Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Coalitions for Landscape Resilience: Institutional Dynamics behind Community-Based Rangeland Management System in North-Western Tanzania

The past few decades have seen a continuing shift of natural resource management paradigm towards multifunctional and multi-actor adaptive management in hope of achieving more resilient landscapes. Recognizing the multitude of institutional actors and their roles as well as dynamics helps to understand communal behaviour, its manifestations in the landscape and resilience under changing socioecological circumstances. We examined institutional actors and their functions and relationships in a long-standing community-based natural resource management system, the ngitili, in north-western part of Tanzania. The aim of the research was to deepen understanding on the role of institutional arrangements and their limitations in supporting resilience of community-based management system. Data was collected through group discussions and interviews in three case study villages and district level, and institutional arrangements were analysed using 4Rs framework and social network analysis. The study shows that the management arrangements have evolved with time and are based on locally negotiated roles and collaboration among bureaucratic and socially embedded village level actors. These local level actors are resource poor, which hinders collaboration and implementation of ngitili management functions. External interventions have temporarily increased management efficiency in the villages but they did not create sustained multi-scale collaboration networks to address external threats to the ngitili resources. The results show that diversified funding sources, technical support and benefit sharing mechanisms are required to incentivize sustainable resource management. For the management system to be more resilient, the existing institutional actors and their ability to adapt should be nurtured by awareness raising, wider stakeholder participation and bridging organizations.
Alteration of the Occlusal Vertical Dimension for Prosthetic Restoration Using a Target Tracking System

Clinicians and researchers have used various methods to reproduce the maxillomandibular relationship and mandibular movement of individual patients using an articulator, with efforts being made to reduce errors associated with the conventional technique. When a change to a vertical dimension is required during the conventional prosthesis construction process, the maxillary and mandibular casts are mounted on the mechanical articulator using a facebow and bite registration and the elevation of the anterior guide pin of the articulator is used. However, this can inevitably cause errors due to differences between the articulator hinge movement and the actual trajectory of the patient. There has recently been increasing interest in tracking the trajectory of jaw motion of a patient, and this paper presents a new technique for altering the vertical dimension based on the measured trajectory. Target materials for performing tracking are attached to the maxillary and mandibular anterior teeth to record opening and closing movements of the patient’s mouth in real time and align the patient’s scanned intraoral data or cast data. The movements of the targets are replaced with the movement of the patient’s oral scan data. Additionally, then the occlusal vertical dimension is set to a new position based on the obtained trajectory. After determining the optimal vertical dimension with consideration of the space required for restoration, maxillary and mandibular STL files are exported and the designed cast is created using a 3D printer. The printed cast is mounted on an articulator for subsequent procedures. This approach maintains the patient’s actual maxillomandibular relationship at various vertical heights and can also reduce the chair time required when adjusting for errors.
Liquid Crystal Displays: Addressing Schemes and Electro-Optical Effects

In this second edition of Liquid Crystal Displays, Ernst Lueder provides a timely update to his successful text. His unique combination of theory and practice presents all the information required for the development and manufacture of modern high performance and energy saving LCDs. The author also strives for an easy to understand description of complex facts. The second edition focuses on a variety of liquid crystal cells and their electronic addressing, and outlines new developments including: High performance VA cells, especially for TV, due to two subpixels with excellent -correction also at oblique viewing Short optical response times in the range of 1 ms also for inter-gray transitions due to novel addressing waveforms Fringe field switching for acceleration of rise and decay of luminance eliminating frame memories Reduction of motion blur by scanning backlights, high frequency frames, edge enhancement and motion blur modeling Very thin LCDs with power saving LED backlights exhibiting unmatched color purity and larger than NTSC color gamut Printed layers on hydrophobic and hydrophilic areas replacing photolithography Practicing electrical engineers, physicists, chemists and display specialists will find this a valuable resource. Researchers will appreciate the practical guidance given for the design of improved LCDs, whilst students are provided with a useful overview of the field.
Towards increased productivity and quality in software development using agile, lean and collaborative approaches

The challenges of the software industry get more complex as software permeates more and more of our daily lives. The consumer wants products that are reliable, rich in functionality, innovative but at the same time inexpensive. The industry faces the challenge of creating more complex, innovative solutions to a lesser cost. For this reason, process improvement is as relevant as ever in the software industry. The question asked by software professionals is: “How do we keep our promises, while minimising our risk, increase our quality and productivity? ” Traditional software process improvement (SPI) approaches such as CMMI and SPICE focus on the quality and risk aspect of the improvement process, while more light-weight methods such as agile and lean focus on keeping promises and increasing productivity by reducing waste. The research presented in this dissertation was performed with that specific goal in mind: improving cost efficiency in the way of working while at the same time not compromising quality. This challenge was attacked from three different angles: the deployment of agile methods for improving the ways of working; the usage of product metrics for quality improvement; and the collaboration on process knowledge for dissemination within a large company. Agile methods evolved during the nineties as a reaction against the unrealistic expectations placed on software development teams by the then prevailing waterfall method for software project management. Software development is a creative process. It differs from other industries in the fact that the main investment in a software development project is in creating something for the first time. Each developer has to be an expert in her own field and spends large portions of her day creating new solutions and solving problems that she has not solved before. Despite the fact that this has been well known for decades, software development projects are still often run as if they were manufacturing lines. One purpose of the agile movement was to make visible this discrepancy between the nature of software development and the practice of how software projects are run. Agile methods have been proven to work well in the context for which they were designed: small, collocated teams working towards a committed customer. In other contexts, and specifically in large, geographically distributed settings, the adoption of agile methods is more challenging. Our approach to this challenge has been to use piloting as a deployment method. This has the two-fold benefit of incrementally building knowledge about the methods and their interaction with the context in question while at the same time helping to overcome resistance to change by gently introducing the cultural changes through first-hand experience. Relevant product metrics can help any software development team im-
The Odds of Match Fixing - Facts & Figures on the Integrity Risk of Certain Sports Bets

Media reports and interested stakeholders often suggest that certain types of sports bets would significantly increase the risks of match fixing occurring. These concerns also surface in policy discussions at both the national and European level. Frequently calls are made to prohibit the supply of “risky” sports bets as a means to preserve the integrity of sports competitions. Questions about the appropriateness of imposing such limitations on the regulated sports betting, however, still linger. The lack of access to systematic empirical evidence on betting-related match fixing has so far limited the capacity of academic research to make a proper risk assessment of certain types of sports bets. This is the first-ever study that assesses the integrity risks of certain sports bets on the basis of quantitative empirical evidence. The research is mainly based on key statistics from Sportradar’s Fraud Detection System (FDS). A five-year dataset of football matches worldwide, which the FDS identified as likely to have been targeted by match fixers, was analysed to observe patterns and correlations with certain types of sports bets. In addition, representative samples of football bets placed with sports betting operator Betfair were collected and analysed.
Folding Techniques for Designers: From Sheet to Form

1. Basics 1.1 Divisions 1.2 Symmetrical Repeats 1.3 Stretch and Skew 1.4 Using Different Polygons 2. Basic Pleats 2.1 Accordion Pleats 2.2 Knife Pleats 2.3 Box Pleats 2.4 Progressive Pleats 3. Other Pleats 3.1 Spiral Pleats 3.2 Closed Pleats 3.3 Twisted Pleats 4. V-Pleats 4.1 Making By Hand 4.2 Variations 4.3 Multiple Vs 4.4 Grid Vs 4.5 Cylindrical Vs 4.6 Complex Surfaces 5. Spans and Parabolas 5.1 X-form Spans 5.2 V-fold Spans 5.3 Parabolas 6. Boxes and Bowls 6.1 Boxes: Flat Box, Gusset Box, Square Gusset Box, Hemmed Box, Hemmed Box Variations, Masu Box, Masu Box Variations, Facted Box 6.2 Bowl Forms 7. No Crease, One Crease 7.1 No Crease 7.2 One Crease 8. Crumpling 8.1 The Basic Technique 8.2 Parallel Crumples 8.3 Rotational Crumpling 8.4 Crumpling Pre-made 3D Forms 9. How to Develop Your Own Folding
Service-Oriented Modeling: Service Analysis, Design, and Architecture

Answers to your most pressing SOA development questions How do we start with service modeling? How do we analyze services for better reusability? Who should be involved? How do we create the best architecture model for our organization? This must-read for all enterprise leaders gives you all the answers and tools needed to develop a sound service-oriented architecture in your organization. Praise for Service-Oriented Modeling Service Analysis, Design, and Architecture "Michael Bell has done it again with a book that will be remembered as a key facilitator of the global shift to Service-Oriented Architecture. With this book, Michael Bell provides that foundation and more-an essential bible for the next generation of enterprise IT. " -Eric Pulier, Executive Chairman, SOA Software "Michael Bell's insightful book provides common language and techniques for business and technology organizations to take advantage of the SOA paradigm. By focusing modeling techniques on the business problem, Bell provides a way for professionals to work throughout the life cycle to create reusable and enduring services. " -Mike Zbranak, CIO, Chase Card Services "This book will become an imperative business and technology service-oriented modeling recipe for any manager, architect, modeler, analyst, and developer in today's software development industry. " -Jeff Schneider, CEO, MomentumSI "'Innovative' and 'groundbreaking' are words that best describe Michael Bell's Service-Oriented Modeling. It depicts a true service modeling approach that elegantly closes a clear and critical service modeling gap in the SOA industry. This holistic book ties these concepts together using real-world examples across a service life cycle that transitions services from ideas and concepts into production assets that deliver business value. A must-read for business and technical SOA practitioners. " -Eric A. Marks, CEO, AgilePath Corporation "As hot as SOA is today, many business and technology professionals still find it challenging to mind the gap between their disparate methodologies and objectives. Herein Michael Bell speaks clearly to both camps in straightforward language, outlining disciplines each can use to communicate effectively and advance the realization of corporate aims. This book is a bible for all who seek to drive business/technology into the future. " -Mark Edward Goodrich, Director, Investing Product Management, Reuters Media "This book takes senior IT architects and systems designers into the depths of modeling for SOA, with a fresh new perspective on tools, terminology, and how to turn the theory into practice. His full life-cycle approach balances process, control, and accountability to align all the participants in the delivery pipeline-clearing the road for successful SOA business solutions. " -Phil Gilligan, Chief Technology Officer, EBS
Spontaneous Raman spectroscopy for intracranial tumors diagnostics ex vivo

Neurosurgery of intracranial tumors, especially of glial origin, is a non-trivial task due to their infiltrative growth. In recent years, optical methods of intraoperative navigation have been actively used in neurosurgery. However, one of the most widely used approaches based on the selective accumulation of fluorescent contrast medium (5-ALA-induced protoporphyrin IX) by the tumor cannot be applied to a significant number of tumors due to its low accumulation. On the contrary, Raman spectroscopy, which allows analyzing the molecular composition of tissues while preserving all the advantages of the method of fluorescence spectroscopy, does not require the use of an exogenous dye and may become a method of choice when composing a system for intraoperative navigation or optical biopsy. This work presents the first results of using the principal component method to classify Raman spectra of human glioblastoma with intermediate processing of spectra to minimize possible errors from the fluorescence of both endogenous fluorophores and photosensitizers used in fluorescence navigation. As a result, differences were found in the principal component space, corresponding to tissue samples with microcystic components, extensive areas of necrosis, and foci of fresh hemorrhages. It is shown that this approach can serve as the basis for constructing a system for automatic intraoperative tissue classification based on the analysis of Raman spectra.
Fuzzing Windows Applications and Network Protocols

Fuzzing is a technique for detecting software flaws by intentionally sending invalid input to a target of evaluation, generally involving a high degree of automation. For software engineers it is crucial to identify and eliminate such flaws since they might be exploitable by a remote attacker. As a consequence an attacker could compromise the application as well as the operating system the software is running on, gain unauthorized access and steal or modify confidential data. Fuzzing provides an instrument to find bugs fast with relatively low costs. While the basic idea behind fuzzing is simple, creating thorough, precise and performant fuzzers is a real challenge. With time and computing power being limiting factors, the success of fuzzing depends on the level of detail when modeling the protocol as well as the effectiveness of the data mutations performed. The goal of this paper is to present methods to effectively fuzz a network (i.e. server) application using an example protocol and a custom fuzzer. By choosing the standards based Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) we not only selected a contemporary protocol that has a gaining popularity in real-time communication applications but that also incorporates many advanced concepts found in other common networking protocols. The scope of the XMPP protocol including all its extensions is vast and therefore presents a major challenge in terms of protocol modeling and target coverage. As our tool of choice we selected the Peach Fuzzing Platform for fuzzer modeling. Peach is a free, powerful framework including many automation features. Partly due to the documentation, which in some areas is very scarce, Peach has quite a steep learning curve. By documenting our experience, successes and mistakes we aim to reduce the initial effort required to become acquainted with Peach and its varied features. Further- more, by following an incremental approach to build-up expertise moving from simple to more challenging problems and techniques proved a viable project guideline. In addition to general fuzzing considerations such as the circumstances under which fuzzing makes sense and the limitations of fuzzing we also present methods to approach fuzzing extensive XML-based protocols and tuning Peach to achieve higher performance and point out strategies to a high level of coverage and precision.
Sinusoids, noise and transients: spectralanalysis, feature detection and real-timetransformations of audio signals for musicalapplications

This thesis examines the possibilities for real-time transformations of musical audio signals using sinusoidal models. Four open-source software libraries were developed with the goal of providing real-time spectral synthesis by analysis tools for composers, musicians, researchers and audio signal processing developers. The first of these, called Simpl, provides a consistent API for interacting with established sinusoidal modelling systems from the literature, and integrates seamlessly with a powerful suite of libraries for scientific computing. Sinusoidal models have been used to transform slowly-varying quasi-harmonic signals with much success, but they have well-documented weaknesses in dealing with transient signal regions. This problem is significant, as in monophonic musical sounds, transient locations often correspond with the attack section of notes and this region plays a large part in our perception of timbre. However in order to improve the synthesis of note attack transients, these regions must first be accurately identified. The first step in this attack transient identification process is generally musical note onset detection. Novel approaches to real-time note onset detection were developed as part of this research and are included in the Modal open-source software library. Modal also includes a set of reference samples that were used to evaluate the performance of the onset detection systems, with the novel methods being shown to perform better than leading solutions from the literature. The onset detection process was then combined with cues taken from the amplitude envelope and the spectral centroid to produce a novel method for segmenting musical tones into attack, sustain and release regions in real-time. The real-time segmentation method was shown to compare favourably with a leading non-real-time technique from the literature, and implementations of both methods are provided in the open-source Note Segmentation library. The Simpl sinusoidal modelling library, Modal onset detection library and Note Segmentation library were then combined to produce a real-time sound manipulation tool called Metamorph. Metamorph is an open source software library for performing high-level sound transformations based on a sinusoids plus noise plus transients model. An overview of the design and implementation of the system is provided, in addition to a collection of examples that demonstrate the functionality of the library and show how it can be extended by creating new sound transformations.
Analysis and Design of Industrial Microwave Ovens Using the Finite Difference Time Domain Method

The Finite Difference Time Domain (FDTD) method is applied to industrial microwave ovens used in the food industry. Theoretical and practical aspects of FDTD analysis for this purpose are dealt with. Two different open-ended applicator types are described and analyzed numerical ly and experimentally and their relative performance is discussed. One of these applicators is a novel design based on low impedance TM modes which reduces edge-overheating and load reflections. It is shown that the common belief that the heating pattern from open-ended microwave applicators can be predicted from their radiation fields alone is often in error, and that resonances in the whole system of applicators and food loads are of major importance.
On building predictive models with company annual reports

Text mining and machine learning methodologies have been applied to biomedicine and business domains for new relationship and knowledge discovery. Company annual reports (or 10K filings), as one of the most important mandatory information disclosures, have remained untapped by the text mining and machine learning community. Previous research indicates that the narrative disclosures in company annual reports can be used to assess the company’s short-term financial prospects. In this study, we apply text classification methods to 10K filings to systematically assess the predictive potential of company annual reports. We specify our research problem along five dimensions: financial performance indicators, choice of predictions, evaluation criteria, document representation, and experiment design. Different combinations of the choices we made along the five dimensions provide us with different perspectives and insights into the feasibility of using annual reports to predict company future performance. Our results confirm that predictive models can be successfully built using the textual content of annual reports. Mock portfolios constructed with firms predicted by the text-based model are shown to produce positive average stock return. Sub-sample experiments and post-hoc analysis further confirm that the text-based model is able to catch the textual differences among firms with different financial characteristics. We see a rich set of research questions with the promise of further insight in this research area. Abstract Approved: Thesis SupervisorApproved: Thesis Supervisor Title and Department
Transcriptional Evaluation of Antioxidant and Anti-Inflammatory Potential of Buchholzia coriacea in Acetaminophen-Induced Sub-Chronic Renal and Hepatic Toxicity

The aim of this research was to evaluate the possible renal and Hepato-protective effects of ethanolic extract of Buchholzia coriacea seed compared to N-acetylcysteine, on gene expression in the liver and kidneys of Wistar rats subjected to sub-chronic dose of paracetamol. Forty wistar rats were divided into eight groups of five rats in each group. Group 1 received only normal diet as control (CTRL). Groups 2-6 received 14.28 mg/kg body weight of Paracetamol (PM). After 6 hours, 200 mg/kg body weight of extract (E1) was given to group 3, 400 mg/kg body weight extracts (E2) given to group 4, 70 and 150 mg/kg body weight of N-acetylcysteine was administered to group 5 and 6 respectively. Groups 7 and 8 received only 200 and 400 mg/kg body weight of extract (E1 and E2) respectively. This schedule was maintained for 90 days.