Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Long-Term Differential and Averaged Deformation of Box-Type Pre-stressed Concrete Exposed to Natural Environment

Middle-scale box-sectional hollow PC ducts, which consist of heterogeneous concrete with different mix proportions, were exposed to natural environments for about three years, and the long-term curvature and axial mean deformation, which have much to do with deflection of long span bridge viaducts, was gaged for verification of coupled thermo-hygral and multi-scale models. The associated internal moisture and the local climate inside micro-pores were measured and the effect of precipitation was quantified over yearly four seasons. The moisture migration linked with concrete multi-scale mechanics was analyzed and the simulation results are compared with the field exposure tests. The reliability of the thermo-hygral analysis, which has been used for estimating the long-term serviceability of bridges, was made firmer.
Move to Markets? An Empirical Analysis of Privatization in Developing Countries

We analyze when, and to a lesser extent how, privatization occurred in a group of thirty-five low or middle-income developing countries. The theoretical perspective turns on the concept of net political benefits, which in our model is the primary determinant of privatization policies. Privatization is a means to an end, of course, rather than an end in itself. But we proceed under the assumption that policymakers have decided, for whatever reason, that privatization is a desirable goal. The decision to privatize is captured here in three related, but distinct, dependent variables: (1) timing, (2) pace, and (3) intensity. Our notion of the independent variable, "net political benefits," is not measured directly, but is instead proxied by an array of macroeconomic, political, and institutional variables. Our key finding is that, though political benefits turn out to explain the timing, pace, and intensity of privatization, the effects are very different in each case. From the theoretical framework, we hypothesize that net political benefits positively affects the timing, pace, and intensity of privatization. The timing hypothesis is tested using a Cox proportional hazard model. The Pace hypothesis is tested using a random effects negative binomial model. The intensity hypothesis is tested using the random effects model. Analyzing the causal relationships in the three models provides a macro overview of the privatization process between 1982-99. The decision to begin to privatize (timing) is fundamentally different from the choice to implement select particular units to privatize (pace) and begin to sell off assets (intensity). In fact, we find that the factors that improve timing delay intensity: early adopters are later implementers. Furthermore, we find that a privatization policy is much more like to be a crisis-driven, last ditch effort to turn the economy around, rather than a carefully chosen policy with explicit, long-term goals. A related, and very important, finding in our analysis has to do with the "lock-in" of institutions. Large public sectors create significant pressures for privatization, in terms of timing, but large public sectors also endow important political actors with powerful resources for delaying, or blocking completely, the implementation of privatization policies. The particular form of political institutions, foreign aid regimes, and level of development of property rights systems in the nation have significant conditioning influences on the extent of lock-in. These relationships may be important for informing policy decisions, and for understanding apparent "failures" of privatization policies.
New method for mathematical modelling of human visual speech

Audio-visual speech recognition and visual speech synthesisers are used as interfaces between humans and machines. Such interactions specifically rely on the analysis and synthesis of both audio and visual information, which humans use for face-to-face communication. Currently, there is no global standard to describe these interactions nor is there a standard mathematical tool to describe lip movements. Furthermore, the visual lip movement for each phoneme is considered in isolation rather than a continuation from one to another. Consequently, there is no globally accepted standard method for representing lip movement during articulation. This thesis addresses these issues by designing a transcribed group of words, by mathematical formulas, and so introducing the concept of a visual word, allocating signatures to visual words and finally building a visual speech vocabulary database. In addition, visual speech information has been analysed in a novel way by considering both lip movements and phonemic structure of the English language. In order to extract the visual data, three visual features on the lip have been chosen; these are on the outer upper, lower and corner of the lip. The extracted visual data during articulation is called the visual speech sample set. The final visual data is obtained after processing the visual speech sample sets to correct experimented artefacts such as head tilting, which happened during articulation and visual data extraction. The ‘Barycentric Lagrange Interpolation’ (BLI) formulates the visual speech sample sets into visual speech signals. The visual word is defined in this work and consists of the variation of three visual features. Further processing on relating the visual speech signals to the uttered word leads to the allocation of signatures that represent the visual word. This work suggests the visual word signature can be used either as a ‘visual word barcode’, a ‘digital visual word’ or a ‘2D/3D representations’. The 2D version of the visual word provides a unique signature that allows the identification of the words being uttered. In addition, identification of visual words has also been performed using a technique called ‘volumetric representations of the visual words’. Furthermore, the effect of altering the amplitudes and sampling rate for BLI has been evaluated. In addition, the performance of BLI in reconstructing the visual speech sample sets has been considered. Finally, BLI has been compared to signal reconstruction approach by RMSE and correlation coefficients. The results show that the BLI is the more reliable method for the purpose of this work according to Section 7.7.
A Simple Strategy to Mitigate the Aliasing Effect in X-band Marine Radar Data: Numerical Results for a 2D Case

For moderate and high speed values of the sea surface current, an aliasing phenomenon, due to an under-sampling in the time-domain, can strongly affect the reconstruction of the sea surface elevation derived from X-band radar images. Here, we propose a de-aliasing strategy that exploits the physical information provided by the dispersion law for gravity waves. In particular, we utilize simplifying hypotheses and numerical tests with synthetic data are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the presented method.
Preterm Premature Rupture of Membranes Complicating Twin Pregnancy: Management Considerations

Preterm premature rupture of membranes (PPROM) is more prevalent in twin gestations and is major contributor to preterm birth. The management of PPROM in twin pregnancies does not differ significantly from that of singletons. In general, antenatal steroids, latency antibiotics, magnesium sulpfate for neuroprotection, and tocolysis are all potential interventions to consider when PPROM complicates a twin gestation. Certain circumstances, such as PPROM following an invasive procedure, at a previable gestational age, or in a monochorionic gestation, warrant special attention as the implications of PPROM and subsequent recommendations for these twin pregnancies may differ. In general, the approach to PPROM in twins should be individualized based on gestational age, and the maternal and neonatal risks of delaying delivery to prolong the pregnancy.
Technique and Results of the Anterior-to-Posterior-to-Anterior Approach in Revision Endoscopic Sinus Surgery

Objective: To perform the anterior-to-posterior-to-anterior technique in revision endoscopic sinus surgery, and to assess the effects and safety of this technique in treating recurrent chronic sinusitis and nasal polyps. Methods: One hundred and thirteen patients with recurrent chronic sinusitis and nasal polyps received anterior-to-posterior-to-anterior revision endoscopic sinus surgery. This surgical technique has 5 important steps, including exposing the choana, enlarging the maxillary sinus ostium, opening the sphenoid sinus and posterior ethmoid sinus anteriorly to posteriorly, resecting the ethmoid sinus posteriorly to anteriorly, and opening the frontal sinus posteriorly to anteriorly. The choana, maxillary sinus ostium, middle turbinate remnant, and the roof and lateral wall of the sphenoid sinus are 4 stable anatomic reference points. Results: Twelve months postoperatively, the mean SNOT-22 score had improved by 18.48 and 100 (88.50%) patients had an improvement in nasal obstruction; thick nasal discharge, loss of smell or taste, and facial pain/pressure improvements were noted in 102 (90.27%), 64 (56.64%) and 76 (67.26%) patients, respectively. Postoperative endoscopic evaluation after 12 months indicated that 29 (25.66%), 12 (10.62%), 5 (4.42%), 6 (5.31%), and 2 (1.77%) patients had mucosal edema, nasal discharge, synechiae, polyps, and crusting, respectively. No severe complications were observed. Conclusion: The anterior-to-posterior-to-anterior technique is an effective and safe approach to revision endoscopic sinus surgery. The 4 stable anatomic reference points are helpful for preventing severe complications in total ethmoidectomy.
A Life Course Approach to Chronic Disease Epidemiology

Ed Diana Kuh, Yoav Ben-Shlomo Oxford University Press, £45, pp 317 ISBN 0 19 2627821 Rating: ! [Graphic][1] ! [Graphic][2] ! [Graphic][3] The 20th century has seen a remarkable shift in the health of populations in industrialised countries. For example, life expectancy in England and Wales has risen from 48.5 years in men and 52.4 years in women in 1901 to 74.4 and 79.6 years respectively in 1996. The main causes of death in 1901 were bronchitis, pulmonary tuberculosis, and pneumonia; in 1996 they were ischaemic heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, and pneumonia. Changes of this size imply that different factors influence health today from at the start of the century. … [1]: /embed/inline-graphic-1.gif [2]: /embed/inline-graphic-2.gif [3]: /embed/inline-graphic-3.gif
Controversies in interventional cardiology: eminence, common sense, and evidence.

Download the Issue @ a Glance podcast Subscribe to the EHJ Podcast ! [Graphic][1] Interventional Cardiology has revolutionized cardiovascular medicine over the last three decades. Starting with a simple balloon1 and later bare-metal and drug-eluting stents and scaffolds2 ( Figure 1 ), numerous new devices including occluders for patent foramen ovale3 and atrial as well as ventricular septal defects, and recently for catheter-based valve implantation,4,5 have been developed and also partly tested in first-in-men studies and randomized trials. In his ESC Lecture ‘ Interventional cardiology, where real life and science do not necessarily meet ’, Bernhard Meier from the University Hospital Bern in Switzerland challenges the concept that evidence-based diagnosis, decision-making, and therapy is and should primarily guide the field.6 He notes that generating and publishing evidence is a tedious job according to ever new and tightened research practice regulations.7 Rules will never prevent the typical human behaviour to show new things as being shinier and old things as being dustier than they really are. He continues by discussing examples of misguidance by poorly produced or misinterpreted evidence. Coronary stents, for instance, were first underestimated due to the fact that they were generally used in bailout situations2 where the outcome remained rather dismal. Then they were overused rather to the detriment of the patient. Now with drug-eluting stents, the overuse persists, but, due to the lower rate of restenosis8 and stent thrombosis,9 is no longer a concern. However, the enhanced potential of drug-eluting stents compared with bare-metal stents was poorly exploited for >10 years because of reports that slipped through the net of good review and publication practice to convey the untenable message that bare-metal stents were preferable.10 Further, Meier believes that the use of fractional flow reserve for decision-making1 … [1]: /embed/inline-graphic-1.gif
Socioeconomic differences in childhood growth trajectories: at what age do height inequalities emerge?

Background Socioeconomic differentials in adult height are frequently observed, but the age at which these inequalities emerge and the patterns they follow through childhood are unknown. Subjects and Methods Using data from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), height trajectories from birth to 10 years (N=12366) were modelled. Individual trajectories were estimated using mixed-effects models. Differences in trajectories by socioeconomic position (SEP) were investigated. Results There was a clear gradient in birth length across categories of maternal education; average birth length in boys was 0.41 cm lower in the lowest maternal education category compared with the highest, which is 0.9% of the average birth length for the highest SEP category (equivalent results for girls 0.65 cm, 1.3%). Socioeconomic differences in childhood growth were small, and only resulted in minimal widening of the height inequality with increasing age. By the age of 10 years, the mean difference between children in the lowest and highest maternal education categories was 1.4 cm for boys and 1.7 cm for girls; similar proportionate differences to those seen at birth (1.0% for boys and 1.2% for girls). Patterns were the same when father's education or household occupational social class were used to measure SEP. Conclusions The socioeconomic differential in height during childhood in this cohort of children born in the UK in the 1990s arises largely through inequalities in birth length, with small increases in the inequality from differences in growth in later childhood.
A Deterministic Profiling Approach to support Behaviour Anomaly Detection

Tracking Behavior Anomalies for identifying user impersonations is a field of active research. While various approaches have been used, it remains true that this process is still not deterministic or controllable enough for practical use. We present a new approach that aims to make the process of profiling behavior patterns of users deterministic by using a Rule-base to assign scores to various events. This also makes such a system highly controllable by permitting real-time modifications to the rule base. By combining asymmetric encryption with an XML based representation of behavior information, we have also made the profiling process a one-way task, where a compromised profile does not reveal sensitive information about the profiled user. We developed and tested a software system to evaluate the concept, and through this we have demonstrated how it is possible to ensure that reporting and monitoring components distributed over a network are not compromised, and our entire system functions on an XML based open, secure protocol. We also discuss the applicability of network packet capture as a source of behavior information. Our results indicate that we have been able to develop a deterministic, secure and extensible framework for distributed behavior anomaly detection.
Uncertain Temporal Observations in Diagnosis

In diagnosis, the notion of observation varies according to the class of considered systems. In discrete-event systems, an observation usually consists of a sequence, or a set of sequences, of totally ordered observable events. This paper extends the concept of discrete-event observation in several ways. First, observable events (messages) may be uncertain in nature, both in behavioral models and in system observations. Uncertain messages are specified by variables ranging on finite sets of observable labels. Second, messages relevant to a system observation are accommodated within a DAG, the observation graph, whose edges define a partial temporal ordering among (uncertain) messages. This way, an observation graph implicitly defines a finite set of system observations in the traditional sense. Consequently, solving a diagnostic problem amounts to solving at one time several traditional diagnostic problems. Finally, the (possibly distributed) reconstruction of the system behavior is further complicated by the fact that homonymous observable labels can be shared by different components. This raises the need of dealing with null messages. The method is appropriate for several real systems, where messages may get lost, are noisy, or attached timestamps are generated by different clocks.
Use of cyanoacrylate glue for persistent post-dural puncture cerebrospinal fluid leak

A nine year‐old girl (12 kg) with a history of multiple laparotomies presented for surgical repair of vesico‐cutaneous fistula and ileostomy closure. The anaesthetic plan was general anaesthesia (GA) with epidural analgesia for post‐operative pain relief. Epidural catheter insertion was attempted under GA at T8‐T9 inter‐space with 18‐G Tuohy needle. There was an accidental dural puncture at a depth of 2 cm and consequently epidural catheterization was abandoned. The puncture site was covered with sterile dressing and the surgery completed under balanced GA with intravenous opioids for peri‐operative analgesia. Post‐operatively, on day 3 clear fluid leaking from epidural puncture site was noticed during dressing change. Laboratory analysis of the fluid showed composition consistent with CSF with no microbial growth. There were no clinical signs or symptoms such as lower back pain, lower extremity weakness or pain, decreased lower extremity reflexes, inability to stand, headache, dizziness, vision problems or seizures. The rate of leak of CSF was approximately one drop every 3 or 4 seconds and the leak increased on crying. The leak did not respond to pressure dressing and bed rest. On the 5th post‐operative day, the patient was posted for re exploration for anastomotic bowel leak under GA. We applied a liquid tissue adhesive (Dermabond; Ethicon, Inc., Somerville, NJ, USA) (2‐octylcyanoacrylate) aseptically on the epidural skin puncture wound. The glue was allowed to polymerize and a dressing applied. The CSF leak ceased after its application. Unfortunately, 8 days later the child had a second bout of sepsis with bowel leak and underwent another re‐exploration under GA. She succumbed to refractory septic shock 3 days after this surgery.
Deposition of polytetrafluoroethylene nanoparticles on graphene oxide/polyester fabrics for oil adsorption

Novel hierarchically structured fabrics were successfully fabricated by coating graphene oxide (GO) and depositing polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) nanoparticles on the surface of polyester (PET) fibres through suction filtration and magnetron sputtering, respectively. The structure, morphology and properties of the PTFE/GO/PET composite fabrics were characterised. The results revealed that the GO sheets had coated the surface of PET fabrics completely and the PTFE nanoparticles deposited on the GO/PET fabrics were compact and uniform. The as-prepared PTFE/GO/PET fabric showed the outstanding hydrophobic property that the contact angle (CA) reached up to 139°. Besides, the PTFE/GO/PET fabrics exhibited a remarkable capacity of adsorbing various organic solvents and oils from wastewater. More importantly, the CA and adsorption capacity of the PTFE/GO/PET fabrics showed no decrease anymore after 10 times of recycling use. The as-prepared material possesses a potential ability to adsorb organic solvents and oil from wastewater.
Multi-Layer Printed Shear Force Sensor on Flexible Substrates

— Printed electronics technology is a promising way of fabricating low-cost electronics without the need for masking and etching. In recent years, additive printing techniques, such as inkjet and screen printing, have been adopted to fabricate low-cost and large-area electronics on flexible substrates. In this work, the design of a 3-axial normal and shear force sensor was developed, that consists of four miniaturized printed capacitors. The partially overlapping electrodes are arranged in a manner so that force sensitivity in orthogonal directions is achieved. The base unit of this sensor has been fabricated using inkjet-printing and characterized. The force response of this sensor was investigated in a force range from 0.1 N to 8 N, the normal-force sensitivity was determined to be S z = 5.2 fF/N and the shear-force sensitivity was S y = 13.1 fF/N. Due to its sensing range, this sensor could be applicable in tactile sensing systems.
Block codes capable of correcting both additive and timing errors

Binary block codes are constructed that are capable of correcting successive timing errors such as the deletion or insertion of s bits (s\leq D) within a single additive burst of errors of length b or less (b=f+g+2D) , where f and D are the design parameters that specify the length of correctable successive timing errors and g is the length of the correctable additive burst. A decoding algorithm is given and the efficiency of these codes is discussed.