Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Estimación robusta en modelos ARMA bidimensionales. Aplicación al procesamiento de imágenes digitales

This work focused on the problem of robust estimation of parameters in two-dimensional autoregressive models with contamination. A new method of robust estimation of the parameters of these models is proposed, called BMM 2D, which is based on the representation of a two-dimensional autoregressive process with an auxiliary model, as a strategy to attenuate the e ect of contamination. Up to the moment and from the de nition of the two-dimensional autoregressive models, initially treated by Whittle (1954), diverse authors have developed proposals to approach the problem of estimation of parameters, generating estimation alternatives when the contamination of the model is additive or innovative. These proposals, although they have shown good performance in applications, are not accompanied (in general) by studies that account for their theoretical properties, such as consistency and asymptotic normality. In this thesis, a new estimator to estimate the parameters of the model in more general conditions of contamination was presented and the consistency and asymptotic normality of the estimator were proved. The work included a comparative analysis between the proposed method, the existing robust estimators and the least squares estimator, through a Monte Carlo simulation study, varying the size of the process observation window, and the type and level of contamination. The results showed that the new estimator is a competitive proposal, both in accuracy and precision, in relation to other classical and robust estimators used so far. Finally, an application to image ltering was presented, which illustrates how the BMM 2D estimator works in practical situations. The procedure attempts to generalize to two dimensions the initiative presented by Muler et al (2009), developed for ARMA models of time series.
Sensitive Two-stage PCR of p53 Genomic

To assess the status of the tumor suppressor gene p53 from samples with low levels (sub-nanogram amounts) of genomic DNA (e.g., from exfoliated cells, skin, small biopsies, mucosa), a technique based on two successive rounds of PCR was developed. In the first round, a 1.84-kb fragment spanning exons 5-9 was generated using a "touchdown" protocol. After purification by spun-column chromatography, this fragment was used as a template for the amplification of the individual exons 5-9 with inner primer sets specific for the adjacent intronic regions. Using this nested primer approach, several micrograms of each individual exon were obtained starting from as little as 62.5 pg of total genomic DNA. This material proved ideal for future analyses by single-strand conformational polymorphism (SSCP) analysis and DNA sequencing. Recent studies indicate that mutations in the p53 gene may be the most common genetic target observed in human malignancies. (1'2} Mutations in the p53 gene have been implicated in many forms of human neoplastic disease. (1'3'4~ The analysis of mutant and wild-type p53 alleles in a wide variety of tumors and cell lines has now established p53 to be a tumor suppressor gene. The arsenal of molecular techniques for the analysis of mutations has recently been enhanced by the application of the PCR. ~s) As part of an experimental system for the analysis of DNA sequence to investigate the origins of cancer, we developed a sensitive two-stage PCR for individual
A Millimeter-Wave Wideband Frequency Conversion Module Based on Waveguide Switched Filters

A wideband frequency conversion module operating at millimeter-wave (MMW) band is proposed in this brief. By up-converting the input intermediate frequency (IF) of 6 GHz with the local oscillator (LO) signal of 13~17 GHz, it can generate the output radio frequency (RF) signal of 32~40 GHz. Firstly, to distinguish the exact position of RF signal from unwanted signal, the detailed spectrum simulation is performed based on the MMW mixer model. After that, some in-band interference signals of 2LO, 3LO-IF and 2LO+2IF overlap with the output RF range are found. To address the issue, a wideband filter is added in LO path to reject LO and 3LO. And more importantly, a switchable waveguide filter integrated in the module is designed to divide the whole RF working band into three sub-bands, thus guaranteeing the output spectrum purity. Through the final measurement, the RF signal power of 6.9~8.5 dBm and the spurious rejection level of 55 dB is obtained.
De Larven der Nederlandse Chironomidae (Diptera) : Orthocladiinae sensu lato

Systematiek De indeling van de Orthocladiinae levert zo mogelijk nog meer problemen op dan die van de andere subfamilies van de Chironomidae. Momenteel is het algemeen gebruikelijk de groep in vier subfamilies te splitsen: Diamesinae, Prodiamesinae, Orthocladiinae en Telmatogetoninae (zie bijv. Saether, 1979a; Ferrarese & Rossaro, 1981; Cranston, 1982). In oudere literatuur worden deze subfamilies vaak niet onderscheiden of wordt een andere indeling gemaakt (Brundin, 1956; Pankratova, 1970; Fittkau & Reiss, 1978). De Telmatogetoninae leven uitsluitend marien en zullen hier buiten beschouwing blijven. De verschillen tussen de larven van de overige subfamilies zijn voor een determineerwerk onpraktisch. Zo is het belangrijkste kenmerk van de Diamesinae-larven gelegen in de bouw van de hypopharynx en het verschil in de bouw van de antenne is niet bij alle soorten duidelijk. Daarom zijn in dit hoofdstuk de drie subfamilies nog als vanouds tesamen genomen en bij de beschrijvingen als een geheel alfabetisch gerangschikt. De alfabetische in plaats van systematische rangschikking is ingegeven door het grote aantal
TkT: Automatic Inference of Timed and Extended Pushdown Automata

To mitigate the cost of manually producing and maintaining models capturing software specifications, specification mining techniques can be exploited to automatically derive up-to-date models that faithfully represent the behavior of software systems. So far, specification mining solutions focused on extracting information about the functional behavior of the system, especially in the form of models that represent the ordering of the operations. Well-known examples are finite state models capturing the usage protocol of software interfaces and temporal rules specifying relations among system events. Although the functional behavior of a software system is a primary aspect of concern, there are several other non-functional characteristics that must be typically addressed jointly with the functional behavior of a software system. Efficiency is one of the most relevant characteristics. Indeed, an application that delivers the right functionalities with an inefficient implementation may fail to satisfy the expectations of its users. Interestingly, the timing behavior is strongly dependent on the functional behavior of a software system. For instance, the timing of an operation depends on the functional complexity and size of the computation that is performed. Consequently, models that combine the functional and timing behaviors, as well as their dependencies, are extremely important to precisely reason on the behavior of software systems. In this paper, we address the challenge of generating models that capture both the functional and timing behavior of a software system from execution traces. The result is the Timed k-Tail (TkT) specification mining technique, which can mine finite state models that capture such an interplay: the functional behavior is represented by the possible order of the events accepted by the transitions, while the timing behavior is represented through clocks and clock constraints of different nature associated with transitions. Our empirical evaluation with several libraries and applications shows that TkT can generate accurate models, capable of supporting the identification of timing anomalies due to overloaded environment and performance faults. Furthermore, our study shows that TkT outperforms state-of-the-art techniques in terms of scalability and accuracy of the mined models.
Screening of chitinolytic actinomycetes for biological control of Sclerotium rolfsii stem rot disease of chilli

Two hundred and eighty three strains were isolated from rhizoshere-associated soils, from Ubon Ratchathani and Srisaket province, using Enrichment Media for isolation of Chitinase-producing Actinomycetes agar (EMCA agar). All strains were screened for chitinolytic activity and sixty eight strains gave significant clear zone on EMCA agar plates. The selected chitinolytic strains were assayed for in vitro antagonism against Sclerotium rolfsii using cornmeal agar (CMA agar) assay procedure and the result showed that thirteen isolates have remarkable inhibiting the growth of the fungus and the top five antagonistic actinomycetes were PACCH 277, PACCH129, PACCH225, PACCH24 and PACCH246, respectively. The result indicated that these actinomycetes produce chitinase which catalyze the degradation of chitin, resulting in inhibition of S. rolfsii growth. Their abilities to control the disease development were tested for in vivo biocontrol assay on chilli seedlings. Two out of thirteen candidate, PACCH24 and PACCH225, antagonists reduced the disease development at 90%. It was suggested that the ability to inhibit the growth of pathogen in vitro was not related to the disease reduction in vivo. The strain PACCH24 was further identified as Streptomyces hygroscopicus according to morphological characteristic, cell wall and cellular sugar analysis and 16S rDNA sequencing. The study implies a novel chitinolytic actinomycete which could be developed to be a biological agent which would be included as a complement with organic fertilizers in order to control stem rot disease and promote growth of chilli.
The Physical Basis of Morphogenesis

A general review is presented of some of the approaches to the general problem of morphogenesis which originate either directly or indirectly in the work of Turing. The main points are the stability analysis of the Gierer-Meinhardt equations and the discussion on the applicability to biological systems of the concepts and techniques of field theory.
REVIEW PAPER ON BEVERAGE AGRO-INDUSTRIAL WASTEWATER TREATMENT PLANT BIO-SLUDGE FOR FERTILIZER POTENTIAL IN ETHIOPA

Agro-industrial sectors in Ethiopia are highly expanding sector and offers substantial challenges for the environment and public health. The brewery industries use large quantities of water for their production processes and at the end, they discharged large amount of effluents that contains a high strength organic waste. The main objective of this review paper is to discuss and summarize the characteristics, treatment techniques, fertilizer potential and other available management options of breweries sludge generated from wastewater treatment plants. Recent (2015) research finding indicated that the brewery sludge contains a very high nitrogen and potassium content, i.e., 420.25 kg ha(-1) and 840 kg ha' respectively compared to the control. Scientific evidences indicated that brewery sludge amended soil they have the tendency to produce more yields (4081.6 kg ha(-1)). Brewery sludge has also other beneficial advantages in production of biogas and building materials with co-digestion with other organic solid residues. The probable drawbacks of the use of sludge on agricultural land application is its pollutant loads including heavy metals, organic compounds and pathogens. Therefore, more research investigation has to be done on the possible sludge treatment mechanisms and the feasibility of sludge generated from brewery industries for agricultural recycling.
Fog drip: a mechanism of toxin transport from Eucalyptus globulus.

DEL MORAL, ROGER, and CORNELIUS H. MULLER (University of California, Santa Barbara). Fog drip: a mechanism of toxin transport from Eucalyptus globulus. Bull. Torrey Bot. Club 96: 467-475. 1969. -Fog drip is a mechanism which leaches metabolites of many kinds from foliar crowns. In southern California few herbs of any species are found beneath the canopy of Eucalyptus globulus. Their absence proved not to be attributable to competition for essential resources; but rather allelopathic chemicals were found to be of principal importance. Natural fog drip was collected from beneath Eucalyptus globulus and shown by bioassay with Bromus rigidats to be inhibitory without concentration. Paper chromatography of fog drip revealed the phytotoxins chlorogenie, p-coumarylquinic, and gentisic acid. Artificial fog drip concentrated three fold inhibited several species of grasses in bioassays performed in artificial media. Fog drip was also toxic in soil bioassays. Additional allelopathic mechanisms in Eutcalyptus involving terpenes adsorbed to soil colloids and phenolic acids leached from the leaf litter do exist, but Eucalyptus globulus fog drip acting alone appears to be capable of produeing severe inhibition of growth in some herb species. The importance of fog drip as an agent of metabolite transfer from leaves and deposition in the environment lies in the capacity of these compounds to influence the structure and diversity of a plant community.
Observations on the behaviour of second stage juveniles of Hetero inside host roots

SUMMARY Using special observation chambers and high resolution video-enhanced contrast microscopy, the behaviour of infective second stage juveniles of Heterodera schachtii was studied inside roots of Brassica napus seedlings. With this technique, intracellular migration of the juveniles to the site of syncytium induction near or within the vascular tissue and feeding from the initial syncytium could, for the first time, be directly observed on live animals. The function of structures inside the feeding apparatus of the nematode and in the initial syncytium, previously only recorded with the transmission electron microscope, was analysed. Feeding from the initial syncytium was invariably in a series of repeated cycles, each composed of three distinct phases : i) continuous withdrawal of nutrients from within a zone of modified cytoplasm through a feeding tube connected to the orifice of the stylet lumen. iil stylet retraction from the feeding site, gentle stylet movements within the stomatal cavity and reinsertion of the stylet-tip, accompanicd by depletion of secretory fluids from within the expanded valve membranes of the two subventral oesophageal gland ampullae. iii) release of secretory fluids from the ampulla of the dorsal œsophageal gland, forming a new feeding tube inside the zone of modified cytoplasm. Events that occurred during these three phases within the feeding apparatus of the nematode and in the initial syncytium are described and discussed.
Machine learning for identifying relevant publications in updates of systematic reviews of diagnostic test studies

Updating systematic reviews is often a time‐consuming process that involves a lot of human effort and is therefore not conducted as often as it should be. The aim of our research project was to explore the potential of machine learning methods to reduce human workload. Furthermore, we evaluated the performance of deep learning methods in comparison to more established machine learning methods. We used three available reviews of diagnostic test studies as the data set. In order to identify relevant publications, we used typical text pre‐processing methods. The reference standard for the evaluation was the human‐consensus based on binary classification (inclusion, exclusion). For the evaluation of the models, various scenarios were generated using a grid of combinations of data preprocessing steps. Moreover, we evaluated each machine learning approach with an approach‐specific predefined grid of tuning parameters using the Brier score metric. The best performance was obtained with an ensemble method for two of the reviews, and by a deep learning approach for the other review. Yet, the final performance of approaches strongly depends on data preparation. Overall, machine learning methods provided reasonable classification. It seems possible to reduce human workload in updating systematic reviews by using machine learning methods. Yet, as the influence of data preprocessing on the final performance seems to be at least as important as choosing the specific machine learning approach, users should not blindly expect a good performance by solely using approaches from a popular class, such as deep learning.
Aircraft Measurements of Physicochemical Evolution of Atmospheric Aerosols in Air Pollution Plumes over a Megacity and Suburban Areas

ABSTRACT As part of the Megacity Air Pollution Studies (MAPS)-Seoul campaign, three types of research flights were conducted over the Seoul Metropolitan Area (SMA) from May till June 2015 to measure the spatial distribution of a pollution plume near a power plant and petrochemical complex, the vertical profiles of pollutants on the western coast of Korea, and the pollutant distribution in the SMA. The pollution plume (~0–700 m) was highly concentrated and dominated by organic aerosol (OA), which very likely oxidized in the plume, as it showed slightly less oxidation near the source and significantly less oxidation at altitudes above the plume. One vertical profile displayed transitions in concentration and changes in the dominant components, suggesting that the particle sources and/or processing differed above ~1000 m; below 1000 m, where the total mass and OA concentrations were high, sulfate and likely transport sources predominated. The other profile, which was assessed during a separate flight, exhibited sharp increases in the OA number concentration and mean diameter, less oxidized organic content, and higher organic and nitrate concentrations above 1400 m, indicating high-altitude transport and a cleaner boundary layer. Finally, flights investigating the distributions of pollutants in the central, upwind, and downwind SMA regions generally detected high levels of oxidation downwind as well as different aerosol masses between the low and high altitudes. This study highlights the necessity of understanding the complex vertical structures of particle layers, such as those identified in and around the SMA, in order to facilitate the adoption of efficient air quality control strategies and enhance air quality forecasting.
Can a ‘wintering area effect’ explain population status of Swainson's hawks? A stable isotope approach

It has been suggested that declines in breeding populations of Swainson's hawks (Buteo swainsoni) in California, Oregon, and Nevada may be due to differential mortality of hawks on their wintering grounds. Although massive mortality incidents reported on the wintering grounds partially support this suggestion, there are no data showing differential use of wintering areas by breeding populations of Swainson's hawks. We used stable‐hydrogen isotope analysis of feathers to determine whether large flocks of hawks wintering in Argentina consisted of a mixture of individuals from across the North American breeding range or consisted of individuals from discrete breeding populations. We found that flocks of wintering Swainson's hawks consisted of a mixture of individuals. The lack of connectivity between populations of breeding and wintering hawks suggests that high wintering mortality, either natural or human‐induced, is unlikely to have direct consequences on a single breeding area in North America. The demographic effects of winter mortality should be ‘diluted’ across the entire breeding range of Swainson's hawks.
Low-Cost Ultrawideband High-Gain Compact Resonant Cavity Antenna

A 3-D printed planar permittivity-gradient superstrate (PGS) is used to improve the directive radiation characteristics of a waveguide-fed compact resonant cavity antenna (CRCA). Far-field directivity of classical uniform superstrate-based RCAs is limited due to nonuniform aperture phase distribution caused by even transmission through the superstrate. Transverse PGS has been used here to remarkably improve aperture phase distribution and hence directive radiation performance of RCAs. Furthermore, the PGS was rapidly prototyped in one hour and 43 min using a low-cost acrylo-butadiene styrene (ABS) filament without using traditional multistep milling and machining. Single step fabrication was performed and effective dielectric constant of the ABS was varied through controlled infill percentage in different regions of the PGS. Measurements of a prototype indicate unrivaled results, from a smaller footprint, which includes peak directivity of 16.048 dB, 3 dB directivity bandwidth of 49.65% and sidelobe levels lower than −10.4 dB throughout the operating frequency band. The 3-D printed PGS thus outperforms all previously reported superstrates, for RCAs, by demonstrating similar radiation performance with an equivalent material cost of only 0.41 USD.
Are Functional Guilds More Realistic Management Units Than Individual Species for Restoration?1

Abstract Categorizing species according to their functional traits, such as spatial and temporal patterns of resource use, effects on ecosystems, and responses to environmental perturbations, can facilitate successful restoration of plant communities. Functional guilds condense species lists by grouping species according to similarities in characteristics we believe to be important in a particular context. These groupings can allow us to (1) ensure community and ecosystem structural and functional attributes, (2) increase competitiveness of the community to deter the establishment of undesirable species, (3) simplify and test models of community assembly including resistance to invasion, succession, and species coexistence, and (4) facilitate cross-site comparisons. As useful as functional guilds can be, we must not overlook the potentially important roles of individual species. In restoration, including multiple species that represent each functional type within a target community may provide a buffer against environmental change. Functional guilds provide realistic conceptual units to ensure that restored plant communities include species that confer the ecological functions of most importance the majority of the time. Additional index words: Community assembly, competition, functional traits, invasion, resource use, stability. Abbreviations: CCNHA, Cedar Creek Natural History Area; CO2, carbon dioxide; N, nitrogen; NO3, nitrate.
Automatic Generation of Author Output based on the Iterative Clustering Method

The structural differences and requirements of diverse techniques in searching resources, disambiguation, and bias in authors’ names for bibliographic searching introduce crafting inaccuracies. On the other hand, usage of external instances of searching such as mail and venue is not sufficient for clearance in searching bibliographic data. This paper proposes iterative clustering method and labeling procedure to search a distinguished set of authors’ affiliations zipped into a function to be performed on three databases having different structures. A distinguished algorithm was created using AI methodology to generate best outcomes toward reduction of bias in author’s names, resulting in the enhancement of accuracy in bibliographic data. This technique also reduced the requirement of diverse manual inputs in searching resources for finding out author’s national outputs. A total of 31 authors (1076 publications) were selected manually and compared against searches of three database sets RISS (Research Information System Store), KMBASE (Korean Medical Database), and DBPIA (Korea Association of Representatives) for a total of 759 found publications. 90.2% of national publication search results confirmed to be accurate.