Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Epoxidized Jatropha Oil as a Sustainable Plasticizer to Poly(lactic Acid)

A renewable resource, epoxidized jatropha oil (EJO), was used as a green plasticizer and added to poly(lactic acid) (PLA). EJO was compounded into PLA at different contents. The addition of 3 wt % EJO to the PLA demonstrates significant improvement in flexibility, which leads to a percentage increase of about 7000% in elongation at break. This tensile result was confirmed by surface morphology analysis with clear proof of plastic deformation in EJO-plasticized PLA. EJO imparts a good heat stabilization effect. Thermal stability of PLA was enhanced upon addition of EJO, which is due to their good interaction and plasticizer dispersion within the PLA matrix. This EJO-plasticized PLA has wide applications in various industries, such as packaging of food and non-food products.
Matched Filter Based Algorithm for Blind Recognition of OFDM Systems

In the cognitive radio context, sensing process is a crucial task. The cognitive devise has to be able to detect and to identify several radio systems. As more standards are now based on OFDM modulation the paper aims with the parameters estimation of such a modulation. All actual OFDM-based standards differ from their subcarrier spacing therefore it will be ingenious to focus on this parameter to identify these systems in a non data aided context. We propose a new efficient algorithm based on the matched filter principle. The behavior of the proposed approach will be studied in the context of practical impairments like frequency and/or time offsets and a multi-paths fading channel. Finally, the performance of the proposed algorithm will be evaluated in contrast with the state of art methods by means of computer simulations.
Optimization-Based Image Segmentation by Genetic Algorithms

Many works in the literature focus on the definition of evaluation metrics and criteria that enable to quantify the performance of an image processing algorithm. These evaluation criteria can be used to define new image processing algorithms by optimizing them. In this paper, we propose a general scheme to segment images by a genetic algorithm. The developed method uses an evaluation criterion which quantifies the quality of an image segmentation result. The proposed segmentation method can integrate a local ground truth when it is available in order to set the desired level of precision of the final result. A genetic algorithm is then used in order to determine the best combination of information extracted by the selected criterion. Then, we show that this approach can either be applied for gray-levels or multicomponents images in a supervised context or in an unsupervised one. Last, we show the efficiency of the proposed method through some experimental results on several gray-levels and multicomponents images.
Aggressive behavior disorders of childhood: a follow-up study.

A group of 90 children, under the age of 15, with aggressive behavior was studied at the Pennsylvania Hospital (Franklin School) between 1925 and 1935. These children came largely from the Middle Atlantic States, and represented a wide [SEE TABLE 2 IN SOURCE PDF. ] spread in their social and economic backgrounds. In an attempt to follow these children to maturity in order to assess their subsequent life adjustment, 66 were followed to the age of 18 or over ( excluding one death at age 6½). Of these 66, 13 subsequently became psychotic; 14 eventually made adequate social adjustment; 39 never made adequate adjustment. Twelve of the last group committed at least one crime of record, but only one of these crimes involved violence or destruction. In the original group, the ratio of males to females was 2½ to 1; in the psychotic group, 6 to 7; in the group adjusting well, 6 to 1. The backgrounds of these children show significant deviations from those of 60 post-encephalitic children.
Decoding cognitive states and motor intentions from intracranial EEG: How promising is high-frequency brain activity for brain-machine interfaces?

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or from public or private research centers. L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés. Decoding cognitive states and motor intentions from intracranial EEG: How promising is high-frequency brain activity for brain-machine interfaces? Karim Jerbi, Etienne Combrisson, Sarang Dalal, Juan Vidal, Carlos Hamame, Olivier Bertrand, Alain Berthoz, Philippe Kahane, Jean-Philippe Lachaux
Internalizing Global Externalities from Biodiversity: Protected Areas and Multilateral Mechanisms of Transfer

Biodiversity can sometimes only be preserved if natural habitats are excluded from human uses. Such protection measures generate positive externalities at the global scale. This holds especially for protection in developing countries that host great parts of global biodiversity. For internalization, financial resources are raised on a multilateral basis and transferred to the host countries. This paper reviews the rationale for protected areas and transfer payments and summarizes empirical data. The resources provided through multilateral mechanisms - even together with official bilateral aid and private spending - fall short of estimated needs for effective protected area systems in developing countries.
Conocimiento y aceptación de leche genéticamente modificada en consumidores de la Región del Maule, Chile

Considering the debate created by genetically modified foods (GMF) in developed countries, the importance of this variable in the decision to purchase milk of consumers in Talca (Maule Region, Chile) and the existence of different market segments was determined via a survey of 400 people. Using a conjoint analysis, it was determined that, in general, the presence of genetically modified foods was more important than the brand or the price. Using a cluster analysis, three segments were distinguished: the largest segments (38.0%) placed greater importance on the manner of food production and preferred milk with no genetic manipulation. The second group (30.5%) also placed greater importance on the manner of food production, but preferred transgenic milk. The third segment (25.8%) placed great importance on brand and preferred genetically modified milk. The three segments rejected store brand products and preferred national brand milk.
El problema de la dependencia en las personas mayores

En sus acepciones mas latas la dependencia evoca las carencias e insuficiencias de la propia condicion humana. Porque somos seres psicobiologicos y, sobre todo, porque somos entes sociales somos dependientes (etimologicamente el termino proviene del latin pendere —pender de algo—), y esa circunstancia nos acompana en nuestro devenir desde la cuna a la tumba. Podria decirse con mayor propiedad que mas que dependientes somos interdependientes: nos necesitamos unos a otros. Y esta multi e inter dependencia se produce tanto en el ambito emocional como en el biologico, el economico, el politico y, en general, en todos los aspectos de nuestra vida.
Population Pharmacokinetics of Piperaquine after Two Different Treatment Regimens with Dihydroartemisinin-Piperaquine in Patients with Plasmodium falciparum Malaria in Thailand

ABSTRACT The population pharmacokinetics of piperaquine in adults and children with uncomplicated Plasmodium falciparum malaria treated with two different dosage regimens of dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine were characterized. Piperaquine pharmacokinetics in 98 Burmese and Karen patients aged 3 to 55 years were described by a two-compartment disposition model with first-order absorption and interindividual random variability on all parameters and were similar with the three- and four-dose regimens. Children had a lower body weight-normalized oral clearance than adults, resulting in longer terminal elimination half-lives and higher total exposure to piperaquine (area under the concentration-time curve from 0 to 63 days [AUCday 0-63]). However, children had lower plasma concentrations in the therapeutically relevant posttreatment prophylactic period (AUCday 3-20) because of smaller body weight-normalized central volumes of distribution and shorter distribution half-lives. Our data lend further support to a simplified once-daily treatment regimen to improve treatment adherence and efficacy and indicate that weight-adjusted piperaquine doses in children may need to be higher than in adults.
Imaging Cell Wall Architecture in Single Zinnia elegans Tracheary Elements1[OA]

The chemical and structural organization of the plant cell wall was examined in Zinnia elegans tracheary elements (TEs), which specialize by developing prominent secondary wall thickenings underlying the primary wall during xylogenesis in vitro. Three imaging platforms were used in conjunction with chemical extraction of wall components to investigate the composition and structure of single Zinnia TEs. Using fluorescence microscopy with a green fluorescent protein-tagged Clostridium thermocellum family 3 carbohydrate-binding module specific for crystalline cellulose, we found that cellulose accessibility and binding in TEs increased significantly following an acidified chlorite treatment. Examination of chemical composition by synchrotron radiation-based Fourier-transform infrared spectromicroscopy indicated a loss of lignin and a modest loss of other polysaccharides in treated TEs. Atomic force microscopy was used to extensively characterize the topography of cell wall surfaces in TEs, revealing an outer granular matrix covering the underlying meshwork of cellulose fibrils. The internal organization of TEs was determined using secondary wall fragments generated by sonication. Atomic force microscopy revealed that the resulting rings, spirals, and reticulate structures were composed of fibrils arranged in parallel. Based on these combined results, we generated an architectural model of Zinnia TEs composed of three layers: an outermost granular layer, a middle primary wall composed of a meshwork of cellulose fibrils, and inner secondary wall thickenings containing parallel cellulose fibrils. In addition to insights in plant biology, studies using Zinnia TEs could prove especially productive in assessing cell wall responses to enzymatic and microbial degradation, thus aiding current efforts in lignocellulosic biofuel production.
Duration Dependent Unemployment Insurance and Stabilisation Policy

In the context of a standard equilibrium matching framework, this paper shows how a duration dependent unemployment insurance (UI) system stabilises unemployment levels over the business cycle. It establishes that re-entitlement effects induced by a finite duration UI program generate intertemporal tranfers from firms that hire in future booms to firms that hire in current recessions. These transfers imply a net hiring subsidy in recessions which stabilises unemployment levels over the cycle.
Computer Analysis of Jazz Chord Sequence: Is Solar a Blues?

This chapter investigates the issue of the role of the computer in musical analysis. Starting with a survey of the main approaches in computer analysis, we focus on the particular problem of Jazz chord sequences harmonic analysis. We propose a theory of chord sequence analysis, based on an explicit conceptual hierarchy of analysis objects. We discuss the implementation of the theory and its results on a typical example (Blues for Alice, by Charlie Parker), for which the system produces an analysis which conforms exactly to human interpretation. We also exhibit a chord sequence, Solar (by Miles Davis), for which the results of the system do not conform to human perception, i.e. it does not find it is a Blues. We conclude on the issue of the role for the computer in musical analysis.
Refractory iron deficiency anemia and Helicobacter Pylori Infection in pediatrics: A review

Background Since the discovery of Helicobacter pylori, several clinical reports have demonstrated that H. Pylori infection has emerged as a new cause of refractory iron stores in children. We carried out a systematic literature review to primarily evaluate the existing evidence on the association between childhood H. Pylori infection and iron deficiency anemia (IDA) and secondly, to investigate the beneficial effects of bacterium elimination. Material and Methods This review concerns important pediatric studies published from January 1991 to October 2014. Fourteen case reports and series of cases, 24 observational epidemiologic studies, seven uncontrolled trials, and 16 randomized clinical trials were included in the review. Results Although there are a few observational epidemiologic studies and some randomized trials mostly due to the potential confounders, most studies reported a positive association linking between H. Pylori infection and iron deficiency or iron deficiency anemia among children. In addition, it seems that elimination of H. Pylori infection induces beneficial effects on iron deficiency. Conclusions Since the evidence for the association of H. pylori eradication therapy and refractory childhood IDA is not enough and there are contrasting data about such association, future high quality and cohort researches are needed to determine the causal association.
The distribution shifts of Pinus armandii and its response to temperature and precipitation in China

Background The changing climate, particularly in regard to temperature and precipitation, is already affecting tree species’ distributions. Pinus armandii, which dominates on the Yungui Plateau and in the Qinba Mountains in China, is of economic, cultural and ecological value. We wish to test the correlations between the distribution shift of P. armandii and changing climate, and figure out how it tracks future climate change. Methods We sampled the surface soil at sites throughout the distribution of P. armandii to compare the relative abundance of pollen to the current percent cover of plant species. This was used to determine possible changes in the distribution P. armandii. Given the hilly terrain, elevation was considered together with temperature and precipitation as variables correlated with distribution shifts of P. armandii. Results We show that P. armandii is undergoing change in its geographic range, including retraction, a shift to more northern areas and from the upper high part of the mountains to a lower-altitude part in hilly areas. Temperature was the strongest correlate of this distribution shift. Elevation and precipitation were also both significantly correlated with distribution change of P. armandii, but to a lesser degree than temperature. Conclusion The geographic range of P. armandii has been gradually decreasing under the influence of climate change. This provides evidence of the effect of climate change on trees at the species level and suggests that at least some species will have a limited ability to track the changing climate.
Analysis of QRS loop in the Vectorcardiogram of patients with Chagas' disease

In the present work, we have studied the QRS loop in the Vectorcardiogram (VCG) of 95 chronic chagasic patients classified in different groups (I, II and III) according to their degree of myocardial damage. For comparison, the VCGs of 11 healthy subjects used as control group (Group O) were also examined. The QRS loop was obtained for each patient from the XYZ orthogonal leads of their High-Resolution Electrocardiogram (HRECG) records. In order to analyze the variations of QRS loop in each detected beat, it has been proposed in this study the following vectorcardiographic parameters a) Maximum magnitude of the cardiac depolarization vector, b) Volume, c) Area of QRS loop, d) Ratio between the Area and Perimeter, e) Ratio between the major and minor axes of the QRS loop and f) QRS loop Energy. It has been found that one or more indexes exhibited statistical differences (p<0.05) between groups 0-II, O-III, I–II, I–III and II–III. We concluded that the proposed method could be use as complementary diagnosis technique to evaluate the degree of myocardial damage in chronic chagasic patients.
Evaluating Dynamic Core Coupling in a Scalable Tiled-CMP Architecture

To obtain benefit of the increasing transistor count in current processors, designs are leading to CMPs that will integrate tens or hundreds of processor cores on-chip. However, scaling and voltage factors are increasing susceptibility of architectures to transient, intermittent and permanent faults, as well as process variations. A very recent solution found in literature consists of Dynamic Core Coupling (DCC) [6]. DCC provides a fault tolerant framework based on dynamic binding of cores for re-execution. This technique relies on the use of a shared-bus. However, for current and future CMP architectures, more efficient designs are tiledCMPs, which are organized around a direct network, since area, scalability and power constraints make impractical the use of a bus as the interconnection network. In this work, we present the changes needed in the original DCC proposal to be used for a direct network environment. These changes are mostly due to the replacement of a bus for a mesh as interconnection network, the coherence protocol and the consistency window. Our evaluations show that, for several parallel scientific applications, the performance overhead with this new environment rises to 10%, 19%, 42.5% and 47% for 4, 8, 16 and 32 core pairs, respectively, compared to the 5% performance degradation as previously reported for 8 core pairs in the original DCC
Pembangunan usahawan tani melalui inisiatif Tanggungjawab Sosial Korporat (CSR): Satu kajian kes

Pembangunan usahawan Tani adalah merupakan salah satu usaha yang boleh dibangunkan oleh syarikat korporat melalui inisiatif Tanggungjawab Sosial Korporat (CSR) bagi tujuan untuk meningkatkan kualiti hidup komuniti. Kertas ini akan membincangkan sumbangan yang telah dilakukan oleh sebuah syarikat korporat multinasional di Malaysia melalui pelaksanaan projek CSR perladangan cili kontrak terhadap kewujudan usahawan tani di Pasir Puteh Kelantan. Seramai 45 petani yang terlibat dengan program CSR syarikat telah ditemu bual bagi mengenal pasti sejauh mana sumbangan CSR telah membangunkan komuniti tani yang terlibat. Kajian yang menggunakan pendekatan kontruktivisme ini telah menggunakan analisa tematik terhadap data temu bual kajian. Tema-tema kajian mendapati melalui program CSR, petani berpeluang untuk memiliki, mengelola dan mengurus ladang serta menanggung risiko pengeluaran tani mereka. Tema-tema ini menunjukkan wujudnya usahawan tani di kalangan komuniti yang terlibat dengan projek CSR yang dilaksanakan tersebut. Selain dari itu sumbangan dari pihak syarikat dan juga pihak kerajaan melalui Pertubuhan Peladang Kawasan (PPK) juga membantu menyediakan persekitaran yang kondusif bagi pembangunan usahawan tani ini.
Variable structure-based decentralized relative attitude-coordinated control for satellite formation

Satellite formations offer more powerful and robust architectures than a single, traditional large satellite. Investigations into the relative attitude control of satellite formations are important for the applications of future space missions. This article addresses two issues concerning the coordinated attitude control of satellite formation flying: (1) decentralized coordination strategies of multiple satellites flying in formation and (2) coordinated controller design. Under the assumption that the relative position and attitude are known, a fully decentralized variable uncertainties and environmental disturbance torques and achieve the attitude coordination among the multiple satellites flying in formation.
Critical power for asymptotic connectivity

In wireless data networks the range of each transmitter, and thus its power level, needs to be high enough to reach the intended receivers, while being low enough to avoid generating interference for other receivers on the same channel. If the nodes in the network are assumed to cooperate, perhaps in a distributed and decentralized fashion, in routing each others' packets, as is the case in ad hoc wireless networks, then each node should transmit with just enough power to guarantee connectivity of the overall network. Towards this end, we determine the critical power at which a node in the network needs to transmit in order to ensure that the network is connected with probability one as the number of nodes in the network goes to infinity. Our main result is this: if n nodes are located randomly, uniformly i.i. d. , in a disc of unit area in /spl Rfr//sup 2/ and each node transmits at a power level so as to cover an area of /spl pi/r/sup 2/=(log n + c(n))/n, then the resulting network is asymptotically connected with probability one if and only if c(n)/spl rarr/+/spl infin/.
Robust Passive Computed Torque Control Applied to Haptic Human-Machine Interaction Systems

This paper presents the design of a motion control strategy based on passivity theory and energy analysis applied to Euler-Lagrange (E-L) systems, particularly to robot manipulators and with purpose to haptic devices. The performance of a robotic structure depends of a proper design of a motion control technique in a regulation action or trajectory tracking in its workspace. With the purpose to proof the passivity and stability results, the control strategy is evaluated in a experimental platform, in our case the PHANToM premium 1.0 haptic device [4].
Prospects of wide-gap fluoride hetero-structures for deep ultraviolet optical devices

The variation of band gap energy and band structure with respect to composition of Li/sub (1-x)/K/sub x/Ba/sub (1-y)/Mg/sub y/F/sub 3/ perovskite-like fluorides is investigated. Analysis of energy chart shows the feasibility of fabricating Li/sub (1-x)/K/sub x/Ba/sub (1-y)/Mg/sub y/F/sub 3/ on either LiBaF/sub 3/ or KMgF/sub 3/.
Fast and Accurate Ray-Voxel Intersection Techniques for Iso-Surface Ray Tracing

A new intersection algorithm for iso-surface volume ray tracing increases performance by roughly a factor of three compared to previous accurate intersection algorithms while offering similar perfor- mance as previous algorithms that only approximated the solution. The image shows some of the test data sets: Bonsai tree, aneurism, engine, and skull. Abstract Visualizing iso-surfaces of volumetric data sets is becoming increasingly important for many practi- cal applications. One crucial task in iso-surface ray tracing is to find the correct intersection of a ray with the trilinear-interpolated implicit surface de- fined by the data values at the vertices of a given voxel. Currently available solutions are either accu- rate but slow or they provide fast but only approxi- mate solutions. In this paper, we analyze the available techniques and present a new intersection algorithm. We com- pare and evaluate the new algorithm against previ- ous approaches using both synthetic test cases and real world data sets. The new algorithm is roughly three times faster but provides the same image quality and better nu- merical stability as previous accurate solutions.