Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Vibration Protection of a Famous Statue against Ambient and Earthquake Excitation Using A Tuned Inerter–Damper

This paper deals with the performance analysis of a vibration-isolation system for Michelangelo Buonarroti’s famous Ronadanini Pieta statue based on the monitoring and analysis of vibration signals. A tuned mass-damper–inerter is introduced in order to increase the effectiveness of the isolator in the horizontal direction. Specifically, a multi-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) model for the system, including non-linear terms, is proposed. The monitoring data of the structure inside the museum were utilized to update the MDOF model of this structure. Then, the effect of different parameters was analysed, and some modifications proposed to enhance the efficiency of the isolation system in its working condition. A combination of tuned mass-dampers (TMD) with an inerter is proposed to attain a considerable increase in the performance of the isolation system based on the main feature of the tuned mass-damper–inerter (TMDI), which can apply high apparent mass to a system without adding considerable real mass to the original system. Various performance functions are used to illustrate the efficiency of the proposed TMDI. It is shown that a significant effect of this passive method is to reduce the level of vibration in the updated model of this sensitive and valuable object.
Cassava whitefly, Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) (Hemiptera: Aleyrodidae) in East African farming landscapes: a review of the factors determining abundance

Abstract Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) (Hemiptera: Aleyrodidae) is a pest species complex that causes widespread damage to cassava, a staple food crop for millions of households in East Africa. Species in the complex cause direct feeding damage to cassava and are the vectors of multiple plant viruses. Whilst significant work has gone into developing virus-resistant cassava cultivars, there has been little research effort aimed at understanding the ecology of these insect vectors. Here we assess critically the knowledge base relating to factors that may lead to high population densities of sub-Saharan African (SSA) B. tabaci species in cassava production landscapes of East Africa. We focus first on empirical studies that have examined biotic or abiotic factors that may lead to high populations. We then identify knowledge gaps that need to be filled to deliver sustainable management solutions. We found that whilst many hypotheses have been put forward to explain the increases in abundance witnessed since the early 1990s, there are little published data and these tend to have been collected in a piecemeal manner. The most critical knowledge gaps identified were: (i) understanding how cassava cultivars and alternative host plants impact population dynamics and natural enemies; (ii) the impact of natural enemies in terms of reducing the frequency of outbreaks and (iii) the use and management of insecticides to delay the development of resistance. In addition, there are several fundamental methodologies that need to be developed and deployed in East Africa to address some of the more challenging knowledge gaps.
Investigation on different clustering techniques in wireless sensor networks

In the recent years, we have witnessed hyperbolic interest within the potential use of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) in an exceedingly wide selection of applications like area observation, healthcare observation, pollution observation, fire detection, landslide detection, natural disaster hindrance, machine health observation, etc., it is become a hot research space. To support high scalability and higher knowledge aggregation, sensor nodes are typically sorted into disjoint, non-overlapping subsets known as clusters. Clusters produce stratified WSNs that incorporate economical utilisation of restricted resources of sensor nodes and so extends network period. Specifically, we will examine the performance in terms of the ability and quality aspects of those schemes. We tend to conjointly discuss enhancements to be created for future planned cluster schemes. Finally, we tend to summarise and conclude the paper with some future directions.
Physical activity and right ventricular structure and function. The MESA-Right Ventricle Study.

RATIONALE Intense exercise in elite athletes is associated with increased left ventricular (LV) and right ventricular (RV) mass and volumes. However, the effect of physical activity on the RV in an older community-based population is unknown. OBJECTIVES We studied the association between levels of physical activity in adults and RV mass and volumes. METHODS The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) performed cardiac magnetic resonance imaging on community-based participants without clinical cardiovascular disease. RV volumes were determined from manually contoured endocardial margins. RV mass was determined from the difference between epicardial and endocardial volumes multiplied by the specific gravity of myocardium. Metabolic equivalent-minutes/day were calculated from the self-reported frequency, duration, and intensity of physical activity. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS The study sample (n = 1,867) was aged 61.8 ± 10 years, 48% male, 44% white, 27% African American, 20% Hispanic, and 9% Chinese. Higher levels of moderate and vigorous physical activity were linearly associated with higher RV mass (P = 0.02) after adjusting for demographics, anthropometrics, smoking, cholesterol, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and LV mass. Higher levels of intentional exercise (physical activity done for the sole purpose of conditioning or fitness) were nonlinearly associated with RV mass independent of LV mass (P = 0.03). There were similar associations between higher levels of physical activity and larger RV volumes. CONCLUSIONS Higher levels of physical activity in adults were associated with greater RV mass independent of the associations with LV mass; similar results were found for RV volumes. Exercise-associated RV remodeling may have important clinical implications.
Development of a projection-based assistance system for maintaining injection molding tools

The maintenance of a tool for injection molding or forming is usually accompanied by its disassembly and assembly. The duration of the assembly activities is often a large part of the total activity time for the maintenance of the tool. The degree of performance of the employees in the execution of these disassembly and assembly activities is often low. In addition, allowances occur (e.g. searching for work equipment). At the Industrial Engineering Lab of the Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Applied Sciences, a prototype of an assistance system was developed to support the assembly activities in toolmaking. With the help of this system, the operator is guided step by step through the assembly process. The economic potential of the system exists in the reduction of training times, the avoidance of assembly errors and the increase of labor productivity.
A neural network and genetic algorithm scheme for optimal dynamic channel assignment in mobile networks

Channel assignment problems (CAP) are classified as NP-hard. The major challenge is how to assign the limited channels optimally while ensuring that electromagnetic interference is minimized and an acceptable quality of service (QoS) is provided. Inefficient channel assignment leads to congestion in mobile networks. This work proposes a scheme that combines the easy convergence ability of neural network and the global search ability of genetic algorithm to address the CAP. The proposed solution to the CAP was tested on Philadelphia standard benchmark problems of frequency assignment and produced a lower call blocking probability at high traffic load thereby proving to be more efficient compared to other schemes.
Iliac crest apophyseal insufficiency avulsion fractures

ABSTRACT Iliac crest apophyseal avulsion fractures are rare injuries caused mainly through forceful contraction of attached muscles during high level sporting activities. We present the first case of a spontaneous iliac crest apophyseal avulsion insufficiency fracture in a patient with severe atopic eczema on oral steroids and review the relevant literature.
Implementation of Instrumental Variable Bounds for Data Missing Not at Random

Instrumental variables are routinely used to recover a consistent estimator of an exposure causal effect in the presence of unmeasured confounding. Instrumental variable approaches to account for nonignorable missing data also exist but are less familiar to epidemiologists. Like instrumental variables for exposure causal effects, instrumental variables for missing data rely on exclusion restriction and instrumental variable relevance assumptions. Yet these two conditions alone are insufficient for point identification. For estimation, researchers have invoked a third assumption, typically involving fairly restrictive parametric constraints. Inferences can be sensitive to these parametric assumptions, which are typically not empirically testable. The purpose of our article is to discuss another approach for leveraging a valid instrumental variable. Although the approach is insufficient for nonparametric identification, it can nonetheless provide informative inferences about the presence, direction, and magnitude of selection bias, without invoking a third untestable parametric assumption. An important contribution of this article is an Excel spreadsheet tool that can be used to obtain empirical evidence of selection bias and calculate bounds and corresponding Bayesian 95% credible intervals for a nonidentifiable population proportion. For illustrative purposes, we used the spreadsheet tool to analyze HIV prevalence data collected by the 2007 Zambia Demographic and Health Survey (DHS).
The IFS (INECO Frontal Screening) and level of education: Normative data

ABSTRACT Level of education is known to confound neuropsychological test performance. The INECO Frontal Screening (IFS) is an easy-to-use and brief measure of several domains of executive function, which has previously shown reliably clinical usefulness and superior psychometric performance when compared to other frontal screening instruments. However, previous studies with the IFS have been limited to participants with high levels of education, preventing its generalizability to populations with less than 12 years of formal education. This is crucial, as less than half of the Latin American population and a large percentage of immigrants in developed countries attain high school education. The aim of this study was to generate IFS normative data in a sample stratified by age and education levels. One hundred and sixty one healthy adults were assessed with the IFS as well as measures of global cognitive screening, namely, the Addenbrooke Cognitive Examination Revised and the Mini-Mental State Examination. Multiple lineal regression analysis showed significant effects for education and nonsignificant effects for age. A correction grid for IFS raw scores was developed and cut-off scores were calculated. The correction grid and cut-off scores may be useful in the interpretation of IFS scores in participants with low education.
Explicit Goal-Driven Attention, Unlike Implicitly Learned Attention, Spreads to Secondary Tasks

To what degree does spatial attention for one task spread to all stimuli in the attended region, regardless of task relevance? Most models imply that spatial attention acts through a unitary priority map in a task-general manner. We show that implicit learning, unlike endogenous spatial cuing, can bias spatial attention within one task without biasing attention to a spatially overlapping secondary task. Participants completed a visual search task superimposed on a background containing scenes, which they were told to encode for a later memory task. Experiments 1 and 2 used explicit instructions to bias spatial attention to one region for visual search; Experiment 3 used location probability cuing to implicitly bias spatial attention. In location probability cuing, a target appeared in one region more than others despite participants not being told of this. In all experiments, search performance was better in the cued region than in uncued regions. However, scene memory was better in the cued region only following endogenous guidance, not after implicit biasing of attention. These data support a dual-system view of top-down attention that dissociates goal-driven and implicitly learned attention. Goal-driven attention is task general, amplifying processing of a cued region across tasks, whereas implicit statistical learning is task-specific.
Killing two birds with one stone: Board reforms in the Japanese electronics industry

This paper combines insights from A Behavioral Theory of the Firm and Neo-Institutional Theory to provide a more comprehensive understanding of how new practices are adopted and transformed. The setting is the spread of the Executive Officer System (EOS) in the Japanese electronics industry. While this system, based on the Anglo-American system of governance, was designed to separate executive and monitoring, in reality, firms that reduced the size of the board only, leaving membership heavily weighted to executive officers. Based on a combination of qualitative and quantitative studies, we argue that this is not merely decoupling or symbolic management; rather, the legitimacy of the EOS system made it readily accessible and salient to firms searching for a solution to problems in decision-making. The legitimacy of EOS as the “global standard” of corporate governance enabled top executives to frame difficult board reforms to internal actors. Through adoption of EOS, firms were able to “kill two birds with one stone” by appealing to investors as well as solving internal problems. This research contributes to our understanding of diffusion and variation, the nature of decoupling, global spread of Anglo-American corporate governance, and NIT and BTF accounts of diffusion of new practices.
Assessment on Using Multitaper and Higher-Order STBC Techniques for Spectrum Estimation in Cognitive Radio

This paper investigates the spectrum estimation (SE) in cognitive radio (CR) using the non-parametric multitaper method (MTM) and higher-order space-time block-code (STBC). Conventional SE methods usually suffer problems from biasing and leakage dilemma and the MTM is considered as an enhancement against such challenging situations. The STBC techniques help alleviate the multipath fading effects in wireless channels and hence improve the overall wireless link performance. The integration of MTM and STBC for SE will be developed using quadrature approximation and assessed using analytical and simulation methods. The simulation results revealed favorable MTM performance gains compared to other classical methods like Periodogram and also the STBC over MIMO for the same test settings.
Evaluation of state probabilities based on deterministic criterion for a distribution system with distributed generation employing boot strapping technique

This paper describes an algorithm for evaluating state probabilities of a distribution system having distributed generation. The probabilities have been classified as healthy, marginal and risky state probabilities based on a deterministic criterion which is based on load and capacity available. Uncertainties in the capacity available from substation and that from distributed generation have been considered. Uncertainties have been considered in two stages i.e. one stage considered the operable availability and the second stage considers random variations around the rated capacity available that of substation or distributed generation. To evaluate the state probabilities boot strapping has been incorporated in Monte Carlo simulation so as to enhance computational efficiency. The algorithm has been implemented on a sample distribution system incorporating annual load duration curve.
Rebuttal from Volker Adams

With great interest I read the opposing view by Sapp and Hagberg (2018) providing evidence that an acute bout of exercise does not damage the endothelial cell layer of systemic blood vessels in healthy individuals. Nevertheless, both of us agree that regular exercise training exerts beneficial effects in healthy individuals and patients with cardiovascular diseases. This beneficial effect is mediated by an increased laminar shear stress, whereas a disturbed turbulent shear stress mediates the development of atherosclerotic lesions. This has already been demonstrated in cell culture studies exposing human umbilical vein endothelial cells to different forms of shear stress (Morawietz et al. 2000; Takabe et al. 2011). The point of view which is less clear is what happens with the endothelial cell layer in vivo after performing a short bout of exercise with an increase of laminar shear stress. Unfortunately, the data available are controversial as obvious from the present CrossTalk. The missing clear-cut evidence for one or the other opinion may also be due to the problem of a missing marker, clearly indicating endothelial damage. As evident from our statements, similar markers, such as circulating endothelial cells, endothelial microparticles, circulating microRNAs or secreted protein were listed, but opposing interpretations were drawn. Therefore, just relying on these markers will not resolve the debate. Examining endothelial function by measuring flow-mediated vasodilatation (FMD) may help to resolve this debate. Unfortunately, also by measuring the FMD before and after an acute bout of exercise the results are controversial, with some investigations reporting a reduced FMD (Gonzales et al. 2011; Llewellyn et al. 2012; Birk et al. 2013) whereas others (Harris et al. 2008; Hallmark et al. 2014) could not confirm this observation. This discrepancy is probably due to the definition of the term ‘single bout of exercise’ (maximal exercise test to running a marathon or even a 246 km run), the intensity at which this bout was performed (ranging from below 50% to 90% V̇O2max) and the time of assessing FMD (immediately after the exercise or 2 h after finishing the test). Based on the data available and also the opinion of Sapp and Hagberg (2018), we may postulate that when the intensity is high enough (above 70% V̇O2max) and the duration is short enough (<1 h) a biphasic response occurs, in which the endothelial function is reduced (a sign of endothelial damage) followed by a restoration of endothelial function. At the molecular level this may be triggered by a balance between reactive oxygen species and nitric oxide or other vasoconstrictive and vasodilatory substances.
Design and performance analysis of modified unsigned braun and signed Baugh-Wooley multiplier

Adders and Multipliers play a vital role in the functioning of various systems used in communication and signal processing. Baugh Wooley and Braun multipliers employ parallel architecture and hence they are the most frequently used multipliers for signed and unsigned operations. In any system design, the three main constraints which determine the performance of the system are speed, area and power requirement. This work involves design and implementation of modified Baugh-Wooley and Braun multipliers for signed and unsigned number multiplication respectively and analysis with respect to speed and power consumption of the designed multipliers. The adder is designed using three different logics, namely, Basic CMOS, Domino and Split Path Data Driven Dynamic Logic (SPD3L). The designed adder is then used to construct the multipliers. An improvement in power and reduction in delay is observed for both the designed multipliers.
Back-to-back configuration of multilevel converters providing redundant operation mode

In recent years multilevel converters become more important. On the one hand, they are essential in terms of output power for medium and high-voltage applications in industry and renewable energy. And on the other hand, they are important in terms of filtering requirements for low power applications, too. For high power wind energy plants at low voltage paralleled converters are used to split up power and obtain redundancy. At medium and high voltage a single converter is used for total output causing a lack of redundancy in case of a failure of a power semiconductor. This paper investigates the back-to-back configuration of multilevel converters for wind energy application based on the principle of partial converters. These converters provide a redundant operation mode after a failure of a power semiconductor. The defective partial converter is disconnected and the remaining parts can continue to operate at reduced output power. Therefore, a lower number of voltage levels is available as well as only half of the DC-link voltage remains. But the downtime until maintenance of the entire system is reduced.
Energy cooperation in comp system based on Q-learning

This paper studies energy harvesting communication systems in which the base station sends data packets using the energy harvested from the surrounding natural environment. We assume that at each time slot only information about the current and past state of the base station is available, modeling the scenario as a Markov decision process and propose a reinforcement learning approach based on Q-learning for the transmitter to learn to cooperation trough energy sharing. For the problem of continuous state space in reinforcement learning, we propose an online algorithm based on approximate linear dependence to sparse sample pool. Furthermore, we use a neural network as approximator for the value function to improve the generalization ability. Numerical results show that our proposed algorithm can significantly improve the system performance even when the future environment change and energy harvested is uncertain for the BS.
Research on model predictive control for modular multilevel converter

For circulating currents suppression and capacitor voltage balancing of modular multilevel converter (MMC), a model predictive control (MPC) strategy is proposed, the corresponding functions is developed according to discrete-time mathematical model of MMC, which takes control on phase current, circulating current and sub modular voltage, the best switching state in each MMC unit is obtained by solving the optimization of the objective function, which achieves capacitor voltage balancing and eliminates circulating currents. The simulation and experimental results verifies the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy, its implementation is easy and simple.
Influence updating and compactness enhanced approach for saliency detection

Salient object detection aims to detect the attractive objects to human viewers in an image. In order to solve the low detection precision problem of existing algorithms, a new method based on influence updating and compactness feature is proposed. Firstly, it propagates the background information to the entire image by using influence updating algorithm and obtains the initial saliency map. Then, it introduces the compactness feature, a low-level cue of image, to obtain the compactness of regions by computing the difference of color space and location space respectively. Finally, initial saliency map is enhanced by the compactness feature and pixel-level saliency correction. Experiment results on MSRA-1000, CSSD and ECSSD databases demonstrate that the proposed method performs well against the state-of-the-art methods by fusing prior knowledges and visual cues in terms of accuracy.