Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Lagging behind: have we overlooked previous‐year rainfall effects in annual grasslands?

Rainfall is a key determinant of production and composition in arid and semi‐arid systems. Long‐term studies relating composition and water availability primarily focus on current‐year precipitation patterns, though mounting evidence highlights the importance of previous‐year rainfall particularly in grasslands dominated by perennial species. The extent to which lagged precipitation effects occur in annual grasslands, however, remains largely unexplored. We pair a long‐term study with two manipulative experiments to identify patterns and mechanisms of lagged precipitation effects in annual grasslands. The long‐term study captured variation in functional group (exotic annual forbs and grasses) abundance and precipitation across 8 years at three northern California grassland sites. We then tested whether lagged rainfall effects were created through seed production and litter (residual dry matter, RDM) by manipulating rainfall and litter, respectively. Rainfall from the previous‐year growing season (both seasonal and total rainfall) shifted functional group abundance. High lagged rainfall was associated with increased grass and decreased forb abundance the following year. Current‐year seasonal rainfall also influenced species composition, with winter rain increasing forb and decreasing grass abundance. Lagged precipitation effects were generally stronger for forbs than for grasses. Our experimental studies provided evidence for two mechanisms that contributed to lagged effects in annual grasslands. Higher rainfall increased seed production for grasses, which translated to more germinable seed the following year. Higher rainfall also increased biomass production and RDM, which benefited grasses and reduced forb abundance. Synthesis. Our results highlight the importance of previous‐year precipitation in structuring annual community composition and suggest two important biotic pathways, seed rain and RDM, that regulate lagged community responses to rainfall. Incorporating lagged effects into models of grassland diversity and productivity could improve predictions of climate change impacts in annual grasslands.
“We Try to Listen – But Do We Understand?” An Explorative Study about User Involvement in Technology-Driven Organisations

Technology-driven organisations are facing new challenges to gain a competitive advantage. It becomes even more challenging to be a step ahead of the competition through technical advance while better addressing user needs may be a way to differentiate. When aiming to develop products that better address the user needs it becomes crucial to understand who are the users and what are their needs, what is the value of user information, and how the information can be used to design more desirable products that may lead to a competitive advantage. We conducted a multiple case study at two technology-driven companies in the aviation and healthcare industry that are aiming to involve users more into the new product development (NPD) process. A series of 14 qualitative interviews revealed two main findings that are discussed: (1) there are different types of information needs according to the development stages and (2) the value of user involvement needs to be recognised from both, the company and its customers.
Immunolocalization of the uptake hydrogenase in the marine Lyngbya majuscula CCAP 1446/4 and other cyanobacteria

In N2-fixing cyanobacteria the reduction of N2 to NH3 is coupled with the production of molecular hydrogen (H2), which is rapidly consumed by an uptake hydrogenase, an enzyme that is present in almost all the diazotrophic cyanobacteria. The cellular and subcellular localization of the cyanobacterial uptake hydrogenase remains unclear, and the previously available data focuses mainly on heterocystous cyanobacteria. This work presents the first effort to localize the uptake hydrogenase in a nonheterocystous cyanobacterium, Lyngbya majuscula CCAP 1446/4. The data obtained revealed higher specific labelling associated with the thylakoid membranes of L. majuscula. As cyanobacteria exhibited a broad morphological diversity, and that may influence the cellular and sub-cellular localization of the uptake hydrogenase, a comparative analysis was performed using a unicellular Gloeothece sp. ATCC 27152, and two heterocystous strains Nostoc sp. PCC 7120 and Nostoc punctiforme PCC 73102. No labelling was found on the vegetative cells of Nostoc sp. PCC 7120, in contrast with the situation in N. punctiforme, in which labelling was detected in both vegetative cells and heterocysts. In addition, sequences of nifK, structural gene encoding the β subunit of the nitrogenase (enzymatic complex responsible for N2-fixation), were obtained for Lyngbya spp. This work will allow additional studies, notably on the correlation between nitrogen fixation and hydrogen metabolism in non-heterocystous cyanobacteria, a line of research that is being followed by other members of the team. Unexpectedly, the images of L majuscula grown in medium containing combined nitrogen using electron microscopy, revealed the presence of an extremely high number of large cyanophycin granules, opening a window of opportunity for future research. The results presented within this work will contribute to a better understanding of the field of H2 metabolism in cyanobacteria, particularly in the non-heterocystous strains effecting a temporal separation between the photosynthesis and the N2 fixation/H2 uptake processes.
Global Analysis of Influencing Forces of Fire Activity: the Threshold Relationships between Vegetation and Fire

Manylarge scale firestudies considered the relationships between fire and its influencing factors as smooth.However, the responses of fire activity to influencing factors could be abrupt on the global scale, because the hysteretic responses of vegetation to fire and vegetation types are discrete. This study examined the climatic, vegetation, anthropogenic, lightning, and topographic factorsdriving variations in global fire density, and discussedthe thresholds of vegetation on fire activity. Fire density was developed from 7 years of Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) active fire data to represent global fire activity, and nine typical influencing variables were selected. The random forest regression tree method was used to identify the relative importance and relationships between fire and the influencing variables. The patterns of global fire density were captured well by the model (78.33% variance was explained), and the related thresholds were identified. Climatic factors played a primary role in determining global fire density. Agricultural land use and topographic roughness were not identified as the most important factors, probably due to the large scale we considered. Three intervals of tree density were identified to have distinct levels of fire density. Intermediate tree density (9%-53%) was related with the highest fire density, but both low and high percent of tree cover were associated with low fire density (7.0 vs. 1.3/0.9 counts per 100 km 2 per year). This study could provide further insights into understanding of the
Effect of zinc supplementation from inorganic and organic sources on growth and blood biochemical pro fi le in crossbred calves

The effect of zinc supplementation from inorganic and organic sources on some physiological and biochemical profi le was investigated in 15 male crossbred calves (age 14-15 months, liveweight 226.0±9.06 kg) randomly divided into three groups of fi ve animals in each. Animals in group I (control) were fed a basal diet comprised of wheat straw and concentrate mixture (33 mg Zn kg-1 diet) with out any supplemental Zn, while those in group 2 and group 3 were given basal diet supplemented with 35 mg Zn kg-1 feed from zinc sulphate and zinc propionate, respectively. All the animals were fed individually on these dietary treatments for a period of 180 days. Body weights of all the calves were recorded fortnightly. Blood samples were collected from all the animals at 0 day and subsequently at an interval of 30 days to estimate certain serum minerals, enzymes, vitamins and hormones. There was no signifi cant difference in the body weight gain among different groups. Zinc intake in groups 2 and 3 was signifi cantly (P<0.001) higher as compared to group 1, but serum zinc and copper concentration did not differ among the groups. Mean activity of alkaline phosphatase, glutamate oxaloacetate transaminase, glutamate pyruvate transaminase and super oxide dismutase was also similar in control and Zn supplemented groups. Mean concentrations of different serum vitamins (retinol, ß-carotene and α-tocopherol) and hormones (triiodothyronine, thyroxin, insulin and testosterone) were not affected by zinc supplementation from inorganic and organic sources in crossbred calves. It may be concluded that * Supported by AP Cess Scheme, ICAR, Krishi Bhawan, New Delhi, India 4 Corresponding author: e mail: rsd@ivri.up. nic.in Journal of Animal and Feed Sciences, 17, 2008, 147–156 148 ZINC SUPPLEMENTATION AND GROWTH OF CATTLE supplementation of zinc in the diet of crossbred calves was not effective in improving the growth rate and concentration of minerals, enzymes, vitamins and hormones in blood serum or plasma in crossbred calves, which may be due to relatively small dose of zinc (35 mg Zn kg-1 diet) used in this study.
An Intelligent Discovery and Error Correction Algorithm for Misunderstanding Gesture Based on Probabilistic Statistics Model

Numerous experiments have shown that there are similar gestures in visual-based gesture recognition. In order to solve the problem, this paper proposes a new algorithm based on Convolution neural network. According to the model test results, the confusion matrix is established. And according to the correspondence between each gesture and the predicted result, misjudgment probability matrix is established. Based on the misjudgment probability matrix, we correct the gestures that have been incorrectly identified by the Convolution neural network model. After this algorithm, the recognition rate of similar gestures is increased by 5% to 12%. The innovation of this paper lies in the secondary error correction of the wrong gesture of Convolution neural network structure.
Generalizations of the Niven constant and the Feller-Tornier constant

We generalize the Niven constant and the Feller-Tornier constant using the same method of proof. Using this method we also obtain a strong connection between the Prime Zeta Function and generalizations of the well-known arithmetical functions ω(n) and Ω(n). For last, we use this method in a new proof of a general theorem on composite numbers proved by the author in a former article. Mathematics Subject Classification: 11A99, 11B99
Transforming healthcare through design-led innovation

The changing demographic across Scotland poses major challenges for the healthcare service (Scottish Government, 2010). The ageing population and rise in long term chronic conditions are placing greater demands, and increasing pressure on service providers (Scottish Government, 2011). As a result, there is a need to consider alternative strategies for healthcare delivery in an attempt to overcome these challenges. Scotland has a new innovation centre which aims to respond to the challenges facing the healthcare system by transforming health and social care delivery (www.dhi-scotland.com). Experience Laboratories are at the core of this model of innovation and are led and developed by the Institute of Design Innovation. Experience labs are an innovative method for trialling and testing new solutions for health and social care and provide a new way of working collaboratively within this context. Within the Experience Lab there is an opportunity for extreme collaboration between academics, business and civic partners to co-create and co-design sustainable solutions together with end-users. The Experience Lab provides a safe, collaborative environment which replicates real life practice within which to trial ideas and engage in design-led activities. These activities open up, and place the user at the centre of the design process. This paper will illustrate the Experience Lab through a case study of a project which explored and developed a new concept system for assisted living to support and empower older adults to live independently at home for longer. The Experience Labs provided the opportunity to user-test the initial concept by developing and validating a solution with users. The design-led approach aimed to deliver requirements for the system that were firmly user driven. The Labs provided a safe and realistic environment through which the Lab team helped users explore the concept and share their feedback and ideas for improvement through activities including experience interviewing, workshops and role-play.
MITIGATION OF BINAURAL FRONT-BACK CONFUSIONS BY BODY MOTION IN AUDIO AUGMENTED REALITY

Front-back confusions are a well-known phenomenon of spatial hearing whereby the listener incorrectly localizes a source to its mirror image position across the frontal plane. This type of localization error can occur for real and synthetically spatialised sound sources. Experiments have shown the listener can resolve front-back ambiguities by rotating their head; also that sound source movement can resolve confusions if the listener is aware of the intended direction of source movement. The present outdoors experiment studies the mitigation of front-back confusions for synthetic binaural spatial audio interactive with body movement but not head-turns. This partly disabled mobile augmented reality system renders sound source positions relative to the world reference frame, (so the listener may walk past a stationary spatialised sound), but it renders instantaneous source bearing relative to the listener’s reference frame. Experiment participants walked past synthetic binaural sound sources with initial azimuths of ±(40°, 60°, 80°, 100°, 120° and 140°) and initial distance of 20 metres. Walk distances were chosen to result in azimuth changes of 4°, 8°, 12° and 16° between initial and final source bearings. Each factor combination resulted in a corresponding source distance change over the course of the walk. Front or back judgments of the initial source positions were recorded before and after walking. Results show statistically significant improvement of front-back localization for source azimuth changes of 12° or 16°, and source distance changes of at least 0.21 of the initial distance.
Sharing Network Resources Efficiently

The transmission control protocol (TCP) is the major transport protocol in the Internet. TCP and its variants have the drawback of not accurately knowing rate share of flows at bottleneck links. Other protocols proposed to address these drawbacks either are not fair to short flows, which are the majority of the Internet traffic, or result in high queue length and packet drops which translate into a high average flow completion time (AFCT). In this paper we present the design and analysis of a Quick congestion Control Protocol (QCP). QCP can quickly give flows their fair share rates hence allow them to quickly finish. Unlike existing schemes, QCP uses an accurate formula to calculate the number of flows sharing a network link. This enables QCP to get fair share rates to flows without over or under-utilization of bottleneck link capacities. We also present an efficient sharing mechanism which QCP uses to assign capacity which is not used by some flows bottlenecked elsewhere to other flows which need the capacity. We show how QCP can be implemented by extending the emerging OpenFlow architecture. Simulation results confirm the design goals of QCP in achieving reduced AFCT.
The coexistence of endemic species of Astyanax(Teleostei: Characidae) is propitiated by ecomorphological and trophic variations

O objetivo deste estudo foi avaliar os fatores que favorecem a coexistencia de tres especies endemicas de Astyanax (Astyanax bifasciatus, Astyanax minor e Astyanax gymnodontus) no reservatorio de Segredo (rio Iguacu, Parana, Brasil), e testar a hipotese de que as tres especies partilham os recursos alimentares, sendo que as variacoes na dieta estao relacionadas as caracteristicas morfologicas das especies. Os peixes foram coletados em tres estacoes de amostragem no primeiro ano apos o fechamento da barragem, nos anos de 1993 e 1994. A dieta foi avaliada atraves da analise dos conteudos estomacais, e a ecomorfologia atraves dos indices ecomorfologicos. Os dados de dieta e morfologia foram ordenados por meio de tecnicas multivariadas (DCA e PCA, respectivamente), com a finalidade de caracterizar as guildas troficas e identificar os padroes ecomorfologicos. Posteriormente, foi realizada uma MRPP para verificar a existencia de diferencas quanto a alimentacao e os padroes morfologicos entre as especies. Padroes troficos e ecomorfologicos foram registrados entre as especies de Astyanax. Diferencas significativas foram encontradas para ambos os aspectos. Dessa forma, os resultados corroboraram a hipotese inicial, sendo a segregacao trofica e ecomorfologica entre as especies deAstyanax do reservatorio de Segredo um fator que pode contribuir para diminuir a competicao entre elas, favorecendo a sua coexistencia no ambiente.
Andean bear–livestock conflicts: a review

Abstract We review the state of knowledge regarding conflicts between the Andean bear (Tremarctos ornatus) and livestock. Information was gathered from the current known geographic range of the species (Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia). Andean bears are perceived as livestock predators where herding is common; bears are frequently blamed for any livestock disappearance or death. This negative perception often leads to the poaching of Andean bears by local residents and to a disregard of protected areas and conservation efforts. We found no systematic documentation of conflicts in any Andean country. Carcass dragging, feeding signs, and presence of tree and ground nests were common features of livestock depredation sites. Direct observation of cattle depredation by Andean bears was reported at 3 sites in Colombia and Ecuador. No seasonal or cyclic patterns of depredation were discerned, and evidence suggested that bear–livestock conflicts were restricted to particular sites and involved problem bears. The conservation of Andean bears requires research on rapid ways of dealing with problem bears, as well as mitigation techniques designed to reduce perceived and actual conflicts between bears and livestock.
Practice of and Barriers to Prevention by Secondary School Athletic Trainers

Purpose: Prevention is a key aspect of care from athletic trainers. There is limited research on the practice strategies employed to prevent injury by secondary school athletic trainers (SSATs). The purpose of this study was to describe the prevention practice strategies and barriers faced by secondary school athletic trainers. Methods: Athletic trainers (n=3010) were recruited from secondary schools through e-mails provided by the national professional organization database. Secondary school athletic trainers were surveyed on their self-reported prevention practices and barriers using a web-based survey platform. Respondents were 28±3 years, predominantly female (n=260/359, 72.4%), with about 5 years (±2yrs) of clinical experience. The survey contained prevention strategies items with tasks from Domain 1 of the Board of Certification Role Delineation Study (6th ed.) that relates to athletic training clinical practice. Barrier items were developed from previous literature about implementing evidence-based practice strategies. Partial data (completion rate=359/473, 75.9%) was used for the analyses. Data were analyzed by using frequencies, medians with percentiles, means, and standard deviations. Results: The least frequently practiced environmental illness monitoring techniques and addressing patient-specific nutritional needs were identified. In contrast, secondary school athletic trainers most frequently practiced compliance for both equipment maintenance and maintaining a clean facility. The most common ‘always practiced’ skills align with Task 102, 103, and 104 in Domain 1 of the Board of Certification Role Delineation Study. These include pre-participation and screening, personal protective equipment, and maintaining treatment and rehabilitation areas through regulatory standards. A lack of time, workload, player compliance, available space, and coach support were the most commonly cited barriers to prevention practice. Conclusions: Overall, secondary school athletic trainers engaged in prevention strategies frequently, yet external factors were barriers to implementation. The consistent and continual practice of prevention skills are essential to risk mitigation. As a result, always practicing the skill is essential and should not be completed as an occasional duty of the athletic training. As many prevention strategies are required for all patient encounters, the frequency of task performance must improve for clinical practice.
BIOSORPTION OF COPPER AND LEAD USING BACTERIAL BIOMASS OF BACILLUS CEREUS AND BACILLUS SUBTILIS ISOLATED FROM EL-MANZALA LAKE, EGYPT.

Shawky Z. Sabae. Two tolerant bacterial strains isolated from El-Manzala Lake, Egypt and identified using biochemical tests and confirmed by 16S r RNA gene as Bacillus cereus and Bacillus subtilis.Then the optimum conditions for biosorption of copper and lead were investigated by using two bacterial strain, the equilibrium time for copper were 25 minutes at Bacillus cereusand 30 minutes at Bacillus subtilis while the equilibrium time for lead were 40 minutes at Bacillus cereusand 50 minutes at Bacillus subtilis, the optimum pH for copper and lead biosorption at Bacillus cereus and Bacillus subtilis was pH 6. The experimental biosorption data mostly were fitted towards the models postulated by Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm equations. The maximum biosorption capacities (q max) for copper and lead obtained by usingBacillus cereuswere 47.6 and 250 mg/g while by usingBacillus subtiliswere 166.7 and 250 mg/g , respectively. Biosorpitve mechanism was confirmed by IR analysis and from the identification nature of acidic and basic sites. Moreover, the postulated mechanism was depended mainly on ionic interaction and complex formation. The results demonstrated that the two bacterial isolates of Bacillus cereus and Bacillus subtilis could be used as a promising biosorbents for the removal of copper and lead ions from aqueous solutions.
Temporary interorganisational collaboration practices in construction design - the use of 3D-IT

Literature has studied how new information technology can influence routines and practices. However, few studies discuss how practices are impacted in a temporary interorganizational cooperation project. In this paper, the main question is how 3D modeling IT influences temporary intergoranizational cooperation practices in the Architecture Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry. The study has focused on four projects in the AEC industry that work in the design phase and in which multiple firms and disciplines are involved for a short period of time to deliver a design. The study is a comparative case study analysis based on interview material (25 interviews) and observations (22 hours). The study contributes to literature in three ways: (1) the study gives an insight in practices concerning how 3D-modelling IT is a boundary object primarily during meetings, but not outside the project meetings or over multiple project boundaries (2) Boundary objects are used in combination with other artifacts. (3) Within the meetings (face-to-face and online meetings) the 3D-modelling IT supports crossing multiple spaces.