Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Optimization of Antenna Performance for Global 21-cm Observations and Verification Using Scaled Copies

The sky-averaged cosmological 21 cm signal can improve our understanding of the evolution of the early Universe from the Dark Age to the end of the Epoch of Reionization. Although the EDGES experiment reported an absorption profile of this signal, there have been concerns about the plausibility of these results, motivating independent validation experiments. One of these initiatives is the Mapper of the IGM Spin Temperature (MIST), which is planned to be deployed at different remote locations around the world. One of its key features is that it seeks to comprehensively compensate for systematic uncertainties through detailed modeling and characterization of its different instrumental subsystems, particularly its antenna. Here we propose a novel optimizing scheme which can be used to design an antenna applied to MIST, improving bandwidth, return loss, and beam chromaticity. This new procedure combines the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm with a commercial electromagnetic simulation software (HFSS). We improved the performance of two antenna models: a rectangular blade antenna, similar to the one used in the EDGES experiment, and a trapezoidal bow-tie antenna. Although the performance of both antennas improved after applying our optimization method, we found that our bow-tie model outperforms the blade antenna by achieving lower reflection losses and beam chromaticity in the entire band of interest. To further validate the optimization process, we also built and characterized 1:20 scale models of both antenna types showing an excellent agreement with our simulations.
Predictive nonlinear studies of TAE-induced alpha-particle transport in the Q  =  10 ITER baseline scenario

We use the HAGIS code to compute the nonlinear stability of the Q = 10 ITER baseline scenario to toroidal Alfvén eigenmodes (TAE) and the subsequent effects of these modes on fusion alpha-particle redistribution. Our calculations build upon an earlier linear stability survey (Rodrigues et al 2015 Nucl. Fusion 55 083003) which provides accurate values of bulk ion, impurity ion and electron thermal Landau damping for our HAGIS calculations. Nonlinear calculations of up to 129 coupled TAEs with toroidal mode numbers in the range n = 1–35 have been performed. The effects of frequency sweeping were also included to examine possible phase space hole and clump convective transport. We find that even parity core localised modes are dominant (expected from linear theory), and that linearly stable global modes are destabilised nonlinearly. Landau damping is found to be important in reducing saturation amplitudes of coupled modes to below δBr/B0∼3×10−4. For these amplitudes, stochastic transport of alpha-particles occurs in a narrow region where predominantly core localised modes are found, implying the formation of a transport barrier at r/a≈0.5, beyond which, the weakly driven global modes are found. We find that for flat q profiles in this baseline scenario, alpha particle transport losses and redistribution by TAEs is minimal.
COVID19-ResCapsNet: A Novel Residual Capsule Network for COVID-19 Detection From Chest X-Ray Scans Images

In the global outbreak of corona-virus disease (COVID-19), it is of foremost priority to find an efficient and faster diagnosis method to reduce the transmission rate of the COVID-19 disease. Recently, deep learning-based detection methods have been proposed as a potential diagnostic tool, because there is much essential information in the radio-logical images for COVID-19 detection. This paper intends to develop a hybrid deep neural network (COVID19-ResCapsNet), using the X-ray images, to predict the risk at the onset of disease in patients suffering from COVID-19. The proposed COVID19-ResCapsNet method consists of two steps. The first step is mainly to extract features with the improved Residual feature extraction network. In the final step, several Capsule Networks are employed to classify COVID-19, and Non COVID-19. The proposed method is evaluated on two CXR image datasets(Dataset-1: 4236 images and Dataset-2: 2250 images) and the classification accuracy can reach 0.9988 on Dataset-1 and 0.9933 on Dataset-2 for binary classification cases. The results are compared with several state-of-the-art pre-trained classification models. The effects of two important hyper parameters: different optimizer and batch size, have also been investigated. Hence, the proposed COVID-19 detection model is effective and can be used as the supplementary tool in clinical application.
Extracellular Vesicle Depletion Protocols of Foetal Bovine Serum Influence Umbilical Cord Mesenchymal Stromal Cell Phenotype, Immunomodulation, and Particle Release

The immunomodulatory properties of MSCs can be recreated using their extracellular vesicles (EVs). Yet, the true capabilities of the MSC EVs cannot be distinguished from contaminating bovine EVs and protein derived from supplemental foetal bovine serum (FBS). FBS EV depletion protocols can minimise this, but vary in terms of depletion efficiency, which can negatively impact the cell phenotype. We explore the impact of FBS EV depletion strategies, including ultracentrifugation, ultrafiltration, and serum-free, on umbilical cord MSC characteristics. Whilst a greater depletion efficiency, seen in the ultrafiltration and serum-free strategies, did not impact the MSC markers or viability, the MSCs did become more fibroblastic, had slower proliferation, and showed inferior immunomodulatory capabilities. Upon MSC EV enrichment, more particles, with a greater particle/protein ratio, were isolated upon increasing the FBS depletion efficiency, except for serum-free, which showed a decreased particle number. Whilst all conditions showed the presence of EV-associated markers (CD9, CD63, and CD81), serum-free was shown to represent a higher proportion of these markers when normalised by total protein. Thus, we caution MSC EV researchers on the use of highly efficient EV depletion protocols, showing that it can impact the MSC phenotype, including their immunomodulatory properties, and stress the importance of testing in consideration to downstream objectives.
Electric Scooter Injuries in Tampa, Florida, Are Associated With High Rates of Head Injury, Hospital Admission, and Emergency Medical Service Transport and Low Rates of Helmet Use

Background Standing electric scooters (e-scooters) were introduced in Tampa, Florida, in 2019. We reviewed 292 e-scooter injury cases at the Tampa General Hospital Emergency Department (ED) to determine what insights we could gain. We sought to identify the characteristics of such presentations, including chief complaint (CC), patient age, day of the week, time of day, length of stay, disposition, acuity, and means of arrival to the ED. We were particularly interested in studying the rates of hospital admission, Emergency Medical Service (EMS) transport, emergent acuity presentations, and head injuries. We also sought to identify the prevalence of alcohol use prior to e-scooter accidents and its effect on the above factors. Methodology This was a retrospective chart review and was exempt from the University of South Florida’s Institutional Review Board approval (STUDY004031). Data from routine clinical care in the Tampa General Hospital ED, a Level-1 Trauma Center ED in Tampa, Florida, from July 19, 2019, to May 30, 2022, were collected through an operational report within the business intelligence infrastructure of the hospital’s electronic medical record system. Data from patients with scooter injury-related encounter codes were extracted to an electronic data capture form and deidentified. Narratives were reviewed to exclude uncertain cases (e.g., patients with moped, kick scooter, mobility scooter injuries, etc.) and to flag for alcohol endorsement, altered mental status, helmet usage, and head injuries that were not listed as the CC. CC, means of arrival, acuity, disposition, arrival/departure day of week, and arrival/departure hour were collected. Data analysis was completed using Microsoft Excel version 16.5 (Microsoft Corp., Redmond, WA, USA) and SPSS Statistics version 28.0 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA). Results A total of 292 of 442 collected cases remained after removing irrelevant flags. Overall, 30.8% (n = 90) of patients were between the ages of 21 and 30, and most patients presented on weekends and nights. Moreover, 40.8% (n = 119) suffered head injuries, 40.8% (n = 119) arrived via EMS, 31.5% (n = 92) were admitted to the hospital, and 18.8% (n = 55) were designated as emergent acuity. Apart from the admission rate, these rates were all higher among alcohol endorsers (39, 13.4%) than non-endorsers (253, 86.6%). Only 2.1% of patients endorsed helmet use. Conclusions We found higher rates of hospital admission and EMS transports in our ED than many previous studies in urban areas have reported. Our data suggest that alcohol use increases the risk of more serious e-scooter injuries, characterized by higher acuity, EMS transport rate, and head injuries among alcohol endorsers. These findings are highly relevant due to the rapidly growing e-scooter presence across the United States and may serve to inform hospitals and EMS systems regarding their role in injury management, as well as future policy regarding their safe use.
The lifespan of solutions to semilinear damped wave equations in one space dimension

In the present paper, we consider the initial value problem for semilinear damped wave equations in one space dimension. Wakasugi [7] have obtained an upper bound of the lifespan for the problem only in the subcritical case. On the other hand, D'Abbicco $\&$ Lucente $\&$ Reissig [3] showed a blow-up result in the critical case. The aim of this paper is to give an estimate of the upper bound of the lifespan in the critical case, and show the optimality of the upper bound. Also, we derive an estimate of the lower bound of the lifespan in the subcritical case which shows the optimality of the upper bound in [7]. Moreover, we show that the critical exponent changes when the initial data are odd functions.
Molecular Detection of Fusarium species infected Corn in Kurdistan region-Iraq

Corn or Maize product is regarded as one of the essential products in the world and stands third product after the rice and wheat crops. Different fungal pathogens attack corn plants; one of them is ear rot, brought on by Fusarium species and whose occurrence is primarily influenced by environmental factors. In order to isolate and identify Fusarium species from corn plants and their prevalence, 50 samples of corn were collected during September, October, and November of 2021 from 30 corn fields in 14 regions of different places in the Kurdistan region of Iraq. From all samples, 39 isolates of Fusarium were detected and based on morphological characteristics, six other species of Fusarium were identified, namely F. verticillioides (33.34%), F. proliferatum (25.64%), F. oxysporum (12.82%), F. incarnatum and F. equiseti (10.25% each), then F. fujikuroi (7.7%). The most prevalent species was F. verticillioides which was isolated from seven corn fields and significantly higher than all other isolated species. All Fusarium isolates were also molecularly identified depending on amplifying the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) universal region using forward ITS1 and reverse ITS4 primers and indicated DNA fragments ranged from 550 to 570 bp. The PCR fragments of the amplified ITS region were sequenced, aligned and registered in NCBI GeneBank with specified accession numbers. The phylogenetic tree and all analyzes were performed using the MEGA program version 11.0. 13. The current study concluded that the corn fields in the Kurdistan region are infected with different Fusarium species, and the most common species is F. verticillioides . As well as the Fusarium species in the Kurdistan region have close evolutionary history to the same species in other countries. Thus, the study recommends more research to investigate the occurrence of toxigenic Fusarium species associated with cereal grains in the region.
Satellite-Based Imagery Techniques for Daytime Cloud/Snow Delineation from MODIS.

Abstract This paper presents two multispectral enhancement techniques for distinguishing between regions of cloud and snow cover using optical spectrum passive radiometer satellite observations from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS). Fundamental to the techniques are the 1.6- and 2.2-μm shortwave infrared bands that are useful in distinguishing between absorbing snow cover (having low reflectance) and less absorbing liquid-phase clouds (higher reflectance). The 1.38-μm band helps to overcome ambiguities that arise in the case of optically thin cirrus. Designed to provide straightforward, stand-alone environmental characterization for operational forecasters (e.g., military weather forecasters in the context of mission planning), these products portray the information that is contained within complex scenes as value-added, readily interpretable imagery at the highest available spatial resolution. Their utility in scene characterization and quality control of digital snow maps is dem.
Is hyperuricosuria really a risk factor for calcium oxalate stone formation?

In the seventies of the last century the term hyperuricosuric calcium oxalate (CaOx) urolithiasis has been coined. Allopurinol significantly decreased the recurrence in CaOx stone formers. Nevertheless, the role of hyperuricosuria has been questioned. Other mechanisms could have decreased the risk for recurrence. The underlying mechanisms are not clear. All these studies have been performed with only a limited number of patients. We studied n=2,480 consecutive patients with CaOx stones. For stone analysis, x-ray diffraction was used. The following parameters were examined in all patients: age, sex, body mass index (BMI), arterial blood pressure, stone episodes, diabetes mellitus; blood: creatinine, glucose, uric acid, calcium, sodium and potassium; urine: pH, volume, calcium, uric acid, citrate, ammonia and urea. According to the uric acid excretion (UAE), patients were divided into two groups: 1. UAE > 4 mmol/d (hyperuricosuria), 2. UAE ≤ 4 mmol/d (normouricosuria). We observed significant correlations between UAE and sex, age, BMI, blood pressure, serum values of creatinine, sodium, urine volume, urine levels of calcium, citrate, urea and ammonia as well as serum calcium. No significant correlations were seen to the stone frequency (number of stone episodes), serum potassium and urine pH. In group 1 (n=741), there were 87.2% male and 12.8% female patients; in group 2 (n=1,739), the ratio was 60.6:39.4%. In the hyperuricosuric group, there were significantly more males than in the normouricosuric collective. Hyperuricosuric subjects had a higher BMI, higher blood levels of uric acid and glucose, a higher diuresis, a higher excretion of calcium, urea and ammonium, but a lower excretion of citrate than normouricosuric patients. All the other parameters did not show any significant differences. Especially the number of stone episodes was not different. We concluded that hyperuricosuria went along with many other risk factors for CaOx stone formation, but was not associated with an increased risk for recurrence. Therefore, UAE is not a prognostic marker in CaOx urolithiasis. It is unlikely that hyperuricosuria is a real risk factor for CaOx stone formation and hyperuricosuric CaOx urolithiasis is an own entity.
Development of Gluten-Free Bread Using Teosinte (Dioon mejiae) Flour in Combination with High-Protein Brown Rice Flour and High-Protein White Rice Flour

Gluten-free bread is an important product that is under development using different sources, such as rice and starchy plants. Teosinte seeds are utilized by ethnic groups in Honduras to produce gluten-free flour to prepare traditional baked goods and beverages. The quality of gluten-free products could vary depending on flour properties, such as amylose content, particle size, and water absorption capacity. A good strategy for developing baked goods is to mix different cereal grain sources to optimize their physicochemical properties. As a result, the current study aimed to develop bread from novel flours including teosinte (TF), high-protein brown rice (BRF), and high-protein white rice (WRF). Breads were analyzed for hardness, specific volume, and color utilizing a Simplex-Centroid mixture design coupled with the desirability function. Pasting, and rheological characteristics of the flours, were also analyzed. For flour characteristics, TF addition to BRF or WRF decreased the peak, trough, breakdown, setback, and final viscosities, which would result in a more stable bread and decrease the flow index of rice flour dispersions. BRF and WRF had similar pasting properties, except that BRF had a lower breakdown viscosity. For bread characteristics, TF addition to BRF or WRF increased the specific volume and hardness of the bread compared to rice flour alone. L* of the crust and crumb a* values were increased with greater TF in the mixture, whereas TF decreased the crust a*and b* values and crumb L* values when mixed with BRF or WRF compared to rice flours alone. WRF and BRF were similar in crumb color (L* and a*), except that BRF had greater crumb yellowness (b*). Teosinte flour can be used in combination with rice flour to produce bread with good quality.
Simulation as a tool to improve wave heating in fusion plasmas

Firstly, a brief overview will be given on different models that are able to describe the behaviour of wave propagation as a function of specific frequency ranges. Each range corresponds to different heating systems, namely, 20–100 MHz for the ion cyclotron resonant heating, 2–20 GHz for lower-hybrid heating or current drive, and 100–250 GHz for electron cyclotron resonant heating or current drive systems. The specification of every system will be explained in detail, including the typical set of equations and the assumptions needed to describe the properties of these heating or current drive systems, as well as their specific domains of validity. In these descriptions, special attention will be paid to the boundary conditions. A review of specific physical problems associated with the wave heating systems will also be provided. The review will detail the role of simulation in answering questions that arise from experiments on magnetized plasma devices devoted to fusion. A few examples that will be covered are the impact of edge turbulence on wave propagation and its consequences on heating system performance, the effects of fast particles and ponderomotive effects, among others. A study that is more focused on radio-frequency sheath effects will also be discussed. It shows that such simulations require very sophisticated tools to gain a partial understanding of the observations undertaken in dedicated experiments. To conclude this review, an overview will be given about the requirements and progress necessary to obtain relevant predictive simulation tools able to describe the wave heating systems used in fusion devices.
A Region Based Stereo Matching Algorithm Using Cooperative Optimization

This paper presents a stereo matching algorithm based on inter-regional cooperative optimization.This algorithm uses regions as matching primitives and defines the corresponding region cost functions for matching by utilizing the color statistics of regions and the constraints on smoothness and occlusion between adjacent regions.In order to obtain a more reasonable disparity map,a cooperative optimization procedure is employed to minimize the matching costs of all regions by introducing the cooperative and competitive mechanism between regions.Firstly,a color based segmentation method is used to segment the reference image into regions with homogeneous color.Secondly,a local window-based matching method is used to determine the initial disparity estimates of each image point.And then,a plane fitting technique is applied to obtain the parameters of disparity plane corresponding to each image region.Finally,under a framework of inter-regional cooperative optimization,the disparity plane parameters of all regions are iteratively optimized by a local optimization method until a reasonable disparity map is obtained.The experimental results based on Middlebury test set indicate that the performance of our method is competitive with the best stereo matching algorithms and the disparity maps recovered are close to the ground truth data.
On the Variation of the Effective Breaking Strength in Oceanic Sea Statesa

AbstractA spectral framework for quantifying the geometric/kinematic and dynamic/energetic properties of breaking ocean waves was proposed by Phillips in 1985. Phillips assumed a constant breaking strength coefficient to link the kinematic/geometric breaking crest properties to the associated excess energy and momentum fluxes from the waves to the upper ocean. However, a scale-dependent (spectral) breaking strength coefficient is needed, but is unavailable from measurements. In this paper, the feasibility of a parametric mean effective breaking strength coefficient valid for a wide range of sea states is investigated. All available ocean breaking wave datasets were analyzed and complemented with wave model behavior. Robust evidence is found supporting a single linear parameter relationship between the effective breaking strength and wave age or significant wave steepness. Envisaged applications for the effective breaking strength are described.
Performance of Unslotted ALOHA With Capture and Multiple Collisions in LoRaWAN

This article explores the capacity limits and the tradeoff between the antagonistic means of enabling reliable data delivery in a loaded LoRaWAN cell. In fact, channel attenuation and variability call for robust transmission settings but the associated load increase causes more collisions between frames. In addition to the physical-layer parameters of the LoRa modulation, this article considers the benefits and tuning of interpacket error correction codes (ECCs), which also trade transmission redundancy for reliability. We thus start by proposing a refined packet delivery ratio (PDR) model that improves the ones found in the literature in that, first, it takes into account the dependency between overcoming ambient noise and dominating colliding frames, and second, it considers the sum of interference powers when multiple colliding frames are present, even if the interference preexists. Moreover, the model extends to the case of a gateway with receiver diversity. In a second step, the model allows to set out the level of redundancy at which ECC is the most effective without hindering capacity: a coding rate of one third. When this is fixed, it allows to define the transmission parameters allocation within a cell and thus the size of the cell. We finally develop an ad-hoc Python discrete-event simulator, freely accessible, to complement the model for assessing the effect of inter-SF and near–far interference and to show the benefits of power control in this respect.