Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Spin, orbital ordering, and magnetic dynamics of LaVO 3 : Magnetization, heat capacity, and neutron scattering studies

We report the results of magnetization, heat capacity, and neutron scattering studies of LaVO3 single crystals. From the neutron-diffraction studies, it was found that the compound is magnetically ordered with a C-type antiferromagnetic spin structure at about 136 K. In the vicinity of the ordering temperature, we also observed hysteresis in the neutron-diffraction data measured on cooling and heating which indicates the first-order nature of the phase transition. In the antiferromagnetically ordered phase, the inelastic neutron scattering studies reveal the presence of a temperature independent c-axis spin-wave gap of about 6 meV which is similar to that previously reported for the sister compound YVO3.
K2 Ultracool Dwarfs Survey. II. The White Light Flare Rate of Young Brown Dwarfs

We use Kepler K2 Campaign 4 short-cadence (one-minute) photometry to measure white light flares in the young, moving group brown dwarfs 2MASS J03350208+2342356 (2M0335+23) and 2MASS J03552337+1133437 (2M0355+11), and report on long-cadence (thirty-minute) photometry of a superflare in the Pleiades M8 brown dwarf CFHT-PL-17. The rotation period (5.24 hr) and projected rotational velocity (45 km s−1) confirm 2M0335+23 is inflated ( ) as predicted for a , 24 Myr old brown dwarf βPic moving group member. We detect 22 white light flares on 2M0335+23. The flare frequency distribution follows a power-law distribution with slope over the range 1031 to 1033 erg. This slope is similar to that observed in the Sun and warmer flare stars, and is consistent with lower-energy flares in previous work on M6–M8 very-low-mass stars; taking the two data sets together, the flare frequency distribution for ultracool dwarfs is a power law over 4.3 orders of magnitude. The superflare ( erg) on CFHT-PL-17 shows higher-energy flares are possible. We detect no flares down to a limit of erg in the nearby L5γ AB Dor moving group brown dwarf 2M0355+11, consistent with the view that fast magnetic reconnection is suppressed in cool atmospheres. We discuss two multi-peaked flares observed in 2M0335+23, and argue that these complex flares can be understood as sympathetic flares, in which fast-mode magnetohydrodynamic waves similar to extreme-ultraviolet waves in the Sun trigger magnetic reconnection in different active regions.
Are Per Capita Real GDP Series in African Countries Non-stationary or Non-linear? What does Empirical Evidence Reveal?

This paper extends the applied time series literature in economic development, by testing whether the per capita real GDP time series in 27 African countries are non-stationary or non-linear and globally stationary over the relatively long period from 1960 to 2007. Using the non- linear unit root tests developed recently by Kapetanios, Shin and Snell (2003) the results show that in one-third of the countries, the series are stationary with non-linear mean reversion. Policy implications are indicated.
TREE SPECIES DIVERSITY ANALYSIS OF KOGO FOREST RESERVE IN NORTH-WESTERNNIGERIA

This research was carried out to determine the tree species composition, relative density and dominance, richness and evenness (diversity) of Kogo Forest Reserve in North-Western Nigeria. Eight sample plots (100m x 100m) were laid at random within the forest reserve, and tree species found were enumerated by point centered quarter (PCQ) method. A total of 249 tree stands were encountered in the reserve, belonging to twenty nine different tree species, distributed within 25 genera and into sixteen 16 families. Family Caesalpiniaceae had the highest number of six species in five genera, followed by Mimosaceae with four species belonging to four different genera. Families Anacardiaceae and Combretaceae had three species each while family moraceae had two species within a genus and all the other eleven 11 families had one species each. Species Annogeisus leiocarpus had the highest relative density and dominance of 24.49% and 23.23% respectively, followed by Isoberlinia doka with 18.07% and 13.14%, and the least was Annona senegalensis having 0.40% and 0.05% respectively. Shannon’s diversity index was 2.626, Species evenness (EH) 0.78, Species richness (d) 1.84 and Shannon’s maximum diversity (Hmax) was 3.37. Kogo had a moderate diversity and hence closure of the forest for exploitation to allow the forest to fully regenerate and enhance the fertility of the soil is therefore recommended.
Pyrethroid Insecticides as the Mitochondrial Dysfunction Inducers

Pyrethroids are used to decrease vector-based health concerns and to increase field yield against agricultural pests. Their metabolism is a concern to disrupt a cell’s homeostatic machinery via reactive oxygen species (ROS) production. They interact with lipid mem- branes to damage the fine balance between membrane lipids and membrane proteins, espe cially mitochondrial substrate transporters and electron carriers. Pyrethroids cause a shift in the metabolic energy production strategy, resulting in ROS production and intracellular lipid deposition. The change of open/closed conformation of some mitochondrial mem- brane proteins increases the vulnerability of mitochondria to Ca 2+ ions. Membrane lipid flu idity change is also a concern because of permeability to the substrates and ions to produce energy and other substrates necessary for the cell. Pyrethroids can change the Ca 2+ signaling and its interaction with ROS signals via disruption of the fine balance between endoplasmic reticulum and mitochondria. They can disrupt the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) via their hydrophobic nature or their ROS production capacity. In conclusion, mitochondria are the center of pyrethroid toxicity, and dysfunction of this organelle via pyrethroid toxicity plays an important role in the fate of cell. Their lipophilic and pro-oxidative nature together with Ca 2+ homeostasis plays a synergistic role in this mitochondrial effect.
Dimensioning network links

htmlabstractOne of the tasks of network management is to dimension the capacity of access and backbone links. In practice, this type of dimensioning is often based on simple rules of thumb, like `take the maximum bandwidth as measured with MRTG, and add a certain safety margin'. Rules of this type lack preciseness, however, as they fail to reliably predict whether the quality, as agreed upon in the Service Level Agreement, is actually provided. To make better predictions, a more sophisticated mathematical setup is needed. The major contribution of this paper is that it presents such a setup; in this a pivotal role is played by a simple, yet versatile, formula that gives the minimum amount of capacity needed, as a function of the average traffic rate, traffic variance (to be thought of as a measure of `burstiness'), as well as the required performance level. In order to apply the dimensioning formula, accurate estimates of the average traffic rate and the traffic variance are needed. As opposed to the average rate, the traffic variance is rather hard to estimate; this is because measurements on small time scales are needed. We present an easily implementable remedy for this problem, in which the traffic variance is inferred from occupancy statistics of the buffer within the switch or router. To validate the resulting dimensioning procedure, we collected hundreds of traces at multiple (representative) locations, estimated for each of the traces the average traffic rate and (using the approach described above) traffic variance, and inserted these in the dimensioning formula. It turns out that the capacity estimate obtained by the procedure, is usually just a few percent off from the (empirically determined) minimally required value.
Unbounded state-dependent sweeping processes with perturbations in uniformly convex and q-uniformly smooth Banach spaces

In this paper, the existence of solutions for a class of first and second order unbounded state-dependent sweeping processes with perturbation in uniformly convex and $q$-uniformly smooth Banach spaces are analyzed by using a discretization method. The sweeping process is a particular differential inclusion with a normal cone to a moving set and is of a great interest in many concrete applications. The boundedness of the moving set, which plays a crucial role for the existence of solutions in many works in the literature, is not necessary in the present paper. The compactness assumption on the moving set is also improved.
Chapter 3 Dehydroepiandrosterone ( DHEA ) and DHEA Sulfate : Roles in Brain Function and Disease

Among the neuroactive steroids, dehydroepiandrosterone (3b-hydroxyandrost-5-ene17-one, [DHEA]) and its sulfated metabolite DHEA sulfate (DHEAS) have been shown to be potent modulators of neural function, including neurogenesis, neuronal growth and differentiation, and neuroprotection. Highlighting the potential health significance of DHEA and DHEAS in humans, serum concentrations decrease steadily with age, with lowest concentrations present at the time many diseases of aging and neurodegeneration become apparent. This temporal association has led to the suggestion that pathology associated with cognitive decline, age-related neurological disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease, dementia, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and adult onset schizophrenia may, in part at least, be attributed to decreased secretion of DHEA. Animal studies suggest neuroprotective functions for DHEA and DHEAS through reduction of glutamate-induced excitotoxicity. Reduced myelin loss and reactive gliosis after spinal cord injury by DHEA treatment also suggest a role for DHEA in the treatment of white matter pathologies such as multiple sclerosis. In this chapter, we discuss the physiological roles of DHEA and DHEAS in the central nervous system (CNS), their potential as neuroprotective hormones with reference to documented effects on excitotoxicity and oxidative stress, and their anti-glucocorticoid actions during chronic stress. The potential for metabolic derivatives of DHEA, such as estrogens and testosterone on brain function, and their contribution to neurodevelopment and neurodegenerative conditions are also discussed.
The Effectiveness of Capital Adequacy Measures in Predicting Bank Distress

Our concern in this article is two-fold: first to see whether the determinants of bank distress and failure have been any different in the GFC from previous years: second to see whether simple measures of capital adequacy outperform their risk-weighted counterparts as predictors, despite the focus on the later in the Basel framework. This paper examines bank distress within a large quarterly data set of FDIC insured US banks from 1992 to 2012. We contrast two methods, the logit technique and discrete survival time analysis, to predict bank failures and draw inferences about the stability of contributing bank characteristics. The models incorporate CAMELS indicators that consider the bank-specific variables and macroeconomic conditions. We contrast risk-based and non-risked-weighted measures of capital adequacy. We find that the non-risk-weighted capital measure, the adjusted leverage ratio, explains bank distress and failures best. The logit model is able to distinguish failing from healthy banks with an accuracy of 80%. The corresponding survival time model achieves 98%. Further, we find evidence that the influence of the characteristics in the two methods differ only slightly. The characteristics of banks getting into bank distress do not change over time in this sample. That means that the familiar banking characteristics for identifying a distress-prone bank identified fragile banks effectively during the global crisis without new information and are likely to continue to work well in the future.
Difference Between Engineering Men and Women: How and Why They Choose What They Do During Early Career

Retention of the engineering workforce is of national importance for global competitiveness. Retention of women engineers is of particular interest because of the impact of their lower starting representation and higher attrition rate on workforce diversity. Exit rates from engineering careers are highest in the first 10 years after graduation. Thus, unlike most workforce retention research, this study focuses on participants who are still in the midst of this critical phase of their careers. We investigated what engineering graduates say about how and why they make early career pathway choices. The motivations for their choices were examined through the lens of gender differences (and similarities) while resting on the fundamental psychological framework provided by self-determination theory (SDT). SDT has demonstrated that the more behaviors are autonomously motivated, the more stable, the more fulfilling, and the more persistent those behaviors become. The current qualitative study is based on interviews with twenty-two early-career engineering graduates (eleven men and eleven women) from three geographically and culturally distinct institutions. While a majority of both men and women expressed autonomous motivations, the ways in which they were expressed imply different outcomes for career persistence. While the results presented herein do not have statistical significance because of small sample size and qualitative methodology, they do provide insight into the types of patterns that emerge from men and women in terms of how they view their careers from past, present, and future perspectives. Understanding these patterns will be helpful in identifying them among early career graduates in engineering and taking appropriate steps to support continued persistence in the field. Identification of these patterns is also helpful for designing a quantitative study that can point to the significance of gender differences in a larger population.
Media Access and Exposure as Determinants of the Political Knowledge of Nigerian Undergraduates

Media scholars and political scientists alike are concerned about the issue of the impact of the mass media on the political behaviour of the people as consumers of media texts and output. In Nigeria, this curiosity is the same. The few studies that had been conducted along this direction had differing outcomes while most of them focused on the situation with the adult population. This study therefore examined the predictive relationship between media access and exposure on the political knowledge of undergraduates in selected universities in South West Nigeria. Using the descriptive survey design through a carefully constructed questionnaire, data were obtained from respondents selected across the study locale, to measure and test five hypotheses in the study. Findings showed, among other things that exposure to the electronic media predicted higher political knowledge and behaviour among respondents than the print media. Most of the respondents also chose television as the most preferred and dominant medium of political information in the country. Based on the findings it was recommended that Government and media proprietors should collaborate to widen the access of youths to the print media through reduced costs and attractive contents. Because of its increasing popularity among the people, practitioners in the broadcast media were enjoined to adhere to strict professional standards in order to sustain the patronage of the audience while taking advantage of emerging benefits of the Internet for wider reach and more appealing programmes and programming.
Stage Preference and Functional Response of Rhynocoris longifrons (Stål) (Hemiptera: Reduviidae) on Three Hemipteran Cotton Pests

In this work, the stage preference and functional response of the indigenous reduviid bug Rhynocoris longifrons feeding on five different densities of the cotton aphid Aphis gossypii, Phenacoccus solenopsis, and Dysdercus cingulatus was examined in Petri dish arenas containing cotton leaves under laboratory conditions. The reduviid predator exhibited a Type II functional response at all hemipteran pests evaluated when data were fit to Holling's disc equation. Predatory rate gradually increased while the predator grew older and adults consumed maximum number of D. cingulatus and P. solenopsis. An opposite trend was observed, while the reduviid was provided with Aphis gossypii. The rate of attack on P. solenopsis was quite low but fairly consistent, with the different life stages of the predator generally more effective. Further investigation of the biological control potential of R. longifrons against cotton pests under pot and controlled filed should be done due to the predator's ability to kill adult stages of all prey species evaluated. These results indicated that R. longifrons could eat more aphids at high prey densities; however, predators also considerably reduced other cotton pests too so it could be considered a prospective candidate for use as a commercial biological control agent for cotton hemipteran pests in India.
Thin Layer Drying Properties of Soybean (Viliamz Cultivar)

This paper peresents a mathematical model for the thin layer drying of the Viliamz cultivar of soybean. The thin layer drying behaviour of soybean was experimentally investigated and the mathematical modelling performed by using thin layer drying models provided in the literature. Experiments were conducted at inlet drying air temperatures of 30, 40, 50, 60 and 70oC and at a fixed drying air velocity of 1 m s -1 . Thirteen different thin layer mathematical drying models were compared according to their r values, RMSE, χ 2 and EF by non-linear regression analysis. The effect of drying air temperature on the model constants and coefficients was predicted using multiple regression analysis. According to the results, the Midilli et al. model was found to be the best mathematical equation for modelling thin layer drying of soybean.
The Ecology of Aquatic Macroinvertebrates: Understanding Interactions Among Drought, Introduced Fishes, and Parasites

Travis McDevitt-Galles, (MA Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology) The Ecology of Aquatic Macroinvertebrates : Understanding interactions among drought, introduced fishes and parasites Thesis directed by Associate Professor Dr. Pieter T. J. Johnson Aquatic macroinvertebrates play key roles in structuring aquatic communities and provide a key link with the surrounding terrestrial environment through their metamorphosis from aquatic larvae to terrestrial adults. It is therefore important to understand how their distribution across a landscape shifts through time and in response to environmental change, such as prolonged drought. Concurrently, because relatively little is known about the parasites that use pond macroinvertebrates as hosts, I also explored the relative importance of factors affecting infection prevalence and parasite load within common invertebrate host taxa. For each year over four years, I sampled 36 ponds within the Bay Area of California, USA, to characterize the diversity and composition of aquatic macroinverebrates and quantify the parasites that utilize these organisms as hosts. I specifically aimed to answer the following questions: (1) what are the relative influences of non-native fishes and hydroperiod in structuring communities? (2) How does the magnitude of such filters vary through time? And (3) how do hostand habitat-level factors combine to determine patterns of infection with larval dragonflies and damselflies? My results indicated that while fish play a dominant role in structuring the macroinvertebrate composition and richness, the strength of this effect was attenuated during a prolonged drought such that, by the last year of the study and the height of
Migration of the Health Belief Model (HBM): Effects of Psychosocial and Migrant Network Characteristics on Emigration Intentions in Five Countries in West Africa and the Mediterranean Region

The effects of psychosocial and migrant network factors on emigration intentions are examined. Following a review of migration and health theories, it is argued that adaptation of the Health Belief Model (HBM) conceptualization of behavioral intentions contributes to a better understanding and prediction of emigration intentions. An HBM-inspired conceptual model is derived and tested, using comparable data collected in migration surveys by a multi-country project on international migration from West Africa and Mediterranean region to Europe. Results show that indicators of the psychosocial constructs of ‘perceived threat to financial living conditions’, ‘perceived benefits and perceived barriers to emigration’, ‘cues to action’ and ‘perceived general self-efficacy’ show effects in predicted directions and contribute considerably to the explanation of emigration intentions. It is therefore recommended that international migration surveys, when examining emigration intentions, use the advocated framework to identify relevant indicators and survey questions to capture and measure the aforementioned psychosocial constructs.
Discovery of an exceptionally bright giant arc at z = 2.369, gravitationally lensed by the Planck cluster PSZ1 G311.65−18.48

As part of an all-sky follow-up of the Planck catalogue of Sunyaev-Zeldovich (SZ) cluster candidates detected in the first 14 months of data, we are observing cluster candidates in the southern sky in the optical imaging and spectroscopy through an ESO Large Programme. Inspection of ESO New Technology Telescope (NTT) R -and z -band imaging data from our programme has revealed an unusually large and bright arc in the field of PSZ1 G311.65−18.48. We establish the basic photometric and morphological properties of the arc and provide conclusive evidence for the gravitational lensing nature of this object. Guided by the NTT images, we have obtained a long-slit spectrum with IMACS on the Magellan-I Baade Telescope, covering a part of the arc and the brightest cluster galaxy of PSZ1 G311.65−18.48. Our imaging data confirm the presence of a galaxy cluster coinciding (within 0.6) with the position of the Planck SZ source. The arc is separated by ~30″ from the brightest cluster galaxy, which closely coincides with the center of curvature of the arc. A photometric analysis yields integrated (Vega) magnitudes of ( R,z,J, K s ) = (17.82,17.38,16.75,15.43) for the arc, more than one magnitude brighter than any previously known lensed arc at z ~ 2–3. The arc is a vigorously star-forming galaxy at z = 2.369, while the Planck SZ cluster lens is at z = 0.443. Even when allowing for lensing magnifications as high as μ = 100 still leads to the conclusion that the source galaxy is among the intrinsically most luminous normal (i.e., non-AGN) galaxies known at z ~ 2–3.
Periodicity of the solar radius revisited by using empirical mode decomposition and the Lomb–Scargle method

Using the Hilbert–Huang transform and the Lomb–Scargle method, we investigate periodicities in the daily solar radius data during the time interval from February 1978 to October 1999 derived from Calern Observatory. The following prominent periods are found: (1) the rotation cycle signal; (2) several mid-term periods including 122, 162.9 and 225 days, annual-variation periodicities (319 and 359 days), quasi-triennial oscillations (3.46 and 3.94 years); (3) the 11-year Schwabe cycle, which is in anti-phase with solar activity. This result indicates that the strong magnetic field associated with the Sun has a greater inhibitive effect on the radius variation.