Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Comparing the performance of different approaches to deal with attribute non-attendance in discrete choice experiments: a simulation experiment

There is a growing body of literature acknowledging that respondents to DCE often use simplifying strategies, like ignoring one or several attributes to provide with their choices. Two main approaches have appeared to analyse the impact of attribute non-attendance on welfare estimates: the stated non-attendance (SNA) approach and the analytical non-attendance (ANA) approach. Using simulation experiments, this paper investigates the results and reliability of the approaches developed in the recent years in order to deal with attribute non-attendance. The simulation results indicate that the treatments so far proposed are not in all cases suitable. In the absence of correlated errors, the SNA approach seems to provide with unbiased welfare estimates but the ANA approach fails to do so. On the other hand, in the presence of correlated errors, none of the approaches seems to provide with unbiased WTP estimates in all cases.
Simulation and Experimental Verification of Intelligence MPPT Algorithms for Standalone Photovoltaic Systems

This study presents compared with Fuzzy Logic Control (FLC) and Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) algorithms, in terms of parameters like tracking speed, power extraction, efficiency and harmonic analysis under various irradiation and cell temperature conditions of Photovoltaic (PV) system. The performance of a PV array are affected by temperature and solar irradiation, In fact, in this system, the experimental implementation and the MATLAB based simulations are In this topology, each Cascaded H-Bridge Inverter (CHBI) unit is connected to PV module through an Interleaved Soft Switching Boost Converter (ISSBC). It also offers another advantage such as lower ripple current and switching loss compared to the conventional boost converter. The results are evaluated by simulation and experimental implemented on a 150 W PV panel prototype with the microcontroller platform. The simulation and hardware results show that ANFIS algorithm is more efficient than the FLC algorithm.
Surveying The Standard of Outpatient Visit Time among General Hospitals: A case study in Qazvin

Background: one of the most essential components in patientphysician relationship is the length of visit. Short time visit can affect visit quality and patientphysician relationship. This study aimed at comparing specialists visit length with standards in general hospitals of Qazvin. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study conducted in general hospitals of Qazvin in 2013. 428 patients were randomly selected to participate who were referred to the outpatient clinics of selected general hospitals. Studied specialties were including Internal Medicine, Surgery, Pediatrics and Obstetrics and Gynecology. In order to data collection, a Checklist including physician and patient related items was used and data analysis performed using SPSS version 19. Results: The study results revealed the mean score of outpatients' visits length was 4.67±2.43 minutes which had a significant difference from standards (p<0.0001). Higher mean score was relate to pediatrics (2.55±7.08) and the lower one was internal physicians (1.82±3.93). Conclusion: In this study, Visit time in developed countries was lower than developing ones. Several factors were identified which affect visit time. Thus, decision makers should use the results to improve outpatients visit quality.
A Review of Information Needs of Rice Farmers: A Panacea for Food Security and Poverty Alleviation

The study aimed at reviewing rice farmers’ agricultural information needs, access, and utilization and the constraints faced in sourcing for information. Information were got on the concept of information needs, assessment of information needs of rice farmers, concept of information access, farmers’ information search behaviour, concept of utilization or adoption of information and the constraints faced or being faced. Review of related literature on the information needs of rice farmers, access and utilization have been included. Recommendations are given for effective transformation in rice production technology sub-sector if considered such as setting up of adult literacy education programme for farmers, developing ICT-based agricultural information delivery support system. Key words : Information, Technology, Utilization, Innovation, Access, Farmers
Evaluating the impact of a mandatory job search program: evidence from a large longitudinal dataset

We assess the impact on unemployment duration and re-employment wages of a large scale employment program implemented in Portugal during the late 1990's and early 2000's. Based on a dataset covering over 1.5 million individuals, we construct a pooled set of treatment and control groups to infer the effect of the program. We test the program effectiveness on two outcome variables: the unemployment duration and wages after unemployment. Based on the class of difference-in-differences matching methods, the estimates of the average effects of the treatment on the treated point towards: (i) a reduction in unemployment spells smaller than 1 month, rather small in the context of long unemployment spells observed in Portugal and (ii) typically a reduction, if statistically insignificant, of the re-employment wages.
Biodegradable Polylactide‐Based Composites

The aim of this chapter is to introduce to the use and possible applications of polylactide‐based composites. Polylactides are biodegradable aliphatic polyesters, which are widely used in medical and ecological‐friendly fields. First of all, a deep description of main characteristics of polylactides is shown. This chapter summarizes many concepts, which comprehend a general view of polylactide biopolymers such as synthesis and structures, physical‐chemical and mechanical characterization and possible applications of final products. Then, an overview of composites based on polylactides and their benefits compared with bare polylactides are described.
Value of Monitoring in Asset Management: A Social Cost- benefit Analysis Approach

We present a framework to investigate new monitoring techniques for infrastructures and assess their potential value for the network management. This framework is based on a social cost benefit analysis tool that aims to (i) assist decision makers in selecting and developing cost-effective new monitoring techniques and (ii) provide managers with socially optimal maintenance and rehabilitation strategies that take into account output from these monitoring systems. Potential value of monitoring consists mainly in enabling condition-based strategies and providing more accurate and relevant information that should result in more cost-effective strategies. Monitoring provides information about either the structure degradation level or its environment. The condition of the structure is represented by a set of technical performance indicators that reflect its degradation level and are linked to a set of end-user service levels. Finally, the end-user service levels are valuated to optimize the cost and benefits of maintenance and rehabilitation strategies. Main feature of the tool we develop is to enable optimal, dynamic and reliabilitybased decisions that are reviewed and updated every time a new relevant information is available. Transition probabilities to predict future deterioration levels are estimated and updated using monitoring data to assess risks and optimize its expected cost. Moreover, the derived strategies are socially optimal and take into account indirect impacts of degradations and M&R strategies on the society and the environment. This is done by consideration and valuation of end-user service levels. We use Markov decision processes which are an appropriate framework for decision-making under uncertainty to incorporate reliability and risk measures within the optimization problem. Copyright © 2013, AIDIC Servizi S.r. l.
Fuzzy-Based Routing in Wireless Mesh Network

Background: Wireless Mesh Network (WMN) is a continuously self-configuring, infrastructure-less network. A fundamental issue arising in Wireless Mesh Network is the selection of the optimal path between any two nodes. A route discovery attempt can possibly result in several paths being uncovered for a single destination. Methods: In this paper, we have proposed trust-based geographical routing algorithms to tackle the cyber-attacks in Smart Grid, which are inspired from the existing Ambient Trust Sensor Routing (ATSR) algorithm. The Fuzzy-based Energy Aware Trust Geographical Routing in Wireless mesh network (FEATGRWMN) is proposed by using the fuzzy logic approach. It can synthesize the trust, energy, and distance metrics to calculate one final score as the routing metric for determining the best route between source and destination nodes. Findings: The extensive simulation studies have confirmed that our new FEATGRWMN algorithm is more timesensitive to detect then avoid the recent malicious attacks than the existing ATSR algorithm. Application: The FEATGRWMN algorithm is able to achieve better routing performance in different network scenarios by solving the weight factor issue.
The role of contract farming in agricultural development in globalise world: an institutional economics analysis

In the wake up ubiquitous agrarian crisis reflected in decelerating growth and increasing farmer suicides this paper examines the institutional constraints faced by agricultural sector. This paper interprets institutions in the very general sense of rules of structure in agricultural production and market interaction. Considering contract farming as a new institutional arrangement evolved in Indian agriculture to minimize risk and maximize profit, the paper assesses its strength in addressing the above problems. The basic question examined is how can contract farming help farmers especially smaller ones in the presence of imperfection of agrarian market (input, output, credit, etc)? Insights from theoretical literature and evidence from empirical studies show that contract farming would be able to address (at least partially) the market imperfections and have significant positive impact on farm households’ income and employment. Nonetheless the impact of contract farming is specific to regions, crops and farmer.
Trade margins, transport cost thresholds and market areas: Municipal freight flows and urban hierarchy

Recent research has determined the existence of a border effect on trade flows within a country associated to agglomeration economies, the size of the spatial unit of reference, as well as to alternative measures of transport costs. Using a micro-database on road freight shipments within Spain for the period 2003-2007, we consistently decompose the total value of municipal freight flows into the extensive and intensive margins at the European Nuts-5 (municipal), 3 (provincial) and 2 (regional) levels and study the impeding effect of actual generalized transport costs (as opposed to proxies given by the standard measures of distance and travel time). Establishing the superiority of this generalized measure of transport costs, we confirm the accumulation of trade flows up to a transport cost value of 330 euros, and conclude that this high density is not explained by the existence of administrative limits (border effects) but to significant changes in the trade flows-transport costs relationship. While this high density of trade coincides with low level administrative borders (municipal and provincial) as there is a positive and significant effect associated to them on all trade decomposition, it is not significant, or even negative, at a larger regional level. To support this hypothesis, we identify significant thresholds in the trade flows-transport costs relationship that are calculated by way of the Chow test of structural change. These breakpoints allow us to split the sample and control for successive administrative borders in both the extensive and intensive margins. Relying on these thresholds we define relevant market areas corresponding to specific transport costs values that portrait a consistent urban hierarchy system of the largest Spanish cities within a radius of about 330 euros, thereby providing clear evidence of the predictions made by the central place theory.
THE VALIDATION OF AN ARTIFICIAL NEURAL NETWORK TO PREDICT POWER OUTPUT FROM ROWING KINEMATICS

The purpose of this research was to develop an individualised artificial neural network (ANN) to predict the rowing performance of a rower using the joint angles produced during the movement. Five novice rowers each completed a 2000m row on a Rowperfect ergometer, during this the kinematics were captured using a 200Hz motion analysis system. The power output of each stroke was obtained from the Rowperfect software. Each ANN was developed to be a fully connected feed-forward back-propagation network trained using the Levenberg-Marquardt method. The input parameters of the network were five joint angles produced during each stroke and the output parameter was the power output produced by the stroke. The results showed an average Pearson correlation co-efficient of 0.83±0.09 (P<0.01) when comparing the actual power output and the ANN predicted power. These significant correlations reveal that the ANN is accurate in predicting power output from joint kinematic data. A Bland & Altman analysis of the data reveals that the power output of the rower can be predicted to an average of 21±6W within a 95% confidence interval. To further develop the research an increased number of rowers will be analysed to develop a more powerful statistical analysis ensuring that generalised movement pattern outputs can be predicted.
Media trajectories in large-scale live events

Large-scale live events, such as marathons and music festivals, involve a large number of participants with a variety of roles, motivations and levels of engagement, as well as a variety of media, from user-generated content to national media. We interviewed runners and spectators in marathons to understand this category of experiences and derive design guidelines. A first analysis of this data, combined with the trajectories framework, shows potential for designing tools supporting retelling the story of these events.
Creating entrepreneurial employees in traditional service sectors The role of coaching and self-efficacy

Increasingly companies seek to enhance employee entrepreneurial behaviour. In this study we explore how coaching first reduces role conflicts associated with acting entrepreneurial and at the same time improving efficiency and reducing failure and secondly increases the entrepreneurial self-efficacy of employees. Building on previous conceptual and empirical studies on intrapreneurship, social psychology and human resource management we formulate several hypotheses concerning the relationship between self-efficacy, coaching and entrepreneurial behaviour of account managers that are tested in the context of a large service organization operating in the financial sector. In doing so we confirm and extend our insights on entrepreneurial behaviour in existing companies.
Minimax convergence rate for estimating the Wasserstein barycenter of random measures on the real line

This paper is focused on the statistical analysis of probability measures $\bnu_{1},\ldots,\bnu_{n}$ on $\R$ that can be viewed as independent realizations of an underlying stochastic process. We consider the situation of practical importance where the random measures $\bnu_{i}$ are absolutely continuous with densities $\bfun_{i}$ that are not directly observable. In this case, instead of the densities, we have access to datasets of real random variables $(X_{i,j})_{1 \leq i \leq n; \; 1 \leq j \leq p_{i} }$ organized in the form of $n$ experimental units, such that $X_{i,1},\ldots,X_{i,p_{i}}$ are iid observations sampled from a random measure $\bnu_{i}$ for each $1 \leq i \leq n$. In this setting, we focus on first-order statistics methods for estimating, from such data, a meaningful structural mean measure. For the purpose of taking into account phase and amplitude variations in the observations, we argue that the notion of Wasserstein barycenter is a relevant tool. The main contribution of this paper is to characterize the rate of convergence of a (possibly smoothed) empirical Wasserstein barycenter towards its population counterpart in the asymptotic setting where both $n$ and $\min_{1 \leq i \leq n} p_{i}$ may go to infinity. The optimality of this procedure is discussed from the minimax point of view with respect to the Wasserstein metric. We also highlight the connection between our approach and the curve registration problem in statistics. Some numerical experiments are used to illustrate the results of the paper on the convergence rate of empirical Wasserstein barycenters.
PSO-Based Robot Path Planning for Multisurvivor Rescue in Limited Survival Time

Since the strength of a trapped person often declines with time in urgent and dangerous circumstances, adopting a robot to rescue as many survivors as possible in limited time is of considerable significance. However, as one key issue in robot navigation, how to plan an optimal rescue path of a robot has not yet been fully solved. This paper studies robot path planning for multisurvivor rescue in limited survival time using a representative heuristic, particle swarm optimization (PSO). First, the robot path planning problem including multiple survivors is formulated as a discrete optimization one with high constraint, where the number of rescued persons is taken as the unique objective function, and the strength of a trapped person is used to constrain the feasibility of a path. Then, a new integer PSO algorithm is presented to solve the mathematical model, and several new operations, such as the update of a particle, the insertion and inversion operators, and the rapidly local search method, are incorporated into the proposed algorithm to improve its effectiveness. Finally, the simulation results demonstrate the capacity of our method in generating optimal paths with high quality.
Discrete Discriminant analysis based on tree-structured graphical models

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the potential use of discriminant analysis based on tree–structured graphical models for discrete variables. This is done by comparing its empirical performance using estimated error rates for real and simulated data. The results show that discriminant analysis based on tree–structured graphical models is a simple nonlinear method competitive with, and sometimes superior to, other well–known linear methods like those assuming mutual independence between variables and linear logistic regression.
Distribution functions for a family of general-relativistic hypervirial models in the collisionless regime

By considering the Einstein-Vlasov system for static spherically symmetric distributions of matter, we show that configurations with constant anisotropy parameter $\beta$ have, necessarily, a distribution function (DF) of the form $F=l^{-2\beta}\xi(\varepsilon)$, where $\varepsilon=E/m$ and $l=L/m$ are the relativistic energy and angular momentum per unit rest mass, respectively. We exploit this result to obtain DFs for the general relativistic extension of the Hypervirial family introduced by Nguyen and Lingam (2013), which Newtonian potential is given by $\phi(r)=-\phi_o /[1+(r/a)^{n}]^{1/n}$ ($a$ and $\phi_o$ are positive free parameters, $n=1,2,.$). Such DFs can be written in the form $F_{n}=l^{n-2}\xi_{n}(\varepsilon)$. For odd $n$, we find that $\xi_n$ is a polynomial of order $2n+1$ in $\varepsilon$, as in the case of the Hernquist model ($n=1$), for which $F_1\propto l^{-1}\left(2\varepsilon-1\right)\left(\varepsilon-1\right)^2$. For even $n$, we can write $\xi_n$ in terms of incomplete beta functions (Plummer model, $n=2$, is an example). Since we demand that $F\geq 0$ throughout the phase space, the particular form of each $\xi_n$ leads to restrictions for the values of $\phi_o$. For example, for the Hernquist model we find that $0\leq \phi_o \leq2/3$, i.e. an upper bounding value less than the one obtained for Nguyen and Lingam ($0\leq \phi_o \leq1$), based on energy conditions.
PLASTIC COLLAPSE MECHANISMS IN COMPRESSED ELLIPTICAL HOLLOW SECTIONS

The plastic collapse response of structural steel elliptical hollow section (EHS) profiles in compression is examined in this paper. As an initial step, a parametric study to identify the factors that determine which plastic mechanisms would arise has been carried out using finite element (FE) results from the current work and experimental data from the literature. Following this, an analytical model to describe the "split flip disc" plastic collapse mechanism in compressed EHS is derived. The parameters controlling the shape and size of the plastic hinges have been investigated and found to be of key importance; hence, special care has been taken in their definition. Finally, the analytically derived load- displacement curves have been compared with FE results. The comparisons have revealed good agreement, confirming the ability of the developed analytical models to predict the plastic collapse response of elliptical tubes.
Response of Strawberry plant (Fragaria ananassa Duch.) to inoculation with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi and Trichoderma viride

The present paper represents the positive role of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal (AM) fungi as biofertilizers in strawberry. Experiments were carried out to assess the effectiveness of Trichoderma viride and AM fungi (Glomus mosseae and Acaulospora laevis) alone or in combination, on the growth and biomass production of strawberry. After 120 days, dual inoculation of A. laevis + T. viride showed maximum increase in plant height (30.5Â±0.3), fresh shoot weight (10.16Â±0.20), dry shoot weight (2.82Â±0.02), fresh root weight (6.70Â±0.10), total chlorophyll (0.841Â±0.05) and phosphorus content in root (1.13Â±0.02) as compared to control. However root colonization and AM spore number were maximum in G. mosseae + A. lavies (90.76Â±1.32) and in G. mosseae (211.16Â±2.56) respectively as compared to uninoculated plants. Triple inoculation of G. mosseae + A. laevis + T. viride (12.33Â± 057) was effective in increasing the leaf area.
Stres psychiczny a czynność gonad męskich

Stress is generally a natural phenomenon that affects behaviour, physiological processes, and neuroendocrine, neurochemical, neurological and immune responses. Many somatic and mental disorders are thought to result from chronic stress. Stress-induced gonadal dysfunction is not restricted to humans, but is observed in all higher animals. Stress-induced gonadal dysfunction comprises disturbances of the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis and of spermatogenesis. Various stressors induce changes in the secretion of neurotransmitters and hormones, such as CRH, ADH, beta-endorphins, somatostatin, VIP, PRL, GH, TSH, dopamine, serotonin, neuropeptide Y, melatonin, ACTH, glucocorticosteroids, catecholamines and androgens. In acute stress, testicular function is principally modified by cytokines and fluctuating concentrations of gonadotropins, while in chronic stress, hypogonadotropic hypogonadism and disruption of spermatogenesis of varying severity, including spermatogenetic arrest, are observed. In spite of the decades-long interest in the relationships between psychological stress and the function of male gonads, many questions in this area remain unanswered. (Pol J Endocrinol 2012; 63 (1): 44–49)