Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Working with Transgender and Gender-variant Youth: Teacher Knowledge, Attitudes, and Perceived Competence

Despite the fact that research shows that access to supportive adults within the school is consistently associated with better outcomes for LGBTQ students (McGuire, Anderson, Toomey, & Russell, 2010; Kosciw et al., 2018), most teachers do not receive significant training—either preservice or post-certification—about some diversity issues, including gender and sexual orientation (Jennings, 2005). Consequently, many educators lack knowledge about transgender individuals, their needs, experiences, and the unique challenges they face. This survey study explored teachers’ perspectives about working with transgender and gender-variant children and adolescents. A total of 76 teachers in the Greater Philadelphia Metropolitan Area, serving students in public and private K-12 schools, completed a survey that examined how perceptions of school inclusivity, teacher training, and previous experience with transgender and gender-variant individuals was related to teacher knowledge about, attitudes toward, and perceptions of confidence for working with gender-minority students. For the first research question, analysis of the data indicated a weak, positive correlation between school inclusivity and teacher knowledge as well as a moderate, positive correlation between school inclusivity and perceived levels of competence in educators. To address the second research question, a series of one-way ANOVAs showed that although the knowledge, attitude, and perceived competence levels of teachers all increased with additional training, the differences between training groups was not significant. For the third research question, a series of independent t-tests showed that increases in experience were associated with increased levels of perceived competence in teachers working with gender minority youth.
Exponential stability and H∞ control of uncertain singular nonlinear switched systems with impulsive perturbations

ABSTRACT This paper investigates the problems of exponential stability and robust control for a general class of uncertain singular nonlinear switched systems subject to impulsive perturbations. An effective computational method is introduced for designing switched linear feedback controllers, which is based on the novel conditions on the solvability of the control problem. The idea for decomposing the singular impulsive increments is applied in this development, which establishes some criteria on exponential stability. Comparing with some existing results on singular switched systems, this design is not only less conservative but also with reduced computational complexity. In addition, the effectiveness of the proposed approach is illustrated by numerical examples.
Comparison of the Emotion Regulation and Temperament Characteristics Between Depressive Patients With and Without Mixed Features.

Introduction "Depressive disorder with mixed features" has been included in the official classification in the latest version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5). Hypothesizing that difficulties in emotion regulation and affective temperament scores are higher in mixed depression comparing to pure depression, we aimed to evaluate the relationship between these phenomena and mixed symptoms. Methods Depressive patients diagnosed by a psychiatrist according to the DSM-5 and had not received any psychiatric treatment for the last 3 months, were included in the study. The Hamilton Rating Scale (HDRS), modified Hypomania Checklist (mHCL), Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS), and the TEMPS-A (Temperament Evaluation of Memphis, Pisa, Paris, San Diego Autoquestionaire) were applied to all participants. Results Of the 63 participants, 40 (63.5%) were women. The mean age was 37.8±12.4 years while mean duration of education was 10.8±4.3 years. The proportion of mixed-depression assessed by the mHCL was 23.8% (n=15). No significant difference was found between the groups concerning gender, age, family history, age at onset of illness, the total number of episodes and temperament scores. Depressive patients with mixed features had significantly higher DERS nonacceptance subscale scores. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that the cyclothymic temperament scale scores significantly affected the total mHCL scores. Conclusion In mixed depression group, higher scores in nonacceptance subscale seems to reflect a tendency to fluctuations in the emotional reactions of a person to the stress. Association between mixed depression, DERS nonacceptance subscale and cyclothymic temperament support the spectrum view that mixed depression is placed between pure depression and bipolarity.
Total Variation Regularization Based on Iteratively Reweighted Least-Squares Method for Electrical Resistance Tomography

The regularization method has been utilized to address the ill-posed inverse problem of electrical resistance tomography (ERT). As one of the regularization methods, the total variation (TV) regularization method has the advantage of edge-preserving. A majority of research has been focused on the study of the penalty term in the TV method. In this article, a novel TV regularization based on iteratively reweighted least squares (TV-IRLS) method is proposed, in which, <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$L_{1}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>-norm is applied to the fidelity term, and a weighting matrix is applied to convert the <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$L_{1}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>-norm to <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$L_{2}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>-norm when calculating the objective function, which reduces the difficulty of solving the <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$L_{1}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>-norm. An improved generalized cross-validation method is adopted to determine the optimal regularization parameter (RP) automatically, and an automatic method is presented for the selection of the threshold value in the weighting matrix to guarantee the accuracy and speed of the solution. Meanwhile, a scaling factor is introduced to constrain the solution and ensure the stability of the solution. For verifying the performance of the proposed TV-IRLS regularization method, both numerical simulation and static experiments are carried out in the image reconstruction of ERT through qualitative and quantitative analysis. The results demonstrate that the proposed TV-IRLS regularization method performs well in improving the quality and resolution of the reconstructed images in ERT. Besides, it is more robust to data noises compared with the Tikhonov regularization method and TV regularization method.
Non-Linear Vibration Isolators with Unknown Excitation and Unmodelled Dynamics: Sliding Mode Active Control

For a class of single-degree-of-freedom non-linear passive vibration isolators with unknown excitation and unmodelled dynamics, two sliding mode control methods—a conventional one and the other using a super-twisting algorithm—were proposed to complement and improve the performances and the robustness of the passive isolators. The proposed control methods only require the estimation of the loading and measured velocities of the isolators. Numerical simulations for a non-linear isolator with quasi-zero stiffness demonstrated that both methods were effective and easy to implement, and the one using a super-twisting algorithm was more promising from the perspective of practical application.
Highly sensitive terahertz-wave detection by Fermi-level managed barrier diode

A hetero-barrier rectifier, Fermi-level managed barrier (FMB) diode, was developed for broadband and low-noise THzwave detection. The FMB diode has a very low barrier height of 100 meV or less, which is essential for attaining low noise-equivalent power detection under a zero-biased condition. The fabricated module integrating a high-gain preamplifier could detect signals in a wide frequency range from 160 GHz to 1.4 THz with a very low noise equivalent power (NEP) of 3 × 10-12 W√Hz at 300 GHz in the square-law detection mode. For the heterodyne detection, an FMB diode module integrating a broadband trans-impedance amplifier was fabricated, exhibiting an intermediate frequency bandwidth of 11 GHz. Using this module, an extremely low NEP of 1.1 × 10-18 W/Hz was achieved with a very low local oscillator power of 6 × 10-6 W at around 300 GHz.
A needs-assessment for the development of Out-of-School Time program for a middle school

Communities that fall in the category of middle to low class economics are in critical need for Out-of-School Time (OST) programs to supervise students while parents are working; however, these numerous communities do not qualify for OST government funding. The purpose of this study is a needs-assessment for a middle school that does not qualify for government funding. Of 974 parents, 325 participated in a comprehensive survey. Eleven school personnel—including top administrators, teachers, and staff—and 6 community members including the city mayor, director of an OST program, president of school board of education, a business leader, and 2 library administrators participated in long open-ended interviews. Primary findings were that only 14% of middle school students are attending OST program(s), though 93% of parents and all interviewee participants believed there is a need and supported an OST program for the school site. Financial limitations are the main barriers for 43% of parents, and 85% agreed that their children would like to participate in OST activities. All interviewees and 85% of parents believed in diverse programs (academic enrichment and recreational), 67% of parents prefer OST period from 3-6 p.m. 35% of parents committed to $7 a day, 45% were willing to contribute to OST materials, 38% committed to volunteering 1 day a month, and the business community is willing to provide one individual daily in support of OST program. Based upon the results of this study, the following 6 conclusions were made: Parents, school personnel, and community members are concerned about adolescent activity from 3 to 6 p.m. as they await rides home; Stakeholders believed an expanded OST program is needed; Strong support existed for a district-housed convenient and affordable OST program; Stakeholders desired a combination of academic, sports, and cultural enrichment activities; Stakeholders were unaware of the need for and avenues for collaborative effort toward an OST program; The study developed 3 needs assessment instruments and a 4-step model for developing an OST program and recommended gathering students' opinions for future studies.
Three-Dimensional Resource Allocation in D2D-Based V2V Communication

Device-to-Device (D2D) communication is the major enabler of Vehicle-to-Everything communication in 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Release 14. The user equipment/device can engage either in direct communication with the infrastructure, use a relay node, or it can communicate directly with another device with or without infrastructure support. The user equipment can be either a hand-held cellular device or a moving vehicle. The coexistence of cellular user equipment with the vehicular user equipment imposes different Quality of Service (QOS) requirements due to the rapid mobility of the vehicles and interference. Resource allocation is an important task by which the user equipment is allocated the required resources based on different QOS parameters. In this paper, we introduced the case of three types of users which share uplink resources: two types of vehicular users, and a third user that acts as a handheld cellular phone, which is nearly static. By keeping in mind, the differential QOS requirements for the three types of users, we have calculated the optimum power and then applied a 3-dimensional graph-based matching and hypergraph coloring based resource block (RB) allocation.
Training and Diffusion of Change: The Impact of Training and Proactivity on Change-Related Advice Giving

This study investigates the effects of organizational change–related training on the diffusion of change through the employee advice network. It also examines the contribution of employee proactivity to the effects of that training. We compare trainees (N = 46) and nontrained peers (N = 47) doing similar work at pre- and posttest to examine how training and individual proactivity contribute to the change process. Results indicate that training is associated with increased change-related knowledge and skills and greater change-related advice giving (i.e., in-degree centrality). Additionally, proactivity is positively related to change-related advice giving and seeking (i.e., in- and out-degree centrality). Our findings also show that the effect of training on change-related advice giving is stronger for more proactive trainees than less proactive ones. We discuss our study’s theoretical and practical implications for both organizational change and employee proactivity.
Identification of novel molecular targets for cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma

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A rapid spread of the stony coral tissue loss disease outbreak in the Mexican Caribbean

Caribbean reef corals have experienced unprecedented declines from climate change, anthropogenic stressors and infectious diseases in recent decades. Since 2014, a highly lethal, new disease, called stony coral tissue loss disease, has impacted many reef-coral species in Florida. During the summer of 2018, we noticed an anomalously high disease prevalence affecting different coral species in the northern portion of the Mexican Caribbean. We assessed the severity of this outbreak in 2018/2019 using the AGRRA coral protocol to survey 82 reef sites across the Mexican Caribbean. Then, using a subset of 14 sites, we detailed information from before the outbreak (2016/2017) to explore the consequences of the disease on the condition and composition of coral communities. Our findings show that the disease outbreak has already spread across the entire region by affecting similar species (with similar disease patterns) to those previously described for Florida. However, we observed a great variability in prevalence and tissue mortality that was not attributable to any geographical gradient. Using long-term data, we determined that there is no evidence of such high coral disease prevalence anywhere in the region before 2018, which suggests that the entire Mexican Caribbean was afflicted by the disease within a few months. The analysis of sites that contained pre-outbreak information showed that this event considerably increased coral mortality and severely changed the structure of coral communities in the region. Given the high prevalence and lethality of this disease, and the high number of susceptible species, we encourage reef researchers, managers and stakeholders across the Western Atlantic to accord it the highest priority for the near future.
Flexible Converters for Meshed HVDC Grids: From Flexible AC Transmission Systems (FACTS) to Flexible DC Grids

Flexible Alternating Current Transmission Systems (FACTS) have achieved to enhance the flexibility of modern AC power systems, by providing fast, reliable and controllable solutions to steer the power flows and voltages in the network. The proliferation of High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) transmission systems is leading to the opportunity of interconnecting several HVDC systems forming HVDC Supergrids. Such grids can eventually evolve to meshed systems which interconnect a number of different AC power systems and large scale offshore wind (or other renewable sources) power plants and clusters. While such heavily meshed systems can be considered futuristic and will not certainly happen in the near future, the sector is witnessing initial steps in this direction. In order to ensure the flexibility and controllability of meshed DC grids, the shunt connected AC-DC converters can be combined with additional simple and flexible DC-DC converters which can directly control current and power through the lines. The proposed DC-DC converters can provide a range of services to the HVDC grid, including power flow control capability, ancillary services for the HVDC grid or adjacent grids, stability improvement, oscillation damping, pole balancing and voltage control. The present paper presents relevant developments from industry and academia in the direction of the development of these converters, considering technical concepts, converter functionalities and possible integration with other existing systems. The paper explores a possible vision on the development of future meshed HVDC grids and discusses the role of the proposed converters in such grids.
Ground motion simulation and validation of the 2008 Chino Hills earthquake in scattering media

We simulate 0–2.5 Hz deterministic wave propagation in 3-D velocity models for the 2008 Chino Hills, CA, earthquake using a finite-fault source model and frequency-dependent anelastic attenuation. Small-scale heterogeneities are modeled as 3-D random fields defined using an elliptically anisotropic von Kármán autocorrelation function with its parameters constrained using Los Angeles basin borehole data. We superimpose the heterogeneity models on a leading deterministic community velocity model (CVM) of southern California. We find that models of velocity and density perturbations can have significant effects on the wavefield at frequencies as low as 0.5 Hz, with ensemble median values of various ground motion metrics varying up to ±50 per cent compared to those computed using the deterministic CVM only. In addition, we show that frequency-independent values of the shear-wave quality factor (Qs0) parametrized as Qs0 = 150Vs (Vs in km s–1) provides the best agreement with data when assuming the published moment magnitude (Mw) of 5.4 (M0 = 1.6 × 1017 Nm) for the finite-fault source model. This model for Qs0 trades off with Qs0 = 100Vs assuming Mw = 5.5 (M0 = 2.2 × 1017 Nm), which represents an upper bound of the Mw estimates for this event. We find the addition of small-scale heterogeneities provides limited overall improvement to the misfit between simulations and data for the considered ground motion metrics, because the primary sources of misfit originate from the deterministic CVM and/or the finite-fault source description.
Preface: The Heidelberg Basin Drilling Project

Abstract. Since Late Pliocene / Early Pleistocene, the River Rhine, as one of the largest European rivers, has acted as the only drainage system that connected the Alps with Northern Europe, especially the North Sea. Along its course from the Alps to the English Channel the river passes several geomorphological and geological units, of which the Upper Rhine Graben acts as the major sediment trap. Whereas the potential of sediment preservation of the alpine foreland basins is low due to the high dynamics of the system, and the area of deposition close to the North Sea was significantly affected several times by Pleistocene sea level changes, the ongoing subsidence of the Upper Rhine Graben offers a unique potential for a continuous sediment accumulation and preservation.
How to reinterpret an Alpine eco-monster. Application of the method of choice experiments for the design of a reuse project

This paper deals with the role of evaluation methods for supporting the design process of sustainable urban and territorial transformations. In particular, the article considers the technique of Choice Experiments (CE) and it proposes a real application of the method for driving the decision-making process related to the reuse project of an abandoned building located in the Italian Alps. The evaluation model is based on different attributes of the reuse project, both tangible and intangible, including internal organization, external areas, accommodation structures and cost. In the evaluation, a questionnaire has been developed for the investigation of the preferences of potential users with reference to alternative reuse scenarios. The results of the application allowed us to determine the importance of the different attributes for the definition of the reuse strategy as well as the economic value of the selected strategy. The study proposed in this paper represents an innovative context of application of the CE method, regarding the economic evaluation of architectural buildings and landscape. A second innovative element of the present research concerns the use of the Choice Experiments approach for supporting the design of alternative solutions for a complex decision making problem.
Programming the deformation of a temperature-driven bilayer structure in 4D printing

4D printing deforms a 2D foldable structure to another shape evolve over time by using heterogeneous material. The deformation of the 2D foldable structure is stimulated by actuators that are fabricated by shape memory materials or bilayer structures. Therefore, the deformation programming method of actuators is a critical technology in 4D printing. This paper proposes a method for programming the deformation of a temperature-driven bilayer structure actuator in 4D printing. The thermo-mechanical mechanism of the bilayer structure actuator is analyzed and three kinds of deformation behavior are modeled. Then a constitutive model with five main deformation programming parameters including the line width, the print height, the print temperature, the filled form, and the stimulation temperature is fitted by the orthogonal experiment and response surface method. The permanent deformation of the bilayer structure actuator results from the programmed parameters and time evolution of the 3D printed structure upon heating. A typical temperature shape memory material polylactic acid is used as a case study to illustrate the methodology and a desired programmed deformation is achieved.
CHILD RESTRAINT ISSUES IN VICTORIA

Approved child restraints offer invaluable protection to child passengers involved in road crashes. There may, however, be scope to further improve the safety benefits of restraints in Victoria. Research suggests up to 70 percent of child restraints have faults in the way they are fitted in vehicles. RACV conducted a survey of 431 parents/carers with one or more children aged 6 years or under to examine attitudes and behaviours in relation to child restraint use. Results indicated parents/carers are not well informed about correct use of child restraints. Many do not understand the risks associated with not installing restraints correctly, using old and damaged restraints, or of travelling with children in restraints that are the wrong size. Most parents/carers were also reluctant to consult professional restraint fitters to overcome misconceptions surrounding restraint use. RACV believes the prevalence of incorrectly fitted restraints in vehicles can be greatly reduced through developments in restraint design and education. (a)