Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
ELECTRICAL ENERGY STORAGE SYSTEMS FOR FUTURE POWER SYSTEMS APPLICATIONS BY MODELING

All over the world power systems are faced with great challenges because of the rapidly increasing integration of renewable energy sources. Electrical energy storage systems (ESS) can help to stabilize the output from volatile and intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind and solar energy. Basically they can be installed close to large wind farms or photovoltaic parks and provide many advantages for future integrated power systems. In this paper we study the impact of ESS on electrical power systems on a larger scale. Therefore we describe the implementation of two different charging strategies for ESS for an already developed simulation model for the German electrical power system and investigate different scenarios with respect to the installed capacities of renewable energy sources and the aggregated capacity of ESS. As a result different output parameters such as the electricity generation mix and CO2 emissions can be investigated. The simulation results show how ESS contribute to a) the integration of electrical power generated by renewable energy sources and b) the reduction of electricity imports and exports.
CREDIT RATIONING AND SME DEVELOPMENT IN BOTSWANA : IMPLICATIONS FOR ECONOMIC DIVERSIFICATION

Economic diversification is a key policy goal for the Government of Botswana. SMEs offer a feasible option towards the actualisation of this goal. The expansion of SMEs in Botswana however is constrained by lack of access to bank credit. This constrained access to credit is argued in the literature to be due to the credit rationing behaviour of banks emanating from asymmetric information in credit markets. Constrained access to credit stifles the growth potential of this vibrant sector which is increasingly generating employment opportunities especially for women (CSO, 2007). This study therefore investigated the factors that influence the credit rationing behaviour of banks towards SMEs using 2007 Informal Sector Survey data collected by Central Statistics Office and supplemented by our own survey of SMEs from the major cities/towns in Botswana on the demand side, and key informant discussions with the banks on the supply side. Heckman Probit Model with sample selection was used to estimate the determinants of the probability of SMEs being credit rationed by banks. The study findings suggest that the experience of SMEs reduces their probability of being credit rationed by banks. From the bank perspective the experience of SMEs is determined from their ability to keep proper financial statements, the performance of their bank accounts with the banks, and their ability to make profits. This calls for capacity building of SMEs in areas of business management (including financial record keeping) if they are to be rated as credit worthy borrowers by the banks. From the SMEs perspective, there is need for banks to improve their efficiency in terms of reduction of loan processing time and cost of borrowing (i.e. interest rate). This will improve access to bank credit by the SMEs and promote their growth thereby stimulating economic diversification, employment creation opportunities, increase household incomes, and contributing to poverty reduction in line with Botswana’s Vision 2016.
ISONETRY : GEOMETRY OF CRITICAL INITIALIZATIONS AND TRAINING

Recent work on critical initializations of deep neural networks has shown that by constraining the spectrum of input-output Jacobians allows for fast training of very deep networks without skip connections. The current understanding of this class of initializations is limited with respect to classical notions from optimization. In particular, the connections between Jacobian eigenvalues and curvature of the parameter space are unknown. Similarly, there is no firm understanding of the effects of maintaining orthogonality during training. With this work we complement the existing understanding of critical initializations and show that the curvature is proportional to the maximum singular value of the Jacobian. Furthermore we show that optimization under orthogonality constraints ameliorates the dependence on choice of initial parameters, but is not strictly necessary.
Linking Marine Plankton Ecosystems and Climate: A New Modeling Approach to the Warm Early Eocene Climate

The fossil record reveals large changes in marine plankton ecosystems linked with both environmental and ecological change across the Cenozoic. An understanding of the drivers of these changes is key to understanding the marine carbon cycle. The response of plankton ecosystems in past warm climates also provides a key analogue for current climate change. While models are employed to quantify interactions between the environment and the biota, current Earth system models strongly encode our understanding of modern marine ecosystems. By contrast, trait‐based models aim to describe the marine plankton ecosystem in terms of fundamental ecological and physiological rules that are less likely to change through time. This provides a unique opportunity to assess the interactions between marine ecosystem and paleoclimate. For the first time, we apply a size‐structured trait‐based plankton ecosystem model embedded in the Earth system model of intermediate complexity, cGENIE, to model plankton communities for the warm climate of the early Eocene. Compared to modern, we find the warm climate is associated with an increase in the mean cell size of plankton communities and export production, particularly in the southern high latitudes, along with lower total phytoplankton biomass. Paleogeography has an important role in regulating the effect of ecosystem structure via changes in ocean circulation and nutrient cycling. Warmer temperatures also drive changes due to enhanced zooplankton grazing. An integration of the fossil record with plankton ecosystem models will provide a powerful tool to assess the impacts of warm climates on marine systems.
Can a humanoid robot continue to draw attention in an office environment?

This study focuses on the use of humanoid robots in office environments, and investigates whether a robot can maintain the attention of passersby after initiation of face-to-face contact. Drawing attention can be considered as a first step in improving the continuity of use of robots; such continuity is one factor in validating their social acceptance, which must be considered when disseminating robots in offices. In this study, we assume that the robot approaches and greets users in order to make the users aware of its presence and encourage them to use it. In particular, the robots used in this study convey various greetings along with three nonverbal indicators (no motion, random motion, and face-to-face contact) when a passerby at the office is close to the robot. For a one-week period, we validated the social acceptance of the robot by examining how these robot motions influenced the rate and continuity of a passerby's attention. The results revealed that face-to-face contact can draw a high degree of attention, and that the presence of the robot affects the continuity with which attention is drawn. Finally, the paper discusses implications for future robot design, in terms of drawing and maintaining high rates of attention from users. GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT
Trapping in irradiated p-onn silicon sensors at fluences anticipated at the HL-LHC outer tracker Tracker group of the CMS Collaboration

The degradation of signal in silicon sensors is studied under conditions expected at the CERN High-Luminosity LHC. 200 μm thick n-type silicon sensors are irradiated with protons of different energies to fluences of up to 3 · 1015 neq/cm2. Pulsed red laser light with a wavelength of 672 nm is used to generate electron-hole pairs in the sensors. The induced signals are used to determine the charge collection efficiencies separately for electrons and holes drifting through the sensor. The effective trapping rates are extracted by comparing the results to simulation. The electric field is simulated using Synopsys device simulation assuming two effective defects. The generation and drift of charge carriers are simulated in an independent simulation based on PixelAV. The effective trapping rates are determined from the measured charge collection efficiencies and the simulated and measured time-resolved current pulses are compared. The effective trapping rates determined for both electrons and holes are about 50% smaller than those obtained using standard extrapolations of studies at low fluences and suggests an improved tracker performance over initial expectations.
Genetic variation in Italian wild cherry (Prunus avium L.) as characterized by nSSR markers

The main aim of our research was to describe the level and distribution of genetic variability of wild cherry (Prunus avium L.) in Italy, using eight nuclear microsatellite markers. The sampled plants were grouped in 11 internally homogeneous breeding zones, defined according to their ecological and vegetational conditions. The mean observed heterozygosity (Ho) was 0.573, and the expected (He) 0.698. Significant departures from Hardy‐Weinberg equilibrium at each locus were found for all breeding zones (P , 0.01). The mean fixation index, calculated taking into account the estimated null allele frequencies, was 0.075, showing a slight excess of homozygotes. FST (departure of genotype frequencies within populations from Hardy‐Weinberg expectations, commonly used as an estimator of genetic differentiation among populations) showed a mean value of 0.046, indicating a slight, although significant, differentiation among breeding zones. However, in general, it was not possible to observe a structuring linked to the geographical location of the breeding zones. The results of the study contribute to a better understanding of our knowledge of the wild cherry genetic variation in Italy, thus making for more efficient programmes aimed at the preservation of biodiversity and for more rational planning of the management of reproductive material. Since our results do not show a clear structuring of genetic variability within the Italian diffusion area of wild cherry, it is not possible to draw any indications on regions of provenance delimitation based only on genetic data, and the identification of the latter should be based mainly on ecological and vegetational features.
Mercury, Arsenic and Lead Removal by Air Gap Membrane Distillation: Experimental Study

Synthetic industrial wastewater samples containing mercury (Hg), arsenic (As), and lead (Pb) ions in various concentrations were prepared and treated by air gap membrane distillation (AGMD), a promising method for heavy metals removal. Three different membrane pore sizes (0.2, 0.45, and 1 μm) which are commercially available (TF200, TF450, and TF1000) were tested to assess their effectiveness in combination with various heavy metal concentrations and operating parameters (flow rate 1–5 L/min, feed temperature 40–70 °C, and pH 2–11). The results indicated that a high removal efficiency of the heavy metals was achieved by AGMD. TF200 and TF450 showed excellent membrane removal efficiency, which was above 96% for heavy metal ions in a wide range of concentrations. In addition, there was no significant influence of the pH value on the metal removal efficiency. Energy consumption was monitored at different membrane pore sizes and was found to be almost independent of membrane pore size and metal type.
Informed Trading Reactions to New Private Information: Evidence from Nonpublic Merger Negotiations

Theory provides competing predictions on whether informed investors immediately trade on newly generated private information. We address this question using Securities and Exchange Commission–mandated disclosures to identify the dates when new private information about target or acquiring firm value is created. We find that informed investors immediately trade on new private information in both the stock and options markets. Next, we investigate which factors drive the speed of these investors’ trading reactions to newly generated private information. We show that cross-sectional variation in the speed of their trading reactions can be explained by the number of privately informed investors, institutional ownership, the expected profits from informed trading and associated risk of attracting the attention of enforcement agencies, and the existence of public information about the acquisition deal. This paper was accepted by David Simchi-Levi, finance.
Contributions of Dopamine D2 and D3 Receptors to Pavlovian Conditioned Approach Behaviors

Dopamine signaling facilitates the attribution of incentive salience, or incentive motivational value, to both foodand drug-associated cues. Understanding the neurobiological mechanisms by which incentive salience is attributed to reward cues may contribute to the development of successful treatments for addiction and related disorders. Previous work has shown that dopamine facilitates the development of a sign-tracking, but not a goal-tracking response. However, it is not yet known which receptors are critical for allowing dopamine to encode the incentive motivational properties of reward cues. Here I studied the impact of different pharmacological agents targeting dopamine D2 and D3 receptors on the expression of signand goal-tracking behaviors. Following Pavlovian conditioned approach training rats were classified as signor goal-trackers. Rats were then treated with the D2/D3 agonist 7-OH-DPAT (0.01-0.32 mg/kg), the D2/D3 antagonist raclopride (0.1 mg/kg), or the selective D3 antagonist SB-277011A (6-24 mg/kg). The effects of these agents on the expression of signand goal-tracking conditioned responses were examined. Treatment with the D2/D3 dopamine receptor agonist 7OH-DPAT or antagonist raclopride specifically attenuated the performance of the previously acquired conditioned response. Treatment with SB-277011A did not impact the expression of either the signor goal-tracking conditioned response. Although dopamine has been shown to encode the incentive motivational properties of reward cues, the present findings suggest that signaling at the dopamine D2 receptor may be critical for both the incentive and predictive properties of reward cues. That is, both agonism and antagonism at the dopamine D2 receptor affected the expression of both signand goal-tracking behaviors.
The Macroeconomic Shock with the Highest Price of Risk

I propose a new method of constructing a macroeconomic shock based on its ability to explain the cross-section of asset returns. The only identifying assumption is that this λ-shock demands the highest risk price per unit of exposure, or equivalently, minimises the associated sum of squared pricing errors, when pricing a given asset portfolio. When applying the method to the stock portfolios studied by Fama-French, a robust economic feature of the λ-shock is the delayed effect on aggregate quantities such as output and consumption and a sharp impact on the short-term interest rate and the term spread. The estimated λ-shock bears strong resemblance both with monetary policy shocks and with technology news shocks studied by the macroeconomic literature.
Generation and spectroscopic signatures of a fractional quantum Hall liquid of photons in an incoherently pumped optical cavity

We theoretically investigate a driven-dissipative model of strongly interacting photons in a nonlinear optical cavity in the presence of a synthetic magnetic field. We show the possibility of using a frequency-dependent incoherent pump to create a strongly-correlated $\nu = 1/2$ bosonic Laughlin state of light: thanks to the incompressibility of the Laughlin state, fluctuations in the total particle number and excitation of edge modes can be tamed by imposing a suitable external potential profile for photons. We further propose angular momentum-selective spectroscopy of the emitted light as a tool to obtain unambiguous signatures of the microscopic physics of the quantum Hall liquid of light.
Revisiting Quick Big Five Personality Test: Testing Measurement Invariance across Gender

Personality is a subject that has been studied because of the social, economic, individual, and educational implications of personality. The widely used model for measuring personality is the Five-Factor Model (FFM). The robustness of the factor structure of the FFM of personality has been provided among cultures and diverse samples. The measurement tools are used to identify differences between individuals or groups. However, in order to make meaningful comparisons, it is necessary to provide the measurement equivalence among the comparison groups. Thus the current study aimed to test the measurement invariance of the Quick Big Five (QBF) items that are used in many disciplines in Turkey. For this purpose, the QBF items were investigated in terms of configural, metric, scalar and strict invariance across gender. In this research, 1114 university students aged between 17-32 years were included in the sample. Firstly, several CFAs were performed for the whole sample and then both men and women separately. The findings of the CFA revealed that the QBF model fit the data. In addition, each of the 30 items of the scale was embedded into a related latent factor in both gender groups. Secondly, sequential multiple group CFA tests to examine measurement invariance were conducted. According to the findings, full configural, partial metric and scalar invariance were fulfilled across gender. However, strict invariance could not be achieved. Imaginative and inquisitive under the openness factor were determined to cause measurement non-invariance. In conclusion, latent mean comparisons can be made by excluding these two items across gender.
Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma: Genomic Heterogeneity Between Eastern and Western Patients

PURPOSE Intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (IHCCA), a global health problem, is increasing in incidence and has differing etiologies worldwide. Next-generation sequencing (NGS) is rapidly being incorporated into the clinical management of biliary cancers. IHCCA is enriched with actionable mutations, and there are several promising targeted therapies under development. NGS data from Asia, where IHCCA is most prevalent, are limited. METHODS Comprehensive genomic profiling of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tumor tissue from 164 Asian and 283 Western patients with IHCCA was performed using NGS. We measured the distribution of DNA repair genetic aberrations (GAs) in IHCCA, along with actionable mutations. Also, we evaluated the association between DNA repair GAs and tumor mutation burden (TMB). Based on the TMB status, patients were distinguished into 3 levels: low (< 6 mut/Mb), intermediate (6-10 mut/Mb), and high (TMB-H; ≥ 10 mut/Mb). RESULTS Seventy-two percent of Asian patients had ≥ 1 actionable GA, with a significantly higher frequency in KMT2C, BRCA1/2, and DDR2 compared with Western patients (P = .02, .003, and .003, respectively); 60.9% of Western patients had ≥ 1 actionable GA and higher frequency of CDKN2A/B and IDH1/2 GAs (P = .0004 and < .001, respectively). GAs in nuclear factor kappa B pathway regulators and DNA repair genes occurred more frequently in Asian patients (P = .006 and .001, respectively). There was a higher frequency of TMB-H in Asian compared with the Western cohort (12.2% v 5.9%; P = .07). CONCLUSION A higher burden of DNA repair mutations and frequency of patients with TMB-H in the Asian IHCCA cohort compared with the Western patients suggests a potential role for DNA repair and immune checkpoint inhibitors in the Asian population. Future clinical trials should account for this genetic heterogeneity.
A study on the smear conversion time and its associated factors in sputum positive Category I Tuberculosis DOTS cases in District Rohtak , Haryana

Tuberculosis still remains one of the major public health problems in the world. There is currently limited data available from developing countries like India on the time required for sputum smear conversion in patients who take uninterrupted DOTS. The present study was undertaken to determine the time to smear conversion in Category I DOTS patients receiving uninterrupted therapy and to determine factors that are associated with smear conversion. The NSP TB cases, which were to start their Category I treatment regimen at District Tuberculosis Centre, DOTS Centre, were recruited and an informed written consent was taken. After enrolment, various parameters were studied (recorded) on a predesigned, pre-tested, semi-structured schedule. After recording results of pre-treatment sputum specimen, recruited subjects were followed at weekly interval. Two sputum specimens were collected on each weekly follow-up. On weekly visit, the subjects were instructed to get the early morning sputum sample and a spot sputum sample was taken at the time of visit. Both the samples were examined thereafter. Weekly follow-up were continued for a maximum of 20 weeks of treatment or until the case becomes sputum smear negative, whichever was earlier. A total of 101 subjects were recruited in the study but 6 subjects could not be followed up for till their smear conversion. The median duration of smear conversion was found to be 4 weeks i.e. 28 days. Cavitatory and bilateral lesions on CXR, consumption of tobacco, pretreatment bacterial load and BMI were independent factors associated with smear conversion.
Reading the trophy: exploring the display of dead animals in hunting magazines

Photographs of trophy animals in 14 popular hunting magazines were analysed to explore the visual representations of dead animal bodies. We found multifaceted messages about the relationships between humans and other animals grounded in narratives of gender, race and embodiment. The visual representations of dead animal bodies are embedded in the taken-for-granted stories of love and affection for nature and wildlife that frame the contemporary hunting agenda, including the assumption that trophy displays memorialize the beauty of nature and natural animals. Disentangling ourselves from that dominant notion of what it means to display dead trophy animals was revelatory. Instead of love and respect for nature and wildlife, we found extreme objectification and marginalization of animal bodies. While we observed some elaborate displays of reassembled and carefully positioned dead bodies to appear as if still alive, a number of trophy exhibits hid the animal body behind or beneath weapons and other hunting equipment. The vast majority of the hunters in the images were white males, and when women or men of colour were included in the photographs their representations were usually consistent with gender and race stereotypes. Of these race/gender stereotypes the most interesting (and most symbolic of the patriarchal nature of the hunting discourse) was that neither women nor men of colour ever held a weapon when they appeared in photographs with white men. Hunting was not about getting enough vitamin B 12. (Donna Haraway, Primate Visions 1989:217)