Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Assessment of Metal Concentrations, Chlorophyll Content and Photosynthesis in Phragmites australis along the Lower Diep River, CapeTown, South Africa

Phragmites australis growing at 4 selected sites along the bank of the lower Diep River, Cape Town, South Africa and in adjacent soil was assessed for photosynthesis, chlorophyll content and metal concentrations in shoots and roots. The rate of photosynthesis was determined using the Infra - red gas analyzer (IRGA). Chlorophyll content of leaves was determined by extraction of the pigments using dimethyl sulphoxide (DMSO). Chlorophyll was quantified from the extract using a spectrophotometer (645 and 665 nm). Ten metals (cadmium, copper, iron, lead, manganese, nickel, zinc, aluminium, chromium, and cobalt) in the shoots and roots of Phragmites australis were measured by ICP-MS. The abundance of the metals were in the order Al > Pb > Cd > Co > Ni > Cr; and for micronutrients, Fe > Mn > Zn > Cu both in the shoots and roots from all the sites investigated. Chlorophyll a, b and total chlorophyll (Chl.T), as well as photosynthesis were significantly lower in P. australis from the river bank compared with the adjacent soil. Increased metal loads in plants from the river bank were found to accompany the decreasing chlorophyll concentrations and photosynthetic rate. More metals were found to be accumulated in plants on the river bank compared to plants from adjacent to the river bank.
TRUNCATION, OVERDISPERSION AND ENDOGENOUS STRATIFICATION IN THE RECREATION DEMAND MODELS

In this paper, we investigate and compare several truncated count data models of travel cost recreation demand. Using on-site data from Jizerske hory Landscape Protection Area in the Czech Republic, we derive the single site recreation demand model with a Poisson and a Negative Binominal specification. The models account for the truncated and overdispersed nature of the data, we also treat the problem of endogenous stratification due to the oversampling of more frequent recreation users. We also use the more flexible approach that allows the overdispersion parameter to vary according to the characteristics of the visitors and we compare it with the more restrictive approach. The results show that the negative binomial model that accounts for truncation and endogenous stratification provides the better goodnessof-fit. If don’t correct overdispersion by relying on Poisson estimates, the consumer surplus will be underestimated. If we account for endogenous stratification, the consumer surplus will be adjusted appropriately upwards.
A MODEL STUDY OF MOLECULAR TRANSPORT IN ELECTROPORATION

OF THE DISSERTATION A model study of molecular transport in electroporation by Miao Yu Dissertation Director: Professor Hao Lin Reversible electroporation is a non-viral technique to introduce foreign molecules into biological cells or tissues, which has found applications in fields including gene transfer, cancer treatment, stem-cell research etc. Despite its promising potential, the improvement of electroporation technique is impeded by the lack of a comprehensive understanding of the underlying mechanisms involved in the process of molecular delivery. This work aims at implementing model studies of electroporation-mediated molecular delivery with the target varying from small molecules (propidium iodide, PI) to macromolecules (DNA). Three significant tasks have been accomplished. First, a model study is performed on the electroporation-mediated delivery of PI. In particular, the effects of extra-cellular conductivity on the amount of PI delivery are carefully investigated and discussed. The results are extensively compared with experiments by Sadik et al. [72], and reveal important physical insights about the transport mechanisms involved. It is confirmed that the electrophoretic transport, not the diffusive transport, is the dominating mechanism in mediating PI delivery, and the inverse correlation observed between PI delivery and extra-cellular conductivity results from an electrokinetic phenomenon termed Field Amplified Sample Stacking (FASS). Second, a model investigation of Fluorescein-Dextran delivery is implemented for double-pulse electroporation.
Building knowledge around complex objects using InforBright Data Warehousing technology

There are considerable challenges in analysing and reporting on word-based data. Infobright data warehousing technology was used to build knowledge around qualitative data that are subject to human interpretation. Infobright was chosen as a system for implementing the data set because its rough set based intelligence appears to be extensible with moderate effort to implement the data warehousing requirements for automatic interpretation of word based data. An example of social sciences research data was used for illustration.
Two Dimensional (2D) Visual Tracking in Construction Scenarios

The tracking of construction resources (e.g. workforce and equipment) in videos, i.e., two-dimensional (2D) visual tracking, has gained significant interests in the construction industries. There exist lots of research studies that relied on 2D visual tracking methods to support the surveillance of construction productivity, safety, and project progress. However, few efforts have been put on evaluating the accuracy and robustness of these tracking methods in the construction scenarios. Meanwhile, it is noticed that state-of-art tracking methods have not shown reliable performance in tracking articulated equipment, such as excavators, backhoes, and dozers etc. The main objective of this research is to fill these knowledge gaps. First, a total of fifth (15) 2D visual tracking methods were selected here due to their excellent performances identified in the computer vision field. Then, the methods were tested with twenty (20) videos captured from multiple construction job sites at day and night. The videos contain construction resources, including but not limited to excavators, backhoes, and compactors. Also, they were characterized by the attributes, such as occlusions, scale variation, and background clutter, in order to provide a comprehensive evaluation. The tracking results were evaluated with the sequence overlap score, center error ratio, and tracking length ratio respectively. According to the quantitative comparison of tracking methods, two improvements were further conducted. One is to fuse the tracking results of individual tracking methods based on the non-maximum suppression. The other is to track the articulated equipment by proposing the idea of tracking the equipment parts respectively. The test results from this research study indicated that 1) the methods built on the local sparse representation were more effective; 2) the generative tracking strategy typically outperformed the discriminative one, when being adopted to track the equipment and workforce in the construction scenarios; 3) the fusion of the results from different tracking methods increased the tracking performance by 10% in accuracy; and 4) the part-based tracking methods improved the tracking performance in both accuracy and robustness, when being used to track the articulated equipment.
FINITE ELEMENT INELASTIC ANALYSIS OF 3-D FLEXIBLE PAVEMENTS UNDER MOVING LOADS

The dynamic response of flexible road pavements to moving vehicles is numerically obtained by the time domain finite element method under three-dimensional conditions. The pavement is modeled as a layered finite rectangular domain. The material behavior of the layers is assumed to be inelastic: viscoelastic or viscoplastic for the top asphalt layer and elastic or elastoplastic of the von Mises and the Prager-Drucker type, respectively, for the other layers. The moving with constant speed loads (wheels) of the vehicle are simulated by assigning time dependent load values at all the surface nodes along the vehicle path, which are activated at the time it takes for every load to travel the distance from the origin to every node’s location. Distributed moving loads are considered. Simple supports on rollers for the bottom and lateral boundaries of the pavement domain are assumed. Comparisons with corresponding elastic solutions are made in order to assess the inelastic material behavior on the response of the pavement.
PREVENTING EFFECT ON DIET-INDUCED OBESITY OFWATER-EXTRACT FROM MASSON PINE POLLEN ON MICE

Background: In order to investigate the preventing effect of water-extract from masson pine pollen (PWE) on obesity in mice. Materials and Methods: Sixty male KM mice (bodyweight was 19±1g) were divided randomly into six groups: normal control group (NC), high fat group (FC), positive control group (Orlistat, 0.05g/kg bw·d, PC), low-dose PWE group (0.0625g/kg bw·d, PWEL), medium-dose group (0.125g/kg bw·d, PWEM) and high-dose group (0.25g/kg bw·d, PWEH). Mice were treated by intragastric administration daily for 6 weeks. Results: The body weight changes of three PWE groups decreased obviously. In serum, TC of PWEH group reduced remarkably (P
The influence of project complexity on estimating accuracy

With the rapid development in technology over recent years, construction, in common with many areas of industry, has become increasingly complex. It would, therefore, seem to be important to develop and extend the understanding of complexity so that industry in general and in this case the construction industry can work with greater accuracy and efficiency to provide clients with a better service. This paper aims to generate a definition of complexity and a method for its measurement in order to assess its influence upon the accuracy of the quantity surveying profession in UK new build office construction. Quantitative data came from an analysis of twenty projects of varying size and value and qualitative data came from interviews with professional quantity surveyors. The findings highlight the difficulty in defining and measuring project complexity. The correlation between accuracy and complexity was not straightforward, being subjected to many extraneous variables, particularly the impact of project size. Further research is required to develop a better measure of complexity. This is in order to improve the response of quantity surveyors, so that an appropriate level of effort can be applied to individual projects, permitting greater accuracy and enabling better resource planning within the profession.
Inauthentically Intense: Coveillance and Consumer Culture among Speedsurfers

This article presents material from a small-scale ethnographic study of a community of windsurfers that use GPS (Global Positioning System) technology to monitor and share their performance online. Following recent debates within Surveillance Studies, these practices are categorised as a form of coveillance. The argument explores the subjectivity produced by the introduction of GPS technology and social media usage in the context of windsurfers. Suggesting that this form of coveillance is yielding a particular consumer culture among its members, the article explores how the GPS-social-media assemblage boosts the desire to consume .
Comparative Larvicidal Properties and Detoxification Machinery of Bioactive Fractions of Leaf Extracts of Hyptis Suaveolens and Chromolaena Odorata on Anopheles gambiae s.l from North West Nigeria.

Malaria is endemic in Nigeria and the impact of chemical insecticides is being undermined by widespread resistance in mosquito vectors. This calls for development of alternative bio-insecticidal approach. The aim of this work was to determine the active fractions of leaves of Hyptis. suaveolens and Chromolena. odorata with insecticidal potential on the larva of Anopheles gambiae s.l. Leaf extracts of the two plants were screen for phytochemicals and the active fractions were subjected to GC-MS analysis. In addition, the detoxification enzymes (GST, esterase and cytochromes P450) as well Glutathione levels on the susceptible and resistant individuals of the larvae were biochemically assayed. Larval bioassay was carried out by the standard procedure described by WHO. The phytochemicals detected include flavonoids, tannins, saponins, terpenoids, alkaloids, phenols and phlobatannins . Butanol fracton of H. suaveolens displayed higher larvicidal activity (LC 50 2167.92ppm) followed by the aqueous fraction (LC 50 2613.01ppm). Both butanol and aqueous fractions of C. odorata also displayed larvicidal activities (LC 50 3117.97ppm; LC 50 3497.27ppm) respectively, but were lower than that observed in Hyptis suaveolens. Biochemical assay of the detoxification enzymes showed significance difference at P <0.05 between the resistant and susceptible larvae for all enzymes. There was however no significant difference in the levels detoxification enzymes in both resistant and susceptible individuals for butanol and aqueous fractions of H. suaveolens when compared with their corresponding fractions of C. odorata at P< 0.05 respectively. The observations recorded in this study showed a promising larvicidal potential of these two plants which if further characterized could offer a promising novel bioinsecticide compound that could substitute the present classes of chemical insecticides used in malaria vector control.
Analyzing the Effect of Family Factors over the Scholar drop out at Elementary School using Classification and Association Rules Techniques

Data Mining offers great opportunities for analyzing data related with several themes, one of the most interesting is the educative environment, which has a lot information about many areas which can be improved. Scholar drop out, it’s one of the biggest problems that education faces, but the great amount of factors that cause it, make it difficult for analyzing. This work presents an analysis of the elementary school drop out problem using techniques like decision tree and generation of association rules for obtaining models that allow to identify the most important family aspects that causes scholar desertion.
Inclusive Safety at School: How to Train Teachers.

The paper presents the activities proposed for the course “Safety at school”, organized by the University of Macerata and Safety Education Training Agency Association. Six workshops held by university professors and other experts focused on the topic of inclusive safety both at school and in the city. Both prospective and in-service teachers attended together these classes, in order to provide the opportunity of exchanging ideas and on the field experiences. The idea of the course was conceived following the earthquakes that struck in central Italy the 24th of August and the 26th and 30th of October 2016 to offer new conceptual and practical instruments to deal with the topic of safety at school
Comfort and functionality of pregnant women's feet study of kinetic parameters with silicon insoles

Pregnant women can suffer pains and muscle-skeletal injuries in their feet, lower limbs and vertebral column, due to physiological and biomechanic changes during pregnancy. In this study we assessed the pain and comfort of the feet during gait: without silicone insoles (for pregnant and non-pregnant women); using hindfoot insoles and complete insoles (only for pregnant women). We also measured the plantar pressure distribution, the ground reaction forces and the duration of the gait cycle (for pregnant women with and without insoles; and for non-pregnant women without insoles). Results showed that pregnant women take a significantly (1± 0,05 e 0,95±0,08 seconds right and left foot respectively vs 0,87±0,07 e 0,86±0,08 seconds of the control group, p=0,001 right foot and p=0,03 left foot) longer time to complete the stance phase, and have significantly (Visual Analogue Scale 4,79) more pain and discomfort in the feet, than non-pregnant women (2,93), p=0,03. Pregnant women preferred the complete silicone insole because these redistributed ground reaction forces (eg: vertical component without insole vs complete insole, 1,07±0,02 to 1,07±0,03 right foot, p=0,831, 1,08±0,03 to 1,06±0,03 left foot, p=0,319) and pressure (eg. without insole vs complete insole: 0,68±0,50 to 0,81±0,28 right foot, p=0,028 and 0,43±0,13 to 0,68±0,27 left foot, p=0,003 or 4,83±1,24 to 4,59±1,33 right foot, p=0,774 and 5,16±0,81 to 4,30±0,62 left foot, p=0,118) and increased the contact area of the feet with the ground (eg. without insole vs complete insole: 13,13± 5,57 to 18,82±3,58 right foot, p=0,001, 10,68±3,91 to 15,85±5,50
The role of measurement problems and monitoring in PES schemes

Payment for environmental services (PES) is seen as a mechanism that can achieve two goals, providing poor resource managers with an additional source of income and maintaining environmental services. Although some reservations have been made on the effectiveness of PES of reaching the poor, similar reservations can be made about achieving the second goal. Because many environmental services are intangible, developing simple and straightforward indicators to measure and monitor the environmental service provided and linking these to the efforts supplied by the resource managers is difficult and costly. But establishing this link is crucial to those who are paying and ultimately for the success of the PES concept. By reviewing the literature on this topic and analysing in a systematic way what types of measurement problems there are, we will show that the type of monitoring that is required within a PES has consequences for the institutional arrangement needed for a successful PES. We find that the institutional arrangements for monitoring vary according to (i) the type of environmental service and its underlying production process; (ii) the extent to which the environmental service can be freely observed or measured; (iii) the extent to which activities of the resource managers who provide the environmental service can be freely observed; and finally (iv) the deterministic or stochastic nature of production processes
Efficient extraction of polyphenolics from the bark of tropical tree species.

tree species. The objective of this study was to discover a method for extracting polyphenolics containing as few sugar components as possible. In this work, water extraction was carried out for the bark of several tropical tree species under various temperature conditions to compare the extractability of polyphenolics and sugar components. The yield and total polyphenolics content of the extracts increased with increase in extraction temperature. Total polyphenolics at 100 ˚C from Acacia mangium, Acacia auriculiformis, Rhizophora apiculata and Larix leptolepis were 14.2, 12.9, 8.0 and 5.3% respectively. Total sugar contents from A. mangium and L. leptolepis, which were determined using a slightly modified phenol–sulphuric acid method, were almost constant at 20–80 ˚C, but increased substantially at 100 ˚C. The same trend was observed with total reducing sugar contents from these two species. Our results suggest that water extraction at 80 ˚C from the barks of A. mangium and L. leptolepis is a good method for the extraction of polyphenolics with very few sugar components.
Colchicine Induced Polpyloids of Carthamus tinctorius L. 1

1 Contribution from the Department of Agronomy, University of California, Davis, California. This study was financially assisted by the Oilseed and Industrial Crops Research Branch, USDA. Received for publication Jan. 30, 1961. = Research Assistant and Professor of Agronomy, respectively. the anthers of this species. This is a report of progress achieved in two generations (C2 and C3) following the induction of tetraploid plants (Q) with colchicine.
Use of Ar pellet ablation rate to estimate initial runaway electron seed population in DIII-D rapid shutdown experiments

Small (2–3 mm, 0.9–2 Pa · m3) argon pellets are used in the DIII-D tokamak to cause rapid shutdown (disruption) of discharges. The Ar pellet ablation is typically found to be much larger than expected from the thermal plasma electron temperature alone; the additional ablation is interpreted as being due to non-thermal runaway electrons (REs) formed during the pellet-induced temperature collapse. Simple estimates of the RE seed current using the enhanced ablation rate give values of order 1–10 kA, roughly consistent with estimates based on avalanche theory. Analytic estimates of the RE seed current based on the Dreicer formula tend to significantly underestimate it, while estimates based on the hot tail model significantly overestimate it.
Thidiazuron and Other Plant Bioregulators for Axenic Culture of Siam Cardamom (Amomum krervanh Pierre ex Gagnep.)

Siam cardamom, one of the most common spice and medicinal plants in Southeast Asia, is usually propagated by vegetative means. Identifi cation of suitable plant bioregulators for high shoot proliferation and growth rate is one of the most important steps for an effective micropropagation protocol. The axillary bud from the rhizome of Siam cardamom could be used as an explant for micropropagation. High axillary shoot proliferation (mean = 10.25 shoots per explant) and plant growth rate were attained using a modifi ed Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium with 0.5 mg.L -1 thidiazuron (TDZ) and 2 mg.L -1 imazalil. An MS medium supplemented with 0.75 mg.L -1 TDZ and 3.0 mg.L -1 6-benzyladenine also enhanced shoot multiplication (8.45 shoots per explant). Proliferated shoots successfully elongated and rooted when transferred to the basal MS medium. Inclusion of paclobutrazol to the medium exerted a negative effect on the growth and development of the Siam cardamom.
The structure of the Sumatran Fault revealed by local seismicity

The combination of the Sunda megathrust and the (strike‐slip) Sumatran Fault (SF) represents a type example of slip‐partitioning. However, superimposed on the SF are geometrical irregularities that disrupt the local strain field. The largest such feature is in central Sumatra where the SF splits into two fault strands up to 35 km apart. A dense local network was installed along a 350 km section around this bifurcation, registering 1016 crustal events between April 2008 and February 2009. 528 of these events, with magnitudes between 1.1 and 6.0, were located using the double‐difference relative location method. These relative hypocentre locations reveal several new features about the crustal structure of the SF. Northwest and southeast of the bifurcation, where the SF has only one fault strand, seismicity is strongly focused below the surface trace, indicating a vertical fault that is seismogenic to ∼15 km depth. By contrast intense seismicity is observed within the bifurcation, displaying streaks in plan and cross‐section that indicate a complex system of faults bisecting the bifurcation. In combination with analysis of topography and focal mechanisms, we propose that the bifurcation is a strike‐slip duplex system with complex faulting between the two main fault branches.
Genotypic and phenotypic diversity among Bacillus species isolated from Mbuja, a Cameroonian traditional fermented condiment

Dichotomous keys based on morphological, cultural and biochemical tests have long been used to identify Bacillus species. The analysis of 16S rDNA is suggested to be used for identification that is more exact. The present study was carried out to compare a conventional phenotypic method with the analysis of the 16S rRNA and gyrB gene for better identification, to determine their phylogenetic relationships and to contribute to selecting starter cultures for Mbuja production. Twenty-six (26) Bacillus strains isolated from 12 samples of Mbuja formerly identified by phenotyping as representatives of eight species ( licheniformis, polymyxa, laterosporus, cereus, circulans, subtilis, pumilus and brevis ) were studied. Results of genotypic analyses were not concurrent with previous phenotypic identification. Bacillus from different species were able to cluster together to form phylogenetic groups. An insight of these groups revealed important genetic diversity between strains from the same species. Bacillus subtilis and close relatives were the most abundant and presented appreciable biochemical traits. This group could therefore be considered for starter selection. Keywords : Mbuja, Bacillus sp. , phenotyping, genotyping, starter African Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(12), pp. 1335-1343