Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Atitudes e motivações em relação ao consumo de alimentos orgânicos em Belo Horizonte - MG

The aim of this study was to characterize the consumer market of organic foods in Belo Horizonte, M.G. , including the socioeconomic profile and consumer's behavior, their perception and knowledge regarding organic food, and also the main motivations and limitations towards the consumption of these products. A direct descriptive and structured research (survey) was carried out with 400 consumers, by using semi-structured questionnaires. Most consumers were female (76.0%), aged over 30 years (90.3%), in a stable relationship (81.3%), degree holders (81.5%), with high household income (over 12 M.S.⁄month) (78.7%). The majority defined organic food as foods without pesticide residues (69.7%). Organic foods were mentioned to contain higher levels of nutrients than conventional foods (82.0%), no genetically modified organisms (75.0%) and no synthetic chemical products (86.0%). The majority was worried about healthy life habits, since 80.5% regularly exercised and 49.2% had already gone on a diet or followed nutritional orientation. All believed in health benefits from consumption of these foods and almost all (98.8%) had already noticed health improvements derived from consumption. Only 16.3% consumed organic food other than fruits and vegetables. Heath concern as well as the higher content of nutrients and more pronounced taste than conventional food were the major motivations for consumption of organic fruit and vegetables. A great part of consumers showed superficial knowledge regarding the issue, evidencing the need for better elucidation about the subject. A repressed demand for these products was observed, since, despite of high interest in organic foods, the high price and low quality limited the consumption of these products in Belo Horizonte.
Influence of Matrix Compounds on the Analysis of Oxidative Hair Dyes by HPLC.

Synopsis Oxidative hair dyeing products consist of a mixture of a broad spectrum of organic compounds including the hair dye's so-called active compounds and the matrix-forming compounds. Forty-seven dye intermediates commonly used in cosmetic formulations have thus been analyzed by RP-HPLC, and their chromatographic characteristics have been recorded. Since the matrix compounds could interfere with the quantitative analysis of the active compounds, eighteen matrix compounds commonly used in cosmetic formulations have been tested for their influence on dye intermediate determination. Since some of them do affect the chromatographic behavior of the dye intermediates, an isolation procedure, for separating matrix components from the dye-forming compounds, consisting of a liquid-liquid extraction by n-heptane, has been set up. In most cases, this procedure is effective for the extraction of the matrix products. Moreover, the dye intermediates are not extracted by n-heptane, and their chromatographic behavior is not altered by the extraction procedure. In summary, this study has shown that a reference method for the analysis of oxidative hair dyes should include a compulsory extraction step before submission of samples to RP-HPLC.
Essential Role of Acidity in the Catalytic Reduction of Nitrogen Monoxide by Methane in the Presence of Oxygen over Palladium-Loaded Zeolites

It has been demonstrated that the protonic acidity is essential for the reduction of nitrogen monoxide by methane over Pd ion-exchanged H-ZSM-5 (Pd/HZ), by the comparison of the reaction with that over Pd ion-exchanged Na-ZSM-5 (Pd/NaZ), having similar dispersion of palladium. It was further shown that the difference between the active Pd/HZ and the inactive Pd/NaZ is present in the reaction between NO2 and CH4.
Age and experience in driving a vehicle and psychomotor skills in the context of automation

Abstract Past research shows that age and driving experience has a significant impact on on-road behavior. Both reaction time, as well as visual-motor coordination and speed of decision making, play an important role with regard to safety. Consequently, research in this area has been carried out for many years. However, there are still very few studies on the impact of these variables on the speed and way of taking control of an automated vehicle. The purpose of the study designed at the Motor Transport Institute was therefore, including but not limited to, verification of the hypothesis concerning the relevance of age and experience to psychomotor skills and its impact on adaptation to automation. The research involved tools for testing psychomotor skills (reaction time, eye-hand coordination) considered in driver psychological tests. The experimental part was carried out with a passenger car simulator, where the driver's behavior was verified under a specific on-road situation, including control takeover. As expected, the analyses proved that age and experience are important factors for both control takeover and way of reaction. Deficits and some elements related to inexperience were found in older and younger drivers, respectively, and those had a significant impact on the analyzed variables.
Coping with COVID-19-induced threats to self

Whereas the COVID-19 pandemic induces in people both uncertainty and angst, the latter may not be a direct consequence of uncertainty as such, but rather of the possible negative outcomes whose subjective certainty increased under the pandemic. From this perspective, we discuss the psychological determinants of people’s reactions to the pandemic and their modes of self-affirmation in response to pandemic-implied threats. Those reactions are guided by value-oriented narratives that may variously drive people’s pro- and anti-social behaviors during the pandemic.
The effects of COVID-19 on virtual working within online groups

Employees may continue to work remotely for a substantial amount of time, even after the end of the pandemic. Our established theories of group processes and intergroup relations can help us understand these new ways of working and online group experiences. However, there are key differences in computer-mediated and face-to-face (FtF) groups. In this essay, I present some of the extant robust theories and findings from computer communication research to understand virtual working within online groups. These perspectives include that group processes develop over a longer period of time as compared to FtF, informal communication is neglected, computer-mediated groups have some advantages over FtF groups, sociomateriality is a useful theoretical lens, and dispersion affects group member cognitions about each other. I use my own lab’s work on entitativity as an example of how moving from FtF to online group research can deepen our understanding of both FtF and online groups. The essay concludes with recommendations for future research.
Analysis of factors of cross-border cooperation in order to increase the competitiveness of small and medium-sized enterprises in Saint-Petersburg

Border regions are considered to be potential "growth points" that have opportunities and conditions for intensive development, including the economic competitiveness of both border regions and their subjects. This point determines the relevance of the topic. The given work is devoted to identifying factors and other key aspects for realizing the cross-border cooperation of SMEs. A survey of SMEs in St. Petersburg was conducted to determine their experience of cooperation and the importance of factors and other key aspects of international cooperation. For this purpose, the following research methods and tools were considered: literature reviews, data collection, questionnaires, data analysis. Through the analysis of the collected data, factors, problems, and barriers have been identified for establishing cross-border cooperation. This article also discusses the impact of the international cooperation of small and medium-sized enterprises on the level of competitiveness of these enterprises. The assessment of competitiveness was carried out based on the dynamic approach and the results of calculations were presented. The comparative analysis of the competitiveness of enterprises to prove the hypothesis was conducted on the example of 23 SMEs in Saint Petersburg for the period 2016--2018. The research confirms the hypothesis about the positive relationship between the international cooperation of enterprises with the level of their competitiveness. In order to identify the impact of sources of competitiveness, a factor analysis of the multiplicative model was conducted. The level of competitiveness is negatively affected by the return on equity index, which is less than one for both groups. For a group of companies with a positive experience, the reason for the decline in the level of competitiveness throughout the period was the decline in the financial stability index. For a group with a negative experience of cooperation, a regular negative factor was a decrease in return on equity index.
Developing Public-Private Partnership Model with Blockchain-Based Crowdfunding Concept for Port City Project

Port-city development is believed as a strategy to increase regional economic growth by improving the welfare of coastal communities, particularly in the archipelagic countries. However, this development needs huge investment to construct both its physical and social infrastructure components. Therefore, the participation of the private sector in the financing aspect is encouraged to improve the project viability and enhance the performance of the capital budget. This research aims to develop an alternative public-private partnership (PPP) model that can attract the interest of both institutional and individual private investors, by proposing financing model that incorporate the crowdfunding method. To achieve its objective, this research adopts both qualitative and quantitative methods conducted in three stages, by firstly carrying out desk study and benchmarking to develop the crowdfunding-based PPP financing scheme, and followed by life-cycle cost (LCC) analysis in the next stage, to examine the financial feasibility of the proposed scheme by taking into account the initial cost, operation & maintenance, and revenue. Lastly, along with an institutional scheme considering the sharing of investment and responsibilities between private companies and individual crowdfunders, this research also formulates the workflow of the transactions conducted in the crowdfunding framework built in the Blockchain platform. The results of this study show that the crowdfunding-based PPP model is feasible to be developed in the investment of landed housing projects of the port-city development, with 15.54% of the internal rate of return obtained from the implementation of the proposed financing mechanism.
Genesis Net: Fine Tuned Dense Net Configuration using Reinforcement Learning

Designing neural networks even in the case of relatively simpler fully connected neural networks / dense networks is a time-consuming process since the architecture design is done manually based on intuition and manual tweaking. In this paper, we present “Genesis Net”, a dense net that starts off with a very basic configuration (“seed configuration”), and subsequently tweaks itself via reinforcement learning (RL) to arrive at an optimal configuration for the task at hand. Genesis Net attained a test error within 0.59% of a similar but bigger documented baseline model. Furthermore, our model was able to achieve this using merely 10.11% of trainable weights that the baseline model used. This significantly smaller network was found using Q-Learning combined with a dynamic action space that allowed for fine tuning the network configuration.
Evaluating the Understandability and Expressiveness of Simulation Executable Models with Professionals: Obtaining perceptions from researchers and practitioners for improving quality of models

Large-scale and complex systems exhibit (i) dynamic structures and behaviors, (ii) several components/systems involved and (iii) multiple interoperability links. Such technologies have exposed limitations and fragilities on traditional software specification languages (such as UML and SySML), since those languages were designed to document single (not multiple interoperating) systems, which can further compromise the quality of the final product. In this context, Executable Models (ExM) technology, such as simulation models, models@runtime and executable UML, match these requirements by supporting engineers with visualization of the systems structures (still at design-time) and the ability to model their behaviors and interactions. However, we currently observe a decrease in the use of models and consequently ExM by software engineering professionals in the academy and industry and we claim that those professionals have not exhibited abilities to use ExM even in simpler scenarios. In this paper, we present the results of an exploratory study on the perceptions of those professionals regarding the use of ExM to solve problems in their current practice. 58 professionals were exposed to situations to solve problems using a specific type of ExM (DEVS simulation models), based on a survey research. Responses were quantitatively and qualitatively analyzed. Results reveal that executable languages still require advances to bring them even closer to the current software engineering practice and towards a larger adoption in the future.
The Evaluation of Problem-Based Learning Model Towards High School Students’ Critical Thinking Skills: A Meta-Analysis Study in Indonesia

ABSTRACT This study aims to see the effectiveness of applying PBL (Problem Based Learning) models in Indonesian High School students’ mathematical critical thinking skills that are based on the series of similar studies. This study uses a meta-analysis method from a number of national scholarly journal articles indexed by Google Scholar, Semantic Scholar, Garuda Portal, DOAJ, ERIC and direct URL from the national journals published between 2012-2019 based on inclusion criteria. The statistical data processing used Comprehensive Meta-Analysis (CMA) V3 software. The results of the study based on the random effect model shows that the combined effect size is 1.201 with large effect criteria. It means that the application of the PBL model significantly has a greater effect on students' mathematical critical thinking skills than the application of conventional models. In addition, there are four study characteristics that are used in the analysis such as; research class, type of research school, year of research and sample size. There were significant differences in the application of the PBL model to students' mathematical critical thinking skills in terms of years of research based on the study characteristics. Meanwhile, from the research class, type of research school and sample size implicate no difference in the effect of applying the PBL model between the study groups. The findings unveil the effectiveness of using the PBL model in mathematical learning that is based on the study characteristics.
Rheology of the Cetyltrimethylammonium Tosilate−Water System. 2. Linear Viscoelastic Regime

In this work, the linear viscoelastic properties of the cetyltrimethylammonium tosilate (CTAT)−water system are examined in detail. This system forms elongated micelles at low and intermediate concentrations, and it yields a hexagonal phase above 27 wt % CTAT at 25 °C. Rheological behavior at low frequencies in a small-amplitude oscillatory shear experiments or at long times in stress relaxation measurements is governed by a single dominant relaxation time, although deviations from the limiting slope of the elastic modulus in the terminal region are observed at high CTAT concentrations. For higher frequencies, however, there is an additional mechanism whose dependence on frequency is analyzed with several rheological models. Analysis of data in terms of the theory of Cates demonstrates that the system consists of flexible micelles in the slow-breaking limit and it exhibits a constant entanglement density along the whole micellar region, even though the average micellar length decreases monotonically with .
Evaluation of Feed Concentration Effects on Salt/Ion Transport through RO/NF Membranes with the Nernst-Planck-Donnan Model

Bulk salt concentration within a membrane channel could vary appreciably for different RO/NF membrane processes, and it even changes along a single membrane channel, which may have an important impact on solute transport through the membrane. However, little research has been conducted on the effects of concentration on transport behaviors. The purpose of this study was to demonstrate a valid method from fundamental theories on membrane transport for predicting the effects of feed salt concentration on salt rejection through RO/NF membranes. The salt transport characteristics under different feed salt concentrations were simulated using the Nernst-Planck-Donnan model. This numerical analysis requires the determination of three key parameters relating to membrane properties; namely, effective membrane thickness, effective membrane pore radius, and effective membrane charge density. The first two properties are independent of bulk salt concentration, whereas the third one could be related to bulk salt conce.
Effects of foam agent on characteristics of thin‐film transistor liquid crystal display waste glass‐metakaolin‐based cellular geopolymer

Thin‐film transistor liquid crystal display (TFT–LCD) waste glass comprises mainly SiO2 and Al2O3, which are suitable raw materials for geopolymer. This study investigates the effects of the amount of foam agents on the properties of waste glass‐based cellular geopolymer. In this investigation, samples underwent a series of tests to determine their quality, including mechanical characterization, compressive strength, flexural strength, fire resistance, thermal conductivity, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy. The experimental results show that the mechanical strength and thermal conductivity decreased with the addition of foam agents, indicating that foam agents can reduce the thermal transfer. The pore volume increased with the amount of increase in foam agent. These results indicated that the amount of foam agent has a more substantial effect than waste glass replacement in geopolymers. © 2013 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 33: 538–550, 2014
Titanium composite PBI-based membranes for high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells. Effect on titanium dioxide amount

The influence of different amounts of micro-sized titanium dioxide (anatase crystalline variety) dispersed into a polybenzimidazole membrane has been studied for its use as an electrolyte in high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells. All of the membranes were cast from a polymer with the same molecular weight. The membranes were physicochemically and electrochemically characterized. From the membranes studied with different amounts of TiO2, the membrane that provided the best properties for its use as an electrolyte was the composite one which contained the lowest amount of filler. The composite membrane with 2 weight percent of the filler absorbed larger (absorbed acid: 2.42 gacid gmembrane−1) and leached lower (remaining acid: 0.78 gacid gmembrane−1) amounts of acid than the other composite and standard one. Because it has the largest acid and water absorption capability, the 2% TiO2-PBI showed also the highest ionic conductivity (0.043 S cm−1), measured out of the fuel cell. Fuel cell measurements and also stability tests (> 140 h) were made for the composite membrane with 2% of the filler and the results were compared with a standard polybenzimidazole fuel cell. The TiO2–PBI composite membrane showed the best performance and achieved a power density of 450 mW cm−1 at 175 °C. Moreover, the composite also showed the best stability under our operation conditions. Thus, the slope of the increase in the ohmic resistance of the composite membrane was 0.009 mΩ cm2 h−1 and the polarization resistance was 1.17 mΩ cm2 h−1 which was two times lower than that of the standard membrane. The benefit of inorganic filler introduction when the fuel cell operates at high temperature has been highlighted.
Flavors and Fragrances

The article contains sections titled: 1. Introduction 1.1. The Chemical Senses 1.2. Definition 1.3. History 1.4. Odor Descriptors, Odor Thresholds, Odor Value 1.4. 1. Qualitative Measurements 1.4. 2. Quantitative Measurements 1.4. 2.1. Odor Threshold 1.4. 2.2. Odor Value 1.5. Regulations and Labeling Requirements 1.5.1. Flavors 1.5.2. Fragrances 2. Single Fragrance and Flavor Compounds 2.1. Aliphatic Compounds 2.1.1. Hydrocarbons 2.1.2. Alcohols 2.1.3. Aldehydes and Acetals 2.1.4. Ketones 2.1.5. Acids and Esters 2.1. 6. Miscellaneous Compounds 2.2. Acyclic Terpenes 2.2.1. Hydrocarbons 2.2.2. Alcohols 2.2.3. Aldehydes and Acetals 2.2.4. Ketones 2.2.5. Acids and Esters 2.2.5.1. Geranyl and Neryl Esters 2.2.5.2. Linalyl and Lavandulyl Esters 2.2.5.3. Citronellyl Esters 2.2.6. Miscellaneous Compounds 2.3. Cyclic Terpenes 2.3.1. Hydrocarbons 2.3.2. Alcohols and Ethers 2.3.3. Aldehydes and Ketones 2.3. 4. Esters 2.3. 5. Miscellaneous Compounds 2.4. Other Cycloaliphatic Compounds 2.4. 1. Alcohols 2.4. 2. Aldehydes 2.4. 3. Ketones 2.4. 4. Esters 2.5. Aromatic Compounds 2.5.1. Hydrocarbons 2.5.2. Alcohols and Ethers 2.5.3. Aldehydes and Acetals 2.5. 4. Ketones 2.5. 5. Esters of Araliphatic Alcohols and Aliphatic Acids 2.5. 6. Aromatic Acids 2.5. 7. Esters Derived from Aromatic and Araliphatic Acids 2.5. 7.1. Benzoates 2.5. 7.2. Phenyl acetates 2.5. 7.3. Cinnamates 2.5. 8. Miscellaneous Compounds 2.6. Phenols and Phenol Derivatives 2.6. 1. Phenols, Phenyl Esters, and Phenyl Ethers 2.6. 2. Phenol Alcohols and their Esters 2.6. 3. Phenol Aldehydes 2.6. 4. Phenol Ketones 2.6. 5. Phenol Carboxylates 2.7. O- and O, S-Heterocycles 2.7.1. Cyclic Ethers 2.7.2. Lactones 2.7.3. Glycidates 2.7. 4. Miscellaneous Compounds 2.8. N- and N, S-Heterocycles 3. Natural Raw Materials in the Flavor and Fragrance Industry 3.1. Introduction 3.2. Isolation of Natural Fragrance and Flavor Concentrates 3.2.1. Essential Oils 3.2.2. Extracts 3.3. Survey of Natural Raw Materials 4. Quality Control 5. Economic Aspects 6. Toxicology and Environmental Aspects
Task Planner for Robotic Disassembly of Electric Vehicle Battery Pack

The rapidly growing deployment of Electric Vehicles (EV) put strong demands on the development of Lithium-Ion Batteries (LIBs) but also into its dismantling process, a necessary step for circular economy. The aim of this study is therefore to develop an autonomous task planner for the dismantling of EV Lithium-Ion Battery pack to a module level through the design and implementation of a computer vision system. This research contributes to moving closer towards fully automated EV battery robotic dismantling, an inevitable step for a sustainable world transition to an electric economy. For the proposed task planner the main functions consist in identifying LIB components and their locations, in creating a feasible dismantling plan, and lastly in moving the robot to the detected dismantling positions. Results show that the proposed method has measurement errors lower than 5 mm. In addition, the system is able to perform all the steps in the order and with a total average time of 34 s. The computer vision, robotics and battery disassembly have been successfully unified, resulting in a designed and tested task planner well suited for product with large variations and uncertainties.