Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Contribution to the Study of the Impact of Building Materials on the Urban Heat Island and the Energy Demand of Buildings

In this century, the world has already witnessed the biggest increase in its population in human history, which led to the increase of the use of the land and shrinking green areas. The main concern of the present thesis is the city which is characterized by higher nighttime temperature compared to rural areas. This phenomenon is known as an urban heat island (UHI). UHI leads to degraded comfort conditions both outdoor and indoor, and as a result, higher energy consumption for cooling. One of the main reasons for the UHI is the materials used for building envelope and urban areas. Many attempts have been made to avoid UHI by using a new type of materials such as using materials with high solar reflectance. In addition, these types of materials help minimize energy consumption if used on an urban scale. In our research, we address the building envelope design with respect to its main types of construction materials as well as its layer design and its shape to mitigate the urban heat island and achieve energy consumption reduction. The work is applied on one of the important residential complexes in Mosul city – Iraq, which will be constructed in many cities in Iraq. The weather of the Mosul city is characterized by hot semi-arid climate. In summer, the climate is dry and extremely hot, whereas it is very cold and the temperatures are down to below zero in winter. The main objective of this research is to propose an appropriate building envelope design and design strategy which provides high thermal performance regarding the exterior and interior surface temperature, high-level of indoor thermal comfort with minimum energy needed, reduce the air temperature difference between the city and its surrounding rural area. It tackles some important questions that are related to the case study: What is the relation between the building envelope design and the following aspects: 1. The external surfaces temperature of buildings and urban surfaces which lead to raise the air temperature, and finally contribute to the UHI phenomenon, 2. The indoor surfaces temperature of buildings which influence the indoor thermal comfort and the energy needed to maintain this level of comfort? To answer the research questions, simulations have been achieved by using Solene-microclimat. From simulation results, it is shown that it is possible to find different combinations of materials, forms and surface coatings to both to reduce the interior and exterior surfaces temperature and consequently, maintain indoor and outdoor thermal comfort. We also show that the strategy can be different depending on the surface exposure to the sun and the interaction between surfaces. We propose a methodology to find the best combination depending on the case study.
About calculation of the Hankel transform using preliminary wavelet transform

The purpose of this paper is to present an algorithm for evaluating Hankel transform of the null and the first kind. The result is the exact analytical representation as the series of the Bessel and Struve functions multiplied by the wavelet coefficients of the input function. Numerical evaluation of the test function with known analytical Hankel transform illustrates the proposed algorithm.
Modelo conceptual de "destination branding": Teste empírico no porto e norte de Portugal

The current study aims to develop and test a new conceptual model for destination branding, including and integrating the concepts of brand identity (brand associations), brand image, perceived quality, satisfation and loyalty. This study hypothesizes relationships among this constructs. This article aims to contribute to the conceptualization of destination branding that is identified as critical concept to the competitiveness of tourist destinations.
1-$\mu\hbox{m}$ Enhancement Mode GaAs N-Channel MOSFETs With Transconductance Exceeding 250 mS/mm

In this letter, 1-mum GaAs-based enhancement-mode n-channel devices with channel mobility of 5500 cm<sup>2</sup>/Vmiddots and g <sub>m</sub> exceeding 250 mS/mm have been fabricated. The measured device parameters including threshold voltage V<sub>th</sub>, maximum extrinsic transconductance g<sub>m</sub>, saturation current I<sub>dss </sub>, on-resistance R<sub>on</sub>, and gate current are 0.11 V, 254 mS/mm, 380 mA/mm, 4.5 Omegamiddotmm, and < 56 pA for a first wafer and 0.08 V, 229 mS/mm, 443 mA/mm, 4.5 Omegamiddotmm, and < 90 pA for a second wafer, respectively. With an intrinsic transconductance g<sub>mi</sub> of 434 mS/mm, GaAs enhancement-mode MOSFETs have reached expected intrinsic device performance
A new polynomial based SLAM algorithm for a mobile robot in an unknown indoor environment

In this work a novel solution to the Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) problem for a mobile robot moving in an unknown indoor environment is proposed. The algorithm uses an Extended Kalman filter and a set of polynomials to map the robot surrounding environment boundaries. The main idea behind the proposed SLAM solution is to use the SLAM landmark extraction process to map the environment boundaries shape and the Kalman filter to estimate boundaries position. The algorithm uses measurements taken from a set of distance sensors placed on the robot. The proposed method has been evaluated in both numerical and experimental tests obtaining satisfactory estimation and mapping results.
POSTER: STAR (Space-Time Adaptive and Reductive) Algorithms for Real-World Space-Time Optimality

It's important to hit a space-time balance for a real-world algorithm to achieve high performance on modern shared-memory multi-core or many-core systems. However, a large class of dynamic programs with more than $O(1)$ dependency achieve optimality either in space or time, but not both. In the literature, the problem is known as the fundamental space-time tradeoff. By exploiting properly on the runtime system, we show that our STAR (Space-Time Adaptive and Reductive) technique can help these dynamic programs to achieve sublinear parallel time bounds while still maintaining work-, space-, and cache-optimality in a processor- and cache-oblivious fashion.
Determinants of Enterprise Risk Management Adoption: An Empirical Analysis of Malaysian Public Listed Firms

influential factors of ERM adoptions by public listed firms in Malaysia. Findings:The two factors of financial leverage and auditor type were found to be significant influential factors for ERM adoption. In other words the findings indicated that firms with higher financial leverage and with a Big Four auditor are more likely to have a form of ERM framework in place. Originality/Value:Since there are relatively few studies conducted in this area and specially in developing economies like Malaysia, this study will broaden the scope of literature by providing novel empirical evidence.
Positive control of sporulation-specific genes by the IME1 and IME2 products in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

In the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, meiosis and spore formation require the induction of sporulation-specific genes. Two genes are thought to activate the sporulation program: IME1 and IME2 (inducer of meiosis). Both genes are induced upon entry into meiosis, and IME1 is required for IME2 expression. We report here that IME1 is essential for expression of four sporulation-specific genes. In contrast, IME2 is not absolutely essential for expression of the sporulation-specific genes, but contributes to their rapid induction. Expression of IME2 from a heterologous promoter permits the expression of these sporulation-specific genes, meiotic recombination, and spore formation in the absence of IME1. We propose that the IME1 and IME2 products can each activate sporulation-specific genes independently. In addition, the IME1 product stimulates sporulation-specific gene expression indirectly through activation of IME2 expression.
Spontaneous Mutations in Diploid Saccharomyces cerevisiae

We performed a 1012-generation mutation-accumulation (MA) experiment in the yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The MA lines exhibited a significant reduction in mean fitness and a significant increase in variance in fitness. We found that 5.75% of the fitness-altering mutations accumulated were beneficial. This finding contradicts the widely held belief that nearly all fitness-altering mutations are deleterious. The mutation rate was estimated as 6.3 × 10−5 mutations per haploid genome per generation and the average heterozygous fitness effect of a mutation as 0.061. These estimates are compatible with previous estimates in yeast.
Algorithms for computing the volume and other integral properties of solids. II. A family of algorithms based on representation conversion and cellular approximation

This paper discusses a family of algorithms for computing the volume, moments of inertia, and other integral properties of geometrically complex solids, e.g. typical mechanical parts. The algorithms produce approximate decompositions of solids into cuboid cells whose integral properties are easy to compute. The paper focuses on versions of the algorithms which operate on solids represented by Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG), i.e., as set-theoretical combinations of primitive solid “building blocks. ” Two known algorithms are summarized and a new algorithm is presented. The efficiencies and accuracies of the three algorithms are analyzed theoretically and compared experimentally. The new algorithm uses recursive subdivision to convert CSG representations of complex solids into approximate cellular decompositions based on variably sized blocks. Experimental data show that the new algorithm is efficient and has predictable accuracy. It also has other potential applications, e.g., in producing approximate octree representations of complex solids and in robot navigation.
Lower and upper bounds for the generalized Marcum and Nuttall Q-functions

Monotonicity criteria are established for the generalized Marcum Q-function QM (alpha, beta) and the standard Nuttall Q-function QM,N (alpha, beta). Specifically, we present that QM (alpha, beta) is monotonically increasing with regard to its order M, for all ranges of the parameters alpha, beta, whereas QM,N (alpha, beta) possesses analogous monotonicity behavior with respect to M + N, under the assumptions of a ges 1 and constant difference M mnplus N ges 1. For the normalized Nuttall Q-function QM,N (alpha, beta), we also state the same monotonicity criterion without the necessity of restricting the range of the parameter alpha. By exploiting these results, we propose closed-form upper and lower bounds for the standard and normalized Nuttall Q-functions, which for the latter case seem to be very tight. Furthermore, concerning the generalized Marcum Q-function, specific tight upper and lower bounds, that have already been proposed in the literature for the case of integer M, are appropriately utilized in order to extend its validity over real values of M. The offered theoretical results can be efficiently applied in the study of digital communications over fading channels, the capacity analysis of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) channels and the decoding of turbo or low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes.
All trees are six-cordial

For any integer $k>0$, a tree $T$ is $k$-cordial if there exists a labeling of the vertices of $T$ by $\mathbb{Z}_k$, inducing a labeling on the edges with edge-weights found by summing the labels on vertices incident to a given edge modulo $k$ so that each label appears on at most one more vertex than any other and each edge-weight appears on at most one more edge than any other. We prove that all trees are six-cordial by an adjustment of the test proposed by Hovey (1991) to show all trees are $k$-cordial.
Decentralized Sequential Hypothesis Testing Using Asynchronous Communication

An asymptotically optimum test for the problem of decentralized sequential hypothesis testing is presented. The induced communication between sensors and fusion center is asynchronous and limited to 1-bit data. When the sensors observe continuously stochastic processes with continuous paths, the proposed test is order-2 asymptotically optimal, in the sense that its inflicted performance loss is bounded. When the sensors take discrete time observations, the proposed test achieves order-1 asymptotic optimality, i.e., the ratio of its performance over the optimal performance tends to 1. Moreover, we show theoretically and corroborate with simulations that the performance of the suggested test in discrete time can be significantly improved when the sensors sample their underlying continuous time processes more frequently, a property which is not enjoyed by other centralized or decentralized tests in the literature.
Performance Modeling for Hierarchical Partitioning in Heterogeneous Multi-Core Environment

Considering application behavior in graph partitioning is an arduous task because of the chickenand-egg problem: the application behavior depends on how the finite element (FE) mesh is decomposed while achieving load balance requires the knowledge of how the application utilizes the underlying resources. Recent advances in multi-core processors further complicate the endeavor by introducing undeterministic hardware diversity and intra-node contention. As an attempt to quantify performance for partitioning refinement, we propose a model that predicts execution times of iterative mesh-based applications running on heterogeneous multi-core clusters. Apart from considering resource heterogeneity, the model takes into account hierarchical communication characteristics, overlap between computation and communication, as well as performance penalties due to intra-node contention. We present a detailed methodology on how to obtain key parameters from a real system and pinpoint potential pitfalls of conventional approaches in obtaining the parameters. Experiments were conducted using a synthetic application benchmark solving a partial differential equation. Evaluation shows a good agreement between actual time measurement and the performance model.
Mutational specificity in a shuttle vector replicating in chromium(VI)‐treated mammalian cells

An SV40‐based shuttle vector, pZ189, was used to characterize the mutation specificity and to explore the mechanism of chromium mutagenesis in mammalian cells. We showed previously that mutagenic DNA damage is induced by the treatment of plasmid with chromium(VI) plus glutathione in vitro. The induced mutation pattern suggested that chromium mutagenesis can be induced by the generation of reactive oxygen intermediates. To further investigate the mechanism of chromium mutagenesis, we treated cultured mammalian cells containing normal pZ189 vector with chromium(VI). Mutations were induced by Cr(VI) in a dose‐dependent manner. The majority of base substitution mutations were widely distributed across the supF mutation target gene and occurred mainly at GC basepairs. Overall, the mutation spectra were not significantly different from each other except for a mutation hot spot at position 43, observed only in plasmids from Cr(VI)‐treated cells. The characteristics of Cr(VI)‐induced mutations were similar to those observed in the mutation spectra induced by H2O2 treatment of the pZ189 plasmid or plasmid‐containing cells. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that induction of mutations by chromium in cultured cells occurs through the generation of oxidative DNA damage. Environ. Mol. Mutagen. 33:313–319, 1999 © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Results on the Spin-Dependent Scattering of Weakly Interacting Massive Particles on Nucleons from the Run 3 Data of the LUX Experiment.

We present experimental constraints on the spin-dependent WIMP (weakly interacting massive particle)-nucleon elastic cross sections from LUX data acquired in 2013. LUX is a dual-phase xenon time projection chamber operating at the Sanford Underground Research Facility (Lead, South Dakota), which is designed to observe the recoil signature of galactic WIMPs scattering from xenon nuclei. A profile likelihood ratio analysis of 1.4×10^{4} kg day of fiducial exposure allows 90% C.L. upper limits to be set on the WIMP-neutron (WIMP-proton) cross section of σ_{n}=9.4×10^{-41} cm^{2} (σ_{p}=2.9×10^{-39} cm^{2}) at 33 GeV/c^{2}. The spin-dependent WIMP-neutron limit is the most sensitive constraint to date.
Multi-feature canonical correlation analysis for face photo-sketch image retrieval

Automatic face photo-sketch image retrieval has attracted great attention in recent years due to its important applications in real life. The major difficulty in automatic face photo-sketch image retrieval lies in the fact that there exists great discrepancy between the different image modalities (photo and sketch). In order to reduce such discrepancy and improve the performance of automatic face photo-sketch image retrieval, we propose a new framework called multi-feature canonical correlation analysis (MCCA) to effectively address this problem. The MCCA is an extension and improvement of the canonical correlation analysis (CCA) algorithmusing multiple features combined with two different random sampling methods in feature space and sample space. In this framework, we first represent each photo or sketch using a patch-based local feature representation scheme, in which histograms of oriented gradients (HOG) and multi-scale local binary pattern (MLBP) serve as the local descriptors. Canonical correlation analysis (CCA) is then performed on a collection of random subspaces to construct an ensemble of classifiers for photo-sketch image retrieval. Extensive experiments on two public-domain face photo-sketch datasets (CUFS and CUFSF) clearly show that the proposed approach obtains a substantial improvement over the state-of-the-art.
A numerical study of tidal farm efficiency in the Western Passage, US and Canada

Turbines are implemented in the regional ocean circulation model to determine the energy extraction efficiency of tidal farms. A power curve is determined for different values of flow blockage when 10 turbines are distributed evenly across the Western Passage in the middle 1/3 of the water column. A speed reduction coefficient of 0.6 represents the most efficient case with ~ 3.95% of the undisturbed in-stream energy being taken. Efficiency is also estimated for different densities and distributions of turbines. The optimum density for a single row appears to be one turbine in every three cells. When turbines are allocated on parallel rows in the direct shadow of one to another the efficiency is reduced because of the wakes, whereas in the lattice form the efficiency is benefited from the speed gain in turbine gaps produced by the neighboring rows.
ATLAS: A Flexible and Extensible Architecture for Linguistic Annotation

We describe a formal model for annotating linguistic artifacts, from which we derive an application programming interface (API) to a suite of tools for manipulating these annotations. The abstract logical model provides for a range of storage formats and promotes the reuse of tools that interact through this API. We focus first on “Annotation Graphs,” a graph model for annotations on linear signals (such as text and speech) indexed by intervals, for which efficient database storage and querying techniques are applicable. We note how a wide range of existing annotated corpora can be mapped to this annotation graph model. This model is then generalized to encompass a wider variety of linguistic “signals,” including both naturally occuring phenomena (as recorded in images, video, multi-modal interactions, etc.), as well as the derived resources that are increasingly important to the engineering of natural language processing systems (such as word lists, dictionaries, aligned bilingual corpora, etc.). We conclude with a review of the current efforts towards implementing key pieces of this architecture.
A Multiwavelength Study of the Massive Star-forming Region S87

This article presents a multiwavelength study toward S87, based on a data set of submillimeter/far-infrared/mid-infrared (submillimeter/FIR/MIR) images and molecular line maps. The submillimeter continuum emission measured with JCMT SCUBA reveals three individual clumps, namely, SMM 1, SMM 2, and SMM 3. The MIR/FIR images obtained by the Spitzer Space Telescope indicate that both SMM 1 and SMM 3 harbor point sources. The J = 1–0 transitions of CO,13CO, C18O, and HCO+, measured with the 13.7 m telescope of the Purple Mountain Observatory, exhibit asymmetric line profiles. Our analysis of spectral energy distributions (SEDs) shows that all three of the submillimeter clumps are massive (110-210 M☉), with average dust temperatures in the range ~20-40 K. A multiwavelength comparison convinces us that the asymmetric profiles of molecular lines should result from two clouds at slightly different velocities, and it further confirms that the star-forming activity in SMM 1 is stimulated by a cloud-cloud collision. The stellar contents and SEDs suggest that SMM 1 and SMM 3 are high-mass and intermediate-mass star-forming sites, respectively. However, SMM 2 has no counterpart below 70 μm, which is likely to be a cold high-mass starless core. These results, as mentioned above, expose multiple phases of star formation in S87.
Ambient Culture: A Possible Future for Entertainment Computing

We provide an overview over cultural differences between East and West, as starting point for the development of entertainment technology towards cultural transformation. We argue for the importance of future entertainmant technology to contribute to cultural transformation processes in the large. We introduce and discuss the ZENetic Computer for the East and the ALICE project for the West. Our concept of Kansei Mediation is supposed to guide the development of theories and frameworks in the context of 'ambient culture'.
Efficient Hardware Implementation of SHA-3 Candidate Grøstl using FPGA

In 2007 NIST announced a public competition to develop a new cryptographic hash algorithm. This competition was announced due to the fact that in recent years, several successful attacks have been reported against SHA-1, thus raised significant alarming conditions against SHA-2. This new algorithm will replace the SHA-2 and can be used in various security applications in the information infrastructure. This paper focuses on efficient implementation of one of the SHA-3 candidates and round-3 finalist Grostl on FPGA. The aim of this work is to achieve high throughput to area ratio (TPA) simultaneously by achieving high throughput by considering tradeoff between area and speed. The design is implemented as fully autonomous with both permutations P and Q are executed in parallel, and are equipped with I/O wrapper. The developed hardware has two designs, first with S-box is implemented using Look-Up-Table (LUT) or Distributed Memory and second with S-box implemented as Block RAM (BRAM). The implementation results obtained using virtex-5, when S-box is implemented as LUT has a throughput of 9.360Gbps and occupied 2253 Slices including I/O wrapper, thus achieves TPA of 4.154 and when S-box implemented as BRAM has throughput of 5.565Gbps and occupied 1356 Slices with wrapper, thus achieves 4.104 throughput per unit area (TPA) .