Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Novel Environmental Awareness Index Measured Cross-Nationally For Fifty Seven Countries

Today, a number of major challenges exist for measuring environmental awareness cross-nationally. These are 1) conceptualising environmental awareness and its relation to concrete behaviour is still under development; 2) the lack of a universally applicable methodology for country comparisons; and 3) the lack of an easy-to-use tool for data gathering for global studies. After overcoming these challenges, a new Environmental Awareness Index (EAI) was constructed. Six hypotheses were formulated on the EAI, relating to 1) national wealth; 2) state of the environment; 3) postmaterialist values; 4) self-transcendence values; 5) self-enhancement values; and 6) gender equality. EAI scores from 57 countries were measured for crossnational comparisons. The countries scoring highest on the EAI are Austria, Sweden, Finland, Germany and Denmark. All the countries with the highest EA are found in Europe. Of the non-European countries, the best performers are Japan, New Zealand and Canada. The weakest EAI scores were found in Southern Asia, Mexico and Africa. Additionally, the perceived current state and trend of the environment in 57 countries was compared. The results indicate that, globally, the perceived state of the environment is rather worrying and in most countries deteriorating. After calculating correlations of the six hypotheses and the measured indicators of the study, the results show support to all six hypotheses. This study strongly indicates that significantly better correlations with the other national-level indices are achieved by studying EA with our wider approach (EAI consisting of motivation, knowledge and skills) than by studying customarily only environmental concern.
On the Capacity of Cognitive Radio Sensor Networks: From Physical Layer to Network Layer

Cognitive Radio has stirred great interest recently, with its tremendous potential to further exploit the scarce spectrum resource. Among the diverse research topics, the fundamental capacity issue deserves a thorough study since it serves as a principle for future implementation and performance evaluation. Existing researches on cognitive capacity mainly fall into two categories: channel capacity and network capacity. The former can accurately portray the pairwise cognitive channel capacity, but less address the case with multiple secondary users. The latter investigates the throughput of largescale network with respect to its size and topology, while ignoring crucial factors in physical layer. Recognizing their strengths and limitations, this paper aims to present a more comprehensive view of the cognitive capacity issue. First, we extend the information theoretic model to a special case in multi-user scenario, which well characterizes the capacity of cognitive multiple access channel (MAC). Second, we analyze network scaling by incorporating sensing errors, and show that physical layer features may affect the throughput performance. Last but not least, our analysis not only extends the existing researches but also sheds some light on the cross-layer study of cognitive capacity.
Observation and verification of software for distributed systems

The main contribution of this dissertation is the development of new theory and techniques in the areas of program observation and verification. These areas are important parts of the specification, design, development and testing phases of a software project's lifecycle. Program observation involves formulating a query about the behavior of a program and then monitoring the program as it executes in order to determine the result of the query. Observation is used in the development phase to track down bugs and clarify understanding of a program's behavior, and in the testing phase to ensure that a program behaves as expected for a given input set. Program verification involves proving that a design meets its specification. This is done during the design phase to ensure that the specifications are satisfied. The fundamental difference between observation and verification is that observation applies to individual executions of a program and verification applies to all executions. Three observation systems are developed in this dissertation: global functions, recursive logic (RCL), and DAG expressions. A global function has the form of a sum of local variables. The observed program is monitored to determine if the value of the global function exceeds some constant. Two special cases of this problem are considered. RCL is a recursive logic built upon conjunctive global predicates. Computational structures of common paradigms such as butterfly synchronization and distributed consensus can be expressed easily in RCL. DAG expressions are an extension of regular expressions from strings to directed acyclic graphs. While a regular expression specifies patterns of letters in a string, a DAG expression specifies patterns of letters in a DAG. The letters in a DAG expression represent local predicates. Nonintrusive observation algorithms for each of these three systems are developed, proven and analyzed for complexity. A system for specifying and verifying distributed programs is developed. A new proof technique is also introduced which uses induction on the complement of the causally precedes relation. These specification and verification techniques are demonstrated on two well known algorithms (vector clocks and mutual exclusion) and one lesser known algorithm (direct dependency clocks).
Modeling the albedo of magma ocean planets

The modeling of telluric exoplanets at the beginning of their history, during their magma ocean stage, has been very active during the last decade. Such models usually consist in coupled models, with various submodules (interior, atmosphere) interacting with each others through matter and/or energy fluxes[1, 2, 3]. Here we present the newest updates to the 1d radiative-convective atmospheric submodule[7, 8] of a coupled interior-atmosphere model developed since 2010[9, 12]. These newest updates consist in the inclusion of Rayleigh scattering, but mainly in the modeling of the reflectivity of the atmosphere in order to determine its albedo. This updated atmospheric model is therefore able to compute both the thermal outgoing longwave radiation (OLR = σTeff) of the planet, and the absorbed stellar flux (ASF = σTeq), thus allowing a self-consistent estimation of the secular cooling heat flux originating from the interior through the atmosphere, given by σ ( Teff 4 − Teq ) . Also, the determination of both thermal emission spectra and spectral reflectivity could help in constraining future exoplanet observations that would happen to currently experience their magma ocean stage.
European Conference on Information Systems ( ECIS ) 2003 eLearning and SMEs : Do Demand and Supply Speak the Same Language ?

This paper reports on research-in-progress designed to understand adoption and diffusion of e-learning (EL) among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in northern Italy. The research takes as its organizing framework the concept that diffusion of an innovation to a group of organizations reflects a match between demand and supply, and augments that framework by reference to Rogers’ (1995) model of the processes of adoption and diffusion of innovation in organizations and the IS literature on adoption by individuals. The first two, exploratory stages of the research are completed. They identified that EL is not widely diffused among the firms of interest. In part, this reflects relatively low participation in all forms of training, but it also reflects low awareness of EL, difficulty in identifying and evaluating products and services on the market, and a perception among non-adopters that EL is costly and they do not have adequate ICT infrastructure for it. In the final stage of the research, focus groups were conducted with both SMEs and EL suppliers to identify the extent to which these groups (demand and supply) have a shared understanding of the nature of EL and its potential.
Comparing food web structures and dynamics across a suite of global marine ecosystem models !

Dynamic Green Ocean Models (DGOMs) include different sets of Plankton Functional Types (PFTs) and equations, thus different interactions and food webs. Using four DGOMs (CCSM-BEC, PISCES, NEMURO and PlankTOM5) we explore how predator–prey interactions influence food web dynamics. Using each model’s equations and biomass output, interaction strengths (direct and specific) were calculated and the role of zooplankton in modeled food webs examined. In CCSM-BEC the single size-class adaptive zooplankton preys on different phytoplankton groups according to prey availability and food preferences, resulting in a strong top-down control. In PISCES the microand meso-zooplankton groups compete for food resources, grazing phytoplankton depending on their availability in a mixture of bottom-up and topdown control. In NEMURO macrozooplankton controls the biomass of other zooplankton PFTs and defines the structure of the food web with a strong top-down control within the zooplankton. In PlankTOM5, competition and predation between microand meso-zooplankton along with strong preferences for nanophytoplankton and diatoms, respectively, leads to their mutual exclusion with a mixture of bottomup and top-down control of the plankton community composition. In each model, the grazing pressure of the zooplankton PFTs and the way it is exerted on their preys may result in the food web dynamics and structure of the model to diverge from the one that was intended when designing the model. Our approach shows that the food web dynamics, in particular the strength of the predator–prey interactions, are driven by the choice of parameters and more specifically the food preferences. Consequently, our findings stress the importance of equation and parameter choice as they define interactions between PFTs and overall food web dynamics (competition, bottom-up or top-down effects). Also, the differences in the simulated food-webs between different models highlight the gap of knowledge for zooplankton rates and predator–prey interactions. In particular, concerted effort is needed to identify the key growth and loss parameters and interactions and quantify them with targeted laboratory experiments in order to bring our understanding of zooplankton at a similar level to phytoplankton. © 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
A LITERATURE REVIEW OF THE QUANTIFICATION OF HIDDEN COST OF POOR QUALITY IN THE HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

Cost of Poor Quality (COPQ) is the sum of all costs that would disappear if the job is done right the first time. COPQ mostly remains hidden because normally it is not quantified and recorded in the existing accounting systems. Management fails to initiate timely corrective actions due to lack of knowledge about their hidden losses. It adversely affects the cost, scope and schedule of projects. These losses cannot be reduced unless they are measured or quantified. Many studies have been conducted on quantification of quality costs in the manufacturing and construction industries, which have been summarized in this study to provide a holistic perspective of all such research studies carried out in the last 40 years starting from 1975 to 2014. Based on the review of 42 pertinent literatures on COPQ it can be inferred that COPQ ranges from 16.91% to 26.90% of company’s revenue. This study has investigated on the ranges of hidden quality costs and the extent by which they can be reduced. The existing quality cost measurement systems are not standardized and yet to attain maturity. Therefore, there is a big room for development and implementation of quality cost measuring system especially in the construction industry. It has opened new avenues for future research in the quantification of quality costs.
Diverse BRCA 1 and BRCA 2 Reversion Mutations in Circulating Cell-Free DNA of Therapy-Resistant Breast or Ovarian Cancer

Purpose—Resistance to platinum-based chemotherapy or PARP inhibition in germline BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation carriers may occur through somatic reversion mutations or intragenic deletions that restore BRCA1 or BRCA2 function. We assessed whether BRCA1/2 reversion mutations could be identified in circulating cell-free DNA (cfDNA) of ovarian or breast cancer patients previously treated with platinum and/or PARP inhibitors. Experimental Design—cfDNA from 24 prospectively accrued BRCA1or BRCA2-germline mutant patients, including 19 platinum-resistant/refractory ovarian cancer and five platinum and/or PARP inhibitor pre-treated metastatic breast cancer patients, was subjected to massively parallel sequencing targeting all exons of 141 genes and all exons and introns of BRCA1 and BRCA2. Functional studies were performed to assess the impact of the putative BRCA1/2 reversion mutations on BRCA1/2 function. Results—Diverse and often polyclonal putative BRCA1 or BRCA2 reversion mutations were identified in cfDNA from four ovarian cancer patients (21%) and from two breast cancer patients (40%). BRCA2 reversion mutations were detected in cfDNA prior to PARP inhibitor treatment in Correspondence to, Britta Weigelt, Department of Pathology, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, 1275 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; Tel +1-212-639-2332; weigeltb@mskcc.orgNicholas C. Turner, Institute of Cancer Research and Royal Marsden Hospital, 237 Fulham Road, London, SW3 6JB, UK; Tel +44 207 352 8133; nicholas.turner@icr.ac. uk. *these authors contributed equally to this work. HHS Public Access Author manuscript Clin Cancer Res. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2018 November 01. Published in final edited form as: Clin Cancer Res. 2017 November 01; 23(21): 6708–6720. doi:10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-17-0544. A uhor M anscript
Time-lapse wave-equation inversion

A regularized least-squares inversion scheme is proposed as a method for correcting poor and uneven subsurface illumination under complex overburden and for attenuating image differences resulting from differences in acquisition geometries. This approach involves a joint inversion of migrated images from different vintages with filters that are explicitly derived from the Hessian of the least-squares solution to the linearized wave equation. By using such a formulation, both the imaging and monitoring challenges are solved as a single problem that yields a more accurate image of the subsurface and its time-evolution. Numerical tests show that this joint inversion technique yields more accurate time-lapse images than those obtained by differencing independently migrated or inverted images.
Vulnerabilities in Bytecode Removed by Analysis, Nuanced Confinement and Diversification (VIBRANCE)

Abstract : The VIBRANCE tool starts with a vulnerable Java application and automatically hardens it against SQL injection, OS command injection, file path traversal, numeric errors, denial of service, and other attacks. For a large class of attacks, the protection added by VIBRANCE blocks the attacks and safely continues execution.
The Implementation Of Eco Office Concept Based On User Behaviour In Office Building

The countless office building in urban area contributes to the significantdegradation of environmental quality. Various green acts has been carried out to preserve the earth by implementing various energy consumption efficiency effort. The research intends to reveal the Eco-office concept in office building. The research employs descriptive quantitative approach. The sample in the research is office-building employee. The research uses questionnaire as the instrument. The instrument is tested for the degree of validity and reliability to comply for the requirements of research data procurement.Analysis of research data using score percentage analysis. Of the five indicators, namely, electricity savings, water savings and conservation, office waste management, greening, and other efforts. The conclusion of the study was that the accumulation of eco office application scores was 59%, which showed that the application of the eco office concept in the building was quite implemented. The distribution of these levels is in accordance with the implementation indicators, namelyelectricity saving (53%),water saving and conserving (56%), office waste management (65%), greening (66%), and other efforts (54%). The suggestions of the research results are the reduction of the use of lights by utilizing solar energy, the use of energy-saving lamps; use of water-saving taps and utilization of wastewater recycling; provision of separated trash bins between organic and inorganic waste; the addition of greening in the building; socialization of eco office application to the employees.
ON ENHANCED IMAGE RESTORATION FOR INDUSTRIAL APPLICATIONS BASED ON WAVELET AND MATHEMATICAL MORPHOLOGY

In the locomotive world automotive industries are the highest and emerging topographies to develop and apply technology for continually improving quality, cost, etc. Probably, image processing is introduced for industrial solicitations in automatic visual inspection system because visual inspection system is not able to identify the small flaws in the industrial products which are used in agricultural sector or others. Although numerous technologies have developed to enhance the ratings in automotive, to overcome the existing system drawbacks, this paper presented a mathematical morphology based on Wavelet neural network (WNN) for Image restoration. According to wavelet neural network and mathematical morphology, a new image restoration algorithm proposed with an image amoeba element for restoring and it perceives any defects in the portions. Further, image restoration is another form of filter that automatically adjust shapes and sizes of structure elements according to the content of the image and the image data trained with the WNN model to regain the original image.
ESTIMATION OF TRIBOLOGICAL PROPERTIES OF LOW AND MEDIUM-CARBON STEELS AFTER HEAT TREATMENT AND SEVERE PLASTIC DEFORMATION

The results of joint comparative tribological studies performed on structural steels with a carbon content of 0.2% and 0.45% are presented in this work. Three states were studied: the source (hot-rolled), after heat treatment (martempering) and after martempering with subsequent severe plastic deformation (SPD) by equal channel angular pressing (ECAP). It is established that the materials after different types of treatment are in different structure states, and show various shear strength of adhesive bonds and adhesive (molecular) components of the friction coefficient in contact with tool steel. And the greatest effect hardening via grain structure refinement is observed on lowcarbon steel. Medium-carbon steel has approximately the same tribological properties after heat treatment (martempering) and after SPD by an ECAP method.
Measuring the flying qualities of MIG-29 simulator

Simulators are getting important role nowadays and hence a validation procedure and flying qualities must be developed to ensure the similarity between the simulator and the aircraft. The flying qualities must be validated in the final stage of development for a simulator since the presence of hardware-in-the-loop makes noise and disturbances for the system. In this article, the flying qualities for the MIG-29 K simulator of the MiG Corporation are investigated to validate its characteristics of longitudinal and lateral flight modes. The flying qualities of the simulated aircraft are compared to the USAF military standard MIL-F 8785c to determine if it is adequate to its specified mission. This research contributes in the development of this simulator by determining the flying quality level of the simulator. Based on the results, the necessary modifications required for the simulator will be determined.
EFFECT OF CORPORATE GOVERNANCE ELEMENTS ON INNATE AND DISCRETIONARY ACCRUALS QUALITY *

In this paper we want to find the association between discretionary accruals quality as well as innate accruals quality and portion of independent directors on the board, having an audit committee in a company, the director manager and chairman of the board are the same, being parent companies, proportion of stock that the main stockholder has and engagement organization of audit in Tehran Stock Exchange. We derive measures of the discretionary and innate components of accruals quality and regress them against corporate governance characteristics. The survey selected 461 qualified stocks from Tehran stock exchange and we selected 85 companies that have our terms. For discretionary accruals, we find, higher proportion of independent directors on the board is the primary governance mechanisms associated with higher accruals quality. For innate accruals quality, we find higher quality is associated with an independent board of directors, a larger and more independent and use of an audit firm from audit organization. Our findings suggest a stronger relation between sound governance mechanisms and innate accruals quality than discretionary accruals quality.
Design and Optimization technique for PV-Wind Hybrid Generation System Based on Fuzzy Logic Controller

In this study, a new approach of optimum and Economical sizing of a Hybrid PV-Wind energy system is presenting in order to assist the Projector to take into contemplation, both of the economic and ecological aspects. This context presents the varied optimization techniques to circumvention the hybrid PV-wind Modal. The hybrid Modal implies the photovoltaic panels and wind turbines. Fuzzy logic Based Optimization techniques are employ to minimize the formulated substantial function, i.e. total cost which add the initial costs, yearly substitution cost, yearly labourer’s cost and sustenance costs with conduce value of the proposed hybrid Modal. It also exhibit the rehearsed and spectacle comparison between the modal with fuzzy and without fuzzy techniques for eminent sizing of spurious PV/Wind energy modal. One computer program and one Matlab model are designed, using MATLAB code to formulate the optimization issue by numerating the colligation of the objective task. Finally, the optimal annotation is achieved by fuzzy logic optimization method. Dynamic modelling, management and simulation have a glance at in the PV/wind electric technology system is dead in MATLAB/Simulink application. The simulation results obtained via various load things and precise analysis of this attached simulation model are given.
Chapter 12 Experimental and numerical modelling of a scaled soil-structure system

Recent earthquakes (Bucharest, 1977; Mexico City, 1985; Kobe, 1995) have shown clearly the great influence of soil-structure interaction (SSI) in the seismic response of structures to earthquakes. Unfortunately, many seismic codes do not consider SSI or consider SSI detrimental only for some specific structures, because generally SSI leads to higher fundamental periods and then, considering the general shape of response and design spectra of seismic codes, to smaller accelerations and stresses in the structure. But, the response spectra of several recent earthquakes were characterized by a very high predominant period. The analysis of SSI could be performed by means of different approaches: the two approaches discussed in the present paper are experimental modelling by means of shaking table tests and numerical modelling by means of a FEM code. A 1:6 scaled steel model resting on a sand deposit is subjected to sinusoidal input motions of different amplitudes and constant frequency and duration. A good agreement is obtained comparing experimental and numerical results, in terms of acceleration and displacement.