Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
UvA-DARE ( Digital Academic Repository ) Novel DNA structures resulting from Dtam 3 excision in tobacco

A Tam3 two-element system has been designed by combining an immobilized Tam3 element with a non-autonomous dTam3 element inserted into the HPT gene. The phenotypic assay employed, restored hygromycin resistance, indicated that trans-activation of the non-autonomous dTam3 element occurred. Molecular analyses of the excision sites revealed that the ends of the dTam3 element remain in the empty donor sites. The predominant consequence of this type of excision appears to be that excised fragments fail to re-integrate into the tobacco genome. Only one case of dTam3 re-integration could be detected. The ends of this element had been degraded upon integration into the tobacco genome. Either the altered structure of the Tam3 derivatives or tobacco host factors are influencing the trans-activation of a dTam3 element, resulting in aberrant excision.
Title Accelerated mirror descent in continuous and discrete time Permalink

We study accelerated mirror descent dynamics in continuous and discrete time. Combining the original continuous-time motivation of mirror descent with a recent ODE interpretation of Nesterov’s accelerated method, we propose a family of continuous-time descent dynamics for convex functions with Lipschitz gradients, such that the solution trajectories converge to the optimum at a O(1/t2) rate. We then show that a large family of first-order accelerated methods can be obtained as a discretization of the ODE, and these methods converge at a O(1/k2) rate. This connection between accelerated mirror descent and the ODE provides an intuitive approach to the design and analysis of accelerated first-order algorithms.
Headphone Noise: Occupational Noise Exposure Assessment for Communication Personnel

For communication personnel exposed to noise emitted by headphones, the sound pressure level measured at the position of the exposed person (but the person absent) does not adequately represent the sound exposure. The first section of this paper reports comments concerning the legislation, the relevant international standards and the stateof-the-art of researches in this field. Then, the second section reports the results of an experimental study undertaken in four different occupational settings in order to detect whether a risk of hearing damage exists for the workers exposed to noise emitted by headphones. During the recordings a headphone identical to that worn by the telephone operator has been positioned on a manikin as to reproduce the same auditory condition. In order to assess the noise exposure, the recordings have been post processed by means of different frequency dependent transformations. The analysis of the results have shown that for some workers the risk of hearing loss exists. The implementation of a sound level limiter directly connected to the headphone has shown a good evidence: the output level never exceeds the defined threshold and the attenuator reacts in a very short time, providing a reduction of 10 dB in 0.3 seconds.
IMPROVING THE EFFICIENCY OF ENERGY CONSUMPTION IN SMART GRIDS WITH APPLICATION OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLECT

Energy saving accuracy estimates are important for development of energy efficient projects and for demonstrating their cost-effectiveness. Increasingly, commercial buildings have an advanced measurement infrastructure, which has led to the availability of high-frequency interval data. These data can be used in a number of energy efficiency tasks, including anomaly detection, control and optimization of heating, ventilation, and air cooling systems. All it makes possible the application of artificial intellect methods and therefore leads to more accurate estimates of energy savings. In this paper, we proposed the method for modeling the consumers energy profile based on the clustering analysis, exactly, modified K-means algorithm. Extended computer simulations have been shown that it improves the accuracy of energy consumption forecasts considerably.
Recognizing large donations to public goods: an experimental test

Private charities often publicise generous individual contributions or contributors, possibly to encourage others to give. In contrast, public good experiments used to study voluntary giving commonly tell participants only of total contributions. This paper reports an experimental test of the effect on contributions of supplying additional selective information. A control treatment is run that reveals only total contributions over ten one-shot decision rounds. This is compared to a second treatment that also informs subjects of the maximum contribution made in their group after each round. In a third treatment, subjects are further given the opportunity to make costly rewards to the maximum contributor. Revealing generous contributions appears to raise average contributions slightly. Surprisingly, adding the ability to reward large contributors does little to generate further increases, though it significantly raises the variance of contributions. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Polymerization of oligo(ethylene glycol) (meth)acrylates: Toward new generations of smart biocompatible materials

Monomers composed of a (meth)acrylate moiety connected to a short poly(ethylene)glycol (PEG) chain are versatile building-blocks for the preparation of “smart” biorelevant materials. Many of these monomers are commercial and can be easily polymerized by either anionic, free-radical, or controlled radical polymerization. The latter approach allows synthesis of well-defined PEG-based macromolecular architectures such as amphiphilic block copolymers, dense polymer brushes, or biohybrids. Furthermore, the resulting polymers exhibit fascinating solution properties in aqueous medium. Depending on the molecular structure of their monomer units, non linear PEG analogues can be either insoluble in water, readily soluble up to 100 °C, or thermoresponsive. Thus, these polymers can be used for building a wide variety of modern materials such as biosensors, artificial tissues, smart gels for chromatography, and drug carriers. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 46: 3459–3470, 2008
11374 Are Apprenticeships Business Cycle Proof ? FEBRUARY 2018

IZA DP No. 11374 FEBRUARY 2018 Are Apprenticeships Business Cycle Proof? * Although there is evidence that apprenticeship training can ease the transition of youth into the labour market and thereby reduce youth unemployment, many policy makers fear that firms will cut their apprenticeship expenditures during economic crises, thus exacerbating the problem of youth unemployment. Using recent panel data of Swiss cantons and dynamic regression models, we examine the relationship between new apprenticeships and the business cycle. The empirical results suggest that economic shocks induce a rather small, pro-cyclical immediate response in the apprenticeship market. However, within a year after the shock, firms compensate for their immediate reaction, with the result that no permanent effect is observable. JEL Classification: E24, E32, I21, J18, J44
THE ORBIT OF THE ORPHAN STREAM

We use recent Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Exploration (SEGUE) spectroscopy and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and SEGUE imaging data to measure the sky position, distance, and radial velocities of stars in the tidal debris stream that is commonly referred to as the “Orphan Stream. ” We fit orbital parameters to the data and find a prograde orbit with an apogalacticon, perigalacticon, and eccentricity of 90 kpc, 16.4 kpc, and e = 0.7, respectively. Neither the dwarf galaxy UMa II nor the Complex A gas cloud has velocities consistent with a kinematic association with the Orphan Stream. It is possible that Segue-1 is associated with the Orphan Stream, but no other known Galactic clusters or dwarf galaxies in the Milky Way lie along its orbit. The detected portion of the stream ranges from 19 to 47 kpc from the Sun and is an indicator of the mass interior to these distances. There is a marked increase in the density of Orphan Stream stars near (l, b) = (253°, 49°), which could indicate the presence of the progenitor at the edge of the SDSS data. If this is the progenitor, then the detected portion of the Orphan Stream is a leading tidal tail. We find blue horizontal branch (BHB) stars and F turnoff stars associated with the Orphan Stream. The turnoff color is (g − r)0 = 0.22. The BHB stars have a low metallicity of [Fe/H]WBG = −2.1. The orbit is best fit to a halo potential with a halo plus disk mass of about 2.6 × 1011 M☉, integrated to 60 kpc from the Galactic center. Our fits are done to orbits rather than full N-body simulations; we show that if N-body simulations are used, the inferred mass of the galaxy would be slightly smaller. Our best fit is found with a logarithmic halo speed of vhalo = 73 ± 24 km s−1, a disk+bulge mass of M(R < 60 kpc) = 1.3 × 1011 M☉, and a halo mass of M(R < 60 kpc) = 1.4 × 1011 M☉. However, we can find similar fits to the data that use a Navarro–Frenk–White halo profile or that have smaller disk masses and correspondingly larger halo masses. Distinguishing between different classes of models requires data over a larger range of distances. The Orphan Stream is projected to extend to 90 kpc from the Galactic center, and measurements of these distant parts of the stream would be a powerful probe of the mass of the Milky Way.
Annual climate variability in the Holocene: interpreting the message of ancient trees

Over vast areas of the world’s landmasses, where climate beats out a strong seasonal rhythm, tree growth keeps unerring time. In their rings, trees record many climate melodies, played in di! erent places and di! erent eras. Recent years have seen a consolidation and expansion of tree-ring sample collections across the traditional research areas of North America and Europe, and the start of major developments in many new areas of Eurasia, South America and Australasia. From such collections are produced networks of precisely dated chronologies; records of various aspects of tree growth, registered continuously, year by year across many centuries. Their sensitivities to di! erent climate parameters are now translated into ever more detailed histories of temperature and moisture variability across expanding dimensions of time and space. With their extensive coverage, high temporal resolution and rigid dating control, dendroclimatic reconstructions contribute signi"cantly to our knowledge of late Holocene climates, most importantly on timescales ranging from 1 to 100 years. In special areas of the world, where trees live for thousands of years or where subfossil remnants of long dead specimens are preserved, work building chronologies covering many millennia continues apace. Very recently, trees have provided important new information about major modes of general circulation dynamics linked to the El Nin8 o/Southern Oscillation and the North Atlantic Oscillation, and about the e! ect of large volcanic eruptions. As for assessing the signi"cance of 20th century global warming, the evidence from dendroclimatology in general, supports the notion that the last 100 years have been unusually warm, at least within a context of the last two millennia. However, this evidence should not be considered equivocal. The activities of humans may well be impacting on the &natural’ growth of trees in di! erent ways, making the task of isolating a clear climate message subtly di$cult. ( 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
CUMULATIVE COAL THICKNESS AND COALBED GAS POTENTIAL IN THE COMOX COAL BASIN; VANCOUVER ISLAND

This paper presents desorption, isotherm and coal thickness data for the Comox Basin on Vancouver Island British Columbia. Cumulative coal thicknesses are presented as contours on a number of maps that together cover the Comox Basin. Cumulative coal thicknesses are greatest in the Cumberland to Tsable River areas. Based on coal rank and isotherms the potential gas capacity of the coal increases to the south. Carbon isotope data from the northern part of the basin indicates a biogeneic origin for the gas.
Measuring Organizational Skills in the General Population: Development and Preliminary Validation of the DOSQ

Organizational skills are a set of cognitive abilities responsible for goal-directed behaviors. While they are moderately studied in clinical settings, the assessment of organizational skills in the general population remains under-studied. This paper presents the new Durand Organizational Skills Questionnaire (DOSQ), which was developed to examine the factors associated with organizational abilities in the general population. Exploratory factor analysis, validated by a confirmatory factor analysis, suggests eight factors: Work Organization, Communication Clarity, Punctuality, GoalOriented Behavior, Assiduity, Workspace Organization, Strategies, and Attentiveness. Three studies using samples from the general population provided evidence for the reliability and validity of the DOSQ’s scores. Overall, the results suggest that the DOSQ offers a valid approach to measuring organizational skills in the general population.
Metrics in automotive software development: A systematic literature review

Software is an integrated part of new features within the automotive sector, car manufacturers, the Hersteller Initiative Software (HIS) consortium defined metrics to determine software quality. Yet, problems with assigning metrics to quality attributes often occur in practice. The specified boundary values lead to discussions between contractors and clients as different standards and metric sets are used. This paper studies metrics used in the automotive sector and the quality attributes they address. The HIS, ISO/IEC 25010:2011, and ISO/IEC 26262:2018 are utilized to draw a big picture illustrating (i) which metrics and boundary values are reported in literature, (ii) how the metrics match the standards, (iii) which quality attributes are addressed, and (iv) how the metrics are supported by tools. Our findings from analyzing 38 papers include a catalog of 112 metrics of which 17 define boundary values and 48 are supported by tools. Most of the metrics are concerned with source code, are generic, and not specifically designed for automotive software development. We conclude that many metrics exist, but a clear definition of the metrics' context, notably regarding the construction of flexible and efficient measurement suites, is missing.
A 10 kpc stellar substructure at the edge of the Large Magellanic Cloud: Perturbed outer disc or evidence for tidal stripping?

We report the discovery of a substantial stellar overdensity in the periphery of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), found using public imaging from the first year of the Dark Energy Survey. The structure appears to emanate from the edge of the outer LMC disk at a radius � 13.5 ◦ due north of its centre, and stretches more than 10 kpc towards the east. It is roughly 1.5 kpc wide and has an integrated V -band luminosity of at least MV = 7.4. The stellar populations in the feature are indistinguishable from those in the outer LMC disk. We attempt to quantify the geometry of the outer disk using simple planar models, and find that only a disk with mild intrinsic ellipticity can simultaneously explain the observed stellar density on the sky and the azimuthal line-of-sight distance profile. We also see possible non-planar behaviour in the outer disk that may reflect a warp and/or flare, as well as deviations that resemble a ring-like structure between � 9 ◦ 12 ◦ from the LMC centre. Based on all these observations, we conclude that our remote, stream-like feature is likely comprised of material that has been stripped from the outskirts of the LMC disk, although we cannot rule out that it represents a transient overdensity in the disk itself. We conduct a simple Nbody simulation to show that either type of structure could plausibly arise due to the tidal force of the Milky Way; however we also recognize that a recent close interaction between the LMC and the SMC may be the source of the stripping or perturbation. Finally, we observe evidence for extremely diffuse LMC populations extending to radii of � 18.5 kpc in the disk plane (� 20 ◦ on the sky), corroboratingprevious spectroscopic detections at comparable distances.
Quantifying non-linearity in planar supersonic potential flows

ABSTRACT An analysis is presented which allows the engineer to quantitatively estimate the validity bounds of aerodynamic methods based in linear potential flows a-priori. The development is limited to quasi-steady planar flows with attached shocks and small body curvature. Perturbation velocities are parameterised in terms of Mach number and flow turning angle by means of a series-expansion for flow velocity based in the method of characteristics. The parameterisation is used to assess the magnitude of non-linear term-groupings relative to linear groups in the full potential equation. This quantification is used to identify dominant nonlinear terms and to estimate the validity of linearising the potential flow equation at a given Mach number and flow turning angle. Example applications include the a-priori estimation of the validity bounds for linear aerodynamic models for supersonic aeroelastic analysis of lifting surfaces and panels.
Design of a Control System for an Organic Flight Array Based on a Neural Network Controller

This paper presents a flight control system for an organic flight array (OFA) with a new configuration consisting of multimodularized ducted-fan unmanned aerial vehicles. The OFA has a distinguished advantage of assembling or separating with respect to its missions or operational conditions because of its reconfigurable structure. Therefore, designing a controller that can be flexibly applied in each situation is necessary. First, a dynamic modeling of the OFA based on a single ducted-fan vehicle is performed. Second, the inner loop for attitude control is designed through dynamic model inversion and a PD controller. However, an adaptive control component is needed to flexibly cope with the uncertainty because the operating environment of the OFA is varied, and uncertainty exists depending on the number of modules to be assembled and disturbances. In addition, the performance of the neural network adaptive controller is verified through a numerical simulation according to two scenarios.
TRENDS AND FLUCTUATIONS IN BRAZILIAN AND ARGENTINE TRADE FLOWS

This paper analyzes the trends and fluctuations of the price and real indexes of Brazilian and Argentine exports and imports in 1980-2002. The analysis uses quarterly data and obtains the trend and fluctuations by applying either the Hodrick-Prescott or the band-pass filter (with periodicity between 1.5 and 8 years) to the original series. The main statistical findings are that: (i) even though the fluctuations of the export and import prices of the two countries are highly correlated, their terms of trade are not because the export price of one country is also highly correlated with the import price of the other country; (ii) in both countries the fluctuations of real imports basically follow the fluctuations of real GDP; and (iii) fluctuations of Brazilian GDP and real imports are highly correlated and seem to lead fluctuations of Argentine exports. To obtain these results the paper analyzes the lead, lag and contemporaneous correlation between the series in question and applies the Granger causality test to investigate whether or not one variable helps to explain the other statistically. The statistical results for the fluctuations are robust for both filters. The trends are also basically the same independently of the filter used and, overall, they seem to converge in the late 1990s. The main policy implication is that exchange-rate coordination may be useful to compensate or smooth the adjustment of the two countries to terms-of-trade shocks, provided that the managed float is flexible enough to allow the bilateral real exchange rate to change according to which country is most affected by the shock. On the real side, synchronization of real GDP would lead to synchronization of real imports, whereas exchange-rate coordination may eliminate the swings of the bilateral real exchange rate between Brazil and Argentina, which is one of the sources of their desynchronized export fluctuations.
Disambiguating the Role of Ambiguity in Perceptual Assimilation and Contrast Effects

We examine how perceptions of a product are affected by the presence of extreme exemplars and find that ambiguity of the product is an important moderator. When the target is a novel one, perceptions assimilate to the context, whereas when it is highly familiar, perceptions are immune to the influence of context. This is as predicted by the interpretation-comparison model. Contrary to this model, however, we find that effects on perceptions are not always assimilative in nature. When product ambiguity falls between the extremes of novel and highly familiar, a contrast effect in perception can occur. This is consistent with the selective accessibility model, which says that a perceptual contrast effect occurs when conditions orient respondents to dissimilarities rather than to similarities among context and target items. In the experiments conducted, context-induced response language effects were circumvented by employing forced-anchor scales. (c) 2009 by JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH, Inc.
History or demography? Determining the drivers of genetic variation in North American plants

Understanding the impact of historical and demographic processes on genetic variation is essential for devising conservation strategies and predicting responses to climate change. Recolonization after Pleistocene glaciations is expected to leave distinct genetic signatures, characterised by lower genetic diversity in previously glaciated regions. Populations’ positions within species ranges also shape genetic variation, following the central‐marginal paradigm dictating that peripheral populations are depauperate, sparse and isolated. However, the general applicability of these patterns and relative importance of historical and demographic factors remains unknown. Here, we analysed the distribution of genetic variation in 91 native species of North American plants by coupling microsatellite data and species distribution modelling. We tested the contributions of historical climatic shifts and the central‐marginal hypothesis on genetic diversity and structure on the whole data set and across subsets based on taxonomic groups and growth forms. Decreased diversity was found with increased distance from potential glacial refugia, coinciding with the expected make‐up of postglacially colonised localities. At the range periphery, lower genetic diversity, higher inbreeding levels and genetic differentiation were reported, following the assumptions of the central‐marginal hypothesis. History and demography were found to have approximately equal importance in shaping genetic variation.