Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Edge Detection of Medical Images Using Modified Ant Colony Optimization Algorithm based on Weighted Heuristics

Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) is nature inspired algorithm based on foraging behaviour of ants. The algorithm is based on the fact how ants deposit pheromone while searching for food. ACO generates a pheromone matrix which gives the edge information present at each pixel position of image, formed by ants dispatched on image. The movement of ants depends on local variance of image's intensity value. This paper proposes an improved method based on heuristic which assigns weight to the neighbourhood. Thus by assigning the weights or priority to the neighbouring pixels, the ant decides in which direction it can move. The method is applied on Medical images and experimental results are provided to support the superior performance of the proposed approach and the existing method.
Assessing Visual Quality of Omnidirectional Videos

In contrast with traditional videos, omnidirectional videos enable spherical viewing direction with support for head-mounted displays, providing an interactive and immersive experience. Unfortunately, to the best of our knowledge, there are only a few visual quality assessment (VQA) methods, either subjective or objective, for omnidirectional video coding. This paper proposes both subjective and objective methods for assessing the quality loss in encoding an omnidirectional video. Specifically, we first present a new database, which includes the viewing direction data from several subjects watching omnidirectional video sequences. Then, from our database, we find a high consistency in viewing directions across different subjects. The viewing directions are normally distributed in the center of the front regions, but they sometimes fall into other regions, related to the video content. Given this finding, we present a subjective VQA method for measuring the difference mean opinion score (DMOS) of the whole and regional omnidirectional video, in terms of overall DMOS and vectorized DMOS, respectively. Moreover, we propose two objective VQA methods for the encoded omnidirectional video, in light of the human perception characteristics of the omnidirectional video. One method weighs the distortion of pixels with regard to their distances to the center of front regions, which considers human preference in a panorama. The other method predicts viewing directions according to the video content, and then the predicted viewing directions are leveraged to allocate weights to the distortion of each pixel in our objective VQA method. Finally, our experimental results verify that both the subjective and objective methods proposed in this paper advance the state-of-the-art VQA for omnidirectional videos.
An AOI approach for IC lead index auto-verification

To wire-bond automatically, the IC lead positions on the CAD drawing and the corresponding ones on the extracted substrate image should be pre-verified. This paper proposed an AOI approach for IC lead index auto-verification which conquered the lead shape distortion, golden exposed, shifting, rotation, and scaling difficulties of extracted substrate image. Experimentations revealed that the proposed AOI approach can accurately verify the corresponding leads between a CAD drawing and the extracted substrate image with high repeatability.
Technologies for cost reduction in sugarcane micropropagation

High cost involved in micro propagation is a major constraint to its popular use in sugarcane (Saccharum spp. hybrid). This study describes two technologies for cost reduction in sugarcane micropropagation, that is, direct regeneration of complete plantlets on the same medium and substituting in vitro rooting by ex vitro rooting in conventional micro propagation. A protocol for one step regeneration of complete plantlets was developed for sugarcane cultivar CoS96268. Complete plantlets were regenerated in 42 days on regeneration medium using leaf disc explants, pretreated on MS medium supplemented with 3 mg/l 2,4-D for eight days. More than 95% explants exhibited regeneration with an average of 23 shoots per explants. After 42 days on regeneration medium, each explants produced 6 to 8 healthy plantlets which could be successfully hardened. A protocol for ex vitro rooting of micro shoots, raised from axillary bud culture was also standardized. In vitro shoots, 5 to 6 cm long, treated overnight with 20 mg/l NAA, led to formation of complete plantlets with more than 90% root induction. These plantlets possessed more than 6 roots of 4 cm average length per plantlet and exhibited 95% survival when transferred to polybags containing soil. Thus, direct adventitious regeneration and ex vitro rooting can be applied to sugarcane micro propagation to reduce cost of plant production.
The Theory of Zero Incident Safety Management

Despite the dramatic improvements in construction safety made over the past few decades, the construction industry as a whole is still nowhere near reaching the Zero Injury goal, let alone the Zero Incident goal. The purpose of this paper is to provide an approach to continue improvements of safety performance in order to reach the Zero Incident goal. Since the concept of "Zero Injury" emerged in the 1990s, increasing numbers of owners and contractors have achieved the Zero Injury goal on construction projects. The key to these achievements is the Nine Zero Injury Principles established by Construction Industry Institute (CII). However, the research on which the Nine Zero Injury Principles relied is questionnaire survey rather than theoretical analysis. Without theoretical analysis supporting the research, the conclusions are often challenged, making the concept of Zero Injury difficult to promote throughout the industry. Thus, there exists the need to develop the theory of Zero Incident Safety Management (ZISM) and re-define the concept of "Zero Incident" to provide theoretical insight into the practical application of ZISM techniques and make Zero Incident more acceptable. Drawing on previous theories of construction accident causation and prevention, a new update accident causation theory was developed. This research then identified the management factors that can eliminate the corresponding accident causation factors. Developing the theory of ZISM can not only helps construction leaders deeply understand and accept the concept of Zero Incident, but also guide how to make Zero Incident come true. To facilitate the most rapid implementation of the Nine Principles, a ZISM standard benchmark tool with leading metrics was created. This tool can be easily used to assess the extent of implementation of safety program in construction projects.
Biodegradable Agar Extracted from Gracilaria Vermiculophylla: Film Properties and Application to Edible Coating

Gracilaria is a red algal genus that biosynthesizes a polymer called agar that is extensively used in the food and pharmaceutical industries as gelling and stabilizing agent. In the last years, many studies have focused on gel properties of this biopolymer; but the agar films and coatings still have few studies reported. The edible film and coating have a protective function, preventing moisture, oxygen and flavour transfers between food and surroundings. The objectives of this work are the production of biodegradable agar films from Gracilaria vermiculophylla, collected in Ria de Aveiro, Portugal, and the study of the effect of glycerol, an hydrophilic plasticizer, on the properties of the films and on subsequent application in edible coating of fresh fruits and vegetables. The agar extraction was carried out at specific optimum parameters determined in previous work (3.5 h pre-treatment duration, 6% NaOH concentration and 2 h extraction time). Agar films were made using the knife coating technique and compared with commercial agar. The physical properties of films such as hygroscopicity, mechanical resistance (Young’s modulus, tensile strength and elongation), and permeability to water vapour and oxygen were characterized. As expected, the plasticizer addition revealed and increase on elongation and decrease on tensile strength. The films were transparent and optically clear, showing good properties similar to the commercial agar films. The potential application of the agar/glycerol solution to fresh vegetable preservation was tested. Model fruits and vegetables were coated with the biopolymer/plasticizer solution and compared with a control sample in terms of colour, firmness, weight loss and shelf life. Considering on one hand the abundance of the raw algal material which is actually an invasive species, and the properties of the agar films and coatings obtained on the other hand, commercial use of G.vermiculophylla from Ria de Aveiro is well justified.
Energy and Exergy Analysis of Heating and Cooling Systems in the Italian Context

Energy saving and emissions reduction are both affected by the energy efficiency of the built environment and the matching between the quality of the energy carrier and the quality of the required energy. Taking into account qualitative aspects of energy leads to the introduction of the exergy concept. Heating and cooling of buildings require low valued energy, but space climatisation is often provided through high exergy sources. This study is related to the IEA ECBCS Annex 49 “Low Exergy Systems for High Performance Buildings and Communities”. The aim of this paper is to compare different existing technologies for heating and cooling, from both the energy and the exergy perspective. The issue of the exergy of renewable energy sources, such as solar energy and natural heat sinks, is addressed. The sensititivity of the analysis to climatic conditions is studied, by applying it to the main Italian climatic zones. Potential and limits of the energy and the exergy approach are compared and discussed.
Niosomes as Novel Drug Delivery System: Review Article

Niosome are non-ionic surfactant vesicles obtained by hydrating mixture of cholesterol and nonionic surfactants. It can be used as carriers of amphiphilic and lipophilic drug. In niosomes drug delivery system, the medication is encapsulated in a vesicle. Niosomes are biodegradable, biocompatible non-immunogenic and exhibit flexibility in their structural characterization. The main object of this review the application of niosome technology is used to treat a number of diseases, niosome have good opportunity in research and beneficial for researcher and pharma industries. Niosome appears to be a well preferred drug delivery system over liposome as niosome being stable and economic. Also niosomes have great drug delivery potential for targeted delivery of anti-cancer, anti-infective agents. Drug delivery potential of niosome can enhances by using novel drug delivery concepts like proniosomes, discomes and aspasome. Niosomes also serve better aid in diagnostic imaging and as a vaccine adjuvant. Thus these areas need further exploration and research so as to bring out or to make for commercially available niosomal preparation.
The spatial distribution of dark matter annihilation originating from a gamma-ray line signal

The GeV–TeV γ-ray line signal is the smoking gun signature of dark matter annihilation or decay. The detection of such a signal is one of the main targets of some space-based telescopes, including Fermi-LAT and the upcoming missions CALET, DAMPE and Gamma-400. An important feature of γ-ray line photons that originate from dark-matter-annihilation is that they are concentrated at the center of the Galaxy. So far, no reliable γ-ray line has been detected by Fermi-LAT, and the upper limits on the cross section of annihilation into γ-rays have been reported. We use these upper limits to estimate the “maximal” number of γ-ray line photons detectable for Fermi-LAT, DAMPE and Gamma-400, and then investigate the spatial distribution of these photons. We show that the center of the distribution will usually be offset from the Galactic center (Sgr A*) due to the limited statistics. Such a result is almost independent of models of the dark matter distribution, and will render the reconstruction of the dark matter distribution with the γ-ray line signal very challenging for foreseeable space-based detectors.
Goal´s Orientation of Brazilian’s Youngers School´s Sports Players.

The aim of this study was among the sports practiced in schools (indoor soccer, volleyball and handball) which motivational orientation predominantly goals of their athletes as well as test instrument TEOSQ in 163 students enrolled in the Elementary Education II, from both genders, practicing collective sports, aged between 10 and 16 years (mean 12.68 ± 1.13) in the city of Cotia, São Paulo Brazil. For assessing individual differences in perspectives on goal, set a school sports practice, determining whether the individual is goal oriented task or ego goal, the results obtained in the calculation of Cronbach Alpha of task orientation achieved 0.78, whereas ego orientation was 0.71. The results of average in ego orientation was 2.60 ± 1.21 (median 3) and guidance to task the average was 3.95 ± 1.21 (median of 4). We conclude that the instrument performed well reproducibility suggesting that participants of this study have characteristics related to task orientation, and thus are more persistent and confident, knowing how to work in groups, and giving a better ownership of their skills.
The Gender Gap in Workplace Authority: A Cross-National Study.

We explore a range of issues concerning the gender gap in workplace authority in seven countries (the United Stares, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, Sweden, Norway and Japan). There are six main empirical conclusions. First, there is considerable cross-national variation in the gender gap in authority: The gap is lowest in the four English-speaking countries (especially the United States and Australia) and highest in Japan. Second, the gender gap in authority within countries and the pattern of cross-national variation do not appear to be the result of gender differences in personal attributes or employment settings. Third, the self-selection hypothesis (that women choose nor to seek authority because of family responsibilities) does not appear to account for much of the gender gap in authority, except perhaps in Canada. Fourth, we find little support for the ''glass-ceiling'' hypothesis that barriers to upward promotions for women in authority hierarchies are greater than the barriers they face in getting into hierarchies in the first place. Fifth, in the United States the barriers faced by women already in hierarchies are weaker than in other countries, and probably weaker than the barriers they faced to enter hierarchies in the first place. Finally we find suggestive evidence that these variations across countries in the gender gap in authority are explained by the interaction between the availability of managerial positions and the capacity of politically organized women's movements to challenge barriers to women gaining authority in the workplace.
Effect of Dynamic High-pressure Homogenization Conditions on Dietary Fiber from Mango Peel

Dietary fiber obtained from mango peel (MPDF) by fermentation with lactic acid bacteria and ultrafine grinding was treated by dynamic high-pressure homogenization (DHPH). And the effect of DHPH conditions on composition and physicochemical properties of mango peel dietary fiber was investigated by determining the content of insoluble dietary fiber (IDF), soluble dietary fiber (SDF), cellulose, hemicellulose, lignin, water absorption capacity (WAC) and oil absorption capacity (OAC). It was found that DHPH could increase the content of SDF in mango peel from 7.80% to 15.69%, while the content of IDF decreased significantly, and the content of total dietary fiber showed a slight downward trend. The loss of hemicellulose was observed after DHPH, while the cellulose and lignin content did not show significant differences. In addition, there was a reduction of WAC and OAC in the treatment. The results indicated that DHPH would effectively promote the transformation of IDF to SDF in MPDF, which may be caused by the degradation of insoluble hemicellulose during DHPH.
Molecular compositions and seasonal variations of organic compounds in atmospheric aerosols from subarctic Alaska

Title Molecular compositions and seasonal variations of organic compounds in atmospheric aerosols from subarctic Alaska [an abstract of dissertation and a summary of dissertation review] Author(s) Haque, Md.Mozammel Citation 北海道大学. 博士(環境科学) 甲第12418号 Issue Date 2016-09-26 Doc URL http://hdl.handle. net/2115/63811 Rights(URL) http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.1/jp/ Type theses (doctoral abstract and summary of review) Additional Information There are other files related to this item in HUSCAP. Check the above URL. File Information Haque_Md.Mozammel_review. pdf (審査の要旨)
Applicability of SERVQUAL in restaurants: an exploratory study in a Portuguese resort

SERVQUAL is the most popular instrument to ascertain service quality. However, some debate exists about its ability to characterize different service environments. Furthermore, there is not a consensus about the inclusion of customer expectations in the model. The research presented in this paper intends to discuss the applicability of SERVQUAL to restaurant services and to analyze the inclusion of customer expectations in such environment. The research was developed in a Portuguese resort and more than 300 customers, from two different restaurants, were invited to participate in the study.
Pine Island glacier ice shelf melt distributed at kilometre scales

Abstract. By thinning and accelerating, West Antarctic ice streams are contributing about 10% of the observed global sea level rise. Much of this ice loss is from Pine Island Glacier, which has thinned since at least 1992, driven by changes in ocean heat transport beneath its ice shelf and retreat of the grounding line. Details of the processes driving this change, however, remain largely elusive, hampering our ability to predict the future behaviour of this and similar systems. Here, a Lagrangian methodology is developed to measure oceanic melting of such rapidly advecting ice. High-resolution satellite and airborne observations of ice surface velocity and elevation are used to quantify patterns of basal melt under the Pine Island Glacier ice shelf and the associated adjustments to ice flow. At the broad scale, melt rates of up to 100 m yr−1 occur near the grounding line, reducing to 30 m yr−1 just 20 km downstream. Between 2008 and 2011, basal melting was largely compensated by ice advection, allowing us to estimate an average loss of ice to the ocean of 87 km3 yr−1, in close agreement with 2009 oceanographically constrained estimates. At smaller scales, a network of basal channels typically 500 m to 3 km wide is sculpted by concentrated melt, with kilometre-scale anomalies reaching 50% of the broad-scale basal melt. Basal melting enlarges the channels close to the grounding line, but farther downstream melting tends to diminish them. Kilometre-scale variations in melt are a key component of the complex ice–ocean interaction beneath the ice shelf, implying that greater understanding of their effect, or very high resolution models, are required to predict the sea-level contribution of the region.
Antibacterial and antioxidant potential of Albizia anthelmintica as a medicinal plant on pathogenic veterinary isolates

Albizia anthelmintica is a medicinal plant belonging to the Fabaceae family. It is widely used by smallholder farmers and pastoralists to treat internal parasites in their livestock. This study aimed to determine the antibacterial and antioxidant potential of A. anthelmintica on pathogenic veterinary isolates. 100% hexane (He100), 100% chloroform (Ch100), 100% ethanol (E100), and 70% ethanol (E70) extracts of the roots and barks of A. anthelmintica were tested against four bacterial strains (Escherichia coli, Clostridium perfringens, Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium and Proteus mirabilis). Thin layer chromatography- 2, 2-diphenyl-1- picryl hydrazyl (TLC-DPPH) assay was used to examine antioxidant potential of extracts. Antimicrobial activity was determined using the disc diffusion method and minimum inhibiting concentrations (MICs) values were determined using the micro-titre broth-dilution method. At a concentration of 500 µg/ml, E70 roots extract showed the highest % DPPH inhibition of 66.9%. Among the bark extracts, the highest free radical scavenging activity was observed in E70 extracts with 58.9% DPPH inhibition. Phytochemical analysis of the plant extracts revealed the presence of compounds which are known to exhibit medicinal properties such as tannins, terpenoids, quinones, saponins and fatty acids phenols. E100 bark extracts contained most of these compounds except flavonoids. Only alkaloids were not detected in any of the roots or bark extracts. Ch100 bark extracts showed the highest antimicrobial activity and all bacterial isolates were resistant to the E100 root extracts. Ch100 root extracts showed the lowest minimum inhibition concentration of 0.625 mg/ml against S. enterica serovar Typhimurium. Findings of this study show that some of the root and bark extracts of the A. anthelmintica plant have both antimicrobial and antioxidant properties. These findings can possibly be relevant in the development of novel medication against veterinary pathogens. Furthermore, this study will guide similar studies. Key words: Antibacterial, antioxidant, Albizia anthelmintica, phytochemical, minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs).
Holocene aeolian phases and human settlements along the Atlantic coast of southern Spain

A combined geomorphological, radiocarbon dating, archaeological and historical approach permits a refining of the age of the coastal dune systems related to estuaries in the Gulf of Cádiz. Three dune systems are distinguished in this paper. The oldest one, D1, which accumulated under prevailing WSW winds during the first millennium bc, overlays both the occupational horizons of Late Neolithic-Early Copper Age (fourth millennium bc) and the‘lithic workshop levels' (fourth to second millennia bc). The middle dune system, D2, containing both Roman and medieval remains, accumulated between the thirteenth or fourteenth centuries and the seventeenth century ad. The youngest D3 system is associated with the time of building of watchtowers in the seventeenth century ad but extends to the present; it is related to SW prevailing winds. We explain the absence of aeolian deposits prior to 2700 cal. BP as the result of trapping of a large part of the sediment supply in the estuaries, which starved the neighbouring beaches and aeolian settings. Aeolian accumulation reached significant values when sedimentation in the coastal zone changed from being mainly aggradational in the estuaries (6500–2700 cal. BP) to mainly progradational in spit barriers and related dunes (post 2700 cal. BP). The present analysis of aeolian systems suggests a non-direct correlation, at least in some cases, between coastal progradation of spit barriers and aridity.
Throughput Optimization in Cooperative Communications using Evolutionary Algorithms

This paper illustrates the results of the throughput of Secondary User (SU) in cognitive radios under cooperative scenario with the use of evolutionary algorithms in the presence of additive white Gaussian (AWGN) noise. In this work, the performance of half-voting and OR fusion rule is studied in terms of Pd Vs Pf curves. OR fusion rule is found to be most suitable in cooperative scenario. Then, Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) and Biogeography Based Optimization (BBO) algorithms are implemented using OR fusion rule to enhance the throughput of cognitive users by taking in to account the protection of primary (licensed) users. The probability of detection is set to 0.9 for protection purpose. Simulations results in terms of co-operations shows that PSO performs better initially but as numbers of co-operations increases PSO performance degrades.