Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
WAGE INCENTIVE PROFILES IN DUAL LABOR MARKETS

This paper formalizes the use of ﬂexible labor contracts in an efﬁciency wage framework and derives market dualism as an endogenous outcome. By allowing temporary contracts to be either renewed or converted into permanent contracts, new theoretical insights emerge both on the equilibrium wage structure and the incentive problem faced by workers and ﬁrms. Since temporary workers weigh the outside option of entering the labor market through permanent positions, the rate at which ﬁxed-term contracts are converted into open-ended contracts is itself an incentive device which acts as a substitute for the wage. It follows that, even if temporary workers face a higher job loss risk, ﬁrms pay a wage differential in favor of permanent workers. The model also predicts that in equilibrium ﬁrms hire exclusively under ﬂexible contracts, then half of them is converted into stable contracts while the remaining contracts are left to expire. Thus,
Pasture degradation and recovery in Australia's rangelands: learning from history

"The extended drought periods in each degradation episode have provided a test of the capacity of grazing systems (i.e. land, plants, animals, humans and social structure) to handle stress. Evidence that degradation was already occurring was identified prior to the extended drought sequences. The sequence of dry years, ranging from two to eight years, exposed and/or amplified the degradation processes. The unequivocal evidence was provided by: (a) the physical 'horror' of bare landscapes, erosion scalds and gullies and dust storms; (b) the biological devastation of woody weeds and animal suffering/deaths or forced sales, and; (c) the financial and emotional plight of graziers and their families due to reduced production in some cases leading to abandonment of properties or, sadly, deaths (e.g. McDonald 1991, Ker Conway 1989). "--Publisher website
HandNeRF: Learning to Reconstruct Hand-Object Interaction Scene from a Single RGB Image

This paper presents a method to learn hand-object interaction prior for reconstructing a 3D hand-object scene from a single RGB image. The inference as well as training-data generation for 3D hand-object scene reconstruction is challenging due to the depth ambiguity of a single image and occlusions by the hand and object. We turn this challenge into an opportunity by utilizing the hand shape to constrain the possible relative configuration of the hand and object geometry. We design a generalizable implicit function, HandNeRF, that explicitly encodes the correlation of the 3D hand shape features and 2D object features to predict the hand and object scene geometry. With experiments on real-world datasets, we show that HandNeRF is able to reconstruct hand-object scenes of novel grasp configurations more accurately than comparable methods. Moreover, we demonstrate that object reconstruction from HandNeRF ensures more accurate execution of downstream tasks, such as grasping and motion planning for robotic hand-over and manipulation. The code is released here: https://github.com/SamsungLabs/HandNeRF
African swine fever in wild boar: investigating model assumptions and structure

African swine fever (ASF) is a highly virulent viral disease that affects both domestic pigs and wild boar. Current ASF transmission in Europe is in part driven by wild boar populations, which act as a disease reservoir. Wild boar are abundant throughout Europe and are highly social animals with complex social organisation. Despite the known importance of wild boar in ASF spread and persistence, there remain knowledge gaps surrounding wild boar transmission. To investigate the influence of density-contact functions and wild boar social structure on disease dynamics, we developed a wild boar modelling framework. The framework included an ordinary differential equation model, a homogeneous stochastic model, and various network-based stochastic models that explicitly included wild boar social grouping. We found that power law functions (transmission $\propto$ density$^{0.5}$) and frequency-based density-contact functions were best able to reproduce recent Baltic outbreaks; however, power law function models predicted considerable carcass transmission, while frequency-based models had negligible carcass transmission. Furthermore, increased model heterogeneity caused a decrease in the relative importance of carcass-based transmission. The different dominant transmission pathways predicted by each model type affected the efficacy of potential interventions, which highlights the importance of evaluating model type and structure when modelling systems with uncertainties.
Explaining Speech Classification Models via Word-Level Audio Segments and Paralinguistic Features

Predictive models make mistakes and have biases. To combat both, we need to understand their predictions.Explainable AI (XAI) provides insights into models for vision, language, and tabular data. However, only a few approaches exist for speech classification models. Previous works focus on a selection of spoken language understanding (SLU) tasks, and most users find their explanations challenging to interpret.We propose a novel approach to explain speech classification models. It provides two types of insights. (i) Word-level. We measure the impact of each audio segment aligned with a word on the outcome. (ii) Paralinguistic. We evaluate how non-linguistic features (e.g., prosody and background noise) affect the outcome if perturbed.We validate our approach by explaining two state-of-the-art SLU models on two tasks in English and Italian. We test their plausibility with human subject ratings. Our results show that the explanations correctly represent the model’s inner workings and are plausible to humans.
Semi-supervised Domain Adaptation on Graphs with Contrastive Learning and Minimax Entropy

Label scarcity in a graph is frequently encountered in real-world applications due to the high cost of data labeling. To this end, semi-supervised domain adaptation (SSDA) on graphs aims to leverage the knowledge of a labeled source graph to aid in node classification on a target graph with limited labels. SSDA tasks need to overcome the domain gap between the source and target graphs. However, to date, this challenging research problem has yet to be formally considered by the existing approaches designed for cross-graph node classification. To tackle the SSDA problem on graphs, a novel method called SemiGCL is proposed, which benefits from graph contrastive learning and minimax entropy training. SemiGCL generates informative node representations by contrasting the representations learned from a graph's local and global views. Additionally, SemiGCL is adversarially optimized with the entropy loss of unlabeled target nodes to reduce domain divergence. Experimental results on benchmark datasets demonstrate that SemiGCL outperforms the state-of-the-art baselines on the SSDA tasks.
C-Pack: Packaged Resources To Advance General Chinese Embedding

We introduce C-Pack, a package of resources that significantly advance the field of general Chinese embeddings. C-Pack includes three critical resources. 1) C-MTEB is a comprehensive benchmark for Chinese text embeddings covering 6 tasks and 35 datasets. 2) C-MTP is a massive text embedding dataset curated from labeled and unlabeled Chinese corpora for training embedding models. 3) C-TEM is a family of embedding models covering multiple sizes. Our models outperform all prior Chinese text embeddings on C-MTEB by up to +10% upon the time of the release. We also integrate and optimize the entire suite of training methods for C-TEM. Along with our resources on general Chinese embedding, we release our data and models for English text embeddings. The English models achieve state-of-the-art performance on MTEB benchmark; meanwhile, our released English data is 2 times larger than the Chinese data. All these resources are made publicly available at https://github.com/FlagOpen/FlagEmbedding.
Electron Precipitation Observed by ELFIN Using Proton Precipitation as a Proxy for Electromagnetic Ion Cyclotron (EMIC) Waves

Electromagnetic ion cyclotron (EMIC) waves can drive radiation belt depletion and Low‐Earth Orbit satellites can detect the resulting electron and proton precipitation. The ELFIN (Electron Losses and Fields InvestigatioN) CubeSats provide an excellent opportunity to study the properties of EMIC‐driven electron precipitation with much higher energy and pitch‐angle resolution than previously allowed. We collect EMIC‐driven electron precipitation events from ELFIN observations and use POES (Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellites) to search for 10s–100s keV proton precipitation nearby as a proxy of EMIC wave activity. Electron precipitation mainly occurs on localized radial scales (∼0.3 L), over 15–24 MLT and 5–8 L shells, stronger at ∼MeV energies and weaker down to ∼100–200 keV. Additionally, the observed loss cone pitch‐angle distribution agrees with quasilinear predictions at ≳250 keV (more filled loss cone with increasing energy), while additional mechanisms are needed to explain the observed low‐energy precipitation.
Bounds for moments of $\ell$-torsion in class groups

Fix a number field $k$, integers $\ell, n \geq 2$, and a prime $p$. For all $r \geq 1$, we prove strong unconditional upper bounds on the $r$-th moment of $\ell$-torsion in the ideal class groups of degree $p$ extensions of $k$ and of degree $n$ $S_n$-extensions of $k$, improving upon results of Ellenberg, Pierce and Wood as well as GRH-conditional results of Frei and Widmer. For large $r$, our results are comparable with work of Heath-Brown and Pierce for imaginary quadratic extensions of $\mathbb{Q}$. When $r=1$, our results are new even for the family of all quadratic extensions of $\mathbb{Q}$, leading to an improved upper bound for the count of degree $p$ $D_p$-extensions over $\mathbb{Q}$ (where $D_p$ is the dihedral group of order $2p$).
Topological superconductivity mediated by magnons of helical magnetic states

We recently showed that spin fluctuations of noncoplanar magnetic states can induce topological superconductivity in an adjacent normal metal [M{\ae}land et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 130, 156002 (2023)]. The noncolinear nature of the spins was found to be essential for this result, while the necessity of noncoplanar spins was unclear. In this paper we show that magnons in coplanar, noncolinear magnetic states can mediate topological superconductivity in a normal metal. Two models of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction are studied to illustrate the need for a sufficiently complicated Hamiltonian describing the magnetic insulator. The Hamiltonian, in particular the specific form of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction, affects the magnons and by extension the effective electron-electron interaction in the normal metal. Symmetry arguments are applied to complement this discussion. We solve a linearized gap equation in the case of weak-coupling superconductivity. The result is a time-reversal-symmetric topological superconductor, as confirmed by calculating the topological invariant. In analogy with magnon-mediated superconductivity from antiferromagnets, Umklapp scattering enhances the critical temperature of superconductivity for certain Fermi momenta.
DePT: Decoupled Prompt Tuning

This work breaks through the Base-New Tradeoff (BNT)dilemma in prompt tuning, i.e., the better the tuned model generalizes to the base (or target) task, the worse it generalizes to new tasks, and vice versa. Specifically, through an in-depth analysis of the learned features of the base and new tasks, we observe that the BNT stems from a channel bias issue, i.e., the vast majority of feature channels are occupied by base-specific knowledge, resulting in the collapse of taskshared knowledge important to new tasks. To address this, we propose the Decoupled Prompt Tuning (DePT) framework, which decouples base-specific knowledge from feature channels into an isolated feature space during prompt tuning, so as to maximally preserve task-shared knowledge in the original feature space for achieving better zero-shot generalization on new tasks. Importantly, our DePT is orthogonal to existing prompt tuning methods, hence it can improve all of them. Extensive experiments on 11 datasets show the strong flexibility and effectiveness of DePT. Our code and pretrained models are available at https://github.com/Koorye/DePT.
The Potential of Ridesharing Adoption and its Effects on CO2 Emissions and Customer Experience

Taxi services are an integral part of urban transport and are a major contributor to air pollution and traffic congestion, which adversely affect human life and health. Sharing taxi rides is one way to reduce the unfavorable effects of cab services on cities. However, this comes at the expense of passenger discomfort, quantified in terms of longer travel times. Taxi ridesharing is a sophisticated mode of urban transport that combines individual trip requests with similar spatiotemporal characteristics into a shared ride. We propose a one-to-one sharing strategy that pairs trips with similar starting and ending points. We examine the method using an open dataset with trip information on over 165 million taxi rides. We show that the cumulative journey time can be reduced by 48 percent while maintaining a relatively low level of passenger inconvenience, with a total average delay compared to an individual mobility case of 6 minutes and 42 seconds. This advantage is accompanied by decreases in emissions of 20.129 tons on an ordinary day and a potential fare reduction of 49 percent, which could point to a widespread passenger acceptance of shared taxi services. Overall, a matching rate of 13 percent is reached while a 27 percent matching rate is attained for high-demand areas. Compared to many-to-many sharing dynamic routing methodologies, our scheme is easier to implement and operate, making fewer assumptions about data availability and customer acceptance.
The Mediterranean around 800: on the brink of the second trade cycle

not moving from East to West, from West to East. There was never a moment in which the "connectivity" between microregions, for example small-scale cabotage from port to port, was not present, as Peregrine Horden and Nicholas Purcell have recently stressed. And Michael McCormick, also very recently, has put a powerful case for the maintenance of a network of communication of all kinds in the Mediterranean throughout the early Middle Ages, including across the low point for interregional movement, which he would date to ca. 650-780.1 So, on one level, there is not a problem with the "realities" of interregional relationships, as the symposium title puts it. It does not require so very dense a communications network for one region to influence another in its material culture-a single princess can do it (as with Theophan6 and the court culture of late 10th-century Germany), or a single artisan or group of artisans moving to a different region (as with the twopronged spread of glazed pottery from the eastern Mediterranean to the West, from Constantinople to Rome in the late eighth century and from Iraq to Syria and Egypt, and then to Tunisia, Sicily, and Spain, in the ninth). 2 It certainly does not require commercial exchange for regions to interconnect at the level of their material culture. All the same, the "realities" in the title of the symposium give space for an analysis of communications of a more specifically economic type, and on a larger scale than the movements of individuals. Those latter movements, indeed, themselves have different sorts of meaning in environments where there is a high level of interregional exchange with respect to those where communications are rather more reduced. Jerome could go from the West to Bethlehem in 386 without thinking twice about it, and write letters from there
Myosin-binding protein C forms C-links and stabilizes OFF states of myosin

Contraction force in muscle is produced by the interaction of myosin motors in the thick filaments and actin in the thin filaments and is fine-tuned by other proteins such as myosin-binding protein C (MyBP-C). One form of control is through the regulation of myosin heads between an ON and OFF state in passive sarcomeres, which leads to their ability or inability to interact with the thin filaments during contraction, respectively. MyBP-C is a flexible and long protein that is tightly bound to the thick filament at its C-terminal end but may be loosely bound at its middle- and N-terminal end (MyBP-CC1C7). Under considerable debate is whether the MyBP-CC1C7 domains directly regulate myosin head ON/OFF states, and/or link thin filaments (“C-links”). Here, we used a combination of mechanics and small-angle X-ray diffraction to study the immediate and selective removal of the MyBP-CC1C7 domains of fast MyBP-C in permeabilized skeletal muscle. After cleavage, the thin filaments were significantly shorter, a result consistent with direct interactions of MyBP-C with thin filaments thus confirming C-links. Ca2+ sensitivity was reduced at shorter sarcomere lengths, and crossbridge kinetics were increased across sarcomere lengths at submaximal activation levels, demonstrating a role in crossbridge kinetics. Structural signatures of the thick filaments suggest that cleavage also shifted myosin heads towards the ON state – a marker that typically indicates increased Ca2+ sensitivity but that may account for increased crossbridge kinetics at submaximal Ca2+ and/or a change in the force transmission pathway. Taken together, we conclude that MyBP-CC1C7 domains play an important role in contractile performance which helps explain why mutations in these domains often lead to debilitating diseases.
A century of breeding - is genetic erosion a reality?

Barley (Hordeum vulgare L. ssp. vulgare) is an important crop in the Nordic and Baltic countries, where it is mainly used for feed and malt. Commercial breeding of barley has been carried out in this region for more than a century, and landraces have been completely replaced by pure line cultivars. There is a concern that plant breeding might lead to a severe reduction of genetic diversity, so-called genetic erosion, since commercial breeding was initially based only on a few successful selections from landraces. The consequences of such erosion would affect plasticity of the crop, which might reduce its ability to adapt to future agriculture and consumption demands and increase the vulnerability to epidemics. The aim of this study was to evaluate the degree of putative genetic erosion and relationships in Nordic and Baltic barley material. A large collection representing landraces and cultivars from the end of the 19th century up to modern material were analysed by isozymes and DNA markers. In addition, field trials were performed in order to observe changes in the diversity of agronomic traits. General indications of a decrease in diversity were observed. A loss of less common alleles was found in molecular markers and a significant decrease of variability was detected for most agronomic traits. However, the molecular markers failed to prove significant diversity changes in the material as a whole. New alleles, not present in Nordic and Baltic landraces and old cultivars, were found in modern material. Differences in the magnitude of diversity varied depending of country and region (North vs South) of origin and row type of the crop. Some of these diversity changes were also significant in the molecular makers, for example a significant decrease in material from the southern part of the region was observed. The two-rowed and six-rowed cultivars of this region were well differentiated not only by agronomic data, but also by DNA markers. They demonstrated differences at chromosome regions distant from the inflorescence determinating genes. While agronomical data separate modern material from landraces and old cultivars fairly well, DNA markers achieved this for most of the countries only when the material was analysed separately by country. The main conclusion of this study is that breeding in Nordic and Baltic countries has decreased diversity at some traits, but overall diversity of the crop has not changed significantly. However, the landraces and old cultivars of the region should still be considered as valuable diversity sources since some of the loci found there are not present in modern materials.
Modelling hydrological responses to land use and climate change : The Mfolozi Catchment.

i ABSTRACT St. Lucia is South Africa’s largest and most important estuarine system. The Mfolozi and Mkuze catchments provide the main source of water to the system. Regional climate change may influence future water and sediment yields from the catchments. Other factors include human activities in the form of land use changes, forestation, urbanisation and/or unsustainable agricultural activities leading to land degradation. In this study these changes were evaluated using an analysis of historical rainfall data for the region, and by applying the ACRU model to simulate water and sediment yields incorporating land use changes. Rainfall intensity was a particular focus since it affects the erosion process that underpins sediment yield by providing and maintaining the water-tosediment ratio within the flow. No consistent evidence of statistically significant changes in mean annual rainfall was found. However, an increase in average intensity of rainfall events across all gauging stations was supported by statistically significant reductions in the number of annual wetdays. An increase in the occurrence of high intensity rainfall (>30mm/day and 50mm/day) was found to be small but statistically significant. Hydrological responses to present land-uses have been evaluated by comparing streamflows and sediment yields generated under natural and current land covers. It was determined that the Mfolozi catchment has undergone a 33% change in land-use from natural conditions. The hydrological impacts of this were a 38% reduction in streamflow accompanied by a 53% increase sediment yield from natural land cover conditions. Subcatchments with high proportions of commercial forest and sugarcane plantations have been identified as the major source of these changes. Using a combination of empirically downscaled rainfall from global climate models, future projections assuming present day land-uses of catchment streamflow and sediment yield have been presented and compared against future projections assuming natural land covers. This was done so as to compare the effects of land-use and climate change on the hydrology of the Mfolozi catchment. Impacts of land-use change were found to be greater