Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Comparative biomechanical evaluation of fixation methods in posterior pilon fractures: a finite element analysis

Background and aim: The clinical management of posterior pilon fractures (PPF) remains a controversy with various surgical fixation techniques induced as the screws or tubular plate. The comparison of stability of fixation methods for PPFs, could help to determine clinical treatment. Therefore, the displacement and stress of fragment fixed via screws, T-plate and tubular plate were studied by finite element analysis method. Materials and methods: A three-dimensional finite element model of normal ankle was established based on the anatomical data from an healthy male volunteer. The PPF model with single fragment were built by cutting the posterior tibial lip parallel to the bimalleolar axis, while the three fixations of screws, T-plate or tubular plate were established and applied on the unstable model. The PPF model with double fragments was cut in sagittal plane based on the PPF model with double fragments, followed by the simulated four fixation methods (two screws or tubular plate fixed to each fragment) applied on the model. The peak displacement and stress on bone or fixation system were identified under the loads of neutrality, external rotation and plantar flexion. Results: For PPF with single fragment, the T-plate system was proved to be superior to screw or tubular plate system in terms of the highest displacement of fracture under neutral loading or external rotation loading. For PPF with double fragments, two tubular plates provide the minimum of fracture displacement under neutral loading or external rotation loading. All fixations performed similarly under the plantar flexion loading while the highest stress on implants or bone around fixations was similar. Conclusions: T-plate can be superior to screws and tubular plate in fracture stability for single segment of PPF. Two tubular plates could be most stable in fixing double segments in PPF, while the medial plating could behave more stable than lateral plating.
What Makes Young Indian Adults Happy? Exploring Predictors of Subjective Happiness

Young adults are at a very vulnerable stage in life. They are full of dreams and passions and at the same time are anxious as to how to cope with obstacles that life will throw at them. The current study attempted to understand what variables predicts subjective happiness the most among young Indian adults. For this purpose, a sample of 120 students was selected from the age range of 18-25 years. Students were administered measures of happiness, flourishing, gratitude, life satisfaction, positive and negative experiences, and resilience. Results showed flourishing, positive experiences and life satisfaction to be the most significant predictors of happiness. Inter correlation analysis revealed significant correlations of subjective happiness with all positive psychological variables chosen in the current study implying the need to lay emphasis upon such variables at the right time and earlier age so that adolescents grow up to have a resilient and happy mindset. Therefore, the study has implications for well being and happiness development programmes in the Indian context.
Improved multi-type birth-death phylodynamic inference in BEAST 2

The multi-type birth-death model with sampling is a phylodynamic model which enables quantification of past population dynamics in structured populations, based on phylogenetic trees. The BEAST 2 package bdmm implements an algorithm for numerically computing the probability density of a phylogenetic tree given the population dynamic parameters under this model. In the initial release of bdmm, analyses were limited to trees consisting of up to approximately 250 genetic samples for numerical reasons. We implemented important algorithmic changes to bdmm which dramatically increase the number of genetic samples that can be analyzed, and improve the numerical robustness and efficiency of the calculations. Being able to use bigger datasets leads to improved precision of parameter estimates. Furthermore, we report on several model extensions to bdmm, inspired by properties common to empirical datasets. We apply this improved algorithm to two partly overlapping datasets of Influenza A virus HA sequences sampled around the world, one with 500 samples, the other with only 175, for comparison. We report and compare the global migration patterns and seasonal dynamics inferred from each dataset. Availability The latest release with our updates, bdmm 0.3. 5, is freely available as an open access package of BEAST 2. The source code can be accessed at https://github.com/denisekuehnert/bdmm.
Distributed Dynamic Economic Dispatch of an Isolated AC/DC Hybrid Microgrid Based on a Finite-Step Consensus Algorithm

The AC/DC hybrid microgrid is the main trend of microgrids’ development, and the dynamic economic dispatch is regarded as an important way to ensure the economic and safe operation of a microgrid system. In this paper, a dynamic economic dispatch model of the isolated AC/DC hybrid microgrid is developed with the objective of minimizing the daily operation cost of controllable units. Furthermore, a distributed algorithm based on the finite-step consensus algorithm is proposed, in which the incremental cost of each distributed generation unit is set as a consensus variable, and all units obtain the optimal values by exchanging information only with their neighbors. In addition, the algorithm converges to the optimal solutions in finite steps, and the efficiency is improved significantly. The effectiveness of the proposed model and the algorithm were verified by simulation.
www.econstor.eu Political Booms, Financial Crises

We show that political booms, measured by the rise in governments’ popularity, predict financial crises above and beyond other better-known early warning indicators, such as credit booms. This predictive power, however, only holds in emerging economies. We show that governments in emerging economies are more concerned about their reputation and tend to ride the short-term popularity benefits of weak credit booms rather than implementing politically costly corrective policies that would help prevent potential crises. We provide evidence of the relevance of this reputation mechanism. JEL-Code: D820, E440, E510, E580, G010, H120, N100, N200.
Herbicidal efficacy of some natural products and mulching compared to herbicides for weed control in onion fields

In two field experiments, the effect of some weed control treatments (citric acid at the rate of 10, 15 and 20%, acetic acid at the rate of 20, 30 and 40%, oxadiargyl, oxyflurfen, rice straw mulch, hand hoeing and an unweeded check control treatment) on weed growth and onion productivity in sandy soils at the Agricultural Experimental Station of the National Research Centre, Egypt was studied. The results indicated that all weeded treatments reduced the dry weight of broadleaf, grassy and total weeds as compared with the weedy check. Oxadiargyl, followed by two hand hoeing, rice straw mulch and acetic acid 40% recorded the greatest weed control efficiency. Insignificant differences were noticed between these treatments. Applying rice straw mulch increased bulb length, bulb diameter, bulb weight and onion yield by 67.52, 57.55, 45.74 and 66.22% over the weedy check, respectively. The highest values of N, P and K were obtained from rice straw mulch treatment followed by hand hoeing, oxadiargyl and acetic acid 40% treatments. It may be concluded that farmers can certainly depend on mulching or acetic acid at 40% instead of using chemical herbicides especially in organic farm systems for controlling onion weeds.
DeepWind: Weakly Supervised Localization of Wind Turbines in Satellite Imagery

Wind energy is being adopted at an unprecedented rate. The locations of wind energy sources, however, are largely undocumented and expensive to curate manually, which significantly impedes their integration into power systems. Towards the goal of mapping global wind energy infrastructure, we develop deep learning models to automatically localize wind turbines in satellite imagery. Using only image-level supervision, we experiment with several different weakly supervised convolutional neural networks to detect the presence and locations of wind turbines. Our best model, which we call DeepWind, achieves an average precision of 0.866 on the test set. DeepWind demonstrates the potential of automated approaches for identifying wind turbine locations using satellite imagery, ultimately assisting with the management and adoption of wind energy worldwide.
FLOW PATTERNS AND MASS TRANSPORT IN A THREE DIMENSIONAL MODEL OF THE HUMAN LUNG

The flow patterns occuring the upper human airways were inves tigated at a realistic bronchial tree model which incorporates six bifurcating generations. The flow was investiga ted by means of computational fluid dynamics. Therefore, oscillatory flow at varying Reynolds and Womersley numbers w a applied. Different flow conditions were simualated including normal ventilation as well as high frequency vent ilation conditions. For validation of the numerical results, particle image velocimetry (PIV) measurements of th e main branches are used. The numerical results were in good agreement with the PIV results. The numerical simulati on then provides information about the flow patterns in the lower branches and the variation at different tidal volu mes and ventilation frequencies. Furthermore, the threedimensional structure of emerging secondary flows was analy zed. The secondary vortices strongly depend on local curvature but are not influenced by uptstream flow or geometry , respectively.
Growth, secondary metabolites production, antioxidative and antimicrobial activity of mint under the influence of plant growth regulators

The effects of plant growth regulators on Mentha piperita explants cultured in vitro were studied for the purpose of analyse growth, secondary metabolite production, antioxidant and antimicrobial activities in micropropagated plants. The basal medium was experimentally supplemented with the auxin, indole-3-butyric acid (IBA) and the cytokinin, N6- benzyladenine (BAP) individually and in combination. Treatment with BAP and IBA resulted in an increased shoot and root number. The production of phenolic compounds was affected by the addition of the highest concentration of BAP, while antioxidant and antimicrobial activities were affected by several BAP and IBA treatments. Our results demonstrate that the application of growth regulators increases growth and secondary metabolite productions in the medicinal herb M. piperita.
Simultaneous H.E.S.S. and RXTE observations of the microquasars GRS 1915+105, Circinus X-1 and V4641 Sgr

Microquasars, Galactic binary systems showing extended and variable radio emission, are potential gamma-ray emitters. Indications of gamma-ray transient episodes have been reported in at least two systems, Cyg X-1 and Cyg X-3. The identification of additional gamma-ray emitting microquasars is key for a better understanding of these systems. Very-high-energy gamma-ray emission from microquasars has been predicted to happen during periods of transient outbursts potentially connected with the formation of a jet-like outflow. Contemporaneous observations using the H.E. S.S. telescope array and the RXTE satellite were obtained on three microquasars: GRS 1915+105, Circinus X-1 and V4641 Sgr with the aim of detecting a broadband flaring event in the very-high-energy gamma-ray and X-ray bands. We report here on the analysis of these data for each system, including a detailed X-ray analysis assessing the location of the sources in a hardness-intensity diagram during the observations. Finally we discuss the derived upper limits on their very-high-energy gamma-ray flux. The analyses presented here will soon be the subject of a detailed publication of the H.E. S.S. Collaboration [1].
A Multi-Agent System toward the Green Edge Computing with Microgrid

The nature of multi-access edge computing (MEC) is to deal with heterogeneous computational tasks near to the end users, which induces the volatile energy consumption for the MEC network. As an energy supplier, a microgrid is able to enable seamless energy flow from renewable and non- renewable sources. In particular, the risk of energy demand and supply is increased due to nondeterministic nature of both energy consumption and generation. In this paper, we impose a risk- sensitive energy profiling problem for a microgrid-enabled MEC network, where we first formulate an optimization problem by considering Conditional Value-at-Risk (CVaR). Hence, the formulated problem can determine the risk of expected energy shortfall by coordinating with the uncertainties of both demand and supply, and we show this problem is NP-hard. Second, we design a multi-agent system that can determine a risk- sensitive energy profiling by coping with an optimal scheduling policy among the agents. Third, we devise the solution by applying a multi-agent deep reinforcement learning (MADRL) based on asynchronous advantage actor-critic (A3C) algorithm with shared neural networks. This approach mitigates the curse of dimensionality for state space and also, can admit the best energy profile policy among the agents. Finally, the experimental results establish the significant performance gain of the proposed model than that a single agent solution and achieves a high accuracy energy profiling with respect to risk constraint.
Non-Poissonian Earthquake Occurrence Probability through Empirical Survival Functions

Earthquake engineering normally describes earthquake activity as a Poissonian process. This approximation is simple, but not entirely satisfactory. In this paper, a method for evaluating the non-Poissonian occurrence probability of seismic events, through empirical survival probability functions, is proposed. This method takes into account the previous history of the system. It seems robust enough to be applied to scant datasets, such as the Italian historical earthquake catalog, comprising 64 events with M ≥ 6.00 since 1600. The requirements to apply this method are (1) an acceptable knowledge of the event rate, and (2) the timing of the last two events with magnitude above the required threshold. I also show that it is necessary to consider all the events available, which means that de-clustering is not acceptable. Whenever applied, the method yields a time-varying probability of occurrence in the area of interest. Real cases in Italy show that large events obviously tend to occur in periods of higher probability.
Solving a bi-objective open shop scheduling problem with fuzzy parameters

This paper presents a new bi-objective possibilistic mixed-integer linear programming model for an open shop scheduling problem. Machine-dependent setup times, fuzzy processing times and fuzzy due dates with triangular possibility distributions are the main constrains of this model. The objectives are to minimize the total weighted tardiness and total weighted completion times. An interactive fuzzy programming solution approach so-called TH, is applied to convert the original model into an auxiliary single-objective crisp model. By the use of a classic approach given in the literature, some numerical instances in small to large sizes are generated. Small-sized problems are solved exactly to obtain the Paretooptimal solutions. For medium to large-sized examples, a hybrid non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II) is presented, in which a local search algorithm is proposed in order to achieve the initial population. Finally, to evaluate the efficiency of the proposed hybrid NSGA-II, the related results are compared with the results of a well-known multi-objective genetic algorithm, namely SPEA-II by the use of some performance metrics.
Examples of hyperbolic knots with distance 3 toroidal surgeries in the 3-sphere

By the work of Thurston, any surgery on a hyperbolic knot in the 3-sphere produces a hyperbolic 3-manifold except in at most finitely many cases. So far, the figure-8 knot seems to be the best candidate for a hyperbolic knot with the most (8) non-trivial exceptional surgeries. In recent years, much progress has been made in the classification of hyperbolic knots admitting more than one exceptional toroidal surgery. In fact, such classification is known for toroidal surgeries with distance at least 4. We give a classification of hyperbolic knots in S admitting two toroidal surgeries at distance 3, whose slopes are represented by twice punctured essential separating tori. Such knots belong to a family K(a, b, n), where a, b, n are integers and gcd(a, b) = 1.
3D Thermal Imaging System with Decoupled Acquisition for Industrial and Cultural Heritage Applications

Three-dimensional thermography is a recent technique—with various fields of application—that consists of combining thermography with 3D spatial data in order to obtain 3D thermograms, high information objects that allow one to overcome some limitations of 2D thermograms, to enhance the thermal monitoring and the detection of abnormalities. In this paper we present an integration methodology that can be applied to merge data acquired from a generic thermal camera and a generic laser scanner, and has the peculiarity of keeping the two devices completely decoupled and independent, so that thermal and geometrical data can be acquired at different times and no rigid link is needed between the two devices. In this way, the stand-alone capability of each device is not affected, and the data fusion is applied only when necessary. In the second part, the real effectiveness of our approach is tested on a 3D-printed object properly designed. Furthermore, one example of an application of our methodology in the cultural heritage field is presented, with an eye to preservation and restoration: the integration is applied to a marble statue called Madonna with the Child, a fine work of the Florentine sculptor Agostino di Duccio (1418–1481). The results suggest that the method can be successfully applicable to a large set of scenarios. However, additional tests are needed to improve the robustness.
On the Stabilization of Neutrally Stable Linear Discrete Time Systems

In this report we construct a stabilizing control law for neutrally stable linear discrete time systems. This is a well studied problem in the literature, particularly in the context where the system is subject to input saturation (Choi, 1999; Bao et al., 2000; Shi et al., 2003; Kim et al., 2004). In particular, Bao et al. (2000) and Shi et al. (2003) construct a linear control law u = Kx such that the closed-loop transition matrix for the unconstrained system, A+BK, is stable. This is the result we present in this report. The particular control law discussed is not of much practical interest—we acknowledge that in practice, using the linear quadratic regulator is generally the most practical control strategy. The purpose of the report is to provide more exposition in proving the result than is given in any of the aforementioned references. The result is also insightful because it draws on LaSalle’s invariance principle, which is useful in many other contexts as well.
User, Public, and Professional Perceptions of the Greenways in the Pearl River Delta, China

The perception of greenways has been intensively investigated to understand the attitudes of stakeholders and to study the preferences of greenway users. In the Pearl River Delta, there has been a long-term debate on the form and function of greenways in campaign-style development, but few studies have focused on the public perception of greenways. Through both onsite and online investigations, this study obtained first-hand data about the user perceptions of greenways in selected case studies and developed an overall understanding of the public perception of the Pearl River Delta (PRD) greenways. Moreover, to examine the academic debate, we further distributed questionnaires to groups that had professional educational backgrounds related to greenway planning. The results showed that, in contrast with the academic debate, the user, public and professional perceptions were positive toward PRD greenways. Although it has been commonly recognized that bikeways compose the primary form of PRD greenways, the results suggested that the public has multiple needs for greenways, in which the primary demands are recreation and transportation. The investigation also identified many issues in greenway practices regarding the accessibility of greenway spaces, the coherence of nonmotorized routes, and the landscape characteristics of the greenways. Finally, this study suggests that more effort should be placed on the everyday demands of greenways, including accessible recreational resources and safe, comfortable, and coherent nonmotorized routes.
Preference Externalities and the Rise of China: Measuring their Impact on Consumers and Producers in Global Film Markets

The preference composition of world movie audiences has changed rapidly over the past few years. China reached half the US total movie revenues in 2014, a tenfold increase since 2008, even as China continued restricting imports. This paper investigates the differential impact of the rise of China on world movie consumers and producers. Using data on box office revenue in 52 countries, along with information on movies’ national origins, we first show that, in general, consumers disproportionately prefer domestic as well as US-origin movies. We then develop a structural framework consisting of a flexible nested logit demand model, along with a supply model relating movie production budgets to the appeal of movies to consumers. We characterize equilibrium via a country-level Nash equilibrium in investment. We use the model to investigate two counterfactuals. First, relative to autarky, current movie trade patterns raise revenue of US producers while reducing revenue of other countries, and trade benefits consumers everywhere. Because US consumers import little, the benefit they experience from trade operate through investment. Second, additional Chinese liberalization would raise consumer surplus in both China and, because of increased investment in some countries, elsewhere as well. But preference externalities would lead to a differential effect on firm investments and movie revenues: the US, other Anglophone countries and Asia would invest more, causing the movie industry in Europe to generate less revenue due to the higher quality competition arising from the other locations. We are grateful to Imke Reimers and Kailin Clarke for excellent research assistance on an earlier version of this paper. All errors are our own.
www.econstor.eu Intergenerational Succession on Family Farms: Evidence from Survey Data

This study examines family farms and characteristics affecting farm succession. Based on a farm survey, three aspects of succession are analysed in the paper: the probability of family succession; the likelihood of having a successor designated; and the timing of succession. Large and specialised farms are more likely to be transferred within the family and to have appointed a successor. The number of family members, as well as the experience of farm operator, is also significantly related to the succession behaviour. The probabilities of succession, and of having a successor, first increase with age and then decline again. Furthermore, timing of succession is delayed as the farm holder ages, suggesting most farm operators’ succession plans to be inconsistent over time. In addition, we find a significant interrelationship between the different aspects of succession indicating that decisions on family succession, the designation of a successor, as well as the timing of succession, are not separable.