Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Distribution and status of breeding landbirds in northern Sonora Mexico

Northern Sonora, Mexico is dominated by steep elevation and rainfall gradients and a variety of vegetation communities with affi nity to the Sonoran, Madrean, Sinaloan, and Chihuahuan biogeographic provinces. Despite high environmental diversity and moderate accessibility, current information on distribution and abundance of breeding landbirds is limited throughout much of this vast region. Between 2000 and 2007, I surveyed landbirds in northern Sonora in four of the six primary watersheds that occur within 125 km of the US. I detected 161 species of landbirds that I presumed were breeding (59% confi rmed) and four additional species that were possibly breeding during 568 site visits to 306 localities. I did not detect seven species that had been presumed to breed in the past, six of which likely still occur, or 10 species that I suspect may breed locally or irregularly in the study area. Based on probabilistic methods, I estimate that as many as 178 species of landbirds likely breed in the study area. Species richness within each of 16 secondary watershed regions increased as the number of major vegetation communities that were present increased, and presence of broadleaf riparian woodland, Madrean evergreen woodland, and Madrean montane conifer forest had the greatest infl uence on richness. Geographic ranges of many species that I observed were much larger than that suggested by previous studies likely as a result of increased effort. Evidence for some species however, suggested that distributions have either expanded or contracted, likely as a result of major changes in vegetation and perhaps climate change. Although some populations await discovery, my fi ndings suggest that northern Sonora supports higher richness of breeding landbirds than any other region of similar area in the borderlands of northern Mexico.
International Journal of Advanced Research in Computer Science and Software Engineering

— The traditional information retrieval techniques does not meet the user’s demand, so there is need to develop an efficient system for content based image retrieval (CBIR). In this paper method is proposed for an efficient CBIR system using Radial basis function (RBF) which can give better results than other existing CBIR. The proposed system use the Scale Invariant Feature Transform (SIFT) to extract the feature from the database. Illumination changes does not affect the system performance due to these SIFT features. These features generate keypoints. The distances between feature vectors of database and the query image are computed using the classifier RBF.
Understanding and Analyzing Appraisal Systems in the Underground Marketplaces

—An appraisal system is a feedback mechanism that has gained popularity in underground marketplaces. This system allows appraisers, who receive free samples from vendors, to provide assessments (i.e., appraisal reviews) for products in underground marketplaces. In this paper, we present the first measurement study on the appraisal system within underground marketplaces. Specifically, from 17M communication traces from eight marketplaces spanning from Feb 2006 to Mar 2023, we discover 56,229 appraisal reviews posted by 18,701 unique ap-praisers. We look into the appraisal review ecosystem, revealing five commonly used requirements and merits in the appraiser selection process. These findings indicate that the appraisal system is a well-established and structured process within the underground marketplace ecosystem. Furthermore, we reveal the presence of high-quality and unique cyber threat intelligence (CTI) in appraisal reviews. For example, we identify the ge-olocations of followers for a social booster and programming languages used for malware. Leveraging our extraction model, which integrates 41 distinct types of CTI, we capture 23,978 artifacts associated with 16,668 (50.2%) appraisal reviews. In contrast, artifacts are found in only 8.9% of listings and 2.7% of non-appraisal reviews. Our study provides valuable insights into this under-explored source of CTI, complementing existing research on threat intelligence gathering.
Association between beta-blocker utilization and heart failure mortality in the peritoneal dialysis population: a cohort study

ABSTRACT Background The prognostic significance of beta(β)-blocker therapy in patients at end-stage renal disease, specifically those receiving peritoneal dialysis (PD) and presenting with heart failure, remains inadequately elucidated due to limited research conducted thus far. Methods A retrospective analysis was performed on a cohort comprising 608 patients receiving PD between September 2007 and March 2019, with a subsequent follow-up period extending until December 2020. Cox regression and propensity score matching weighted analysis was used to model adjusted hazard ratios for β-blocker use with heart failure-related mortality. Competing risk analysis and subgroup analysis were carried out to further elucidate the correlation. Results β-blockers were prescribed for 56.1% of the peritoneal dialysis patients. Heart failure occurred in 43.4% of the total population and 15.5% of deaths were due to heart failure. The prescription of β-blockers was associated with a 43% lower adjusted hazard ratio (HR) for heart failure death within the cohort (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.36–0.89; P = 0.013). Even after accounting for competing risk events, patients in the group using β-blockers demonstrated a significantly lower cumulative risk of heart failure-related mortality compared to those not using β-blockers (P = 0.007). This protective effect of β-blockers was also observed in subgroup analyses. Conversely, β-blocker use had no statistically significant associations with all-cause mortality. Conclusion The use of β-blockers was associated with a reduced risk of heart failure-related mortality in the PD population. Future randomized clinical trials are warranted to confirm the beneficial effect of β-blockers in the context of PD.
Optimal Feeding Strategy on Microalgae Growth in Fed-Batch Bioreactor Model

Some countries in the world turn to alternative energy source to fulfill their necessity of fuel. One of the alternative fuels is biodiesel. Raw material of biodiesel can be produced by microalgae cultivation in fed-batch bioreactor. To improve the productivity of microalgae cultivation, we need to determine the optimal control of microalgae growth. This paper discusses mathematical model of microalgae growth in fed-batch bioreactor, and solves the optimal feeding strategy problem by using Pontryagin Minimum Principle. Then we compare the controlled microalgae growth model with the uncontrolled one. Numerical simulation with DOTcvpSB shows that the controlled microalgae growth model yields more harvest and less cost function than the uncontrolled one.
Sedimentary Environment of the Early Pleistocene Gravels of the Edfu formation from the Saqqara Archaeological Site (Egypt) – Preliminary Results

Abstract A gravel horizon is preserved in several locations within the world-wide known archaeological site in Saqqara (northern Egypt). It is characterized by a variable thickness, composed of coarse, quartz, quartzitic and flint pebbles, and considered to correspond to gravels of the Edfu Formation, deposited in the Early Pleistocene by the early phase of the Nile development (Protonile Phase). This relatively short (ca. 200 ka) and at the same time very dynamic period of Protonile activity during the Edfu Pluvial is one of the most poorly recognized hydrological-climatic episodes of the Quaternary in north-eastern Africa. This paper is focused on the preliminary sedimentological-petrographic characteristics of these deposits and an attempt to indicate their source areas as well as mechanisms of transportation and deposition in the context of Pleistocene pluvial episodes.
Understanding the Implementation and Security Implications of Protective DNS Services

—Domain names are often registered and abused for harmful and illegal Internet activities. To mitigate such threats, as an emerging security service, Protective DNS ( PDNS ) blocks access to harmful content by proactively offering rewritten DNS responses, which resolve malicious domains to controlled hosts. While it has become an effective tool against cybercrime, given their implementation divergence, little has been done from the security community in understanding the deployment, operational status and security policies of PDNS services. In this paper, we present a large-scale measurement study of the deployment and security implications of open PDNS services. We first perform empirical analysis over 28 popular PDNS providers and summarize major formats of DNS rewriting policies. Then, powered by the derived rules, we design a methodology that identifies intentional DNS rewriting enforced by open PDNS servers in the wild. Our findings are multi-faceted. On the plus side, the deployment of PDNS is now starting to scale: we identify 17,601 DNS servers (9.1% of all probed) offering such service. For DNS clients, switching from regular DNS to PDNS induces negligible query latency, despite additional steps (e.g., checking against threat intelligence and rewriting DNS response) being required from the server side. However, we also find flaws and vulnerabilities within PDNS implementation, including evasion of blocking policies and denial of service. Through responsible vulnerability disclosure, we have received 12 audit assessment results of high-risk vulnerabilities. Our study calls for proper guidance and best practices for
Impact of slurry fertilization on nutrient leaching and on the abundance of antibiotic resistance genes in agricultural soil

The leaching of nutrients in regions where annual precipitation considerably exceeds evaporation needs to be minimised. Our objective was to study the dependence of leached nitrogen and potassium on botanical composition of grassland sward. Mini-lysimeters filled with loamy sand were embedded in three swards (a mixture of three grass species, grasses mixed with white clover and grasses mixed with lucerne). Annual nitrogen application rates (0, 60, 120 and 180 kg ha-1) in conjunction with three fertilizers (mineral fertilizer, cattle slurry and sewage sludge) were applied. The nitrogen and potassium leaching was measured monthly during three years. We concluded that nitrogen and potassium leaching are affected by sward botanical composition. The leaching of both elements was the lowest from grass-clover sward.
Evidence of a shallow magma intrusion beneath the NE Rift system of Mt. Etna during 2013

Continuous GPS (CGPS) data, collected at Mt. Etna between April 2012 and October 2013, clearly define inflation/deflation processes typically observed before/after an eruption onset. During the inflationary process from May to October 2013, a particular deformation pattern localised in the upper North Eastern sector of the volcano suggests that a magma intrusion had occurred a few km away from the axis of the summit craters, beneath the NE Rift system. This is the first time that this pattern has been recorded by CGPS data at Mt. Etna. We believe that this inflation process might have taken place periodically at Mt. Etna and might be associated with the intrusion of batches of magma that are separate from the main feeding system. We provide a model to explain this unusual behaviour and the eruptive regime of this rift zone, which is characterised by long periods of quiescence followed by often dangerous eruptions in which vents can open at low elevation and thus threaten the villages in this sector of the volcano.
Compromising Industrial Processes using Web-Based Programmable Logic Controller Malware

—We present a novel approach to developing programmable logic controller (PLC) malware that proves to be more flexible, resilient, and impactful than current strategies. While previous attacks on PLCs infect either the control logic or firmware portions of PLC computation, our proposed malware exclusively infects the web application hosted by the emerging embedded webservers within the PLCs. This strategy allows the malware to stealthily attack the underlying real-world machinery using the legitimate web application program interfaces (APIs) exposed by the admin portal website. Such attacks include falsifying sensor readings, disabling safety alarms, and manipulating physical actuators. Furthermore, this approach has significant advantages over existing PLC malware techniques (control logic and firmware) such as platform independence, ease-of-deployment, and higher levels of persistence. Our research shows that the emergence of web technology in industrial control environments has introduced new security concerns that are not present in the IT domain or consumer IoT devices. Depending on the industrial process being controlled by the PLC, our attack can potentially cause catastrophic incidents or even loss of life. We verified these claims by performing a Stuxnet-style attack using a prototype implementation of this malware on a widely-used PLC model by exploiting zero-day vulnerabilities that we discovered during our research 1 . Our investigation reveals that every major PLC vendor (80% of global market share [1]) produces a PLC that is vulnerable to our proposed attack vector. Lastly, we discuss potential countermeasures and mitigations.
STUDY OF SEA LEVEL RISE USING SATELLITE ALTIMETRY DATA (A case study: Sea Of Semarang)

Sea level rise was one thing that can threaten human life, especially those living coastal region. Not only the coastal areas threatened by sea level rise but small islands outermost region of Indonesia also threatened by sea level rise and almost lost due to sea level continued to rise from year to year. On the island of Java in particular, there are several cities that are experiencing serious problems of sea level rise call Jakarta, Semarang, Pekalongan, Tuban and Surabaya. Sea level rise that occurred in cities is caused by rising global temperatures resulting in melting glaciers and ice there dikutub, consequently the volume of water in the sea increased dramatically and lead to sea level rise. It is also exacerbated by the rate of decline in soil is very high, namely the city of Semarang, the rate of decline in soil between 8-13 cm / year. So it is very threatening to the survival of people living in coastal areas, therefore the observation of sea level rise should continue to be observed annually. One of the emerging technologies and widely used for observing the sea level rise that satellite altimetry. In this study used satellite altimetry Jason-1 to observe the rate of sea level rise in the region Semarang in 2009 to 2011 to obtain prediction with mathematical methods to determine the annual rate for the next year. On this study, large sea level rise semarang is 12.83 mm / year.
SENSE: Enhancing Microarchitectural Awareness for TEEs via Subscription-Based Notification

—Effectively mitigating side-channel attacks (SCAs) in Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) remains challenging despite advances in existing defenses. Current detection-based defenses hinge on observing abnormal victim performance characteristics but struggle to detect attacks leaking smaller portions of the secret across multiple executions. Limitations of existing detection-based defenses stem from various factors, including the absence of a trusted microarchitectural data source in TEEs, low-quality available data, inflexibility of victim responses, and platform-specific constraints. We contend that the primary obstacles to effective detection techniques can be attributed to the lack of direct access to precise microarchitectural information within TEEs. We propose S ENSE , a solution that actively exposes underlying microarchitectural information to userspace TEEs. S ENSE enables userspace software in TEEs to subscribe to fine-grained microarchitectural events and utilize the events as a means to contextualize the ongoing microarchitectural states. We initially demonstrate S ENSE ’s capability by applying it to defeat the state-of-the-art cache-based side-channel attacks. We conduct a comprehensive security analysis to ensure that S ENSE does not leak more information than a system without it does. We prototype S ENSE on a gem5-based emulator, and our evaluation shows that S ENSE is secure, can effectively defeats cache SCAs, and incurs negligible performance overhead (1.2%) under benign situations.
Effects of temperature acclimation on the upper thermal tolerance of two Arctic fishes

Acclimating broad whitefish (Coregonus nasus) and saffron cod (Eleginus gracilis) to 5#x00B0;C and 15#x00B0;C resulted in a shift in temperature tolerances through changes in CTmax and HSP70 protein and mRNA expression. These responses indicate that these two species have the potential to acclimate to temperature changes associated with climate change.
Simple Determination of Bosentan in Plasma Samples by Reversed-Phase High-Performance Liquid Chromatography

Background: In order to measure the plasma levels of Losartan and Bosentan, a sensitive Reverse Phase-High Performance Liquid Chromatography (RP-HPLC) technique was developed. Methods: To compare bioavailability, the Area Under the Curve (AUC), peak plasma concentration (Cmax), and time to Cmax (Tmax) were employed. The standard curve (150-2400 ng/ml) was linear (R2=0.999), relative errors were between 2.4 to 10.05% and the coefficient of variation (CV%) ranged from 1.52 to 10.88. A single dosage (test and reference) was used for the in vivo investigation, which involved 16 healthy individuals. Results: The AUC0-48, AUC0-, Cmax, and Tmax of the test and reference had no statistically significant differences. The Cmax and 95% confidence intervals of the ratio of Cmax of the two formulations were 0.93-0.96 and 97.6-135%, respectively. Conclusion: Therefore, it was established that generic Bosentan was equivalent to Bosentan from Actelion and that both medications could be regarded as equally effective in clinical settings. The blood level of Bosentan could be measured using this straightforward procedure in all hospital laboratories.
CQESTR: A model to estimate carbon sequestration in agricultural soils

ABSTRACT: The PC-based model for predicting tillage and crop rotation effects on organic carbon decomposition and storage in the soil as organic matter (OM) uses crop residue and root biomass production, tillage type and timing, and average temperature from existing c-factor files, created with the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE). Residue nitrogen content and soil Layering information-including layer thickness, organic matter content, and bulk density-complete the input requirements for the model. Short-term trends of surface and remaining buried residue and Long-term trends in soil organic matter content, are computed for individual fields and cropping practices. The model was calibrated with soil organic carbon observations (converted to equivalent OM values) from plots with over 60 years of recorded management history including wheat/fallow with manure additions and wheat/fallow with stubble removal. Computations have a 95% confidence interval of +/-3.3 g OM kg−1 soil (0.33% OM). Comparison of OM calculations from the calibrated model with observed values from Lancaster, Wisconsin, and Lexington, Kentucky, produced mean residual errors ranging from -3.O to + 0.2 g OM kg−1 soil (-0.3 to + 0.02% OM.
Diurnal Patterns in the Observed Cloud Liquid Water Path Response to Droplet Number Perturbations

A key uncertainty in Aerosol‐cloud interactions is the cloud liquid water path (LWP) response to increased aerosols (λ). LWP can either increase due to precipitation suppression or decrease due to entrainment‐drying. Previous research suggests that precipitation suppression dominates in thick clouds, while entrainment‐drying prevails in thin clouds. The time scales of the two competing effects are vastly different, requiring temporally resolved observations. We analyze 3‐day Lagrangian trajectories of stratocumulus clouds over the southeast Pacific using 2019–2021 geostationary data. We find that clouds with a LWP exceeding 200 g m−2 exhibit a positive response, while clouds with lower LWP show a negative response. We observe a significant diurnal cycle in λ, indicating a more strongly negative daytime adjustment driven by entrainment‐drying. In contrast, at night, precipitation suppression can occasionally fully counteract the entrainment‐drying mechanism. Overall, λ appears weaker than previously suggested in studies that do not account for the diurnal cycle.
TEE-SHirT: Scalable Leakage-Free Cache Hierarchies for TEEs

—Protection of cache hierarchies from side-channel attacks is critical for building secure systems, particularly the ones using Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs). In this paper, we consider the problem of efficient and secure fine-grained partitioning of cache hierarchies and propose a framework, called Secure Hierarchies for TEEs (TEE-SHirT). In the context of a three-level cache system, TEE-SHirT consists of partitioned shared last-level cache, partitioned private L2 caches, and non-partitioned L1 caches that are flushed on context switches and system calls. Efficient and correct partitioning requires careful design. Towards this goal, TEE-SHirT makes three contributions: 1) we demonstrate how the hardware structures used for holding cache partitioning metadata can be effectively virtualized to avoid flushing of cache partition content on context switches and system calls; 2) we show how to support multi-threaded enclaves in TEE-SHirT, addressing the issues of coherency and consistency that arise with both intra-core and inter-core data sharing; 3) we develop a formal security model for TEE-SHirT to rigorously reason about the security of our design.
Basenverzadiging in soortenrijke trilvenen

De wereldwijde bezorgdheid voor de bescherming van de natuur wordt ingegeven door een sterke achteruitgang van vele soorten organismen als gevolg van milieuverontreiniging en van vernietiging van natuurgebieden. Het Natuurbeleidsplan (Ministerie van LNV, 1989) en de bemoeienis met het milieu (Langeweg, 1989) getuigen van een toegenomen wil om hier in Nederland iets aan te doen. Intussen is het tot het algemeen bewustzijn doorgedrongen dat vele soorten die een belangrijke rol zouden moeten spelen in de ontwikkeling van de natuur geheel of vrijwel geheel uit ons land dreigen te verdwijnen. De natuurgebieden waarin zij vanouds voorkwamen zijn 'ziek'. Daarom is in 1991 een begin gemaakt met een programma van 'intensive care' voor de meest bedreigde natuur, tot het milieu weer schoon genoeg is en nieuwe gebieden geschikt gemaakt zijn voor natuurontwikkeling. De patiënten liggen tijdens de behandeling 'aan de monitor'. Er is een Commissie van Deskundigen geweest, die de ziekteaanwijzingen heeft gerapporteerd en aanbevelingen heeft gedaan voor de behandeling (Jansen et al., 1990). De te nemen maatregelen zijn uitgewerkt door de terreinbeheerders. Zo worden nu ook enkele gevallen van verzuurd kraggeveen behandeld, in het Ilperveld (Noord-Holland) en in De Weerribben (Noordwest-Overijssel). In het natuurbeleid heet deze behandeling 'Effectgerichte Maatregelen'. Men wil met die onduidelijke term kennelijk zeggen dat in dit geval het probleem, de milieuvervuiling, niet bij de bron wordt aangepakt, maar bij de gevolgen. Het gaat niettemin om herstelmaatregelen die in aangepaste vorm als beheersmaatregelen in het reguliere natuurbeheer thuishoren. In het Ilperveld zijn de maatregelen uitgevoerd door het Noord-Hollands Landschap. Het verloop van de behandeling wordt gevolgd door een combinatie van onderzoekers van de Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht (Bootsma et al., 1992). In De Weerribben is de uitvoering door het Staatsbosbeheer uitbesteed aan de combinatie Klip, Konijn en Heidemij. De monitoring wordt verzorgd door het Instituut voor Bosen Natuuronderzoek (Prins et al., 1992).