associated with NHL, although we observed an association with the lowest tertile of exposure duration (OR = 2.1; 95% CI, 1.0–4.7). Conclusions Our findings offer additional support for an association between high levels of exposure to TCE and increased risk of NHL. However, we cannot rule out the possibility of confounding from other chlorinated solvents used for vapor degreasing and note that our exposure assessment methods have not been validated.
Faster document navigation with space-filling thumbnails

Scrolling is the standard way to navigate through many types of digital documents. However, moving more than a few pages can be slow because all scrolling techniques constrain visual search to only a small document region. To improve document navigation, we developed Space-Filling Thumbnails (SFT), an overview display that eliminates most scrolling. SFT provides two views: a standard page view for reading, and a thumbnail view that shows all pages. We tested SFT in three experiments that involved finding pages in documents. The first study (n=13) compared seven current scrolling techniques, and showed that SFT is significantly faster than the other methods. The second and third studies (n=32 and n=14) were detailed comparisons of SFT with thumbnail-enhanced scrollbars (TES), which performed well in the first experiment. SFT was faster than TES across all document types and lengths, particularly when tasks involved revisitation. In addition, SFT was strongly preferred by participants.
Incorporation of an invasive plant into a native insect herbivore food web

The integration of invasive species into native food webs represent multifarious dynamics of ecological and evolutionary processes. We document incorporation of Prunus serotina (black cherry) into native insect food webs. We find that P. serotina harbours a herbivore community less dense but more diverse than its native relative, P. padus (bird cherry), with similar proportions of specialists and generalists. While herbivory on P. padus remained stable over the past century, that on P. serotina gradually doubled. We show that P. serotina may have evolved changes in investment in cyanogenic glycosides compared with its native range. In the leaf beetle Gonioctena quinquepunctata, recently shifted from native Sorbus aucuparia to P. serotina, we find divergent host preferences on Sorbus- versus Prunus-derived populations, and weak host-specific differentiation among 380 individuals genotyped for 119 SNP loci. We conclude that evolutionary processes may generate a specialized herbivore community on an invasive plant, allowing prognoses of reduced invasiveness over time. On the basis of the results presented here, we would like to caution that manual control might have the adverse effect of a slowing down of processes of adaptation, and a delay in the decline of the invasive character of P. serotina.
Does type of disability make a difference in affiliate stigma among family caregivers of individuals with autism, intellectual disability or physical disability?

BACKGROUND Studies have shown that beyond public and self stigma, stigma can also impact family members. Only scant research has examined the internalised aspects of stigma, known as affiliate stigma, among family caregivers of individuals with disabilities. This study examined affiliate stigma among family caregivers of individuals with developmental disabilities via a comparison between caregivers of individuals with intellectual disabilities (ID), autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and physical disabilities (PD) in Israel. METHODS Family caregivers (n = 171) of individuals with developmental disabilities, mainly ID (22.4%), ASD (32.9%) and PD (27.1%), completed a self-report structured questionnaire including the Affiliate Stigma Scale and background variables. RESULTS Results supported a one-factor structure for the Affiliate Stigma Scale. Overall, affiliate stigma was relatively low in this sample, but was found to be higher among caregivers of individuals with ASD when compared with caregivers of individuals with ID or PD. CONCLUSION Findings from this study point to the importance of supporting caregivers of individuals with ASD to decrease their feelings of stigma. It is also important to further develop scales measuring affiliate stigma in order to capture the multi-dimensional nature of the concept.
Maternal MTHFR polymorphisms and risk of spontaneous abortion.

OBJECTIVE To asses the association between intake of folate and B vitamins and the incidence of spontaneous abortion (SA) according to the maternal methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) polymorphisms (677 C>T and 1298 A>C). MATERIAL AND METHODS We conducted a nested case-control study within a perinatal cohort of women recruited in the state of Morelos, Mexico. Twenty-three women with SA were compared to 74 women whose pregnancy survived beyond week 20th. Intake of folate and B vitamins respectively, was estimated using a validated food frequency questionnaire. Maternal MTHFR polymorphisms were determined by PCR-RFLP and serum homocysteine levels by HPLC. RESULTS Carriers of MTHFR 677TT and 1298AC genotypes respectively showed an increased risk of SA (OR 677TT vs. CC/CT=5.0; 95% CI: 1.2, 20.9 and OR 1298 AC vs. AA=5.5; 95% CI: 1.1, 26.6). CONCLUSIONS Our results support the role of MTHFR polymorphisms as a risk factor for SA, regardless of dietary intake of B vitamins.
Chandra Observations of High-Mass Young Stellar Objects in the Monoceros R2 Molecular Cloud

We observed the Monoceros R2 molecular cloud with the ACIS-I array on board the Chandra X-Ray Observatory. From the central 3. ′2 × 3. ′2 region, we detect 154 sources above the detection limit of ~5 × 10-16 ergs s -1 cm -2 with a 100 ks exposure. About 85% of the X-ray sources are identified with an infrared counterpart, including four high-mass stars in the zero-age main-sequence (ZAMS) and/or pre-main-sequence (PMS) phase. The X-ray spectra of the high-mass ZAMS and PMS stars are represented by a thin thermal plasma model of a temperature above ~2 keV. The X-rays are time variable and exhibit rapid flares. This high-temperature plasma and flaring activity is similar to that seen in low-mass PMS stars and is contrary to the behavior observed in high-mass main-sequence stars.The X-ray luminosity increases as the intrinsic K-band flux increases. However, the X-ray luminosity saturates at a level of ~1031 ergs s-1. We conclude that high-mass ZAMS and PMS stars emit X-rays, possibly because of magnetic activity such as that of low-mass stars.
pH-Dependent Transitions in Xanthorhodopsin†

Abstract Xanthorhodopsin (XR), the light-driven proton pump of the halophilic eubacterium Salinibacter ruber, exhibits substantial homology to bacteriorhodopsin (BR) of archaea and proteorhodopsin (PR) of marine bacteria, but unlike them contains a light-harvesting carotenoid antenna, salinixanthin, as well as retinal. We report here the pH-dependent properties of XR. The pKa of the retinal Schiff base is as high as in BR, i.e. ≥12.4. Deprotonation of the Schiff base and the ensuing alkaline denaturation cause large changes in the absorption bands of the carotenoid antenna, which lose intensity and become broader, making the spectrum similar to that of salinixanthin not bound to XR. A small redshift of the retinal chromophore band and increase of its extinction, as well as the pH-dependent amplitude of the M intermediate indicate that in detergent-solubilized XR the pKa of the Schiff base counterion and proton acceptor is about 6 (compared to 2.6 in BR, and 7.5 in PR). The protonation of the counterion is accompanied by a small blueshift of the carotenoid absorption bands. The pigment is stable in the dark upon acidification to pH 2. At pH < 2 a transition to a blueshifted species absorbing around 440 nm occurs, accompanied by loss of resolution of the carotenoid absorption bands. At pH < 3 illumination of XR with continuous light causes accumulation of long-lived photoproduct(s) with an absorption maximum around 400 nm. The photocycle of XR was examined between pH 4 and 10 in solubilized samples. The pH dependence of recovery of the initial state slows at both acid and alkaline pH, with pKas of 6.0 and 9.3. The decrease in the rates with pKa 6.0 is apparently caused by protonation of the counterion and proton acceptor, and that at high pH reflects the pKa of the internal proton donor, Glu94, at the times in the photocycle when this group equilibrates with the bulk.
Quantitative Characterization of Pore Corrugation in Ordered Mesoporous Materials Using Image Analysis of Electron Tomograms

Electron tomography and image analysis are combined to characterize ordered mesoporous silica SBA-15. The morphology of the mesopores with average diameter 6 nm is analyzed in terms of cylinders having variable radii and centers that are statistically centered on the points of a distorted hexagonal lattice. The variations in the mesopore centers and radii add up and result in pore wall corrugation with amplitude of 1.6 nm. The correlation length of the corrugation along the pore axis was found to be 4−5 nm. The amplitude of the corrugation compared well with the 1.9 nm thick microporous corona obtained from X-ray diffraction (XRD). In general, the present approach provides a detailed microscopic 3D model of nanostructured materials that complements macroscopic measurements such as physisorption and XRD.
Modelling mesh independent transverse cracks in laminated composites with a simplified cohesive segment method

A methodology is proposed for modelling transverse matrix cracks in laminated composites in a three-dimensional explicit finite element analysis framework. The method is based on the introduction of extra degrees of freedom to represent the displacement discontinuity and the use of a cohesive zone model to determine damage evolution and crack propagation. The model is designed for the analysis of matrix cracks in laminates made of uni-directional fibre-reinforced plies, allowing several assumptions to be made which greatly simplify the algorithm. This was implemented in the commercial software Abaqus/Explicit as a user-defined element subroutine (VUEL). The methodology was verified via the analysis of open-hole tension tests considering both 45 and quasi-isotropic layups. The results were found to be in qualitative agreement with experimental observations in terms of the nucleation and propagation of matrix cracks, the progressive delamination behaviour and the evident interactions between these damage mechanisms.