Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Principles and steps of the method of diagnosis on agrarian systems: a case study from Sathing Phra area, southern Thailand

ln many cases, the failure of agricultural development projects has been attributed to a lack of understanding of farmers varied circumstances, and of the practices and strategies they adopt Lo achieve their goals. In order to overcome this problem, the need for a preliminary phase of a directed diagnosis prior to any research and development actions, is now widely recognized. Its general objectives are to understand the internal coherence and to classify the existing farming systems according to their socio - economic objectives and the kinds of problems faced in reaching them. This paper presents a set of tools articulated in to a global, systemic and historical approach based on the coherence concept of agrarian system. After a definition of its main interrelated variables, each step of the methodology of diagnosis proposed here is described and illustrated by examples from the rice - growing area of Sathing Phra. The first stage involves an agro - ecological zonation and analysis of the recent technical and socio - economic transformations of the regional context in order to understand the organization of the landscape and its evolution. This is followed by the selection of different types of villages and a limited number of agricultural production systems for an in - depth analysis of their functioning pattern. The subsequent building of a functional typology of the local farming systems based on the differentiation of their socioeconomic objectives and the constraints to achieving them constitutes a key stage. Finally the role and evolutionary trend of each type of farming systems identified are evaluated in a synthesis at the regional agrarian system level. Taking into account the national agricultural policy and the international environment, priorities can be given to the various problems identified at the farm level to feed the second phase of on - farm design of appropriate technologies or socio - economic organizations for each type of agricultural production system concerned. (Resume d'auteur)
Software Industry Experience for High School Students

High school students typically do not have an understanding of what it takes to successfully transition between the high school and professional world. This paper describes how a group of ten high school students participated in a nine-week software development internship program. The interns worked on developing a semi-autonomous vehicle to be controlled remotely by a ground station. They went through the full development life-cycle using formal agile process. The participants gained experience in project management, and how to negotiate with the customer to reduce the complexity of the project to an achievable scope, given available resources (time, personnel, and cost).
RAPD ANALYSIS TO DETECT SOMACLONAL VARIATION OF PINEAPPLE CULTURES DURING In Vitro MICROPROPAGATION

Plant off-type becomes a concern in pineapple micropropagation. Reliable methods are needed to detect and to reduce plant off-type. This research was conducted to confirm the occurrence of somaclonal variation during micropropagation of pineapple clone Simadu. The culture period (long- and short-period) and the regeneration methods (direct organogenesis, indirect organogenesis and somatic embryogenesis) were studied to know their contribution in bringing out somaclonal variation. RAPD analysis using 10 primers was performed to confirm genetic variation. The result showed that RAPD assay could be applied as early detection of somaclonal variation of pineapple, where OPA primers were better to be used than OPJ primers. The phenotypic variation occurred in the four year-old pineapple plants and plantlets were due to genetic variation. It has proved that the long-period of cultures is the main contributor of somaclonal variation, while the regeneration method and plant growth regulator could also induce genetic variation. The new cultures showed higher level of similarity. Therefore, it needs a correct strategy to apply micropropagation method of pineapple to minimize plant off-type. It was recommended to avoid the use of long-period culture as mother stock and to apply direct organogenesis method for micropropagation rather than indirect organogenesis and somatic embryogenesis.
In-vitro Characterization of Silk Sericin as an Anti-aging Agent

Silk sericin is a natural macromolecular protein derived from the silkworm, Bombyx mori. It is also a by-product of silk-making. From previous reports, many cosmeceuticals and other cosmetic products have been developed with silk sericin. This study aimed to investigate an anti-aging property of silk sericin by in-vitro characterization using fibroblast cell culture model. The results showed that silk sericin can stimulate collagen type I synthesis, suppress the regulation of nitrite, which nitrite may induces oxidative stress, and up-regulate the expression of b-cell lymphoma 2 (bcl-2) to inhibit cell apoptosis, without altering fibroblast growth kinetics or cellular ultrastructure. Sericin anti-aging properties were comparable to vitamin C, except for oxidative stress, where silk sericin was superior. The results suggested that silk sericin possesses anti-aging properties that could be usefully incorporated into high-quality cosmetics, cosmeceuticals, and food supplements.
Co-Production of Knowledge: A Conceptual Approach for Integrative Knowledge Management in Planning

Sustainable land use needs a manageable nexus of knowledge from planning practice, policy makers, the private economy, and civic society, as well as from scientific research. This is mutually dependent on the communicative and collaborative turn in spatial planning as well as by transdisciplinary research approaches. This paper offers an approach how to organise knowledge management and co-production of knowledge in the context of complex land use decisions. Therefore, a prototype of an internet-based knowledge platform is introduced based on a theoretical reflection of concepts for integrated information and knowledge management, as well as on practical experiences derived from a German case study. We conclude that sustainable land use requires Planning Support Systems (PSS) that combine transdisciplinary perspectives in order to co-produce robust knowledge. This also implies a transdisciplinary design of PSS. Challenges of implementation are discussed and further research is specified.
Mathematic Modeling and Performance Analysis of an Adaptive Congestion Control in Intelligent Transportation Systems

In this paper, we develop a preventive congestion control mechanism applied at highway entrances and devised for Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS). The proposed mechanism provides a vehicular admission control, regulates input traffic and performs vehicular traffic shaping. Our congestion control mechanism includes two classes of vehicles and is based on a specific priority ticket pool scheme with queue-length threshold scheduling policy, tailored to vehicular networks. In an attempt to cope with vehicular traffic fluctuation, we integrate an adaptation ticket generation module. The enhanced mechanism is then able to detect road congestion and provide performance metrics to road site units at the highway entrance. Mathematical modeling based on the embedded Markov chain method highlights the benefits of the proposed scheme. Performance analysis demonstrates the mechanism capability to accurately characterize road traffic congestion conditions, shape vehicular traffic and reduce travel time.
The Design and Realization of Vehicle Rent Information System Based on Java

In recent years, with the “Internet ” action plan put forward by the state, “Internet industry” has been widely used in various industries, especially in the country. With the encouragement of the “Internet traffic” innovative form, the Internet rental car industry is developing rapidly. Therefore, the establishment of a network-based car rental management system is conducive to improving the operational capacity of enterprises to meet the needs of industry development. The system is mainly based on j2EE, mainly using struts 2 Spring hibernate and other frameworks, using MyEclipse as a development tool, MYSQL as a database, Macromedia Dreamweaver as a tool for interface beautification, and using JAVA language development. The page adopts JSP dynamic page development technology. The system has simple interface, easy operation and easy maintenance.
Survivability Using Adaptive Reconfigurable Systems

Summary Significant advances have been made in reconfigurable computing device technology paving the path for fast, dynamically reconfigurable systems. The biggest challenge in the way of flexible adaptive computing is runtime reconfiguration. Many difficult issues are involved in runtime reconfiguration. Some of these issues are application specific and as such need to be considered by application designer while designing the system. Adequate high-level tool support is required to assist the designer in this complex task. Other difficult issues are concerned with the hardware and software consistency and the real-time behavior of the system. The execution environment must provide enabling support for these issues. The paper discusses the issues involved in runtime reconfiguration and presents a Model Integrated approach that attempts to address some of the issues at multiple levels. The Model Integrated approach provides a design environment that assists the application designer in capturing system design, requirements and constraints, and provides analysis and automatic synthesis capability from the captured information. The synthesized system is deployed in an execution environment that provides the basic primitives for reconfiguration and enables some of the difficult issues in runtime reconfiguration.
Impedance and modulus spectroscopy studies of Ba4SrSmTi3V7O30 ceramics

Modulus and impedance spectroscopy studies on barium strontium samarium vanadate (Ba4SrSmTi3V7O30) were carried out, as functions of frequency (1 kHz–1 MHz) and temperature (31–500 °C). XRD analysis of Ba4SrSmTi3V7O30 ceramic revealed the formation of single phase compound in an orthorhombic structure. The Cole–Cole plots showed a non-Debye type of dielectric relaxation. The dc and ac analyses of Ba4SrSmTi3V7O30 reveal typical negative temperature coefficient of resistance (NTCR) behaviour. The electric modulus, which describes the dielectric relaxation of the compound, is fitted to the Kohlrausch exponential function. Modulus analysis suggests the existence of a hopping mechanism for the electrical transport processes of the material.
RADIO SENSITIVITY OF RICE GENOTYPES TO GAMMA RADIATIONS BASED ON SEEDLING TRAITS AND PHYSIOLOGICAL INDICES

Three Basmati rice genotypes viz., 00515, 99417 and Super Basmati were examined for varietal differences in radio sensitivity to gamma radiations. Dry healthy seeds were exposed to variable doses of gamma radiations i.e., 150- 400 Gy with 50 Gy intervals. Highly significant differences among the genotypes (p<0.01) for all traits were observed. The differences among radiation treatments were highly significant (p<0.01) for shoot and root length, shoot and root fresh weight, water uptake, chlorophyll contents (a, b), plant height and panicle fertility while non significant differences were observed for germination percentage only. The genotype × dose interactions were non significant for germination percentage, shoot length, root length, shoot fresh weight and plant height indicating stability of performance for characters across different radiation levels. In contrast, chlorophyll (a, b), root fresh weight, water uptake and panicle fertility exhibited significant differences for interactions. Mutagenic treatments shifted mean values towards negative direction for almost all traits but not in a definite pattern. However, water uptake of seeds increased with increasing gamma radiation doses. In general, genotypes displayed variable response towards gamma radiations.
Penalized Logistic Regression in Case-Control Studies by Jiying Wen

Likelihood-based inference of odds ratios in logistic regression models is problematic for small samples. For example, maximum-likelihood estimators may be seriously biased or even non-existent due to separation. Firth proposed a penalized likelihood approach which avoids these problems. However, his approach is based on a prospective sampling design and its application to case-control data has not yet been fully justified. To address the shortcomings of standard likelihood-based inference, we describe: i) naive application of Firth logistic regression, which ignores the case-control sampling design, and ii) an extension of Firth’s method to case-control data proposed by Zhang. We present a simulation study evaluating the empirical performance of the two approaches in small to moderate case-control samples. Our simulation results suggest that even though there is no formal justification for applying Firth logistic regression to case-control data, it performs as well as Zhang logistic regression which is justified for case-control data.
Wealth Effects in the Consumption Function of Argentina: 1980-2000

The effects of wealth on consumersexpenditure have been widely studied since a long time ago, but a recent literature has suggested that consumersdecisions respond to "wealth perception". This work models aggregate consumption of Argentina trying to identify such effects over a period of great macroeconomic variability. The results show that: (i) national disposable income is the only long-run determinant of private consumption, (ii) two proxies for adjusting wealth are adopted by the consumers in the short-run: a measure of real exchange rate and an effect from last peak income and (iii) the consumers' behaviour of Argentina cannot be interpreted in terms of models with liquidity constraints.
Introduction to Establish the Comparative Analysis of 16S rRNA Gene Sequences with amoA and nxrA for Nitrifying Bacteria Isolated from East Kolkata Wetland: an International Ramsar Site

The nitrogen cycle is most complex and very important for the life on earth. Nitrifying bacteria which carried out nitrogen cycling process play a vital role in water quality control, thus creating a genomic fingerprint database for surveillance and monitoring of genetic variability of nitrifying bacteria is very important and also to establish a Biosecurity protocol for the Bheries located in different areas of West Bengal. The currently evolutionary relationships and the natural diversity of Ammonia Oxidizing Bacteria (AOB) and Nitrite Oxidizing Bacteria (NOB) is mainly based on comparative sequence analyses of their genes encoding the 16S rRNA and the active site polypeptide of the ammonia monooxygenase (AmoA) and Nitrite oxidoreductase (NxrA) in the East Kolkata Wetland. This study extended significantly the 16S rRNA and amoA databases for AOB, nxrA databases for NOB. Therefore, either of the functional markers (amoA or nxrA) can be used to trace ammonia oxidizers or structural marker (16S rDNA) can be used to trace specific species in environmental studies. These techniques included the use of 16S rDNA genes to characterize natural AOB and NOB populations and to analyze their taxonomic and phylogenetic features. The current perception of AOB and NOB phylogeny established by comparative 16S rRNA sequence analysis could be confirmed independently by exploiting the gene amoA and nxrA genes and proved as an alternative phylogenetic marker. The aim of our work is to investigate the potential of the ammonia monooxygenase subunit A gene (amoA) and Nitrite oxidoreductase (nxrA) gene as functional markers for AOBs and NOBs along with 16S rDNA sequence analysis in EKW. For ecological surveillance, genes like amoA and nxrA specific for the nitrifying bacteria under present research work could be a more reliable tool.
Informed Teachers and Learners: The importance of assessing the characteristics needed for lifelong learning

In order to be members of the learning society, students must become lifelong learners; that is, learners who have a wide repertoire of cognitive learning strategies, are metacognitive about learning and themselves as learners, are motivated to learn, and can manage their feelings and available resources effectively. Although there is evidence that these lifelong learner characteristics contribute to academic achievement, not many teachers or students know much about them or their relationship to learning and assessment. In this paper, we describe how cognitive, metacognitive, motivational and affective aspects of learning can be assessed using both quantitative and qualitative methods and discuss how the outcomes of this assessment can inform learning, teaching and assessment practices that foster lifelong learning.
Assessing at the borderline: Judging a vocationally related portfolio holistically

This study investigated the cognitive strategies that underpin assessors’ holistic judgments of a school-based vocationally-related portfolio performance. Using a portfolio already identified as containing borderline qualities, quantitative data were gathered about features that six assessors attended to as they holistically evaluated the portfolio. This information was gathered through verbal protocols and supplemented with information from a modified Kelly’s Repertory Grid interview technique (Kelly, 1955). This elicited assessors’ perceptions about the characteristics of the assessment criteria, allowing the influence of each factor to be ranked. Another objective was to collect qualitative data about the socio-contextual features in which the assessors’ practices were situated. The study uses Activity Theory to explore the relationship between the factors that potentially influence assessors’ judgments, suggesting a theoretical position that assessor judgments are influenced or framed within the context of their experience and differing perspectives.
The impact of Information Technology on business competitiveness

In this paper, the theoretical contributions from resource-based view of the relationship between investment in information technology and firm performance are revised and they are related to the empirical works in this field. The conclusion of the revision is the necessity to consider a series of additional factors that moderate the studied relationship and that, therefore, determine the competitive potential of this technology.
Predictors of re-hospitalisation in a naturalistic cohort of patients with bipolar affective disorder

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P3D: a general data-reduction tool for fiber-fed integral-field spectrographs

The reduction of integral-field spectrograph (IFS) data is demanding work. Many repetitive operations are required to convert raw data into, typically, a large number of spectra. This effort can be markedly simplified through the use of a tool or pipeline, which is designed to complete many of the repetitive operations without human interaction. Here we present our semi-automatic data-reduction tool p3d, which is designed to be used with fiber-fed IFSs. Important components of p3d include a novel algorithm for automatic finding and tracing of spectra on the detector and two methods of optimal spectrum extraction in addition to standard aperture extraction. p3d also provides tools to combine several images, perform wavelength calibration and flat field data. p3d is at the moment configured for four IFSs. To evaluate its performance, we tested the different components of the tool. For these tests we used both simulated and observational data. We demonstrate that a correction for so-called cross-talk due to overlapping spectra on the detector is required for three of the IFSs. Without such a correction, spectra will be inaccurate, in particular if there is a significant intensity gradient across the object. Our tests showed that p3d is able to produce accurate results. p3d is a highly general and freely available tool. It is easily extended to include improved algorithms, new visualization tools, and support for additional instruments. The program code can be downloaded from the p3d-project web site http://p3d.sourceforge. net.
Multiscale Symbolic Transfer Entropy on Closing Eyes and Being Idle in rhythm of Electroencephalogram

As we all know, electroencephalogram (EEG) is an effective tool to analyze many disease, epilepsy, for example. According to the latest research, we have found out that the value of multiscale symbolic transfer entropy (MSTE) on closing eyes and being idle differs but there is a question still, what exactly makes this difference? Therefore, we analyze different rhythm of EEG and finally we draw this conclusion: the value of MSTE on closing eyes and being idle differs exactly in the δ rhythm of EEG. With this conclusion, we can catch the dynamic information much more convenient and accurately. Keywords-multiscale symbolic transfer entropy(MSTE), Electroencephalogram (EEG), closing eyes, being idle
Peer-learning and reflective thinking in an On-line community of learners

There is a growth in the use of Computer Mediated Communications (CMC) in teacher education and professional development, together with a strong interest in creating reflective discourse communities among teachers. With the use of CMC, geographically and socially isolated teachers can be brought together on-line to collaborate and co-construct knowledge by engaging in open and critical discourse. This paper looks at a specific on-line unit that was designed to bring together science and mathematics teachers from around the world for the purpose of familiarising them with technologies which they can utilise for their own, and their students' communicative learning. Underpinning the design of this unit was the creation of a networked community of learners who engage with one another in peer-learning and reflective thinking. This study was conducted to determine the extent to which the intentions underpinning the design of this unit were fulfilled. In order to investigate this, data was triangulated from students’ transcripts, end-of semester evaluations, and students’ reflective stories. Analysis suggests that participants demonstrated a strong sense of belonging to this community, thus enabling them to share their experiences and knowledge. Peer learning became a significant feature of the community.