Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Time-resolved spectroscopic diagnostic of laser-induced plasma on germanium targets

Time-resolved optical emission measurements have been made in laser-induced plasma plumes following CO2 pulsed-laser (10.591 μm, 64 ns and intensity from 0.27 to 4.9 GW cm−2) irradiation of germanium targets. The temporal behavior of Ge atoms and ionized excited species Ge3+, Ge2+, and Ge+ is reported. The results show a faster decay of the continuum emission and Ge3+, Ge2+ ionic species than in the case of Ge+ and neutral Ge atoms. The velocity distributions for Ge3+, Ge2+, Ge+, and Ge species are obtained from time-of-flight measurements. Electron density in the laser-induced plasma was estimated from the analysis of spectral data at various times from the CO2 laser pulse incidence. From the intensity decay with the delay time for Ge+, Ge2+, and Ge3+, we estimated the three-body electron-ion recombination rate constants for these species.
A New Wideband Unidirectional Antenna Element

A novel wideband unidirectional antenna composed of a planar electric dipole and a shorted patch antenna is presented. The antenna is excited by a Γ-shaped strip feed line. A wide impedance bandwidth of 43.8% (SWR≤1.5) from the frequency of 1.85 to 2.89 GHz is achieved. Stable radiation pattern with low cross- polarization, low backlobe radiation, nearly identical E-and H-plane patterns and an antenna gain of ~8dBi is found across the entire operating bandwidth.
Dynamic Characterization of Open-ended Pipe Piles in Marine Environment

This chapter is focused on the experimental investigations that can be carried out to dy‐ namically characterize open-ended pipe piles in marine environment. Different test ty‐ pologies, such as impact load test, free vibration test, forced vibration test, and ambient vibration test, are presented and described with the purpose to provide the right tools to analyze the dynamic behavior, at both small and large strains, of single piles or a system of piles. The appropriate instrumentation, with the suitable protection from marine envi‐ ronment and pile driving installation procedure, is also illustrated. Furthermore, the most common signal processing techniques useful for handling the experimental raw data are addressed together with the analysis techniques for the evaluation of the modal parame‐ ters: natural frequencies, damping ratios, and mode shapes. Finally, a part of the experi‐ mental campaign carried out by the authors on near-shore open-ended pipe piles is reported as a case study.
Transport of Interfacial Area Concentration in Two-Phase Flow

The accurate prediction of thermal hydraulic behavior of gas-liquid two-phase flow is quite important for the improvement of performance and safety of a nuclear reactor. In order to analyze two-phase flow phenomena, various models such as homogeneous model, slip model, drift flux model and two-fluid model have been proposed. Among these models, the two-fluid model (Ishii (1975), Delhaye (1968)) is considered the most accurate model because this model treats each phase separately considering the phase interactions at gas-liquid interfaces. Therefore, nowadays, two-fluid model is widely adopted in many best estimate codes of nuclear reactor safety. In two-fluid model, averaged conservation equations of mass, momentum and energy are formulated for each phase. The conservation equations of each phase are not independent each other and they are strongly coupled through interfacial transfer terms of mass, momentum and energy through gas-liquid interface. Interfacial transfer terms are characteristic terms in two-fluid model and are given in terms of interfacial area concentration (interfacial area per unit volume of two-phase flow) Therefore, the accurate knowledge of interfacial area concentration is quite essential to the accuracy of the prediction based on two-fluid model and a lot of experimental and analytical studies have been made on interfacial area concentration. In conventional codes based on two-fluid model, interfacial area concentration is given in constitutive equations in terms of Weber number of bubbles or droplets depending upon flow regime of two-phase flow (Ransom et al. (1985), Liles et al. (1984)). However, recently, more accurate and multidimensional predictions of two-phase flows are needed for advanced design of nuclear reactors. To meet such needs for improved prediction, it becomes necessary to give interfacial area concentration itself by solving the transport equation. Therefore, recently, intensive researches have been carried out on the models, analysis and experiments of interfacial area transport throughout the world
1 Commuting Stress-Turnover Intention Relationship 2 and the Mediating Role of Life Satisfaction : An 3 Empirical Analysis of Turkish Employees 4

Using hierarchical regression analysis within a mediation model framework, the present 8 study explores direct and indirect (through life satisfaction) causal impacts of commuting stress on 9 turnover intention of employees from 29 business organizations in six populous cities of Turkey. A 10 semi-random heterogeneous sample of 214 employees with different demographics was surveyed 11 in winter and summer times for also capturing seasonal variations of variables. The results 12 supporting the partial mediating role of life satisfaction in the positive relationship between 13 commuting stress and turnover intention infer that commuting stress induces turnover intention 14 directly and indirectly (by reducing life satisfaction). The analysis of variance reveals that 15 demographic characteristics of employees such as gender, marital status, age, and family size 16 together with commuting type and commuting duration matter for their perceived commuting 17 stress, life satisfaction, and turnover intention levels. Commuting stress perception is relatively 18 higher in summer time whereas the other magnitudes are consistently and significantly invariant 19 between two survey implementations. The study concludes with a call for the consideration of 20 commuting stress and life satisfaction together with environmental and demographic factors when 21 analyzing the antecedents and consequences of employee turnover intention. 22
Combined Impact of Quorum Quenching and Backwashing on Biofouling Control in a Semi-Pilot Scale MBR Treating Real Wastewater

This study demonstrates the combined effect of quorum quenching (QQ) and backwashing on biofouling control in MBR treating real wastewater. The quorum quenching mechanism is an emerging biological technique using Rhodococcus sp. entrapped in polymer coated sodium alginate beads whereas, backwashing is a distinguished physical technique for biofouling control. Two parallel semi-pilot scale MBRs i.e., QQ-MBR (quorum quenching MBR) with cellentrapping beads (CEBs) and C-MBR (conventional MBR) with vacant CEBs at 0.5% effective volume of the bioreactor, were monitored for comparative performance evaluation. In the first phase, both the MBRs were operated without backwashing having operational cycle of eight min filtration and two min relaxation and in the second phase; MBRs were operated with backwashing having operation cycle of eight min filtration, one min relaxation and one min backwashing. QQ-MBR with backwashing exhibited greater biofouling control capability and elongated filtration duration with respect to QQ-MBR without backwashing. Comparatively less soluble EPS concentrations were detected in QQ-MBR as compare to C-MBR in both modes of operation while backwashing contributed to retard the rapid increase in trans-membrane pressure (TMP) also known as TMP jump. Study reveals the novelty of successful application of combined influence of permeate backflushing technique and QQ (anti-biofouling) strategy in MBR and potential use for full scale applications.
Increasing Group Entitativity

Previous research has shown the strength of the linguistic intergroup bias across different intergroup settings. However, there is no evidence of linguistic discrimination within minimal groups. This experiment aimed to shed light on the phenomenon of linguistic intergroup discrimination in a minimal group setting, and to investigate the impact of group entitativity on this bias. Four group entitativity conditions were created by altering the mere categorization condition toward less entitativity and toward more entitativity. Participants were asked to describe the choice allegedly made by another participant in allocating resources to ingroup and outgroup members. Results showed an overall linguistic bias, whereby ingroup behaviors were described more positively and abstractly than outgroup behaviors. Increasing group entitativity resulted in increasingly biased outgroup descriptions, which in the most entitative condition revealed a predominant use of negative abstract terms.
An Extension of the Consumption-Based CAPM Model

We extend the Consumption-based CAPM (C-CAPM) model to representative agents with different risk attitudes. We first use the concept of expectation dependence and show that for a risk averse representative agent, it is the first-degree expectation dependence (FED) rather than the covariance that determines C-CAPM’s riskiness. We extend the assumption of risk aversion to prudence and propose the measure of second-degree expectation dependence (SED) to obtain the values of asset price and equity premium. These theoretical results are linked to the equity premium puzzle. Using the same dataset as in Campbell (2003), the estimated measures of relative risk aversion from FED and SED approximations are much lower than those obtained in the original study and correspond to the theoretical values often discussed in the literature. The theoretical model is then generalized to higher-degree risk changes and higher-order risk averse representative agents.
Measuring Groundwater Irrigation Efficiency in Pakistan: A DEA Approach Using the Sub-vector and Slack-based Models

We estimate the efficiency of groundwater use in cotton production in the Punjab province of Pakistan. We use a survey data of 189 cotton producers comprising 98 tube-well owners and 91 water buyers in order to get the differential impact of tube-well ownership on groundwater use efficiency. We use data envelopment analysis to compute the technical, scale, cost and allocative efficiencies for tube-well owners and water buyers relative to a meta-frontier and groupfrontiers. The DEA sub-vector and slack-based models are used to compute groundwater use efficiency. The results indicate low levels of technical inefficiencies with water buyers being more inefficient relative to tube-well owners. However, groundwater use inefficiency is more pronounced than the respective technical efficiency. The sub-vector and slack-based estimates are highly correlated suggesting the robustness of the results. The results on returns to scale indicate that the majority of cotton growers are operating at increasing returns to scale, suggesting that efficiency can be improved by expanding the scale of operation. We use a second-stage bootstrap truncated regression to investigate the factors that influence technical efficiency and groundwater use efficiency. We find that the level of education, seed quality and extension services have positive significant impacts on technical and groundwater use efficiency. We suggest that knowledge of crop water requirements and the use of improved crop varieties can play role in improving the efficiency of groundwater use.
Drug Resistance Pattern of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis Isolated from Patients Attending a Referral Hospital

This study was carried out to isolate M. tuberculosis from smear positive sputum samples by MB/BacT automated culture system and investigate the drug resistance pattern. Among 101 smear positive cases 96 (95.05 %) yielded growth of Mycobacteri a, 3 (02.97 %) were contaminated and 2 (01.98 %) showed no growth. Culture positive detection time for M. tuberculosis was lowest 7 days and highest 36.3 days and average detection time was11.3 days. Detection time for NTM was 19.2 days. Among 96 isolates 95 (98.96 %) were M. tuberculosis and remaining 1 (1.04 %) was photochromogen Non-tuberculous Mycobacteria (NTM). Out of 95 M. tuberculosis 51 (53.84 %) were resistant to at least one drug, 38 (40.00 %) to INH, 31 (32.63%) to RMP, 13(13.68 %) to SM, 11 (11.58 %) to EMB and 10 (10.53 %) to PZA and multi-drug resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) was 21 (22.11 %). Resistance to one drug was 21 (22.11%), two drugs 15 (15.79 %), to three drugs 10 (10.53 %) and resistant to four or more drugs 5(5.26 %) cases. Bangladesh J Med Microbiol 2010; 03 (02): 13-17
Impact of Brand Equity on Customer Purchase Decisions: An Empirical Investigation with Special Reference to Hatchback Car Owners in Central Haryana

With stiffening of competition among different car companies it become extremely important for marketers to focus on branding of their products. Brand equity is important tool for associating a brand and influencing customers in making purchase decisions for particular brand of hatchback cars. Factor analysis is used to understand the underlying factors influencing customers in positive purchase intension. The study throws light on various factors of brand equity marketers much focus on to attract and retain their prospective and existing customers. The study concludes that right marketing mix in marketing strategy a pivotal role in customer purchase decision criterion.
Modeling of returns and trading volume by regime switching copulas

The structure of links between realized volatility and trading volume can be reflected by regime switching copulas. The estimation by means of copula based regime switching models delivered results concerning the interdependencies between realized return volatility and trading volume of selected companies listed in ATX. A copula in the first regime was chosen as an asymmetric copula with positive lower and upper tail dependencies. Conversely Gaussian copula in the second regime is a symmetric copula and variables linked with it are tail independent. For all analyzed stocks the probability of being at the first regime appeared to be vitally greater than being at the second regime. This result suggest that there is considerable dependence between realized volatility and daily volume in extreme values. The results suggest that interdependencies between realized volatility and trading volume do not probably depend on the size but rather on the branch of a company.
Service quality in higher education

Quality experts believe that, ‘measuring customer satisfaction at an educational establishment might be regarded by educators as one of the greatest challenges of the quality movement’ (Cloutier & Richards, 1994, p. 117). This challenge is only one of several that surround quality improvement efforts in higher education. This paper focuses on identifying and evaluating techniques used to take on the challenges of quality improvement in higher education. This paper also examines two primary difficulties: first, definition of the customer; and second, measuring customer quality perceptions. An examination of representative historical applications of quality techniques was conducted as well as identification of the differences and similarities surrounding quality improvement efforts in each of three service areas typically found in higher education: academic, administrative, and auxiliary functions. While recognising these higher education areas differ from the typical business environment, positive research findings on the application of quality techniques for these areas were discovered.
Star formation rates from young-star counts and the structure of the ISM across the NGC 346/N66 complex in the SMC

The rate at which interstellar gas is converted into stars, and its dependence on environment, is one of the pillars on which our understanding of the visible Universe is build. We present a comparison of the surface density of young stars (Σ�) and dust surface density (Σdust) across NGC 346 (N66) in 115 independent pixels of 6×6pc 2 . We find a correlation between Σ� and Σdust with a considerable scatter. A power law fit to the data yields a steep relation with an exponent of 2.6±0.2. We convert Σdust to gas surface density (Σgas) and Σ� to star formation rate (SFR) surface densities (ΣSFR), using simple assumptions for the gas-to-dust mass ratio and the duration of star formation. The derived total SFR (4±1·10 −3 M⊙ yr −1 ) is consistent with SFR estimated from the Hα emission integrated over the Hα nebula. On small scales the ΣSFR derived using Hα systematically underestimates the count-based ΣSFR, by up to a factor of 10. This is due to ionizing photons escaping the area, where the stars are counted. We find that individual 36pc 2 pixels fall systematically above integrated disc-galaxies in the Schmidt-Kennicutt diagram by on average a factor of ∼7. The NGC 346 average SFR over a larger area (90pc radius) lies closer to the relation but remains high by a factor of ∼3. The fraction of the total mass (gas plus young stars) locked in young stars is systematically high (∼10 per cent) within the central 15pc and systematically lower outside (2 per cent), which we interpret as variations in star formation efficiency. The inner 15pc is dominated by young stars belonging to a centrally condensed cluster, while the outer parts are dominated by a dispersed population. Therefore, the observed trend could reflect a change of star formation efficiency between clustered and non-clustered star-formation.
Ridge Augmentation Techniques in Preprosthetic Implant Surgery

Rehabilitation of missing teeth with dental implant-supported restorations has become a predictable treatment option in dentistry. The stability of hard and soft tissues around the implant is fundamental for long-term success. However, due to factors such as trauma, oncologic diseases, and missing teeth, vertical and horizontal bone loss is expected, and the available bone may not be suitable for optimum implant placement. Ridge augmentation procedures are applied to increase in the volume of the deficient sites for implant treatment. Autogenous block bone augmentation and guided bone regeneration (GBR) are two surgical approaches for implant placement. Autogenous bone is widely used for augmentations because of its osteogenic potential. A myriad of biomaterials, including xenografts, allografts, alloplasts, and composite grafts, are available for GBR. The aim of this chapter is to provide a brief summary of these methods and to discuss the advantages and pitfalls of ridge augmentation techniques.
Burnout and Engagement in University Students

This study examines burnout and engagement—the hypothesized opposite of burnout—in university students from Spain (n = 623), Portugal (n = 727), and the Netherlands (n = 311). Confirmatory factor analyses showed that the expected three-factor structures of the adapted versions of the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) for students (including Exhaustion, Cynicism, and Reduced Efficacy) and the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES) for students (including Vigor, Dedication, and Absorption) fitted to the data of each sample. However, a rigorous test revealed that most factor loadings of the MBI were not invariant across all samples. Results with the UWES were slightly better, indicating invariance of factor loadings of Absorption in all samples and of Vigor in two of the three samples. Furthermore, as hypothesized, the burnout and engagement subscales were negatively correlated. Finally, irrespective of country, Efficacy and Vigor were positively related to academic performance, that is, the number of passed exams relative to the total number of exams in the previous term.
A Literature Survey of Neutronics and Thermal-Hydraulics Codes for Investigating Reactor Core Parameters; Artificial Neural Networks as the VVER-1000 Core Predictor

In this chapter, we investigated an appropriate way to predict neutronics and thermalhydraulics parameters in a large scale VVER type nuclear reactors. A computer program is developed to automate this procedure using Artificial Neural Network (ANN) method. The neutronics and thermal-hydraulics codes are connected to each other and then the neural network method use results with different configuration of a suggested core for prediction. The main objective of this research is to develop fast and first estimation tool (a software) based on ANNs which allows large explorations of core safety parameters. This tool is very useful in reactor core design and in-core fuel management or loading pattern optimization. Therefore, herein, an overview study on the multiphysics/multiscale coupling methods for designing current and innovative VVER systems by coupling neutronics parameters (using MCNP 5) and thermal-hydraulics simulator (e.g., COBRA-EN) are carried out. This work is aimed to extend the modeling capabilities of coupled Monte Carlo/Subchannel codes for whole core simulations based on pin-level in order to address many problems e.g. higher burn-up, Mox-fuels, or to improve the performances and accuracy of reactor dynamics. Verification and validation of the above development are the main concern and important procedures and therefore taking into account using experimental data or another code-tocode benchmarking. Finally the extended simulation capabilities should be applied to analyze a selected VVER reactor and we present our input computer codes for interested readers. Also, our future designed user friendly Artificial Neural Network (ANN) software would be given for everyone who wants to get it. Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant (BNNP), a VVER-1000 Russian model, was simulated during the first plant operational period using WIMS and CITATION codes (Faghihi et al., 2007). Modelling of all rods (including fuel rods, control rods, burnable and non-burnable poison rods) and channels (including central guide channel, measuring channel) were carried out
Maximizing Network Lifetime in MANET using Average Energy Flooding

Wireless mobile Ad Hoc stations have limited battery capacity, hence, Ad Hoc routing protocols ought to be energy conservative. Route discovery is a common operation in routing to resolve many issues relating to battery capacity. In a Mobile Ad Hoc Network (MANET) in particular, due to host mobility, such operations are expected to be executed more frequently. As radio signals are likely to overlap with others in a geographical area, a straightforward broadcasting by flooding is usually very costly and will result in serious redundancy, contention, and collision, resulting in broadcast storm problem. In this paper, an algorithm is proposed to improve the flooding performance of an Ad Hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV) routing protocol called, Probabilistic-AverageEnergy-flooding (PAEF) which periodically performs an averaging algorithm Calculate-Average-Energy (CAE) to estimate the average energy Eavg. This algorithm is used in route discovery process to make a rebroadcast decision by the node. Route request message is rebroadcast with a probability that depends on the difference between the residual energy Er and the calculated average energy. Our simulation results show an improvement in the network lifetime and the throughput compared to traditional AODV.
The Scientific Potential for Astronomy from the Antarctic Plateau: A Report prepared by the Australian Working Group for Antarctic Astronomy

Our knowledge of the universe comes from recording the photon and particle fluxes incident on the Earth from space. We thus require sensitive measurement across the entire energy spectrum, using large telescopes with efficient instrumentation located on superb sites. Technological advances and engineering constraints are nearing the point where we are recording as many photons arriving at a site as is possible. Major advances in the future will come from improving the quality of the site. The ultimate site is, of course, beyond the Earth’s atmosphere, such as on the Moon, but economic limitations prevent our exploiting this avenue to the degree that the scientific community desires. Here we describe an alternative, which offers many of the advantages of space for a fraction of the cost: the Antarctic Plateau.