Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
RADseq Data Suggest Occasional Hybridization between Microcebus murinus and M. ravelobensis in Northwestern Madagascar

The occurrence of natural hybridization has been reported in a wide range of organisms, including primates. The present study focuses on the endemic lemurs of Madagascar, primates for which only a few species occur in sympatry or parapatry with congeners, thereby creating limited opportunity for natural hybridization. This study examines RADseq data from 480 individuals to investigate whether the recent expansion of Microcebus murinus towards the northwest and subsequent secondary contact with Microcebus ravelobensis has resulted in the occurrence of hybridization between the two species. Admixture analysis identified one individual with 26% of nuclear admixture, which may correspond to an F2- or F3-hybrid. A composite-likelihood approach was subsequently used to test the fit of alternative phylogeographic scenarios to the genomic data and to date introgression. The simulations yielded support for low levels of gene flow (2Nm0 = 0.063) between the two species starting before the Last Glacial Maximum (between 54 and 142 kyr). Since M. murinus most likely colonized northwestern Madagascar during the Late Pleistocene, the rather recent secondary contact with M. ravelobensis has likely created the opportunity for occasional hybridization. Although reproductive isolation between these distantly related congeners is not complete, it is effective in maintaining species boundaries.
Carry-Over of Zearalenone and Its Metabolites to Intestinal Tissues and the Expression of CYP1A1 and GSTπ1 in the Colon of Gilts before Puberty

The objective of this study was to evaluate whether low doses of zearalenone (ZEN) affect the carry-over of ZEN and its metabolites to intestinal tissues and the expression of CYP1A1 and GSTπ1 in the large intestine. Prepubertal gilts (with a BW of up to 14.5 kg) were exposed in group ZEN to daily ZEN5 doses of 5 μg/kg BW (n = 15); in group ZEN10, 10 μg/kg BW (n = 15); in group ZEN15, 15 μg/kg BW (n = 15); or were administered a placebo (group C, n = 15) throughout the experiment. After euthanasia, tissues were sampled on exposure days 7, 21, and 42 (D1, D2, and D3, respectively). The results confirmed that the administered ZEN doses (LOAEL, NOAEL, and MABEL) were appropriate to reliably assess the carry-over of ZEN. Based on the observations made during 42 days of exposure to pure ZEN, it can be hypothesized that all mycotoxins (ZEN, α-zearalenol, and β-zearalenol) contribute to a balance between intestinal cells and the expression of selected genes encoding enzymes that participate in biotransformation processes in the large intestine; modulate feminization processes in prepubertal gilts; and elicit flexible, adaptive responses of the macroorganism to mycotoxin exposure at the analyzed doses.
Smart Steerable Biomedical Catheter by Femtosecond Laser Micropatterning of Polypyrrole Actuator and 3D Fibre-Optic Shape Sensor

Smart Steerable Biomedical Catheter by Femtosecond Laser Micropatterning of Polypyrrole Actuator and 3D Fibre-Optic Shape Sensor Kenneth Kuei-Ching Lee Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Department of The Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering University of Toronto 2015 Femtosecond laser processing was applied to enhance microactuators and enable optical sensing and thereby advance the development of smart steerable biomedical catheters. The advantages of ultrafast direct laser ablation were exploited to enhance the strain bending response of polypyrrole (PPy), a conjugated conducting polymer, by surface texturing hexagonal arrays of micron-sized holes. These microstructures overcame the ion diffusion rate-limited actuation mechanism in thick actuators that was necessary for maximum catheter bending force. Secondly, three-dimensional (3D) femtosecond direct laser writing of optical components in a single coreless optical fibre was developed to provide a temperature-compensated fibre-optic 3D shape sensor. An appropriate design is presented for in vivo catheter shape sensing to provide positional and azimuthal feedback without fluoroscopy. Polypyrrole exhibits large electrochemical strain with low driving voltage that is suitable for steerable catheter designs. However, a major limitation towards application development is PPy’s slow speed of electrochemical actuation, which is proportional to the longest ion diffusion path to the polymer’s inner volume. Ablative laser microstructuring was investigated as means to shorten such diffusion path, and, in turn, increase the actuation rate. Numerous combinations of design variables including the hole diameter,
A traditional ground-based system for woody biomass harvesting in Short Rotation Woody Crop (SRWC) plantations – a case study in Michigan

ABSTRACT Reconfigured forage harvesting equipment utilized for plantation biomass harvesting and processing is highly productive but is expensive and not yet widely used in short rotation woody crop (SRWC) production systems. Traditional timber harvesting equipment, on the other hand, has been widely used for decades and can be adapted for use in SRWC plantations. Productivity of these traditional systems is not well understood when utilized in such plantations. To that end, productivity and costs were evaluated for a traditional ground-based system (feller-buncher, skidder, loader, and grinder) in a 3.1-ha small-diameter hybrid poplar plantation in Escanaba, Michigan, USA. Operation cycle time predictive models were developed from a time and motion analysis. Operation productivity and costs were generated and then compared with published data for a reconfigured forage harvesting system. Compared values between the two systems included: machine hourly rate, in dollars per scheduled machine hour ($/SMH), the production cost, in dollars per oven dry ton ($/ODT), and the system production rate, in oven dry tons per productive machine hour (ODT/PMH). The machine hourly rate and production cost of the traditional system were found to be $284.00/SMH, and $22.30/ODT, respectively; while the production rate was found to be variably between 8.82–35.44 ODT/PMH. A sensitivity analysis was conducted on the traditional harvesting system to test the effect of machine utilization on production costs, where an equal utilization rate of 80% dropped production costs to $17.92/ODT. A net energy analysis was also conducted, demonstrating a net energy ratio of 24.8:1 for the traditional system.
Stable Subgraph Isomorphism Search in Temporal Networks

In this paper, we study a new problem of seeking stable subgraph isomorphisms for a query graph in a temporal graph. To solve our problem, we first develop a pruning-based search algorithm using several new pruning tricks to prune the unpromising matching results during the search procedure. To further improve the efficiency, we propose a novel index structure called <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">${{\mathsf {BCCIndex}}}$</tex-math><alternatives><mml:math><mml:mi mathvariant="sans-serif">BCCIndex</mml:mi></mml:math><inline-graphic xlink:href="wang-ieq1-3175800.gif"/></alternatives></inline-formula>, based on an idea of bi-connected component decomposition of the query graph, which can efficiently support the stable subgraph isomorphism search. Equipped with the <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">${{\mathsf {BCCIndex}}}$</tex-math><alternatives><mml:math><mml:mi mathvariant="sans-serif">BCCIndex</mml:mi></mml:math><inline-graphic xlink:href="wang-ieq2-3175800.gif"/></alternatives></inline-formula>, we present an efficient query processing algorithm based on a carefully designed tree join technique. We conduct extensive experiments to evaluate our algorithms on four large real-life datasets, and the results demonstrate the efficiency and effectiveness of our algorithms.
Potential Use of Topical Insulin in Chronic Diabetic Wound Healing

Wound healing disturbances that occur in chronic diabetic wounds result in various complications and cause a significant burden. With the increasing prevalence of diabetes mellitus, it is estimated that the numbers of chronic diabetic wounds and their complications will also continue to increase. One of the latest managements using growth factors for chronic diabetic wounds gives satisfactory results, but their use is still limited because of the high costs. This study aims to explore the effectiveness of using topical insulin as a cheaper and effective alternative therapy in chronic diabetic wounds. The method of this study is a literature review sourced from Google Scholar and ProQuest search engine. Eight articles were obtained that are relevant to be discussed in this study. According to studies conducted so far, topical insulin can improve wound healing through the modulation of inflammation and insulin signaling pathways. In conclusion, there is improved wound healing in diabetic chronic wounds patients that were given topical insulin. Therefore topical insulin should be considered as part of chronic diabetic wounds management. Keywords: wound healing; chronic diabetic wounds; growth factors; topical insulin
THE USE OF SOME NON-CONVENTIONAL PROTEIN SOURCES FOR FATTENING CATTLE

A thesis submitted to the post gradates school, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria- Nigeria. In partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Department of Animal Science Ahmadu Bello University Samaru- Zaria Nigeria NOVEMBER, 2005.
Traffic State Prediction Using One-Dimensional Convolution Neural Networks and Long Short-Term Memory

Traffic prediction is a vitally important keystone of an intelligent transportation system (ITS). It aims to improve travel route selection, reduce overall carbon emissions, mitigate congestion, and enhance safety. However, efficiently modelling traffic flow is challenging due to its dynamic and non-linear behaviour. With the availability of a vast number of data samples, deep neural network-based models are best suited to solve these challenges. However, conventional network-based models lack robustness and accuracy because of their incapability to capture traffic’s spatial and temporal correlations. Besides, they usually require data from adjacent roads to achieve accurate predictions. Hence, this article presents a one-dimensional (1D) convolution neural network (CNN) and long short-term memory (LSTM)-based traffic state prediction model, which was evaluated using the Zenodo and PeMS datasets. The model used three stacked layers of 1D CNN, and LSTM with a logarithmic hyperbolic cosine loss function. The 1D CNN layers extract the features from the data, and the goodness of the LSTM is used to remember the past events to leverage them for the learnt features for traffic state prediction. A comparative performance analysis of the proposed model against support vector regression, standard LSTM, gated recurrent units (GRUs), and CNN and GRU-based models under the same conditions is also presented. The results demonstrate very encouraging performance of the proposed model, improving the mean absolute error, root mean squared error, mean percentage absolute error, and coefficient of determination scores by a mean of 16.97%, 52.1%, 54.15%, and 7.87%, respectively, relative to the baselines under comparison.
Genetic Divergence In Baby Corn (Zea Mays L.)

A field experiment was conducted with 80 genotypes in three replications in randomized block design at College Farm, College of Agriculture, ANGRAU, Rajendranagar during Kharif 2011-2012. The data on baby corn yield and other traits were results indicated that the varieties were distributed in eight clusters of which cluster VI had maximum intra- cluster distance (3.09) followed by cluster III (3.01) cluster I (2.99) and cluster V (2.85) and remaining clusters are having minimum cluster distances with the zero. The inter- cluster distance ranged from 2.32 (clusters V and IV) to 9.32 (clusters VII and VI). Among the clusters variations were planted height, ear height, baby corn length, cob weight, number of cobs per plant, cob yield per plant, cob yield and green fodder yield. The contribution of each character towards total genetic diversity. In that out of 13 characters plant height (42.31%), ear height (16.84%), baby corn length (17.22%) and cob yield (7.97) contributed high for divergence.
Determining Pre-Service Teachers’ Astronomy-Related Self-Efficacy Belief Levels

This study aims to reveal the astronomy-related self-efficacy beliefs of pre-service teachers studying science education, primary school education, and social studies education programmes. The study is conducted using the survey design, a quantitative research method. The study sample consists of 322 pre-service teachers in their third or fourth year of a science education, primary school education, or social studies education programme at a university in Turkey’s Central Anatolia Region during the 2016 fall semester. The Astronomy Teaching Self-Efficacy Belief Scale developed by Güneş was used as the data collection tool. SPSS 22 was used to analyse the data, and the analyses benefited from descriptive and inferential statistics. Based on the findings, the pre-service teachers’ total scores for astronomy self-efficacy showed no significant difference in terms of certain variables (i.e., gender, age, year, and having taken a previous astronomy course). However, significant differences were found regarding self-efficacy scores in terms of the programme and having taken part in astronomy and sky-gazing activity. Concerning the obtained results, the following suggestions can be made: pre-service teachers should be actively involved during the astronomy course, and their classroom management experiences should be promoted to improve their astronomy self-efficacy belief levels.
Modeling and design of high force RFMEMS contact switches

This thesis describes the modeling and design issues of high force electrostatically actuated RFMEMS contact switches. Various reliability issues and challenges are associated with the design of RFMEMS contact switches. The reliability of microcontacts is of major importance in increasing the lifetime of such devices. A semi-analytical model based on the beam deflection theory is developed to calculate the contact force delivered by parallel-plate electrostatically actuated switch structures. The model is capable of fast and accurate static solution for complicated switch structures which are normally analyzed using finite element analysis techniques. High force designs are presented together with finite element simulations confirming the model results and reflecting on the reliability of these switch structures. The RF performance is expected to be comparable to recently announced commercial counterpart specifications. A simple all-metal surface micromachining technology providing thick electroplated nickel beams will be used to implement high force switch structures.
Harnessing the digital economy for developing countries

This report makes a call for why the digital economy matters for developing countries and what they need to consider when developing a national digital strategy. The world is undergoing a digital revolution with significant implications for global economies and livelihoods. This revolution is predicated on the ever-increasing pace of technological innovation and diffusion. Digital technologies and their attendant applications are reshaping whole domains of human activity, and are spreading across the world faster than previous waves of technological innovation. The digital revolution is thus too important for any country to overlook. As outlined in Section II, the digital economy can be harnessed for inclusive and sustainable growth: digital technologies make life easier for citizens and consumers, raise the productivity of workers and firms, and help governments extend key services to those who need them most. However, this does not just happen randomly: governments must engage in strategic planning to maximise the development impact of digitalisation and ensure that its benefits are evenly distributed. Using the experience of leading economies in the digital space, Section III looks at some of the broad and generic enabling factors that developing countries can develop and use as foundations for their digital economies. The concluding section, Section IV, examines three key lessons developing countries can learn from other countries’ digital experiences. It provides some guiding principles around thinking about how to craft a national digital strategy that builds on top of the enablers of the digital economy.
Mammographic mass recognition using feature reuse and channel attention mechanism

Mass recognition is one of the important steps in early diagnosis for breast cancer. However, one of the major issues in mass recognition is low sensitivity. In this study, a novel convolutional neural network using feature reuse and channel attention mechanism is proposed and evaluated for mass recognition in mammograms. To improve representational power of network, our model takes advantage of two advanced techniques: one is feature reuse for exploiting the potential of the network through directing connections, and the other is the channel attention mechanism for modelling the interdependencies between channels by integrating the channel‐wise information. The performance of our model is evaluated on DDSM and the values of the evaluation are 92.05%, 91.25%, 91.25%, 92.71%, 0.91 and 0.96 in terms of accuracy, precision, sensitivity, specificity, F1_score and AUC, respectively. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed model to mass recognition task in mammograms.
Motivation in Reading Primary Scientific Literature: a questionnaire to assess student purpose and efficacy in reading disciplinary literature

ABSTRACT A growing body of literature shows that Primary Scientific Literature (PSL) is a valuable and useful tool for STEM. Current assessments measuring the success of PSL-based interventions focus mainly on specific scientific content and/or the specific scientific skills students learn. We believe that the underlying motivation students consider while learning to read PSL is equally important to assess. We present ‘Motivation in Reading Primary Scientific Literature,’ a 19 item novel questionnaire based on student purpose for reading PSL and student efficacy for reading PSL. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses (EFA and CFA) were performed on data collected from students enrolled in introductory Biology courses (n = 411 for EFA and n = 325 CFA). Results confirmed 19 items that can be used to measure student motivation in reading PSL through four subscales: (1) expectancy-value, (2) self-efficacy, (3) performance/competence and (4) interest. Preliminary external validity of the Motivation in Reading PSL questionnaire verified differences (p < .05) in students’ motivation between one control and two treatment groups after a one-semester PSL-based intervention. These findings suggest that our questionnaire can be used by instructors who implement PSL-based interventions and would like a more comprehensive understanding of how their students approach reading PSL.
Low-Power Wide-Area Networks: Comparison of LoRaWAN and NB-IoT Performance

Low-power wide-area networks (LPWANs) have become an important enabler for the Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity. Application domains, such as smart cities, smart agriculture, intelligent logistics, and transportation, require communication technologies that combine long transmission ranges and energy efficiency. Recent and future trends make the long-range wide-area network (LoRaWAN) and narrowband-IoT (NB-IoT) the most prospective drivers of the IoT business. In this article, after discussing the main features of the two technologies, we carry out a fair quantitative comparison between the two, investigating different performance indicators, in order to guide designers in the selection of the most appropriate technology, depending on the application requirements.
A fuzzy-based multi-stage quality control under the ISO 9001:2015 requirements

This work focuses on the problem of non conformity (NC) characterisation in quality management systems (QMS) and introduces a fuzzy inference engine (FE) for NC analysis based on multi-stage quality control. The research has a twofold objective: 1) to characterise NCs based on risk analysis principles, 2) to define NC priorities. The FE is implemented according to the main requirements of the new ISO 9001:2015 Standard regarding risk analysis and NC assessment. The methodology was tested within an assembly line of mechanical components, where a number of NCs were detected and classified with respect to multiple features. Within this classification, risk analysis is explored through the use of failure mode effects and criticality analysis (FMECA). A risk criticality index (RCI) is defined and evaluated, which addresses NC criticality and the relative action priorities. [Received 28 January 2016; Revised 25 March 2016; Accepted 24 June 2016]
CSR and CEO’s Moral Reasoning in the Automotive Industry in the Era of COVID-19

This paper assesses whether and to which extent the COVID-19 pandemic, which represents a scenario of high moral intensity, is influencing the moral reasoning of top CEOs (chief executive officers) in the paradigmatic case of the automotive industry and how this moral reasoning relates to their CSR response to the crisis and their CSR plans in the long run. To this end, we took the CEO letters before and after the pandemic outbreak of the top 15 automotive companies, and applied Weber’s method to conduct a moral reasoning categorization, along with an examination of their CSR approach and initiatives. The results show a predominant moral paralysis among these CEOs, where positive reactions addressed are philanthropic in nature and more likely to be a transient response to the crisis, rather than a sustained long-term improvement of their CSR rooted in a significant moral approach enhancement. Furthermore, CEOs at the lowest stages of moral reasoning, primarily focused on their own business and immediate stakeholders, are less likely to highlight these philanthropic initiatives. The outcome evidences the convenience of addressing CSR from the lens of moral reasoning, and it further draws the attention of the scientific community, companies and their top management, stakeholders, and society to the relevance of investigating and considering the moral reasoning of top management in large corporations and its implications.
Family formation trajectories and migration in the United States by the end of the 20th century

Studies often explain differences in family behaviors by migration status by testing four hypotheses: socialization, selection, disruption, and assimilation/adaptation. These hypotheses were initially formulated as competing explanations, but some scholars have argued that they are complementary. Currently, however, this complementary relationship is not well understood. In this article, I draw on intersectionality theory to challenge this hypothesis-based narrative of the relationship between migration and family formation and dissolution trajectories. I use retrospective information on marriages, union dissolutions, and births of men and women from five waves of the National Survey of Family Growth (1995–2015) to construct a six-category typology of family trajectories. This typology divides men and women into groups with similar family formation and dissolution trajectories. I correlate this typology with information on each respondent’s race/ethnicity, educational attainment, place of birth, and age at migration. The exploratory analysis of these correlations underlines the need for approaches that move beyond testing the above-mentioned hypotheses toward nuanced descriptions of the multiple ways in which family formation and migration paths are intertwined, and how these relationships are influenced by gender and social class inequalities.