Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effect of plant traits and population structure on the female reproductive success of the endemic Primula elatior subsp. bergidensis (Primulaceae)

This study explores the possible causes of variation in female reproductive success of the subspecific taxon Primula elatior subsp. bergidensis, a distylic endemic to the north-western Iberian Peninsula, by analysing both vegetative and reproductive traits. In three populations, we marked vegetative and reproductive individuals either by mapping the spatial position of every individual (in one population), or by establishing permanent quadrats (in the remainder two populations). We recorded floral morph (pin or thrum), width and length of the largest leaf, scape length, and number of flowers produced; all individuals were monitored to estimate the number of fruits and seeds produced. The results show that the morph ratio did not differ significantly from 1:1 in any of the populations. The number of flowers per plant varied between populations, and longer scape length was associated with higher fruit set in all populations. Plant size, scape length, and population spatial structure all had major effects on reproductive success, but the strength—and in some cases the direction—of the effects varied among populations.
Proteomic and morphological divergence in micro-allopatric morphotypes of Melarhaphe neritoides in the absence of genetic differentiation

The intertidal zone represents an interesting model system to study adaptation because several ecological factors change abruptly across this area, causing strong divergent selective pressures on a scale of meters. On the Galician shore (NW Spain), 3 species (Littorina saxatilis, Nucella lapillus and Melarhaphe neritoides) show similar adaptation to survive these abrupt changes. The 3 species have independently evolved morphotypes with similar morphological features that occur either in sheltered or exposed environments. However, while in L. saxatilis and N. lapillus the morphotypes are genetically based, no genetic divergence has been found between the morphotypes of M. neritoides. To better understand the extent of divergence be tween the 2 morphotypes of M. neritoides and the causes of this polymorphism, protein expression patterns of morphotypes collected from 2 Galician localities were studied. Additionally, mtDNA genetic diversity and shell morphometrics were studied for a reference population at Silleiro. A significant and geographically consistent divergence in protein expression was found between morphotypes kept under controlled laboratory conditions for 1 mo. Morphometric analyses showed that the morphotypes maintained the differences in shell shape even after being kept for 15 mo under similar laboratory conditions. No significant genetic differentiation was found between the 2 morphotypes at the mtDNA level despite the high genetic diversity observed. Together, our data suggest phenotypic plasticity as the most likely cause for the morphotypes and provide putative candidate loci that can be further studied for a better understanding of the origin of this adaptive polymorphism.
Do Lenders Discriminate in Processing Defaults

A major criticism leveled against the Berkovec, Canner, Gabriel, and Hannan (BCGH) study of potential lending discrimination is that there are significant unobservable influences that could bias their results against a finding of discriminatory behavior. Two of the three critics maintain that, among these unobservable influences should be a higher incidence of foreclosure for minorities, conditional on loan default, which would explain the BCGH findings. This article examines that question in detail and finds that the postdefault foreclosure experience of minorities is very similar to that of nonminorities, and that lenders tend to give minorities more (rather than less) time to work out their situation before commencing foreclosure. These findings are robust across a number of dimensions, nullifying the above-mentioned critiques of BCGH. However, the article also points out methodological weaknesses that still leave doubts as to the validity of the BCGH results.
Foreign Technology Transfer: An Assessment of Russia’s Economic Dependence on High-Tech Imports

The article examines Russia’s dependence on hightech imported goods. We improve the OECD hightechnology product classification by increasing the level of disaggregation, accounting for new goods, ensuring comparability over time, and differentiating goods by technological level on quite high levels of disaggregation. We describe the major trends in the world market for high-tech goods and identify the leading countries in each sector (most frequently, China, Germany, Republic of Korea, Switzerland, and Singapore) primarily by calculating net exports of high-tech goods in these sectors. We also assess Russian competitive positions in the global market for high-tech goods by sectors, applying the newly developed competitiveness index, and measure Russian dependence on high-tech goods imported from countries that recently imposed sanctions against Russia. We show that Russia’s economy is highly dependent on imports of pharmaceutical goods and medical equipment, machinery and equipment (except nuclear reactors, fuel elements, engines and turbines), and electrical equipment. The sectors with most imports originating from ‘sanctionimposing’ countries are aircraft, medical and optical equipment, engines and turbines, and pharmaceutical goods. Computers and electronic equipment are at the opposite pole: in these sectors, China is the world leader and the key partner for Russia.
Consumption awareness of Indian community towards food label in Klang, Selangor

As the third largest ethnic in Malaysia, Indian community plays an important role in the increasing economy of food products and their awareness towards food labels can be considered as important indicator too. The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) is utilized as a theoretical framework in explaining the Indian consumers’ awareness in consuming food products with the food labels in Klang, Selangor, Malaysia. Primary data was obtained through the designated questionnaire which had been distributed to 300 respondents representing Indian consumers. The data was obtained using stratified random sampling technique. The study used descriptive analysis, chi-square test, and reliability test in order to analyze the collected data. The overall results indicate that the presence of food labels have significance relationship with the awareness of Indian consumers in buying and consuming the food products. Besides, most of the respondents concerned about religious and healthy practices. Thus, this study has become a strong indicator on how the awareness level of Indian consumers towards food label.
Regional flow duration curves for ungauged sites in Sicily

Abstract. Flow duration curves are simple and powerful tools to deal with many hydrological and environmental problems related to water quality assessment, water-use assessment and water allocation. Unfortunately the scarcity of streamflow data enables the use of these instruments only for gauged basins. A regional model is developed here for estimating flow duration curves at ungauged basins in Sicily, Italy. Due to the complex ephemeral behavior of the examined region, this study distinguishes dry periods, when flows are zero, from wet periods using a three parameters power law to describe the frequency distribution of flows. A large dataset of streamflows has been analyzed and the parameters of flow duration curves have been derived for about fifty basins. Regional regression equations have been developed to derive flow duration curves starting from morphological basin characteristics.
Dichloroacetate (DCA) Promotes a De-Differentiated Phenotype in Dental Pulp-Derived Stem Cells in vitro

Mesenchymal dental pulp-derived stem cells (DPSC) may be capable of regenerating many tissue types, including bone, adipocyte, vascular, and neural tissues. Methods currently under development direct pluripotent stem cells to differentiate, however, spontaneous in vitro differentiation may also occur – although the mechanisms that direct this process have not been fully elucidated. The goal of this study was to evaluate the potential of dichloroacetate (DCA), a cell proliferation inhibitor, to mediate growth and promote de-differentiation of DPSC exhibiting markers of different lineages. Thirty DPSC isolates were isolated and characterized using standard in vitro assays. Two cell lines exhibited evidence of spontaneous, non-directed in vitro differentiation. mRNA screening revealed these isolates may have spontaneously differentiated into neuronal progenitors and odontoblast progenitors. The remaining cell lines remained uncommitted. A dose-dependent inhibition of proliferation was observed following administration of DCA (10 – 1000 nmol), with the growth inhibitory maximum observed at 200 nmol. This inhibition was associated with a statistically significant decrease in cellular adhesion among the neuronal progenitors to Fibronectin, as well as Collagen. This provides evidence that growth of one lineage of spontaneously in vitro differentiated mesenchymal stem cells derived from dental pulp (neuronal progenitors) may be modulated, in part, through administration of exogenous metabolic regulators including DCA. Moreover, this inhibition may be associated with alterations in adhesion to extracellular matrix proteins, as well as down-regulation of key differentiation markers – suggesting a potential new mechanism for tissue engineering involving DPSC.
MODELING SEVEN YEARS OF EVENT HORIZON TELESCOPE OBSERVATIONS WITH RADIATIVELY INEFFICIENT ACCRETION FLOW MODELS

An initial three-station version of the Event Horizon Telescope, a millimeter-wavelength very-long baseline interferometer, has observed Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*) repeatedly from 2007 to 2013, resulting in the measurement of a variety of interferometric quantities. Of particular importance is that there is now a large set of closure phases measured over a number of independent observing epochs. We analyze these observations within the context of a realization of semi-analytic radiatively inefficient disk models, implicated by the low luminosity of Sgr A*. We find a broad consistency among the various observing epochs and between different interferometric data types, with the latter providing significant support for this class of model of Sgr A*. The new data significantly tighten existing constraints on the spin magnitude and its orientation within this model context, finding a spin magnitude of a = 0.10 − 0.10 − 0.10 + 0.30 + 0.56 , an inclination with respect to the line of sight of θ = 60 ° − 8 ° − 13 ° + 5 ° + 10 ° , and a position angle of ξ = 156 ° − 17 ° − 27 ° + 10 ° + 14 ° east of north. These are in good agreement with previous analyses. Notably, the previous 180° degeneracy in the position angle has now been conclusively broken by the inclusion of the closure-phase measurements. A reflection degeneracy in the inclination remains, permitting two localizations of the spin vector orientation, one of which is in agreement with the orbital angular momentum of the infrared gas cloud G2 and the clockwise disk of young stars. This may support a relationship between Sgr A*'s accretion flow and these larger-scale features.
Numerical Study of Nonlinear Dispersive Wave Models with SpecTraVVave

In nonlinear dispersive evolution equations, the competing effects of nonlinearity and dispersion make a number of interesting phenomena possible. In the current work, the focus is on the numerical approximation of traveling-wave solutions of such equations. We describe our efforts to write a dedicated Python code which is able to compute traveling-wave solutions of nonlinear dispersive equations of the general form \begin{equation*} u_t + [f(u)]_{x} + \mathcal{L} u_x = 0, \end{equation*} where $\mathcal{L}$ is a self-adjoint operator, and $f$ is a real-valued function with $f(0) = 0$. The SpectraVVave code uses a continuation method coupled with a spectral projection to compute approximations of steady symmetric solutions of this equation. The code is used in a number of situations to gain an understanding of traveling-wave solutions. The first case is the Whitham equation, where numerical evidence points to the conclusion that the main bifurcation branch features three distinct points of interest, namely a turning point, a point of stability inversion, and a terminal point which corresponds to a cusped wave. The second case is the so-called modified Benjamin-Ono equation where the interaction of two solitary waves is investigated. It is found that is possible for two solitary waves to interact in such a way that the smaller wave is annihilated. The third case concerns the Benjamin equation which features two competing dispersive operators. In this case, it is found that bifurcation curves of periodic traveling-wave solutions may cross and connect high up on the branch in the nonlinear regime.
Enhancing Reliability of STT-MRAM Caches by Eliminating Read Disturbance Accumulation

Spin-Transfer Torque Magnetic RAM (STT-MRAM) as one of the most promising replacements for SRAMs in on-chip cache memories benefits from higher density and scalability, near-zero leakage power, and non-volatility, but its reliability is threatened by high read disturbance error rate. Error-Correcting Codes (ECCs) are conventionally suggested to overcome the read disturbance errors in STT-MRAM caches. By employing aggressive ECCs and checking out a cache block on every read access, a high level of cache reliability is achieved. However, to minimize the cache access time in modern processors, all blocks in the target cache set are simultaneously read in parallel for tags comparison operation and only the requested block is sent out, if any, after checking its ECC. These extra cache block reads without checking their ECCs until requesting the blocks by the processor cause the accumulation of read disturbance error, which significantly degrades the cache reliability. In this paper, we first introduce and formulate the read disturbance accumulation phenomenon and reveal that this accumulation due to conventional parallel accesses of cache blocks significantly increases the cache error rate. Then, we propose a simple yet effective scheme, so-called Read Error Accumulation Preventer cache (REAP-cache) to completely eliminate the accumulation of read disturbances without compromising the cache performance. Our evaluations show that the proposed REAP-cache extends the cache Mean Time To Failure (MTTF) by 171x, while increases the cache area by less than 1% and energy consumption by only 2.7%.
The effect of freezing on cryosurvival of yak sperm

A study was carried out to study the effect of freezing on cryosurvival of yak semen. Artificial insemination in yak is still in infancy. Semen cryopreservation and use of artificial insemination can be applied in yak husbandry for conservation and rapid multiplication of superior germplasm. Semen was collected from four adult yak bulls using artificial vagina method managed under uniform conditions. A total of 40 ejaculates comprising of 10 ejaculates each bull were collected following twice a week schedule and evaluated for fresh semen characteristics. The fresh yak semen characteristics viz. ejaculate volume (ml), mass activity (0-4), initial sperm motility (%), sperm concentration (x 106/ml), live sperm (%), sperm abnormality (%) and intact acrosome (%) were 3.10 ± 0.18, 3.53 ± 0.96, 83.89 ± 2.87, 1180.22 ± 42.32, 77.63 ± 4.23, 8.45 ± 3.33 and 93.61 ± 3.78 respectively. The ejaculates were diluted (1:10) with Tris extender consisting of 6.4 ml glycerol and 20 ml of fresh egg yolk. Straws were equilibrated at 5 ° C for 4 hours followed by exposure to liquid nitrogen vapour for 10 minutes and finally transferred to liquid nitrogen container for storage. The cryosurvival rate was studied after 7 days of storage in liquid nitrogen. The frozen semen was thawed in warm water (37°C) for 30 seconds for evaluation. Mean values of postthaw sperm motility (%), live sperm (%) and intact acrosome (%) in yaks were 55.67 ± 4.67, 65.62 ± 3.23 and 89.26 ± 3.67 respectively. In conclusion, yak semen has a better cryosurvival while freezing in tris extender with 6.4 per cent glycerol and 20 per cent egg yolk following an equilibration period of 4h. SAARC J. Agri. , 15(2): 215-218 (2017)
Pollution and economic growth: a maximum likelihood estimation of environmental Kuznets curve

As in Brock and Taylor (2011) in this paper we consider the importance of the relationship between the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) Literature and the Economic Growth Theories. To address this issue we construct country production functions that directly incorporate CO2 emissions as input and estimate them using Stochastic Frontiers. This approach differs from that of Brock and Taylor (2011) but is similar to the one followed by Koop (1998). By introducing the environmental “bads” directly in the production function, we can analyse their contribution to total output growth. We highlight an important contribution of CO2 emissions to growth and find out that the EKC seems not to hold, at least for most countries.
Coupled nonlinear oscillations of microbubbles

The coupling effects on the acoustic signature from nonlinear oscillations of a group of microbubbles is investigated. In general, exploring this phenomenon would require solving a set of (linearly) coupled nonlinear ordinary differential equations (\lowercase {ODE}s). However, assuming that the initial conditions of all bubbles are identical and that all bubbles are equi-distant from each other simplifies the governing equations to just a single \lowercase {ODE}. Numerical data obtained by solving this \lowercase {ODE} is used to investigate the effects of bubble population size on the subharmonics and ultraharmonics of the system. As the number of bubbles is increased, the natural frequency and the damping of the system decreases. There is a slight shift in the frequencies at which the maximum bubble oscillation occur. The amplitude of oscillations near the main resonance are significantly reduced as the number of bubble increases.
The Poetry Handbook: A Guide to Reading Poetry for Pleasure and Practical Criticism

This text provides a practical guide to the poet's craft. There are chapters on metre, form, layout, lineation, punctuation, rhyme, diction, syntax, history, biography, and gender, as well as one on exams which includes sample essays by undergraduates. At the end of every chapter each topic is applied to the same poem, Nobel-winner Derek Walcott's "Nearing Forty", building up a full technical reading. Critical and scholarly terms are italicized and clearly explained, both in the text and in glossaries. Notes and quotations are supplemented by detailed reference to both the Oxford Anthology of English Literature and the Norton Anthology of Poetry and there is a substantial "Suggestions for Further Reading" section.
Development of Simple SequenceRepeat Markers for ChionanthusRetusus (Oleaceae) and EffectiveDiscrimination of CloselyRelated Taxa

The genus Chionanthus (Oleaceae Hoffmans. & Link) includes deciduous or evergreen trees and shrubs distributed widely in tropical and sub-tropical areas, including a few temperate species. Although Chionanthus species are planted as ornamental garden plants and commercialized for natural products, genetic information for Chionanthus spp. is lacking. We created microsatellite-enriched libraries of Chionan- thus retusus Lindl. & Paxton, assembled 1072 contigs, and detected 1010 repeats. The frequency of the repeats decreased with the increase in repeat length, and the most abundant motifs were: AG, AC, AAG, ACC, AT, and ACTC. We screened 384 markers on 12 accessions of four related taxa that included C. retusus, Chionanthus virginicus L. , Chionanthus pygmaeus Small, and Osmanthus americanus (L.) Benth. & Hook. A total of 195 simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers amplified and discriminated six accessions of C. retusus and 57 SSR markers amplified and discriminated across the four Oleaceae species screened. To identify the best markers to use in future experiments, the ''Unique Pattern Informative Combination'' (UPIC) values were calculated for all the markers and the 100 markers that were most effective are reported here. The percentage of heterozygous loci across the 384 markers was lowest for C. retusus (29.3%) and highest for O. americanus (68.9%). The SSR markers developed here could assist in taxonomy and hybridization investigations for breeding programs and authentication of varieties used as medicinal plants.
Does Competition Spur Innovation in Developing Countries

Using the Climate Investment Survey from the World Bank, we analyze the effect of competition on technological innovation in developing countries. We deal with endogeneity of competition by using the interaction between industry turnover and entry regulation as an instrument. The basic idea for this instrument is that entry regulations have a negative and more pronounced effect on competition in those industries with more natural turnover. Our results indicate a negative impact of competition on several measures of innovation outputs and inputs, which are robust across industries and using alternative measures of competition.
Photocatalytic removal of phenol by ferromagnetic N-TiO2/SiO2/Fe3O4 nanoparticles in presence of visible light irradiation

Photocatalytic Removal of Phenol by Ferromagnetic NTiO2/SiO2/Fe3O4 Nanoparticles in presence of Visible Light Irradiation Vincenzo Vaiano, Olga Sacco, Diana Sannino, Marco Stoller, Paolo Ciambelli, Angelo Chianese Department of Industrial Engineering, University of Salerno, Via Giovanni Paolo II 132, 84084 Fisciano (SA), Italy Department of Chemical Material Environmental Engineering, University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy. vvaiano@unisa.it
The habitat preferences of web building spiders

Habitat selection is an important decision to make by most species as consequences such as loss of fitness or even death can result if wrong choices are made. Web building spiders are ubiquitous species, and can be found in almost any type of environment from alpine forests to desert terrains. Factors influencing their choice of habitat is, however, still relatively unknown and has been observed to differ between populations, species and even individuals. This review will outline the main factors influencing the habitat selection of web building spiders, as well as potential constraints that may prohibit colonisation. Spiders are important components to ecosystems, providing food for a plethora of species as well as controlling levels of invertebrate prey. Understanding factors influencing the habitat selection of web building spiders is therefore important and must be studied further.