Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pore-Scale Simula ons to Determine the Applied Hydrodynamic Torque and Colloid Immobiliza

2011, Vol. 10 Pore-Scale Simula ons to Determine the Applied Hydrodynamic Torque and Colloid Immobiliza on Values of the applied hydrodynamic torque (Tapplied) and the resis ng adhesive torque (Tadhesion) will determine whether a colloid will be immobilized (Tapplied ≤ Tadhesion) or roll (Tapplied > Tadhesion) on a solid water interface. Previous literature has demonstrated in 1–2 collector (grain) systems that the infl uence of Tapplied on colloid reten on can be signifi cant under unfavorable a achment condi ons and that only a frac on of the solid surface may contribute to reten on. However, many ques ons remain on how to obtain, analyze, and upscale informa on on the forces and torques that act on colloids near solid surfaces in porous media. To address some of these gaps in knowledge, high resolu on pore-scale water fl ow simula ons were conducted for sphere packs (25 spheres) over a range of Darcy veloci es, grain sizes and distribu ons, and porosi es. The spa al variability of Tapplied was calculated from this informa on, and successfully described using a lognormal cumulave density func on (CDF). Linear interpola on and scaling techniques were subsequently used to predict the lognormal CDF of Tapplied for various colloid sizes, grain sizes and distribu ons, and water veloci es. The lognormal CDF of Tapplied was then evaluated at select values of Tadhesion (i.e, interac on energy) to quan fy the frac on and loca ons on the solid surface that contributes to colloid reten on (Sf), and the theore cal maximum solid phase concentra on of retained colloids (Smax).
Performance comparison of LS, LMMSE channel estimation method in frequency and time domain for OQAM/OFDM systems

In this paper, we first compare least square (LS) and linear minimum mean square error (LMMSE) channel estimation method with frequency and time domain in offset quadrature amplitude modulation/orthogonal frequency division multiplexing(OQAM/OFDM) systems. We proposed an iterative LMMSE channel estimation in time domain which needn't a priori knowledge for the channel. Simulation results demonstrate that the time domain methods improve the channel estimation performance compare to the frequency domain methods. Moreover, simulation results show that the proposed method has an approximate performance with the conventional LMMSE method.
How internationalised is your university? From structural indicators to an agenda for integration

New research at the University of Warwick demonstrates two shortcomings with the current benchmarking of internationalisation: they are based purely on structural measures and they use a simple bi-polar distinction between home and international students. There are several dangers in relying on these measures: Structural internationalisation ≠ Student satisfaction: Latest research shows that in the UK, the lower the proportion of UK students, the less satisfied students of all backgrounds are. This does not mean that structural internationalisation should be avoided; on the contrary, students appreciate the value of an 'internationalisation' experience, so what we need is an agenda for integration. Structural internationalisation ≠ integrated community: Latest research shows that the quality of interaction between people of different backgrounds is the crucial factor. Some individuals and groups find this more difficult than others, especially members of large national cohorts. This again shows that we need an agenda for integration. Structural internationalisation ≠ Global skills: Latest research shows that mixed nationality group work is particularly important for the development of 'global skills'. So our agenda for integration needs to be applied to the classroom as well as the campus. A truly internationalised university of the future will have to measure its success not only in terms of structural factors like the number/proportion of international students but also by its ability to implement an agenda for integration that will facilitate the development of the 'global skills' that employers are seeking in their new employees.
Optimal Fault-Tolerant Control for Discrete-Time Nonlinear Strict-Feedback Systems Based on Adaptive Critic Design

This paper investigates the problem of optimal fault-tolerant control (FTC) for a class of unknown nonlinear discrete-time systems with actuator fault in the framework of adaptive critic design (ACD). A pivotal highlight is the adaptive auxiliary signal of the actuator fault, which is designed to offset the effect of the fault. The considered systems are in strict-feedback forms and involve unknown nonlinear functions, which will result in the causal problem. To solve this problem, the original nonlinear systems are transformed into a novel system by employing the diffeomorphism theory. Besides, the action neural networks (ANNs) are utilized to approximate a predefined unknown function in the backstepping design procedure. Combined the strategic utility function and the ACD technique, a reinforcement learning algorithm is proposed to set up an optimal FTC, in which the critic neural networks (CNNs) provide an approximate structure of the cost function. In this case, it not only guarantees the stability of the systems, but also achieves the optimal control performance as well. In the end, two simulation examples are used to show the effectiveness of the proposed optimal FTC strategy.
Hemoglobin A1c levels in diagnosed and undiagnosed black, Hispanic, and white persons with diabetes: results from NHANES 1999-2000.

PURPOSE Although the prevalence of diabetes among various racial/ethnic groups has been well studied, little is known about the racial/ ethnic differences in Hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) in diagnosed and undiagnosed diabetes. HbA1c correlates with morbidity and mortality in diabetes. Knowledge of the racial/ethnic differences in HbA1c would impact screening and intervention in primary care settings. This study describes racial/ethnic differences in HbA1c among US Black, Hispanic, and White diagnosed and undiagnosed persons with diabetes. METHODS This study included participants in the 1999-2000 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey who were > or =20 years old with a HbA1c measurement. The association between HbA1c and race in diagnosed and undiagnosed persons with diabetes (with body mass index [BMI] and age as covariates) was determined. The distribution of HbA1c and mean HbA1c in diagnosed and undiagnosed diabetes and the rates of diagnosed and undiagnosed diabetes with their corresponding HbA1c levels are described by race/ethnicity. RESULTS Estimated diabetes prevalence in US persons > or =20 years is 8.2%, with 2.3% having undiagnosed diabetes. Whites with diabetes had lower mean HbA1c levels (7.6%, standard error [SEI 0.2) than Blacks (8.1%, SE 0.3) or Hispanics (8.2%, SE .3). Whites with diagnosed diabetes were less likely to have HbA1c> or =11% (1.7%) than Blacks (11.1%) or Hispanics (10.4%). Hispanics with undiagnosed diabetes were more likely to have HbA1c-7% (60.5%) than Blacks (39.3%) or Whites (37.8%). CONCLUSIONS Significant numbers of persons with diabetes are undiagnosed. There are significant racial/ethnic differences in HbA1c levels, which are significantly higher in Blacks and Hispanics. Comprehensive risk-based screening and intervention for diabetes is needed in order to address racial and ethnic disparities, especially in minorities.
On Wavelength-Routed Networks With Reversible Wavelength Channels

We observe that the performance of wavelength- routed (WR) networks often suffers from asymmetric traffic and network traffic patterns differing from the original design plans. WR networks with a fixed number of channels in a given transmission direction are inflexible. Therefore, we propose reversible wavelength channels. Like a reversible lane in highway systems, a reversible wavelength channel has the flexibility of its transmission direction being configurable at the setup of a lightpath. So far reversible wavelength channels have not been discussed in WR networks even though we observe that most of the required technologies are already available. In this paper, we discuss all the required technologies for implementing reversible wavelength channels in WR networks. We demonstrate that reversible wavelength channel can provide significant performance improvement for WR networks when the traffic is asymmetric. Even if the traffic is symmetric, we also have nontrivial performance improvement with reversible wavelength channels, i.e., the blocking performance of WR networks with reversible wavelength channels will be similar to that of normal WR networks with doubling the number of fibers per link. Different implementation approaches for reversible wavelength channels are discussed. Among them, the performance of the reversible waveband approach is discussed in detail.
Changes in the swinging lifestyle: a US national and historical comparison

Abstract Although engaging in extramarital relationships with permission from spouses has been practised for generations, relatively little is known about those who participate and how they have changed over the years. This study expands on existing research by comparing the demographics and sexual practices of those in swinging and non-swinging communities from the 1980s to those in 2016. Data from the 1980s were collected through membership forms submitted to a swinger organisation and a national dataset conducted in the USA (i.e. The General Social Survey), while the recent dataset was collected through an online survey. Compared to the non-swinging population, swingers were more likely to be Caucasian, younger, educated, wealthy and more satisfied with their marriage and sex life. Demographic comparisons of swingers from 1982 to 2016 showed an increase in diversity, growing connection to the US Democratic Party and increased use of protection to avoid sexually transmitted diseases. Marital satisfaction remained the same regardless of year measured, but the amount of sex engaged in over a year decreased over time.
Brain tumor extraction using graph based classification of MRI time series for diagnostic assistance

Automatic extraction of brain tumor regions from temporal sequence of MRI images has a great contribution for diagnostic assistance since it helps the expert to reduce the area of the region to analyze. However, it presents a challenging task for medical applications. Compared to single images, MRI images time series carry more rich information. Therefore, extracting the appropriate information among these data is more difficult. Moreover, spatio-temporal relationship modeling using graphs offers a simple way for powerful analysis. In this paper, a graph-based classification of MRI image time series is applied. It uses the advantages of graph representation of such data in order to extract the relevant information. This framework proved its efficiency in the context of Satellite Images Time Series (SITS) classification in order to monitor land cover evolution. Therefore, we intend to take advantage of this SVM graph based classification of image time series in medical imaging context. Using graph representation, an adapted labeling and temporal neighborhood definition are used for MRI time series' regions modeling. Then, SVM classification using graph kernel is applied to extract brain tumor regions. The experimental results have been conducted on real MRI data proving the accuracy of the proposed approach.
Does risk affect capital structure adjustments

Purpose - – This paper aims to theorize that if risk affects costs and benefits of capital structure adjustments, then it should affect the speed at which firms adjust their leverage toward the target. To investigate this hypothesis, the author empirically examines the role of firm-specific and macroeconomic risk on firms’ capital structure adjustments. Design/methodology/approach - – The author augments the standard reduced-form partial adjustment model of capital structure by incorporating firm-specific and macroeconomic risk. The two-step robust system-generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator is used to estimate the proposed model for a large panel of UK manufacturing firms. An unbalanced annual panel data set covering the period from 1981 to 2009 is utilized for empirical analysis. Findings - – The estimated adjustment speeds indicate that both firm-specific risk and macroeconomic risk significantly affect the speed at which firms adjust their capital structure toward the target. In particular, the author shows that firms adjust their leverage faster toward the target when firm-specific risk is relatively low. This is perhaps because firms face lower costs of adjustment when both firm-specific and macroeconomic risks are low. Overall, the paper provides evidence that different levels and different types of risk exert asymmetric effects on capital structure adjustments. Practical implications - – The results presented in this paper suggest that managers have to carefully consider both the overall state of the economy and the solvency of their own business activities when making their financing decisions. The results also help in explaining why firms time equity and debt markets. Originality/value - – The paper significantly adds to our understanding of asymmetries in adjustment speed across firms and over times. The paper can also be useful to understand why firms would not aggressively act to offset the effects of changes in the market value of equity or gains and losses in earnings.
Universal Dependencies Version 2 for Japanese

In this paper, we are presenting our work to build Universal Dependencies (UD) resources for Japanese. The UD Japanese resources are built based on automatic conversion from several treebanks. The word delimitation, POS, and syntactic relations of the existing treebanks are ported for the UD annotation scheme. We discuss the issues of the UD scheme found through porting of the Japanese language.
A Dataset for Inter-Sentence Relation Extraction using Distant Supervision

© LREC 2018 - 11th International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation. All rights reserved. This paper presents a benchmark dataset for the task of inter-sentence relation extraction. The paper explains the distant supervision method followed for creating the dataset for inter-sentence relation extraction, involving relations previously used for standard intra-sentence relation extraction task. The study evaluates baseline models such as bag-of-words and sequence based recurrent neural network models on the developed dataset and shows that recurrent neural network models are more useful for the task of intra-sentence relation extraction. Comparing the results of the present work on iner-sentence relation extraction with previous work on intra-sentence relation extraction, the study suggests the need for more sophisticated models to handle long-range information between entities across sentences.
Organizational and labor markets as career ecosystem

The chapter offers a novel perspective on internal and external labor markets (within and outside organizations), exploring factors that influence talent flow in a fragmented, dynamic and global employment environment. Paradoxes are presented and discussed, such as the co-existence of stable and dynamic labor markets or the existence of different ‘rules of the game’ for different segments of markets. I discuss the different meaning that the term ‘employability’ may have for individuals, for organizations, and for nations in a competitive business environment. Through the lenses of contemporary career theories, I offer a comprehensive view that covers several theoretical perspectives, including human capital theory, psychological-contract and contemporary career ideas. The concept of the ecosystem as a framework is introduced, alongside human capital theory, depicting the relevance and importance of considering labor markets as ecosystems for understanding and managing careers at the organizational and national level. Lessons are drawn for individuals employed in different professions, sectors and geographies. Practical implications are presented for people management, with a realistic career preview for individuals and for organizational and national decision makers.
Situativity theory and emerging trends in teacher professional development

The current focus on teacher quality in Australian education has highlighted the importance of ongoing professional development (PD), with research (DETYA, 2001: Kenway et al, 1999) indicating the effectiveness of school-based PD and other longer term programs. These examples of PD approaches link to Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD), situativity theory and communities of practice research. In particular, Vygotsky’s ZPD focuses on potential performance and uses social and environmental artefacts to deliberately accelerate learning and the internalization process beyond competence. In applying ZPD to teacher learning, situativity theory rather than an individually-based cognitive learning approach is emphasised. Therefore, the most effective PD is situated in a particular school, team or community of shared understanding. It involves social interaction and includes learning from observing individuals, sharing ideas through oral and written language, and engaging in practical tasks such as analysing student work. Situativity theory may be further expanded beyond situated authentic practice activities to encompass Communities of Practice, which emphasises an anthropological perspective. While Communities of Practice highlight learning within the social context, a significant focus is that the individual identity becomes intertwined and inseparable from the community. A key aspect is that reproduction of the community occurs through a process of legitimate peripheral participation of newcomers. This involves gradual negotiation of meanings, with the learner progressively moving towards a more central position in the community. This paper examines the concepts of ZPD, situativity theory and Communities of Practice in relation to emerging trends in teacher PD. Coaching, mentoring, study groups and other PD examples will be discussed.
Blindness to background: an inbuilt bias for visual objects.

Sixty-eight 2- to 12-year-olds and 30 adults were shown colorful displays on a touchscreen monitor and trained to point to the location of a named color. Participants located targets near-perfectly when presented with four abutting colored patches. When presented with three colored patches on a colored background, toddlers failed to locate targets in the background. Eye tracking demonstrated that the effect was partially mediated by a tendency not to fixate the background. However, the effect was abolished when the targets were named as nouns, whilst the change to nouns had little impact on eye movement patterns. Our results imply a powerful, inbuilt tendency to attend to objects, which may slow the development of color concepts and acquisition of color words. A video abstract of this article can be viewed at: https://youtu.be/TKO1BPeAiOI. [Correction added on 27 January 2017, after first online publication: The video abstract link was added. ].
Porous polymer coatings on metal microneedles for enhanced drug delivery

We present a simple method to coat microneedles (MNs) uniformly with a porous polymer (PLGA) that can deliver drugs at high rates. Stainless steel (SS) MNs of high mechanical strength were coated with a thin porous polymer layer to enhance their delivery rates. Additionally, to improve the interfacial adhesion between the polymer and MNs, the MN surface was modified by plasma treatment followed by dip coating with polyethyleneimine, a polymer with repeating amine units. The average failure load (the minimum force sufficient for detaching the polymer layer from the surface of SS) recorded for the modified surface coating was 25 N, whereas it was 2.2 N for the non-modified surface. Calcein dye was successfully delivered into porcine skin to a depth of 750 µm by the porous polymer-coated MNs, demonstrating that the developed MNs can pierce skin easily without deformation of MNs; additional skin penetration tests confirmed this finding. For visual comparison, rhodamine B dye was delivered using porous-coated and non-coated MNs in gelatin gel which showed that delivery with porous-coated MNs penetrate deeper when compared with non-coated MNs. Finally, lidocaine and rhodamine B dye were delivered in phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) medium by porous polymer-coated and non-coated MNs. For rhodamine B, drug delivery with the porous-coated MNs was five times higher than that with the non-coated MNs, whereas 25 times more lidocaine was delivered by the porous-coated MNs compared with the non-coated MNs.
Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Financial Illiteracy, Inattention, and Sluggish Mortgage Refinancing

We analyze the effect of an exogenous shock to the Italian mortgage market. A new reform passed in 2007 has abolished prepayment fees and simplified mortgage refinancing, making it akin to a cost-free decision to households. This law — along with the almost simultaneous drop in market interest rates — has generated important gains for fixed rate borrowers, which we quantify at up to 8 percent of the principal balance. Nevertheless, only 4.2 percent of borrowers have locked in this opportunity. We establish a causal relationship between this sluggish behavior, investors’ inattention, and their level of financial illiteracy.
Thrifty Females, Frisky Males: Winter Energetics of Hibernating Bats from a Cold Climate

Mammalian hibernation consists of energy-saving torpor bouts (periods of controlled reduction in body temperature [Tb]) interspersed with brief arousals to normothermic Tb. Frequency and duration of torpor bouts and arousals can affect winter survival and are thought to be influenced by an optimization balancing the energetic benefits of prolonged torpor against the physiological and ecological costs (e.g., accumulation of metabolic wastes). Female little brown bats (Myotis lucifugus) spend their fat reserves more slowly than males during winter, presumably so they can emerge from hibernation in good condition to initiate pregnancy. We used temperature telemetry over three winters to test a prediction of the optimization hypothesis that female M. lucifugus would use longer torpor bouts and/or shorter arousals than males. Females did conserve energy relative to males by adjusting the magnitude and duration of arousals but not the duration of torpor bouts. Although torpor bout duration did not vary by sex for adults, it did vary by age. Adults initially used longer torpor bouts than young-of-the-year, but this difference declined as cave temperature warmed in spring. Males and females in better condition spent more energy during hibernation, again via increased arousal duration rather than decreased torpor bout duration. Longer arousals by males could increase reproductive fitness if males mate with torpid females throughout winter. Our results highlight demographic differences in winter behavior for small hibernators facing extreme energy limitation in cold climates and illustrate the influence that reproductive costs have on hibernation energetics.