Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Organizational crisis preparedness during the COVID-19 pandemic: an investigation of dynamic capabilities and organizational agility roles

Purpose While there is a consensus that dynamic capabilities (DC) and organizational agility are two key mechanisms that help firms to survive and cope with the environment’s dynamic change and uncertainties, little is known about their roles in leveraging firms’ preparedness to overcome organizational crises during turbulent contexts such as the COVID-19. The purpose of this study is twofold. This paper first analyzes the direct relationship between DC and organizational agility dimensions (i.e. customer, operational and partnering agilities). Second, this paper investigates the direct link between organizational agility dimensions and a firm’s organizational crisis preparedness. Design/methodology/approach Based on a survey of Moroccan firms administrated during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, a theoretically derived model was tested using partial least squares structural equation modeling. Findings The results show that DC are significantly related to the three types of agility and that only customer and operational agility affect organizational crisis preparedness. Originality/value This research provides new insights into crisis management literature by introducing and empirically examining the impact of DC and organizational agility in addressing global crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic.
Artificial Intelligence techniques based on the integration of symbolic logic and deep neural networks: A systematic review of the literature

The need for neural-symbolic integration becomes apparent as more complex problems are tackled, and they go beyond limited domain tasks such as classification. In this sense, understanding the state of the art of hybrid technologies based on Deep Learning and augmented with logic based systems, is of utmost importance. As a consequence, we seek to understand and represent the current state of these technologies that are highly used in intelligent systems engineering.This work aims to provide a comprehensive view of the solutions available in the literature, within the field of applied Artificial Intelligence (AI), using technologies based on AI techniques that integrate symbolic and non-symbolic logic (in particular artificial neural networks), making them the subject of a systematic literature review (SLR). The resulting technologies are discussed and evaluated from both perspectives: symbolic and non-symbolic AI.In this work, we use the PICOC & Limits method to define the research questions and analyze the results.Out of a total of 65 candidate studies found, 24 articles (37%) relevant to this study were selected. Each study also focuses on different application domains. Conclusion: Through the analysis of the selected works throughout this review, we have seen different combinations of logical systems with some form of neural network and, although we have not found a clear architectural pattern, efforts to find a model of general purpose combining both worlds drive trends and research efforts.
Contribution of Capillary Adhesion to Friction at Macroscopic Solid–Solid Interfaces

We calculate the maximal adhesive force that results from the capillary bridge at the tip-on-substrate interface. This adhesive force consists of three contributions; the capillary force (Fc), the tension force (Ft) and the van der Waals force (Fv), Fad ⃑⃑ ⃑⃑ ⃑ = Fc ⃑⃑⃑⃑ ⃑+ Ft ⃑⃑⃑ + Fv ⃑⃑⃑⃑ . The capillary force (Eq. (S1)) results from the pressure difference inside and outside the meniscus known as the Laplace pressure (PLaplace), which then acts on the circular projected area within which the meniscus wets the tip (A = πR), as illustrated in inset of Fig. 1(b):
Influence of 3D Printing Parameters on the Mechanical Stability of PCL Scaffolds and the Proliferation Behavior of Bone Cells

Introduction The use of scaffolds in tissue engineering is becoming increasingly important as solutions need to be found for the problem of preserving human tissue, such as bone or cartilage. In this work, scaffolds were printed from the biomaterial known as polycaprolactone (PCL) on a 3D Bioplotter. Both the external and internal geometry were varied to investigate their influence on mechanical stability and biocompatibility. Materials and Methods: An Envisiontec 3D Bioplotter was used to fabricate the scaffolds. First, square scaffolds were printed with variations in the strand width and strand spacing. Then, the filling structure was varied: either lines, waves, and honeycombs were used. This was followed by variation in the outer shape, produced as either a square, hexagon, octagon, or circle. Finally, the internal and external geometry was varied. To improve interaction with the cells, the printed PCL scaffolds were coated with type-I collagen. MG-63 cells were then cultured on the scaffolds and various tests were performed to investigate the biocompatibility of the scaffolds. Results: With increasing strand thickness and strand spacing, the compressive strengths decreased from 86.18 + 2.34 MPa (200 µm) to 46.38 + 0.52 MPa (600 µm). The circle was the outer shape with the highest compressive strength of 76.07 + 1.49 MPa, compared to the octagon, which had the lowest value of 52.96 ± 0.98 MPa. Varying the external shape (toward roundness) geometry, as well as the filling configuration, resulted in the highest values of compressive strength for the round specimens with honeycomb filling, which had a value of 91.4 + 1.4 MPa. In the biocompatibility tests, the round specimens with honeycomb filling also showed the highest cell count per mm2, with 1591 ± 239 live cells/mm2 after 10 days and the highest value in cell proliferation, but with minimal cytotoxic effects (9.19 ± 2.47% after 3 days).
RTLS For Dummies

Select, invest in, and deploy a Real Time Location System Is your business ready for an RTLS? This friendly, hands-on guide shows you how to understand and implement this cutting-edge technology, explaining RTLS methodologies in plain English. From the initial deployment to monitoring to determining Return on Investment, you'll see how to successfully meet your needs, ensure data accuracy, and sustain your system. Get your bearings understand what RTLS does and its various methodologies, determine your needs, and select the right system Prepare for installation outline your goals, plan your applications, assess your site, select the right tag technology, and conduct a pilot test Implement RTLS in your world know how to train your staff, set expectations, set up monitoring, and assess whether the RTLS is working as desired Deal with design issues learn the most common pitfalls of RTLS implementation and how to handle them Take the technology tour use RTLS to locate at choke points, room level, presence, by association, and precisely Monitor and secure your RTLS verify and fine-tune your system, establish performance metrics, and manage security issues and vulnerabilities such as network attacks Open the book and find: An overview of RTLS and its uses Explanations of underlying technologies How to integrate RTLS into your other business applications Comparative detail on technologies that enable different types of locating Tips for evaluating RTLS vendors Essential RTLS resources and references Tips for getting the most out of the batteries used in tags Privacy issues related to RTLS
Machine Learning-Aided Design of Dielectric-Filled Slotted Waveguide Antennas With Specified Sidelobe Levels

This paper presents the use of machine learning (ML) to facilitate the design of dielectric-filled Slotted Waveguide Antennas (SWAs) with specified sidelobe level ratios (SLR). Conventional design methods for air-filled SWAs require the simultaneous solving of complex equations to deduce the antenna’s design parameters, which typically requires further manual simulation-based optimization to reach the desired resonance frequency and SLR. The few works that investigated the design of filled SWAs, did not optimize the design for a specified SLR. For an accelerated design process in the case of specified SLRs, we formulate the design of dielectric-filled SWAs as a regression problem where based on input specifications of the antenna’s SLR, reflection coefficient, frequency of operation, and relative permittivity of the dielectric material, the developed ML model predicts the filled SWA’s design parameters with very low error. These parameters include the unified slots length and the non-uniform slot displacements required to achieve the desired performance. We experiment with several regressive ML algorithms and provide a comparative study of their results. Our numerical evaluations and validation experiments with the best performing ML models demonstrate the high efficiency of the proposed ML approach in estimating the dielectric-filled SWA’s design parameters in only a few milliseconds. A comparison to the design obtained through conventional optimization using the Genetic Algorithm also indicates superiority of the ML models in computation time and resulting antenna performance.
Online Obstacle Trajectory Prediction for Autonomous Buses

We tackle the problem of achieving real-world autonomous driving for buses, where the task is to perceive nearby obstacles and predict their motion in the time ahead, given current and past information of the object. In this paper, we present the development of a modular pipeline for the long-term prediction of dynamic obstacles’ trajectories for an autonomous bus. The pipeline consists of three main tasks, which are the obstacle detection task, tracking task, and trajectory prediction task. Unlike most of the existing literature that performs experiments in the laboratory, our pipeline’s modules are dependent on the introductory modules in the pipeline—it uses the output of previous modules. This best emulates real-world autonomous driving and reflects the errors that may accumulate and cascade from previous modules with less than 100% accuracy. For the trajectory prediction task, we propose a training method to improve the module’s performance and attain a run-time of 10 Hz. We present the practical problems that arise from realising ready-to-deploy autonomous buses and propose methods to overcome these problems for each task. Our Singapore autonomous bus (SGAB) dataset evaluated the pipeline’s performance. The dataset is publicly available online.
Electrospun Nanofibrous Membranes for Controlling Airborne Viruses: Present Status, Standardization of Aerosol Filtration Tests, and Future Development

The global COVID-19 pandemic has raised great public concern about the airborne transmission of viral pathogens. Virus-laden aerosols with small size could be suspended in the air for a long duration and remain infectious. Among a series of measures implemented to mitigate the airborne spread of infectious diseases, filtration by face masks, respirators, and air filters is a potent nonpharmacologic intervention. Compared with conventional air filtration media, nanofibrous membranes fabricated via electrospinning are promising candidates for controlling airborne viruses due to their desired characteristics, i.e., a reduced pore size (submicrometers to several micrometers), a larger specific surface area and porosity, and retained surface and volume charges. So far, a wide variety of electrospun nanofibrous membranes have been developed for aerosol filtration, and they have shown excellent filtration performance. However, current studies using electrospinning for controlling airborne viruses vary significantly in the practice of aerosol filtration tests, including setup configurations and operations. The discrepancy among various studies makes it difficult, if not impossible, to compare filtration performance. Therefore, there is a pressing need to establish a standardized protocol for evaluating the electrospun nanofibrous membranes’ performance for removing viral aerosols. In this perspective, we first reviewed the properties and performance of diverse filter media, including electrospun nanofibrous membranes, for removing viral aerosols. Next, aerosol filtration protocols for electrospun nanofibrous membranes were discussed with respect to the aerosol generation, filtration, collection, and detection. Thereafter, standardizing the aerosol filtration test system for electrospun nanofibrous membranes was proposed. In the end, the future advancement of electrospun nanofibrous membranes for enhanced air filtration was discussed. This perspective provides a comprehensive understanding of status and challenges of electrospinning for air filtration, and it sheds light on future nanomaterial and protocol development for controlling airborne viruses, preventing the spread of infectious diseases, and beyond.
Nanoparticle-Mediated Photothermal Therapy Limitation in Clinical Applications Regarding Pain Management

The development of new effective cancer treatment methods has attracted much attention, mainly due to the limited efficacy and considerable side effects of currently used cancer treatment methods such as radiation therapy and chemotherapy. Photothermal therapy based on the use of plasmonically resonant metallic nanoparticles has emerged as a promising technique to eradicate cancer cells selectively. In this method, plasmonic nanoparticles are first preferentially uptaken by a tumor and then selectively heated by exposure to laser radiation with a specific plasmonic resonant wavelength, to destroy the tumor whilst minimizing damage to adjacent normal tissue. However, several parameters can limit the effectiveness of photothermal therapy, resulting in insufficient heating and potentially leading to cancer recurrence. One of these parameters is the patient’s pain sensation during the treatment, if this is performed without use of anesthetic. Pain can restrict the level of applicable laser radiation, cause an interruption to the treatment course and, as such, affect its efficacy, as well as leading to a negative patient experience and consequential general population hesitancy to this type of therapy. Since having a comfortable and painless procedure is one of the important treatment goals in the clinic, along with its high effectiveness, and due to the relatively low number of studies devoted to this specific topic, we have compiled this review. Moreover, non-invasive and painless methods for temperature measurement during photothermal therapy (PTT), such as Raman spectroscopy and nanothermometry, will be discussed in the following. Here, we firstly outline the physical phenomena underlying the photothermal therapy, and then discuss studies devoted to photothermal cancer treatment concerning pain management and pathways for improved efficiency of photothermal therapy whilst minimizing pain experienced by the patient.
Study of Various Floral Types on Different Plants of Garcinia indica (Thouars) Choisy and Correlation of Its Functionality in Sexual Reproduction

ABSTRACT Genus Garcinia shows high diversity of sexual systems; most of them are dioecious in nature. The other reported sexual systems of Garcinia include gynodioecious, androdioecious, monoecious, and andromonoecious. Garcinia indica (Thouars) Choisy was reported as facultative apomictic polygamodioecious species. There is a large diversity in floral types. Hence, a detailed study of various floral types found on different types of plants of G. indica and to correlate its functionality with sexual reproduction was undertaken. The study at Kokum Plot, BSSKVV, Dapoli, revealed that the male plants could be categorized into four types – androecious, functional males, andromonoecious, and hermaphrodites. The female plants displayed large variation in number and viability of stamens/staminodes. Each category showed significant difference in phenology, floral morphology and pollen types. In December, the percentage of staminate flowers (79.13 ± 2.93%) in androecious trees was significantly higher than functional males (58.61 ± 8.60%) or andromonoecious trees (56.36 ± 2.77%) (p ≤ .01). As female plants started flowering, all male morphotypes bore significantly higher numbers of staminate flowers and carpellate flowers were significantly reduced. Pollen viability was highest in androecious flowers at 90.11 ± 1.10% and lowest at 64.70 ± 2.09% in hermaphrodite trees. Earlier studies reported female flowers bore well-developed female gametophyte, but the embryo development was not observed. Thus, the fruit formation might be apomictic, but in present embryological investigation; more than 60% of female and andromonoecious flowers, a well-developed embryo was formed between 8 and 24 h after anthesis. Thus, the embryo formation might be sexual or apomictic. Floral types favoring sexual reproduction are essential for conservation of highly endemic species.
Modeling of High-Resolution 3D Sonar for Image Recognition

Automated underwater 3D sonar image recognition has great potential to simplify many underwater tasks. Sonar modeling is necessary to recognize 3D object images. We propose a 3D sonar model that can predict what an object is based on by recognizing similarities to objects that pre-exist in a database. The sonar’s displaying mechanism and characteristics of the 3D sonar image are studied. Due to the nature of acoustics, a sonar image is not necessarily always an accurate depiction of an object. The proposed model enables mapping of a 3D world onto a 2D sonar screen. This modeling framework enables the implementation of various optical vision techniques for recognition. Recognition experiments were conducted to evaluate the model’s accuracy.
Measurement of energy consumption in Wireless LANs and Radio Frequency Identification systems

As mobile hand-held devices such as cell phones and personal digital assistants are battery operated, it is important to minimize their energy consumption. The limited lifetime of the battery is always a problem for all portable devices. Although battery technology has undergone a massive development over the years, it has not kept pace with other technologies. Therefore, research needs to be done to use the limited life time of the battery in an efficient way. With developments in science and technology, the power consumption of portable devices has been brought down due to the decrease in the size of the display and optimization of components. The trend toward smaller sizes of portable devices involved is responsible for the wireless network interface consuming a larger share of overall power consumption of a system. In order to optimize the power consumption of wireless communication, we should be aware of the power consumption pattern. Accurate energy models are required for designing and testing energy aware protocols. The accuracy of these energy models and their contribution toward energy aware protocol design depend on the accuracy and availability of sufficient data about power consumption of these devices. This work contributes to the building of such a power consumption database through a series of measurements of currently available Wireless Network Interface Cards (WNIC) and Radio Frequency Identification Devices (RFID). These measurements also help in understanding the behavior of these technologies at the lower levels of the network stack.
Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program: Computer-Based Procedures for Field Activities: Results from Three Evaluations at Nuclear Power Plants

Nearly all activities that involve human interaction with the systems of a nuclear power plant are guided by procedures. The paper-based procedures (PBPs) currently used by industry have a demonstrated history of ensuring safety; however, improving procedure use could yield tremendous savings in increased efficiency and safety. One potential way to improve procedure-based activities is through the use of computer-based procedures (CBPs). Computer-based procedures provide the opportunity to incorporate context driven job aids, such as drawings, photos, just-in-time training, etc into CBP system. One obvious advantage of this capability is reducing the time spent tracking down the applicable documentation. Additionally, human performance tools can be integrated in the CBP system in such way that helps the worker focus on the task rather than the tools. Some tools can be completely incorporated into the CBP system, such as pre-job briefs, placekeeping, correct component verification, and peer checks. Other tools can be partly integrated in a fashion that reduces the time and labor required, such as concurrent and independent verification. Another benefit of CBPs compared to PBPs is dynamic procedure presentation. PBPs are static documents which limits the degree to which the information presented can be tailored to the task and conditionsmore » when the procedure is executed. The CBP system could be configured to display only the relevant steps based on operating mode, plant status, and the task at hand. A dynamic presentation of the procedure (also known as context-sensitive procedures) will guide the user down the path of relevant steps based on the current conditions. This feature will reduce the user’s workload and inherently reduce the risk of incorrectly marking a step as not applicable and the risk of incorrectly performing a step that should be marked as not applicable. As part of the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Light Water Reactors Sustainability Program, researchers at Idaho National Laboratory (INL) along with partners from the nuclear industry have been investigating the design requirements for computer-based work instructions (including operations procedures, work orders, maintenance procedures, etc.) to increase efficiency, safety, and cost competitiveness of existing light water reactors. « less
Qualitative phytochemical screening, antibacterial, antioxidant and cytotoxicity activities of the leaf extracts of Diospyros philippinensis A.DC. (Ebenaceae)

The use of medicinal plants for disease prevention and treatment is gaining recognition due to the various biologically active phytochemicals they produce. This study was conducted to assess the ability of the leaf extracts of Diospyros philippinensis A.DC. , an endemic tree species in the Philippines for the presence of phytochemical constituents and was examined for potential bioactivities by employing several assays like Kirby-Bauer disc diffusion method, DPPH Assay and MTT assay for antibacterial, antioxidant and cytotoxicity activities of the extracts respectively. Phytochemical test results revealed the presence of alkaloids, flavonoids, saponins, phenols, quinones, cardiac glycosides, phlobatannins, carbohydrate, cardenolides and proteins. The leaf extracts were found to exhibit antibacterial activity against gram-positive bacteria and high antioxidant activity (99.22% ± 0.005) but no cytotoxicity effect was found against the selected cancer cell line. The study therefore concludes that D. philippinensis leaf extract can be a source of antibacterial and chemo preventive agents. This claim may be used as a basis for future investigation.