Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Survey-based comparison of performance and change in performance of firms using traditional manufacturing, JIT and TOC

In recent decades, companies have adopted management philosophies such as Just-In-Time (JIT) and Theory of Constraints (TOC) in an effort to improve productivity and, thus, financial performance. This paper describes the use of a comprehensive set of criteria to examine empirically changes in business unit performance, over 3 years, as reported by firms adopting these management philosophies as well as by those using a traditional manufacturing approach. We compare the performance and the change in performance of companies reporting TOC adoption, those reporting JIT adoption, those reporting to have adopted both, and those reporting to have adopted neither (traditional manufacturing). Results indicate that the greatest performance and improvement in performance accrued to adopters of TOC. JIT did not have superior performance or superior change in performance when compared with traditional manufacturing. Change in performance for firms using JIT and TOC simultaneously was negative and trailed all others, though not to a significant degree (except when compared with TOC).
Rare diseases and mental health in the UK - a quantitative survey and multi-stakeholder workshop

Background Rare disease patients and carers report significant impacts on mental health but this has not been extensively studied. We explored the experiences of UK-based individuals through an online survey, and offer recommendations for policy and practice developed with a multi-stakeholder workshop. Results In total 1,355 patients and 571 carers responded to the survey.Due to their rare condition, the majority of respondents had felt worried/anxious (95%); stressed (93%); low/depressed (90%); emotionally exhausted (88%). Thirty-six percent of patients and 19% of carers had had suicidal thoughts.Challenges that are particular to rare conditions and which negatively affect mental health included limited knowledge of the condition amongst healthcare professionals (88%), not being believed or taken seriously by healthcare professionals (80%), and lack of available information about the condition (76%). Only 23% of respondents felt healthcare professionals considered mental health as equally important as physical health. Almost half of patients (46%) and carers (48%) reported never having been asked about their mental health, or that of the person they care for, by healthcare professionals.Forty-six percent of respondents had received professional psychological support; the most common reason for not having accessed professional psychological support was that it had not been suggested (41%). Fifty-nine percent of respondents had accessed sources of additional emotional support, such as patient groups, with the majority (75%) having found this support themselves. With input from our multi-stakeholder workshop we developed recommendations for healthcare professionals to be supported to effectively and sensitively recognise and address patients’ and carers’ mental health needs; and for service level coordination of care to integrate professional psychological support with rare disease services.Conclusions Living with a rare disease substantially impacts mental health. Many of the drivers of poor mental health reflect issues specific to managing rare conditions. To meet existing UK government commitments, there should be a focus on empowering healthcare professionals who treat rare disease patients and on integration of mental health support with rare disease services.
The asymmetric effect of online social networking attribute‐level performance

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the asymmetric effect of negative and positive attribute‐level performance (i.e. effort expectancy, performance expectancy, social influence, facilitating conditions, flow experience, and satisfaction) of online social networking (OSN) on behavioral intention.Design/methodology/approach – An investigation of behavioral intention in OSN was conducted, with a total of 482 effective questionnaires collected. The psychometric properties of the measures were investigated and a dummy‐variable regression model was applied to estimate the regression coefficients.Findings – The results confirm that the importance of asymmetrical effect is not equivalent for different attributes. Negative performance on performance expectancy, effort expectancy, flow experience, and satisfaction had a larger effect on behavioral intention than positive performance. In contrast, positive performance on social influence and facilitating conditions had a larger effect on behavioral int.
Tax Compliance and Uncompliance Entity: A Comparative Study of Investor Reaction

As the theory of signals that companies will always give a positive signal so investors are interested, but what about the tax policy taken by the company whether investors react? This research was conducted to determine investor reaction to company policies to comply with tax provisions or not comply with taxation provisions. With regression and comparative analysis, using secondary data from manufacturing companies in Indonesia in 2013-2017, it is known that investors react more significantly to corporate tax non-compliance policies compared to company policies to comply. However, with a positive reaction on tax non-compliance and negative reaction on corporate tax compliance, it indicates that investors in Indonesia are more concerned with the company's short-term performance in the form of current profits compared to long-term performance in the form of future profits which are likely to be affected by tax penalties arising from tax uncompliance.
Round Robin Calculations of Collapse Loads—A Torispherical Pressure Vessel Head With a Conical Transition

Round robin calculations of collapse loads for a pressure vessel were made by sixteen teams in Japan. The model is composed of a cylinder and a trispherical head with a conical transition. The structure is an example in which the stress classifications specified in the ASME Code are not strictly applicable. The calculations were performed to clarify the issue of the evaluation procedure using the limit analysis method specified in the ASME Code, Sec. 3, and to check the sensitivity of calculation models and programs. It is found that the stress in the knuckle region has certain characteristics of secondary stress, yet still dominates the collapse of the vessel. Using the limit analysis to prove the validity of stress classifications is recommendable. The sensitivity of the calculation methods is not so significant. Therefore, it is concluded that the limit analysis can be used as a standard procedure in regulations.
A disaster evacuation network model for transporting multiple priority evacuees

There is an increasing number of natural disasters occurring worldwide, particularly in populated areas. These events affect a large number of people, causing injuries and fatalities. Providing rapid medical treatment is of utmost importance in such circumstances. The problem of transporting patients to medical facilities has been studied to only a small extent. One of the challenges is to find a strategy that can simultaneously maximize the number of survivors and minimize the total evacuation cost under a given set of resource and geographic constraints. We propose a mathematical optimization model called Triage–Assignment–Transportation (TAT) model that decides on the tactical routing assignment of several classes of evacuation vehicles between staging areas and shelters in the nearby area. The model takes into account the level of injury to the evacuees, the capacities of vehicles, and available resources at each shelter. TAT is a mixed-integer linear programming and minimum-cost flow model. Comprehensive computational experiments are performed to examine the applicability of the TAT model. TAT can offer valuable insights for decision-makers about the number of staging areas, evacuation vehicles, and medical resources that are required to complete a large-scale evacuation based on the estimated number of evacuees.
Thermal hydraulic analysis of the Oregon State TRIGA Reactor using RELAP5-3D

Thermal hydraulic analyses have being conducted at Oregon State University (OSU) in support of the conversion of the OSU TRIGA reactor (OSTR) core from high-enriched uranium (HEU) to low-enriched uranium (LEU) fuel as part of the Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors program. The goals of the thermal hydraulic analyses were to calculate natural circulation flow rates, coolant temperatures and fuel temperatures as a function of core power for both the HEU and LEU cores; calculate peak values of fuel temperature, cladding temperature, surface heat flux as well as departure from nuclear boiling ratio (DNBR) for steady state and pulse operation; and perform accident analyses for the accident scenarios identified in the OSTR safety analysis report. RELAP5-3D Version 2.4. 2 was implemented to develop a model for the thermal hydraulic study. The OSTR core conversion is planned to take place in late 2008. (author)
Validation and Forecasts in Models Estimated from Multiday Travel Survey

Multiday travel surveys (also known as panel data) have recently assumed high relevance in travel behavior analysis and activity-based modeling. Basically two types of multiday data have been collected: cross-sectional data repeated at separate points in time and data gathered over a continuous period of time. So far, the studies using panel data have focused on the estimation of demand models; little is known about the application and validation of models estimated on repeated measurements. Even the definition of the holdout sample is not obvious in panel data sets. This paper studies issues related to model validation and forecasting of continuous data sets. With both simulated and real data, empirical evidence is provided on the effects that different patterns of correlation have on model forecast and policy analysis. Results show that the way holdout samples are extracted affects the validation results and that the best results are obtained when a percentage of individuals with all of their observations are used. The logit model in the presence of taste heterogeneity could produce biased modal shifts, while failing to account for correlation across observations, did not seem to produce relevant effects on policy analysis. The real case study, estimated by using a 6-week travel diary (MobiDrive), confirms only in part the analysis on simulated data. Results also confirm that in panel data, a model with a better fit might provide a worse validation and forecast.
Shear Diaphragm Bracing of Beams. II: Design Requirements

Light gauge metal decking is commonly used in the building and bridge industries for concrete formwork. In addition to supporting the wet concrete, the metal forms also improve the lateral-torsional buckling capacity of the beams or girders they are fastened to since they behave as a shear diaphragm and restrain the warping deformation of the top flange. The design requirements for shear diaphragm bracing are not well established. This is the second part of a two-part paper. The first part of the paper focused on the general stability bracing behavior for shear diaphragms connected to the top flanges of adjacent beams or girders. This part of the paper outlines the design requirements for shear diaphragm bracing and focuses on both the stiffness and strength requirements for beam stability. Design expressions are presented for the stiffness and strength requirements as well as a model that can be used to estimate the forces in the fasteners that connect the diaphragms to the top flanges of the beams. An example is presented at the end of the paper demonstrating the use of the design expressions.
Scheduling short-term hydrothermal generation using evolutionary programming techniques

The authors presents a novel evolutionary programming (EP) based algorithm for the short-term hydrothermal scheduling problem. To more realistically represent the relationship between the generation and amount of water discharge for hydroaggregates, the generation models of the hydro plants as well as thermal plants are often expressed as nonlinear and nonsmooth curves with prohibited areas. The advantage of the proposed algorithm is that it is capable of determining the global or near global optimal solutions to such an optimisation problem with multiple local minima. The developed algorithm is illustrated and tested on two model systems. The test results are compared with those obtained using gradient search, simulated annealing and genetic algorithm methods. Numerical results show that the proposed EP-based algorithm can provide accurate solutions within a reasonable time.
Thermal Performance of Danish Solar Combi Systems in Practice and in Theory

An overview of measured thermal performances of Danish solar combi systems in practice is given. The thermal performance varies greatly from system to system. Measured and calculated thermal performances of different solar combi systems are compared and the main reasons for the different thermal performances are given. Further, a parametric study on two solar combi system types is performed. Based on the investigation it can be concluded that the thermal performance first of all is influenced by the space heating consumption during the summer period and that the systems in practice perform as theoretically expected.
Parametric Investigation of the Steady-State Response of a Mechanical Seal With Two Flexibly Mounted Rotors

A parametric analysis is performed to investigate the steady-state dynamic response ofa mechanical seal with two flexibly mounted rotors. The effect of changing various inertia, support, and fluid film properties is examined. Short rotors are shown to benefit from gyroscopic aligning moments and to exhibit their maximum steady-state misalignment when one of the shaft speeds is zero. Long rotors experience misaligning gyroscopic moments, but if only one of the two rotors is long then aligning moments from the short rotor can be transmitted through the fluid and counteract the detrimental gyroscopic effect in the long rotor. In this case rotors which corotate are shown to have a higher steady-state misalignment than those which counterrotate because of the reduction of the hydrodynamic moments, thus leading to increased leakage and a higher probability of face contact.
ANALYZING BIDDING STATISTICS TO PREDICT COMPLETED PROJECT COST

Ratios were constructed relating the second lowest bid, mean bid, median bid, maximum bid to the low bid for highway construction projects in Texas to study if there are useful patterns in project bids that are indicators of the project completion cost. It was found that the value of the ratios tend to be larger for projects where the completed cost deviates significantly from the original low bid. Larger ratio values were found for projects that were completed with a greater than 20% cost increase and for projects that were completed with a reduction in cost from the original bid amount of 10% or more. Regression and neural network models were developed to predict the completed cost of Texas highway projects using the bidding ratio data. The input data used were transformed using the natural logarithm. Various combinations of the calculated ratios, as well as the project low bid were used as input to the models. The models tested produced predictions of varying accuracy. The models produced predictions that varied between having 41,02% and 54.01% of their test cases within 5% of the actual completed project cost. The model with the highest percentage of closely predicted cases was a regression model using the mean bid ratio, the coefficient of variation, and the low bid as inputs.
CO2 laser cutting: analytical dependence of the roughness of the cut edge on the experimental parameters and process monitoring

Over the last few years laser cutting has been widely introduced in industrial production lines, mainly due to the high processing speeds. In the present work a fundamental aspect of the cutting process of metals has been considered: the formation of periodic striations on the cut edge that greatly affects the quality of the treated samples. Therefore this paper is devoted to the study of the roughness of the cut surfaces with a particular attention to the dependence of this parameters on the working conditions. For a better understanding of the variables involved in the process, a comparison of the experimental data with the results of an analytical model has been performed. Furthermore a real time monitoring of the infrared emission coming from the interaction zone has been carried out by means of an electrooptic device properly developed for the measurements of the local temperature. A correlation between these data and the roughness measurements has been found.
Spatial Trend and Management of Road Traffic Accident Fatalities in Nigeria

Nigeria has an unenviable record of road accident fatalities when statistics of road traffic accident across the globe are contrasted. The magnitude of road traffic accident in Nigeria has been known to vary significantly among the various traffic corridors located in all the states of the federation. The occurrence of accident is somewhat influenced by the level of economic and social development at the state level. This paper attempt to provide an insight to the spatial and geographical dimension of Road Traffic Accident in Nigeria over time. Adequate attempt has been made to examine the relative impact of the Federal Road Safety Commission in its effort to achieving its mandate. The methodology of study involved the ranking of the states of the federation and federal capital territory using available records of road accident fatalities. This is with a view to provide insight to the need for variation in the application of accidents prevention strategies across the states of the federation. The paper advocated for the application of accident prevention strategies with due consideration of the uniqueness of the distinctive spatial attributes of each states. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015. v4n1p25
Factors that Influence Canadian Generalist and Physical Education Specialist Elementary School Teachers’ Practices in Physical Education: A Qualitative Study

Interviews were conducted with 16 elementary school teachers across Canada (eight generalists and eight physical education [PE] specialists) to explore their experiences when instructing PE. Questions were phrased to encourage exploration of the perspectives of generalists and specialists, with a particular focus on teaching philosophy, barriers faced while instructing PE, facilitators and resources that enhance PE instruction, and the teachers’ self-efficacy when teaching PE. Generalists noted perceived lack of time, inadequate facilities and equipment, insufficient training, lack of knowledge, and low self-efficacy as barriers. Conversely, specialists noted that their advanced training, professional development opportunities, high self-efficacy, and technology use positively supported their teaching practices. Keywords: physical education, elementary school, generalist, specialist, physical activity
Machining Dynamics Involving Whirling Part I: Model Development and Validation

A complex machining model describing the coupled tool—workpiece dynamics subject to nonlinear regenerative cutting forces, instantaneous depth-of-cut and workpiece whirling due to material imbalance is presented. The workpiece is modeled as a system of three rotors, namely, unmachined, being machined and machined, connected by a flexible shaft, thus enabling the motion of the workpiece relative to the tool and tool motion relative to the machining surface to be three-dimensionally established as functions of spindle speed, depth-of-cut, rate of material removal and whirling. A rich set of nonlinear behaviors of both the tool and workpiece including period-doubling bifurcation and chaos signifying the extent of machining instability at various depth-of-cuts is observed. Results presented herein agree favorably with physical experiments reported in the literature. It is found that, at and up to certain ranges of depth-of-cuts, whirling is non-negligible if the fundamental characteristics of machining dynamics are to be fully understood. Additionally, contrary to one's intuition, whirling is found to have insignificant impact on tool motions.
Investigating sustainable practices in the Malaysian office building developments

Purpose – Economically, Malaysia has one of the fastest growing construction industries in the world; however, the necessary balance between socio-economic and ecological systems – to avoid further environmental damage – has not yet been reached by the industry. This paper aims to explore the extent of sustainable development practices (socially, environmentally and economically) in the Malaysian construction industry, focusing on the office building sector. Design/methodology/approach – Semi-structured in-depth interviews with 30 stakeholders from various backgrounds of the Malaysian construction industry are used to explore their challenges and motivations for pursuing sustainable outcomes. Findings – The study finds that economic issues are the first priorities among stakeholders in any decision-makings for building projects and cost becomes one of the major reasons for the slow progress in implementing sustainable practices in building projects. Socially, there is still a wide gap of knowledge and awa.
Experiments with high-power CW klystrons using extended interaction catchers

This paper reports results on a two-year research program, most of which has already been presented orally. The objective was to exploit the extended interaction principle to obtain more CW power output, bandwith, and efficiency than a classical klystron would give. An attempt is made to arrive at criteria for comparing classical klystron catchers with extended interaction catchers and possibily with traveling-wave amplifiers. Results of tests on various experimental tubes are given and discussed. It is pointed out that the improvement in performance varies as the amount of extension of the catcher but this is limited by self-oscillation. Agreement between experimental results and a start oscillation theory developed for the structure tested is fairly good. It is concluded that the most likely application is in high average power tubes at very high frequencies, X band and higher; and that further research is needed on slow-wave circuits and on extended bunchers.