Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pollination ecosystem services in South African agricultural systems

Insect pollinators, both managed and wild, have become a focus of global scientific, political and media attention because of their apparent decline and the perceived impact of this decline on crop production. Crop pollination by insects is an essential ecosystem service that increases the yield and quality of approximately 35% of crops worldwide. Pollinator declines are a consequence of multiple environmental pressures, e.g. habitat transformation and fragmentation, loss of floral resources, pesticides, pests and diseases, and climate change. Similar environmental pressures are faced in South Africa where there is a high demand for pollination services. In this paper, we synthesise data on the importance of different pollinators as a basis for services to South African crops and on the status of managed honeybees. We also focus on insect pollination services for the Western Cape deciduous fruit industry, which is worth ZAR9800 million per year and is heavily reliant on pollination services from managed honeybees. We discuss landscape and regional level floral resources needed to maintain sufficient numbers of managed honeybee colonies. In summary, the available literature shows a lack of data on diversity and abundance of crop pollinators, and a lack of long-term data to assess declines. We highlight key areas that require research in South Africa and emphasise the critical role of floral resource availability at the landscape and regional scale to sustain pollinators. We conclude that understanding the dynamics of how floral resources are used will help inform how landscapes could be better managed in order to provide long-term sustainable pollination services.
AN EMPIRICAL STUDY OF GREEN SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT DRIVERS, PRACTICES AND PERFORMANCES: WITH REFERENCE TO THE PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY OF ANKLESHWAR (GUJARAT)

The Green Supply Chain (GSC) is a key element of an enterprise -wide green management strategy. A GSC can help agencies comply with new federal guidelines while achieving a wide range of eco nomic, social, national security, and environmental goals. This study aims to investigate the green supply chain management practices likely to be adopted by the pharmaceutical industry in Ankleshwar. The relationship between green supply chain management practices and environmental performance and operational performance, as well as financial performance, is studied. The approach of the present research includes a literature review, in depth interviews and questionnaire surveys. The companies in the pharma ceutical industry approved by the International Organization for Standardization 14001 certification in Gujarat before January 2010 were sampled for empirical study.Based on a literature review, twelve propositions are put forward. The survey questionnair e was designed with 54 items using literature and industry expert input. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted to derive results from the survey da ta which included 27 responses. The data were then analyzed using statistical package for the social s ciences, and structural equation modeling was used as a path analysis model to verify the hypothetical construction of the study. The results indicat e that the pharmaceutical industry have adopted green supply chain practices in response to the current wav e of international green issues and have generated favorable environmental, operational and financial performances for the respective companies
Deriving WCET Bounds by Abstract Execution

Standard static WCET analysis methods today are based on the IPET technique, where WCET estimation is formulated as an integer linear programming (ILP) problem subject to linear program flow constraints with an objective function derived from the hardware timing model. The estimate is then calculated by an ILP solver. The hardware cost model, as well as the program flow constraints, are often derived using a static program analysis framework such as abstract interpretation. An alternative idea to estimate the WCET is to add time as an explicit variable, incremented for each basic block in the code. The possible values of this variable can then be bound by a value analysis. We have implemented this idea by integrating the time estimation in our Abstract Execution method for calculating program flow constraints. This method is in principle a very detailed value analysis. As it computes intervals bounding variable values, it bounds both the BCET and the WCET. In addition, it derives the explicit execution paths through the program which correspond to the calculated BCET and WCET bounds. We have compared the precision and the analysis time with the traditional IPET technique for a number of benchmark programs, and show that the new method typically is capable of calculating as tight or even tighter WCET estimates in shorter time. Our current implementation can handle simple timing models with constant execution times for basic blocks and edges in the CFG, but it is straightforward to extend the method to more detailed hardware timing models.
Effect of nitrogen fertilization on morphological and biochemical traits of some Apiaceae crops under arid region conditions in Egypt

Khalid KA. 2013. Effect of nitrogen fertilization on morphological and biochemical traits of some Apiaceae crops under arid region conditions in Egypt. Nusantara Bioscience 5: 15-21. Arid regions in Egypt are characterized by poor nutrients content and unfavorable environmental conditions which negatively affect growth and productivity of medicinal and aromatic plants including anise, coriander, and sweet fennel. So the main objective of the present investigation was to study the effect of different levels of N, namely 0 (control), 100, 150 and 200 kg ha -1 used as ammonium sulphate [(NH 4 ) 2 SO 4 ] (20% N), on selected morphological and biochemical characteristics of anise, coriander and sweet fennel plants cultivated under arid regions conditions during two successive seasons. The most effective dose of nitrogen was 200 kg ha -1 of N, resulting in a positive increase in vegetative growth characters and content of essential oil, fixed oil, total carbohydrates, soluble sugars, protein and nutrients (NPK).
Correlation of misperceptions in Turkish nurses’ knowledge regarding HIV and their attitude toward patients with HIV/AIDS

The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) slowly destroys the immune system, making it difficult for the body to fight against diseases and infections. Opportunistic infections and their complications may consequently be fatal (1). Globally, 40 million people are currently living with HIV, with 95% of cases in developing countries (2,3). Nurses and laboratory workers are at greatest risk for this disease, regardless of the clinic in which they work. Because HIV is transmitted through the body fluids of the infected person (semen, vaginal secretions and blood) (4). HIV/acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) remains difficult for health care professionals to manage. A report on HIV/AIDS-related health workers revealed that 5378 nurses of people living with HIV (PLWH) acquired this virus during their employment period (5).
Improving the surface‐ground water interactions in the Community Land Model: Case study in the Blue Nile Basin

Soil moisture is a key water cycle parameter known to interact with atmospheric processes. Arguably, land surface models that simulate land surface processes and surface fluxes to the atmosphere do not capture adequately the spatial variability of soil moisture, particularly over areas with complex topography. In this study, version 3.5 of the Community Land Model (CLM3.5) is applied with a new parameterization in an effort to correct the spatial bias of soil moisture and understand the consequential effects on the simulated water cycle fluxes and states in the Blue Nile Basin. This parameterization accounts for a groundwater recharge term from surface water, a process that is not included in CLM, providing an effective two‐way interaction scheme between rivers and groundwater. Using satellite soil moisture data, this parameterized term is shown to have a positive correlation to contributing area, defined at each model grid cell and representing the number of grid cells that drain to that local grid cell. With the new parameterization applied to CLM, soil moisture, soil temperature, evapotranspiration flux, water table depth, and vegetation water content all showed significant differences from the control CLM run (without the parameterization) at or above the 95% confidence level. The differences in the spatial distribution of these variables are expected to affect precipitation simulations from regional climate modeling. As the Blue Nile is a region that has one of the greatest interannual and seasonal precipitation variability globally, the ability to predict this variability is essential for optimal reservoir operations including buffering of water resources during times of drought.
Sustainability concern in value management: A study on Government s building project

A B S T R A C T Active promotions of sustainable development by government and nongovernmental organisations have proved that Malaysia is committed to reduce the nation s carbon emission intensity by 40% per GDP by 2020. The building industry was identified as one of the biggest resource user, therefore sustainable building is seen to be the effective way to reduce it. To date, only 6 government buildings were certified as Green Building which did not reflect to the initiatives and policies made by the government in sustainable practice although it has already begun since 1979. Value Management (VM) has been recognized by Malaysian Government as a strategic planning tool and it has been practice ever since, a suitable mechanism to deliver sustainable construction project. In order to propose the idea of integrating sustainability in VM practice, a field study was conducted to VM practitioners, which involve in government-building projects. The survey was to investigate sustainable consideration in the existing practice of VM. The aim of this paper is to investigate sustainable consideration in the existing practice of VM. This study found that the sustainable knowledge between VM practitioners and the attention given to the project sustainability were only at moderate level. This study provides evidence to suggest that sustainable concern is not one of project s priorities, which could prove the need to integrate sustainable concern and VM practice in buildings project to enable better involvement of sustainability into present governments practice.
CSIR optronic scene simulator finds real application in self-protection mechanisms of the South African Air Force

The Optronic Scene Simulator (OSSIM) is a second-generation scene simulator that creates synthetic images of arbitrary complex scenes in the visual and infrared (IR) bands, covering the 0.2 to 20 μm spectral region. These images are radiometrically accurate and based on theoretical physics models. The image rendering is implemented in specialised algorithms and calculated in double precision floating point. The simulation system has been extensively used for near infrared and infrared simulations.
Investigating the factors influencing the acceptance of fully autonomous cars

Once thought of as a product of science fiction, self-driving cars are discussed today as an unavoidable means towards improving transportation systems. In fact, many car manufacturers have announced their plans to deploy highly autonomous cars as soon as 2020; according to the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) these vehicles are capable of reacting 'even if the human driver does not respond appropriately to the request to intervene (SAE level 4)'. There is however a long way to go before fully autonomous cars (SAE level 5) - where pedals and steering wheels are forgone and limitations to driving during severe weather or in unmapped areas are surmounted - are produced. Herein, the overall aim is to study the drivers and inhibitors of autonomous cars' acceptance across cultures with a special focus on the different risks that might deter consumers from using highly and/or fully autonomous cars. After an extensive reviewing of previous works, a research model based on UTAUT2 was developed and accordingly an online survey was conducted in the US and in Germany; 313 valid answers were collected and analyzed. The findings presented here have serious implications both on the academic field as well as the industry, especially in regards to the roles that risks, culture and gender play in the acceptance of fully autonomous cars.
Investigation of torsion, warping and distortion of large container ships

Large deck openings of ultra large container ships reduce their torsional stiffness considerably and hydroelastic analysis for reliable structural design becomes an imperative. In the early design stage the beam model coupled with 3D hydrodynamic model is a rational choice. The modal superposition method is ordinary used for solving this complex problem. The advanced thin-walled girder theory, with shear influence on both bending and torsion, is applied for calculation of dry natural modes. It is shown that relatively short engine room structure of large container ships behaves as the open hold structure with increased torsional stiffness due to deck effect. Warping discontinuity at the joint of the closed and open segments is compensated by induced distortion. The effective torsional stiffness parameters based on an energy balance approach are determined. Estimation of distortion of transverse bulkheads, as a result of torsion and warping, is given. The procedure is illustrated in the case of a ship-like pontoon and checked by 3D FEM analysis. The obtained results encourage incorporation of the modified beam model of the short engine room structure in general beam model of ship hull for the need of hydroelastic analysis, where only the first few natural modes are of interest.
Differential Fed Ultra-Wideband Multiple-Mode Antenna Using Uniform Narrow Slot Radiator

A new ultra-wideband antenna based on a uniform narrow slot is proposed. The slot radiator is fed by a pair of difierential microstrip-lines, to implement a balanced and vialess antenna. The multiple-mode resonances of the radiator are excited simultaneously to form an ultra-wideband radiation, by optimizing antenna dimensions and port impedance. Comparing with other ultra-wideband slot antennas, this antenna has improved radiation patterns and low cross polarization due to its symmetry in structure. Antenna samples are designed and fabricated for veriflcation. The measured impedance bandwidth has successfully achieved a fractional bandwidth of 106% (VSWR < 2:5). The radiation patterns are also measured and agree well with the prediction.
PKS 1814-637: a powerful radio-loud AGN in a disk galaxy

We present a detailed study of PKS 1814-637, a rare case of powerful radio source (P5 GHz = 4.1 × 1025 W Hz-1) hosted by a disk galaxy. Optical images have been used to model the host galaxy morphology confirming it to be dominated by a strong (and warped) disk component that is observed close to edge-on to the line of sight. This is the first radio galaxy found to reside in a disk dominated galaxy with radio luminosity equivalent to powerful FRII objects. At radio wavelengths, PKS 1814-637 is about 480 pc in diameter and it is classified as a compact steep spectrum (CSS) source; such sources are usually considered to be radio sources observed in the early stages of their evolution. However, the optical and mid-IR spectroscopic properties of PKS1814-637 show more in common with Seyfert galaxies than they do with radio galaxies, with the detection of H2, and PAH emission features, along with HI and silicate absorption features, providing evidence for a rich ISM which is likely to be related to the disk morphology of the host galaxy. We argue that the interaction between the radio plasma and the rich ISM in this and similar objects may have boosted their radio emission, allowing them to more easily enter flux limited samples of radio sources. In this case, PKS 1814-637 represents a type of "imposter": an intrinsically low power object that is selected in a radio flux limited sample because of the unusually efficient conversion of jet power into radio emission. This would make PKS 1814-637 an extreme example of the effects of jet-cloud interactions in galaxies containing a rich ISM, and perhaps a missing link between radio galaxies and radio-loud Seyfert galaxies. However, it is unlikely that jet-cloud interactions alone can account for the unusually powerful radio emission compared to Seyfert galaxies, and it is probable that the jet in PKS 1814-637 is also intrinsically more powerful than in typical Seyfert galaxies, perhaps due to a higher bulge and black hole mass. The estimated BH mass is indeed higher than the majority of Seyfert galaxies in the local Universe. We speculate that sources similar to PKS1814-637 are likely to be more common at high redshifts, because of the enhanced probability at earlier epochs of triggering radio sources in moderately massive bulges that are also gas-rich.
How to incentivize your workforce: a theoretical and empirical analysis

The question of how to incentivize employees is a highly debated topic in the economic literature. While multiple theories have been evolved in the past 40 years about how to incentivize employees, empirical research remains scarce and is often based on case studies or narrow segments in the workforce. In this thesis, foundations are formed of how to incentivize workforces in general, taking into account that objective performance measures are often not available. Proxies are chosen in order to identify if there is an empirical relationship between these foundations and the financial performance of firms in the whole of Europe. Although the conclusion of this thesis is that there is no significant relationship between the foundations to incentivize workforces and the financial performance of firms in Europe, this thesis forms a basis of how empirical research can be done in order to exploit how to incentivize workforces in general.
Diffusion tensor imaging data reveals GRM3 polymorphism's association with white matter integrity in schizophrenia

While the functional disconnectivity hypothesis of schizophrenia has been the subject of much study, very little is known about the contribution of individual genotypes to connectivity between brain regions in either schizophrenia patients or in healthy controls. In this study, we obtained diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) maps and genome-wide SNP data from 74 cases and 87 ageand gender-matched controls. Correlations were performed between loading coefficients obtained from fractional anisotropy (FA) values in networks of regions representing 6 maximally independent components and 134 SNPs in genes that have been found to be important in myelination and/or schizophrenia. By using independent component analysis (ICA) to analyze the FA data we move beyond single voxels (voxel based morphometry) to a source based morphometry. In doing so, we can obtain networks of FA values that covary in a similar way among subjects, and we can study the relationship between these networks and genotype. We report one SNP located in the intronic region of the metabotropic glutamate receptor 3 gene GRM3 that showed a significant correlation with connectivity in patients but not in controls (p<1.0x10 -4 ). This SNP, rs7808623, has not been previously shown to be associated with schizophrenia, although association has been shown with several SNPs in GRM3.
Reconsidering the Quality and Utility of Downscaling

Dynamical downscaling (DDS) is performed using regional climate models (RCMs) with global atmospheric states as the input, but there is no consensus among researchers on how to define and estimate the resolvable scale of the various climatic variables obtained by DDS. Sources of RCM uncertainties, including both internal model and intermodel variability, have been assessed by performing ensemble simulations and model intercomparisons, sometimes under the controversial assumption that model bias is independent of the climatic state. Compared with low-resolution global climate simulations, DDS can add value in several ways. For example, because they consider high-resolution topographic data, RCMs can often capture mesoscale phenomena and can better represent climate dynamics. Another downscaling method, empirical statistical downscaling (ESD), is complementary to DDS because it is based on a different philosophy (i.e., sources of information) and on a mostly different set of assumptions. More collaboration and communication should be encouraged among those who develop models, those who use models and perform downscaling, those who use downscaling data, and those who make decisions Corresponding author: Izuru Takayabu, Atmospheric Environment and Applied Meteorology Research Department, Meteorological Research Institute, Nagamine 1-1, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-0052, Japan E-mail: takayabu@mri-jma.go. jp ©2016, Meteorological Society of Japan Journal of the Meteorological Society of Japan Vol. 94A 32
Evaluation of PMIP2 and PMIP3 simulations of mid-Holocene climate in the Indo-Pacific, Australasian and Southern Ocean regions

Abstract. This study uses the simplified patterns of temperature and effective precipitation approach from the Australian component of the international palaeoclimate synthesis effort (INTegration of Ice core, MArine and TErrestrial records – OZ-INTIMATE) to compare atmosphere–ocean general circulation model (AOGCM) simulations and proxy reconstructions. The approach is used in order to identify important properties (e.g. circulation and precipitation) of past climatic states from the models and proxies, which is a primary objective of the Southern Hemisphere Assessment of PalaeoEnvironment (SHAPE) initiative. The AOGCM data are taken from the Paleoclimate Modelling Intercomparison Project (PMIP) mid-Holocene (ca. 6000 years before present, 6 ka) and pre-industrial control (ca. 1750 CE, 0 ka) experiments. The synthesis presented here shows that the models and proxies agree on the differences in climate state for 6 ka relative to 0 ka, when they are insolation driven. The largest uncertainty between the models and the proxies occurs over the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool (IPWP). The analysis shows that the lower temperatures in the Pacific at around 6 ka in the models may be the result of an enhancement of an existing systematic error. It is therefore difficult to decipher which one of the proxies and/or the models is correct. This study also shows that a reduction in the Equator-to-pole temperature difference in the Southern Hemisphere causes the mid-latitude westerly wind strength to reduce in the models; however, the simulated rainfall actually increases over the southern temperate zone of Australia as a result of higher convective precipitation. Such a mechanism (increased convection) may be useful for resolving disparities between different regional proxy records and model simulations. Finally, after assessing the available datasets (model and proxy), opportunities for better model–proxy integrated research are discussed.