Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
How Ethical is Islamic Banking in the Light of the Objectives of Islamic Law

Islamic banking is based on moral foundations that make it distinct from conventional banking. Some argue that because of its foundation in Islam, Islamic banking may represent a more morally appealing alternative. Yet, evidence shows that this is not the case. Indeed, the current practice of Islamic banking has not been able to achieve its goals which are based on Islam's moral values: to enhance justice, equitability, and social well-being. This essay examines the extent to which Islamic banking is ethical and concludes that the practice of the industry does not seem to be de facto ethical from the Islamic perspective of ethical values. It only consists in trading the same instruments of conventional banks without genuinely enforcing Islam's ethical vision. The practice of Islamic banking misrepresents Islam and does not contribute to solving social problems. The interaction between maqasid al-shari᾽a (objectives of Islamic law) and qiyās (deductive analogy) provides a supplementary tool for interpreting the failure of the prior in terms of the practical misuse of the latter by Islamic banks. This essay provides an interpretive approach to the current debate about why Islamic banking has failed and suggests ways to move cautiously in the future.
Spatial-resolved high-speed THz analog-to-digital convertor comprising phase modulated beam steering architecture

We studied and characterized the beam steering effect for THz radiation based on the doubly-corrugated spoofed surface plasmon polariton (DC-SSPP) architecture and analyzed the design of a high-speed THz analog-to-digital converter (ADC). Metal-covered GaAs are used to form both arms of an interferometer, while voltage-controlled, localized carrier concentration provides modulation to the signal propagating phase. Relative phase differences between THz beams in separate arms of the interferometer can give rise to deflected radiation in the far field, which is further converted to a digitized output by a spatially arranged detector array. Applying the beam deflector with a full differential implementation of the input voltage signal and a combination of nonlinear detector arrays with carefully designed gain and saturation power, a 3-bit ADC with > 60 GS/s operation speed and direct digitized readout is demonstrated.
Research and Publication by Communication Faculty in East Africa: A Challenge to the Global Community of Communication Scholars

Abstract Few African scholars publish articles in top journals, present papers at prestigious conferences, or produce monographs that influence the direction of the field of communication as a whole. We explored hindrances to scholarly productivity in East Africa by administering questionnaires to faculty members at five leading communication departments and conducting in-depth interviews with department heads, librarians, and other senior faculty members. Results indicated that an increase in institutional priority on research and publication makes this an opportune juncture for collaboration with the international scholarly community to facilitate research and publication activity by African academics.
An improved Single-Pass clustering algorithm internet-oriented network topic detection

The Single-Pass clustering algorithm, its two main disadvantages are easily affected by the orders of inputs of text and low precision when we use it to process the network text clustering. Through introducing the concept of seeds of topic, the paper proposed an improved Single-Pass clustering algorithm which inherited the main means of Single-Pass clustering algorithm. The experiment results showed that the improved algorithm could not only improve the speed of clustering, but also decrease the probabilities of miss detection, false detection, and the cost of wrong detection. The improved Single-Pass clustering algorithm that has improved the quality of clustering and topic detection both has high practicability and good reference value to the research of analysis for internet public opinion.
Analysis of large-signal and small-signal instabilities in piezoelectric transformers driving cold cathode fluorescent lamps

This paper investigates the behavior of voltage-fed piezoelectric transformers (PTs) driving cold cathode fluorescent lamps (CCFLs). It is shown that the nonlinear equivalent lamp resistance can have a dramatic impact on the overall system performance, causing possible instabilities both at large and small signal level. The effects of the variable load resistance, with a negative small-signal value, are enhanced by the PT, that behaves like a high-Q resonant circuit, and by the presence of the coupling inductor, usually placed between the half-bridge inverter and the PT to ensure zero-voltage commutation of the inverter switches. Such instabilities are investigated considering a constant frequency inverter where the lamp current is controlled by varying the DC-link voltage. SPICE simulations and analytical models are employed to explain the unstable behaviors observed in different experimental prototypes.
Protecting Memory-Performance Critical Sections in Soft Real-Time Applications

Soft real-time applications such as multimedia applications often show bursty memory access patterns---regularly requiring a high memory bandwidth for a short duration of time. Such a period is often critical for timely data processing. Hence, we call it a memory-performance critical section. Unfortunately, in multicore architecture, non-real-time applications on different cores may also demand high memory bandwidth at the same time, which can substantially increase the time spent on the memory performance critical sections. In this paper, we present BWLOCK, user-level APIs and a memory bandwidth control mechanism that can protect such memory performance critical sections of soft real-time applications. BWLOCK provides simple lock like APIs to declare memory-performance critical sections. If an application enters a memory-performance critical section, the memory bandwidth control system then dynamically limit other cores' memory access rates to protect memory performance of the application until the critical section finishes. From case studies with real-world soft real-time applications, we found (1) such memory-performance critical sections do exist and are often easy to identify; and (2) applying BWLOCK for memory critical sections significantly improve performance of the soft real-time applications at a small or no cost in throughput of non real-time applications.
Protecting User Privacy in Remotely Managed Applications

This thesis presents an end-to-end system architecture for online services to provide it's users with a rprivacy guaranteer. The privacy guarantee as described in this thesis relates to the technological enforcement of the user's privacy policies by these online applications that are otherwise untrusted by the user.Applications on the Internet are complex in that they integrate different types of functionalities into a consistent interface for the user. This thesis categorizes these functionalities into three generic components n a learning module that operates on the data from multiple users to gather higher level trends and aggregates, a data storage and transformation module that provides the core functionality of data presentation and finally a client-side component that interacts with the cloud-side functionalities and is responsible for sourcing input from the user and presenting them on the user's device in a secure fashion.This thesis looks at the privacy risks introduced by each of these components and describes a rtrusted systemr that can be used by these online services to prove that the user specified privacy policies are enforced. The system consists of multiple independently developed solutions n Gupt, Rubicon, Bubbles and MobAds. These solutions work at tandem with each other to provide an end-to-end privacy perspective.While privacy policies and EULAs have largely been enforced in the realm of legal proceedings, this prototype implementation of an end-to-end privacy enforcement architecture demonstrates that it is both feasible and practical to enforce user privacy policies within the system.
Grip and pinch strength among selected adult occupational groups

A survey of 402 normal subjects (203 men, 199 women) was conducted to assist in distinguishing potential differences in norms of hand strength. Norm data had previously been collected from mixed occupational groups, but in the present study it was hypothesised that people involved in heavy manual work on a daily basis might possess greater hand strength than others. The volunteers were adults working in industry and agriculture; they were subdivided into occupational categories. Measurements of grip, key and palmar pinch using the Jamar dynamometer and B and L pinch gauge were collected, using the protocol described by Mathiowetz. Volunteers also rated their individual hand strength job requirements subjectively. Mean values were established with regard to age, sex, dominance, occupational group and subjective rating. Significant differences were found with regard to age and sex but not to dominance; there was no evidence of differences between occupational groups or between subjective rating and individual scoring, i.e. volunteers who perceived their job as requiring a high degree of strength did not achieve higher test measurements than others. A high interrater reliability was demonstrated when comparing these follow-up measurements with the original data. It was concluded that, for clinical and rehabilitative purposes, therapists can interpret assessment of outcome most accurately by comparing patients' results with the existing norm data.
Influence of Sampling Variation and Analytical Errors on the Performance of the Multivariate Reference Region

Summary The effects of sampling variation, of deviations from normality of data distributions, and of analytical errors on the performance of the parametric multivariate 0.95 reference region are studied. The standard error of the proportion being included in the region is similar to that of the univariate interval, i.e. 0.016 for N = 100. Deviations from normality cause a moderate decrease of the proportion included in the region. The region is very sensitive to an increase of the analytical imprecision occurring after the region has been established. E.g., for a dimension of 20, an increase of the total standard deviation of each analyte distribution by a factor of 1.25 decreases the included proportion from 0.95 to 0.54. Analytical inaccuracy may have a strong impact when the variables are correlated. In conclusion, stable analytical methods and efficient quality control systems are important to ensure a reasonable performance of a multivariate reference region.
An IoT Real-Time Biometric Authentication System Based on ECG Fiducial Extracted Features Using Discrete Cosine Transform

The conventional authentication technologies, like RFID tags and authentication cards/badges, suffer from different weaknesses, therefore a prompt replacement to use biometric method of authentication should be applied instead. Biometrics, such as fingerprints, voices, and ECG signals, are unique human characters that can be used for authentication processing. In this work, we present an IoT real-time authentication system based on using extracted ECG features to identify the unknown persons. The Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) is used as an ECG feature extraction, where it has better characteristics for real-time system implementations. There are a substantial number of researches with a high accuracy of authentication, but most of them ignore the real-time capability of authenticating individuals. With the accuracy rate of 97.78% at around 1.21 seconds of processing time, the proposed system is more suitable for use in many applications that require fast and reliable authentication processing demands.
A Temporal Abstraction Framework for Classifying Clinical Temporal Data

The increasing availability of complex temporal clinical records collected today has prompted the development of new methods that extend classical machine learning and data mining approaches to time series data. In this work, we develop a new framework for classifying the patient's time-series data based on temporal abstractions. The proposed STF-Mine algorithm automatically mines discriminative temporal abstraction patterns from the data and uses them to learn a classification model. We apply our approach to predict HPF4 test orders from electronic patient health records. This test is often prescribed when the patient is at the risk of Heparin induced thrombocytopenia (HIT). Our results demonstrate the benefit of our approach in learning accurate time series classifiers, a key step in the development of intelligent clinical monitoring systems.
On software component co-installability

Modern software systems are built by composing components drawn from large repositories, whose size and complexity is increasing at a very fast pace. A fundamental challenge for the maintainability and the scalability of such software systems is the ability to quickly identify the components that can or cannot be installed together: this is the co-installability problem, which is related to boolean satisfiability and is known to be algorithmically hard. This paper develops a novel theoretical framework, based on formally certified. semantic preserving graph-theoretic transformations, that allows to associate to each concrete component repository a much smaller one with a simpler structure, but with equivalent co-installability properties. This smaller repository can be represented graphically, giving a concise view of the co-installability issues in the original repository, or used as a basis for various algorithms related to co-installability, like the efficient computation of strong conflicts between components. The proofs contained in this work have been machine checked in Coq.
A wide dynamic range switched-LNA in SiGe BiCMOS

A wide dynamic range, high current efficient switched-LNA has been developed by using SiGe BiCMOS technology. The low loss RF MOSFET reduced silicon substrate effect at high frequency is used as a bypass switch for the LNA. The 800-900 MHz LNA is demonstrated in this work. In high gain/low distortion mode for transmitting and receiving simultaneously, the amplifier achieves 15.3 dB gain, 1.4 dB noise figure and +1.6 dBm IIP3 with 5.9 mA DC current. In high gain/low current mode for receiving only, 13.3 dB gain, 1.6 dB noise figure and -0.6 dBm IIP3 are achieved with 3.0 mA. In low gain mode, 1.5 dB insertion loss and +16.1 dBm IIP3 with <10 /spl mu/A are realized by the bypass switch. The switched-LNA is housed in a very small and low cost SON12 plastic package with a down-mixer.
A Multi Perspective Approach for Understanding the Determinants of Cloud Computing Adoption among Australian SMEs

Cloud computing is proved to be an effective computing technology for organisations through the advantages that it offers such as cost-effectiveness, IT technical agility and scalability, enhancing businesses processes, and increasing enterprises competitiveness. In Australia, there is an emerging trend that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) begin to adopt this technology in the conventional working practices. However, there is a dearth of prior studies on examining the factors that influence the cloud computing adoption among Australian SMEs. To fill the empirical vacuum, this research-in-progress proposes an integrated framework for examining the determinants of cloud computing service adoption with the consideration of the unique characteristics of Australian SMEs, such as relatively low adoption of cloud computing services, less innovative, and limited knowledge about cloud computing and its benefits and hindrances. To this end, we are conducting consecutive studies to investigate this research issue. An exploratory interview study will be undertaken to identify and verify the unique characteristics of Australian SMEs toward the cloud computing adoption. This is followed by an organisational level survey that examines the effects of those determinants on cloud computing adoption. Finally, a decision model for cloud computing adoption among Australian SMEs will be developed by using a Multi Criteria Decision Approach (MCDA) through rating, prioritising, and ranking of various criteria and alternatives available to the decision makers. Adopting the mixed-method research fashion, this research-in-progress intends to make significant implications to scholars and practitioners alike in the cloud computing research and applications areas.
A comparative study on RIP and OSPF protocols

Routing of data packets is one of the important process in the internet. A routing protocol specifies the method of communication among routers used in the inter connection of networks. There are number of routing protocols which have application on the internet like OSPF, RIP, EIGRP, OPNET, IGRP, etc. Every protocol has its own feature of packet routing. This paper presents a simple comparative study of RIP and OSPF dynamic routing protocols. The Routing Information Protocol (RIP) comes under the distance vector algorithm and the Open Shortest Path First Protocol(OSPF) is a link state routing algorithm.
Biological Oxidations and Antioxidant Activity of Natural Products

Oxygen is the most prevalent element in the earth’s crust. It exists in air as a diatomic molecule, O2. Except for a small number of anaerobic bacteria, all living organisms use O2 for energy production and it is essential for life as we know it. Energy production by organisms from food material requires “oxidation”, which implies the loss of electrons. However the potential of O2 to oxidize also makes it toxic. Oxidation can inactivate important enzymes, and anaerobes that do not have antioxidant mechanisms do not survive in an O2 environment (Magder, 2006).
On Decentralized Incentive Compatible Mechanisms for Partially Informed Environments

Algorithmic Mechanism Design focuses on Dominant Strategy Implementations. The main positive results are the celebrated Vickrey-Clarke-Groves (VCG) mechanisms and computationally efficient mechanisms for severely restricted players (“single-parameter domains”). As it turns out, many natural social goals cannot be implemented using the dominant-strategy concept [37, 33, 22, 20]. This suggests that the standard requirements must be relaxed in order to construct general-purpose mechanisms. We observe that in many common distributed environments computational entities can take advantage of the network structure to collect and distribute information. We thus suggest a notion of partially informed environments. Even if the information is recorded with some probability, this enables us to implement a wider range of social goals, using the concept of iterative elimination of weakly dominated strategies. As a result, cooperation is achieved independent of agents’ belief. As a case study, we apply our methods to derive Peer-to-Peer network mechanism for file sharing.
Insights into environmental controls on microbial communities in a continental serpentinite aquifer using a microcosm-based approach

Geochemical reactions associated with serpentinization alter the composition of dissolved organic compounds in circulating fluids and potentially liberate mantle-derived carbon and reducing power to support subsurface microbial communities. Previous studies have identified Betaproteobacteria from the order Burkholderiales and bacteria from the order Clostridiales as key components of the serpentinite–hosted microbiome, however there is limited knowledge of their metabolic capabilities or growth characteristics. In an effort to better characterize microbial communities, their metabolism, and factors limiting their activities, microcosm experiments were designed with fluids collected from several monitoring wells at the Coast Range Ophiolite Microbial Observatory (CROMO) in northern California during expeditions in March and August 2013. The incubations were initiated with a hydrogen atmosphere and a variety of carbon sources (carbon dioxide, methane, acetate, and formate), with and without the addition of nutrients and electron acceptors. Growth was monitored by direct microscopic counts; DNA yield and community composition was assessed at the end of the 3 month incubation. For the most part, results indicate that bacterial growth was favored by the addition of acetate and methane, and that the addition of nutrients and electron acceptors had no significant effect on microbial growth, suggesting no nutrient- or oxidant-limitation. However, the addition of sulfur amendments led to different community compositions. The dominant organisms at the end of the incubations were closely related to Dethiobacter sp. and to the family Comamonadaceae, which are also prominent in culture-independent gene sequencing surveys. These experiments provide one of first insights into the biogeochemical dynamics of the serpentinite subsurface environment and will facilitate experiments to trace microbial activities in serpentinizing ecosystems.
Utilising discursive positioning in counselling

ABSTRACT Foucault's concern with the production of subjectivity has led to the development of positioning theory, as it has been called by Bronwyn Davies, Rom Harré and Luk van Langenhøve. The concept of discursive positioning has particular value for counselling because it shows how people are positioned in discourse in particular moments by their own and by others’ utterances. Positioning theory also points to the efforts people make to resist and refuse discursive positions they are called into in conversation. This article demonstrates how listening to the nuances of discursive positioning in a conversation can enrich professional practice. I shall use several examples from narrative counselling conversations in order to demonstrate these principles in action.
Thick-Film Carbon Dioxide Sensor via Anodic Adsorbate Stripping Technique and Its Structural Dependence

A three-electrode based CO2 sensor was fabricated using thick-film technology. The performance of this sensor was further enhanced by incorporating platinum nanoparticles onto the working electrode surface. An eight-fold increase in the signal output was obtained from the electrode with the platinum nanoparticles. The sensing output was linearly related to the CO2 presented. Stability measurements demonstrated that the decline of the active surface area and the sensitivity of the sensor were 8% and 13%, respectively, over a two week period of time. The sensor response appeared to be a structural dependence of the crystallographic orientation of platinum electrode.