Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Strategy Management and Maintenance for Thin Surface Course Systems

Thin surface course systems (TSCS) have been in widespread use on the Highways England Strategic Road Network since their introduction in the 1990s. A premature failure of TSCS will result in early intervention and hence a significant cost. Surface disintegration (fretting) is acknowledged to be the main defect within TSCS. It occurs when individual aggregate particles under the action of traffic and environmental factors are lost. The aim of this research was to study and seek to set up a series of recommendations to improve the management and maintenance strategy of thin surface course systems for their entire serviceable life. This research was planning to explore and investigate the long term performance of thin surfacing systems in particular in relation to surface disintegration (fretting) on site. As part of this research TSCS core samples were obtained from several sites. The cores were subjected to a comprehensive matrix of laboratory tests for determining the rheological behaviour characteristics of binders. This included Penetration grade, Softening Point determination and Sweep test using a Dynamic Shear Rheometer over a range of different temperatures (5oC to 80oC) and frequencies (0.1Hz to 10Hz) tests. A set of laboratory tests for evaluating the mechanical performance characteristics of the mixtures were also carried out to fully investigate the effect of compaction on the long term performance of the mixtures. The resulting mixtures’ properties were then investigated by looking at their compaction results including Bulk Density, Max density and air void Content. The laboratory data was then interpreted and analysed against available in-situ performance data in order to find any possible correlation between the in-situ performance surface of TSCS (in particular fretting) and binder/mixture properties of Thin Surface Course Systems.
Are green bonds and sustainable cryptocurrencies truly sustainable? Evidence from a wavelet coherence analysis

This article aims to explore the co-movement of daily returns among S&P green bonds (GB/GBs), the top five sustainable cryp-tocurrencies, Bitcoin, the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index (DJSWI) and the Dow Jones Sustainability Emerging Market Index (DJSEMI) to determine whether GBs, Bitcoin and sustainable cryp-tocurrencies are truly sustainable; in addition, it investigates hedging and diversification opportunities. Using a partial wavelet coherence framework to capture the bivariate co-movement, our findings show strong (weak) positive co-movements among GB (sustainable cryptocurrencies) and DJSWI returns, where GBs (sustainable cryptocurrencies) have a heterogeneous leading role in the short-term and long-term horizons. Results indicate moderate positive (negative) co-movement among GBs and sustainable cryptocurrencies (Bitcoin) and DJSWI in the short run (long run). Overall, the results show GB (sustainable cryptocurrencies) acts as a diversifier for Bitcoin and sustainable cryptocurrencies in most cases (DJSWI). However, increasing Bitcoin returns adversely impacts the DJSWI in the long run. Findings are equally imperative for green investors, crypto traders and policymakers, where investors and traders can earn financial and social returns, and policy-makers can deploy suitable policies for the development of sustainable cryptocurrency mining processes. The role of Bitcoin is alarming for the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and global greener economy.
Significant Differences in BTI and TDDB Characteristics of Commercial Planar SiC-MOSFETs

Silicon carbide (SiC) metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFETs) have been produced by several vendors for commercial applications. SiC-MOSFET reliability was assessed using bias-temperature instability (BTI) and time-dependent dielectric breakdown (TDDB) characteristics. Here, we compared two planar SiC-MOSFET samples (A and B) from different vendors. The samples exhibited significantly different positive and negative BTI, time-dependent gate-current, TDDB lifetime statistics, and temperature dependence. These differences suggest NO (nitric oxide)-annealing variations.
Potentiality of oregano essential oils as a growth modulator, immune enhancer and natural antioxidative in mite infested Newzealand white rabbits

A total of twenty four unsexed New Zealand White (NZW) rabbits, weaned at 5 weeks of age, were observed to assess the impacts of some environmental stressors like stocking density (SD) and external parasite infestation (mite) on the growth performance and some blood biochemical parameters of this growing rabbits and assess the use of Oregano Essential Oil (OEO) supplementation as an antistressor for the rabbit intensification and mite infestation problems. NZW rabbits were housed in wire cages (45 cm x 45 cm x35 cm) in groups of 2 rabbits cage-1 (low stocking density; LSD) and 4 rabbits cage-1 (high stocking density; HSD). For the two densities, NZW rabbits were fed three diets with variable OEO levels and experimentally infested with P. cuniculi for 7 weeks by the following manner, (T1) group was the control group that has 0.0 OEO level kg-1 diet without mite infestations, (T2) and (T3) group were supplemented with 200 mg OEO kg-1 diet but only (T3) group was experimentally infested with mites, while the last treatment (T4) was experimentally infested with mites and supplemented with 400 mg OEO kg-1 diet. Finally, the current study found that a low dose of OEO-based feed had a favorable influence on the growth performance of NZW rabbits kept at LSD, with apparent benefits on antioxidant defense and innate immunity status. Our results also revealed that feed conversion ratio in rabbits provided with phytogenic supplemented diets had significantly lower values than in rabbits fed other treatments, indicating that phytogenics can promote growth. As a result, the practical consequences of phytogenic inclusion in rabbit feeds include the potential to improve rabbit growth performance and feed utilization. This would allow for faster rabbit growth, which would result in increased production time at optimal density while avoiding rabbits' parasitic infestations with mite. In conclusion, the findings of this study revealed that adding OEO in a dose of 200 mg kg-1 diet enhanced feed utilisation, rabbit somatic growth and ameliorating intensification and mite infestation stress effects on NZW rabbits.
Dance Therapy as an Alternative treatment for People with Eating Addiction in the Era of COVID-19

Dance therapy is also able to increase the hormone endorphins. Psychologically, dance is a form of therapy in expressing emotions through appropriate movements so that it can make humans more discover the meaning of their choices so that eventually humans find happiness and humans can find friends who serve to enlighten itself. If someone is happy, then that person will feel happy and diligent to activate his body more to move. This activity can burn fat. Therefore, researchers can see that dance therapy is a form of therapy that reduces the dangers of eating addiction.
Development of Novel Gluten-Free Sausage Based on Chickpea, Corn Flour, and HPMC

The present work was carried out to study the effectiveness of substitution of wheat flour with different levels of chickpea flour, corn flour, and hydroxypropyl methylcellulose (HPMC) for the production of gluten-free sausages. The prepared sausages were subjected to physicochemical, color, texture, thermal, and sensory analyses 24 h after production. Proximate chemical composition indicated that the protein content was raised by the addition of chickpea flour. The result of thermal analysis indicated that the addition of chickpea flour increased To, Tp, Tf, and ΔH and decreased ∆W1. Textural properties revealed that hardness was higher in samples containing chickpea flour and adhesiveness, chewiness, and gumminess were lower in samples with chickpea flour and corn flour. Sensorial properties showed that there were no significant differences between samples except the sample containing 6% chickpea flour. Based on the obtained results, it seems that the sample containing 4% corn flour, 6% chickpea flour, and 0.3% HPMC had the best formulation.
Clinical, haemato-biochemical alterations with acute phase response in canine parvoviral enteritis

Canine parvoviral enteritis (CPV) is one of the most contagious fatal viral diseases in young puppies with subsequent alterations in homeostasis; This study was conducted on a total number of 35 puppies of different breeds, with age range of 2-6 months old with signs compatible with canine parvovirus enteritis. Another apparently healthy five puppies within similar age range were enrolled as healthy control group. Up on admission, clinical signs were recorded and rapid in-clinic IC test kit for detection of CPV Ag in feces. Blood samples were used to determine haemato-biochemical alterations along with Acute phase response values. Vomiting and foulsmelling bloody diarrhea with marked dehydration were the main recorded clinical signs. Hemogram of CPV infected dogs, revealed the presence of microcytic hypochromic anemia, significant leukopenia with marked lymphopenia and neutropenia. The total serum proteins, albumin, total globulins, sodium, potassium, chloride, levels were significantly decreased in CPV infected group than its level in healthy control dogs. On contrary the mean values of, aspartate transaminase (AST), alanine transaminase (ALT), alkaline phosphatase (ALP), blood urea nitrogen (BUN) and creatinine were significantly increased in diseased dogs. Results of acute phase biomarkers revealed Significant increase in serum amyloid A (SAA), haptoglobin (Hp) and C-reactive protein (CRP) with significant reduction in mean values of serum albumin in diseased puppies. Based on obtained results, CPV enteritis has negative impact on haemato-biochemical biomarkers and strong expression of acute phase reaction in diseased dogs.
Wind Pressure Distribution on a Multiple Hyperbolic Paraboloid Shell Roof Building

Wind pressure distribution was investigated on a multiple hyperbolic paraboloid (HP) shell roof building by model test in the wind tunnel. The roof of the model was a grouping of four similar HP shells in a ‘normal’ array forming a square in plan. Wind tunnel experiments were carried out; wind pressure distribution and the contours of wind pressure on shell roof and walls were determined for various wind directions. The average suctions on roof were computed and compared with those on a single HP shell roof and on a multiple HP shell roof having a ‘sawtooth’ array. The highest point suction encountered was −4·12q whilst the maximum average suction on the roof was −0·61q.
With Friends Like These: Does American Soft Power Advance International Religious Freedom?

The International Religious Freedom Act, passed by Congress in 1998, set international religious freedom promotion (IRF) as a core objective of American foreign policy. Although formally empowering the president to enact punitive sanctions in instances of extreme religious repression, IRF is primarily a soft power instrument, with the expressed intent to persuade rather than coerce states into greater respect for religious freedom. Nearly a quarter century since its enactment, however, religious discrimination has markedly increased worldwide. This paper therefore seeks to quantitatively evaluate the extent to which American soft power, measured via levels of popular approval for the United States in countries surveyed by various polling agencies from 2002 to 2014, has correlated with shifts in governmental religious discrimination (GRD) since 1998. We find that not only do higher levels of approval of the United States correlate with greater increases in GRD, but this effect is particularly robust in more democratic states, in which American soft power should presumably have a greater influence. These findings should be deeply troubling for IRF advocates, empirically validating prevalent concerns regarding the efficacy, priority, and viability of IRF as a foreign policy instrument.
Comparative Analysis of the Predictive Power of Machine Learning Models for Forecasting the Credit Ratings of Machine-Building Companies

The purpose of this study is to compare the predictive power of different machine learning models to reproduce the credit ratings of Moody's assigned to machine-building companies. The study closes several gaps found in the literature related to the choice of explanatory variables and the formation of a sample of data for modeling. The task to be solved is highly relevant. There is a growing need for high-precision and low-cost models for reproducing the credit ratings of machine-building companies (internal credit ratings). This is due to the ongoing growth of credit risks of companies in the industry, as well as the limited number of assigned public ratings to these companies from international rating agencies due to the high cost of rating process. The study compares the predictive power of three machine learning models: ordered logistic regression, random forest, and gradient boosting. The sample of companies includes 109 enterprises of the machine-building industry from 18 countries for the period from 2005 to 2016. The financial indicators of companies that correspond to the industry methodology of Moody's and the macroeconomic indicators of the home countries of the companies are used as explanatory variables. The results show that among models studied the artificial intelligence models have the greatest predictive ability. The random forest model showed a prediction accuracy of 50%, the gradient boosting model showed accuracy of 47%. Their predictive power is almost twice as high as the accuracy of ordered logistic regression (25%). In addition, the article tested two different ways of forming a sample: randomly and taking into account the time factor. The result showed that the use of random sampling increases the predictive power of the models. The inclusion of macroeconomic variables into the models does not improve their predictive power. The explanation is that rating agencies follow a "through the cycle" rating approach to ensure the stability of ratings. The results of the study may be useful for researchers who are engaged in assessing the accuracy of empirical methods for modeling credit ratings, as well as practitioners in banking industry who directly use such models to assess the creditworthiness of machine-building companies.
The Innovation of Values: Exploring the Role of News Media Exposure and Communication in Moral Progress in the Netherlands

ABSTRACT The world has made enormous moral progress since the 1980s. People emphasize universal emancipative values and freedom more. In this research, the role of media use and interpersonal communication therein is studied from a diffusion of innovations perspective. A secondary analysis of World Values Survey data from the Netherlands was conducted (N = 4281). Emancipative values are widely supported; however, worries about loss of freedom and moral regress increasingly lead to societal conflicts. The results show value gaps and different uses of media between adoption categories, especially between laggards and others. Multimedia use is correlated to supporting emancipative values. Early adopters use news media most, while early majority and laggards use digital media more. Outcomes such as lower levels of connectedness in combination with higher standard deviations for emancipative values indicate that media and interpersonal communication can help include laggards more in supporting emancipative values and resolving social conflicts.
Melatonin and selenium supplementation in extenders improves the post-thaw quality parameters of rat sperm

Objective The aim of this study was to determine the effects of melatonin and selenium in freezing extenders on frozen-thawed rat sperm. Methods Semen samples were collected from 20 adult male Wistar albino rats. Following dilution, the samples were divided into six groups: four cryopreserved groups with 1 mM and 0.5 mM melatonin and selenium supplements, and two fresh and cryopreserved control groups. The rapid freezing technique was used to freeze the samples. Flow cytometry was used to assess plasma membrane integrity, mitochondrial membrane potential, and DNA damage, while computer-assisted sperm analysis was used to assess motility. Results Total motility was higher in the 1 mM melatonin supplementation group than in the cryopreserved control group (mean±standard error of the mean, 69.89±3.05 vs. 59.21±1.31; p≤0.05). The group with 1 mM selenium had the highest plasma membrane integrity (42.35%±1.01%). The cryopreserved group with 0.5 mM selenium had the highest mitochondrial membrane potential, whereas the cryopreserved control group had the lowest (45.92%±4.53% and 39.45%±3.52%, respectively). Conclusion Cryopreservation of rat semen supplemented with 1 mM melatonin increased sperm motility after freeze-thawing, while supplementation with 0.5 mM selenium increased mitochondrial activity.
The Prevalence and Genetic Diversity of PCV3 and PCV2 in Colombia and PCV4 Survey during 2015–2016 and 2018–2019

Four genotypes of circovirus have been recognized in swine, with PCV2 and PCV3 being the most associated with clinical manifestations, while PCV4 does not have a defined disease. In addition, PCV2 is associated with different syndromes grouped as diseases associated with porcine circovirus (PCVAD), while PCV3 causes systemic and reproductive diseases. In the present study, we retrospectively detected PCV2, PCV3, and PCV4 in Colombia during two periods: A (2015–2016) and B (2018–2019). During period A, we evaluated stool pools from the 32 Colombian provinces, finding a higher prevalence of PCV3 compared to PCV2 as well as PCV2/PCV3 co-infection. Furthermore, we determined that PCV3 had been circulating since 2015 in Colombia. Regarding period B, we evaluated sera pools and tissues from abortions and stillborn piglets from the five provinces with the highest pig production. The highest prevalence found was for PCV3 in tissues followed by sera pools, while PCV2 was lower and only in sera pools. In addition, PCV2/PCV3 co-infection in sera pools was also found for this period. The complete genome sequences of PCV3 and PCV3-ORF2 placed the Colombian isolates within clade 1 as the majority in the world. For PCV2, the predominant genotype currently in Colombia is PCV2d. Likewise, in some PCV3-ORF2 sequences, a mutation (A24V) was found at the level of the Cap protein, which could be involved in PCV3 immunogenic recognition. Regarding PCV4, retrospective surveillance showed that there is no evidence of the presence of this virus in Colombia.
FlexLip: A Controllable Text-to-Lip System

The task of converting text input into video content is becoming an important topic for synthetic media generation. Several methods have been proposed with some of them reaching close-to-natural performances in constrained tasks. In this paper, we tackle a subissue of the text-to-video generation problem, by converting the text into lip landmarks. However, we do this using a modular, controllable system architecture and evaluate each of its individual components. Our system, entitled FlexLip, is split into two separate modules: text-to-speech and speech-to-lip, both having underlying controllable deep neural network architectures. This modularity enables the easy replacement of each of its components, while also ensuring the fast adaptation to new speaker identities by disentangling or projecting the input features. We show that by using as little as 20 min of data for the audio generation component, and as little as 5 min for the speech-to-lip component, the objective measures of the generated lip landmarks are comparable with those obtained when using a larger set of training samples. We also introduce a series of objective evaluation measures over the complete flow of our system by taking into consideration several aspects of the data and system configuration. These aspects pertain to the quality and amount of training data, the use of pretrained models, and the data contained therein, as well as the identity of the target speaker; with regard to the latter, we show that we can perform zero-shot lip adaptation to an unseen identity by simply updating the shape of the lips in our model.
The Influence of Perceived Ease of Use and Perceived Usefulness on E-Wallet Continuance Intention

The developments of information technology and the advent of new normal in Indonesia had transformed how transaction was conducted, increasing the importance of e-wallet. This study aimed to analyze the effect of perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, and customer satisfaction on e-wallet continuance intention. This study focused on customers of e-wallets in Indonesia. This research was quantitative research with data collection used the purposive sampling technique. This sampling was conducted by distributing questionnaires to 97 e-wallet customers in Indonesia, with eight questionnaires being rejected due to unmet criteria. Partial Least Square Path Modeling (PLSPM) was used to test the hypotheses. The study found that perceived ease of use had a direct positive influence on continuance intention as well as an indirect positive influence on it through customer satisfaction as an intervening variable, perceived enjoyment did not directly influence continuance intention but had indirect positive influence on it through customer satisfaction as an intervening variable, and customer satisfaction positively influenced continuan­ce intention
Gestational Weight Gain among women with different pre-pregnancy BMI and its relation with Birth Weight of Neonates

Aim: To find out the relationship between gestational weight gain among women with different early pregnancy Body Mass Index and birth weight of neonates. Methods: This is an analytical observational hospital based study. Singleton pregnancy within 10 weeks of gestation were included in the study and they were followed at term. First trimester Body Mass Index was calculated and the women were divided in to underweight, normal weight, overweight and obese according to World Health Organization classification. Total gestational weight gain was calculated and compared according to the American College of Obstetrics guideline. The birth weight of neonate was recorded soon after the delivery and the relation between gestational weight gain and birth weight of the neonate was studied. Results: Total 228 women were analyzed. Most of the women (69%) had normal Body Mass Index with the mean gestational weight gain of 10.59±4.317 kg and the mean birth weight 3.03±0.487 kg. Underweight and normal weight women had less pregnancy weight gain; overweight women had slightly higher weight gain whereas obese women had weight gain as per the recommendation. The birth weight of neonate was higher in overweight and obese women (p=0.004) but without positive correlation. Conclusions: The gestational weight gain is not related to the birth weight of neonates but related to the early pregnancy BMI.
RITUAL, CRAFT, AND ECONOMY IN OHIO HOPEWELL: AN EXAMINATION OF TWO EARTHWORKS ON THE LITTLE MIAMI RIVER

ii Dedication . iv Acknowledgements . v Vita . viii List of Figures . xii List of Tables . xv Chapter 1 : Introducing Ritual, Craft, and Economy in Ohio Hopewell . 1 Summary of Research Questions . 14 Outline of Dissertation . 14 Chapter 2 : Political Economy, Ritual Economy, and the Production of Socially Valued Goods 17 Political Economy . 17 Ritual Economy . 18 Producing Socially Valued Goods . 25 Ritual Economy and Craft Production: Archaeological Implications . 28 Chapter 3 : Hopewell . 32 Eastern Woodlands Culture History: A Brief Review . 32 Hopewell . 43 Hopewell Subsistence . 47 Hopewell Settlement Patterns . 50 Hopewell Ceremonialism . 56 Hopewell Socio-Political Organization and the Question of Complexity . 61