Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Nematode Parasites of Anurans from Three Cocoa Farms in Ondo State, Nigeria

The research was designed to investigate the parasitic fauna of Anurans from cocoa farms in Ondo state. Amphibians are one of the most threatened groups of vertebrates. Many reasons are attributed to the decline of amphibian species such as global warming, habitat destruction and modification, others include: exploitation, pesticide use, introduced species, ultraviolet-B radiation (UV-B), pollution, parasites and diseases. A total of 31 frogs from 4 genera, Hemisus, Ptychadena, Rana and Xenopus and 7 toads from 1 genus, Sclerophrys were examined. 9 frogs were collected from Oluwateru farm at Iwoye Village; 7 frogs were collected from Folorunso farm at Ako-Igbatoro and 15 frogs from Obodulu farm in Idanre. 5 toads were collected from Oluwateru farm at Iwoye Village and 2 toads from Obodulu farm in Idanre. In all cases collection was done between 20:00 hrs and 05:00 hrs. Collected specimens were transported in sealed but ventilated containers to the laboratory where identification was done to species level. The frogs were anaesthetized until death in absolute chloroform soaked in cotton wool placed inside kill-jar for 3 minutes in the laboratory. The gastrointestinal tracts were cut open and the contents of the various sections were put into separate Petri dishes containing normal saline. The skin and the bladder were observed directly under a dissecting microscope for the presence of cysts and monogeneans. The parasites were fixed and preserved in 70% alcohol following standard procedure. Parasites recovered from the gastrointestinal tracts of the anurans include Cosmocerca ornata, Deising, 1861, Cosmocerca cummutata, Diesing, 1851 Paracosmocerca mucronata, Kung and Wu, 1945, Ampliceacum africanum, Taylor, 1924, Gendria liberrei Bain and Philipon, 1969 and Chenospirura asturi Hsu, 1957 Others were Procamallus brevis Kung, 1948 and Camallanus dimitrovi Durette- Desset and Batcharov, 1974. Some of the parasites are zoonotic while a few others are established parasites of African fishes and water Birds raising probable public health concerns from the findings. Further works aimed at unravelling the biodiversity of hosts and parasites in the lush ecosystem of Ondo state, as well as identification of organisms involved in the life cycle are noted.
ATHLETES’ JUSTIFIcATION OF cHEATING IN SPORT: RELATIONSHIP WITH MORAL DISENGAGEMENT IN SPORT AND PERSONAL FAcTORS

Research background and hypothesis. The research focus is on university athletes’ justification of cheating in sport. We hypothesised that moral disengagement would be more linked to more favourable evaluations of cheating in sports activities among athletes. Secondly it was hypothesised that justification of cheating in sport would be linked to gender and, accordingly, it would not be associated with experience in sport. Research aim was to reveal the dependence of the athletes’ assessment of cheating in their sports activities and moral disengagement in sport considering their personal factors Research methods. The sample included 338 (246 male and 92 female) athletes recruited from Lithuanian universities.The participants completed the Justification of Deception in Sport Scale (Sukys, Nickus, 2010) and the Moral Disengagement in Sport Scale-Short (MDSS-S; Boardley, Kavussanu, 2008). Research results. The regression analyses showed that gender of athletes was a significant predictor for justification of cheating in sport (β = 0.15, p < 0.01) as male student athletes more justified cheating in sport. Years of involvement in sport were not related with overall justification of cheating in sport. Moral disengagement in sport was a predictor for the overall justification of cheating in sport (β = 0.35, p < 0.001). Discussion and conclusions. Our study revealed the relationship between moral disengagement in sport and athletes’ justification of cheating in sport. Analysing different forms of cheating it was found that moral disengagement in sport was a stronger predictor for the justification of such deceptive actions that are linked to athletes’ manipulation of the rules of the sports and manipulation with the results of the sports contest. It was established that male student athletes more justified cheating in sport. Research results did not reveal relationship between overall justifications of cheating by years of involvement in sport. However, the analysis of the justification of different forms of cheating showed that students with less sports experience more justified deceptive actions linked to the manipulation with the results of the sports contest, and, on the contrary, less justified other forms of cheating in sport.
Chloroquinoline-3-carbonitriles: Synthesis and Reactions

We herein describe the first review which aims to focus soberly the various synthetic methods and chemical reactions of chloroquinoline-3-carbonitrile derivatives. The reactions are subdivided into groups that cover reactions of chloro substituent at 2 or 4 and 2,4 positions, as well as cyano substituent at 3 position and reactions which involve both groups. Most types of reactions have been successfully applied and used in the production of biologically active compounds.
Exploring Factors That Facilitate Acculturation Strategies and Academic Success of West African Immigrant Youth in Urban Schools

Immigrant students in U.S. educational system experience challenges learning to adapt and integrate into new educational environments. Little is known, however, about factors that facilitate acculturation strategies of immigrant youth from West Africa and how they affect their academic success and challenges faced. Considering the current political discourse over the influence of immigration in U.S. schools, 20 immigrant youth from Ghana and Nigeria were recruited and interviewed in the metropolitan area of New York City. Analyses of semi-structured interviews revealed that teacher, parent, and peer support; social and electronic media; and extracurricular activities emerged as the factors that helped acculturation strategies and academic success. Challenging factors were dealing with sociocultural differences; discrimination, stress, and social integration; and language differences. The article discusses the implications of these findings for teachers to understand acculturation strategies to help West African immigrant youth to adapt, acculturate, and integrate into new school environments.
Ecology and systematics of the genus Liphistius (Aranae: Liphistiidae) from Peninsular Malaysia / Nurul Syuhadah Mohamed Dzarawi

The primitive trap door spider genus Liphistius is currently known from few region in South East Asia, including Malaysia. In the year 2012, Malaysian Government has listed all the fourteen species and one subspecies originated from this region as protected under the Malaysian Wildlife Conservation (Amendment of Schedule) Order 2012 to protect this group from commercial collectors. Unfortunately the trap door spiders are poorly studied because of the rarity of adult’s specimens. The work on this group of conservation importance is also constrained by the difficulties in species identification. In this study the distribution of the genus Liphistius from Peninsular Malaysia was surveyed for the first time. A total of 33 population sites were investigated with new population records for several places in Terengganu, Perak, Pahang and Johor. Nine species and ten morpho species were examined in this study. All the species examined were described with information on type data, material examined and geographical distribution. The identified known species were L. malayanus, L. desultor, L. murphyorum, L. endau, L. langkawi, L. kanthan, L. batuensis, L. laruticus and L. tempurung. Images of adults, genitalia structures and distribution maps are provided. Molecular analysis was employed to help with the identification process and to clarify the species status. DNA barcoding method and neighbour joining analysis were employed to delimit the species. Bayesian inference and maximum parsimony analysis were then used to test the monophyletic and relationship of the genus Liphistius from Peninsular Malaysia. All the molecular methods conducted supported the existence of the five described species within Liphistius spp. in Peninsular Malaysia.
A Study on the Determinants of Financial Performance of U.S. Agricultural Cooperatives

A significant number of studies have been made in the area of agricultural economics; however, there is a paucity of work that investigates factors or determinants which influence the financial performance of agro cooperatives. This paper investigates determinants of financial performance for the United States (U.S.) agricultural cooperatives for the period 2009–2017. By using the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) database, we created a sample of 37 U.S. agro cooperatives. For analysis, we used panel regression analysis as it is suitable to deal with fixed effect or random effect error component presented in the model. Finding states that the U.S. agro cooperatives are found highly sensitive to economic policy uncertainty. The results provide evidence of a negative relationship between size and profitability. Moreover, the impact of growth and capital intensity is also reflected in the return on asset (ROA). In this study, we considered ROA as a proxy for firm performance. Implications and suggestions for further new research are also discussed.
Characteristics of Spherical Organic Particles Emitted from Fixed-Bed Residential Coal Combustion

Residential coal combustion is one of the most significant sources of carbonaceous aerosols in the Highveld region of South Africa, significantly affecting the local and regional climate. This study investigated single coal-burning particles emitted when using different fire-ignition techniques (top-lit up-draft versus bottom-lit up-draft) and air ventilation rates (defined by the number of air holes above and below the fire grate) in selected informal braziers. Aerosol samples were collected on nucleopore filters at the Sustainable Energy Technology and Research Centre Laboratory, University of Johannesburg. The individual particles (~700) were investigated using a scanning electron microscope equipped with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX). Two distinct forms of spherical organic particles (SOPs) were identified, one less oxidized than the other. The particles were further classified into electronically dark and bright. The EDX analysis showed that 70% of the dark spherical organic particles had higher (~60%) relative oxygen content than in the bright SOPs. The morphology of spherical organic particles were quantified and classified into four categories: ~50% were bare single particles; ~35% particles were aggregated and formed diffusion accretion chains; 10% had inclusions, and 5% were deformed due to impaction on filter material during sampling. This study concludes that there are two distinct kinds of coal burning spherical organic particles and that dark SOPs are less volatile than bright SOPs. The authors also show that these spherical organic particles are similar in nature and characteristics to tar balls observed in biomass combustion and that they have the potential to absorb sunlight thereby affecting the earth’s radiative budget and climate. This study provides insights into the mixing states, morphology, and possible formation mechanisms of these organic particles from residential coal combustion in informal stoves.
EU Merger Policy Predictability Using Random Forests

I study the predictability of the EC’s merger decision procedure before and after the 2004 merger policy reform based on a dataset covering all affected markets of mergers with an official decision documented by DG Comp between 1990 and 2014. Using the highly flexible, non-parametric random forest algorithm to predict DG Comp’s assessment of competitive concerns in markets affected by a merger, I find that the predictive performance of the random forests is much better than the performance of simple linear models. In particular, the random forests do much better in predicting the rare event of competitive concerns. Secondly, postreform, DG Comp seems to base its assessment on a more complex interaction of merger and market characteristics than pre-reform. The highly flexible random forest algorithm is able to detect these potentially complex interactions and, therefore, still allows for high prediction precision.
Plug-and-Play Control of the Virtual Infinite Capacitor

The virtual infinite capacitor (VIC) is a nonlinear active capacitor for dc voltage filtering (ripple elimination). It can replace large and unreliable electrolytic capacitors, and it is intended for dc systems where random fluctuations of the dc bus voltage may occur. We propose a plug-and-play (PnP) realization of the VIC, which can be connected directly to the dc bus like a passive capacitor without any extra connections. The proposed control algorithm automatically adjusts the reference voltage of the VIC so that it will be equal to the equilibrium voltage of the dc bus. For the stability of complex interconnected systems, it is recommended that the impedance of the components should be strictly positive real. By studying the output impedance of PnP VIC, we discuss how to achieve the strictly positive-real property of the overall dc bus by a careful choice of controllers and filters. The results were tested by simulations and experiments on a circuit comprising a commercial power factor compensator with an average of 390 V output and a variable resistive load (up to 345 W).
A Simple Approach to Assess if a Financial “Bubble” is Present: The Case of Bitcoin

This article’s goal is to evaluate if the recent price behavior of Bitcoin can be characterized as a financial market “bubble”. To deal with this assessment, we adopt a statistical definition of a “bubble” derived from the efficient market hypothesis and we propose a simple method to test this proposition, based on the time-series model known as random walk. We analyze the data available for Bitcoin prices, together with an asset selected as benchmark, and perform statistical tests derived from simple regression equations. The main conclusion is that there is consistent evidence that that Bitcoin follows the pattern of a financial “bubble” – at least, such pattern is more evident in the case of Bitcoin than in the stock index used as benchmark.
Selective and Dynamic Control of Thermal Conduction in Graphene Heterostructures

Thermal transport is critical in engineering system design, as it directly affects the stability, durability, and efficiency of systems. To overcome new challenges in engineering design for high-power, flexible, and miniaturized devices, more effective, delicate, and specific control of thermal transport is required. As two-dimensional (2D) materials have attracted attentions due to their promises for innovative devices, demands for advanced control of their thermal transport have also arisen. Among 2D materials, graphene has been intensively studied for various applications due to its exceptional properties, and especially, its high thermal conductivity allows for effective investigation of various control effects. Therefore, graphene is selected for this study on thermal transport control. Selective and dynamic control of in-plane and cross-plane thermal transport are investigated for graphene and graphene heterostructures with Si and SiO2. For enhanced understanding of various control mechanisms, atomic vibrations and their fundamental properties are examined via molecular dynamics simulations. Structural design (substrate, defect, doping, etc.) and system conditions (temperature and pressure), which can affect scattering kinetics and interfacial transmission, are examined to achieve selective and dynamic thermal transport control. This study suggests the following findings: 1) Adding a substrate to freestanding graphene significantly reduces thermal conductivity by suppressing out-of-plane phonons, while the effect of another substrate is minimal. 2) Applying a mechanical pressure is very effective for anisotropic control, showing that change of cross-plane thermal transport is more than ten times larger than in-plane transport. 3) Reduction of nanosize structural defects (holes) on graphene is two-ordersof-magnitude larger than macroscale porous structure with the same porosity. Moreover, the hole arrangement in nanoscale systems can change the transport reduction and induce
Staff perspectives on victimisation in multi-ethnic Chilean elementary schools

ABSTRACT This paper draws on qualitative interviews conducted with school staff in four multi-ethnic urban public schools in Santiago, Chile, to provide a sociological analysis of common-sense constructs surrounding victimisation. The questions guiding the study were to what extent school staff share similar perspectives toward victimisation (as demonstrative of a school culture), and how this impacts the capacity to generate positive school climates in multi-ethnic elementary urban schools in Santiago. Drawing on theories of school culture, I propose that staff members’ abilities and willingness to identify and implement preventive measures in schools are collectively defined and legitimated. I demonstrate that this has important repercussions in contexts of higher-than-average ethnic compositions where assimilation is encouraged, and victimisation is denied or attributed to other causes. Symbolic and superficial celebrations of multiculturalism are common, but cultural discourses of difference maintain ethnic youth in marginalised positions and prevent more inclusive educational practices. Some staff perspectives adhere to colour-blind liberal forms of racism in these contexts, and these are most common in school cultures where victimisation is downplayed or thought to be an issue cultivated in the home. Recommendations are made to incorporate culturally-sensitive pedagogies and cultural mediators to confront these narratives among school climate committees.
Data-Driven Metro Train Crowding Prediction Based on Real-Time Load Data

This paper formulates the car-specific metro train crowding prediction problem based on real-time load data and evaluates the performance of several data-driven prediction methods (lasso, stepwise regression, and boosted tree ensembles). Two variants of the prediction problem are considered: 1) train-centered prediction, focusing on in-vehicle crowding information provision and 2) station-centered prediction focusing on crowding information provision at stations. The methodology is applied to a metro line in Stockholm, Sweden. The prediction accuracy is evaluated with respect to absolute passenger loads and discrete crowding levels. When available, predictions with real-time load data significantly outperform historical averages, with accuracy improvements varying in magnitude across target stations and train cars depending on load variability. The results suggest that the real-time crowding information can be provided sufficiently early to influence travelers’ route, train, and car choices, in order to reduce in-vehicle crowding.
Effects of Electrification on the Production and Distribution in the Coal Industry: Evidence from 1900s Japan

This paper studies how electrification affected the economic performance and industrial relations of the Japanese coal mining industry in the 1900s. We find that electrification considerably improved productivity and increased the number of workers, but had statistically zero effects on minersâ€™ wages and significantly declined the labor income share, using difference-in-differences estimation. We explain this phenomenon by using the â€œsuperstar firmâ€ hypothesis, which provides a consistent explanation of the recent declines in labor income share in the US economy.
Augmenting Blood Profile and Reproduction in Buffaloes of Tribal Areas of Vadodara District (Gujarat) through Appropriate Mineral Mixture Supplementation

An on-farm trial for 90 days was conducted using 20 anestrus and 20 repeat breeder buffaloes to evaluate the effect of supplementing appropriate mineral mixtures (AMMs) on their nutrient intake, blood profile, estrus occurrence, and conception. Both anestrus and repeat breeder buffaloes were randomly allotted to 2 treatments, i.e., T1 (Ionic mineral mixture) and T2 (T1 + 25% extra zinc in the chelate form). The average intake of DCP, TDN, and copper in anestrus and repeat breeder buffaloes calculated as per information collected from farmers were almost the same among treatments and as per requirements of animals. The average intake of calcium and phosphorus was higher by 65% and 45% than the requirements in anestrus and repeat breeder buffaloes. However, Zn intake was lower by about 35% of the requirement in all treatments. Blood glucose, serum total protein, and serum albumin levels increased marginally on supplementation of T1 and T2 mineral mixtures for 90 days, particularly in anestrus buffaloes. The serum triglycerides and total cholesterol increased, but non-significantly (p >0.05), particularly in T1 groups of both anestrus and repeat breeder animals, whereas levels of BUN and creatinine increased significantly (p less than 0.05) in both the groups of repeat breeders and T1 group of anestrus buffaloes. Activities of serum alkaline phosphatase decreased non-significantly, whereas those of alanine and aspartate aminotransferases remained mostly unaltered. In contrast, the serum Ca, P, Mg, Na, K, and Zn concentration increased significantly (p less than 0.05; p less than 0.01) following 90 days supplementation of T1 and T2 minerals in both anestrus and repeat breeders. The number of days taken for return to the heat of anestrus and repeat breeder buffaloes as well as the cost of feeding was reduced upon supplementation of T2 as compared to T1 mineral mixture. The study showed the beneficial role of mineral supplementation in improving the health and reproductive status of infertile buffaloes.
High‐Resolution Mapping of Yield Curve Shape and Evolution for High‐Porosity Sandstone

Understanding the onset and nature of inelastic deformation in porous rock is important for a range of geological and geotechnical problems. In particular for sandstones and siliciclastic sediments, which often act as hydrocarbon reservoirs, inelastic strain can significantly alter the permeability affecting productivity or storativity. The onset of inelastic strain is defined by a yield curve plotted in effective mean stress (P) versus differential stress (Q) space. Yield curves for porous sandstone typically have a broadly elliptical shape, with the low‐pressure side associated with localized brittle faulting (dilation) and the high‐pressure side with distributed ductile deformation (compaction). However, recent works have shown that, for different porous rocks, the curve shape can evolve significantly with the accumulation of inelastic strain. Here yield curve shape and evolution of two high‐porosity sandstones (36–38%) is mapped along different loading paths using a high‐resolution technique on single samples. The data reveal yield curves with a relatively shallow geometry and with a compactive side that is partly comprised of a near‐vertical limb. Yield curve evolution is found to be strongly dependent on the nature of inelastic strain with samples compacted under a deviatoric load (i.e., with a component of shear strain) having peak stress values that are approximately 3 times greater than similar porosity samples compacted under a hydrostatic load (i.e., purely volumetric strain). These results have important implications for predicting how the strength of porous rock evolves along different stress paths, which differ in reservoirs during burial, fluid extraction, or injection.