Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effects of Inlet Flow Field Conditions on the Performance of Centrifugal Compressor Diffusers: Part 1 — Discrete-Passage Diffuser

This is Part 1 of a two-part paper considering the performance of radial diffusers for use in a high performance centrifugal compressor. Part 1 reports on discrete-passage diffusers (shown in Fig. 1) while Part 2 describes a test of a straight-channel diffuser designed for equivalent duty. Two builds of discrete-passage diffuser were tested, with 30 and 38 separate passages. Both the 30 and 38 passage diffusers investigated showed comparable range of unstalled operation and similar level of overall diffuser pressure recovery.The paper concentrates on the influence of inlet flow conditions on the pressure recovery and operating range of radial diffusers for centrifugal compressor stages. The flow conditions examined include diffuser inlet Mach number, flow angle, blockage, and axial flow non-uniformity. The investigation was carried out in a specially built test facility, designed to provide a controlled inlet flow field to the test diffusers. The facility can provide a wide range of diffuser inlet velocity profile distortion and skew with Mach numbers up to unity and flow angles of 63° to 75° from the radial direction.The consequences of different averaging methods for the inlet total pressure distributions, which are needed in the definition of diffuser pressure recovery coefficient for non-uniform diffuser inlet conditions were also assessed. The overall diffuser pressure recovery coefficient, based on suitably averaged inlet total pressure, was found to correlate well with the momentum-averaged flow angle into the diffuser. Furthermore the pressure recovery coefficient was found to be essentially independent of the axial distortion at diffuser inlet, and the Mach number, over the wide flow range (from maximum flow to the beginning of flow instabilities) investigated. It is thus shown that the generally accepted sensitivity of diffuser pressure recovery performance to inlet flow distortion and boundary layer blockage can be largely attributed to inappropriate quantification of the average dynamic pressure at diffuser inlet. Use of an inlet dynamic pressure based on availability or mass-averaging in combination with definition of inlet flow angle based on mass average of the radial and tangential velocity at diffuser inlet removes this sensitivity. © 1998 ASME
Do propranolol and amisulpride modulate confidence in risk-taking?

Background: Making rational choices and being able to consciously reflect on the goodness of these choices is important for successfully navigating the world. Value-based decisions have been extensively studied, but we know little about the factors that influence our confidence in value-based choice. Particularly, we know very little about the neurotransmitters that may mediate these processes. Methods: In this double-blind, placebo-controlled study design involving 61 healthy human subjects (30 female), we assessed the contributions of dopamine (400 mg amisulpride) and noradrenaline (40 mg propranolol) to value-based decision making and the subjective confidence therein in a monetary risky gambling task. Results: We did not find any significant effect of either of the two pharmacological manipulations, neither on value-based decision making, nor on subjective confidence. Conclusion: We discuss these (null) findings, and release all relevant data and code. This will allow researchers to further interrogate the data, to counteract publication biases in favour of significant findings, and to use our study as a source for balanced meta-analyses.
Microbubble dynamics and jetting near tissue-phantom biointerfaces.

Precise excitation of cavitation is a promising mechanism for microsurgery procedures and targeted drug delivery enhancement. The underlying phenomenon of interest, jetting behaviour of oscillating cavitation bubbles, occurs due to near-surface interactions between the boundary, liquid, and bubble. Within this study we measured boundary effects on the cavitation bubble dynamics and morphology, with an emphasis on observation and measurement of jetting behaviour near tissue-phantom biointerfaces. An important mechanism of boundary poration has been observed using time-resolved optical microscopy and explained for different tissue-phantom surface densities and Young's modulus. Below a critical distance to the boundary, around γ = 1.0, the resulting jets penetrated the tissue-phantom, resulting in highly localized few micrometer diameter jets.
The Pedagogical Value of Creating Accessible Games: A Case Study with Higher Education Students

The potential of games in empowering underrepresented groups is a central theme in the field of media studies. However, to ensure that everyone can benefit from them, it is necessary to ensure that they are inclusive and accessible. In the present work, we have implemented a Participatory Action Research (PAR) approach to target this problem, right at the stage of training new game designers and game developers. Thus, through a game-design-based or experimental game design pedagogical approach, we intended to promote inclusive and accessibility-driven game design and development skills in students, while decreasing their negative attitudes towards people with Intellectual Disability (pwID). A protocol with a Non-Governmental Organization in the field was established and, during two semesters, students were challenged to develop 10 accessible games and physical interfaces for pwID and motor disabilities, through participatory processes. Pre and post assessment was conducted, through a mixed-method approach. After participating in this process, students reported satisfaction and increased knowledge of cognitive and motor accessibility, and inclusive game design in general. Moreover, the attitudinal assessment showed significantly lower levels of prejudiced beliefs towards pwID (p < 0.05).
Effect of N,N'-Dicyclohexyl Terephthalic Dihydrazide on the Crystallization and Properties of Isotactic Polypropylene

Application of nucleating agents is a common way to manipulate the structure and properties of crystalline polymers. Our goal was to synthesize N,N'-dicyclohexyl terephthalic dihydrazide (DCTDH) and study it from the viewpoint of applicability as a nucleating agent for isotactic polypropylene (iPP). We used differential scanning calorimetry to investigate the efficiency of DCTDH in samples containing the nucleating agent in a wide concentration range. We used polarized light microscopy to study the crystalline morphology developed in the presence of this nucleating agent. To characterize the mechanical properties of the nucleated samples, we performed tensile and impact tests on injection molded specimens. DCTDH proved to be a non-soluble α-nucleating agent in iPP, with a saturation concentration around 300 ppm. The nucleating agent has a significant effect on the crystalline structure of iPP, microspherulitic structure forms in its presence. Owing to the different structure, a considerable change in the mechanical properties is observable: with increasing nucleating agent content the tensile modulus increases, while impact resistance has a maximum value around 300 ppm nucleating agent content.
Psychosocial Determinants of Adolescents’ Cyberbullying Involvement—The Role of Body Satisfaction

Background: Although the relationship between adolescents’ body image and cyberviolence has been proved, little is known about the place of body image among other psychosocial determinants. The study aimed to assess the relationship between body satisfaction and cyberbullying in the context of other psychosocial factors. Methods: We used data of 5817 adolescents (47.6% boys, mean age = 15.43) from the survey conducted in 2018 in Poland as a part of the Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children. Four groups of cyberbullying involvement were defined: only bullies, only victims, both bullies and victims, and not involved. Body satisfaction and ten other independent variables were classified as sociodemographic, socioeconomic, individual and social factors. A series of multinomial logistic regression models were estimated and compared using the pseudo R-sq Nagelkerke coefficient. Results: Although family support seemed to be the most protective, the findings have proved that body satisfaction reduces significantly the risk of cyberbullying. The relationship was more pronounced in victims and bully-victims. A slightly stronger protective effect of body satisfaction has been observed in boys. Conclusions: The strengthening of body image may be an effective measure to prevent adolescents’ cyberbullying, as well as to bring about improvements in social support, connections to others, and school performance.
Exploring mobile/WiFi handover with multipath TCP

Mobile Operators see an unending growth of data traffic generated by their customers on their mobile data networks. As the operators start to have a hard time carrying all this traffic over 3G or 4G networks, offloading to WiFi is being considered. Multipath TCP (MPTCP) is an evolution of TCP that allows the simultaneous use of multiple interfaces for a single connection while still presenting a standard TCP socket API to the application. The protocol specification of Multipath TCP has foreseen the different building blocks to allow transparent handover from WiFi to 3G back and forth. In this paper we experimentally prove the feasibility of using MPTCP for mobile/WiFi handover in the current Internet. Our experiments run over real WiFi/3G networks and use our Linux kernel implementation of MPTCP that we enhanced to better support handover. We analyze MPTCP's energy consumption and handover performance in various operational modes. We find that MPTCP enables smooth handovers offering reasonable performance even for very demanding applications such as VoIP. Finally, our experiments showed that lost MPTCP control signals can adversely affect handover performance; we implement and test a simple but effective solution to this issue.
Survival and Success Rates of Monolithic Zirconia Restorations Supported by Teeth and Implants in Bruxer versus Non-Bruxer Patients: A Retrospective Study

The aim of this study was to assess retrospectively the survival and success rates of monolithic zirconia restorations supported by teeth and implants in bruxer versus non-bruxer patients. Methods: A total of 15 bruxer and 25 non-bruxer patients attended the recall appointment. The bruxer group (mean age of 61.2 ± 13.3 years and follow-up of 58.7 ± 16.8 months) were treated with 331 monolithic zirconia restorations, while the non-bruxer group, with a comparable mean age and follow-up time, were treated with 306 monolithic zirconia restorations. Clinical data were retrieved from the patients’ files. At the recall appointment, all supporting teeth and implants were examined for biological and technical complications, and the restorations were evaluated using modified California Dental Association (CDA) criteria. Data were statistically analyzed using survival analysis methods. A significance level of p < 0.05 was used. A total of 31 versus 27 biologic and technical complications were recorded in the bruxer and non-bruxer groups, respectively. No significant differences were found between the two groups regarding overall complications and survival rate. Regarding the type of complication, a significantly higher rate of veneered porcelain chipping (p = 0.045) was observed in the bruxer group. With regard to biological complications, the only complications that exhibited a borderline, although not significant, difference were three fractured teeth exclusively in the bruxer group (p = 0.051), which were replaced with implant-supported restorations. Within the limitations of this study, we conclude that there were no significant differences in the overall survival and success rates of the monolithic zirconia restorations in bruxer versus non-bruxer patients, although veneered zirconia restorations and single tooth abutments exhibited a higher rate of complications in the bruxer group.
The Effect of Occupants’ Behaviour on the Building Performance Gap: UK Residential Case Studies

Studies have shown that the assumptions used to create dynamic thermal models of buildings do not reflect their actual energy use. Bridging the energy performance gap is vital in ensuring that a designed or retrofitted building meets the energy performance targets. Using thermal analysis simulation software TAS, this paper presents a simulation model of seven different UK single family houses. The results from the various models are validated by comparing the actual energy demand against the simulated consumption. The simulation results show that the heating set point has the greatest impact on the simulated energy demand. The results also demonstrate that the energy demand of the dwellings can be reduced by applying window opening schemes and by controlling the heating setpoint temperature and schedule. Plug load consumption is also considered by using plug load data of real UK households, as obtained from a longitudinal study, and calibrating the model based on average plug load contributions for the households. The results showed that, by increasing the heating set point and window opening schedules by 10% from self-reported data, and by considering an additional 12% for plug loads, the energy performance gap is reduced to less than >15% for all examined houses.
Evaluation of soil carbon simulation in CMIP6 Earth System Models

Abstract. The response of soil carbon represents one of the key uncertainties in future climate change. The ability of Earth System Models (ESMs) to simulate present day soil carbon is therefore vital for reliable projections. In this study the most up-to-date CMIP6 ESMs are evaluated against empirical datasets to assess the ability of each model to simulate soil carbon and related controls: Net Primary Productivity (NPP) and soil carbon turnover time (τs). Comparing CMIP6 with CMIP5, uncertainties in modelled soil carbon remain, particularly the underestimation of northern high latitude soil carbon stocks. There is a robust improvement in the simulation of NPP in CMIP6 compared with CMIP5, however the same improvements are not seen in the simulation of τs. These results suggest a greater emphasis is required on improving the representation of below-ground soil processes in future developments of models. These improvements would help reduce the uncertainty of projected carbon release from global soils under climate change and to increase confidence in the carbon budgets associated with different levels of global warming.
A Mediterranean-Style Diet Plan Is Associated with Greater Effectiveness and Sustainability in Weight Loss in Patients with Obesity after Endoscopic Bariatric Therapy

This study aimed to investigate the impact of a Mediterranean-style diet on weight loss effectiveness and sustainability in patients with obesity who underwent endoscopic bariatric therapies (EBT), relative to a protein diet plan. Thus, 132 patients with obesity (BMI 30–40 kg/m2) who underwent EBT, were asked to follow a Mediterranean-style diet plan (n = 52) or a protein diet plan (n = 26) for six months. General linear models were used to compare outcome variables between dietary intervention groups. Results showed that participants who followed a Mediterranean-style diet plan lost 14.2% more weight (95% CI: 3.0; 25.3), compared with those who followed a protein diet plan. Additionally, following a Mediterranean-style diet plan was associated with the sustainability of weight loss. Note that three months after the end of the dietary intervention, the patients who followed a Mediterranean-style diet plan were still losing weight (−1.2 ± 3.0 kg), while those with a protein diet plan gained, on average, 2.4 ± 3.3 kg (p < 0.001). Therefore, we conclude that combining EBT with a Mediterranean-style diet plan could represent an effective dietary intervention to improve the effectiveness and sustainability of weight loss after an EBT.
Mechanistic Basis for the Role of Phytochemicals in Inflammation-Associated Chronic Diseases

Chronic inflammatory diseases occur in a large portion of the population and are associated with a poor diet. Key natural products found in fruits and vegetables may assist in lowering inflammation associated with chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and cancer. This review seeks to examine the roles of several natural products, resveratrol (RES), quercetin (QUE), curcumin (CUR), piperine (PIP), epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), and gingerol (GIN), in their ability to attenuate inflammatory markers in specific diseases states. Additionally, we will discuss findings in past and ongoing clinical trials, detail possible phytochemical–drug interactions, and provide a brief resource for researchers and healthcare professionals on natural product and supplement regulation as well as names of databases with information on efficacy, indications, and natural product–drug interactions. As diet and over-the-counter supplement use are modifiable factors and patients are interested in using complementary and alternative therapies, understanding the mechanisms by which natural products have demonstrated efficacy and the types of drugs they interact with and knowing where to find information on herbs and supplements is important for practicing healthcare providers and researchers interested in this field.
Two-Stage Task Offloading Optimization With Large Deviation Delay Analysis in IoT Networks

In the edge computing Internet of Things network, we minimize the offloading overhead (caused by the bandwidth cost for data transmission and computation resource consumption for task remote processing) while providing the end-to-end (E2E) delay provisioning. Under the scenario, a tandem queue consisting of a transmission queue and a computing process queue is formed by the tasks offloaded to the edge server via wireless link and then processed through the computing resource. Due to the tandem queue, the offloading decision and computing resource allocation are coupled over the tandem queue. To make the problem tractable, we decouple the above two operations and propose a two-stage offloading filtering and computing resource allocation policy. After decouple, we then investigate the delay bound violation probability of the tandem queue by leveraging large deviation analysis. Further, we reveal that under the same E2E delay provisioning, the offloading overhead under the proposed decoupled policy can approach to the non-decoupled optimum by selecting an appropriate value of control parameter. Simulation results verify the theoretical analysis and show the efficiency of the proposed policy.
The Impact of Financial Development and FDI on Renewable Energy in the UAE: A Path towards Sustainable Development

Several empirical studies have explored the influence of financial development on energy consumption; however, the impact of financial development, economic growth, and FDI on renewable energy consumption (REC) has not been studied in the case of the UAE. For this purpose, the long and short-run interactions among economic growth, FDI, financial development, and renewable energy consumption are explored by applying the new technique of bootstrap autoregressive distributed lag, along with Granger causality analysis, in the context of the UAE for the period from 1989–2019. Using estimation techniques, the study reveals the main findings and implications for policymakers in the UAE. The present research provides significant empirical evidence that financial development, FDI, and economic growth can significantly increase renewable energy consumption in the UAE. Therefore, it is essential to promote financial development in the UAE in order to avert the financial risks that undermine the stability of the financial markets and that negatively affect the REC. Furthermore, policymakers in the UAE should promote the concept of green finance and should provide more funds for investments in green energy for sustainable energy development in the UAE.
Bladder Ultrastructure and Urinary Cytokine Abnormality in Patients with Recurrent Urinary Tract Infection and the Changes after Intravesical Platelet-Rich Plasma Injections

This study investigates the bladder from patients with recurrent urinary tract infection (rUTI) at baseline and after intravesical platelet-rich plasma (PRP) injections. Patients with rUTI who underwent repeated intravesical PRP injections provided bladder and urine specimens at baseline and after treatment. Bladder specimens were investigated with electron microscopy and Western blotting. The urine sample was analyzed with commercially available Milliplex immunoassays. A total of 29 patients were enrolled. At baseline, the rUTI bladders exhibited defects of integrity in umbrella cells, a widened tight junction, and lysed organelles. Intracellular bacterial community incubations in the epithelial cells were also noted. Improvement in bladder defects after PRP injection was noted in 25–42% of patients. Bladder UPK3 expression was significantly lower in the patients with rUTI than in controls. Baseline levels of urinary inflammatory cytokine interleukin (IL)-6, IL-8, and brain-derived neurotrophic factor were higher in the patients with rUTI than in the controls, but there were lower levels of vascular endothelial growth factor and nerve growth factor. In the patients with rUTI who recovered from acute infection, the bladders still had immature urothelium, various ultrastructural defects, and elevated urinary inflammatory cytokines. PRP injection has the potential to promote bladder recovery in some of these patients.
Decolonising and demedicalising intersex research

In this commentary, we examine the role of non-Indigenous psychology researchers in settler states such as Aotearoa / New Zealand. A key focus is on demedicalising and decolonising intersex. We describe approaches to knowledge production that are based on the decolonising thinking of Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers, and that open up opportunities for resistance and transformation. We then examine how decolonisation can be brought into dialogue with demedicalisation. Finally, we consider opportunities for an Indigenous understanding of health to contribute to the demedicalising aspirations of intersex advocates and researchers.
Planting Hope: supporting the greener curriculum.

Abstract Major challenges in education for sustainable development and environmental education include finding teaching strategies that both demonstrate / foster good practice and that help reconnect learners with a natural world that lies outside their everyday experience. The ‘Connecting with Hope’ exercise involves participants in an end-of-term tree planting, conducted in the name of carbon mitigation. As part of the exercise, participants are asked to write their main hope for the future across three tree labels and attach these hopes to three trees that they have planted. Their wishes include the hopes that human actions will not destroy our world and that humans should treat their fellows with greater consideration and respect. When asked to reflect upon the reasons behind the exercise, the majority recognise that this includes helping them repay their debts to the environment and accept their personal responsibility for sustainability.