Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Agricultural Incomes Development in EU till 2030: Scenario Analysis of Main Driving Factors

Europe’s rural areas are expected to witness rapid changes due to developments in demography, (agricultural) policies, global trade, climate change, technology and enlargement of the European Union. These changes will affect farmers’ production and income level and make the final outcome of this process uncertain. This paper tries to assess this uncertainty by analyzing the results of 34 scenarios of the EURURALIS project. The scenario outcomes were used to investigate agricultural income development and to analyze the impact of different combinations of macroeconomic and policy factors on agricultural income. The results of these scenarios were achieved in a modeling framework consisting of a modified version of the Global Trade Analysis Project model (GTAP) and the more ecological-environmental oriented Integrated Model to Assess the Global Environment (IMAGE).
Locating Tumours in the MRI Image of the Brain by using Pattern Based K-Means and Fuzzy C-Means Clustering Algorithm

: This paper presents a powerful segmentation method which is the integration of Pattern based K-means also modified Fuzzy C-means (PKFCM) gathering calculation for trademark extraction with versatile gamma amendment which result in better upgraded picture contrast with other existing strategies. In this strategy, the model is selected based on the convolution between the gray level intensity in the small portion of the brain image and the image of the brain tumor. The K algorithm means emphasizing the initial segmentation through proper model selection. Updated membership is obtained using the distances from cluster centroid to cluster data points, until it reaches the best. This Euclidian distance depends on the different characteristics, namely intensity, entropy, contrast, dissimilarity and homogeneity of the coarse image, which only depended on its similarity to conventional FCMs. Then, depending on the upgrade and automatic cluster selection, a sharp segmented image with a red marked tumor is obtained by modified FCM technique. The small deviation of the gray level intensity of normal and abnormal tissue is detected through PKFCM. The performance of the PKFCM method is analyzed through the neural network which provide better regression and less error. The performance parameters show significant results that they are effective in detecting brain tumors based on multiple intensity MRI images of brain.
SEMI-INTENSIVE PRODUCTION OF PENAEUS VANNAMEI

Because marine shrimp species convenient for aquacultural purposes live mainly in warm-water environments, commercial shrimp farms are located principally along tropical and sub-tropical marine coastlines. Other than the South-East Asiatic countries, the Latin America countries are important shrimp producers that contribute in satisfying the international demand of marine shrimp. Part of the imported shrimp in Italy come from Guatemala, where the shrimp aquaculture (representing around the 88% of the total aquaculture production) is based mainly on the Pacific white shrimp (Penaeus vannamei). Common rearing procedures of one of the biggest marine shrimp farms operating in Guatemala are described. Some productive parameters of Penaeus vannamei brought out by semi-intensive system in earthen ponds are quantified. Productive data result in a uniform distribution of weight classes at different days after stocking, besides the growth trend and feed conversion ratio agree with the growth performance of Penaeus vannamei. Growth data, fitted on the von Bertalanffy model, present the maximum weight gain (0.13 g/day) 28 days after stocking. Shrimp survival after a grow-out period of 80 days in a 2.44-ha pond is around 56% and the gross yield turns out to be more than one ton per hectare. In conclusion, semi-intensive shrimp farming performed in Guatemala allows to have high productivities as well as a good quality product. On the other hand it must be highlighted that this kind of cultivation represents a risk for the environmental equilibrium along the coasts of tropical countries.
Student Teachers’ Perceptions on Educational Technologies’ Past, Present and Future

The aim of this study is to reveal Computer Education and Instructional Technologies student teachers’, who are in a distance teacher education program, perceptions on past, present and educational technologies of future via infographics. In this study, 54 infographics, which were created by student teachers who were enrolled in Special Teaching Methods II course at spring semester of 2013-2014 academic years, were analyzed. The infographics were analyzed via document review technique. These themes are “Educational technologies of past” (f=241), “Educational technologies of present” (f=240) and “Educational technologies of future” (f=158). Student teachers mentioned the most frequently “CD” (f=34) and “Television” (f=32) oriented to educational technologies of past. The most frequent views on educational technologies of present were “Smartboard” (f=24) and “Online Courses” (f=23). The most frequent opinion of student teachers about the educational technologies of future is “Holograms” (f=26) and “Virtual classroom” (f=22).
Black carbon variability since preindustrial times in the eastern part of Europe reconstructed from Mt. Elbrus, Caucasus, ice cores

Abstract. Black carbon (BC), emitted by fossil fuel combustion and biomass burning, is the second largest man-made contributor to global warming after carbon dioxide (Bond et al., 2013). However, limited information exists on its past emissions and atmospheric variability. In this study, we present the first high-resolution record of refractory BC (rBC, including mass concentration and size) reconstructed from ice cores drilled at a high-altitude eastern European site in Mt. Elbrus (ELB), Caucasus (5115 m a.s.l.). The ELB ice core record, covering the period 1825–2013, reflects the atmospheric load of rBC particles at the ELB site transported from the European continent with a larger rBC input from sources located in the eastern part of Europe. In the first half of the 20th century, European anthropogenic emissions resulted in a 1.5-fold increase in the ice core rBC mass concentrations with respect to its level in the preindustrial era (before 1850). The summer (winter) rBC mass concentrations increased 5-fold (3.3-fold) in 1960–1980, followed by a decrease until ∼ 2000. Over the last decade, the rBC signal for summertime slightly increased. We have compared the signal with the atmospheric BC load simulated using past BC emissions (ACCMIP and MACCity inventories) and taken into account the contribution of different geographical regions to rBC distribution and deposition at the ELB site. Interestingly, the observed rBC variability in the ELB ice core record since the 1960s is not in perfect agreement with the simulated atmospheric BC load. Similar features between the ice core rBC record and the best scenarios for the atmospheric BC load support anthropogenic BC increase in the 20th century being reflected in the ELB ice core record. However, the peak in BC mass concentration observed in ∼ 1970 in the ice core is estimated to occur a decade later from past inventories. BC emission inventories for the period 1960s–1970s may be underestimating European anthropogenic emissions. Furthermore, for summertime snow layers of the 2000s, the slightly increasing trend of rBC deposition likely reflects recent changes in anthropogenic and biomass burning BC emissions in the eastern part of Europe. Our study highlights that the past changes in BC emissions of eastern Europe need to be considered in assessing ongoing air quality regulation.
Mutual intelligibility between closely related languages in Europe

ABSTRACT By means of a large-scale web-based investigation, we established the degree of mutual intelligibility of 16 closely related spoken languages within the Germanic, Slavic and Romance language families in Europe. We first present the results of a selection of 1833 listeners representing the mutual intelligibility between young, educated Europeans from the same 16 countries where the test languages are spoken. Next, we present the data from a sub-group of listeners who had not learned the test language and had had minimal exposure to it. This allows us to investigate how well the listeners understand the test language on the basis of structural similarities between their own language and the test languages. Finally, we compare the results of the two data sets to the traditional genealogic characterisation of the three language groups. We expect the intelligibility results from the second group of listeners who had had minimal exposure to the test language to be a better reflection of the genealogical characterisation than the results from the larger group who had sometimes been exposed to the test language or had learned it at school.
Computing for Perturbative QCD (A Snowmass White Paper)

SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, USA Florida State University, Tallahassee, USA Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, USA Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, USA University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, USA Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, USA Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, USA University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, USA University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland KEK, Tsukuba, Japan CERN, Geneva, Switzerland Southern Methodist University, Dallas, USA Northwestern University, Chicago, USA Albert-Ludwigs-Universitat, Freiburg, Germany State University of New York, Buffalo, USA
Interspecific Variation in Anemone Shrimp Distribution and Host Selection in the Florida Keys (USA): Implications for Marine Conservation

Host and symbiont abundances often depend on the degree of host specificity and differences in costs and benefits of these associations. In this study, we investigated the distribution of anemone shrimps and their hosts along with the shrimps' host selection behavior to evaluate the degree of host specificity in a nearshore benthic community undergoing rapid environmental change. We compared the distribution of two shrimp species, Periclimenes pedersoni Chace, 1958, and Periclimenes yucatanicus (Ives, 1891), with their three anemone hosts, Condylactis gigantea (Weinland, 1860), Stichodactyla helianthus (Ellis, 1767), and Bartholomea annulata (Lesueur, 1817). The proportion of host anemones occupied by each shrimp species was significantly non-random considering abundance of each species per location and significantly different from a previous study conducted 18 yrs earlier. This was due to a decline in S. helianthus abundance. Periclimenes yucatanicus abundance was correlated with C. gigantea abundance, but P. pedersoni abundance was correlated with B. annulata abundance and all anemone species combined. A dichotomous choice test between C. gigantea and B. annulata revealed that P. yucatanicus selected C. gigantea regardless of its original host species. However, P. pedersoni selected its original host species. These results suggest that P. yucatanicus retains a strong host specificity for C. gigantea, whereas P. pedersoni appears to show no particular host specificity. Species with strong host specificity, such as P. yucatanicus, may be less likely to switch host species, and therefore, may be more susceptible to a decline in host abundance.
A hydroeconomic modeling framework for optimal integrated management of forest and water

Forests play a determinant role in the hydrologic cycle, with water being the most important ecosystem service they provide in semiarid regions. However, this contribution is usually neither quantified nor explicitly valued. The aim of this study is to develop a novel hydroeconomic modeling framework for assessing and designing the optimal integrated forest and water management for forested catchments. The optimization model explicitly integrates changes in water yield in the stands (increase in groundwater recharge) induced by forest management and the value of the additional water provided to the system. The model determines the optimal schedule of silvicultural interventions in the stands of the catchment in order to maximize the total net benefit in the system. Canopy cover and biomass evolution over time were simulated using growth and yield allometric equations specific for the species in Mediterranean conditions. Silvicultural operation costs according to stand density and canopy cover were modeled using local cost databases. Groundwater recharge was simulated using HYDRUS, calibrated and validated with data from the experimental plots. In order to illustrate the presented modeling framework, a case study was carried out in a planted pine forest (Pinus halepensis Mill.) located in south‐western Valencia province (Spain). The optimized scenario increased groundwater recharge. This novel modeling framework can be used in the design of a “payment for environmental services” scheme in which water beneficiaries could contribute to fund and promote efficient forest management operations.
Standard source of atmospheric black carbon aerosol generated from ultrasonic spray of BC suspension

Abstract. Black carbon (BC) aerosol has strong radiative forcing and plays an important role in global climate change and human health. A generator with low levels of BC-air is developed in this study for researchers to calibrate BC monitors. Ultrasonic nozzle is applied to atomize BC suspension to produce quantificational BC-air samples which can be used directly as a standard source of BC. Membrane test conducted by balance is used to check up its feasibility. Results show that the relationship of weight increment of membrane and target concentration of BC-air have very good linearity. This confirms that the ultrasonic spray system is a good source to generate standard concentration of BC-air. The device has good feasibility in the BC concentrations range of 0–200 μg m−3. Multi Angle Absorption Photometer (MAAP) is used to detect the concentration of BC-air generated by the ultrasonic spray of suspension. Target concentrations generated by the device accord with the measured data of MAAP.
Perception Framework for Activities of Daily Living Manipulation Tasks

There is an increasing concern in tackling the problems faced by the elderly community and physically in-locked people to lead an independent life experience problems with self-care. The need for developing service robots that can help people with mobility impairments is hence very essential. Developing a control framework for shared human-robot autonomy will allow locked-in individuals to perform the Activities of Daily Living (ADL) in a flexible way. The relevant ADL scenarios were identified as handling objects, self-feeding, and opening doors for indoor navigation assistance. Multiple experiments were conducted, which demonstrates that the robot executes these daily living tasks reliably without requiring adjustment to the environment. The indoor manipulation tasks hold the challenge of dealing with a wide range of unknown objects. This thesis presents a framework developed for grasping without requiring a priori knowledge of the objects being manipulated. A successful manipulation task requires the combination of aspects such as environment modeling, object detection with pose estimation, grasp planning, motion planning followed by an e cient grasp execution, which is validated by a 6+2 Degree of Freedom robotic manipulator.
Quantitative Evidence of Goodwin’s Non-Linear Growth Cycles

The article searches for quantitative evidence in favor of an extended version of Goodwin´s predator-prey model of endogenous distribution-employment cycles for 16 countries. The model is extended to include several harmonics in both series. The model fits all the observations both within sample and out of sample for half of the countries, with a 10% error, and for 4 countries with a 5% error. This suggests that the model may be useful in empirical work.
A Hybrid Stress Plane Element with Strain Field

In this paper, a plane quadrilateral element with rotational degrees of freedom is developed. Present formulation is based on a hybrid functional with independent boundary displacement and internal optimum strain field. All the optimality constraints, including being rotational invariant, omitting the parasitic shear error and satisfying Fliepa’s pure bending test, are considered. Moreover, the static equilibrium equations are satisfied in this scheme. Authors’ element has only four nodes and twelve degrees of freedom. For the boundary displacement field, Alman’s second-order displacement function is employed. The validities of the proposed element are demonstrated by eleven numerical examples: thick curved beam, thin cantilever beam, Cooke’s skew beam, thin curved beam, cantilever beam with distortion parameter, high-order patch test, cantilever beam with five and four irregular mesh, Mc Neal’s thin cantilever beam and cantilever shear wall with and without openings. When utilizing the coarse and irregular meshes, numerical tests show the high accuracy, rapid convergence and robustness of the suggested element. Less sensitivity to distortion is another property of the new element.
Molecular and seroepidemiological study of Leishmania infantum infection among humans, dogs and wild canines from Azarshahr (new endemic focus), Iran

An epidemiological survey of visceral leishmaniosis among domestic and wild canines as well people was carried out in the new endemic focus of Azarshahr (northwest of Iran) to assess the distribution of the disease and the possible association between infection in dogs and people during 2008-2009. At first using direct agglutination test (DAT), an examination of visceral leishmaniosis was carried out among 1500 Azarshahr district residents children in the age from 6 month to 10 years old. Then, one hundred and twenty domestic dogs, ten jackals, ten foxes and ten wolves from the district were examined for clinical and serological signs of canine leishmaniosis. The sera were evaluated by DAT then parasitological study was performed for all seropositive animals. Human sera samples, the overall seropositive rate of disease was 1.3% (19/1500) (95% CI, 0.7 to 1.8) by DAT (1:3200 and above). Data analysis revealed that serological positivity was statistically associated with age groups (� 2 =7.46, P =0.023). Of the 120 serum sampled collected from 120 domestic and stray dogs, 19.2% (23/120) (95% CI, 12.1-26.2) were positive by DAT (1:320 and above). No statistically significant difference was found between male (17.9%) and female (37.5%) seroprevalence (P=0.172). Also, no statistically significant difference was found between serological positivity and age groups (P=0.107). Serology and parasitology tests that were performed in 30 wild canines showed 10% of these animals were infected by Leishmania infantum. Amastigotes of Leishmania were observed in 14 seropositive dogs after dissection and parasitological examinations. A polymerase chain reaction (PCR) genotyping tool was developed and used to identification of species of the seropositive dog isolates. This isolates were identified as L. infantum. The present study provides, for the first time, information on the distribution of the visceral leishmaniosis in Azarshahr county of Iran, as a new endemic focus of disease.
Upper-mantle seismic structure in a region of incipient continental breakup: northern Ethiopian rift

SUMMARY The northern Ethiopian rift forms the third arm of the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden triple junction, and marks the transition from continental rifting in the East African rift to incipient oceanic spreading in Afar. We determine the P- and S-wave velocity structure beneath the northern Ethiopian rift using independent tomographic inversion of P- and S-wave relative arrival-time residuals from teleseismic earthquakes recorded by the Ethiopia Afar Geoscientific Lithospheric Experiment (EAGLE) passive experiment using the regularised non-linear least-squares inversion method of VanDecar. Our 79 broad-band instruments covered an area 250 × 350 km centred on the Boset magmatic segment ∼70 km SE of Addis Ababa in the centre of the northern Ethiopian rift. The study area encompasses several rift segments showing increasing degrees of extension and magmatic intrusion moving from south to north into the Afar depression. Analysis of relative arrival-time residuals shows that the rift flanks are asymmetric with arrivals associated with the southeastern Somalian Plate faster (∼0.65 s for the P waves; ∼ 2s for the S waves) than the northwestern Nubian Plate. Our tomographic inversions image a 75 km wide tabular low-velocity zone (δVP ≈− 1.5 per cent, δVS ≈− 4 per cent) beneath the less-evolved southern part of the rift in the uppermost 200‐250 km of the mantle. At depths of >100 km, north of 8.5 ◦ N, this low-velocity anomaly broadens laterally and appears to be connected to deeper low-velocity structures under the Afar depression. An off-rift low-velocity structure extending perpendicular to the rift axis correlates with the eastern limit of the E‐W trending reactivated Precambrian Ambo‐Guder fault zone that is delineated by Quaternary eruptive centres. Along axis, the low-velocity upwelling beneath the rift is segmented, with low-velocity material in the uppermost 100 km often offset to the side of the rift with the highest rift flank topography. Our observations from this magmatic rift zone, which is transitional between continental and oceanic rifting, do not support detachment fault models of lithospheric extension but instead point to strain accommodation via magma assisted rifting.
Human activity recognition on smartphones for mobile context awareness

Activity-Based Computing [1] aims to capture the state of the user and its environment by exploiting heterogeneous sensors in order to provide adaptation to exogenous computing resources. When these sensors are attached to the subject’s body, they permit continuous monitoring of numerous physiological signals. This has appealing use in healthcare applications, e.g. the exploitation of Ambient Intelligence (AmI) in daily activity monitoring for elderly people. In this paper, we present a system for human physical Activity Recognition (AR) using smartphone inertial sensors. As these mobile phones are limited in terms of energy and computing power, we propose a novel hardware-friendly approach for multiclass classification. This method adapts the standard Support Vector Machine (SVM) and exploits fixed-point arithmetic. In addition to the clear computational advantages of fixed-point arithmetic, it is easy to show the regularization effect of the number of bits and then the connections with the Statistical Learning Theory. A comparison with the traditional SVM shows a significant improvement in terms of computational costs while maintaining similar accuracy, which can contribute to develop more sustainable systems for AmI.
Permanent magnet flux-switching machine, optimal design and performance analysis

In this paper an analytical sizing-design procedure for a typical permanent magnet flux-switching machine (PMFSM) with 12 stator and respectively 10 rotor poles is presented. An optimal design, based on Hooke-Jeeves method with the objective functions of maximum torque density, is performed. The results were validated via two dimensions finite element analysis (2D-FEA) applied on the optimized structure. The influence of the permanent magnet (PM) dimensions and type, respectively of the rotor poles' shape on the machine performance were also studied via 2D-FEA.
Wavelength-stabilized tapered laser diodes in an external Talbot cavity: simulations and experiments

We present the experimental and theoretical evaluation of the coherent combining of an array of index-guided tapered laser diodes in an external Talbot cavity. A theoretical model taking into account the propagation inside the semiconductor device has been developed to determine the cavity spatial modes. In parallel, experiments have been realized with 10 emitters in a compact setup and a volume Bragg grating as the external mirror. 1.7 W have been obtained at 976 nm for the in-phase mode in a narrow laser line (<0.1 nm).