Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Kinetics of nonexchangeable‐potassium release and plant response in some calcareous soils

Nonexchangeable K + constitutes a slowly available reserve that may significantly influence K + fertility of soils. Laboratory and greenhouse experiments were conducted to characterize the K + supply and nonexchangeable K + -release kinetics in 10 calcareous soils using 0.01 M CaCl 2 and 0.01 M oxalic acid extractions. Total K + uptake by wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) grown in the greenhouse was used to measure plant-available K + . The release of K + was characterized by an initial fast rate followed by a slower rate. The nonlinear relationship in the early stages of the K + release may be attributed to the edge sites, and release of K + from interlayer exchange sites may be responsible for the second part of the K + release. Kinetics of K + release was described best with power function, which showed the best fit of the four models tested. Parameters of kinetics models in 0.01 M CaCl 2 were significantly related to K + uptake by wheat. Potassium release was also correlated to initial NH 4 OAc-extratable K + and to HNO 3 -extractable K + .
Protective role of Camel's Milk Against Paracetamol Induced Hepatotoxicity in Male Rats

This study was undertaken to examine the effect of camel's milk against paracetamol induced toxicity in male rats. Eighteen white male rats were used, these animals were divided into three groups each group contain six animals as a following: First group I is the control group treated with normal saline for seven days, second group II treated intraperitoneally with paracetamol (1 ml/ kg) at the first day and fourth day of the experimental 7 days, third group III treated intraperitoneally with paracetamol (1 ml/ kg ) at the first day and the fourth day of the experimental 7 days, and then treated orally with camel's milk for seven days. The result indicate that the paracetamol caused a significant increased (p < 0.05) in the level of the serum glutamate pyruvate transaminase (SGOT), serum glutamate oxaloacetate transaminase (SGPT), alkaline phosphate (ALP), cholesterol, and triglyceride levels. Also, there was a significant decreased in albumin, while there was a non significant decreased in total protein and globulin levels compared with the control group. Protective activity of camel's milk against toxicity of paracetamol observed in decreasing of SGOT, SGPT, ALP, cholesterol, and triglyceride levels, and increased in the total protein and albumin levels.
An Intensive Study of the Size and Composition of Submicron Atmospheric Aerosols at a Rural Site in Ontario, Canada

Atmospheric sampling was conducted at a rural site near Egbert, about 70 km north of Toronto, Ontario, Canada from March 27 to May 8, 2003 to characterize the physical and chemical properties of the ambient aerosol in near real-time. The instrumentation included a tapered element oscillating microbalance (TEOM), an ultrafine condensation particle counter (UCPC), a scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS), an aerodynamic particle sizer (APS), an aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS), and a particulate nitrate monitor (R&P 8400N) for aerosol measurements. Gas-phase non-methane hydrocarbon compounds (NMHCs) were measured by gas chromatograph-flame ionization detection (GC-FID). Filter samples were also collected for analysis of inorganic ions by ion chromatography (IC). Aerosol properties varied considerably depending upon meteorological conditions and airmass histories. For example, urban and industrial emissions advected from the south strongly influenced the site occasionally, resulting in higher particulate mass with the higher fractions of nitrate and organics. Cleaner northwesterly winds carried aerosols with relatively higher fractions of organics and sulfate. The AMS derived mass size distributions showed that the inorganic species in the particles with vacuum aerodynamic diameters between about 60 nm and 600 nm had mass modal vacuum aerodynamic diameters around 400–500 nm. The particulate organics often exhibited two modes at about 100 nm and 425 nm, more noticeable during fresh pollution events. The small organic mode was well correlated with gas-phase nonmethane hydrocarbons such as ethylbenzene, toluene, and propene, suggesting that the likely sources of small organic particles were combustion related emissions. The particulate nitrate exhibited a diurnal variation with higher concentrations during dark hours and minima in the afternoon. Particulate sulfate and organics showed evidence of photochemical processing with higher levels of sulfate and oxygenated organics in the afternoon. Reasonable agreement among all of the co-located measurements is found, provided the upper size limit of the AMS is considered.
Ultrafine nanoporous gold by low-temperature dealloying and kinetics of nanopore formation

A low-temperature dealloying technique was developed to tailor the characteristic length scale of nanoporous gold for advanced functional applications. By systematically investigating the kinetics of nanopore formation during free corrosion, the authors experimentally demonstrated that the dealloying process is controlled by the diffusion of gold atoms at alloy/electrolyte interfaces, which strongly relies on the reaction temperatures. Low dealloying temperatures significantly reduce the interfacial diffusivity of gold atoms and result in an ultrafine nanoporous structure that has been proved to be useful with improved chemical and physical properties.
Pyrite Framboids as Biomarkers for Iron-Sulfur Systems

The role of microorganisms in the formation of pyrite framboids has been suggested, but remains unresolved. We identified subsurface habitats from a sulfidic aquifer present in carbonate rock in Romania, where abundant pyrite framboids were found associated with microbial mats. Three types of subsurface microbial communities were studied: submerged mats overlaying clay-rich sediments, floating mats developed at the water-gas (sulfide/carbon dioxide) interface, and detrital FeS-rich sediments associated with floating microbial mats. All three habitats are anoxic, low temperature, low salinity, saturated with bicarbonate, and contain hydrogen sulfide, thiosulphate, and elemental sulfur. Sulfur stable isotope fractionation suggests that pyrite framboids from the floating microbial mats have a biogenic origin. Pyrite framboids characteristics, such as nucleation, growth, and spheroidicity, depend on conditions within the microbial mats and the inheritance of shape during the replacement of spheroidal greigite. We hypothesize that biogenic pyrite is formed in these microbial communities via a sulfide/ferrous iron pyritization mechanism. Some of the signatures of this type of biogenic pyritization are a similarity in size distribution between FeS spheroids and FeS2 framboids, the presence of microorganisms using sulfide and ferrous iron as a source of energy, reversed iron sulfide bilayers, a narrow size distribution of the pyrite framboids, a small numbers of large microcrystallites within the framboids, a S-fractionation up to 11.14 between H2S and FeS and up to 16.24 between H2S and FeS2. These signatures are relevant for the study of the biologically controlled pyritization and thus they are valuable tools for geomicrobiology, paleo-microbiology and exobiology.
Physical properties of bay laurel seeds.

A b s t r a c t. The physical properties of bay laurel seeds were determined at different moisture levels. As the moisture content increased, the major, intermediate and minor diameters increased linearly. The sphericity, surface area, true and bulk densities and the angle of repose increased, whereas porosity decreased with increasing moisture content. The coefficients of static and dynamic friction were the highest for galvanized steel, followed by chromium sheet, aluminium sheet and PVC, respectively. K e y w o r d s: bay laurel, physical properties
Validation of engine combustion models against detailed in-cylinder optical diagnostics data for a heavy-duty compression-ignition engine

Abstract Three different approaches for modelling in-cylinder compression-ignition engine processes for partially premixed combustion modes are compared with experimentally observed cylinder pressure and in-cylinder images of liquid- and vapour-fuel penetration, ignition, combustion, and soot formation in an optically accessible heavy-duty direct injection engine. A multi-dimensional computational fluid dynamics model for engine combustion, KIVA-3V, served as a common platform into which three different combustion submodels were integrated: (1) characteristic time combustion (KIVA-CTC); (2) representative interactive flamelet (KIVA-RIF); and (3) direct integration using detailed chemistry (KIVA-CHEMKIN). Three different engine operating strategies with significant premixing of fuel and air prior to ignition were investigated: Low-temperature combustion achieved by charge dilution, with fuel injection either (1) early, or (2) late in the engine cycle, and (3) long ignition delay, high-temperature combustion (i.e. no charge dilution) with fuel injection near top dead centre of the piston stroke. Comparison of simulated cylinder pressure and heat-release rates with the experimental results shows that all the combustion submodels predict the cylinder pressures and heat-release rates reasonably well, but predictions of in-cylinder phenomena were significantly different among the submodels. The KIVA-CHEMKIN submodel predictions agree best with experimental observations of the location of ignition sites and the spatial distribution of soot and OH. The KIVA-RIF model, which uses global quantities to account for turbulence-chemistry interactions, under-predicts the flame lift-off, while ignition sites and species distributions are broader than observed experimentally. The KIVA-CTC submodel greatly over-predicts the spatial extent and total amount of in-cylinder soot.
In search of 'project chemistry'

The paper aims to provide a language and a conceptual toolkit to deepen our understanding of the impact of relational and social issues on the success of construction projects. Building on several streams of literature, as well as on individual and group interviews with construction practitioners, the paper develops the notion of ‘project chemistry’ as a way of capturing some of the relational and behavioural dimensions and factors that may affect project success and effectiveness in construction. The paper introduces a provisional theoretical framework that (a) identifies a number of external and project level determinants of ‘project chemistry’, (b) suggests ways of measuring how and how well people interact, perceive, and work together in a project, and (c) relates these issues to broader economic and technical factors. The paper concludes with some reflections on the implications and challenges for future research and management practices raised by the notion of ‘project chemistry’.
Role of calcium-enriched mixture in endodontics

Calcium-enriched mixture (CEM) has been recently introduced as a hydrophilic tooth-colored cement. The CEM cement powder is composed of calcium oxide, calcium sulfate, phosphorus oxide, and silica as major elements. CEM is alkaline cement (pH~11) that releases calcium hydroxide (CH) during and after setting. The physical properties of CEM, such as flow, film thickness, and primary setting time are favorable. This cement is biocompatible and induces formation of cementum, dentin, bone and periodontal tissues. This novel cement has an antibacterial effect comparable to CH and superior to mineral trioxide aggregate (MTA) and sealing ability similar to MTA. Its clinical applications include pulp capping, pulpotomy, root-end filling and perforation repair. This review describes the composition, properties and clinical applications of CEM in endodontics.
Nutritional levels for anthurium : Young versus mature leaves

Abstract Sampling the most recently mature leaf of anthurium (Anthurium andraeanum Lind.), subtending a 3/4‐mature flower, has been the leaf selected for plant analysis evaluation. In order to determine the validity of selecting the most recently matured leaf as the standard for analysis, nutritional levels of the most recently matured leaf verses a younger leaf, within ten days of maturity and prior to forming a suberized covering, were compared over an eight‐year period. Leaf samples were selected from four cultivars ('Kozohara’, ‘Kaumana’, ‘Ozaki’, and ‘Nitta Orange') and analyzed for their nitrogen (N), potassium (K), phosphorus (P), calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), boron (B), iron (Fe), manganese (Mn), copper (Cu), molybdenum (Mo), and zinc (Zn) contents. Mean tissue levels of the macroelements N, P, K, Ca, and to a lesser extent Mg were consistantly higher in the younger leaves for all four cultivars analyzed. Comparatively lower macronutrient and some micronutrient levels in mature leaves (subtending .
I Can See It in Your Eyes: Gaze as an Implicit Cue of Uncanniness and Task Performance in Repeated Interactions With Robots

Over the past years, extensive research has been dedicated to developing robust platforms and data-driven dialog models to support long-term human-robot interactions. However, little is known about how people's perception of robots and engagement with them develop over time and how these can be accurately assessed through implicit and continuous measurement techniques. In this paper, we explore this by involving participants in three interaction sessions with multiple days of zero exposure in between. Each session consists of a joint task with a robot as well as two short social chats with it before and after the task. We measure participants' gaze patterns with a wearable eye-tracker and gauge their perception of the robot and engagement with it and the joint task using questionnaires. Results disclose that aversion of gaze in a social chat is an indicator of a robot's uncanniness and that the more people gaze at the robot in a joint task, the worse they perform. In contrast with most HRI literature, our results show that gaze toward an object of shared attention, rather than gaze toward a robotic partner, is the most meaningful predictor of engagement in a joint task. Furthermore, the analyses of gaze patterns in repeated interactions disclose that people's mutual gaze in a social chat develops congruently with their perceptions of the robot over time. These are key findings for the HRI community as they entail that gaze behavior can be used as an implicit measure of people's perception of robots in a social chat and of their engagement and task performance in a joint task.
Determination of Cotinine, 3′-Hydroxycotinine, and Their Glucuronides in Urine by Ultra-high Performance Liquid Chromatography

The measurement of the primary nicotine metabolites, cotinine and trans-3′-hydroxycotinine, is a useful biomarker of nicotine exposure and metabolism genetics for smoking cessation research. Herein is described an ultra-high performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry method for the determination of these primary nicotine metabolites in urine. Urine samples were diluted one hundred-fold with water and introduced into an ultra-high performance liquid chromatography triple quadrupole mass spectrometer using positive ion electrospray ionization with multiple reaction monitoring. Levels of urinary nicotine metabolites: cotinine, trans-3′-hydroxycotinine, and their respective glucuronides were determined directly using deuterated internal standards and compared with indirect determination by enzymatic hydrolysis. The assay was applied to a community sample of smokers’ urine (n = 280). The assay demonstrated satisfactory performance (relative standard deviation of 1.6–6.5 percent at the 1000 nanograms per milliliter level and >98 percent recovery) suitable for application to smoking studies with a run time less than five minutes. The mean (min-max) levels of cotinine and cotinine-glucuronide were 968 (31-3831) and 976 (9-5607) nanograms per milliliter. The mean (min-max) levels of trans-3′-hydroxycotinine and trans-3′-hydroxycotinine-glucuronide were 3529 (13-21337) and 722 (0-4633) nanograms per milliliter. Direct determination of glucuronide metabolites was superior to indirect measurement using enzymatic hydrolysis, where there was evidence of loss of metabolites during sample preparation. A sensitive and selective ultra-high performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry assay was successfully developed for the determination of cotinine, trans-3′-hydroxycotinine, and their glucuronides in urine. The rapid and simple sample preparation makes this assay suitable for high throughput studies involving nicotine metabolism phenotype for both cytochrome P450 2A6 and uridine 5′-diphospho-glucuronosyltransferase, smoking prevalence, and cessation studies.
Evaluation of the effects of bovine demineralized bone matrix and coralline hydroxyapatite on radial fracture healing in rabbit

Stimulating bone production may be applied to the management of fractures, non-unions, and osteomyelitis. Hydroxyapatite is compatible and osteoconductive for bone regeneration. This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of osteoinductive activity of xenogenic demineralized bone matrix (DBM) in combination with osteoconductive hydroxyapatite (HA) in osseous location. Twenty four adult New Zealand white rabbits (male, weight: 2.5 to 3.0 kg) were randomly divided into four groups. All rabbits were anesthetized with intramuscular administration of ketamin and xylazine. After preparing the operation site, the right radius was exposed, and a full thickness 5 mm defect was created in the mid-diaphyseal region. The defects were filled with DBM and hydroxyapatite in Group I, DBM in Group II, hydroxyapatite in Group III and Group IV was considered as a control group. The formation and healing of bone were determined by histological and mechanical analysis during 8 weeks. Implantation of combination of DBM and hydroxyapatite yielded significant (p < 0.05) bone formation resulting in histological, and mechanical evidence of union compared to other groups. The second group which received DBM showed better bone healing compared to the third group. No instances of union were observed in the hydroxyapatite and control groups. Our results suggest that bovine DBM may be more useful in combination with hydroxyapatite as a therapeutic adjuvant in clinical situations when local formation of bone is needed. Key words: Demineralized bone matrix, coralline hydroxyapatite, bone healing, rabbit.
Effects of coarse-fragment content and size on soil erosion under simulated rainfall

Farmers have long considered coarse fragments a hindrance in potato production. Rock picking or crushing has become a routine operation. Using simulated rainfall events and runoff-erosion plots (1 m × 1 m), the effects of coarse-fragment content (0, 7, 15 and 25% by volume) and size (1.0–1.9, 1.9–5.1 and 5.1–7.6-cm diam) on runoff, infiltration and soil loss were evaluated on an Orthic Dystric Brunisol. Study objectives were to quantify the influence of coarse fragments on soil erosion and to convert these relationships into mathematical equations for use with existing models to predict soil loss. Although there were only marginal increases in infiltration and reductions in runoff attributable to increasing content and size of coarse fragments, the rate of soil loss from the control was higher than that from all other treatments. In general, the rate of soil loss decreased with increasing content and size of coarse fragments. The effects of content and size of coarse fragments on soil-loss reduction, eith.
Spectral Characterisation of Dairy Products Using Photon Time-of-Flight Spectroscopy

In this paper, we present, for the first time, the absorption and reduced scattering spectra of commercially available milk and yoghurt products, obtained using photon-time-of-flight spectroscopy. The ability of this technique to separate the contributions from absorption and scattering in the sample provides important information on the chemical composition and micro-structural properties, which are not available with the traditional techniques used in dairy production. The instrument operates in the spectral range from 500 nm to 1030 nm. The reduced scattering coefficient varies from 5 cm−1 for milk with 0.1% fat in the near infrared range, to 60 cm−1 for yoghurt with 3.0% fat in the green wavelength regime. The absorption is within the range of 0.05–0.5cm−1, with only small variation in the absolute value between products. Our results show that the reduced scattering clearly distinguishes milk and yoghurt with the same fat content and can offer a reliable way of monitoring structural formation during milk fermentation.
Application of an Ion‐Packing Model Based on Defect Clusters to Zirconia Solid Solutions: II, Applicability of Vegard's Law

This paper reports that lattice parameter data of cubic phases and cube roots of unit-cell volumes of tetragonal phases in homogeneous ZrO{sub 2}-containing solid solutions were compiled to examine the validity of Vegard's law. Except for ZrO{sub 2}--CeO{sub 2} and ZrO{sub 2}--UO{sub 2} systems, the data for cubic phases were expressed by the equation d = a,X + B, where d, a{sub s}, X, and b denote the lattice parameter, a constant depending on dopant species, the dopant content, and a constant independent of dopant species, respectively. For tetragonal phases, the cube roots of unit-cell volumes could be fitted by a similar equation except for the data in the ZrO{sub 2}--MO{sub 2} systems (M = Ge and U). The constant a{sub s} was calculated using an ion-packing model and was independent of the defect cluster models. The calculated a{sub s} is close to the experimentally observed one, although the former is slightly smaller than the latter in the ZrO{sub 2}--MO{sub u} systems (u = 1 and 1.5). This difference was ascribed to the lack of consideration of the ionic distortions from the ideal sites of the fluorite-type structure.
Structural studies of GaN1-x Asx and GaN1-x Bix alloys for solar cell applications

We have discovered materials with a wide tunability of the band gap that opens the possibility to achieve a desirable material for multi-junction solar cells. Two different alloy systems have been studied. GaN1-xAsx alloys over the entire composition range were grown by plasma-assisted MBE at low temperature on crystalline and amorphous (glass) substrates. For growth on sapphire the alloys are amorphous in the composition range of 0.17<x<0.75, but for growth on glass the composition range for amorphous alloys extends to x∼0.1. The bandgap of the GaN1-xAsx alloys ranges from 3.4-0.7 eV, covering a large part of the solar spectrum, therefore this material is potentially useful for solar energy conversion. The substitution of N by Bi in GaN forming GaN1-x Bix is extremely difficult since Bi and N have even larger differences in size and electronegativity. TEM studies of GaN1-xBix with x up to 0.2 show that the alloy is not entirely amorphous. Small crystallites embedded in an amorphous matrix are observed and Bi segregation was confirmed by Electron Energy Loss studies. A strong reduction in band gap is observed in samples with increasing Bi, suggesting the formation of a random alloy but low energy absorption tail may be related to the presence of the crystallites observed by TEM (© 2012 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)