Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Implementing POGIL in the Lecture and the Science Writing Heuristic in the Laboratory--Student Perceptions and Performance in Undergraduate Organic Chemistry.

This study investigated the possible connection between effective laboratory activities and student performance on lecture exams. In a traditional undergraduate organic chemistry course for non- science majors, students could predict the products of organic reactions, but struggled to provide reaction mechanisms for those same reactions, despite obtaining perfect scores on their laboratory reports where reaction mechanisms were required. In addition, student attitudes toward chemistry in general were sharply negative after taking organic chemistry. To address these two issues, we implemented POGIL activities in the course and the Science Writing Heuristic in the laboratory to replace the standard lecture format and verification laboratory experiments. This paper will focus on student performance on nucleophilic substitution reaction mechanisms on a class exam. Performance on these questions improved compared with students in past traditional classes. In addition, students were given a pre-class and post-class survey regarding their perceptions of the course. At the conclusion of the term, many students thought the class was easier than what they initially expected. This illustrates the view that non-science majors have the ability to learn organic chemistry from a mechanistic point of view, and integrate concepts learned in the laboratory with concepts presented in the lecture.
Gesundheitszustand und Gesundheitsverhalten von Auszubildenden im ersten Lehrjahr - Erste Ergebnisse einer Befragung in Bielefelder Berufskollegs

BACKGROUND: Apprentices form the major subgroup in adolescents aged between 16 and 25 years in Germany. Prospectively today's apprentices will display an important role within the society by being the backbone of the future middle class, a socio-economic group of high significance. However, there is little knowledge about the health of apprentices, a major determinant of economic and social capacity. A number of surveys has focussed on the health of adolescents, but these studies failed to provide specific data regarding the subgroup of apprentices. AIMS OF THE STUDY: The aims of this study were to survey the health status and the health behaviour of apprentices in a large range of qualified jobs and to point out possible differences be-tween the occupantional fields and gender-specific items. These differences could serve as a starting point for the development of specially-tailored prevention and health promoting strategies in the dual vocational education system. METHODS: 528 vocational first-year scholars aged between 16 to 25 years were enrolled in the study. A standardised questionnaire concerning life-style attitudes, (physical activity, smoking, alcolhol consumption, drug-abuse, the amount of sleep and dietary habits) was provided in different vocational school settings. The survey was conducted as a pilot-study in vocational schools of Bielefeld in spring 2005. RESULTS: The response rate was 100%. Health risk behaviours were common in apprentices. The percentage of smokers was higher than 50%, exceeding the average rate found in contemporary students. Physiological activity and sleeping quantity was significantly reduced compared to the period of regular scholarship, while drug-abuse slightly decreased. Gender, graduation and the vocational choice had an influence on the health behaviour of the apprentices. CONCLUSIONS: Depending on gender and the vocational choice, apprentices differed in their health risk behaviour and therefore require specially-tailored prevention activities. Health promotion and physical activity programs as an integrated unit in the daily life in schools and at the working places are necessary to increase the awareness for health-related life-style factors and to counterbalance the effects of occupational exposure. Based on the results both partners of the dual vocational training are challenged to implement effective and coordinated programmes to maintain health in this population.
The self organising fuzzy controller

This paper describes the conceptual development of a self-organising fuzzy PID (SOF-PID) controller and applies it to a nonlinear revolute-joint robot-arm. The SOF acts as an intelligent master controller making small changes to the values of the three PID gains during the system operation, without the need to use the knowledge of an experienced human operator. The step input trajectories were applied to the SOF-PID controller at the setpoint. The same experiments were repeated using the conventional self-organising fuzzy (SOF) controller, the PID controller and the self-tuning controller, subject to the same information supplied at the setpoint. The results of the SOF-PID controller were compared with those of the other three controllers. For the step input the SOF-PID controller produced a smaller steady state error and a negligible overshoot compared to the SOF controller, the PID controller and the self-tuning controller.
Gain and Angle of Approach Effects on Cursor-Positioning Time with a Mouse in Consideration of Fitts' Law

Over the past decade, indirect pointing with a mouse has become a fundamental part of the GUI environment. In that regard research has used Fitts' law to measure speed and accuracy of the human-motor system when using input devices. Other studies have found that angle of approach also affects performance. However, most such analyses have not considered control-display gain as a factor. The present study found that gain interacted with angle of approach, amplitude, and target size on movement time. Fitts' law remained an effective predictor of movement time across all conditions; however, less variance was accounted for in the higher control-display gain conditions. Based on these results, recommendations are given for GUI design.
R&D intensity and the performance of IPOs

The importance of innovation resides in the nexus of competitive ability. This article investigates the relationship between Research and Development (R&D) intensity and the performance of Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) in Taiwan. Our empirical results show that most companies have lowered R&D intensity before IPO, whereas they slightly increase R&D intensity after issuance. That implies that earnings manipulation before going public may exist. An additional finding is that, those companies which have gradually increased their R&D intensity prior to IPO perform not only better than the market portfolio in the long run, but also superior to those which spent less in R&D before IPO.
Efficient Aggregate Computations in Large-Scale Dense Wireless Sensor Networks

Assuming a world where we can be surrounded by hundreds or even thousands of inexpensive computing nodes densely deployed, each one with sensing and wireless communication capabilities, the problem of efficiently dealing with the enormous amount of information generated by those nodes emerges as a major challenge. The research in this dissertation addresses this challenge. This research work proves that it is possible to obtain aggregate quantities with a timecomplexity that is independent of the number of nodes, or grows very slowly as the number of nodes increases. This is achieved by co-designing the distributed algorithms for obtaining aggregate quantities and the underlying communication system. This work describes (i) the design and implementation of a prioritized medium access control (MAC) protocol which enforces strict priorities over wireless channels and (ii) the algorithms that allow exploiting this MAC protocol to obtain the minimum (MIN), maximum (MAX) and interpolation of sensor values with a time-complexity that is independent of the number of nodes deployed, whereas other state-of-the-art approaches have a time-complexity that is dependent on the number of nodes. These techniques also enable to efficiently obtain estimates of the number of nodes (COUNT) and the median of the sensor values (MEDIAN). The novel approach proposed to efficiently obtain aggregate quantities in large-scale, dense wireless sensor networks (WSN) is based on the adaptation to wireless media of a MAC protocol, known as dominance/binary countdown, which existed previously only for wired media, and design algorithms that exploit this MAC protocol for efficient data aggregation. Designing and implementing such MAC protocol for wireless media is not trivial. For this reason, a substantial part of this work is focused on the development and implementation of WiDom (short for Wireless Dominance) a wireless MAC protocol that enables efficient data aggregation in large-scale, dense WSN. An implementation of WiDom is first proposed under the assumption of a fully connected network (a network with a single broadcast domain). This implementation can be exploited to efficiently obtain aggregated quantities. WiDom can also implement static priority scheduling over wireless media. Therefore, a schedulability analysis for WiDom is also proposed. WiDom is then extended to operate in sensor networks where a single transmission cannot reach all nodes, in a network with multiple broadcast domains. These results are significant because often networks of nodes that take sensor readings are designed to be large scale, dense networks and it is exactly for such scenarios that the proposed distributed algorithms for obtaining aggregate quantities excel. The implementation and test of these distributed algorithms in a hardware platform developed shows that aggregate quantities in large-scale, dense wireless sensor systems can be obtained efficientlly.
Categorising Example Sentences in Dictionaries for Research Purposes

Examples in dictionaries come in many different forms. They may be sentences or phrases. They may be corpus-based or made up by the lexicographer. They may contain the lemma in its uninflected form or they may contain an inflection of the lemma. In some dictionaries the function of examples is to provide contextual support to the meaning of the headword, and in others the grammatical support that they provide is more important. While there is literature on the usefulness of examples, and on whether examples should be corpus-based or not, there is very little on what makes one example more useful than another. I have set out to find out what sort of examples South African school users identify as most helpful. In this article, I look at whether examples in five South African school dictionaries do provide suitable contextual or grammatical support. I have constructed a table to classify example sentences according to different criteria. I filled in this table with randomly selected words and their examples which have been taken from five different South African school dictionaries. The goal of this research is to present characteristics of examples in a way that makes them easier to analyse and compare. This should help lexicographers in future dictionaries check whether they have written or selected the best possible examples for their users' needs.
Control and Cybernetics Dynamic Programming in Constrained Markov Decision Processes

We consider a discounted Markov Decision Process (MDP) supplemented with the requirement that another discounted loss must not exceed a specified value, almost surely. We show that the problem can be reformulated as a standard MDP and solved using the Dynamic Programming approach. An example on a controlled queue is presented. In the last section, we briefly reinforce the connection of the Dynamic Programming approach to another close problem statement and present the corresponding example. Several other types of constraints are discussed, as well.
A corpus comparison approach for terminology extraction

This article examines one of the possible approaches to identifying technical terms: a corpus comparison approach using the range and frequency of word forms. In order to identify terms using the corpus comparison approach, a ratio is used as a tool based on the comparative range and frequency of word forms between a technical corpus and a comparison corpus. A rating scale approach is used as the basis for evaluating the corpus comparison approach.The analysis shows that the corpus comparison approach works reasonably well with around 86% overlap with the results from the rating scale approach. It also shows that the corpus comparison approach using word types is a reasonably simple and practical way of identifying terms.
Multi-parametric optimisation of the modular computer architecture

The paper describes an approach that allows optimisation of computing architecture selection in case of multi-parametric requirements. The proposed method is oriented to systems combined from modular components. The approach is based on decomposition of a multi-dimensional design space into multiple two-dimensional subdesign spaces. The paper presents the procedure that drastically reduces the number of architectural variants to be analysed. This has become possible by the presentation of each subdesign space in a form of a tree, hierarchical arrangement, and further pruning of subdesign spaces. The proposed approach is applicable to any system architecture based on modules with known performance parameters. As a result, the proposed method has allowed selection of the architecture, which satisfies multiple performance constrains (e.g., performance, cost, power consumption, reliability, etc.), in a small time range. The implementation of the method for the architectural optimisation of the reconfigurable data-stream processors, which are based on the Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) devices, is also discussed.
Article Omission in Headlines and Child Language: A Processing Approach

The results of the crosslinguistic (Dutch, Italian and German) database analysis and experiments presented in my study show that there are interesting similarities between the pattern of article omission by adults in newspaper headlines and the pattern of article omission observed in language acquiring children. Further, I show that in both languages and in both groups of speakers article omission is optional. Moreover, article omission appears to be influenced by the presence of a finite verb or a preposition and by the sentence position of the article-requiring noun. Although this effect works in the same direction in all three languages (less omissions if the verb is finite, less omissions after a preposition, less omissions in sentence-internal position), the concrete consequences are different. In order to come to a unified model that can account for these findings I introduce a base model of article selection that describes the process of article selection under normal and specific circumstances, with normal speakers and speakers with limited processing resources. According to this model, for an article to be produced, the targeted form needs to receive the highest activation among the members of the article set. I argue that the final output of the article selection process is the result of a competition between all members of the set. In a sense, the article selection process therefore can be characterized as resolving uncertainty with regard to which element of the set will win the competition. The higher the uncertainty, the more processing resources are necessary to select an article from the set. In my study I present an information-theoretical method to calculate the uncertainty level in the article set, the relative entropy value. The relative entropy of the article system reflects the differences in probability distribution between the elements: the higher the differences in probability distribution (and, thus the higher the value of relative entropy), the more processing resources are required to select an article from the article set. I show that the relative entropy value is higher in Dutch than in German, and higher in German than in Italian. I argue that both children and headline writers are sensitive to differences in the processing resources necessary for article selection, children because of their limited processing resources, headline writers (and readers) because of the restricted time readers have available. I show that with the measure of relative entropy we can account not only for the crosslinguistic differences in omission pattern, but also for the relation between article omission and finiteness, for the influence of the use of a preposition before the article-requiring noun on the omission of articles, for the relation between article omission and sentence position and for differences in omission pattern of different articles (particularly the differences in omissions of ‘de’ and ‘het’ in Dutch and the differences between omission of definite and indefinite articles in Italian).
Human factors of 3‐D displays

Abstract— This paper provides a selected review of a number of important perceptual and human‐factors issues that arise when 3‐D displays are designed and used. This review and analysis draws heavily from the basic vision literature in order to help provide insight for future design solutions for 3‐D displays. Issues discussed include (1) the basics of human stereopsis, (2) interocular crosstalk, (3) oculomotor responding and distance scaling of binocular disparity information, (4) accommodative‐vergence mismatch, and (5) stereoanomly. The paper concludes with a presentation of several recommendations for the design of 3‐D displays.
Balance and Bias in Network Evening News Coverage of Presidential State of the Union Addresses

While balance and fairness are important journalistic norms worthy of research, many previous studies have only examined them in the electoral context. A content analysis of news coverage of State of Union Messages from 1982-2013 on ABC, CBS, and NBC, tests for balance in tone as well as sourcing between the President's side and the partisan opposition. It also addresses partisan or ideological biases. Despite the customary opposition response, coverage showed sourcing imbalances favoring the President the vast majority of time on all networks. Though the overall tone was neutral, non-partisan and media sources were decidedly negative. Democratic presidents received more favorable coverage than Republicans, though Republican presidents were somewhat more likely to receive airtime advantage. ABC also appeared more balanced than the other two. Journalists may be balancing the presidency's institutional bias with critical outside voices, and tempering a Democratic tonal bias with greater use of Republican sound bites.
A Note on “Surface Roughness Prediction Model in Machining of Carbon Steel by PVD Coated Cutting Tools”

An article published in this journal by Sahin and Motorcu[1] developed a surface roughness model based on the response surface method, multiplicative-logarithmically linearized approach for determination of the cutting parameters in turning of AISI 1040 carbon steel. Their published results for the surface roughness show that it appears Sahin and Motorcu[1] have obtained wrong constants (C, m, n, p), thereby resulting in incorrect solutions for the surface roughness prediction model. This note works through the solutions to show how Sahin and Motorcu[1] incorrectly handled the published prediction model constants to their solution. The established predictive model shows that the surface roughness increases with the increase of feed rate but decreases with cutting speed and depth of cut.
Optimizing auditory images and distance metrics for self‐organizing timbre maps*

Abstract The effect of using different auditory images and distance metrics on the final configuration of a self‐organized timbre map is examined by comparing distance matrices, obtained from simulations, with a similarity rating matrix, obtained using the same set of stimuli as in the simulations. Gradient images, which are intended to represent idealizations of physiological gradient maps in the auditory pathway, are constructed. The optimal auditory image and distance metric, with respect to the similarity rating data, are searched using the gradient method.
Coordination and Task Interdependence during Schedule Adaptation

This article discusses the influence of organizational and behavioral variables on coordination between planners during plan adaptation. Fast communication and mutual alignment are necessary to maintain schedule feasibility in a situation with several schedulers. Therefore, coordination modes are required that facilitate communication and joint problem solving. Moreover, building on interdependence theory, we hypothesize that the schedulers' perceptions of task interdependence influence rescheduling performance. Experimental results indicate that a group decision‐making coordination mode enforcing cooperation outperforms a distributed decision‐making coordination mode involving emergent alignment. The level of perceived task interdependence explains this better performance. Therefore, perceptions of task interdependence are put forward as an important behavioral factor influencing rescheduling performance, with several important implications for theory and practice. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
The acquisition of formulaic language by EFL learners A cross-sectional and cross-linguistic perspective

Most of the studies on the use of phraseology by second language learners concentrate on advanced L2 users. Researchers attempt to tease out to what extent learners’ phraseology is different from the native one. There are almost no accounts of formulaic language emerging at the early stages of learning, particularly in foreign language settings. The research reported in this paper attempts to bridge this gap. It is exploratory in nature and investigates the emergence and use of lexical bundles by a range of students learning English in the classroom setting. The data analyzed in the study were drawn from the ICCI corpus and are examined with reference to learners’ ages, stages of proficiency, and L1 backgrounds. The probed essays were written by students in grades 6, 9 and 12 with Chinese, German, Hebrew, Japanese, Polish and Spanish as their L1s.
Agro-Students' Appraisal of Online Registration of Academic Courses in the Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta, Ogun State Nigeria.

With integration of information technology tool for academic course registration in the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta, the study assessed the agro-students’ appraisal of the online tool for course registration. A simple random sampling technique was used to select 325 agrostudents; and validated and reliable questionnaire was used for collection of data on the study objectives. Results of the analysis data showed that the use of online registration tool was appraised valuable for convenient course for registration (뀀ഀȠ = 4.47; SD = 0.682), reduction of attendant stress/rigour of manual course registration (뀀ഀȠ= 4.59; SD = 0.573), guaranteed eligibility to write examination on registered courses ( = 4.06; SD = 0.992) and creation of database for students’ record of registered courses ( = 4.03; SD = 0.993). The Spearman’s rho correlation analysis of the study hypothesis showed a significant and positive association between the agrostudents’ appraisal of online registration of academic courses and their academic performance (r = 0.155, p < 0.05); educational background (r = 0.128, p < 0.05); mode of entry into FUNAAB (r = 0.127, p < 0.05). The linear regression analysis showed that the students’ appraisal of the online tool for registration of courses was significantly determined by their frequency of usage of the eduportal (β = 2.185, p < 0.01). It was thus concluded that online registration of academic courses in FUNAAB is a worthwhile development, and recommended that it should be sustained; and the students should be well trained on usage of the eduportal in order to develop skilful and efficient use of the online tool for registration of their academic courses. 뀀ഀȠ