Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Spatial structure of relaxation events and crab settlement in the northern California upwelling system

During spring and summer 1993, we monitored settlement of crabs (primarily Cancer spp.) and sea urchins Strongylocentrotus spp. in conjunction with physical variables associated with coastal circulation to investigate how physical conditions influence the spatial distribution of recruitment along the coast. Observations were made along a 100 km stretch of the northern California coast (USA), from the Gulf of the Farallones north to Point Arena. Temperature, salinity and wind stress data indicated fluctuations in upwelling and provided evidence for the alongshore, northward flow of warm, low salinity water during upwelling relaxation events which typically lasted several days. On a weekly time scale, crab settlement was positively correlated with temperature, and negatively correlated with salinity, indicating that settlement occurred during relaxation events. Correlations were higher north of Point Reyes, where high settlement occurred only during relaxation, than south of Point Reyes, where settlement occurred both during relaxation events and to a lesser degree during upwelling. Overall crab settlement was higher south of Point Reyes. On a daily time scale, crab settlement north of Point Reyes was associated with the sharp increase in temperature observed as the relaxation current reached that point on the coast. This association suggested that crabs were transported northward alongshore In the thermal front which propagated northward during each relaxation event. This alongshore transport mechanism may be responsible for the predictable pattern of settlement variability within this system: with continuous, event-modulated settlement south of Point Reyes and episodic, event-dependent settlement to the north. Similar physical/biological interactions may occur at other points along this coast and along the midlatitude boundaries of other oceans.
Climate Regime Effects on Pacific Herring Growth Using Coupled Nutrient-Phytoplankton-Zooplankton and Bioenergetics Models

Abstract We used a nutrient-phytoplankton-zooplankton (NPZ) model coupled to a fish bioenergetics model to simulate the weight-at-age responses of Pacific herring Clupea pallasii to climate regimes. The NPZ model represents the daily dynamics of the lower trophic levels by simulating the uptake and recycling dynamics of nitrogen and silicon and the photosynthesis and grazing interactions of multiple functional groups of phytoplankton and zooplankton. The bioenergetics model simulates the number and mean weight of Pacific herring for each of 10 age-classes. Three zooplankton groups simulated in the NPZ model provide estimates of the prey used to determine the consumption component of the herring bioenergetics model. We used a spawner-recruit relationship to estimate the number of new age-1 individuals joining the herring population every year. The coupled models were applied to the coastal upwelling area off the west coast of Vancouver Island. Model simulations were performed to isolate the effects of each.
Simulation of a Triple Inverted Pendulum Based on Fuzzy Control

The inverted pendulum is a classic problem in dynamics and control theory and is widely used as a benchmark for testing control algorithms. This paper studies the use of fuzzy control method to study the stability control problem of a triple inverted pendulum system. By the linear model of the system, the feedback weight matrix of the LQR optimal control and the feedback parameters of the linear optimal control are designed to determine the parameters of the fuzzy controller. The simulation results show that the proposed method can achieve the stability control of the three stage inverted pendulum, and has good dynamic performance with simple parameter selection.
A STUDY ON BENCHMARKING UNDERSTANDING, KNOWLEDGE AND IMPLEMENTATION BARRIERS IN MALAYSIAN OIL PALM INDUSTRY

This paper is based on a survey conducted on top management’s benchmarking understanding, awareness and barriers in the Malaysian oil palm industry. The two main objectives of this paper are: firstly, to investigate the level of understanding and knowledge; secondly, to identify the barriers that could hinder and disrupt the benchmarking implementation in the Malaysian oil palm industry. A survey questionnaire tested for reliability and validated by experts and practitioners was developed and distributed through postal mail and email to 700 respondents involved in the oil palm industry. Survey results revealed that 77.9% of them are still in the moderate category, 8.1% in the low category and only 14% have good benchmarking understanding and knowledge. Survey results also showed that the three main barriers faced during the benchmarking implementation are due to: lack of understanding on the benchmarking knowledge, lack of clarity with regard to specific areas to be benchmarked and top management culture
Medicinal plants used in child care in southern Brazil

In many cultures throughout the world, mostly in developing countries, medicinal plants play an important role in the maintenance of people’s health. Despite this, some plants can be inherently toxic. People are not generally well-informed about this risk, and the concept that natural means safe prevails. Considering the associated risk of the misuse of medicinal plants, children represent an even more vulnerable group than adults. The main goal of this study is to evaluate the local knowledge of medicinal plants related to child care by mothers and care takers in a district of Criciuma, Southern Brazil. An ethnobotanical household survey was carried out with 42 mothers or care takers through open interviews, and botanical samples of the plants they used were gathered. The information collected about traditional knowledge was compared with references cited in Normative Instruction n°5 journal, and other scientific literature in order to evaluate similarities and differences. A total of 18 plant species were mentioned. Information on 83% of cited plants were found in the scientific references. 51% of therapeutic uses matched the literature guidelines. There was an absence of indications and restrictions for use with children for 34% of mentioned plants. The use of medicinal plants can be considered an important element in the maintenance of local knowledge and culture. This practice also represents an affordable therapeutic option, in communities where poverty and a lack of access to modern medicine are prominent factors. Just like other medicines, medicinal plants may have side effects however, and administration to children should be performed with careful attention. Key words: Ethnobotany, local plant knowledge, medicinal plants, children.
Innovation System Analysis of the Wood and Furniture SME's in the Region of Thessaly

Development strategies and regional projects of innovative actions, constitute the catalysts of regional and national economic development, according to Lisbon strategy for economic, social and environmental renewal. Under this direction, the region of Thessaly in Greece comes behind far more than the other European or national regions concerning innovation and especially business innovation. Although it is difficult to isolate the nature, the sources and the results of innovation a congruency exists to the opinions concerning the elements of innovation (Gordon and McCann 2005). Focusing to the branch of wood and furniture enterprises, a first diagnosis is attempting through this study, in order to seek the sources and constrains of innovation in the branch and analyze the innovation wood and furniture system. The study focuses to the registration of innovative performance of wood and furniture SME’s of the region, mainly through the economic aspect of business innovation simultaneously to the sector and regional innovation system analysis. Specifically the aims of the study concern: • Assessment of wood and furniture SME’s innovation factors, sources and constraints. • Ways and measurement of innovation funding in the specific branch • Determination of wood and furniture SME’s strategy for economic development
Heavy metal Contaminations of Urban soils in Ostrava, Czech Republic: Assessment of Metal Pollution and using Principal Component Analysis

This study investigates the status of heavy metals contaminations in urban soils of Ostrava in the Czech Republic. The main aim of this study was determination of concentration of Cd, Pb, Zn, Cu, Mn, V and Hg, assessment of contamination levels of metals in urban soils and verification of potential source of metals contamination. Soil samples were collected from soil layer of 20 cm and metals were determined by atomic spectroscopy methods (F AAS, GF AAS, AMA 254). It was concluded that metals concentrations in studied soils increased in the following order: Hg < Cd < Cu < Pb < V < Zn < Mn, with mean values of Hg (0.17 mg/kg), Cd (0.20 mg/kg), Pb (66.93 mg/kg), Zn (209.51 mg/kg), Cu (38.49 mg/kg), V (105.18 mg/kg) and Mn (1349.85 mg/kg). The results obtained from assessment of metals pollution by means of index of geoaccumulation (I geo ), enrichment factor (EF), contamination factor (CF), pollution load index (PLI), pollution index (PI) and integrated pollution index (IPI) confirmed that urban soils were contaminated in the range from moderately through strongly polluted up to highly contaminated soils. Multivariate statistics approach (Principal Component Analysis) was adopted for the data treatment for identification of contamination sources. This study verified that soil contamination was the result of the industrial processing that occurred in the studied area. All of these data confirmed that Cd, Pb, Zn, Cu, Mn, V and Hg come from anthropogenic activities, especially from industrial processes.
Employability and marketability of the graduates of Islamic studies in Islamic banking and finance: Malaysian experience

Purpose: This paper attempts to explore the role played by Islamic Studies in the areas of Islamic economical and financial education at Higher Educational Institutions for employability and marketability of the graduates; particularly, in facing the challenges of the issues of globalization. This desirable change of trend in teaching and learning is closely linked with the emergence of Islamic Banking systems and institutions, which are widespread in Islamic Countries and have even entered into the majority non-Muslim countries. Design/methodology/approach: This conceptual-based paper critically analyzes Marketability of qualified students in terms of attaining employment and their integration in the mainstream society. This paper then shows how much the Islamization project in Malaysia has impact on the development of the study of Islamic Banking and Finance; with increasing the job opportunities in this filed; how much function the government has instilled, if the state policy is not involved in, can there be still a field of interest? Findings: This paper finds that Islamic studies including Islamic banking and finance have least percentage of unemployed graduates. In another word, the globalization resulted that the graduates of these studies have much chance to be employed than others. Research limitations/implications: This paper assumes that the outcomes of the paper can be applied to newly established institutions for betterment of Islamic studies in banking and finance graduates. However, this may not be applicable to all Islamic studies individually. Practical implications: This paper shows that the area of Islamic economics, banking and finance would benefit by introducing soft and hard skills as well as double degree or major programs in Islamic studies. Originality/value: This paper contributes to the researchers, academicians, Banking and Finance institutions to provide more opportunities to increase the employability and marketability of the graduates in Higher Education. As Malaysia, particularly, has accomplished a remarkable growth in developing Islamic financial institutions besides the conventional banking system, Islamic Banking system and its various institutions required workers and officials with background and competencies in Islamic studies. In fulfilling the demand, Malaysian higher educational institutions spontaneously introduced courses and programs on Islamic banking.
An error protection protocol for user-transparent bridging of Fast Ethernet data transmission over the optical fading channel in an aeronautical environment

This paper presents an extensive insight into error protection techniques for free space optical links, focusing in particular in aeronautic stratospherically applications. The long distances present in these scenarios along with challenging atmospherically conditions present significant obstacles that degrade link performance. Thus it is imperative to apply highly efficient error protection scheme to avoid unacceptably high loss rates. The goal was to design a point-to-point data link layer error protection protocol that allows user-transparent bridging of Fast Ethernet data transmission over the optical fading channel in an high altitude inter platform link environment.
The Dynamic of land Cover Change in Abuja City, Federal Capital territory, Nigeria

The Federal Capital City of Abuja, Nigeria, is one of the World’s fastest growing citiesexperiencing rapid urbanization. This work aimed at assessing the dynamic of Abuja city’s land cover, Federal Capital Territory Abuja Nigeria. The following objectives were to: identify the characteristics and the spatial distribution of the urban land cover, and estimate the dynamics in the Land cover over a period of 25 years. The data used were Landsat TM and ETM + images (path and row 189/54 respectively) with a 30m spatial resolutions; for the periods 1986,1990,2001,2006 and 2011; and sourced from glovis and glcf NASA. The satellite images selected for the land cover classification were bands 543. Artificial Neural Network algorithm was used for the urban Land cover classification. Land cover categories was analyzed by regression techniques. The results of the analysis showed that the built up area was more prominent in the urbanized areas with 207% change from 1986 to 2011. There is inverse relationship between vegetation and built-up area and direct relationship also exist between the built-up and the years. The study concluded that the green vegetation area has weaken the effects on urban heat island, while, built-up area has the capability of strengthening the effects of urban heat island in the Abuja city. Owing to the constraints posed by availability and quality of data; to study the dynamics of city land cover; satellite based sensors with very high spatial resolution were recommended to enable highly detailed land use/cover, and ecological characterization of the urban environment of the city.
Developing a Cognitive Model to Motivate School Principals in South African Rural Schools

Abstract The need to conduct the study was necessitated by a lack of motivation among South African principals. This paper reports on the findings from a formal study designed to develop a cognitive model to motivate the principals in the Mpumalanga province in South Africa. That was done by identifying and explaining factors impacting on the motivation of principals. A qualitative study was selected while semi-structured interviews, field notes and official documents were used for the data collection. An interpretative approach was employed to analyse principals’ experiences about motivating or demotivating factors. The findings indicated that the motivation of school principals was influenced by both cognitive and systemic factors. It was recommended that intrinsic outcomes and employing cognitive abilities might improve their motivation when facing challenges in their leadership role.
Arrovian aggregation of MBA preferences: An impossibility result

Cerreia-Vioglio, Ghirardato, Maccheroni, Marinacci and Siniscalchi (Economic Theory, 48:341-375, 2011) have recently axiomatised preferences in the presence of ambiguity as Monotonic Bernoullian Archimedean (MBA) preferences. We investigate the problem of Arrovian aggregation of MBA preferences - and prove dictatorial impossibility results for both finite and infinite populations.
Data Envelopment Analysis: A Tool of Measuring Efficiency in Banking Sector

The present paper examined the review of literature related to measuring relative efficiency of banks using data envelopment analysis (DEA). The efficiency of banks is measure through the ability of the individual bank to maximise output given a certain level of input. By measuring its efficiency, it can serves as early warning or benchmark of its performance and it can define future improvement in various area such as managerial, technology or socio-economic. DEA is comprises of two basic model that are DEA Charnes-Cooper-Rhodes model with constant return to scale assumption and DEA Banker-Charnes-Cooper model with variable return to scale assumption. In banking industry, DEA is using two approaches that are production or intermediation approach. The former highlights banks as delivering services in the form of transaction and the later assumes banks intermediate funds between surplus units to deficit unit. The study of efficiency in banks with similar economic and political condition is important as banks operate in parallel.
Corner Detection Using Color Density Gradient

A novel corner detection approach which is based on clustering the pixels by density gradient is proposed. Moving along the density gradient, the pixels will arrive at their object center, and at corner neighborhood, the density gradients all point away in any direction. Hence, two eigenvalues of the Hessian matrix are all positive and significant in density gradient field. The proposed method is invariant to the detection scale, and it can be applied for all type images.
Histological effects aqueous extract of Allium sativum (Alliaceae) bulb on bone and spleen of adult wistar rats

Allium sativum , commonly known as garlic is a member of the Alliaceae family and it is one of the earliest known medicinal plant. The aim of this study is to evaluate the histological effects of aqueous extract of Allium sativum bulb on selected organs (bone marrow and spleen) of the mononuclear phagocyte system using adult Wistar Rats. Twenty adult Wistar rats were grouped into four experimental groups: A, B, C and D. Rats in group A served as control and were administered distill water daily for period of five weeks. While groups B, C and D were administered aqueous extract of Allium sativum bulb orally at doses of 150, 300 and 600mg/kg body weight daily for a period of five weeks respectively. At the end of the experiment the animals were sacrificed, the spleen and bone marrow were harvested and fixed in 10% buffered formalin for histological studies. Photomicrographs of processed slides were taken using light microscope. The result obtained in the various treatment groups revealed in a non-dose dependent fashion increase in cellularity and myeloid- erythoid cells in the bone marrow and mild lymphoid follicular activation accompanied by sinus histiocytosis in the spleen. In conclusion, administration of aqueous extract of Allium sativum bulb showed enhanced immunostimulatory properties in the bone marrow and spleen of adult Wistar rats. Dietary supplement with Allium sativum can boost the immunity of Individuals living in communities with low socio-economic status who are prone to malnutrition and infections. Keywords: histological, sinus histiocytosis, mononuclear phagocyte system, cellularity myeloid- erythoid cells
Progressive outliers in listener perception of sound change

This paper explores how vocalic outliers are perceived in the context of an ongoing sound change, with the prior understanding that listeners integrate vocalic outliers in establishing speakers’ intended vowel output, but they do so with a bias (Labov, Baranowski, and Dinkin 2010). We focus on the short-e (DRESS) vowel that is undergoing generational change in lower Michigan. We conducted an experiment to determine whether local community members preferentially incorporate progressive outliers (the outliers in the direction of change) over other outliers into their perception of the vowel's mean position. The results indicate that vocalic outliers were integrated into mean calculation of speakers output, concurrent with the prior study (Labov, Baranowski, and Dinkin 2010). Listeners also displayed bias, as the low shorte progressive outliers were accorded more weight when compared with the high short-e outliers that are in the opposite direction of change. Yet this preference was almost exclusively displayed by the female listeners, who also produced a more lowered short-e in a reading task. This suggests that vocalic outliers are important indicators of the direction of sound change in progress, and that women show special perceptual sensitivity to diachronically progressive outliers. This working paper is available in University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics: https://repository.upenn. edu/pwpl/vol24/iss2/18
OMICS based Interventions for Climate Proof Crops

Agriculture – the key to human civilization without doubt can be regarded as an essential part of our daily lives providing us our bread and butter. Food production or creation of fibers, fuels, raw materials & biopharmaceuticals forming the fundamental basis of human and animal sustenance is because of crop and other plant species. With a long history of humankind and agriculture co-existence, and immense & indispensable importance of agriculture in human sustenance today, it is therefore our duty to further promote and sustain agriculture. The present global scenario takes our attention to what we call ‘Climate Change’. Adverse change in climate can lead to imbalance in food production and ultimately imbalance of the human health, nutrition, and happiness. It is evident that the impact of climate change covers all regions. Thus, we need strategies that enable us to increase our food production to feed the ever-growing human population and at the same time keep sustainability and effect on environment in mind. This is where the term sustainable agriculture comes into play. Indefinite food production without causing severe or irreversible damage to the ecosystem is the key. Sustainable agriculture should not be misunderstood by totally abolishing new technologies. But it actually aims at developing technologies that helps in improving agriculture production without having negative impact on the environment. We here propose certain biotechnology-based strategies that can overcome negative impact of climate change and will also lead in improving future food production and livelihood. Droughts, irregular precipitations, deviated temperatures are predicted to be frequent in the near future. The question is, how do we tackle these problems? There is a need to have climate proof crops, i.e. the crops that can sustain various abiotic stresses. So far conventional means have been exploited but looking at the looming population and the intensity of climatic vagaries the need is to focus on new technologies having solutions with sustainability. One such technology is omics, and where transcriptomics and proteomics are two key approaches. Large numbers of genes/proteins that are involved in regulating different stresses and finally can be exploited to generate next-generation crops to enable enhanced food production are available. Molecular breeding has tremendous scope that will ensure introgression of desirable traits in cultivars without any linkage drag. Biotechnology also provides us the platform to look for desirable genes across genera and even the kingdom. Thus genome revolution has to play a role in next green revolution to have climate proof crops that can improve future food production and livelihood for sustainable human habitations.