Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Buneev Arithmetic coding on GPU

The aim of this thesis is to investigate possibilities for creating parallel arithmetic coding implementation and measure performance improvements. In the first part, short overview of Arithmetic coding with its serial implementation (FastAC by Amir Said) is presented. The thesis then describes principles of work with GPUs and identifies possibilities of algorithm improvement and parallelization. Several parallel implementations are given, with varying performance improvements and occasional drawbacks. In conclusion, thesis provides results of performance tests of our implementation, as well as discussion about feasibility of applying GPU-oriented version of algorithm instead of serial one in real-world applications.
Antioxidant, Antibacterial, Anticancer Activities and Chemical Constituents of the Essential Oil from Mesua ferrea Leaves

Essential oil from leaves of Mesua ferrea L. was isolated by hydrodistillation and analyzed by means of GC and GC-MS. The yield of obtained essential oil was at 0.064% and it was appearred as yellow liquid. Thirty-five constituents were identified, constituting 81.4% of the total volatile components. The major constituents were trans-caryophyllene (30.9%), -caryophyllene oxide (17.9%), -humulene (6.0%), -cadinene (4.1%), -muurolene (3.5%), -cadinene (2.3%), -selinene (1.9%), germacrene D (1.8%) and -bisabolene (1.6%). Antioxidant activity of the essential oil was evaluated by using the DPPH (1,1-diphenyl2-picrylhydrazyl) radicals scavenging assay. The essential oil showed antioxidant activity with the IC50 of 31.67 mg/mL. In addition, the essential oil exhibited significant antibacterial activity against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus with the MIC values of 250 and 125 mg/mL, respectively. This oil also exhibited anticancer activities against KB, MCF-7 and NCI-H187 cell lines with the IC50 values of 24.02, 16.19, and 20.32 μg/mL, respectively, but it was non-cytotoxic to Vero cell line.
UAV Swarm with Mesh Radios: Development Update

Many of the swarms demonstrated today lack a key piece in order to be useful in the real-world: communication. Our most basic and commonly used communication infrastructure such as cellular networks and WiFi, assume that communication is facilitated by a centralized actor or controller. This falls short in a swarm setting. We demonstrate that the technology exists to take swarms to the next level and enable new fully decentralized swarms for novel applications.
Promoting a positive work experience for South African domestic workers

Orientation: Domestic work remains a main source of employment for many South African women. Despite legislation directed at protecting the rights of South African domestic workers, research indicates that many still experience marginalisation and a sense of powerlessness. This prompts a need to understand the factors that could enhance a positive work experience for domestic workers.Research purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the factors that contribute to a positive work experience for domestic workers in South Africa.Motivation: Because of limited work opportunities and a lack of access to finance and education in South Africa, domestic work will continue to provide a source of employment in the future. It is thus important to implement strategies to enhance the positive nature of the domestic work experience.Research approach/design and method: A qualitative design, utilising a semi-structured interview format for data collection purposes, was utilised. The sample comprised seven domestic workers and seven employers of domestic workers.Main findings: Thematic analyses extracted job security, wages, working conditions and the relationship with employer as the most important considerations for domestic workers. Employers of domestic workers highlighted compliance with legislation, perceiving the employee as part of the family, retirement planning and respect as important factors.Practical/managerial implications: It is proposed that employers purposefully comply with the relevant legislation to promote feelings of job security, and that domestic workers are educated in the legal requirements surrounding domestic work. Employers are further encouraged to establish open and trust-based relationships characterised by respect and consider the need for post-retirement provision. The importance of education and training in professionalising the domestic work sector is raised.Contribution/value-add: The results of this study contribute to promoting the value and status of domestic work by providing a voice for marginalised employees and promoting a humanistic and positive work experience.
Complete septate uterus with cervical duplication and longitudinal vaginal septum: an uncommon mullerian anomaly -

The most commonly reported mullerian duct anomalies are septate, arcuate, didelphys, unicornuate or hypoplastic uteri. Here we describe a presentation of unusual mullerian anomaly. We report a case of 31 year old nulliparous woman with primary infertility married since 5 years with history of excision of longitudinal vaginal septum 2 years back. Clinical examination revealed two cervix. On ultrasound, she was diagnosed with single fundus with 2 uterine cavities and double cervix with complete septum within. Diagnosis was confirmed with hysterosalpingogram and MRI showing no communication between the two uterine cavities. On combined laproscopy and hysteroscopy, the septum was excised above the level of cervix transforming into a single cavity uterus with free bilateral spillage of fallopian tubes, keeping the two cervix intact. This anomaly is inconsistent with generally accepted understanding of mullerian development but fits within alternative hypothesis. Establishing an accurate diagnosis is essential for planning treatment and management strategies.
Training aligned with business strategies: aiming at the ‘Strategic fit’

Training wherever linked with business strategies has helped organizations manage their global business environments and to gain competitive advantage. Although much research has been done on the issue of training aligned with business strategies however there are very scanty studies on a “strategic fit” that shows an integration of training with the business strategies particularly those enterprises that have practiced acquisitions and mergers in the recent times and felt the need of integrating training with their novel business strategies or helping their people to acquire the learning of the required strategic skills and competencies. Methodologically, stratified and sampling random techniques were used to select the respondents for the study and an adapted questionnaire was distributed. Two softwares namely, Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) and Smart PLS (PLS-SEM) were used to analyze the data collected. The findings of the study revealed that training and business strategy is a key to achieving employees’ strategic fit. Thus, training and business strategy are important predictors of strategic fit in an organization. In the end, this study concludes that training and business strategy are a way of updating employees’ competency. This study recommends that since change is constant, training and re-training of employees should be the watch-word of any organization.
Rotor Blade Optimization and Flight Testing of a Small UAV Rotorcraft

Rotor blade optimization with blade airfoil Reynolds numbers between 100,000 and 500,000 characteristic of small single-rotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) was performed for hover using Blade Element Momentum Theory (BEMT) and demonstrated via flight tests. BEMT was used to test various airfoil profiles and rotor blade shapes using airfoil data from 2D computational fluid dynamics simulations with Reynolds numbers representative of the blade elements. Selected blade designs were manufactured and flight tested on a Blade 600X single main-rotor UAV (671 mm blade radius) to validate the theoretical results. The parameters considered during the optimization process were the rotor frequency, radius, taper ratio, twist, chord length, airfoil profile and blade number. The best of the improved blade designs increased the figure of merit, a measure of rotor efficiency, from 0.31 to 0.68 and reduced power consumption by 54%. Reducing the rotational frequency accounted for 45% of the improvement in power consumption, while the taper ratio and blade number accounted for 25% and 17% respectively. The blade twist and airfoil profile only had a minor effect on the power consumption, contributing 7% and 6% to the improvement. The rotor diameter and root chord were kept identical to the original rotor and hence had no contribution. The presented results could serve as useful guidelines to single-rotor UAV manufacturers and operators for increasing endurance and payload capabilities. Nomenclature Cd section drag coefficient Clα section lift-curve slope CP rotor power coefficient CT rotor thrust coefficient F Prandtl’s tip-loss function FM figure of merit kx longitudinal linear induced inflow coefficient ky lateral linear induced inflow coefficient LD section lift coefficient P rotor power (Pinduced + Pprofile) ∗Corresponding author (email: MarkKotwiczHerniczek@cmail.carleton.ca)
Evaluation of Relation Between Terminal Context Characteristics and Automation: A Regression Analysis

Since the introduction of automation from ECT Delta in 1993, container shipping market has come through a long way. The demand for container shipping exploded after 21 century, and container vessels are becoming ever larger to accommodate the growing demand, and thereby comes the requirement for high productivity in terminal operation, which reduce the turnaround time and improve the utilization of berth. Because of the maturity of information technology, terminal automation is also advancing into new territory. What was called “full automation” has been brought to a whole new level, which covers the cargo handling process from ship all the way through the terminal gate. The improvement in productivity from adopting automation project has attracted many major ports, they either have already built or on their way to build automated terminals. Hence, this thesis aimed to find out the pattern of terminal context characteristics behind automation, to see whether automation is only applicable to larger busy ports or is it irrelevant to these characteristics. The research has found no strong statistic relation between the level of automation and terminal context characteristics, but do indicate that newer automated terminals are more likely to be fully automated, and high level of automation is likely to have positive effect on improving terminal capacity. List of Abbreviation (e)RTG – (electric) Rubber Tyred Gantry (A)RMG – (Automated) Rail Mounted Gantry AGV – Automated Guided Vehicle TOS – Terminal Operating System ULCV – Ultra Large Container Vessels TEU – Twenty-Foot Equivalent
Distributed Rate-Control and Delay-Guaranteed Scheduling in MR-MC Wireless Mesh Networks

Wireless mesh networks (WMNs) can provide flexible wireless connections in smart city, Internet of Things (IoT), and device-to-device (D2D) communications. The performance of WMNs can be greatly enhanced by adopting the multi-radio multi-channel (MR-MC) technique, which enables a node to communicate with more nodes simultaneously. However, increasing the number of data flows will result in network congestion and longer end-to-end delays. In this paper, a distributed rate-control and delay-aware (DRDA) scheduling algorithm is proposed based on a multidimensional conflict graph. To satisfy the arrival rate and delay constraints of a flow, two virtual queues are constructed. All the actual and virtual queues are stabilized by the Lyapunov drift optimization method. The scheduling policy of each flow is optimized only based on the local information. The simulation results show that our proposed algorithm can maintain the stability of all the queues and strictly satisfy the arrival rate and delay constraint of each flow in the network as well.
A Positioning Method of Distributed Power System by Considering Characteristics of Droop Control in a DC Microgrid

In this paper, a positioning method of distributed power system is proposed to minimize the average voltage variation of a DC microgrid through voltage sensitivity analysis. The voltage sensitivity under a droop control depends on the position of the distributed power system. In order to acquire a precise voltage sensitivity under a droop control, we analyzed the power flow by introducing a droop bus with the considerations of the droop characteristics. The results of the positioning method are verified through PSCAD/EMTDC simulation.
The Level of Oxytetracycline Uptake
in the Presence of Copper Ions and
the Physiological Response
of Brassica chinensis L.

Copper and oxytetracycline (OTC) are two ordinary contaminants in farmlands. In the present study, the effects of oxytetracycline and Cu on growth, photosynthetic pigments, and antioxidant indices of Brassica chinensis were investigated. The results showed that treatments with OTC promoted growth of seedlings and roots, which were diminished by the addition of 100 mg/kg Cu.
Improved Intuitive Automated Attendance System using Unorthodox Algorithms

One of the troublesome undertakings in Image Processing is accurately recognizing faces in videos, which consecutively offers less precision. Recognizing faces irrespective of the gender is an effortless task for humans; however, from a machine or a robot’s perspective, it is an entangled task. Identifying the gender of an individual using their voice is simple when contrasted with facial pictures. This kind of binary classification can be used in various applications, for example, a surveillance system, directed publicizing, demographic gathering, human-machine interaction, content-based indexing and searching, biometrics, and so forth. In order to detect faces with ranging accuracy, there are multiple methods proposed by researchers, yet no existing system can produce an accuracy of 100%. In this manuscript, an automated attendance system is built, to recognize faces from existing trained dataset of student images collected from live training. Along with Face Recognition, the system is equipped with second-level security of QR code scanning. At the testing stage, the experimental results exhibited a precision of 93.00% and an f1-score of 0.9.
Air quality and acid deposition impacts of local emissions and transboundary air pollution in Japan and South Korea

Abstract. Numerous studies have reported that ambient air pollution, which has both local and long-range sources, causes adverse impacts on the environment and human health. Previous studies have investigated the impacts of transboundary air pollution (TAP) in East Asia, albeit primarily through analyses of episodic events. In addition, it is useful to better understand the spatiotemporal variations in TAP and the resultant impact on the environment and human health. This study aimed at assessing and quantifying the air quality impacts in Japan and South Korea due to local emissions and TAP from sources in East Asia - one of the most polluted regions in the world. We applied state-of-the-science atmospheric models to simulate air quality in East Asia and then analyzed the air quality and acid deposition impacts of both local emissions and TAP sources in Japan and South Korea. Our results show that ∼ 30 % of the annual average ambient PM2.5 concentrations in Japan and South Korea in 2010 were contributed to by local emissions within each country, while the remaining ∼ 70 % were contributed to by TAP from other countries in the region. More detailed analyses also revealed that the local contribution was higher in the metropolises of Japan (∼ 40 %–79 %) and South Korea (∼ 31 %–55 %) and that minimal seasonal variations in surface PM2.5 occurred in Japan, whereas there was a relatively large variation in South Korea in the winter. Further, among all five studied anthropogenic emission sectors of China, the industrial sector represented the greatest contributor to annual surface PM2.5 concentrations in Japan and South Korea, followed by the residential and power generation sectors. Results also show that TAP's impact on acid deposition (SO42- and NO3-) was larger than TAP's impact on PM2.5 concentrations (accounting for over 80 % of the total deposition), and that seasonal variations in acid deposition were similar for both Japan and South Korea (i.e., higher in both the winter and summer). Finally, wet deposition had a greater impact on mixed forests in Japan and savannas in South Korea. Given these significant impacts of TAP in the region, it is paramount that cross-national efforts should be taken to mitigate air pollution problems across East Asia.
Challenges of Being a Chinese Principal: Practitioner Perspectives

This qualitative study examined how public-school principals spent their professional day, the challenges they faced, and their advice to new principals regarding how to respond to the challenges they identified. The themes that emerged from the data underscored the demands of high-stakes test preparation that the participants felt undermined education quality and stifled student creativity. The relationships across themes that emerged identified being a good teacher and life-long learner as essential to instructional supervision and maintaining one’s focus on raising the quality of student’s educational experiences. Demonstrating a good moral character was even more critical, however, to maintaining one’s priorities and serving as a role model for teachers and students.
TURKISH ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION DISCUSSION PAPER 2006/7 http ://www.tek. org.tr DETERMINANTS OF TURKISH INFLATION

The main purpose in this paper is to investigate the determinants of inflationary process in Turkish economy. For this purpose, based on some potential causes of inflation, an empirical model is contructed upon emphasizing the roles of various factors on inflationary process. The results obtained support the view of cost-push inflation led by exchange rate depreciations, wage indexation mechanism, real interest structure and public sector pricing behaviour which is considered some part of wholesale prices, rather than the demand-pull monetary factors. Some other factors such as the course of real effective exchange rate have been found indicating a relieving effect on the cost pressure settled in domestic economy as well. Supporting these arguments, we find that the smaller the growth performance of the economy given the cost-pressure through exchange-rate pass-through effects, wage indexation mechanism and the real interest structure be imposed, the larger would be the inflation structure. These all might also be given as evidence to that the cost-push rather than demand-pull factors would affect the course of Turkish business cycles.
The Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of Poplar Catkin Fibers Evaluated by Atomic Force Microscope (AFM) and Nanoindentation

In this study, the microstructure and mechanical properties of poplar (Populus tomentosa) catkin fibers (PCFs) were investigated using field emission scanning electron microscope, atomic force microscopy (AFM), X-ray diffraction, and nanoindentation methods. Experimental results indicated that PCFs had a thin-wall cell structure with a large cell lumen and the hollow part of the cell wall took up 80 percent of the whole cell wall. The average diameters of the fiber and cell lumen, and the cell wall thickness were 5.2, 4.2, and 0.5 µm, respectively. The crystallinity of fibers was 32%. The AFM images showed that the orientation of microfibrils in cell walls was irregular and their average diameters were almost between 20.6–20.8 nm after being treated with 2 and 5 wt. % potassium hydroxide (KOH), respectively. According to the test of nanoindentation, the average longitudinal-reduced elastic modulus of the PCF S2 layer was 5.28 GPa and the hardness was 0.25 GPa.
Sorafenib (Nexavar®; Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Montville, NJ, USA) is an oral multikinase inhibitor that inhibits the serine-threonine kinases Raf-1 and B-Raf, the receptor tyrosine kinase activity of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) receptors 1-3, and platelet-derived growth factor

At advanced stages of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), the multikinase inhibitor sorafenib is the only effective treatment. Surrogate markers that predict the biological and clinical efficacy of sorafenib may help tailor treatment on an individual patient basis. In the present study, the clinical significance of the expression of HOXB9, a transcriptional factor, in HCC was assessed. Increased HOXB9 expression in HCC was found to be positively correlated with the expression of angiogenic factors, increased vascular invasion and was found to be associated with poor overall patient survival. Sorafenib treatment effectively suppressed the expression of angiogenic factors and activation of the Raf/MEK/ERK pathway in HOXB9-expressing HCC cell lines. Consistent with these findings, HCC patients, whose cancer expressed high levels of HOXB9, exhibited increased overall survival upon sorafenib treatment. Collectively, these results suggest that HOXB9 expression in HCC could be a surrogate marker for a beneficial response to sorafenib treatment.
Perceived stress and resilience and their relationship with the use of mobile phone among nursing students

Abstract Objective. The study sought to explore the relationship between levels of stress and resilience with the use of the mobile phone in nursing students. Methods. Cross-sectional study conducted with 102 nursing students from several Nursing schools in India who were invited to participate in the research. The data were gathered by using the following instruments: Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) by Cohen, The Connor-Davidson Resilience scale (CD-RISC), and Mobile Phone Involvement Questionnaire (MPIQ) by Walsh. Results. Most of the participants were women (94.1%), studying in the undergraduate (70.6%), with a mean age of 25.2 years. In all, 77.5% of the students had stress perception between moderate and high, 20.6% had high resilience capacity, and 25.5% were frequent mobile phone users. Perceived stress was correlated significantly and negatively with age and resilience capacity. Graduate students had greater capacity to recover than undergraduate students. Conclusion. This study indicates the negative relation of resilience capacity with stress and the use of mobile phones among nursing students. Hence, it is necessary for institutions preparing nurses to develop intervention strategies to enhance the resilience capacity, improve skills to manage stress, and healthy use of the mobile phone.
A Conceptual Framework for Occupant- Centered Building Management Decision Support System

Buildings’ energy consumption makes the largest portion of the overall energy consumption. Commercial buildings are specific and their energy efficiency should not be viewed as a standalone issue. On the contrary, it needs to be viewed in function of the goals of the hosted businesses and organizations. The critical factor for achieving these goals are employees, who are also usually occupants of these buildings and, thus, hold one of the keys to reduced energy consumption. It has been shown that energy-conscious behaviour of building occupants presents a significant opportunity to save energy. Human behaviour is, however, very complex and hard to predict, and there needs to be a set of conditions satisfied for occupants to cooperate on the energy efficiency level. Majority of commercial buildings’ occupants are not directly affected by their energy-consumption related behaviour due to the non-obvious/-direct incentive to reduce energy use and no access to their levels of consumption. In this paper we present a framework for a building energy management decision support system that is motivated by these findings, and therefore, centres the occupants and motivates them to both achieve business-wise and improve their energy-related behaviour.