Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modeling the ecosystem: a meta-synthesis of ecosystem and related literatures

The "ecosystem" metaphor has been gaining increasing currency in management research; however there is only limited recognition and integration of other similar management constructs and underlying theory. We conduct a systematic review of the ecosystem and related literature, defining an ecosystem as a network of interconnected organizations, organized around a focal firm or platform, which incorporates both production and use side participants. We suggest three interdependent characteristics that provide the boundaries of the ecosystem construct - value logic, participant symbiosis and institutional stability - and outline the interrelationships between them. Utilizing these characteristics, we propose the "ecosystem model" as a practitioner tool, analogous to the business model, which describes the rationale of how an ecosystem creates, delivers and captures value. We conclude by identifying emerging trends and areas for future research.
Low-cost 3D vision for autonomous vehicles

Computational Vision is poised to transition from the laboratory to the battlefield; however, which techniques are the most appropriate for tactical applications? This report provides a review of 3D vision techniques and evaluates their potential application to various classes of autonomous vehicles from a systems engineering perspective. This report provides an overview of 3D vision techniques, evaluates robustness and susceptibility to countermeasures, evaluates vehicle integration requirements, and identifies promising approaches.
Factors causing stress in postgraduate dental students during COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-sectional survey

Background: COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the academic and clinical training of postgraduate dental students. This study aimed to assess various factors causing psychological stress in them, and the extent of stress perception during pandemic. Materials and Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 250 postgraduate students from nine dental colleges of Haryana and National Capital Region, India, responded to an online questionnaire sent electronically to them in September 2020, which included modified dental environment stress (DES) score, Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), and questions regarding COVID-associated stress (CAS). Students already diagnosed with any psychiatric disorder or having a history of any major adverse event during the last 6 months likely to affect their psychological health were excluded from this study. The data obtained were analyzed using Chi-square test, Independent t-test, univariate ANOVA with post hoc tests, Pearson moment correlation, and multiple hierarchical regression tests. P < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: DES score was moderate for 48.8% and high for 34.4% of the participants. PSS was moderate for 69.2% and high for 18.8% of the participants. The most stressful factor in dental environment was the pattern of university examination, while the most stressful factor specific to COVID-19 was the fear of family members contracting the infection. PSS score was significantly higher in female participants. DES and CAS scores were significantly higher in students staying in hostels. Multiple hierarchical regression model depicted gender, mean health, and DES score as significant predictors of PSS. Conclusion: Postgraduate dental students reported the adverse impact of COVID-19 pandemic upon their training and prospects as a reason for the increase in stress.
Effectiveness of Classification Methods on the Diabetes System

In today’s world using data mining and classification is considered to be one of the most important techniques, as today’s world is full of data that is generated by various sources. However, extracting useful knowledge out of this data is the real challenge, and this paper conquers this challenge by using machine learning algorithms to use data for classifiers to draw meaningful results. The aim of this research paper is to design a model to detect diabetes in patients with high accuracy. Therefore, this research paper using five different algorithms for different machine learning classification includes, Decision Tree, Support Vector Machine (SVM), Random Forest, Naive Bayes, and K- Nearest Neighbor (K-NN), the purpose of this approach is to predict diabetes at an early stage. Finally, we have compared the performance of these algorithms, concluding that K-NN algorithm is a better accuracy (81.16%), followed by the Naive Bayes algorithm (76.06%).
Control Methods of Active Power Filter

Active power filter (APF) is an important device to compensate harmonic and reactive current in power system control method adopted has a great influence on its performance. The paper introduces several control methods used by APF, including the deadbeat control, single-cycle control, space vector control and so on. After comparing and analyzing their individual advantages and disadvantages, some improvements for APF performance are proposed.
RISK MANAGEMENT AND CONTINGENCY PLANNING IN EVENTS: PARTICIPANTS' REACTIONS TO THE CANCELLATION OF IRONMAN NEW ZEALAND 2012

Previous event studies on risk and risk management have predominantly been undertaken from the perspective of event organizers, whilst the perceptions of event participants in relation to risks, their eventuation, and management have received less attention. This paper presents an exploratory case study of amateur athletes’ reactions to the cancellation of a participation-based sporting event, with particular reference to their perceptions of risk management and contingency planning initiatives deployed by event organizers. Drawing upon semi-structured interviews with participants of the cancelled 2012 Ironman New Zealand triathlon it was found participants perceived the situation as diligently and competently handled. Some criticism was directed however, towards event organizers’ communication strategies and aspects of their contingency initiatives. This research highlights the role comprehensive risk management and contingency planning can play in preventing damage to an event’s image and reputation if adverse circumstances are encountered.
Dielectric breakdown of PDMS thin films

This note presents the data on the dielectric breakdown of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) thin films with thicknesses from 2 to 14 μm between the silicon electrodes. The results demonstrate that there is a strong dependence of the breakdown field on both the electrode gap and shape. The breakdown fields range from 250 to 635 V μm−1, depending on the electrode geometry and gap, approaching 10× the breakdown fields for air gaps of the same size. The results are critical for understanding the performance limits of PDMS thin films used in the electromechanical microsystems.
Study on an Integrated Child Safety Seat

A new integrated child safety seat is presented in this paper. The seat is a two-mode seat for a motor vehicle cooperable with an adult seat belt assembly to provide two modes operation including an adult seat mode and a child seat mode. The seat locates in the center of the rear seat. The structure of the seat was designed in detail. The height of the booster of the seat can be adjusted continuously according to the seated shoulder height of the child passenger. The depth of booster cushion also can be changed according to the size of the passenger. The sled test with the seat was conducted. The seat simulation models with different booster heights were developed using MADYMO software and validated. Then, these models were used to study the performance of the seat in frontal impact. Some key parameters of the seat were studied in simulation test. The results of the test and simulation show that the seat can provide effective protection for the children aged from 3 to 10 years in frontal impact.
Investigation of the hydraulic design for a high-performance centrifugal pump

We investigated the hydraulic design in terms of high efficiency and good cavitation performance of centrifugal pumps for water supplies. The subject of the investigation was the centrifugal pump, which consists of a suction bend, impeller, diffuser, and discharge volute. The investigation was basically conducted using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) with design of experiments (DOE) and an optimization technique. The suction bend design was implemented first to obtain a uniform flow at the impeller inlet to provide good cavitation performance. We investigated the sensitivity of each parameter value comprising the suction bend configuration for obtaining uniform flow using a parameter design technique with DOE and CFD analyses. The key parameters that enable a better flow field were estimated efficiently and the values of the parameters were adjusted to obtain the optimized configuration. On the other hand, to achieve high performance of the impeller and diffuser shape, the effect of the configuration parameter values on hydraulic loss was also examined using the parameter design based on CFD and a multi-objective optimization technique. The investigation for obtaining a shape achieving high hydraulic efficiency was made practical by taking into account the trade-off of performance characteristics, i.e., performance instability at a low flow rate and gradient of the head curve. When predicting hydraulic performance, it is important to investigate the interaction of flow between the impeller and diffuser to accurately simulate the flow field. The combined analysis of the impeller and diffuser, therefore, was implemented using unsteady flow simulation, and the results were applied to the parameter design using an optimization technique. Finally, the unsteady flow calculation of a complete pump was carried out to confirm the appropriateness of the hydraulic design. The hydraulic performance of the pump was also confirmed using a model pump test. As the result of these investigations, the hydraulic shape of a high-efficiency and high-cavitation centrifugal pump was developed.
Baseline Predictors of Adherence in a Randomised Controlled Trial of a New Group Psychological Intervention for People with Recurrent Binge Eating Episodes Associated to Overweight or Obesity

Purpose: Understanding the high rate of treatment adherence in trials of people with eating disorders is important as it can compromise the quality of the trials. In clinical practice, it may also contribute to illness chronicity, relapse, and costs. Thus, we investigated factors associated with adherence to a new treatment HAPIFED, which integrates cognitive behavioural therapy having extended sessions with body weight loss therapy compared to cognitive behavioural therapy with extended sessions alone, for individuals with Bulimia Nervosa or Binge Eating Disorder or other eating disorders comorbid with overweight or obesity. Methods: In total, 98 participants having bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder and other specified and unspecified eating disorders were recruited with 50 randomised to HAPIFED and 48 to the control intervention CBT-E, all administered in groups of up to 10 participants. An investigator external to the site conducted the random allocation, which was concealed from the statistician involved in the analysis, and known only to the therapists until the finalization of the 12-month follow-up after the end of active treatment. Three scenarios in the timeline treatment of a total of 30 sessions were assessed: 33% or 60% or 75% of presence. Mixed-effects logistic regression analysis was performed to find the correlates of adherence after adjusting for clustering by number of group participants. To account for heterogeneity by types of eating disorders in the sample, the latter variable was considered as a control factor in the models. A subgroup analysis was performed for those with binge eating disorder as this was the largest (N = 66) eating disorder group. Results: None of the six variables—frequency of binge eating episodes, purging, eating disorder symptom severity, weight, illness duration and mental health-related quality of life—significantly predicted adherence at 33%, but longer illness duration predicted higher treatment adherence at both 60% and 75% presence of the interventions. Also for 75% presence, higher body weight predicted lower treatment adherence. For the subgroup analysis, those having higher illness duration had significantly higher odds of treatment adherence for 60% and 75% of the sessions. Conclusions: Higher adherence due to late treatment completion was associated with longer binge eating illness length and a lower body weight. More research is needed to recognize factors that may interfere with engagement in treatments aiming to avoid early dropout.
Meta-Analysis of Prevalence of Depression in Dental Students during COVID-19 Pandemic

Background and Objectives: The COVID-19 pandemic has a negative impact on the mental health of the population in general, and in college students in particular. Dental students have seen their teaching altered and their clinical practice reduced. This study was aimed at conducting a systematic review and meta-analysis of studies reporting levels of depression among dental students during the COVID-19 and estimating the pooled prevalence of depression. Materials and Methods: Medline via PubMed and other databases were searched for studies on the prevalence of depression in dental undergraduates, published from 1 December 2019 to 1 September 2021. The pooled proportions of depression were calculated with random effects models. Results: We identified 13 studies from 9 countries. The pooled prevalence of depression in dental students was 37% (95% CI: 26–49%) with no variation due to gender, response rate or methodological quality. We only found a significantly higher prevalence of depression in studies from Asia compared to Europe and America. Conclusions: Our results suggest that dental students are suffering from higher levels of depression compared with the general population or other college students during the COVID-19 pandemic, with differences across regions. Measures to improve mental health and wellbeing of dental students during the pandemic are needed.
Tracking control of piezoelectric stack actuator using modified Prandtl–Ishlinskii model

This article presents the development of Prandtl–Ishlinskii hysteresis model and tracking control of piezoelectric stack actuator with severe hysteresis. Classical Prandtl–Ishlinskii model is a linearly weighted superposition of many backlash operators with different threshold and weight values, which inherits the symmetric property of the backlash operator at about the center point of the loop formed by the operators. To describe the asymmetric hysteresis of piezoelectric stack actuators, two modified operators were developed, one for ascending branches and another for descending branches. Based on this modified model, a feedforward controller was designed to compensate the hysteresis. Since the modified model describes the inverse of hysteresis, the feedforward controller and the hysteresis of piezoelectric stack actuator canceled each other. To attenuate the creep effect and reduce tracking error, a feedback controller was proposed to work with the feedforward controller. Experimental results show that this control scheme that combines feedforward and feedback controllers greatly improves the tracking of the piezoelectric actuator and the error is less than 0.15 µm.
Lead-acid Battery State-of-Health Evaluation with Short Discharge Method

Electricity access to rural areas in third world countries is still a big problem. Second-life components can present a good solution for these areas as solar PV (Photo-Voltaic) panels can still be used after twenty five years of use. PSUs (power supply units) from computers can be used as solar charge controllers after just a little change while batteries can also be used in their second-life when they are eliminated from their first use. This second life use of electrical components is done with the frugal innovation principles. But using batteries in second-life requires SoH accurate measurement which is still difficult with already existing methods especially when history of battery is unknown. In this paper, a new method is introduced based on short discharge of the battery. This method is cheap, fast, reliable and accurate enough for second-life batteries. A second-life battery means that when a battery is done for its life but still it can be used for small load than before. The method can be applied in two different ways and maximum error for both variations is around 10% which is very much acceptable for second-life batteries. The well-known two-pulse method is also performed to compare results for same conditions and error can be as high as 55% in some cases. The method is equally good for flooded (car) and AGM (solar) lead-acid batteries. The method introduced in the paper highly relies on SoC accurate measurement. Here, two-pulse method is used as SoC measurement method with short discharge method.
The new constitution freezing the press: Freedom of expression and statutory limitations in Libya

Abstract This study examined the Libyan conflict which started in 2011 until now. In the same way, the study also focused on how Libyan journalists are fighting for media freedom, particularly in the context of the media laws in the new Constitution of 2017. Through focus group discussions were done with 40 Libyan journalists. The findings of the study indicated that some media laws did not conform to the international laws and UN treaties, which the Libyan Parliament Committee approved. Another finding of the study was that the journalists advocated for a change in the media laws so that they subscribe to the international law. In addition, the journalists also noted that the Constitution should guarantee press freedom. The journalists indicated that they receive threats if they publish stories critical of the governments or ISIS. They also suggested that their actions as journalists have not been sufficiently factored into the political science framework of the safety valve which may be playing the same role with the new democratisation process in 2021. In the context of these findings, the following recommendations were made: the new government should change Articles 35, 37, 38, 42, 43, 46 and 132 to conform to the international laws and UN treaties.
Characterization of liquid crystal polymer for high frequency system-in-a-package applications

Liquid crystal polymer (LCP) is a promising substrate for electronics packaging. In this paper, the high frequency characteristics of LCP were investigated using a microstrip ring resonator to verify the possibility of applying the material in RF packaging. The relative dielectric constant and the loss tangent have been measured. The radiation loss of the ring is considered to accurately determine the loss tangent. A GaAs MMIC switch circuit was fabricated using LCP as substrate to demonstrate the application of this material for system-in-a-package. From the high frequency measurements, it is shown that LCP has low dielectric constant and low loss tangent in the frequency range from 1 GHz to 35 GHz. It is also found that LCP can be used in system-in-a-package applications.
Blackcurrant Improves Diabetic Cardiovascular Dysfunction by Reducing Inflammatory Cytokines in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus Mice

Diabetic cardiovascular dysfunction is a representative complication of diabetes. Inflammation associated with the onset and exacerbation of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is an essential factor in the pathogenesis of diabetic cardiovascular complications. Diabetes-induced myocardial dysfunction is characterized by myocardial fibrosis, which includes structural heart changes, myocardial cell death, and extracellular matrix protein accumulation. The mice groups in this study were divided as follows: Cont, control (db/m mice); T2DM, type 2 diabetes mellitus mice (db/db mice); Vil.G, db/db + vildagliptin 50 mg/kg/day, positive control, dipeptidyl peptidase-4 (DPP-4) inhibitor; Bla.C, db/db + blackcurrant 200 mg/kg/day. In this study, Bla.C treatment significantly improved the homeostatic model evaluation of glucose, insulin, and insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) indices and diabetic blood markers such as HbA1c in T2DM mice. In addition, Bla.C improved cardiac function markers and cardiac thickening through echocardiography. Bla.C reduced the expression of fibrosis biomarkers, elastin and type IV collagen, in the left ventricle of a diabetic cardiopathy model. Bla.C also inhibited TD2M-induced elevated levels of inflammatory cytokines in cardiac tissue (IL-6, IL-1β, TNF-α, and TGF-β). Thus, Bla.C significantly improved cardiac inflammation and cardiovascular fibrosis and dysfunction by blocking inflammatory cytokine activation signals. This showed that Bla.C treatment could ameliorate diabetes-induced cardiovascular complications in T2DM mice. These results provide evidence that Bla.C extract has a significant effect on the prevention of cardiovascular fibrosis, inflammation, and consequent diabetes-induced cardiovascular complications, directly or indirectly, by improving blood glucose profile.
Injection-locked oscillator chain: a possible solution to millimeter-wave MMIC synthesizers

An injection-locked oscillator (ILO) MMIC chain, which cascades low/high frequency-band ILOs, is proposed for simple and cost-effective millimeter-wave local oscillators and synthesizers, and primary 5-GHz-band and 50-GHz-band ILO MMICs, which are injection-locked at subharmonic factors from 1 to 1/16 and from 1 to 1/4 respectively, are demonstrated.
Tuning Characteristics of DFB Diode Laser and its Application to TDLAS Gas Sensor Design

Static and dynamic tuning characteristics of Distribute Feedback (DFB) diode lasers are investigated with practical laser devices. These characteristics are the basic guidelines for practical TDLAS sensors design. Static tuning characteristics help to select suitable diode lasers from limited available laser devices with specific wavelength and to set an appropriate working current and temperature. Dynamic tuning characteristics decide the sweep speed of current slope in both direct absorb Spectroscopy (DAS) and wavelength modulation Spectroscopy (WMS). Because of nonlinearity in the relation between wavelength and tuning current, the measured spectral line position should be corrected by the dynamic characteristics. For WMS, current tuning efficient and IM/AM (Intense modulation/Amplitude modulation) differential phase could be utilized to optimize laser modulation and harmonic components demodulation.
Conceptual and methodological issues in pathways model research

ABSTRACT The Pathways Model proposes three principal pathways into pathological or problem gambling which is predicated on two principal assumptions. The first is that risk factors can be differentiated into distinct clusters. The second is that certain preexisting individual differences, co-morbidities or circumstances contribute to an increased risk of subsequent gambling-related problems. In this paper, we argue that much of the evidence in support of the Pathways model has principally focused on the first of the assumptions. Research supports the view that there are sub-groups or subtypes of gamblers who approximate the clustering of characteristics postulated by the Pathways Model. However, such evidence does not so readily confirm the second assumption, namely the factors identified are antecedents or causal contributors to the development of gambling problems. In this paper, we examine the types of evidence required to strengthen support for the Model. Important research priorities include the need for additional longitudinal studies into the emergence and influence of risk factors; the relative importance of experiential and dispositional factors; and, being able to show differences in the pattern of associated co-morbidities as distinct from just differences in the severity of gambling disorder across the subtypes.