Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
End-to-End Convolutional Autoencoder for Nonlinear Hyperspectral Unmixing

Hyperspectral Unmixing is the process of decomposing a mixed pixel into its pure materials (endmembers) and estimating their corresponding proportions (abundances). Although linear unmixing models are more common due to their simplicity and flexibility, they suffer from many limitations in real world scenes where interactions between pure materials exist, which paved the way for nonlinear methods to emerge. However, existing methods for nonlinear unmixing require prior knowledge or an assumption about the type of nonlinearity, which can affect the results. This paper introduces a nonlinear method with a novel deep convolutional autoencoder for blind unmixing. The proposed framework consists of a deep encoder of successive small size convolutional filters along with max pooling layers, and a decoder composed of successive 2D and 1D convolutional filters. The output of the decoder is formed of a linear part and an additive non-linear one. The network is trained using the mean squared error loss function. Several experiments were conducted to evaluate the performance of the proposed method using synthetic and real airborne data. Results show a better performance in terms of abundance and endmembers estimation compared to several existing methods.
Mitigation and traceback countermeasures for dos attacks

Denial of service (DoS) attacks impose an imminent threat to the availability of Internet services. The alarming increase of such attacks coupled with the emergence of sophisticated DoS attack techniques, call for efficient defense mechanisms to counter these attacks. Although there has been ongoing research in this area—focusing on DoS prevention, mitigation, and traceback—the existing countermeasures lack in several qualitative and quantitative metrics. In this context, this dissertation makes two key contributions in the design and analysis of efficient, scalable schemes for DoS mitigation and traceback. First, efficient perimeter mitigation schemes based on novel concepts, such as “protocol-determinism” and “victim-assistance” are proposed. The proposed schemes enable ISP edge routers to perform timely mitigation of both end-host and network exhaustion attacks. The proposed mitigation schemes have been evaluated through analytical studies for classical and advanced attacks quantifying security metrics, such as false positive and false negative rates, and performance metrics, such as effective attack rate and connection establishment latency increase. Our analysis shows that the proposed schemes offer very low false positive and false negative rates, and reduce attacker's effective attack rate significantly with an acceptable increase in connection establishment latency. Second, hybrid IP traceback schemes that integrate the concepts of packet marking and packet logging in a novel manner are proposed. The goal is to achieve a drastic reduction in the number of attack packets required to conduct the traceback process. The proposed traceback schemes have been evaluated through a combination of analytical and simulation studies quantifying performance metrics, such as number of attack packets, storage overhead, and attack localization distance. Our studies show that the proposed traceback schemes are superior in comparison to the well known PPM scheme. This dissertation opens up several directions for future research which includes (1) designing efficient mitigation schemes in the context of inter-domain network, (2) designing efficient mitigation schemes that employ traceback, and (3) designing a comprehensive DoS defense mechanism that integrates DoS prevention, mitigation, and traceback in an efficient manner.
Virtually new: A case description of a health system's new employee orientation COVID‐19 response plan

As a result of the novel Coronavirus of 2019 (COVID–19), everyday life was transformed globally. With this, organizations were faced with the need to strategically and empathetically balance employee safety with business continuity as their survival largely depended on enacting immediate response measures by shifting to working remotely. When work moved online, essential programs including new employee onboarding, required a transition to virtual learning and development. This case description outlines Jackson Health System's COVID–19 New Employee Orientation (NEO) response plan through the lens of andragogy, with an emphasis on technological considerations. Following a description of decisions and responses to design and execute the virtual orientation program, a discussion is presented of three overarching lessons learned in the process: Virtual onboarding is a necessarily iterative process; virtual onboarding must be intentional; and the technological divide must be addressed. Recommendations for human resource development (HRD) research and practice are offered.
Adopting and integrating cyber-threat intelligence in a commercial organisation

ABSTRACT Cyber-attacks are increasingly perpetrated by organised, sophisticated and persistent entities such as crime syndicates and paramilitary forces. Even commercial firms that fully comply with industry “best practice” cyber security standards cannot cope with military-style cyber-attacks. We posit that the primary reason is the increasing asymmetry between the cyber-offensive capability of attackers and the cyber-defensive capability of commercial organisations. A key avenue to resolve this asymmetry is for organisations to leverage cyber-threat intelligence (CTI) to direct their cyber-defence. How can commercial organisations adopt and integrate CTI to routinely defend their information systems and resources from increasingly advanced cyber-attacks? There is limited know-how on how to package CTI to inform the practices of enterprise-wide stakeholders. This clinical research describes a practitioner-researcher’s experiences in directing a large multinational finance corporation to adopt and integrate CTI to transform cybersecurity-related practice and behaviour. The research contributes practical know-how on the organisational adoption and integration of CTI, enacted through the transformation of cybersecurity practice, and enterprise-wide implementation of a novel solution to package CTI for commercial contexts. The study illustrates the inputs, processes, and outputs in clinical research as a genre of action research.
Thermo-mechanical Analysis of Thermal Compression Bonding Chip-Join Process

Heterogeneous Integration (HI) Packaging has enabled high-bandwidth, low-latency communication between package components such as CPUs, GPUs and memory units for AI workloads. Examples of enabling HI packaging technologies include Si interposers, high-density laminates with thin films, silicon bridges and stacked chips.Thermo-compression bonding (TCB) chip-join process is achieved by the application of pressure and temperature to the mating surfaces which can be silicon-silicon or silicon-laminate substrate. A silicon-silicon structure has minimal thermal expansion mismatch while there is a large thermal expansion mismatch between silicon and laminate substrate. Also, the pressure and temperature capabilities of the TCB tools can be vastly different for different manufacturers. As a result, it is important to understand the effects of varying the TCB process parameters on the package components and interconnect quality.In this study, transient finite element models were created for the TCB process for a silicon-bridge structure with direct bonded heterogenous integration (DBHi) packaging. The package model consists of processor and bridge chips, interconnects between the chips, and underfill around the interconnects. In addition, our models also included TCB tool components in direct contact with the package, such as the ceramic heater, nozzle and heated pedestal. Appropriate thermal and mechanical boundary conditions were applied to the models based on the assembly process parameters for the different packages. The quality of the bonds was assessed from the resultant temperature profiles, stress distribution and warpage in the package components and interconnects. The effect of process parameters including bond temperature, bond force and temperature ramping rate was also studied to provide guidance toward improving the TCB bond profiles. Our work presents the first extensive modeling effort for thermal compression bonding of HI package structures to complement our prior thermo-mechanical analysis of the isolated package systems.
Do Arctic mixed-phase clouds sometimes dissipate due to insufficient aerosol? Evidence from comparisons between observations and idealized simulations

Abstract. Mixed-phase clouds are ubiquitous in the Arctic. These clouds can persist for days and dissipate in a matter of hours. It is sometimes unknown what causes this sudden dissipation, but aerosol–cloud interactions may be involved. Arctic aerosol concentrations can be low enough to affect cloud formation and structure, and it has been hypothesized that, in some instances, concentrations can drop below some critical value needed to maintain a cloud. We use observations from a Department of Energy ARM site on the northern slope of Alaska at Oliktok Point (OLI), the Arctic Summer Cloud Ocean Study (ASCOS) field campaign in the high Arctic Ocean, and the Integrated Characterisation of Energy, Clouds, Atmospheric state, and Precipitation at Summit – Aerosol Cloud Experiment (ICECAPS-ACE) project at the NSF (National Science Foundation) Summit Station in Greenland (SMT) to identify one case per site where Arctic boundary layer clouds dissipated coincidentally with a decrease in surface aerosol concentrations. These cases are used to initialize idealized large eddy simulations (LESs) in which aerosol concentrations are held constant until, at a specified time, all aerosols are removed instantaneously – effectively creating an extreme case of aerosol-limited dissipation which represents the fastest a cloud could possibly dissipate via this process. These LESs are compared against the observed data to determine whether cases could, potentially, be dissipating due to insufficient aerosol. The OLI case's observed liquid water path (LWP) dissipated faster than its simulation, indicating that other processes are likely the primary drivers of the dissipation. The ASCOS and SMT observed LWP dissipated at similar rates to their respective simulations, suggesting that aerosol-limited dissipation may be occurring in these instances. We also find that the microphysical response to this extreme aerosol forcing depends greatly on the specific case being simulated. Cases with drizzling liquid layers are simulated to dissipate by accelerating precipitation when aerosol is removed while the case with a non-drizzling liquid layer dissipates quickly, possibly glaciating via the Wegener–Bergeron–Findeisen (WBF) process. The non-drizzling case is also more sensitive to ice-nucleating particle (INP) concentrations than the drizzling cases. Overall, the simulations suggest that aerosol-limited cloud dissipation in the Arctic is plausible and that there are at least two microphysical pathways by which aerosol-limited dissipation can occur.
Long-term health after Severe Acute Malnutrition in children and adults- the role of the Pancreas (SAMPA): Protocol

Background: Prenatal growth retardation may increase the risk of later chronic non-communicable diseases (NCDs), including diabetes; however, long-term effects of wasting malnutrition in childhood or adulthood are less studied. Pancreatic exocrine and endocrine functions, both critical for nutrition and NCD aetiology, may not fully recover following malnutrition. However, the evidence and mechanistic information is piecemeal. We hypothesise that wasting malnutrition at any age has long-term detrimental effects on endocrine and exocrine pancreatic structure and function. Methods: The SAMPA international research programme will assess pancreatic structure and function in 3700 participants from ongoing observational nutrition cohorts, two adolescent and four adult, in Zambia, Tanzania, Philippines, and India. Pancreas size, structure, and calcification will be assessed by ultrasound and computed tomography (CT) scan; exocrine function by faecal elastase and serum lipase; and endocrine function by haemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) and blood glucose, insulin and C-peptide concentrations during an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT). In-depth hormonal analyses of incretins, glucagon, proinsulin and trypsinogen during OGTT and intravenous glucose tolerance tests will be done in subsets of adult participants. Pancreatic size and function outcomes will be compared between people with and without prior wasting malnutrition. Analyses will investigate effect modification by sex, current age, time since malnutrition, current body mass index and dietary patterns. Mathematical modelling of OGTT data will be used to estimate the relative contribution to glucose dysregulation of decreased insulin production, changes in insulin clearance and increased insulin resistance. Proinsulin/insulin ratio will be analysed in archived samples from the Tanzanian cohort using a nested case-control design to investigate whether abnormal values precede diabetes. Conclusions: SAMPA, a large-scale multi-centre research programme using data from people with or without prior wasting malnutrition to assess several aspects of pancreatic phenotype, will provide coherent evidence for future policies and programmes for malnutrition and diabetes.
Identifying quiescent compact objects in massive Galactic single-lined spectroscopic binaries

Context. The quest to detect dormant stellar-mass black holes (BHs) in massive binaries (i.e. OB+BH systems) is challenging; only a few candidates have been claimed to date, all of which must still be confirmed. Aims. To search for these rare objects, we study 32 Galactic O-type stars that were reported as single-lined spectroscopic binaries (SB1s) in the literature. In our sample we include Cyg X-1, which is known to host an accreting stellar-mass BH, and HD 74194, a supergiant fast X-ray transient, in order to validate our methodology. The final goal is to characterise the nature of the unseen companions to determine if they are main-sequence (MS) stars, stripped helium stars, triples, or compact objects such as neutron stars (NSs) or stellar-mass BHs. Methods. After measuring radial velocities and deriving orbital solutions for all the systems in our sample, we performed spectral disentangling to extract putative signatures of faint secondary companions from the composite spectra. We derived stellar parameters for the visible stars and estimated the mass ranges of the secondary stars using the binary mass function. Variability observed in the photometric TESS light curves was also searched for indications of the presence of putative companions, degenerate or not. Results. In 17 of the 32 systems reported as SB1s, we extract secondary signatures, down to mass ratios of ∼0.15. For the 17 newly detected double-lined spectroscopic binaries (SB2s), we derive physical properties of the individual components and discuss why they have not been detected as such before. Among the remaining systems, we identify nine systems with possible NS or low-mass MS companions. For Cyg X-1 and HD 130298, we are not able to extract any signatures for the companions, and the minimum masses of their companions are estimated to be about 7 M . Our simulations show that secondaries with such a mass should be detectable from our dataset, no matter their nature: MS stars, stripped helium stars or even triples. While this is expected for Cyg X-1, confirming our methodology, our simulations also strongly suggest that HD 130298 could be another candidate to host a stellar-mass BH. Conclusions. The quest to detect dormant stellar-mass BHs in massive binaries is far from over, and many more systems need to be scrutinised. Our analysis allows us to detect good candidates, but confirming the BH nature of their companions will require further dedicated monitorings, sophisticated analysis techniques, and multi-wavelength observations.
Shape Dependency of Fatigue Life in Solder Joints of Chip Resistors

This study is attempted to correlate between solder joint shape and fatigue life in experimental and numerical approaches. The test assemblies consisting of R1005 (1.0 × 0.5 mm) and R0402 (0.4 × 0.2 mm) soldered with SAC 305 solder material are subjected to thermal shock loading (-55 °C to 150 °C, dwell time 3 min, 6 cycles per hour). In an effort to analyze the effect of solder joint shape on fatigue life, the test assemblies are printed with different solder paste volume which induces variations in solder joint shape. The variations observed on the solder volumes generated are categorized as concave, straight, tiny convex, and convex symmetrically which are essentially achieved using stencils with different opening sizes. Another variation that is induced artificially is having unsymmetrical solder paste volume on two copper pads of a single component. Group of passive components which induces variations in solder joint shape symmetry or asymmetry are monitored to measure the resistances during thermal shock test.
A Review on Autonomous Vehicles: Progress, Methods and Challenges

Vehicular technology has recently gained increasing popularity, and autonomous driving is a hot topic. To achieve safe and reliable intelligent transportation systems, accurate positioning technologies need to be built to factor in the different types of uncertainties such as pedestrian behavior, random objects, and types of roads and their settings. In this work, we look into the other domains and technologies required to build an autonomous vehicle and conduct a relevant literature analysis. In this work, we look into the current state of research and development in environment detection, pedestrian detection, path planning, motion control, and vehicle cybersecurity for autonomous vehicles. We aim to study the different proposed technologies and compare their approaches. For a car to become fully autonomous, these technologies need to be accurate enough to gain public trust and show immense accuracy in their approach to solving these problems. Public trust and perception of auto vehicles are also explored in this paper. By discussing the opportunities as well as the obstacles of autonomous driving technology, we aim to shed light on future possibilities.
Advances in Percutaneous Patent Foramen Ovale Closure: From the Procedure to the Echocardiographic Guidance

Percutaneous patent foramen ovale (PFO) closure by traditional, double disc occluder devices was shown to be safe for patients with PFO, and more effective than prolonged medical therapy in preventing recurrent thromboembolic events. The novel suture-mediated “deviceless” PFO closure system overcomes most of the risks and limitations associated with the traditional PFO occluders, appearing to be feasible in most interatrial septum anatomies, even if data about its long-term effectiveness and safety are still lacking. The aim of the present review was to provide to the reader the state of the art about the traditional and newer techniques of PFO closure, focusing both on the procedural aspects and on the pivotal role of transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) in patient’s selection, peri-procedural guidance, and post-interventional follow-up.
Noise Level inside Sri Lanka Transport Board Buses and Hearing Impairment of Long- and Short-Distance Bus Drivers of Ampara and Batticaloa Districts, Sri Lanka

Background: Transport drivers are more vulnerable to hearing impairment due to the traffic environment and fast-growing urbanization. Objective: The study aims to determine the noise level inside the Sri Lanka Transport Board (SLTB) buses, hearing impairment of state transport bus drivers, and its associated factors in the selected districts of Eastern Province, Sri Lanka. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive study was carried out among 256 state bus drivers using a systematic sampling technique. A screening tool to assess the level of hearing impairment of drivers and a format to measure equivalent noise level inside the SLTB buses were used to collect data. Noise measurement was done using Benetech Sound Level Meter (Model DB 130). Results: With reference to the noise level inside buses, 88.4% (n = 53) exceeded 85 dB (A), and 21.7% of buses (n = 13) were above 90 dB (A). According to the hearing tool's hearing impairment assessment, the hearing of the majority of the study participants (84.4%, n = 216) was not affected. The association between hearing impairment and past history of ear diseases, surgeries, or head trauma was statistically significant (P = 0.017). Conclusions: Noise level inside the SLTB buses in Ampara and Batticaloa districts exceeded the 85 dB limit prescribed under the WHO standards of occupational noise exposure. The years of service of a bus was the only factor shown a statistically significant association with the level of noise inside the bus.
Quantitative Assessment of Pollution Status of Heavy Metals in the Water from Mairua Dam, Faskari LGA, Katsina State, Northwestern Nigeria

Pollution of surface water by toxic metals has received considerable attention due to its risk to human health and ecology. Consequently, the present study focused on the assessment of the heavy metal concentrations in the water from Mairua dam. This research reveals the concentrations of the selected toxic metals (Pb, Cd, Co, Cr and Ni) in water samples. The following trend was observed across the sampling points; Co> Cr> Cd> Ni> Pb. The concentrations of Pb across the sampling points were within the WHO (2011) permissible limits. However the Cd concentrations across the sampling points were within the WHO limits of 0.003 mg/kg with exemption of W1, W2, W3, W4, W5, W8 and W10 respectively. Similarly the concentrations of Co in the analyzed water samples were all above WHO (2011) tolerable limits of 0.01 mg/kg. The elevated level of cobalt in the water may be attributed to leachates from farmlands and domestic waste. The concentrations of Cr across the sampling points were within the WHO (2011) permissible limits of 0.005 mg/kg with exemption of samples W2, W3, W4, W7, W8, W10 and W11 respectively. However, the concentrations of Ni across the sampling points were higher than WHO (2011) permissible limits of 0.01 mg/kg. Nickel is introduced into the environment from both natural and man-made sources. The results obtained for Contamination Factors reveals low contamination (Cf<1) with an exemption of Cd in points W1 and W2. PLI denotes no pollution and Hazard quotient values also showed that the analyzed water has no potential health effects with exemption to Cd. The results also shows that there was no significant difference in the analyzed samples at p<0.005 across the sampling sites. Pollution of the water by Cd may be as a result of anthropogenic activities that are released into the dam. It is recommended to periodically monitor the water.