Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The AKR of the Earth: From studies inside the sources to distant observations and remote sensing

One follows the path of the Auroral Kilometric Radiation (AKR) from the inside of the sources up to remote observation points. Wave and plasma processes related to the AKR that are encountered along this travel are described and discussed. This paper is organized as a review of the observations of the AKR with emphasis on the ones recently obtained with the experiments of the Viking satellite that crossed about fifty sources. Inside the sources, the AKR appears to be generated at a frequency very close to the electron gyrofrequency, sometimes below. Direct observations of the wave electric field show that it lies in a plane quasi perpendicular to the geomagnetic field. Ion and electron observations show that the AKR is generated inside field–aligned acceleration structures. The observation of up–flowing ion beams inside the sources is indicative of a keV field–aligned potential drop from the bottom of the acceleration region to the altitude of the satellite. This can account for the removal of the thermal electrons from these regions. In the velocity space, electron measurements give evidence of an enhancement of particles trapped between the magnetic mirror point and the point where they are reflected by the parallel ‘electrostatic’ field. This ‘bump’ in the velocity space is an efficient free energy source for the Cyclotron Maser Instability (CMI). In the AKR source regions, the plasma density is extremely low, and the plasma is strongly magnetized. Furthermore, the analysis of the plasma density inside a large number of sources compared to the plasma density in non– emitting regions shows the existence of a threshold for the plasma density above which the AKR is not generated. At the edges of the sources, down–going electron beams testify the presence of acceleration regions above the satellite. Related to these beams, intense short duration electrostatic bursts are observed. The edges of the source regions present sharp density gradients perpendicular to the geomagnetic field. The role that these gradients play for the escape or the trapping of the energy is discussed in the light of analytical and simulation studies. The possibility of a mode conversion due to these gradients is discussed. Centre Nat. d’Études des Télécommunications, Centre Nat. de la Recherche Scientifique, Centre de Recherche en Physique de l’Environnement, 92131 Issy–les–Moulineaux Cedex, France
Risk Sharing in Highly Incomplete Markets: The Role of Insurance Companies

This paper analyzes how insurance companies allow the issue of market incompleteness to be overcome. A general equilibrium economy is considered in which heterogeneous agents face endowment risks. Markets are incomplete: there are only markets for trading commodities ex-post and hedging price risks ex-ante. I introduce insurance companies supplying individual insurance contracts against endowment risks and sharing their uncertain profit through stock markets. I show that this restores Pareto optimality and generates the allocation obtained in the complete Arrow-Debreu setting despite drastically fewer markets. Substituting a tremendous amount of illiquid financial markets by insurance companies seems to be an effective way to implement risk management in the real world.
The effects of cimetidine and ranitidine on psychomotor function in healthy volunteers.

Single oral doses of cimetidine (400 mg), ranitidine (150 mg), promethazine (25 mg) or placebo were administered to 8 healthy volunteers in a double-blind study. Cimetidine and ranitidine did not cause any significant change in critical flicker frequency (c.f.f.), reaction time, pursuit rotor of the visual analogue scale scores for sedation. Promethazine significantly lowered c.f. f. , prolonged reaction time and increased sedation when compared with placebo. It is concluded that in this study cimetidine and ranitidine had little, if any, effect on psychomotor function.
Efficiency assessment of state-owned financial institutions using data envelopment analysis: the case of Vietnam

ABSTRACT Measurement of public sector enterprises' performance, especially efficiency measurement by way of a DEA model, has gained prominence in recent years among academics and practitioners. However, the different sources of input and output chosen to be used in the DEA model would produce different results for the assessor. The current research uses a closed-ended questionnaire aiming to explore suitable sources of input and output for use in a data envelopment analysis (DEA) model to assess the efficiency of public sector commercial banks (PSCBs) in Vietnam. The data is subsequently analysed quantitatively using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) with the AMOS program. The results show five sources of input and five sources of output suitable for inclusion in the DEA model. This paper provides a reliable basis for policy analysts and performance assessors to use DEA to analyse efficiency and effectiveness in PSCBs and might trigger future research on efficiency evaluation of PSCBs using DEA in the context of Vietnam.
Factors Associated with Agreeing to Early Childbearing Among School Girls of Selected Rural Districts in Zambia

Background: The Zambia Demographic Health survey conducted in 2014 reported a notable number of adolescent girls 3627(11.7%) who had their first sexual intercourse by age 15 and the Zambia National Health Strategic Plan 2017-2021 highlighted the high adolescent birth rate which stood at 141 per 1000 live births between the years 2013 and 2014. In this paper, we adopted the WHO definition of an Adolescent as any person between the ages of 10 to 19 years. This study aimed at investigating baseline factors that leads to agreeing into early childbearing practices among adolescent girls in selected rural districts of Zambia nested in the RISE cluster randomized trial. In this study early childbearing was taken to mean any pregnancy before the age of 16. Methods: This study is a nested quantitative cross-sectional design. Participants were girls attending grade seven at various schools in 2016. Information on factors that could influence the participants’ view on childbearing were collected at baseline. A complete enumeration of approximately 5000 girls recruited in 12 rural districts of Central and Southern provinces were analysed. Descriptive statistics were presented as frequencies and percentages in tables. To check for association with categorical variables, either Chi-squared or Fisher’s exact test was done depending on whether the assumptions for Chi-squared test were satisfied or not. Univariate and Multiple Logistic regression analysis was used to test the association between independent factors and early childbearing. Clustering in the study was accounted for using robust standard errors. Results: The findings showed that more than two-thirds 3189 (73.7%) of the participants had little or no knowledge regarding adolescent sexual and reproductive health services while less than one-third 1137 (26%) had knowledge regarding Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health services. Adolescents with mobile phones were 2.5 times more likely to have children early compared to adolescents without mobile phones. Majority 227 (69%) who agreed to early childbearing were aged 10 to 15 years, whilst the least 99(30.3%) were in the age range of 16 to 20 years. In addition, results revealed that one-year increase in age of an adolescent girl increases agreeing to early childbearing by 30% (OR=1.30, 95% CI (1.01, 1.67), p- value=0.03). Overall, very few factors (mobile phone and age) at baseline were found to be associated with agreeing to early childbearing. Conclusions: Only mobile phone use and age were associated with agreeing to early childbearing.
Corporate Taxation and Productivity Catch-Up: Evidence from 11 European Countries

Firms that lay far behind the technological frontier have the most to gain from imitating the technology or management practices of others. That some firms converge relatively slowly to the productivity frontier suggests the existence of factors that cause them to under-invest in their productivity. In this paper we explore whether higher rates of corporate taxation affect firm productivity convergence because they reduce the after tax returns to productivity enhancing investments for small firms. Using data for 11 European countries we find evidence for such an effect; productivity growth in small firms is slower the higher are high corporate tax rates. Our results are robust to the use of instrumental variable and panel data techniques with quantitatively similar effects found from a natural experiment following the German tax reforms in 2001.
A database evolution approach for object-oriented databases

The paper describes a composite evolution approach which integrates the evolution of the various types of entities in an object-oriented database into one model. The approach provides maintainers with a coherent and comprehensible view of the system and at the same time maintains change histories at a fine granularity. Links among meta-objects are implemented using dynamic relationships which are semantic constructs and first-class objects. Referential integrity is maintained by the relationships architecture reducing the evolution complexity at the meta-object level. A customisable and exchangeable instance adaptation approach is proposed. The approach is based on separating the instance adaptation code from class versions using aspects, abstractions used in Aspect-Oriented Programming to localise crosscutting concerns. A high level object-oriented model offering transparent access to the proposed evolution functionality is provided.
Haematological profile of albino rats exposed to polar leaf extracts of Portulaca oleracea Linn.

Although the use of medicinal plants is becoming popular globally, some of these plants which are purported to be safe are not without side effects or toxicity. Portulaca oleracea, Linn. is among the medicinal plants used globally in the treatment of diseases and management of health challenges. The dearth of information on the toxicity of Portulaca oleracea in a long term use prompted this study which investigated the sub-chronic effect of the oral administration of polar (aqueous methanol) leaf extracts of Portulaca oleracea on haematological parameters in male albino rats. Sixtyfour animals were randomly divided into 4 groups of 16 rats each. Group 1(Control) received 0.5 ml of 20% Tween 80 (vehicle), Groups 2, 3 & 4 received 125, 250 & 500 mg/kg bw of the extract respectively for 60 days by oral gavage. On days 14, 28, 42 and 60; four rats from each group were anaesthetized and blood samples were collected for haematology. No significant (p>0.05) variation occurred in the mean values of PCV, hemoglobin concentration, RBC count, platelet count and differential leucocyte count relative to the control throughout the 60-day duration. Significant (p<0.05) increase in WBC count was recorded on day 42 in the 500mg treated group. Oral administration of polar leaf extract of P.oleracea as used in this study had no injurious effect on haematological parameters in a long term treatment of 60 days; thus can be said to be non-toxic to blood parameters.
A Sensorless Rotor Temperature Estimator for Induction Machines Based on Current Harmonic Spectral Estimation Scheme

This paper proposes a sensorless rotor temperature estimator for small to medium size mains-fed induction machines. With measurements obtained from only current and voltage sensors, the proposed estimator can capture the rotor temperature in an online fashion. First the rotor speed is extracted from the current harmonic spectrum based on the estimated rotor slot and eccentricity harmonic frequencies. Then the inductances are estimated from the induction machine equivalent circuit. The stator winding resistance at ambient temperature is the only motor parameter needed at this stage. Once the inductances are obtained, they are fed into the rotor resistance estimation algorithm to yield an estimate of the rotor resistance. Finally the rotor temperature is calculated from the linear relationship between temperature and rotor resistance. Experimental results from different motors are shown to validate the proposed scheme. The whole scheme is accurate and reliable and is therefore suitable to be implemented in a rotor thermal protection relay or a motor drive employing vector control scheme to compensate for the detuning effects
Detailed profiling organic carbon content of oil shales with thermal core logging technique

Summary The development of a thermal core logging technique as a field-scale geophysical technique presented new possibilities for multiphysical testing of shales, e.g. preparation of representative databases of the thermal properties for basin modeling and hydrodynamic modeling for thermal methods of EOR, and practical application of correlations between shale thermal conductivity and total organic carbon. The technique of determination of oil shale total organic carbon from the thermal core logging data was developed that provides detailed continuous high-resolution profiling total organic carbon of oil shales along wells. The technique was studied and tested on more than 11 500 oil shale samples from Bazhenov and Domanic Formations when more than 1250 shale samples were also tested for total organic carbon content with Rock-Eval pyrolysis. The data on shale total organic carbon obtained from the measurements with pyrolysis allow to calibrate and control the results of total organic carbon determinations from the thermal core logging. Continuous profiling total organic carbon from continuous thermal core logging provides reasonable selection of shale samples for future investigations and are basis for basin modeling and calculation of reserves
Immunomodulating effect of Schistosoma mansoni soluble egg antigen on course of induced diabetes mellitus in experimental mice

Background: Helminth infections, particularly S.mansoni, are known to induce a protective role against various forms of autoimmune diseases, including type 1diabetes (TID). The observed S.mansoni significant inhibition or delay of diabetes development in non-obese diabetic mice (NOD), appeared to be due to a modulation of the diabetes-associated th1response towards protective th2 responses through IL-10 production. Objective: To study the effect of S. mansoni SEA on the immune response in induced TIDmouse moduel. Material and Methods: In this study, 90 male Swiss Albino mice of 6 weeks old, weighing between 90 and 100g were divided into 5 groups; control group (I): Streptozontocin (STZ)-treated group (II); soluble egg antigen (SEA)-immunized group (III); (STZ+SEA) group (IV); (SEA+STZ) group (V). Mice were subjected to measurement of blood glucose levels at two and four weeks by colorimetric method, and measurement of IL-10 by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Histopathological examination of pancreatic sections of the five groups investigated signs suggesting presence or absence of pancreatic inflammation. Results: Significant lowering of blood glucose level occurred at 2-weeks in groups III and V compared to group II and at 4-weeks in groups III, IV and V compared to group II, and in group V compared to group IV. Significant higher IL-10 level occurred at 2-weeks in groups IV and V compared to group II, and in groups IV and V compared to group III and in group V compared to group IV. In 4-weeks, significant increase in IL-10 level occurred in groups II, IV, V compared to group I, and in group V compared to group IV. No significant difference between groups III and I was recorded. Histopathological changes of pancreatic sections of groups I and III showed normal architecture of pancreatic cells; While groups II and IV coinciding with STZ treatment showed vacuolation and necrosis of islets of Langerhans at 2-weeks the inflammation subsided in group IV. In group V there was dilation of blood vessels with inflammatory cells at both weeks. Conclusion: S.mansoni derived SEA proved to be protective against TID leading to improvement of blood sugar control and indicating the protective role of S.mansoni infection.
Biomonitoring Road Dust Pollution Along Streets
with Various Traffic Densities

Three lichen species (Phaeophyscia orbicularis, Physcia adscendens, and Xanthoria parietina), were sampled from the deciduous trees along nine streets of various traffic densities in Prešov, Slovakia. The total concentrations of risk elements (Al, As, Ba, Cd, Cr, Cu, Fe, Li, Mn, Ni, Pb, Zn) were determined by the ICP-OES method. Phaeophyscia orbicularis showed the best ability to accumulate all evaluated risk elements except Pb and Cr. X. parientina was found to be the least suitable for bioaccumulation purposes. The concentration of evaluated risk elements in lichen insoles came predominantly from traffic, which was confirmed by a significant positive correlation between risk elements and traffic density. Based on the results of contamination factor, evaluated streets were most polluted by Cr, Fe, Ni, Pb and Zn and only slightly polluted by Cd. Provably higher values of Cd, Cu, Fe, Ni and Zn were measured in streets with higher traffic density. According to the cluster analysis, two groups of risk elements, expressing their origin, were found.
Local-Scale Urban Energy Balance Observation under Various Sky Conditions in a Humid Subtropical Region

The present study presents local-scale urban energy balance observations under various sky conditions in a humid subtropical region. The study site is a typical urban residential area in Guangzhou in which building density is 38%, vegetation coverage is 36%, and mean building height is 21 m. The observation was conducted at a 110-m-high tower using the eddy covariance technique from September to November 2016. The median diurnal pattern and daily maxima were achieved for all radiation components and turbulent fluxes. The Bowen ratio (β) results indicated a predominant role for sensible heat flux (QH) in the daytime and latent heat flux (QE) at night. The sky conditions played a significant part in the urban surface energy exchanges, showing that the median daily maxima of net radiation (Q*), QH, storage heat flux (ΔQS), surface albedo, and β all present a consistent order from large to small for clear, cloudy, and rainy days and a different order of rainy, clear, and cloudy days for QE. The mean daytime QH/Q*, QE/Q*, ΔQS/Q*, and β changed with urban density, while QE/Q* and β also varied with vegetation fraction. Furthermore, the adaptability of net all-wave radiation parameterization (NARP), objective hysteresis model (OHM), and local-scale urban meteorological parameterization scheme (LUMPS) were validated, given the index of agreements of 0.998 and 0.951 for Q* and ΔQS and the reasonable RMSEs for QH and QE. The present study helps to verify and improve the parameterizations of energy exchange over an urban surface in the humid subtropical region.
Robust Stability Analysis of DC Microgrids With Constant Power Loads

This paper studies stability analysis of dc microgrids with uncertain constant power loads (CPLs). It is well known that CPLs have negative impedance effects, which may cause instability in a dc microgrid. Existing works often study the stability around a given equilibrium based on some nominal values of CPLs. However, in real applications, the equilibrium of a dc microgrid depends on the loading condition that often changes over time. Different from many previous results, this paper develops a framework that can analyze the DC microgrid stability for a given range of CPLs. The problem is formulated as a robust stability problem of a polytopic uncertain linear system. By exploiting the structure of the problem, we derive a set of sufficient conditions that can be efficiently checked by solving convex optimization problems to guarantee locally robust stability. The effectiveness and nonconservativeness of the proposed framework are demonstrated using simulation examples.
Evaluation of Rett Syndrome Symptom Improvement by Metabolic Modulators in Mecp2‐Mutant Mice

Mouse models recapitulate many symptoms of Rett Syndrome, an X‐linked disorder caused by mutations in methyl‐CpG‐binding protein 2 (MECP2). The study of Mecp2‐null male mice has provided insight into pathogenesis of the disorder—most recently, dysregulation of cholesterol and lipid metabolism. Perisymptomatic treatment with statin drugs successfully mitigates the effects of this metabolic syndrome, increases longevity, and improves motor function. Described here is a metabolic drug screening protocol and timeline for symptom evaluation in Mecp2‐mutant mice. Specifically, mice are treated twice weekly with a compound of interest alongside subjective health assessments, bi‐weekly body composition measurements, and blood chemistries. Throughout treatment, behavioral phenotyping tests are carried out at specific time points. This protocol is highly adaptable to other neurological diseases; however, the time for completion depends on the specific mutant model under study. The protocol highlights the use of techniques described in several different Current Protocols in Mouse Biology articles to carry out testing in a preclinical model. Curr. Protoc. Mouse Biol. 3:187‐204 © 2013 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Effect Size Reporting Practices in Applied Linguistics Research: A Study of One Major Journal

Many surveys of effect size (ES) reporting practices have been conducted in social science fields such as psychology and education, but few such studies are available in applied linguistics. To bridge this gap and to echo the recent calls for more robust statistics from scholars in applied linguistics and beyond, this study represents the first attempt, in the field of applied linguistics, to focus upon ES reporting practices. With an innovative “two-standards” approach for coding, which overcomes the limitations with similar studies in other social science fields (e.g., communication), this study assesses the ES reporting practices over a span of 6 years in a major journal. Findings include the following: (a) the ES reporting rate is about 50% and (b) some improvement of ES reporting over time is in evidence. Future research directions (e.g., examining whether and how ES is interpreted after being reported) are suggested.