Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Performance evaluation of leachate treatment system using innovative sulfur circulation method

Abstract A pilot‐scale experimental study was carried out to evaluate the performance of an innovative method for early stabilization of landfill. This method employs sequential processes of: leachate collection; nitrification through aeration; sulfate addition in effluent tank; and leachate injection back to the landfill. This study focused on; 1) decomposition of recalcitrant organic matters, 2) the characteristics of denitrification, 3) sulfide oxidation for sulfate recovery, and 4) nitrification by aerating discharged leachate. It was found that, when sulfate (SO4 2−) added leachate was introduced inside the landfill, sulfate‐reducing bacteria decomposed recalcitrant organic matters like lignocellulose by using SO4 2− as an electron acceptor and simultaneously sulfur‐oxidizing bacteria denitrified the leachate using sulfides (H2S, HS−, S2−) as electron donors. These two types of bacteria existed not competitively but symbiotically on substrate utilization. Sulfate‐reducing bacteria produced S2−while sulfur‐oxidizing bacteria oxidized S2− to SO4 2−. During aeration, the concentration of NO3 −‐N increased from near zero up to 925mg l−1. Eventual denitrification efficiency in the simulated waste landfill was observed to be approximately 92.3%. Also, S2− present in the discharged leachate was converted to SO4 2− again in the aeration process. Sulfate needed in this process could be recirculated. Therefore, the amount of sulfate required in the operation of this method could be maintained marginal after the initial addition of sulfate in the effluent tank. Decomposition of recalcitrant organic matters and denitrification hastened the stabilization of landfill. The results of this study indicated that this innovative method was effective and economic.
Psychometric Properties of the Persian Version of Death Depression Scale-Revised in Iranian Patients with Acute Myocardial Infarction

Objective: Limited research has examined the psychometric properties of death depression scales in Persian populations with cardiac disease despite the need for valid assessment tools for evaluating depressive symptoms in patients with life-limiting chronic conditions. The present study aimed at evaluating the reliability and validity of the Persian Version of Death Depression Scale - Revised (DDS-R) in Iranian patients who had recent acute myocardial infarction (AMI). Method: This psychometric study was conducted with a convenience sample of 407 patients with AMI diagnosis who completed the Persian version of the DDS-R. The face, content, and construct validity of the scale were ascertained. Internal consistency, test–retest, and construct reliability (CR) were used to assess reliability of the Persian Version of DDS-R. Results: Based on maximum likelihood exploratory factor analysis and consideration of conceptual meaning, a 4-factor solution was identified, explaining 75.89% of the total variance. Goodness-of-fit indices (GFI), Comparative Fit Index (CFI), Normed Fit Index (NFI), Incremental Fit Index (IFI), and Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) in the final DDS-R structure demonstrated the adequacy of the 4-domain structure. The internal consistency, construct reliability, and Intra-class Correlation Coefficients (ICC) were greater than . 70. Conclusion: The DDS-R was found to be a valid and reliable assessment tool for evaluating death depression symptoms in Iranian patients with AMI.
Phenomenology of the subtypes of delirium: Phenomenological differences between hyperactive and hypoactive delirium

Abstract Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine the differences in phenomenology between hypoactive and hyperactive subtypes of delirium, and specifically to determine the comparative prevalence of perceptual disturbances (e.g., hallucinations) and delusions in these two subtypes of delirium. Method: We conducted an analysis of Memorial Delirium Assessment Scale (MDAS) items in a set of 100 delirium cases evaluated and treated at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) utilizing an MSKCC Institutional Review Board (IRB) approved Clinical Delirium Database. Individual MDAS items, reflecting the phenomenology of delirium, were compared in delirious patients classified as to motoric subtype (hypoactive versus hyperactive based on MDAS item no. 9, psychomotor activity). Particular attention was paid to differences between subtypes as to the prevalence of perceptual disturbances (MDAS item no. 7) and delusions (MDAS item no. 8). Results: Significant differences were found between hyperactive and hypoactive subtypes of delirium for the presence and severity of perceptual disturbances and delusions; with perceptual disturbances (e.g., hallucinations) and delusions being significantly more prevalent in hyperactive than in hypoactive delirium. The prevalence of perceptual disturbances was 50.9% and the prevalence of delusions was 43.4% in patients with hypoactive delirium. In patients with hyperactive delirium, the prevalence of perceptual disturbances was 70.2% and the prevalence of delusions was 78.7%. The prevalence of perceptual disturbances and delusions in both subtypes of delirium was significantly correlated with the presence of moderate-to-severe disturbance of consciousness/arousal (MDAS item no. 1) and attention impairment (MDAS item no. 5), but was not correlated with the presence of moderate-to-severe cognitive impairment (MDAS item nos. 2–4). Significance of results: Contrary to earlier studies, which indicated extremely low prevalence rates of perceptual disturbances (e.g., hallucinations) and delusion in hypoactive delirium, our study demonstrates that the prevalence of perceptual disturbances and delusions in hypoactive delirium is much higher than previously reported (50.9% and 43.4%, respectively), and deserving of clinical attention and intervention.
THE ROLE OF ENTREPRENEURIAL ORIENTATION IN ACHIEVING ORGANIZATION PERFORMANCE THROUGH BUSINESS MODEL INNOVATION AND ASSET RELATIONAL COLLABORATION

Purpose of the study: This study examines the role of entrepreneurial orientation in achieving the best performance of the firm through the mediation of business model innovation and strategic relational assets as intangible assets that are inimitable. Methodology: The study was conducted in 105 private hospitals in Indonesia, affected by the reform of the regulation and influenced by digital disruption, which triggered the disruptive change. This study used a quantitative method and processed by Structural Equation Modelling program for quantitative data analysis. Main Findings: The results of this study concluded that the entrepreneurial orientation of the hospital has a significant positive impact on the achievement of organizational performance, either directly or with the mediation of business model innovation and the collaboration between hospital management and the physicians. Applications of this study: This study proved to be a critical determinant for the business model innovation and the growth of hospital performance. Novelty/Originality of this study:As the theoretical contribution of this study is to enrich the development of entrepreneurial orientation concept as a part of organizational entrepreneurship which emphasizes the relationship of the stakeholders of an industry, through integration with some concepts and theories in strategic management such as resource-based theory, business model innovation and stakeholder theory.
Risk factors for hepatitis C virus transmission in the municipality of Catanduva, State of São Paulo: a case-control study.

INTRODUCTION Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is primarily transmitted via contact with the blood of infected patients, although the form of contact has not been identified for a significant percentage of carriers. The present study evaluated possible risk factors for HCV transmission in a medium-sized town located in the northwest region of the State of São Paulo. METHODS This was a case-control study, with the case group consisting of 190 chronic HCV carriers older than 18 years residing in the municipality of Catanduva. The control group also consisted of 190 individuals with HCV-negative serology. The groups were paired (1:1) for gender, age range (± five years), and place of residence. The same structured questionnaire was applied to all subjects, who gave written informed consent to participate in the study. The data were statistically analyzed using crude and adjusted logistic regression, and the results were expressed as odds ratios with a 95% confidence interval. RESULTS The demographic profiles of the groups indicated a predominance of males (68.9%) and mean ages of 47.1 years (case group) and 47.3 years (control group). After adjusting for conditional regression, the following factors were found to represent risks for HCV: history of sexually transmitted disease (STD) and blood transfusion; accidents with syringes and/or needles; tattoos; and the use of non-injectable drugs and injectable medications. CONCLUSIONS The transmission of HCV via the blood route has been well characterized. Other forms of contact with human blood and/or secretions are likely to transmit the virus, although with a lower frequency of occurrence.
SAGIS: a proposal for a Sardinian Geographical Information System and an assessment of alternative implementation strategies

The author has been preparing machine readable data on Sardinia collected from a wide variety of sources for over eight years. The data, scattered between over 300 ASCII data files, cover topics including medieval legislation, demographic statis tics, bibliographic references and environmental indicators. This paper examines the problem of integrating data where the required structures push the system designer towards using a range of software packages. As the bulk of the database is static a front end solution is proposed which accesses the packages using a single inverted file approach.
Modelisation et simulation de systemes a topologie variable due a des liaisons de contact

La plupart des programmes de simulation sont capables de calculer le mouvement d'un systeme articule compose de corps rigides lorsque ce mouvement est continu, c'est-a-dire en l'absence de contact entre les corps rigides composants le systeme et entre le systeme et son environnement. Certains de ces programmes peuvent simuler des contacts de maniere locale mais aucun ne peut simuler sans restrictions des contacts multiples et simultanes. Pourtant il serait tres interessant de disposer de tels programmes en vue de simuler la reponse d'un robot sous l'action d'une commande dans le cas de robot devant effectuer une tache d'assemblage ou dans le cas de robot marcheur. Cette these traite des problemes de collision et propose un algorithme optimise en temps de calcul. Cette algorithme prend en compte, la detection de collision en trois dimensions, le controle du pas de temps afin d'eviter l'interpenetration entre les corps, les discontinuites au niveau des vitesses dans le cas des chocs et des indicateurs qui determinent la perte ou le gain de contraintes algebriques. Cet algorithme a ete installe dans le code d'elements finis plexus developpe au c. E. N. Saclay. Il ne traite pas les liaisons de contact avec frottement, ce probleme est toutefois discute en conclusion et constitue l'objet de futurs travaux
The 2015 Power Trading Agent Competition

This is the specification for the Power Trading Agent Competition for 2015 (Power TAC 2015). Power TAC is a competitive simulation that models a “liberalized” retail electrical energy market, where competing business entities or “brokers” offer energy services to customers through tariff contracts, and must then serve those customers by trading in a wholesale market. Brokers are challenged to maximize their profits by buying and selling energy in the wholesale and retail markets, subject to fixed costs and constraints. Costs include fees for publication and withdrawal of tariffs, and distribution fees for transporting energy to their contracted customers. Costs are also incurred whenever there is an imbalance between a broker’s total contracted energy supply and demand within a given time slot. The simulation environment models a wholesale market, a regulated distribution utility, and a population of energy customers, situated in a real location on Earth during a specific period for which weather data is available. The wholesale market is a relatively simple call market, similar to many existing wholesale electric power markets, such as Nord Pool in Scandinavia or FERC markets in North America, but unlike the FERC markets we are modeling a single region, and therefore we model locational-marginal pricing through a simple manipulation of the wholesale supply curve. Customer models include households, electric vehicles, and a variety of commercial and industrial entities, many of which have production capacity such as solar panels or wind turbines. All have “real-time” metering to support allocation of their hourly supply and demand to their subscribed brokers, and all are approximate utility maximizers with respect to tariff selection, although the factors making up their utility functions may include aversion to change and complexity that can retard uptake of marginally better tariff offers. The distribution utility models the regulated natural monopoly that owns the regional distribution network, and is responsible for maintenance of its infrastructure. Real-time balancing of supply and demand is managed by a market-based mechanism that uses economic incentives to encourage brokers to achieve balance within their portfolios of tariff subscribers and wholesale market positions, in the face of stochastic customer behaviors and weather-dependent renewable energy sources. The broker with the highest bank balance at the end of the simulation wins.
Investigating unstable fixation in patients with macular disease.

PURPOSE To assess the effect on visual acuity of compensating fixation instability by controlling retinal image motion in people with macular disease. METHODS Ten patients with macular disease participated in this study. Crowded and noncrowded visual acuity were measured using an eye tracking system to compensate for fixation instability. Four conditions, corresponding to four levels of retinal image motion, were tested: no compensation (normal motion), partial compensation (reduced motion), total compensation (no motion), and overcompensation (increased motion). Fixation stability and the number of preferred retinal loci were also measured. RESULTS Modulating retinal image motion had the same effect on crowded and noncrowded visual acuity (P = 0.601). When fixation instability was overcompensated, acuity worsened by 0.1 logMAR units (P < 0.001) compared with baseline (no compensation) and remained equal to baseline for all other conditions. CONCLUSIONS In people with macular disease, retinal image motion caused by fixation instability does not reduce either crowded or noncrowded visual acuity. Acuity declines when fixation instability is overcompensated, showing limited tolerance to increased retinal image motion. The results provide evidence that fixation instability does not improve visual acuity and may be a consequence of poor oculomotor control.
Exercise-Training Reduced Blood Pressure and Improve Placental Vascularization in Pregnant Spontaneously Hypertensive Rats –Pilot Study

Assess the effects of exercise-training on resting arterial pressure and heart rate, placental fetuses morphologic alterations in pregnant spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHRs). Twenty SHRs and their respective control normotensive rats (WKY) were submitted or not to a swimming protocol during 9 weeks, resulting in four pregnant experimental groups: sedentary hypertensive (PSH), trained hypertensive (PTH), sedentary normotensive (PSN), and trained normotensive (PTN). Exercise-training by swimming attenuates arterial pressure in pregnant SHRs, and can contribute to an increase in the length of fetuses and the percentage of the vessels in the placenta.
Tolérance aux pannes dans un réseau de capteurs sans fil multi-canal. (Fault tolerance in a mulichannel wireless sensor network)

Le developpement dans les micros systemes electromecaniques (MEMS) combine avec l'emergence des nouvelles technologies de l'information et de la communication a permis l'integration des fonctionnalites de collecte, de traitement et de transmission des donnees dans un seul dispositif minuscule qui est le capteur sans fil. En voie de consequence, les reseaux composes de ces capteurs offrent aujourd'hui une pleiade d'avantages par rapport aux reseaux traditionnels notamment en termes de simplicite et de cout de deploiement. Ceci a conduit au developpement d'une gamme tres variee d'applications des reseaux de capteurs sans fil dans les domaines de la sante, de l'environnement, de l'industrie, des infrastructures, des activites spatiales, ou encore des activites militaires et dans plusieurs autres domaines. Cependant, de nouveaux defis surgissent des caracteristiques particulieres de ces reseaux. En realite, de nombreuses applications de ces reseaux sont critiques et exigent qu'un fonctionnement correct du reseau soit maintenu le plus longtemps possible. Par contre, les environnements dans lesquels ces reseaux sont deployes rendent la mission de maintien en condition correcte de ces reseaux tres compliquee et meme parfois impossible ; d'ou la necessite d'integrer des mecanismes d'auto-correction qui visent a surmonter les problemes qui puissent surgir dans le reseau sans intervention humaine. Dans ce contexte, nous avons, dans cette these, concentre notre etude sur les techniques et les mecanismes mis en œuvre pour ameliorer la propriete de tolerance aux pannes dans les reseaux de capteurs sans fil. Tout d'abord, nous avons propose des approches centralisees et distribuees pour l'auto-retablissement de la connectivite et la reallocation des canaux dans un contexte de reseaux de capteurs sans fil reposant sur des communications multi-canal apres la panne d'un nœud critique. Apres la formulation du probleme sous la forme d'un probleme d'optimisation multi-objectif, nous avons propose des algorithmes bases sur des heuristiques de coloration de graphes et d'arbre de Steiner, tres connus dans la theorie de graphes pour la resolution de ce type de problemes. Dans une deuxieme partie de cette these, nous avons etudie un cas d'application particulier, l'agriculture de precision, et avons propose une solution distribuee pour le retablissement du fonctionnement du reseau de capteurs sans fil
Elaboration et caractérisation d'un nouveau type de vecteurs de clonage à nombre de copies régulable

L'integration de plasmides en des points predetermines du chromosome d'escherichia coli, et les possibilites ainsi offertes: cartographie, etude de l'activite des genes ou des effets du contexte nucleoidique, clonage ou echange d'alleles, prise en charge de la replication par le plasmide integre, sont realisables a l'aide d'outils distincts aux possibilites limitees. L'objet de cette etude a ete la mise au point d'un plasmide vecteur a replication regulee par l'operateur de maniere thermo-independante. Le replicon de depart a ete cole1, tandis que le systeme lac a servi a l'asservissement du nombre de copies. Le chapitre 1 decrit la derivation d'un vecteur, pam9, a partir d'un plasmide a replication dependante du promoteur lacuv5. Pam9 peut s'integrer par homologie et prendre en charge la replication du chromosome. Toutefois, pla51 et ses derives apparaissent n'exister qu'a l'etat trimerique, ce qui en limite l'utilite. Le chapitre 3 decrit la construction de nouveaux vecteurs a nombre de copies modulables, pam34 et pam35, portant la region regulatrice de l'operon lac substitue au promoteur de l'arn ii amorce, et conservant les elements regulateurs rnai-rnaii et rom. Le chapitre 4 porte sur la replication de ces plasmides. Celle de pam34, porteur de lacl, est strictement dependante de la presence d'inducteur. Ceci permet la selection de l'integration du plasmide au chromosome, la prise en charge de sa replication, et le clonage par recurrence de region proches. J'ai montre aussi que pam34 est un agent efficace pour la chasse de vecteurs de meme incompatibilite. Les proprietes de pam34 permettent son emploi pour diverses manipulations genetiques et pour les etudes de la replication du chromosome et du cycle cellulaire. Ces perspectives sont abordees dans la discussion finale
Option Pricing with a Pentanomial Lattice Model that Incorporates Skewness and Kurtosis

This paper analyzes a pentanomial lattice model for option pricing that incorporates skewness and kurtosis of the underlying asset. The lattice is constructed using a moment matching procedure, and explicit positivity conditions for branch probabilities are provided in terms of skewness and kurtosis. We also explore the limiting distribution of this lattice, which is compound Poisson, and give a Fourier transform based formula that can be used to more efficiently price European call and put options. An example illustrates some of the features of this model in capturing volatility smiles and smirks.
Regional Disparities in Hungarian Urban Energy Consumption – A Link Between Smart Cities and Successful Cities

Cities account for 60–80% of global energy consumption, and based on projections the development of urban areas will be the main engine of energy use growth in the future. While it may seem that this topic plays only a marginal role in urban research, in energy economics more and more studies are focusing on the concept of the smart energy city and resilient city related to energy use as a possible way toward sustainability and human wellbeing. Our main objective is to examine the dimension of smart environment through residential energy use. We focus on the regional disparities of urban energy use (electricity use and natural gas consumption) in Hungary. The analysis covers 23 Hungarian cities and Budapest during the period from 2010 to 2015. The Theil Index and the area-based Gini index are calculated. We conclude that on the whole no significant inequalities or spatial differences were identified among the cities. The Theil Index components (within-group inequality component and between-group inequality component) draw attention to the within-group differences related to natural gas consumption. These disparities are more decisive than values of the between-group inequality components. It cannot be stated that belonging to the “elite” groups of cities causes significant changes in the urban electricity and natural gas consumption patterns. Key-words: AR-Gini, Theil index, Residential energy use, Disparities.
Testing for long memory in the LKR/USD exchange rate: Evidence from Sri Lanka

The question of whether exchange rate markets are efficient or not, is directly related to whether or not long memory is present in the exchange rate changes. Therefore, this paper explores the nature of the data generating processes of foreign exchange rate LKR against the US Dollar (USD), (LKR/USD) by examining the long memory properties of the LKR/USD return series based on econophysics models. In this study, autocorrelation function and spectral density function are used as visual test to inspect long memory of exchange rate returns. Further, parametric-ARFIMA model, Semi-parametric test proposed by Geweke and Porter-Hudak, Local Whittle estimator and non-parametric (R/S) test are employed as inferential tests to examine the long memory properties of the LKR/USD using daily data for the period from 2005-01-03 to 2016-12-30. Kernel density of LKR/USD return series show peak and fat tail postures. Visual inspection and inferential results reveal strong evidence of long memory property in the daily LKR/USD exchange rate return. It indicates that pricing by the market participants is not efficient. The results of this study have policy implications for traders and investors in designing and implementing trading strategies. It can also be helpful in predicting expected future return. Thus, the results of this study should be useful to regulators, practitioners and investors.