Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Model to Study Microscopic Mechanisms in High-Tc Superconductors

) in which the conducting phase is in equilibrium with the superconducting phase. The most important properties of the superconducting phase are: zero resistance, ideal diamagnetism (Meissner effect), magnetic flux quantization and persistent current in superconducting rings, cylinders or coils. On the other hand, many effects are found in superconducting constrictions as well as in junctions between two superconductors or in junctions between a superconductor and a conductor. These effects are known as “Josephson effects”: (1) It is possible to occur tunneling of Cooper pairs across a thin insulator between two superconductors and thus a superconducting current may be maintained across the junction; (2) when we apply an electric field gradient across a Josephson junction an electromagnetic wave may be produced, (3) when a beam of electromagnetic waves is incident over a Josephson junction a variable electric potential difference may be produced. Due to all the effects mentioned above, superconducting devices may be projected for an enormous number of practical applications. Superconducting wires can be used for power transmission and in other applications when zero resistance is required. A possible application of magnetic levitation is the production of frictionless bearings that could be used to project electric generators and motors. Persistent currents can be used in superconducting magnets and in SMES (superconducting magnetic energy storage). Devices based on the Josephson effects are actually been used in very sensitive magnetometers and appropriate devices based on these effects may give rise to a new generation of faster computers. Superconducting magnets are been used in particle accelerators and may also be used to levitate trains. Many of these devices are successfully been used and new devices are been developed. However, the actual use of these superconducting devices is limited by the fact that they must be cooled to low temperatures to become superconducting. Currently, the highest T
Atomic and molecular data for spacecraft re-entry plasmas

The modeling of atmospheric gas, interacting with the space vehicles in re-entry conditions in planetary exploration missions, requires a large set of scattering data for all those elementary processes occurring in the system. A fundamental aspect of re-entry problems is represented by the strong non-equilibrium conditions met in the atmospheric plasma close to the surface of the thermal shield, where numerous interconnected relaxation processes determine the evolution of the gaseous system towards equilibrium conditions. A central role is played by the vibrational exchanges of energy, so that collisional processes involving vibrationally excited molecules assume a particular importance. In the present paper, theoretical calculations of complete sets of vibrationally state-resolved cross sections and rate coefficients are reviewed, focusing on the relevant classes of collisional processes: resonant and non-resonant electron-impact excitation of molecules, atom–diatom and molecule–molecule collisions as well as gas-surface interaction. In particular, collisional processes involving atomic and molecular species, relevant to Earth (N2, O2, NO), Mars (CO2, CO, N2) and Jupiter (H2, He) atmospheres are considered.
Effect of Sintering Temperature on Compressive Properties of Porous Aluminum Produced by Spark Plasma Sintering

Porous aluminum with a porosity of 78% and pore sizes of 850–1000 mm was produced by the spacer method including spark plasma sintering (SPS) at various sintering temperatures of 773–853 K and the dissolution of space-holding sodium chloride particles. The effect of sintering temperature on the compressive properties of porous Al was investigated. The stress-strain curves for the specimens fabricated at 813 K and higher exhibited a plateau region with a nearly constant flow stress to a large strain of about 40%. However, the specimens fabricated at less than 813 K showed no plateau regions, although there were no significant differences in the characteristics of the pores by macroscopic observation between the porous Al specimen fabricated at 843 K and that fabricated at 773 K. Microscopic observation revealed that there were large voids in the cell wall of the specimens fabricated at 773 K, showing that sintering was insufficient and the connection of Al powder was poor. Furthermore, the fully-dense Al specimen fabricated at 793 K exhibited poor ductility in tension. Therefore, poor ductility in tension of cell walls may be responsible for the lack of plateau regions in the specimens fabricated at less than 813 K.
Asymptotic preserving discretization of a Jin–Xin model with implicit equilibrium manifold on a bounded domain

In this paper, we design and analyze a numerical scheme that approximates a Jin–Xin linear system with implicit equilibrium on a bounded domain. This scheme relaxes toward the asymptotic limit of the linear system. The main properties of the limiting scheme are that it does not require to invert the implicit function defining the manifold and that it provides an accurate discretization of the boundary conditions.
Prevalence of Metabolic Syndrome in Obese Pediatric Population: Relation to Serum Leptin Concentrations

Childhood obesity represents the most relevant nutritional disorder in our environment. This study examines the prevalence of metabolic syndrome in an obese pediatric population and its relation to serum leptin concentrations. A cross-sectional clinical and metabolic study was accomplished in a group of 106 obese children (47 males and 59 females). Patients were classified into prepubertal group (Tanner stage I) and pubertal group (Tanner stages II–V). Prevalence of insulin resistance [homeostasis model assessment (HOMA)], hypertriglyceridemia, low high-density lipoprotein (HDL) and arterial hypertension (HTA) was 38.7, 45.3, 28.3 and 33.8%, respectively. Metabolic syndrome prevalence (30.2%) was significantly higher in the pubertal group (38%) than the prepubertal group (23.2%). There was a positive correlation between leptin and body mass index (BMI) (r = 0.529), leptin and HOMA indexes (r = 0.562) and leptin and triglycerides (r = 0.314). In addition, there was a positive correlation between HOMA indexes and triglycerides (r = 0.596). Clinical and metabolic disorders associated with obesity and related to the so-called metabolic syndrome are already present in pediatric population. Leptin could play an important role in the etiopathogenesis of the metabolic syndrome.
A mechanical mounting system for functional near-infrared spectroscopy brain imaging studies

In this work a mechanical optode mounting system for functional brain imaging with light is presented. The particular application here is a non-invasive optical brain computer interface (BCI) working in the near-infrared range. A BCI is a device that allows a user to interact with their environment through thought processes alone. Their most common use is as a communication aid for the severely disabled. We have recently pioneered the use of optical techniques for such BCI systems rather than the usual electrical modality. Our optical BCI detects characteristic changes in the cerebral haemodynamic responses that occur during motor imagery tasks. On detection of features of the optical response, resulting from localised haemodynamic changes, the BCI translates such responses and provides visual feedback to the user. While signal processing has a large part to play in terms of optimising performance we have found that it is the mechanical mounting of the optical sources and detectors (optodes) that has the greatest bearing on the performance of the system and indeed presents many interesting and novel challenges with regard to sensor placement, depth of penetration, signal intensity, artifact reduction and robustness of measurement. Here a solution is presented that accommodates the range of experimental parameters required for the application as well as meeting many of the challenges outlined above. This is the first time that a concerted study on optode mounting systems for optical BCIs has been attempted and it is hoped this paper may stimulate further research in this area.
FastPay: A Secure Fast Payment Method for Edge-IoT Platforms using Blockchain

Blockchain-based cryptocurrency systems such as Bitcoin and Ethereum have attracted much attention during the last decade. In recent years, a trend of combining Internet of Things (IoT) devices with blockchain technology has emerged. Digital payments can be made on front-end IoT devices, while a back-end blockchain serves as a distributed ledger to ensure the validity of payments across the system. Nevertheless, fast payments are usually on demand in such a scenario, but an open problem still remains on how to protect blockchain-based systems from double-spending attacks in the context of fast payment. Off-chain techniques, such as Lightning Network and Raiden Network, act as countermeasures to this problem, but they all suffer from the hidden transactions problem. To combat this problem, we propose FastPay, a solution for achieving secure fast payments in blockchain-backed edge-IoT systems. Preliminary evaluation on our prototype demonstrates the effectiveness of FastPay.
Isothermal compression of staurolite: A single-crystal study

Abstract The response of staurolite to pressure was studied by single crystal X-ray diffraction (XRD) in a diamond-anvil cell, using crystals with composition: (Fe3.365Zn0.025Li0.114Co0.009 Mn0.034)[T2, M4] (Al2Mg0.307)[M3] (Al15.491Fe3+0.104Mg0.394Cr0.004Ti0.07)[M1, M2] (Si7.534 Al0.466)[T1] O48H3. Lattice parameters, measured at various pressure up to 7.264(6) GPa, were fitted using a thirdorder Birch-Murnaghan equation of state (EoS). The resulting EoS parameters are: V0 = 740.85(7) Å3, K0 = 180(2) GPa and K' = 4.7(6), a0 = 7.8723 (2) Å, K0 = 189(2) GPa, and K'a = 4.1 (6), b0 = 16.62453(1) Å, K0 = 179(2) GPa, K'b = 6.1(6) and c0 = 5.6604 (4) Å, K0 = 179(5) GPa, K'c = 2(1); whereas the angle b remained almost constant with increasing pressure. These data suggest an almost isotropic compressibility. Structural evolution was studied by comparison of structural refinements carried out with data collected at 0.0001, 2.48, 4.15, 5.43, 6.84, and 8.74 GPa. All refinements were made in the Ccmm space group. Polyhedral evolution with P is a function of occupancy: whereas the T1 tetrahedron and the M1 and M2 octahedra, occupied by Si and Al, are practically incompressible, the T2 tetrahedron, and the M4 and M3 octahedra, only partially occupied principally by Fe (the first two) and by Al (the last), show larger changes as a function of pressure. As a consequence, the two kyanite and Fe-Al hydroxide layers, which can be used to describe the staurolite structure, have different compressibilities.
Essential micro-foundations for contemporary business operations: Top management tangible competencies, relationship-based business networks and environmental sustainability

Although various studies have emphasized linkages between ﬁrm competencies, networks and sustainability at organizational level, the links between top management tangible competencies (TMTCs) (e.g. contemporary relevant quantitative-focused education such as big data analytics and data-driven applications linked with the internet of things, relevant experience and analytical business applications), relationship-based business net- works (RBNs) and environmental sustainability have not been well established at micro-level, and there is a literature gap in terms of investigating these relationships. This study examines these links based on the unique data collected from 175 top management rep-resentatives (chief executive officers and managing directors) working in food import and export ﬁrms headquartered in the UK and New Zealand. Our results from structural equation modelling indicate that TMTCs are the key determinants for building RBNs, mediating the correlation between TMTCs and environmental sustainability. Directly, the competencies also play a vital role towards environmental practices. The ﬁndings further depict that relationship-oriented ﬁrms perform better compared to those which focus less on such networks. Consequently, our ﬁndings provide a deeper understanding of the micro- foundations of environmental sustainability based on TMTCs rooted in the resource-based view and RBNs entrenched in social network theory. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our ﬁndings, and we provide suggestions for future research.
Corporate Governance and Dividend Policy in Poland

The goal of this paper is twofold. First, we explore the determinants of the dividend policy in Poland. Second, we test whether corporate governance practices determine the dividend policy in the non-financial companies listed on Warsaw Stock Exchange. We compose, for the first time, quantitative measures on the quality of the corporate governance for 110 non-financial listed companies. Our results suggest that large and more profitable companies have a higher dividend payout ratio. Furthermore, riskier and more indebted firms prefer to pay lower dividends. The findings finally, based on the period 1998-2004, demonstrate that an increase in the TDI or its subindices that represent corporate governance practices brings about a statistically significant increase in the dividend-to-cash-flow ratio. Moreover, the estimates prove to be significant after the inclusion of standard additional controls.
Bank Capital, Risk-Taking, and the Composition of Credit

We propose a tractable framework to examine the system-wide effects of bank capital requirements. In our model, banks can serve a socially beneficial role by financing firms that are credit rationed by public markets, but banks' access to deposit insurance (and implicit debt guarantees) creates socially undesirable risk-shifting incentives. Equity ratio requirements reduce banks' risk-taking incentives, but may also constrain banks' balance sheets. When existing bank capital is sufficiently high, increases in equity-ratio requirements unambiguously improve welfare and the stability of the banking system. However, when bank capital is scarce, increased equity-ratio requirements induce credit rationing of both bank-dependent firms with positive NPV projects and risky firms with negative NPV. In this case, the net effects on welfare and the risk-taking of banks are ambiguous, as they depend on which type of credit rationing dominates. Our model provides conceptual guidance on the cyclicality of optimum capital requirements as well as their dependence on the development of public markets and the cross-sectional distribution of firms.
Improving the Cost-Effectiveness of the Conservation Reserve Program: A Laboratory Study

Abstract The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) is arguably the world's largest payments-for-ecosystem services program, with $1.8 billion paid to farmers in 2017 for practices on 23.4 million acres. The CRP uses a pay-as-bid, reverse auction with field-specific price caps to enroll most of the land in the program. Economic theory and empirical studies from other domains suggest that the restrictive price-cap auction format used in the current design of the CRP exhibits issues in terms of efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Using a laboratory experiment, we study the impact of varying the tightness of the price-cap auctions. We also examine two alternative auction formats based on reference prices. We find that excessively tight bid caps reduce efficiency and cost effectiveness by discouraging participation. Conversely, bid caps set too high also reduce cost-effectiveness by allowing higher rents. An exogenous reference price ranking format, which makes medium-cost sellers more competitive against low-cost sellers, reduces both efficiency and cost-effectiveness. An endogenous reference price format increases cost-effectiveness by increasing participation and reducing rents.
A Novel Hotel Recommendation Model

With the development of Internet, a large amount of users purchase product, book hotels, buy goods from the web. They also share their experiences on the web. Other users can read the reviews or rating scores to choose the products or services. The user is difficult to read the information, since the data on the web is very huge. Recommendation system is an important technique which produces high quality recommendations. However, the amount of work increases with the number of participants in traditional recommendation system. In this paper, we propose a novel recommendation model which employs user-based collaborative filtering techniques to recognize the user-item matrix. Our experiment on different datasets shows that the proposed model acquires satisfactory performance than existing model.
Asymmetric Release Planning: Compromising Satisfaction against Dissatisfaction

Maximizing satisfaction from offering features as part of the upcoming release(s) is different from minimizing dissatisfaction gained from not offering features. This asymmetric behavior has never been utilized for product release planning. We study Asymmetric Release Planning (ARP) by accommodating asymmetric feature evaluation. We formulated and solved ARP as a bi-criteria optimization problem. In its essence, it is the search for optimized trade-offs between maximum stakeholder satisfaction and minimum dissatisfaction. Different techniques including a continuous variant of Kano analysis are available to predict the impact on satisfaction and dissatisfaction with a product release from offering or not offering a feature. As a proof of concept,we validated the proposed solution approach called Satisfaction-Dissatisfaction Optimizer (SDO) via a real-world case study project. From running three replications with varying effort capacities, we demonstrate that SDO generates optimized trade-off solutions being (i) of a different value profile and different structure, (ii) superior to the application of random search and heuristics in terms of quality and completeness, and (iii) superior to the usage of manually generated solutions generated from managers of the case study company. A survey with 20 stakeholders evaluated the applicability and usefulness of the generated results.
BRAF Genetic Testing to Select Melanoma or Glioma Patients for Targeted Therapy

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Number of Accidents or Number of Claims? An Approach with Zero-Inflated Poisson Models for Panel Data

The "hunger for bonus" is a well-known phenomenon in insurance, meaning that the insured does not report all of his accidents to save bonus on his next year's premium. In this article, we assume that the number of accidents is based on a Poisson distribution but that the number of claims is generated by censorship of this Poisson distribution. Then, we present new models for panel count data based on the zero-inflated Poisson distribution. From the claims distributions, we propose an approximation of the accident distribution, which can provide insight into the behavior of insureds. A numerical illustration based on the reported claims of a Spanish insurance company is included to support this discussion. Copyright (c) The Journal of Risk and Insurance, 2009.
EFFECT OF THE THERMAL TREATMENT ON THE Pb (II) ADSORPTION ABILITY OF BLAST FURNACE SLAG

The aim of this study is to evaluate the possibilities for improving the adsorption capacity of blast furnace slag in processes for removal of heavy metal ions from aqueous media. Three samples of slag have been prepared by heating of granulated blast furnace slag. The initial slag and thermally treated slag samples have been characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscope (SEM) and BET analysis. It has been found that the main crystalline phase of the analyzed slag samples is melilite. Merwinite and pseudowollastonite have been also identified. The Pb(II) adsorption isotherms have been obtained under bath conditions. All samples demonstrate a good Pb(II) removal ability. The equilibrium adsorption data are described by the Langmuir model. The highest Pb(II) adsorption capacity has been achieved by the blast furnace sample treated at 860 oC. The obtained results suggest that it is possible to improve the adsorption properties of blast furnace slag and slag based materials, by control of the phase composition.
Early-onset and Late-onset Major Depressive Disorder in the Elderly : A DTI Study with Tract-based Spatial Statistics

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is the most prevalent psychiatric illness in the elderly. DTI (Diffusion tensor imaging) has been applied widely in order to study the aetiology and physiopathology of major depressive disorder. DTI provides in vivo measures of the brain and numerous studies have discovered white matter abnormalities in MDD in the elderly. The objective is to investigate the changes in white matter in late onset depressive patients (P) compared to early onset depressive patients (CP) and healthy control subjects (C) using tract based spatial statistics (TBSS). First conclusions of this work suggest that abnormalities are found in the hippocampus, forceps minor and superior longitudinal fasciculus of late onset depressive patients.