Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Preventing Dimensional Collapse in Contrastive Local Learning with Subsampling

This paper presents an investigation of the challenges of training Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) via self-supervised objectives, using local learning as a parallelizable alternative to traditional backpropagation. In our approach, DNN are segmented into distinct blocks, each updated independently via gradients provided by small local auxiliary Neural Networks (NNs). Despite the evident computational beneﬁts, extensive splits often result in performance degradation. Through analysis of a synthetic example, we identify a layer-wise dimensional collapse as a major factor behind such performance losses. To counter this, we propose a novel and straightforward sampling strategy based on blockwise feature-similarity, explicitly designed to evade such dimensional collapse.
NBER WORKING PAPER SERIES INSPECTING THE MECHANISM: LEVERAGE AND THE GREAT RECESSION IN THE EUROZONE

We thank Fiorella De Fiore, Emi Nakamura, Vania Stavrakeva, and Philip Lane for their discussions, as well as Mark Aguiar, Gita Gopinath, Gianluca Violante, Caterina Mendicino and seminar participants at NYU, Harvard, Berkeley, Banque de France, CREI, ECB, Warwick, ESSIM-CEPR and the NBER for their comments. Joseba Martinez provided outstanding research assistance. We thank the Fondation Banque de France for financial support. Philippe Martin is also grateful to the Banque de France Sciences Po partnership for its financial support. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
An Introduction to the Dynamics of El Nino and the Southern Oscillation

Many scientists either working on the El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) problem or its many applications have not been trained in both the equatorial ocean and atmospheric dynamics necessary to understand it. This book seeks to overcome this difficulty by providing a step by step introduction to ENSO, helping the upper level graduate student or research scientist to learn quickly the ENSO basics and be up to date with the latest ENSO research. The text assumes that the reader has a knowledge of the equations of fluid mechanics on a rotating earth and emphasizes the observations and simple physical explanations of them. Following a history of ENSO and a discussion of ENSO observations in Chapters 1 and 2, Chapters 3-5 consider relevant equatorial ocean dynamics, Chapters 6 and 9 relevant atmospheric dynamics, and Chapters 7 and 8 the main paradigms for how the Pacific Ocean and atmosphere couple together to produce ENSO. Chapter 8 also discusses the old mystery of why ENSO tends to be locked in phase with the seasonal cycle. Successful dynamical and statistical approaches to ENSO prediction are discussed in Chapters 10 and 11 while Chapter 12 concludes the book with examples of how ENSO influences marine and bird life. * Quick reference guide and step by step introduction to El Nino/Southern Oscillation dynamics* Keep informed and up to date on El Nino/Southern Oscillation research and how El Nino and the Southern Oscillation can be predicted* Understand how El Nino can affect marine and bird life
"Hair-Esteem Toolkit For Black Girls": The Development Of A Self-Esteem Toolkit For Black Adolescent Girls Centering Hair As A Tool For Empowerment

2 DEDICATION . 3 RATIONALE: WHY BLACK GIRLS DESERVE BETTER . 6 HAIRITAGE: THE HISTORICAL IMPORTANCE OF BLACK HAIR . 6 MORE THAN “JUST HAIR”: A MARKER OF RACIAL IDENTITY AMONG BLACK GIRLS AND WOMEN . 9 HAIR VALUATION . 12 HAIR HARASSMENT AND DISCRIMINATION . 13 SELF-ESTEEM AND BLACK GIRLS: PUBLIC HEALTH IMPLICATIONS . 15 MAKING THE CASE FOR HAIR AS A TOOL FOR SELF-ESTEEM . 18 TOOLKITS: A KNOWLEDGE TRANSLATION TOOL . 19 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK . 20 BLACK GIRLHOOD . 20 EMPOWERMENT THEORY . 21 YOUTH PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH (YPAR) . 22 METHODS . 23 STUDY DESIGN . 23 DATA COLLECTION . 24 RESEARCHER POSITIONALITY STATEMENT . 26 RESULTS . 27 DISCUSSION . 35 EVALUATION . 42 5 FUTURE IMPLICATIONS . 42 LIMITATIONS . 44 CONCLUSION . 44 REFERENCES . 46 APPENDIX A: YOUTH ADVISORY BOARD MEETING OUTLINE . 60 APPENDIX B: SCALES FOR THE EVALUATION OF THE TOOLKIT . 62 APPENDIX C: HAIR-ESTEEM TOOLKIT FOR BLACK GIRLS . 63
Monitoring Works: Getting Teachers to Come to School

This paper combines a randomized experiment and a structural model to test whether monitoring and financial incentives can reduce teacher absence and increase learning. In 57 schools in India, randomly chosen out of 113, a teacher's daily attendance was verified through photographs with time and date stamps, and his salary was made a non-linear function of his attendance. The teacher absence rate changed from 42 percent in the comparison schools to 21 percent in the treatment schools. To separate the effects of the monitoring and the financial incentives, we estimate a structural dynamic labour supply model that allows for heterogeneity in preferences and auto-correlation of external shocks. The teacher response was almost entirely due to the financial incentives. The estimated elasticity of labour with respect to the incentive is 0.306. Our model accurately predicts teacher attendance in two out-of-sample tests on the comparison group and a treatment group that received different financial incentives. The program improved child learning: test scores in the treatment schools were 0.17 standard deviations higher than in the comparison schools.
Reservoir heterogeneity in a carbon sequestration target: The Donovan Sand member of the Rodessa Formation, Citronelle field, Alabama

RESERVOIR HETEROGENEITY IN A CARBON SEQUESTRATION TARGET: THE DONOVAN SAND MEMBER OF THE RODESSA FORMATION, CITRONELLE FIELD, ALABAMA Keith Coffindaffer The Citronelle field, located in Mobile County, Alabama, has been chosen as a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) pilot site, and supercritical CO2 has been injected for the combined purposes of long-term storage testing and enhanced oil recovery (EOR). The target formation for injection is the Early Cretaceous Donovan Sand of the Rodessa Formation, and is characterized by discontinuous fineto medium-grained, heterogeneous arkosic fluvial sandstones interbedded with fissile mudstones and micaceous silts. Based upon core analysis of the Donovan Sand, depofacies indicate a fluviodeltaic/estuarine depositional environment for the Donovan Sand. Probable sources of the Donovan sediments are the Motts Gneiss and the Hospilika Granite, both of which are exposed within the Pine Mountain Window at the Georgia/Alabama state border and into central Georgia. Through synthesis of core, thin section, and well log analysis, reservoir heterogeneity and porosity development within the Upper Donovan Sand is highly variable, with porosity averages of ~2-5%, but locally can be up to ~13%. In more porous zones there is more evidence of grain alteration and creation of secondary porosity, while in the lower porosity sections cementation or high matrix content fill interstitial space and the main pore type is primary pores. Porosity and cement percentages, rather than mineralogic composition, were used to categorize sandstones into petrofacies due to the consistent mineral composition of the Donovan Sand. According to petrofacies-to-well log correlations, the most porous petrofacies are present within the same stratigraphic zone (defined herein as a ‘high porosity zone’) and this zone is interpreted to represent a porous (> 5% ɸ) fluid migration pathway in the subsurface. An Upper Donovan Sand structure map, thickness map, and average porosity map generated using transform equations from SP and bulk density curves show that the thickest portions of the Upper Donovan do not directly correlate with the most porous areas within the formation. This research may serve as an analog for other mature oil and gas fields and CCS sites targeting fluvial-deltaic reservoirs.
Labor Market Flows in the Cross Section and Over Time 11 February 2011

Many theoretical models of labor market search imply a tight link between worker flows (hires and separations) and job gains and losses at the employer level. Partly motivated by these theories, we exploit establishment-level data from U.S. sources to study the relationship between worker flows and job flows in the cross section and over time. We document strong, highly nonlinear relationships of hiring, quit and layoff rates to employer growth in the cross section. We also develop a framework for evaluating how well various models and views fit the patterns in the data. Aggregate fluctuations in hires and layoffs are well captured by empirical specifications that impose a tight cross-sectional link between worker flows and job flows. Aggregate fluctuations in quits are not. Allowing the cross-sectional quit relationship to vary with aggregate conditions leads to remarkable improvement in fit, consistent with models of labor market dynamics that assign a major role to endogenous quit behavior.
The undersigned have examined the dissertation entitled : EFFECTS OF A MINDFULNESS-BASED MOBILE APPLICATION ON EMPATHY AND MINDFULNESS WITH PSYCHOTHERAPISTS presented on October 26 , 2017 by

This study explores the feasibility of using a mindfulness-based mobile application (MBMA) with psychotherapists, and investigates whether the use of the MBMA has an impact on psychotherapists’ levels of empathy and mindfulness. The study employs a within-subjects, pretest-posttest design in which participants (n=16) completed questionnaires 30 days apart. Between these questionnaires, the participants utilized the smartphone application Insight Timer (Insight Network, Inc., 2016) on a daily basis. Professionally qualified therapists and doctoral psychology trainees currently practicing psychotherapy who have no or minimal experience with mindfulness practice were considered for inclusion in this study. The study generated paired samples t-tests using SPSS to determine if the intervention is associated with increased levels of mindfulness and empathy as measured by self-report scales. Findings indicate a low degree of engagement with professional psychotherapists in the study. Participants demonstrated improvement on overall mindfulness (t(15)= -4.69, p<. 001), as well as on 4 out of the 5 facets of mindfulness including observing (t(15)=-4.62, p<. 001), describing (t(15)= -3.19, p=. 006), nonjudging (t(15)= -3.44, p=. 004), and nonreactivity (t(15)= -4.17, p<. 001). Participants did not show improvement on the acting with awareness (t(15)= -2.65, p=. 018) facet of mindfulness, or on any of the 3 factors of empathy: empathic concern (t(15)= -0.88, p=. 391), personal distress (t(15)= 0.41, p=. 690), and perspective taking (t(15)= -2.05, p=. 058). These findings suggest that smartphone MBI delivery has the potential to improve psychotherapist mindfulness in a brief time period, but does not show promise for improving psychotherapist empathy.
Synchronization dynamics of dual-mode solid-state and semiconductor DFB lasers under frequency-shifted feedback : applications to microwave photonics

Le controle de la difference de frequence entre deux lasers est un defi transversal a de nombreux domaines de la photonique, que ce soit dans un but de generation heterodyne d'un battement micro-onde de grande purete, ou pour des experiences de metrologie ou de telecommunication. L'avancee des connaissances sur la dynamique de lasers soumis a divers couplages a permis le developpement de methodes de stabilisation basees sur l'injection optique. Nous etudions ici theoriquement et experimentalement un mecanisme appele reinjection decalee en frequence (RDF), qui permet dans des situations variees de controler precisement la difference de frequence entre deux lasers. Dans un premier temps, la methode RDF est appliquee a un laser a etat solide bi-polarisation bi-frequence Nd:YAG afin de verrouiller en phase ses deux modes de polarisation orthogonaux. Le developpement d'un modele type «rate equations» en bonne adequation avec les experiences a aussi permis de mettre en lumiere un certain nombre de regimes de synchronisation partielle dits de phase bornee. De plus, nous montrons que cet etat peut subsister en presence d'oscillations chaotiques de l'intensite et de la phase. Le comportement du laser sous RDF est etudie pour differentes valeurs du desaccord de frequence, du taux d'injection, du retard eventuel, et du couplage inter-modes. Enfin, la necessite d'inclure un couplage phase-amplitude (facteur de Henry non-nul) dans le modele a mene au developpement d'une methode pour mesurer ce coefficient habituellement neglige dans les lasers solides. Le mecanisme de stabilisation par RDF est ensuite applique a un composant semiconducteur original contenant deux lasers DFB sur InP. Malgre une plus grand complexite du schema de couplage, et la presence de retards effectifs importants, il reste possible de synchroniser en phase ces lasers. Des bandes d'accrochages liees au retard sont observees, et reproduites a l'aide d'un modele numerique. Ce dernier permet aussi de determiner les conditions de fonctionnement minimisant l'influence de parametres experimentaux non maitrises. Enfin, ce systeme, permettant de controler une phase micro-onde sur porteuse optique, peut etre integre dans une boucle resonante de type oscillateur opto-electronique (OEO) qui ne necessite pas de reference externe. On realise un oscillateur micro-onde sur porteuse optique auto-reference, a bande laterale unique, ayant des performances encourageantes. Dans ce cadre, il semble que la plupart des techniques developpees pour les OEO puissent etre reinvesties.
Interactive Segmentation of Radiance Fields

We first pre-train the model for the volumetric density and radiance for 20, 000 iterations. Once the radiance field is stabilized on the VM-48 TensoRF representation, we introduce distillation using student-teacher strategy similar to that of [6, 12] on the VM-64 TensoRF variant. Upon adoption, the resultant VM-48 variant of TensoRF along with its shallow MLP represents the radiance field, and VM-64 consititute the distilled features. It is to be noted that the distilled features are not accompanied by a shallow MLP. The features are store at voxel lattice locations and tri-linearly interpolated to be compared and optimized against the DINO features without the involvement of any non-linearity. The adoption is done with λ = 0.001 for the weighted loss function for 5, 000 iterations. The loss is taken on the features and radiance together to maintain consistency.
International Stock Return Predictability : Evidence from New Statistical Tests Amélie CHARLES

We investigate whether stock returns of international markets are predictable from a range of fundamentals including key financial ratios (dividend-price ratio, dividendyield, earnings-price ratio, dividend-payout ratio), technical indicators (price pressure, change in volume), and short-term interest rates. We adopt two new alternative testing and estimation methods: the improved augmented regression method and wild bootstrapping of predictive model based on a restricted VAR form. Both ∗Audencia Business School of Management, 8 route de la Jonelire, 44312 Nantes, France. Email: acharles@audencia.com. †LEMNA, University of Nantes, IEMN–IAE, Chemin de la Censive du Tertre, BP 52231, 44322 Nantes, France. Email: olivier.darne@univ-nantes.fr. ‡Olivier Darné gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Chaire Finance of the University of Nantes Research Foundation. §Corresponding Author: J.Kim@latrobe.edu. au; All computations are conducted using the VAR.etp package (Kim, 2014c) based on R (R Core team, 2014). The R codes used in this paper are available from the authors on request.
New insight into the atmospheric chloromethane budget gained using stable carbon isotope ratios

Abstract. Atmospheric chloromethane (CH3Cl) plays an important role in stratospheric ozone destruction, but many uncertainties still exist regarding strengths of both sources and sinks and the processes leading to formation of this naturally occurring gas. Recent work has identified a novel chemical origin for CH3Cl, which can explain its production in a variety of terrestrial environments: the widespread structural component of plants, pectin, reacts readily with chloride ion to form CH3Cl at both ambient and elevated temperatures (Hamilton et al., 2003). It has been proposed that this abiotic chloride methylation process in terrestrial environments could be responsible for formation of a large proportion of atmospheric CH3Cl. However, more information is required to determine the global importance of this new source and its contribution to the atmospheric CH3Cl budget. A potentially powerful tool in studying the atmospheric CH3Cl budget is the use of stable carbon isotope ratios. In an accompanying paper it is reported that the reaction of CH3Cl with OH radical, the dominant sink for atmospheric CH3Cl, is accompanied by an unexpectedly large fractionation factor (Gola et al., 2005). Another recently published study shows that CH3Cl formed by the abiotic methylation process at ambient temperatures has a unique stable carbon isotope signature, extremely depleted in 13C, unequivocally distinguishing it from all other known sources (Keppler et al., 2004). Using these findings together with data existing in the literature, we here present three scenarios for an isotopic mass balance for atmospheric CH3Cl. Our calculations provide strong support for the proposal that the largest source of atmospheric CH3Cl (1800 to 2500 Gg yr-1) is the abiotic methylation of chloride in terrestrial ecosytems, primarily located in tropical and subtropical areas where turnover of biomass is highest. Furthermore our calculations also indicate that the microbial soil sink for CH3Cl is likely to be much larger (>1000 Gg yr-1) than that previously assumed.
The Lender of Last Resort: A 21th Century Approach

The classical Bagehot's conception of a Lender of Last Resort (LOLR) that lends to illiquid banks has been criticized on two grounds: on the one hand, the distinction between insolvency and illiquidity is not clear cut; on the other a fully collateralized repo market allows Central Banks to provide the adequate aggregated amount of liquidity and leave the responsibility of lending uncollateralized to the banks. The object of this paper is to analyze rigorously these issues by providing a framework where liquidity shocks cannot be distinguished from solvency ones and ask whether there is a need for a LOLR and how should it operate. Determining the optimal LOLR policy requires a careful modeling of the structure of the interbank market and of the closure policy. In our set up, the results depend upon the existence of moral hazard. If the main source of moral hazard is the banks' lack of incentives to screen loans, then the LOLR may have to intervene to improve the eﬃciency of an unsecured interbank market; if instead, the main source of moral hazard is loans monitoring, then the interbank market should be secured and the LOLR should never intervene. JEL Classification: E58, G28 (This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)
Image Acquisition Stage 2 : Anchoring Stage 1 : Mesh Reconstruction Stage 4 : Mesh Propagation Stage 3 : Image-Space Tracking Stage

We present a new technique for passive and markerless facial performance capture based on anchor frames. Our method starts with high resolution per-frame geometry acquisition using state-of-theart stereo reconstruction, and proceeds to establish a single triangle mesh that is propagated through the entire performance. Leveraging the fact that facial performances often contain repetitive subsequences, we identify anchor frames as those which contain similar facial expressions to a manually chosen reference expression. Anchor frames are automatically computed over one or even multiple performances. We introduce a robust image-space tracking method that computes pixel matches directly from the reference frame to all anchor frames, and thereby to the remaining frames in the sequence via sequential matching. This allows us to propagate one reconstructed frame to an entire sequence in parallel, in contrast to previous sequential methods. Our anchored reconstruction approach also limits tracker drift and robustly handles occlusions and motion blur. The parallel tracking and mesh propagation offer low computation times. Our technique will even automatically match anchor frames across different sequences captured on different occasions, propagating a single mesh to all performances. CR Categories: I.3. 3 [COMPUTER GRAPHICS]: Picture/Image Generation—Digitizing and scanning; I.3. 5 [COMPUTER GRAPHICS]: Computational Geometry and Object Modeling—Geometric algorithms, languages, and systems;
Update to Limits to Growth: Comparing the World3 Model With Empirical Data

We conducted a data comparison between scenarios from the 2004 Limits to Growth (LtG) book and empirical data. The scenarios ran on the latest version of the system dynamics model World3-03, which had not before been evaluated in this way. Our research benefitted from improved data availability, and included a scenario and two variables that had not been part of previous quantitative LtG analysis. Sourcing data from various organizations, including the World Bank and the United Nations, we plotted observed data along with four LtG scenarios spanning a range of assumptions on technological developments, the amount of natural resources, and societal priorities. From these graphs and two quantitative accuracy measures we constructed, we found that the four World3-03 scenarios align closely with observed global data. The two scenarios that showed the closest alignment indicate a decline in food productivity, industrial capital, and human welfare levels within three decades. Our results are inconclusive as to
Living in the shadow of the large dams : long term responses of downstream and lakeside communities of Ghana's Volta River Project

Studies of populations affected by large dams are usually about physically displaced and resettled communities. This book on the Volta River Project breaks with the mould and tackles the long term environmental and socio-economic impacts of the Akosombo and Kpong Dams and the livelihood responses of two neglected groups- downstream and lakeside communities. In a detailed study which takes a gendered political economy of livelihoods approach, the book examines livelihoods in downstream and lakeside communities from a historical perspective. The study takes into account the contribution of factors, such as the environmental restructuring of the Lower Volta and the exodus of its most economically active population to the Volta Lake, the state's neglect of affected communities, the changing economic and social context of Ghana, and social relations of class, gender and kinship (including inter-generational relations) to livelihood trajectories and outcomes.