Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Geographies of youth, volunteering and religion: narratives of young Muslim volunteers in Birmingham, UK

This thesis sits at the interface of three cross-cutting areas of research: youth, volunteering and religion. Geography has made notable contributions to the study of youth in recent years, through a focus on spatialities of the lives of young people. There remains, however, a bias towards research on young people in higher education. Research by geographers on volunteering has been vibrant and diverse, yet understandings of what and who a volunteer is remain hazy and problematic. Islam has received considerable attention within geography. The relationship between Islam and the West is continually shifting and geographical research needs to keep up with this everchanging landscape. This thesis examines the narratives of young Muslim volunteers in Birmingham, UK, exploring four research questions: (1) What is the landscape of volunteering in Muslim communities in Birmingham? ; (2) What pathways do young Muslims take to become volunteers? ; (3) What are the experiences of young Muslims who volunteer? ; and (4) How does volunteering shape the identities of young Muslims? To address these research questions, a mixed methods approach was utilised, comprising of a questionnaire survey of 382 respondents and a series of 45 interviews amongst Muslims between the ages of 18 to 25. The motivations for volunteering amongst the respondents were primarily altruistic, challenging the depiction of youth volunteering as a route to corporate work. Muslim women were more exposed to discrimination within their own communities through cultural and religious expectations, particularly within more religiously conservative communities. Women were also more exposed to abuse from outside of their communities through Islamophobia. Volunteering amongst young Muslims provided a sense of belonging, eroded stereotypes and broke down barriers within society. The findings of this thesis provide empirical and conceptual contributions to literature on youth, volunteering and religion. The research expands the literature on young people beyond a focus on higher education, as well as providing analytical purchase to the understanding of vital conjunctures in relation to youth transitions. This thesis provides several conceptual contributions to research on volunteering, developing definitions of volunteering to reflect the diversity of formal, informal and embodied micro practices uncovered within this research project. This thesis offers new perspectives on the everyday lives of young Muslims in Britain through their engagement with volunteering.
Emergence of Linguistic Representations by Independent Component Analysis

Our aim is to find syntactic and semantic relationships and ro les of words based on the analysis of corpora. We study three methods for analyzing words in contexts as potential methods for solving this task. The methods are latent semantic analysis, self-organizing map and independent component analysis. Latent semantic analysis is a simple method for automatic generation of concepts that are useful, e.g., in encoding documents for information retrieval purposes. However, these concepts cannot easily be interpreted by humans. Self-organizing maps can be used to generate an explicit diagram which characterizes the relationships between
The Uniform Generalized Decomposition Method for Generating Algebraic Expressions of Fibonacci Graphs

The paper investigates relationship between algebraic expressions and Fibonacci graphs (which give a generic example of non-series-parallel graphs). We propose the uniform generalized decomposition method for constructing Fibonacci graph expressions. On every step this method divides the graph of size n into k parts of the same size. We prove that to reach the smallest possible length of the corresponding algebraic expression the number k should be chosen equal to 2. When k is 2, the method generates expressions of ( ) 2 n O
Advanced Star Coordinates

With the development of data collection technology, effective visualization tools are needed urgently to understand the abundant multidimensional and multivariate data and information in the science, engineering and commerce fields. Star Coordinates is a traditional multivariate data visualization technique, but there are some limitations of it. In the paper we propose the advanced star coordinates (ASC), which addresses these drawbacks. ASC uses the diameter instead of the radius as the dimension axis, projects the multidimensional information object to low dimension visual space, which is meaningful to users, and designs the dimension configuration strategy to optimize the order and angle of the dimension axes. The experiment results show that the dimension configuration strategy reduces the user operation burden greatly and helps them explore the connotative characteristics of the multidimensional information aggregation quickly and exactly. The visualization result is easily understandable and expresses the dimension distribution information effectively.
Exercise decreases myelin‐associated glycoprotein expression in the spinal cord and positively modulates neuronal growth

To successfully grow, neurons need to overcome the effects of hostile environments, such as the inhibitory action of myelin. We have evaluated the potential of exercise to overcome the intrinsic limitation of the central nervous system for axonal growth. In line with the demonstrated ability of exercise to increase the regenerative potential of neurons, here we show that exercise reduces the inhibitory capacity of myelin. Cortical neurons grown on myelin from exercised rats showed a more pronounced neurite extension compared with neurons grown on poly‐D‐lysine, or on myelin extracted from sedentary animals. The activity of cyclin‐dependent kinase 5, a kinase involved in neurite outgrowth, was found to be increased in cortical neurons grown on exercise‐myelin and in the lumbar spinal cord enlargement of exercised animals. Exercise significantly decreased the levels of myelin‐associated glycoprotein (MAG), a potent axonal growth inhibitor, suggesting that downregulation of MAG is part of the mechanism through which exercise reduces growth inhibition. It is known that exercise elevates brain‐derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) spinal cord levels and that BDNF acts to overcome the inhibitory effects of myelin. Accordingly, we blocked the action of BDNF during exercise, which suppressed the exercise‐related MAG decrease. Protein kinase A (PKA) has been related to the ability of BDNF to overcome growth inhibition; in agreement, we found that exercise increased PKA levels and this effect was reverted by blocking BDNF. Overall, these results show that exercise promotes a permissive cellular environment for axonal growth in the adult spinal cord requiring BDNF action. © 2007 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
2356-5608 Bond Graph Based Modelling and SMC Control of a Tunnel Dryer

In this paper, a sliding mode control with a proportional integral (PI) sliding surface applied to the hybrid tunnel dryer has been assessed through simulations. A dynamic model of the process was developed specifically for this purpose. The pseudo-bond graph methodology was used in modelling the system, such methodology was very suitable for this thermal process and permits us to establish a mathematical model. The proposed sliding mode controller is used to control the thermal and mass variables in the dryer, such as temperature and product moisture content. Simulation results show that this control strategy can obtain excellent control performance with no chattering problem and a good tracking of trajectory. Keywords—Pseudo bond graph modelling; sliding mode control; PI sliding surface; tunnel dryer; temperature; moisture content
Hyaluronan and RHAMM in Wound Repair and the “Cancerization” of Stromal Tissues

Tumors and wounds share many similarities including loss of tissue architecture, cell polarity and cell differentiation, aberrant extracellular matrix (ECM) remodeling (Ballard et al., 2006) increased inflammation, angiogenesis, and elevated cell migration and proliferation. Whereas these changes are transient in repairing wounds, tumors do not regain tissue architecture but rather their continued progression is fueled in part by loss of normal tissue structure. As a result tumors are often described as wounds that do not heal. The ECM component hyaluronan (HA) and its receptor RHAMM have both been implicated in wound repair and tumor progression. This review highlights the similarities and differences in their roles during these processes and proposes that RHAMM-regulated wound repair functions may contribute to “cancerization” of the tumor microenvironment.
CB1 Antagonism Exerts Specific Molecular Effects on Visceral and Subcutaneous Fat and Reverses Liver Steatosis in Diet-Induced Obese Mice

OBJECTIVE The beneficial effects of the inactivation of endocannabinoid system (ECS) by administration of antagonists of the cannabinoid receptor (CB) 1 on several pathological features associated with obesity is well demonstrated, but the relative contribution of central versus peripheral mechanisms is unclear. We examined the impact of CB1 antagonism on liver and adipose tissue lipid metabolism in a mouse model of diet-induced obesity. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Mice were fed either with a standard diet or a high-sucrose high-fat (HSHF) diet for 19 weeks and then treated with the CB1-specific antagonist SR141716 (10 mg · kg−1 · day−1) for 6 weeks. RESULTS Treatment with SR141716 reduced fat mass, insulin levels, and liver triglycerides primarily increased by HSHF feeding. Serum adiponectin levels were restored after being reduced in HSHF mice. Gene expression of scavenger receptor class B type I and hepatic lipase was induced by CB1 blockade and associated with an increase in HDL-cholesteryl ether uptake. Concomitantly, the expression of CB1, which was strongly increased in the liver and adipose tissue of HSHF mice, was totally normalized by the treatment. Interestingly, in visceral but not subcutaneous fat, genes involved in transport, synthesis, oxidation, and release of fatty acids were upregulated by HSHF feeding, while this effect was counteracted by CB1 antagonism. CONCLUSIONS A reduction in the CB1-mediated ECS activity in visceral fat is associated with a normalization of adipocyte metabolism, which may be a determining factor in the reversion of liver steatosis induced by treatment with SR141716.
Do employees actually intend to turnover when betrayed? Evidence from China and the USA

PurposeThe main purpose of present study is to investigate how familial collectivism and gender affect the psychological contract violation–turnover intention relationship by comparing Chinese with American samples.Design/methodology/approachIn total, 688 and 892 full-time workers were recruited, respectively, from China and the USA to form the two samples. Then, three-way interaction regression models were used to test the hypotheses.FindingsThe results indicate that familial collectivism will negatively moderate the psychological contract violation–turnover intention relationship in the Chinese sample and positively moderate their relationship in the American sample. Moreover, the moderating effect of familial collectivism on the relationship between psychological contract violation and turnover intention is significant among the male employees and insignificant among the female employees for Chinese sample. Whereas for the American sample, the moderating effects are significant among both the male and the female employees.Originality/valueThis study improves the theoretical model of Turnley and Feldman (1999) by examining the moderating effect of familial collectivism and gender differences on the relationship between psychological contract violation and turnover intention. And two samples (China vs the USA) are used in the study, which helps to explain the possible difference in influencing the relationship between psychological contract violation and turnover intention between two nations. The main practical implication for managers is that organizations should recognize the importance of the gender role and individuals’ culture orientation when implementing different human resource management policies.
Bystanders of bullying: Social-cognitive and affective reactions to school bullying and cyberbullying

The Bystander Intervention Model by Latané and Darley (1970) describes the stages necessary for a bystander to intervene in an emergency and can be used to explain bystander behavior in the case of bullying. Social-cognitive and affective reactions to bullying such as empathy with the victim, moral disengagement, feelings of responsibility, defender self-efficacy and outcome expectancy are supposed to determine whether a bystander passes through all stages of the intervention model and are thereby crucial for the behavioral response. These mental reactions were compared between school bullying and cyberbullying in a sample of 486 German students (56% girls, age: M = 12.95) from 28 classes with a newly developed questionnaire covering the five Social-Cognitive and Affective Reactions to Bullying (SCARB) for school context and cyber context separately. Confirmatory factor analysis showed an acceptable fit and internal consistency coefficients were acceptable to good. In line with our hypotheses, for cyberbullying as compared to school bullying students reported higher moral disengagement and lower feelings of responsibility and self-efficacy. However, no significant difference was found for empathy. The level of negative outcome expectations was lower for cyberbullying than for school bullying. Results confirm that the context of bullying matters for the social-cognitive and affective reactions of bystanders.
The transportation problem with exclusionary side constraints

We consider the so-called Transportation Problem with Exclusionary Side Constraints (TPESC), which is a generalization of the ordinary transportation problem. We confirm that the TPESC is NP-hard, and we analyze the complexity of different special cases. For instance, we show that in case of a bounded number of suppliers, a pseudo-polynomial time algorithm exists, whereas the case of two demand nodes is already hard to approximate within a constant factor (unless P = NP).
Reading-based Screenshot Summaries for Supporting Awareness of Desktop Activities

Lifelogging augments people's ability to keep track of their daily activities and helps them create rich archives and foster memory. Information workers perform a lot of their key activities throughout the day on their desktop computers. We argue that activity summaries can be informed by eye-tracking data. Therefore we investigate 3 heuristics to create such summaries based on screenshots to help reconstruct people's work day: a fixed time interval, people's focus of attention as indicated by their eye gaze, and a reading detection algorithm. In a field study with 12 participants who logged their desktop activities for 3 consecutive days we evaluated the usefulness of screenshot summaries based on these heuristics. Our results show the utility of eye tracking data, and more specifically of using reading detection to determine key activities throughout the day to inform the creation of activity summaries that are more relevant and require less time to review.
Parameters to monitor multiple auditory steady-state responses: Spectral F test

Identification of multiple auditory steady-state responses (ASSR) can be made by objective detection techniques. According to general literature on the subject, the spectral F test (SFT) is one of the frequency domain techniques that can be utilized. This study has the objective to evaluate how parameters like sweep length and number of bins affects the performance of the detector based on SFT, in order to determine the best parameters to monitor ASSRs. The Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve, applied on signals that have been collected from 14 subjects aged between 10 and 26, was the performance measurement adopted. The results obtained suggest the utilization of 8 seconds sweep length and 20 adjacent bins.
Kinetic and thermodynamic studies of the adsorption of heavy metals on to a new adsorbent: coal mine drainage sludge

In this study, we investigated the application of sludge waste obtained from a coal mine drainage treatment facility that treats acid mine drainage (designated as AMD) from metal‐mine water. The coal mine drainage sludge (designated as CMDS), which contained 70% goethite and 30% calcite, was utilized as a sorption material for Cu(II) and Zn(II) removal from an aqueous solution of metallic mine drainage. The equilibriums and kinetics were investigated during a series of batch adsorption experiments. The Langmuir model was used to fit the equilibrium data, resulting in the best fits. The removal efficiencies were controlled by solution pH, temperature, initial concentration of heavy metal, sorbent amount and contact time. The pseudo‐second‐order kinetic model was used to fit the kinetic data, providing a good correlation with the experimental data. The results of a thermodynamic study showed that the activation energies (EA) were 3.75 and 1.75 kJ mol−1 for the adsorption of Cu(II) and Zn(II) on to CMDS at pH 5.5. These values of activation energy could correspond to physisorption. The positive values obtained for both the standard enthalpy change, Δ0, and the standard entropy change, ΔS0, suggest that the adsorption of Cu(II) and Zn(II) on to the CMDS was an endothermic reaction and that randomness increased at the solid–liquid interface during the adsorption of Cu(II) and Zn(II) on to the CMDS. The adsorption process also followed a pseudo‐second‐order kinetic model.
Public Sector Innovation as Governance Reform: A Comparative Analysis of Competitive and Collaborative Strategies in the Swedish Transport Sector

The constraining impact of bureaucracy on creative problem solving has been a recurring theme in research on public innovation, and public actors increasingly seek to “steer” innovation through interactive spaces for collaboration and competition. This article examines this form of “meta-governance” in the case of the Swedish Transport Administration and reveals a pattern where the initial opening of arenas for innovation is followed by a countermovement toward organization. Findings suggest that the introduction of elements of organization, such as hierarchy, rules, and membership, in governance spaces is a key strategy for coming to grips with a new innovation promoting role.
Good Partner, Good Parent

This cross-sectional, dyadic questionnaire study examined the contribution of romantic attachment and responsive caregiving to parenting style, investigating both gender and partner effects. One hundred and twenty-five couples with children aged 7 to 8 years completed measures of attachment styles, responsive caregiving toward partner, and parenting styles. Structural Equation Modeling was used to examine the intra- and interpersonal associations between romantic attachment, caregiving responsiveness, and parenting styles. Attachment avoidance and anxiety were both negatively associated with responsive caregiving to partner, which in turn was positively associated with authoritative (optimal) parenting styles and negatively associated with authoritarian and permissive (nonoptimal) parenting styles. Responsive caregiving mediated all links between attachment and parenting, with an additional direct association between attachment anxiety and nonoptimal parenting styles that was not explained by caregiving responsiveness. Findings are discussed with reference to attachment theory.
Heavy quark in an expanding plasma in AdS/CFT

Using the Janik-Peschanski dual to a Bjorken flow, a Langevin equation is derived for a heavy quark in an expanding = 4 supersymmetric Yang-Mills plasma. Such a plasma is characterized by a proper-time dependence of the temperature and corresponds to a system out of equilibrium. The analysis first focuses on a quark at rest in the plasma comoving frame. The case of a quark moving across a longitudinally expanding plasma is then considered. The two-point functions for the random noise acting on such heavy quark probes are computed.
Trinucleotide Repeats: A Structural Perspective

Trinucleotide repeat (TNR) expansions are present in a wide range of genes involved in several neurological disorders, being directly involved in the molecular mechanisms underlying pathogenesis through modulation of gene expression and/or the function of the RNA or protein it encodes. Structural and functional information on the role of TNR sequences in RNA and protein is crucial to understand the effect of TNR expansions in neurodegeneration. Therefore, this review intends to provide to the reader a structural and functional view of TNR and encoded homopeptide expansions, with a particular emphasis on polyQ expansions and its role at inducing the self-assembly, aggregation and functional alterations of the carrier protein, which culminates in neuronal toxicity and cell death. Detail will be given to the Machado-Joseph Disease-causative and polyQ-containing protein, ataxin-3, providing clues for the impact of polyQ expansion and its flanking regions in the modulation of ataxin-3 molecular interactions, function, and aggregation.
Combining Opinions About the Order of Rule Execution

How should opinions of control knowledge sources be represented and combined? These issues are addressed for the case where control knowledge is used to form an agenda, i.e., a proposed knowledge source execution order. A formal model is developed in the Dempster/ Shafer belief calculus and computational problems are discussed as well. The model is applicable to many other problems where it is desired to order a set of candidates using a knowledge-based approach.
Learning feature distance measures for image correspondences

Standard but ad hoc measures such as sum-of-squared pixel differences (SSD) are often used when comparing and registering two images that have not been previously observed before. In this paper, we propose a framework to address the problem of learning a parametric feature distance measure to measure the dissimilarity between pairs of images. The method is based on optimizing the parameters of the distance measure in order to minimize correspondence classification errors on training data. Because the learning process involves relative (rather than absolute) visual content between image pairs, the learned distance measure may also be applied to other images with very different visual content. Results on matching classification with a wide variety of image content show that the learned feature distance measure clearly outperforms the standard measures of SSD, chamfer and Bhattacharyya histogram distances.
An Empirical Analysis of the Determinants of Success of Food and Agribusiness E-Commerce Firms

E-commerce's value creation in agricultural and food markets will only occur to the extent that e-commerce firms exist throughout the supply chain. The problem is that e-commerce firms throughout the agricultural and food supply chain have faced a serious challenge in staying in business. Many have been forced to exit the market, and only a few have survived to develop into functional web-based businesses. The objective of this research study is to identify characteristics that are associated with successful e-commerce firms throughout the agricultural and food supply chain. Relevant e-commerce and agricultural e-commerce literature suggests several characteristics that influence the success for agricultural and food e-commerce firms. A limited-dependent variable technique, logistic regression, is used to relate websites' characteristics to their probability of survival.