Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A 10 year record of black carbon and dust from a Mera Peak ice core (Nepal): variability and potential impact on melting of Himalayan glaciers

Abstract. A shallow ice core was extracted at the summit of Mera Peak at 6376 m a.s. l. in the southern flank of the Nepalese Himalaya range. From this core, we reconstructed the seasonal deposition fluxes of dust and refractory black carbon (rBC) since 1999. This archive presents well preserved seasonal cycles based on a monsoonal precipitation pattern. According to the seasonal precipitation regime in which 80% of annual precipitation falls between June and September, we estimated changes in the concentrations of these aerosols in surface snow. The analyses revealed that mass fluxes are a few orders of magnitude higher for dust (10.4 ± 2.8 g m−2 yr−1 than for rBC (7.9 ± 2.8 mg m−2 yr−1). The relative lack of seasonality in the dust record may reflect a high background level of dust inputs, whether from local or regional sources. Over the 10-year record, no deposition flux trends were detected for any of the species of interest. The data were then used to simulate changes in the surface snow albedo over time and the potential melting caused by these impurities. Mean potential melting caused by dust and rBC combined was 713 kg m−2 yr−1, and for rBC alone, 342 kg m−2 yr−1 for rBC under certain assumptions. Compared to the melting rate measured using the mass and energy balance at 5360 m a.s. l. on Mera Glacier between November 2009 and October 2010, i.e. 3000 kg m−2 yr−1 and 3690 kg m−2 yr−1 respectively, the impact of rBC represents less than 16% of annual potential melting while the contribution of dust and rBC combined to surface melting represents a maximum of 26%. Over the 10-year period, rBC variability in the ice core signal primarily reflected variability of the monsoon signal rather than variations in the intensity of emissions.
Thirteen years of observations on biomass burning organic tracers over Chichijima Island in the western North Pacific: An outflow region of Asian aerosols

East Asia is the world's greatest source region for the emission of anthropogenic aerosols and their precursors due to the rapid industrialization and intensive biomass burning (BB) activities. BB emits specific organic tracers such as levoglucosan, mannosan, and galactosan, which are produced by pyrolysis of cellulose and hemicellulose and then transported downwind to the western North Pacific by westerly winds. Here we present long‐term observations of BB tracers over the remote Chichijima Island in the western North Pacific (WNP) from 2001 to 2013. Elevated concentrations of BB tracers by an order of magnitude were found in midautumn to midspring with winter maxima, which are strongly involved with the atmospheric transport by westerly winds from the Asian continent to the WNP, as supported by backward trajectory analyses. Throughout the observations, we found an increase in the averaged concentrations of BB tracers from 2006 to 2013, which is mainly caused by enhanced BB events in Asian urban and rural areas, as supported by enhanced fire/hot spots in East Asia via satellite images. We also found that the period of the high concentrations was prolonged from 2006 to 2013. Comparison between monthly averaged concentrations of BB tracers and backward air mass trajectories clearly demonstrates that the winter/spring maxima over Chichijima are involved with the seasonal shifting of atmospheric circulation followed by downwind transport of BB aerosols to the WNP. High abundances of BB tracers over the WNP indicate that BB‐laden air masses can be transported to remote marine environments.
Test-Driven Web Application Development: Increasing the Quality of Web Development By Providing Framework with an Emphasis On Test-Driven Design and Development Methodologies

Web applications – especially those based on interpreted programming languages – are quickly becoming more utilized and more commonplace than traditional client applications. Despite this growth, no open solution has yet fulfilled the need of a risk-reducing development framework that supports test-driven methodologies and tools designed to coordinate the resources responsible for the most effective development of web applications based on interpreted programming languages. This research paper presents a test-driven development framework consisting of openly available components that can be used by development teams writing web applications based on interpreted programming languages based on the methodologies and tools used by traditional software development teams using compiled programming languages. TEST-DRIVEN WEB APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT | iii
Analysis of the Fracture Surfaces of New Development Insulated Iron Powder Compounds

Goal of the present paper is the analysis of the fracture surfaces of an Insulated Iron Powder Compound (IIPC) with di erent additions of aluminium alloy (0.25, 0.5 and 0.75 wt.%), in order to improve the mechanical properties, evaluated as the transverse rupture strength (TRS) with su cient magnetic properties (mainly represented by the iron loss and coercivity force). Investigation of microstructure and porosity development concluded that improvements in bending strength and impact values require the reduction of surface oxides during the heat treatment, in order to get a proper load bearing area between the adjacent particles.
NCM: The Integration Approach for NN-VANETs

Mobility management is one of the most challenging research issues for VAN ETs to support Intelligent Transportation S ystem (ITS ) applications such as infotainment, internet access and video streaming. The NEMO centric approach is used to integrate the NEMO protocol with VANETs. The combination of NEMO protocol with VANET supports communications between RS Us and vehicles to provide internet access. The Nested NEMO based VAN ETs has the problem of high routing delay. NEMO Centric Approach is suitable for Nested NEMO based VANETs to challenge the high routing delay. The main goals of the proposed system are to support global internet access and session continuity as well as to support multihop communication. The simulation is accomplished by the integration of VANET MOBIS IM (MOBIlity S IMulation) Tool and NS -2(Network Simulation) Tool. The X-graph is used to analyze the performance of the network. Key Terms: M obility M anagement, NEM O Protocol, Nested NEM O, Routing Delay, VANETs
Predictors of Juvenile Survival in Birds

Abstract The survival probability of birds during the juvenile period, between the end of parental care and adulthood, is highly variable and has a major effect on population dynamics and parental fitness. As such, a large number of studies have attempted to evaluate potential predictors of juvenile survival in birds, especially predictors related to parental care. Lack’s hypothesis linking body reserves accumulated from parental care to the survival of naive juveniles has organized much of this research, but various other predictors have also been investigated and received some support. We reviewed the literature in this area and identified a variety of methodological problems that obscure interpretation of the body of results. Most studies adopted statistical techniques that missed the opportunities to (1) evaluate the relative importance of several predictors, (2) control the confounding effect of correlation among predictor variables, and (3) exploit the information content of collinearity by evaluati.
Nonlinear transversely vibrating beams by the homotopy perturbation method with an auxiliary term

This paper presents the high order frequency-amplitude relationship for nonlinear transversely vibrating beams with odd and even nonlinearities, using Homotopy Perturbation Method with an auxiliary term (HPMAT). The governing equations of vibrating buckled beam, beam carrying an intermediate lumped mass, and quintic nonlinear beam are investigated to exhibit the reliability and ability of the proposed asymptotic approach. It is demonstrated that two terms in series expansions are sufficient to obtain a highly accurate periodic solutions. The integrity of the analytical solutions is verified by numerical results.
Cosmological constraints on mirror matter parameters

Up-to-date estimates of the cosmological parameters are presented as a result of numerical simulations of cosmic microwave background and large scale structure, considering a flat Universe in which the dark matter is made entirely or partly of mirror matter, and the primordial perturbations are scalar adiabatic and in linear regime. A statistical analysis using the Markov Chain Monte Carlo method allows to obtain constraints of the cosmological parameters. As a result, we show that a Universe with pure mirror dark matter is statistically equivalent to the case of an admixture with cold dark matter. The upper limits for the ratio of the temperatures of ordinary and mirror sectors are around 0.3 for both the cosmological models, which show the presence of a dominant fraction of mirror matter, .
Isolation of a polysaccharide from Achillea millefolium and its effects on inflammatory responses in THP-1 monocytes

3 Ágrip . 5 Acknowledgements . 7 Table of contents . 8 Table of figures . 11 List of tables . 12 Declaration of contribution . 13 List of abbreviations . 14 1 Introduction . 17 1.1 The immune system . 17 1.1.1 Inflammation . 18 1.1.2 Monocytes . 18 1.1.2.1 THP-1 monocytes . 19 1.1. 3 Dendritic cells. 20 1.1. 3.1 In vitro dendritic cell model . 20 1.2 Cell signaling . 21 1.2.1 IFN-γ signaling . 21 1.2. 2 Toll-like receptors . 21 1.2. 2.1 Toll-like receptor 4 signaling . 22 1.2. 3 Mitogen activated protein kinase . 24 1.2. 3.1 Extracellular signal regulated kinases . 24 1.2. 3.2 p38 . 25 1.2. 4 PI3K / Akt pathway . 25 1.2. 5 Nuclear transcription factor kappa-B . 25 1.2. 6 Monocytic co-stimulatory and adhesion molecules . 26 1.2. 6.1 CD40 . 26 1.2. 6.2 CD80 and CD86 . 26 1.2. 6.3 CD54 . 26 1.2. 6.4 HLA-DR . 26 1.2. 7 Cytokines . 26 1.2. 7.1 Interleukin-12 . 27 1.2. 7.2 Interleukin-10 . 27 1.2. 7.3 Interleukin-1β . 28 1.2. 7.4 Interleukin-6 . 28 1.2. 7.5 Interleukin-8 . 28 1.2. 7.6 Interleukin -23 . 29 1.2. 7.7 Interleukin-27 . 29
THE CORRELATION BETWEEN DERIVED NASALANCE MEASURES AND PERCEIVED NASALITY IN CHILDREN WITH REPAIRED CLEFT LIP AND PALATE

Context: Velopharyngeal dysfunction (VPD) is one of the associated condition reported in individuals with repaired cleft lip and palate (RCLP) leading to hypernasality. Nasality can be assessed by nasometer through nasalance values. But, mean nasalance values (N) found to be overlapping between individuals with RCLP and normals. To overcome these limitations Nasalance Distance (ND) and Nasalance Ratio (NR) are derived based on nasalance range. Aims: The study is aimed to evaluate, correlate and compare acoustical (N, ND & NR) and perceptual measures of nasality between the children with RCLP and control group. Settings and Design: Institutional setup and standard group comparison design Methods and Material: The study included fifteen children with RCLP ranging from 6 to 11 years and the control group consists of age and gender matched 15 typically developing children. Four point standard rating scale was used to rate the hypernasality by three speech language pathologists (SLP’s) and Nasometer was used to measure the mean and derived nasalance scores for vowels and sentences in Kannada. Statistical analysis: SPSS, Cronbach’s Alpha test, multivariate analysis and Pearson’s product movement correlation were used to analyze the data. Results: Significant increase in the mean nasalance value and NR was seen in children with RCLP than the control group, whereas ND was contrary. ND was highly correlated with perceived nasality than N. The NR of sentences shows high negative correlation. Conclusions: The measures based on range of nasalance can be adapted to the routine clinical examinations for better correlation with perceived nasality.
DEVELOPMENT OF MICRO CONTROLLER-BASED MONITORING SYSTEM FOR A STAND-ALONE PHOTOVOLTAIC SYSTEM

Photovoltaic (PV) system performance highly depends on meteorological parameters and, to reduce frequent maintenance and avoid PV system failure, the meteorological and electrical parameters of the system need to be monitored. This paper is on the development of a simple, reliable and high precision photovoltaic monitoring system, which obtains PV system parameters (i.e. PV panel temperature, irradiance, PV battery voltage, ambient temperature and humidity and PV system load current) in real time, display and store the parameters in personal computer. The system uses electronic sensors to obtain the PV system parameters, which are then processed by a microcontroller with Arduino Board and the parameters displayed in personal computer. C language was used for the microcontroller programming. From the experimental results obtained from the work, it shows that the parameters obtained using the developed systems have good correlations with those obtained using standard commercial instruments used in meteorological stations and laboratory for measurements of the same parameters. The mean bias error of the parameters obtained using the developed system to those obtained using meteorological/laboratory instruments are 0.043%, 0.0412%,-0.297% and 0.024% for solar radiation intensity, temperature, humidity and PV battery voltage measurements respectively. The research would provide PV end-users with important information that will be useful in improving PV system performance by reducing frequency of maintenance and also avoid PV system failure. http://dx.doi. org/10.4314/njt.v35i4. 27
Efficient, Superstabilizing Decentralised Optimisation for Dynamic Task Allocation Environments

Decentralised optimisation is a key issue for multi-agent systems, and while many solution techniques have been developed, few provide support for dynamic environments, which change over time, such as disaster management. Given this, in this paper, we present Bounded Fast Max Sum (BFMS): a novel, dynamic, superstabilizing algorithm which provides a bounded approximate solution to certain classes of distributed constraint optimisation problems. We achieve this by eliminating dependencies in the constraint functions, according to how much impact they have on the overall solution value. In more detail, we propose iGHS, which computes a maximum spanning tree on subsections of the constraint graph, in order to reduce communication and computation overheads. Given this, we empirically evaluate BFMS, which shows that BFMS reduces communication and computation done by Bounded Max Sum by up to 99%, while obtaining 60-88% of the optimal utility.
Inkjet-Printed Interdigital Bandpass Filter with Wide Stopband Using Multilayer Liquid Crystal Polymer Technique

This article presents a two-layer inkjet-printed interdigital bandpass filter using lamination bonding process on liquid crystal polymer (LCP) substrates for radio frequency electronic applications. Various percentages of torque force were applied over a 4 × 4 cm2 area with a 942 kg fixed force in the lamination bonding process. The insertion loss and surface morphology of the inkjet-printed silver film were examined on various torque forces to develop the lamination bonding process. The lamination bonding was performed at 12% torque and 270°C. A three-dimensional bandpass filter was realized with a of −2.2 dB at 11.5 GHz with a 17% fractional bandwidth. A multilayer inkjet-printed bandpass filter was successfully developed to verify the design methodology and fabrication of inkjet-printing technology and lamination bonding technique for a three-dimensional integrated circuit package.
Motion planning of rolling surfaces

In this paper, we address the issues of controllability and motion planning for the control system S/sub R/ that results from the rolling without slipping nor spinning of a two dimensional Riemmanian manifold M/sub 1/ onto another one M/sub 2/. In the first part of the paper, we describe precisely the control system under consideration together with its Lie algebraic structure. This leads to a recovery of the result of Agrachev and Sachkov (1999) who provided a necessary and sufficient condition on the manifolds for complete controllability of S/sub R/. In the main part of the paper, we present two procedures to tackle the motion planning problem when M/sub 1/ is a plane and M/sub 2/ a convex surface. The first approach is based on differential algebra. We show that S/sub R/ is a Liouvillian system and if M/sub 2/ has a symmetry of revolution, we compute a maximal linearizing output. The second technic consists of the use of a continuation method to attack the motion planning problem. Even though S/sub R/ admits nontrivial abnormal extremals, we are still able to successfully apply the continuation method if M/sub 2/ admits a stable periodic geodesic.
Imaging Concrete Structures Using Air-Coupled Impact-Echo

In this paper, air-coupled impact-echo is successfully applied for nondestructive evaluation of concrete. The air-coupled sensor is a small (6.3 mm diameter) measurement microphone located several centimeters above the top surface of the concrete being evaluated. Unwanted ambient acoustic noise is attenuated by a specially designed sound insulation enclosure. Test results show that air-coupled sensors are effective for impact-echo when appropriate impactors are used. Impact-echo data obtained by air-coupled sensors are equivalent to those obtained by conventional contact sensors. Test results from concrete slabs containing artificial delaminations and voids are reported, where an air-coupled impact-echo scan is conducted over the entire slab area. Defects are located in the generated two-dimensional contour image. The areal size of defects are accurately determined when the measurement point spacing in the scan is smaller than half of the expected defect size. Test results from air-coupled impact-echo scans carried out over internal metal and plastic ducts within another concrete slab are also reported. The goal of the experiment is to investigate the grouting condition inside the ducts. Impact-echo line scan images differentiate poorly grouted sections from the well-grouted sections within the metal duct.
Reservoir computing on nanophotonic chips

Reservoir computing is a decade old framework from the field of machine learning to use and train recurrent neural networks and it splits the network in a reservoir that does the computation and a simple readout function. This technique has been among the state-of-the- art for a broad class of classification and recognition problems such as time series prediction, speech recognition and robot control. However, so far implementations have been mainly software based, while a hardware implementation offers the promise of being low- power and fast. Despite essential differences between classical software implementation and a network of semiconductor optical amplifiers, we will show that photonic reservoirs can achieve an even better performance on a benchmark isolated digit recognition task, if the interconnection delay is optimized and the phase can be controlled. In this paper we will discuss the essential parameters needed to create an optimal photonic reservoir designed for a certain task. This design can lead to an efficient implementation of a photonic reservoir on a nanophotonic chip.
Joint Estimation of Additive and Dominance Effects of Markers Using a Genomic Model with a Residual Polygenic Effect

Routine genotyping of female animals in genomic selection programme opens up the opportunity to estimate non-additive genetic effects of SNP markers by using direct phenotypes of the genotyped cows. Non-additive effects of markers, e.g. dominance effects, provide useful information for genomic mating and herd management. We extended our current BLUP SNP genomic model, which includes a residual polygenic effect, to additionally estimate dominance effects of SNP markers. A new estimation algorithm was implemented to improve the rate of convergence for all estimated effects of the new genomic model. Parallel computing technique was applied to reduce the total clock time of the full estimation process. To study the convergence behaviour of the genomic dominance model, lactation yield deviations of cows and associated effective data contribution were obtained from German routine genetic evaluation for milk production and somatic cell scores based on a random regression test-day model. Genotypic and phenotypic data of a total of 17,635 cows were used to estimate dominance effects and breeding values of the SNP markers together with residual polygenic effects. Dominance variance of 5% and 10% of the total genetic variance were assumed to investigate the influence of dominance variance. Interim solutions of the model effects were compared to the final estimates from a long iteration process with 10,000 rounds. Based on the correlations between the dominance effect and breeding value estimates, it seems that the dominance effects of a large number of SNP markers can be accurately estimated and properly separated from the breeding value effects within a reasonable time frame. Further results on the convergence behaviour of the new genomic model are discussed.
Linking soil and water quality in conservation agricultural systems

Conservation agricultural systems (i.e., conservation tillage, cover crops, and pastures) that have high surface-soil organic C are highly effective in improving surface soil properties and processes, thus reducing water runoff and soil erosion and improving water quality. Literature was reviewed to document the important linkage that surface soil organic matter has on soil and water quality. Soil organic matter is a key property that drives many important soil functions, e.g. supplying and cycling of nutrients; infiltrating, filtering, and storing water; sequestering C from the atmosphere; and decomposing organic matter and xenobiotics. Stratification of soil organic matter with depth under various conservation agricultural systems was shown to influence water runoff volume and quality in studies across small plots, fields, and water catchments. Soil organic matter stratification with depth buffers soil and water quality against “normal” perturbations in agricultural systems. Perturbations of concern still remain with excessively high nutrient applications from fertilizer and manure inputs that can cause leaching of nitrate to groundwater and runoff of dissolved P to surface water bodies. To meet the human nutritional needs of the rapidly expanding global population while sustaining our invaluable natural resources, a multidisciplinary approach is needed to develop, characterize, and implement alternative, highly productive management systems that also conserve soil and water resources for the future.
Which Risk Attitude Components are related to Intelligence

In this thesis risk attitudes and inter-temporal choices are related to intelligence. By comparing and reviewing existing research on the subject the form and nature of this relation will be determined. Several subjective attitude components are considered: Likelihood insensitivity, risk aversion, and time preferences. Based on the combined knowledge of existing papers it is concluded that higher intelligence leads to more risk neutral and more patient behavior. For the component likelihood insensitivity indications of a relation are found, however to truly determine the nature of this relation more information and research is required.