Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A replication study on implicit feedback recommender systems with application to the data visualization recommendation

In this study, we compare the Bayesian personalized ranking (BPR) algorithms with two recent state‐of‐the‐art algorithms, namely, noisy‐label robust Bayesian point‐wise optimization (NBPO) and Light Graph Convolution Network (LightGCN) algorithms, to validate and generalize their performance by using six publicly available datasets and one proprietary dataset containing web‐based data visualization usage records. We follow the guidelines explained in the original studies to pre‐process the input data and evaluate these algorithms using various evaluation metrics. We also perform hyperparameter tuning for the recommendation algorithms to determine the optimal configuration resulting in the best recommendation quality. We observe that the best hyperparameter configuration varies based on the algorithms and the datasets. The results of our analysis show some similarities with the results of the original studies while differing in certain respects. We observe that adaptive oversampling BPR (AOBPR) and LightGCN algorithms generate higher quality recommendations than the other algorithms. However, algorithm convergence rates vary significantly for each dataset. We note that the AOBPR approach is particularly useful for data visualization recommendation task, and can contribute to the improved recommendations in practice.
Investigations into thermionic cooling for domestic refrigeration

Thermionic refrigeration using semiconductor heterostructures is examined theoretically and experimentally. A theory of single-barrier devices is first developed where two classes of single-barrier devices are defined and compared. So-called class 1 devices are found to always perform better. A theory of multiple-barrier devices based on class 1 barriers is then developed using a numerical solution. Experimentally, three generations of 10-barrier devices based on AlxGa1−xAsGaAs heterostructures were made and electrically characterised. This material is by no means ideal (as will be discussed) but was used due to availability and because, at the commencement of this work, had never been used for this purpose before. Thermal measurements were made to determine if any cooling occurred at room temperature. No cooling was observed but the electrical characteristics allowed for examination of the models developed. It was found that the earlier models used did not accurately model the I-V characteristics of the devices. This was attributed to the fact that the initial models did not take space-charge into account. A more robust numerical model is developed in which the I-V characteristics of devices are predicted much more accurately. This model is then used to design new generations of devices. The work concludes by recommending a next generation design in which substantially more cooling is expected compared to the samples examined here. The probability of cooling being observed in the future is therefore increased. The type of devices described here will always be hindered because of heat conduction. Other methods incorporating thermionic emission, such as an opto-thermionic system in which removed heat is given off as light, may ultimately prove to be the best solution. This aside, it is hoped that the work presented here will contribute to the understanding of the field.
Analysis and characterization of transponder antennae for radio frequency identification (RFID) systems

An investigation into the use of various radio frequency identification (RFID) antenna designs was performed. Passive RFID tag antennae with a resonant frequency range of 902–928 MHz were tested for robustness and efficiency in the Packaging Science RFID Laboratory at the University of Florida. Commercially available single‐ and dual‐dipole tags were examined for read performance. Electromagnetic modelling software was used to model the impedance matching and detuning effects of nearby conducting surfaces. s‐Parameters, current densities and polar plots of various dipole designs were estimated. Strategies used to shorten antenna length, such as capacitive loading, were evaluated. A simple half‐wave dipole antenna was modelled in order to determine the effect of length on resonant frequency and performance. Parameter sweeps showed that a length of 14.4 cm was required for resonance at 915 MHz and 50 Ω termination. Capacitive loads shortened the dipole to 8.4 cm while adding 4.2 cm to height. It was verified that a conducting surface, such as metal packaging, had strong detuning effects on RFID tag antennae. Different methods, such as tuning stubs, alleviated the detuning effects by allowing bandwidths twice as large as with a simple dipole. Finally, the rationale for commercially available RFID antenna designs was discussed. It was found that analysis of actual antenna tag structures in the laboratory and exploring different methods to improve efficiency can lead to improvements in RFID performance. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
A single‐phase algorithm for mining high utility itemsets using compressed tree structures

Mining high utility itemsets (HUIs) from transaction databases considers such factors as the unit profit and quantity of purchased items. Two‐phase tree‐based algorithms transform a database into compressed tree structures and generate candidate patterns through a recursive pattern‐growth procedure. This procedure requires a lot of memory and time to construct conditional pattern trees. To address this issue, this study employs two compressed tree structures, namely, Utility Count Tree and String Utility Tree, to enumerate valid patterns and thus promote fast utility computation. Furthermore, the study presents an algorithm called single‐phase utility computation (SPUC) that leverages these two tree structures to mine HUIs in a single phase by incorporating novel pruning strategies. Experiments conducted on both real and synthetic datasets demonstrate the superior performance of SPUC compared with IHUP, UP‐Growth, and UP‐Growth+ algorithms.
Evaluation and Comparison of Stress Status between Hypertensive and Normotensive Subjects

Hypertension is a prevalent life style disease that causes cardiovascular diseases associated mortality worldwide. Being a devastating endemic, hypertension require special emphasis to be studied for its complications and consequences. Existing literatures provide robust evidences of the disastrous effects of hypertension on psychological stress separately, but there are least evidences comparing the same between hypertensive and normotensive adults. This study mainly concentrates on the effect of hypertension on stress levels and its comparison between hypertensive and normotensive individuals. Objective: To identify the differences of stress status among hypertensive and normotensive individuals. Methods: A CASE and a CONTROL group each constituting with a sample of 44 subjects between the age group 25-65 years were recruited in the study. The stress status of the study group was assessed by the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS). Data were statistically analyzed using SPSS (Version 20.0). Descriptive statistics were presented as frequencies, percentages and mean± S.D. Statistical differences between the stress status of case and control groups were conducted by Independent Sample T-test. Results: Majority (54.5%) of the hypertensive patients belonged to the age group of 56-65 years. The average Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) Scores of the case group were 26.68±6.03 and that of the control group were 10.43±6.57. The differences between the Average PSS scores of the case and control groups were found to be highly statistically significant (P-0.00). Conclusions: Hypertensive cases recruited for the study had moderate and high levels of stress when compared to the normotensive controls of the same age- group (25-65years). Key words: Hypertension; Normotension; Stress Status; Perceived Stress Scale.
The complete chloroplast genome of the endangered tree Parashorea chinensis (Dipterocarpaceae)

Abstract The complete chloroplast genome sequence of Parashorea chinensis, an endangered large tree species in the northern edge of tropical Asia, is determined in this study. The total genome size is 152,002 bp, containing a large single copy (LSC) region (84,094 bp) and a small single copy region (20,003), which were separated by two inverted repeat (IRs) regions (23,954 bp). The overall GC contents of the plastid genome were 37.1%. In total, 116 unique genes were annotated and they consisted of 81 protein-coding genes, 31 tRNA genes, and four rRNA genes. Phylogenetic analysis based on 20 chloroplast genomes indicates that P. chinensis is closely related to P. macrophylla.
Associations between Maternal Dietary Patterns and Infant Birth Weight in the NISAMI Cohort: A Structural Equation Modeling Analysis

The mother’s diet during pregnancy is associated with maternal and child health. However, there are few studies with moderation analysis on maternal dietary patterns and infant birth weight. We aim to analyse the association between dietary patterns during pregnancy and birth weight. A prospective cohort study was performed with pregnant women registered with the prenatal service (Bahia, Brazil). A food frequency questionnaire was used to evaluate dietary intake. Birth weight was measured by a prenatal service team. Statistical analyses were performed using factor analysis with a principal component extraction technique and structural equation modelling. The mean age of the pregnant women was 27 years old (SD: 5.5) and the mean birth weight was 3341.18 g. It was observed that alcohol consumption (p = 0.05) and weight-gain during pregnancy (p = 0.05) were associated with birth weight. Four patterns of dietary consumption were identified for each trimester of the pregnancy evaluated. Adherence to the “Meat, Eggs, Fried Snacks and Processed foods” dietary pattern (pattern 1) and the “Sugars and Sweets” dietary pattern (pattern 4) in the third trimester directly reduced birth weight, by 98.42 g (Confidence interval (CI) 95%: 24.26, 172.59) and 92.03 g (CI 95%: 39.88, 165.30), respectively. It was also observed that insufficient dietary consumption in the third trimester increases maternal complications during pregnancy, indirectly reducing birth weight by 145 g (CI 95%: −21.39, −211.45). Inadequate dietary intake in the third trimester appears to have negative results on birth weight, directly and indirectly, but more studies are needed to clarify these causal paths, especially investigations of the influence of the maternal dietary pattern on the infant gut microbiota and the impacts on perinatal outcomes.
N/spl times/N multiwavelength optical cross-connect based on tunable fiber Bragg gratings

We propose a highly channel-scalable multiwavelength optical cross-connect (OXC) based on tunable fiber Bragg gratings (TFBGs), which is suited for metropolitan or access networks. N/spl times/N OXC of this architecture is constructed by cascading independently operating routing modules, and each routing module consists of fiber Bragg gratings (FBGs) with fixed center wavelength and a TFBG-based N/spl times/N routing block. The group velocity dispersion (GVD) and intraband crosstalk (IXT) are the main signal-degrading factors arising from the operation of the proposed OXC, and the effectiveness of each factor is individually investigated numerically for 10-Gb/s nonreturn-to-zero (NRZ) systems. Then, a routing experiment of the proposed OXC is carried out in a 3/spl times/3 routing block configuration, using OC-192 signals with channel spacing of 0.8 nm. Finally, the installable size of the proposed OXC and network scale are estimated by resorting to a comprehensive numerical simulation of 10-Gb/s NRZ signal transmission.
“Welcome to your Daily Wellness Check”: The Proposed Evaluation of a SMS-based Conversational Agent for Managing Health and Wellbeing

University students tend to sacrifice healthy lifestyles in favor of academic and financial gain. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic has led to online schooling and reduced access to healthcare resources. To mitigate these pressures, artificial intelligence conversational agents (CA) have addressed mental wellness in the general population but are yet to address physical well-being. Therefore, a CA that can address barriers and improve physical and mental well-being by cultivating healthy behaviors is desired. This research is designed to evaluate the feasibility and user experience of a text-based CA on addressing student barriers for a healthy lifestyle using evidence-based theories including the Theory of Planned Behavior and Motivational Interviewing over a two-week timeframe. Data collection has been paused due to the pandemic; results are expected to show positive impacts on well-being outcomes compared to an information-only control group and support the implementation of CAs to those with less accessibility to healthcare resources.
Quantum-Chemical Consideration of Al2M2 Tetranuclear Metal Clusters (M–3d-Element): Molecular/Electronic Structures and Thermodynamics

Quantum-chemical calculation of most important parameters of molecular and electronic structures of tetra-nuclear (pd) metal clusters having Al2M2 composition, where M = Sc, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, or Zn (bond lengths, bond and torsion angles), and HOMO and LUMO of these compounds by means of DFT OPBE/QZVP method, have been carried out. It has been found that, for each of these metal clusters, an existence of rather large amount of structural isomers different substantially in their total energy, occurs. It has been noticed that molecular structures of metal clusters of the given type differ significantly between them in terms of geometric parameters, as well as in geometric form, wherein the most stable modifications of metal clusters considered are similar between themselves in geometric form. In addition, the standard thermodynamic parameters of formation of metal clusters considered here, and namely standard enthalpy ΔfH0(298 K), entropy Sf0(298 K), and Gibbs’ energy ΔfG0(298 K) of formation for these metal clusters, were calculated.
Power aware multiple QoS constraints routing protocol with mobility prediction for MANET

A mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is composed of mobile nodes, which do not have any fixed wired communication infrastructure. The protocol called 'Power aware Multiple Quality of Service (QoS) constraints Routing Protocol with Mobility Prediction (PMQRPMP)' is the extension of the existing protocol called 'Multiple QoS constraints Routing Protocol with Mobile Predicting (MQRPMP)'. It adds a power constraint along with QoS constraints mentioned in MQRPMP to select a best routing path among multiple paths between a source and a destination as to increase packet delivery ratio (PDR), reliability and efficiency of mobile communication. It collects the residual battery power of each node for each path; selects a path, which has nodes with good battery power for transmission to satisfy the power constraint. It uses the mobility prediction formula to find the stability of a link between two nodes.
EURL ECVAM Strategy to replace, reduce and refine the use of fish in aquatic toxicity and bioaccumulation testing

The assessment of aquatic toxicity and bioaccumulation are important components of the environmental hazard and risk assessment of all types of chemicals and are therefore included in several pieces of European Union and international legislation. In this document, the European Union Reference Laboratory for Alternatives to Animal Testing (EURL ECVAM) outlines approaches which will deliver an impact on the replacement, reduction and refinement (3Rs) of fish tests used for aquatic toxicity and bioaccumulation testing. The document is based on an assessment of the regulatory needs for these endpoints, the scientific state-of-the art and recent activities in these areas. It highlights ongoing efforts at research, validation, guideline development and regulatory level. The proposed strategy is also intended to provide a framework for the prioritisation of alternative test methods submitted to EURL ECVAM for validation. Implementation of the strategy will rely on the coordinated efforts of multiple stakeholders. EUROPEAN COMMISSION JOINT RESEARCH CENTRE Institute for Health and Consumer Protection Systems Toxicology Unit EU Reference Laboratory for Alternatives to Animal Testing (EURL ECVAM) EURL ECVAM Strategy to replace, reduce and refine the use of fish in aquatic toxicity and bioaccumulation testing Marlies Halder, Aude Kienzler, Maurice Whelan and Andrew Worth
3D Cell Culture Systems: Tumor Application, Advantages, and Disadvantages

The traditional two-dimensional (2D) in vitro cell culture system (on a flat support) has long been used in cancer research. However, this system cannot be fully translated into clinical trials to ideally represent physiological conditions. This culture cannot mimic the natural tumor microenvironment due to the lack of cellular communication (cell-cell) and interaction (cell-cell and cell-matrix). To overcome these limitations, three-dimensional (3D) culture systems are increasingly developed in research and have become essential for tumor research, tissue engineering, and basic biology research. 3D culture has received much attention in the field of biomedicine due to its ability to mimic tissue structure and function. The 3D matrix presents a highly dynamic framework where its components are deposited, degraded, or modified to delineate functions and provide a platform where cells attach to perform their specific functions, including adhesion, proliferation, communication, and apoptosis. So far, various types of models belong to this culture: either the culture based on natural or synthetic adherent matrices used to design 3D scaffolds as biomaterials to form a 3D matrix or based on non-adherent and/or matrix-free matrices to form the spheroids. In this review, we first summarize a comparison between 2D and 3D cultures. Then, we focus on the different components of the natural extracellular matrix that can be used as supports in 3D culture. Then we detail different types of natural supports such as matrigel, hydrogels, hard supports, and different synthetic strategies of 3D matrices such as lyophilization, electrospiding, stereolithography, microfluid by citing the advantages and disadvantages of each of them. Finally, we summarize the different methods of generating normal and tumor spheroids, citing their respective advantages and disadvantages in order to obtain an ideal 3D model (matrix) that retains the following characteristics: better biocompatibility, good mechanical properties corresponding to the tumor tissue, degradability, controllable microstructure and chemical components like the tumor tissue, favorable nutrient exchange and easy separation of the cells from the matrix.
Influence of the Big Five on Driving Frequency During the Early Phase of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Our objective was to examine how the Big Five personality traits affected driving behavior during the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. Data was collected online via Amazon Mechanical Turk. Chi-Squared Tests with bootstrapping revealed a significant pandemic effect on driving frequency with a moderate effect size. However, insignificant results of the Big Five were found relative to the weekly driving frequency. Simple Correspondence Analysis was used to examine patterns between the Big Five and driving frequency graphically. Individuals high in Agreeableness, Openness, Conscientiousness, and Neuroticism were more likely to drive less frequently and therefore comply with isolation guidelines. However, there were conflicting results in Neuroticism. Some of the High and Medium Low groups were grouped closely with lower driving frequencies. To explain this result, there may be a mediating or moderating factor that was not captured in this analysis, which requires more research to examine.
Comparing the Effectiveness of the Unified Protocol Transdiagnostic and Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction Program on Anxiety and Depression in Infertile Women Receiving In Vitro Fertilisation

Introduction: Our study aimed to preliminary evaluated outcomes on anxiety and depression symptoms among infertile women treated with unified protocol transdiagnostic (UP) in a group format and mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR). Methods: A total of 45 subjects were randomly selected, of which 15 subjects were assigned to each of the experimental groups and 15 subjects in the control group. After referral by the reproductive endocrinologist, the subjects were evaluated by a clinical psychologist in terms of SCID structured; beck anxiety inventory and beck depression inventory-second edition then the subjects were randomly assigned into two groups. Results: We found significant decline on general anxiety, and depression, while significant change over treatment in the UP and MBSR groups was observed as compared to control group. Our analysis revealed the larger effect sizes for changes in anxiety symptoms, followed by depressive. Furthermore, Treatment outcomes were demonstrated in UP and MBSR groups on general symptoms of anxiety, and depression after 3-months follow-up. Conclusion: MBSR training declined mean anxiety and depression, and enhanced mindfulness, which can be applied as a useful approach for managing and decreasing anxiety and depression in infertile women receiving In vitro fertilisation (IVF).
Older People’s Lived Perspectives of Social Isolation during the First Wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Italy

The aim of the present study is to understand the experiences of isolation and strategies used to cope with it among older people living at home during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. More specifically, the roles of media and online technologies were also explored. Semistructured interviews were conducted via telephone between March and April 2020 with 30 people aged 72–94 years old living in Northern Italy. The thematic analysis identified six thematic areas: changes in daily life, emotions, social networks, exploited resources and strategies, use of media, and view of the future. Older people faced the emergency in heterogeneous ways; some were able to take advantage of their own residual resources and of social support, whereas in other cases, isolation exacerbated existing weaknesses. Technology and media were useful for reducing loneliness and fostering social contacts, but people with age-related impairments or low digital literacy presented many difficulties in approaching new technologies. Moreover, the overabundance of information could also increase anxiety and feelings of threat. Given the impact of social isolation on older people’s well-being, it is critical to identify and strengthen personal resources and social support strategies that may help older people cope with the restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.