Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modeling the Influence of a Variable Permeability Inclusion on Free‐Surface Flow in an Inclined Aquifer

The interaction of sub‐surface, gravity‐driven flows with inclusions of different permeabilities are investigated theoretically using a model that exploits the relative shallowness of the motion. Numerically computed solutions for steady motion around cylindrical inclusions reveal a range of behaviors dependent on the ratio of the interior to exterior permeability and a dimensionless flow parameter that measures the far‐field thickness to the product of the gradient of the slope down which the fluid flows and the width of the inclusion. When the inclusion is relatively narrow, the depth of the flow is little changed from its far‐field value and the fluid is focused into inclusions of higher permeability and deflected around those of lower permeability. However, if the inclusion is relatively wide then three qualitatively different regimes emerge, dependent on the ratio of permeabilities. When the interior and exterior permeabilities are similar, then negligible deviation of the flow occurs apart from within thin transition layers at the boundary of the inclusion. When the permeabilities differ significantly, the flow forms deep ponds at either the upstream or downstream boundary of the inclusion for relatively low or high permeability inclusion, respectively, which arise due to deflection or focusing. In each case, asymptotic relationships are derived between the depth of the flow and the parameters. Inclusions of differing cross‐section are also analyzed numerically and analytically to draw out the interplay between adjustment, deflection and focusing.
Convergence in Viral Outbreak Research: Using Natural Language Processing to Define Network Bridges in the Bench-Bedside-Population Paradigm

Research on viral outbreaks at the pandemic scale responds to heightened social urgency and the need to expedite scientific discovery from the “bench” to the “bedside” to the wider population. We sought to better understand translational research within the context of pandemics, both historical and present day, by tracking publication trends in the immediate aftermath of virus outbreaks. We used a blend of natural language processing (NLP), social network analysis and human annotation approaches to analyze the 85,663 articles in the COVID-19 Open Research Dataset (CORD-19). We found stable and repeated characteristics throughout subsets of peer-reviewed published literature corresponding to seven different viral outbreaks over the last several decades. Three distinct groups or “neighborhoods” recurred across all of the model networks – (1) bench science, (2) clinical treatments, and (3) broader public health trends. Notably, in each historical virus model, small “bridge” nodes representing translational research connect the three otherwise disconnected neighborhoods. These bridging studies embody research convergence by both integrating the vocabulary and methods of different disciplines and bodies of previous work and by citing other papers beyond their narrow field. In the case of COVID-19, the literature continues to evolve apace along with the virus, and we can witness the phases of response unfold as the science progresses. This study demonstrates how the different sectors of biomedical research respond independently to public health emergencies and how translational research can facilitate greater information synthesis and exchange between disciplinary silos.
“A little bit of everything?” Conceptualising performance measurement in hybrid public sector organisations through a literature review

PurposeNumerous of today's public sector organisations (PSOs) can be characterised as hybrids. Hybridity is caused by different (at times conflicting) demands that stem from the institutional environment, which is likely to affect performance measurement in these organisations. This paper focuses on the relationship between hybridity and organisational performance, which has so far not been studied in detail.Design/methodology/approachBased on a literature review (final sample of 56 articles), the authors systematise performance dimensions alongside the pillars “economy”, “efficiency”, “effectiveness” and “(social) equity”. The article summarises results in a framework for measuring performance in hybrid PSOs. The authors outline strategies as to how public managers can tailor frameworks to the requirements and idiosyncrasies of organisations.FindingsSince hybrid PSOs combine logics from different administrative models (Weberian bureaucracy, market-capitalism and democracy), so need their organisational performance measurement systems. Potential synergies from and frictions between the different performance dimensions related to the four pillars are discussed.Originality/valueThis is the first literature review on performance dimensions and their application in hybrid PSOs. The distilled “hybrid performance measurement framework” can be scrutinised and further refined in future research.
Quantifying the Role of Occurrence Losses in Catastrophe Excess of Loss Reinsurance Pricing

The aim of this paper is to merge order statistics with natural catastrophe reinsurance pricing to develop new theoretical and practical insights relevant to market practice and model development. We present a novel framework to quantify the role that occurrence losses (order statistics) play in pricing of catastrophe excess of loss (catXL) contracts. Our framework enables one to analytically quantify the contribution of a given occurrence loss to the mean and covariance structure, before and after the application of a catXL contract. We demonstrate the utility of our framework with an application to idealized catastrophe models for a multi-peril and a hurricane-only case. For the multi-peril case, we show precisely how contributions to so-called lower layers are dominated by high frequency perils, whereas higher layers are dominated by low-frequency high severity perils. Our framework enables market practitioners and model developers to assess and understand the impact of altered model assumptions on the role of occurrence losses in catXL pricing.
Optimal Allocation in Small Area Mean Estimation Using Stratified Sampling in the Presence of Non-Response

Sample survey provides reliable current statistics for large areas or sub-population (domains) with large sample sizes. There is a growing demand for reliable small area statistics, however, the sample sizes are too small to provide direct (or area specific) estimators with acceptable and reliable accuracy. This study gives theoretical description of the estimation of small area mean by use of stratified sampling with a linear cost function in the presence of non-response. The estimation of small area mean is proposed using auxiliary information in which the study and auxiliary variable suffers from non-response during sampling. Optimal sample sizes have been obtained by minimizing the cost of survey for specific precision within a given cost using lagrangian function multiplier lambda and Partial Differential Equations (PDEs). Results demonstrate that as the values of the respondent sample increases sample units that supply information to study and auxiliary variable tends to small area population size, the non-response sample unit tends to sample units that supply the information as the sampling rate tends to one. From theoretic analysis it is practical that the Mean Square Error will decrease as the sub-sampling fraction and auxiliary characters increase. As the sub-sampling fraction increases and the value of beta increases then the value of large sample size is minimized with a reduction of Lagrangian multiplier value which minimizes the cost function.
Hepatoprotective effects of the decoction and macerated leaves of Rhamnus alaternus L. on rats exposed to carbon tetrachloride

The plant of Ramnus alaternus L. (Rhamnaceae) has been object of many therapeutic indications for traditional medicine. Many studies have showed a hepatoprotective activity of R. alaternus L. The objective of this study was to compare the hepatoprotective activities of decoction and macerated R. Alaternus L. leaves extracts on rats initially exposed to carbon tetrachloride CCl4 (1 ml/kg). The macerated leaves (250 mg/kg body weight) showed a highly significant hepatoprotective activity (p < 0.01) expressed by a significant decrease in enzymatic biochemical markers such as total bilirubin, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and transaminases (GOT and GPT). Mean serum biochemical marker levels were 4.5 ± 0.9 mg/dL, 143 ± 3.7, 43.5 ± 9.2 and 32.2 ± 5.1 U/L, respectively. These results illustrate the dominance of the hepatoprotective pharmacological activity of macerated R. alaternus L. leaves. Key words: Rhamnaceae, traditional medicine, hepatoprotective activity, biochemical markers, alcaline phosphatase.
Assessing the Emancipatory Nature of Chinese Extinction Accounting

ABSTRACT The majority of research into corporate reporting on biodiversity and conservation generally concludes that such reporting is dominated by impression management, corporate self-interest and an anthropocentric mindset. This has led many researchers to dismiss corporate reporting, focusing increasingly on the activities of NGOs, the public sector and government level reporting. However, recent work has explored the potential for a corporate reporting (and reporting by other entities) to encapsulate emancipatory elements, where such elements demonstrate at least an intention to be transformative and emancipatory in the sense of improving conservation, enhancing biodiversity protection and, critically, preventing species extinctions. Extinction accounting that provides details on how a company is protecting/restoring habitat, enhancing biodiversity, and taking a dynamic approach to conservation could, potentially, lead to ecological and environmental improvements. Chinese listed companies have not, to date, received attention from researchers in relation to extinction accounting. This paper seeks to analyse an extensive sample of Chinese listed companies in a high ecological impact sector to assess the extent to which their biodiversity disclosures are dominated by impression management, in order to identify any elements of the reporting that could be interpreted as emancipatory extinction accounting. We respond to a call from the literature to research extinction accounting by companies in developing economies, given the paucity of the research in this area. Our findings suggest that despite a strong tendency for companies to reveal impression management and self-interest in their disclosures, there are examples of emancipatory extinction accounting, where they appear to be eliciting genuine transformation in their conservation behaviours and activities. Further, we identify species-specific, species-centric reporting as a significant element of extinction accounting, demonstrating the way in which emancipatory extinction accounting is growing and evolving in practice. This represents a significant contribution to the existing literature as previous research in the mining industry found only anthropocentric’ legitimacy-dominated extinction accounting. It is encouraging that elements of an emancipatory extinction accounting are beginning to emerge in reporting practice in a high impact sector in a developing economy.
The value of local ecological knowledge to guide tree species selection in tropical dry forest restoration

Forest restoration projects involving active planting should prioritize species that are useful to local communities, while also considering species' threat status and resistance to local stress factors, but scientific knowledge on these criteria is scarce, especially in understudied tropical ecosystems. We hypothesized that local ecological knowledge can help to fill this gap. Through interviews with 47 local experts and 197 randomly selected households in 8 rural communities of the tropical dry forests of northwestern Peru and southern Ecuador, we identified the species perceived as most useful, most threatened, and most resistant to local stress factors. To better understand the studied local ecological knowledge, we also explored the following research questions and their implications for species selection decisions: (1) How does species' potential usefulness compare to their active use? (2) How does species' perceived threat status relate to their usefulness? (3) Does local knowledge on species' resistance to local stress factors corroborate scientific knowledge? We found large differences between the potential and active use of species and illustrate how data on both can yield useful insights. Furthermore, we found that species' perceived threat status was mainly linked to their usefulness for construction wood, and that the vast majority of local perceptions on species' threat status and stress resistance coincided with scientific knowledge. Our findings illustrate the large potential of local ecological knowledge for improving species selection strategies and thereby increasing the success of forest restoration efforts worldwide.
Precast Concrete Paving Repairs at Vancouver International Airport

In 2019, Vancouver International Airport conducted a precast concrete panel replacement pilot project on Taxiway Victor to establish whether precast concrete was a viable option for a planned runway repair project. This was the first major use of precast airfield pavement in North America in nearly 20 years. Twelve panels measuring 6 m × 7.5 m with a thickness of 360 mm and weighing up to 43 metric tons each were installed to demonstrate the viability of in-situ concrete panel replacement in 8-h night work windows. The panels were designed as heavily reinforced “ductile slabs”; conventional pavement design procedures would have required much greater slab thickness and removal/replacement of base material, which would have greatly slowed panel replacements. Load transfer was provided by 38-mm diameter galvanized steel dowels, which were spaced nonuniformly along each panel edge. The use of bottom slots presented a clean surface with minimal potential for foreign object damage. Five of the panels included embedded airfield light cans, which required great placement precision to ensure their proper alignment and function. Seven of the panels were nonplanar, requiring a special first-of-its-kind warped casting bed that was large enough to produce nonplanar airfield-sized panels to the specified fabrication tolerances. Many valuable lessons were learned during this pilot project, which confirmed that long-life jointed precast concrete pavement repairs could be successfully constructed in 8-h overnight work windows on an active airfield using large repair panels and doweled joints, while adhering to strict panel-to-panel elevation tolerances.
In Situ Fabricated Cu–Ag Nanoparticle-Embedded Polymer Thin Film as an Efficient Broad Spectrum SERS Substrate

Thin films of polymer–metal nanocomposites can serve as efficient surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates; it would be highly advantageous if it can be fabricated by a cost-effective and facile protocol, and high enhancement factors (EF) can be realized for a range of excitation wavelengths, enabling sensitive detection of different analytes. Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) thin films with embedded Cu–Ag nanoparticles are fabricated through a simple in situ procedure via stepwise formation of CuO–PVA and Cu–PVA; the fabrication is monitored through the different stages, by spectroscopy, microscopy, electron diffraction, and elemental analysis. Choice of the Cu–Ag combination is dictated by its broad plasmonic extinction, favorable cost factor, and chemical stability of the nanocomposite; the hydrogel character of PVA facilitates analyte absorption and contact with the nanoparticles, leading to efficient SERS. Cu–Ag–PVA thin film with an optimal composition is shown to display plasmonic extinction ov.
Views of Sports Sciences Students About Distance Education During Covid-19: SWOT Analysis

This study is aimed to examine the views of the students of the Faculty of Sports Sciences on distance education with SWOT analysis and to evaluate the current circumstance The phenomenology design was used in the study The research group consisted of 62 students studying at Afyon Kocatepe University Faculty of Sport Sciences located in a town in the Aegean region in Turkey In collecting the data, the personal information form created by the researchers and the semi-structured interview form was used, and the data obtained were analyzed by content analysis and descriptive analysis technique As a result of the findings, it was seen that the views of the students studying in the field of sports sciences on the strengths of distance education provided the best conditions in the Covid-19 process, gained experience in synchronous-online courses and the online system, and to reinforce the knowledge by making use of projects and assignments Views on the weaknesses of distance education were expressed as the inability of every student to benefit from the right to education under equal conditions, difficulties in accessing the internet, and lack of materials Besides, the views on the opportunities of distance education were determined as good management of the process, planning the applied courses face-to-face, that is, choosing the hybrid system, motivating the students for the assignments and projects, and making up compensatory programs applied to solve the problems Socialization of students, unsuitable working environment, anxiety, and negative views of the society towards the education system were recorded as threats and dangers
Cultural Sustainability: Teaching and Design Strategies for Incorporating Service Design in Religious Heritage Branding

Under globalization, a local brand must be managed by strengthening local uniqueness and representativeness to become a unique brand that is irreplaceable in the international market. An examination of Taiwan’s cultural characteristics and resources shows that religion has been the focus of the government’s tourism promotion in recent years. A religious site is filled with architectural, historical, aesthetic, and cultural elements. Through online marketing and multilingual introductions, the government has packaged Taiwan’s religious culture into a brand. Temples not only provide devotees with a place for spiritual sustenance but also offer them cultural tourism experiences. When service design is integrated into the branding process, the various touchpoints experienced are the key to promoting temple and tourist interactions. A culture can be converted into unique and representative patterns by using brand design strategies, thereby creating opportunities for cultural sustainability. This study chose a national monument temple in Yunlin County, Taiwan, as the study location. Through a course of instruction, students with professional design backgrounds were granted the opportunity to work in a monumental temple, where they practiced participatory learning, played the role of mentors, and developed design proposals. By using observation and interview methods as well as service design tools, the students identified problems and needs and proposed service design insights and design implementation plans. The results of this study were analyzed along with the design flow, course outcomes, and students’ open-ended questionnaires. Finally, a religious branding design strategy based on the core value of cultural sustainability was proposed.
Response of Gross Primary Productivity to Drought Time‐Scales Across China

Drought largely affects terrestrial gross primary productivity (GPP) by its duration (i.e., drought time‐scales). However, the large‐scale impact of drought time‐scales on GPP is still not well understood, partly due to limited understanding of ecological processes and difficulties in quantifying drought time‐scales. Here, we examined the responses of GPP to drought in China during the last four decades, using state‐of‐the‐art GPP data estimates and a multiscalar drought metric. Most of the GPP data suggested that the time‐scales at which drought has the largest influence on annual GPP (dominant drought time‐scales) were well related to climate region and vegetation type. The GPP responded to drought more rapidly in arid regions than that in semiarid and subhumid regions, with a mean dominant drought time‐scale of 15 and 20 months, respectively; as plants in arid regions can rapidly adapt to water shortage through physiological strategies, while, in semiarid and subhumid regions plants usually can withstand a degree of water deficits. In a humid region, GPP did not rapidly respond to drought, probably because the high soil water availability buffered the effect of drought. In addition, most of the GPP estimates suggested that grasslands and croplands tended to respond to drought at shorter time‐scales than that of forests, shrublands, and sparse vegetation. The study highlights the importance of improving the effects of water availability on vegetation activity and further consideration of vegetation adaptability to drought in both remote sensing GPP algorithms and parameterizations of current terrestrial ecosystem models.
Modeling and process simulation of hollow fiber membrane reactor systems for propane dehydrogenation

We report a detailed modeling analysis of membrane reactor systems for propane dehydrogenation (PDH), by integrating a two-dimensional (2-D) nonisothermal model of a packed bed membrane reactor (PBMR) with ASPEN process simulations for the overall PDH plant including downstream separations processes. PBMRs based on ceramic hollow fiber membranes—with catalyst placement on the shell side—are found to be a viable route, whereas conventional tubular membranes are prohibitively expensive. The overall impact of the PBMR on the PDH plant (e.g., required dimensions, catalyst amount, overall energy use in reaction and downstream separation) is determined. Large savings in overall energy use and catalyst amounts can be achieved with an appropriate configuration of PBMR stages and optimal sweep/feed ratio. Overall, this work determines a viable design of a membrane reactor-based PDH plant and shows the potential for miniaturized hollow-fiber membrane reactors to achieve substantial savings. © 2017 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 63: 4519–4531, 2017
Zebrafish as a Tool for Studying Inflammation: A Systematic Review

Abstract Danio rerio (zebrafish) is a suitable animal model that has been used to model a wide range of diseases such as aquaculture-relevant infectious agents and inflammatory processes. This study reviewed methods employed to study inflammation in zebrafish to reveal its usefulness in modeling inflammation. PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and Lilacs databases were searched for original research articles published until February 18, 2020, using the keywords “inflammation” AND “zebrafish. ” Of the 3001 articles identified, 60 were included in this study. These included articles that compiled the methods used to induce inflammation with the most frequently used methodologies being tail fin injury and immersion in inflammatory solution. Moreover, the effectiveness of the methodology was confirmed by the increase in inflammatory cells (macrophages and neutrophils), enhanced levels of cytokines (TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, and IL-8), and chemokines (CXCL18-l1). These results confirmed that inflammatory processes in zebrafish are similar to those in other animal species, such as catfish (Ictalurus punctatus) and mammals. Therefore, zebrafish can be used to screen new anti-inflammatory agents and elucidate the pathway and pathology of inflammation, which can also be translated to other fishes and help to prevent fish diseases, resulting in a positive impact on the aquaculture economy.