Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Analysis of fluid substitution in a porous and fractured medium

To improve quantitative interpretation of seismic data, we analyze the effect of fluid substitution in a porous and fractured medium on elastic properties and reflection coefficients. This analysis uses closed-form expressions suitable for fluid substitution in transversely isotropic media with a horizontal symmetry axis (HTI). For the HTI medium, the effect of changing porosity and water saturation on (1) P-wave moduli, (2) horizontal and vertical velocities, (3) anisotropic parameters, and (4) reflection coefficients are examined. The effects of fracture density on these four parameters are also studied. For the model used in this study, a 35% increase in porosity lowers the value of P-wave moduli by maximum of 45%. Consistent with the reduction in P-wave moduli, P-wave velocities also decrease by maximum of 17% with a similar increment in porosity. The reduction is always larger for the horizontal P-wave modulus than for the vertical one and is nearly independent of fracture density. The magnitude of the anisotropic parameters of the fractured medium also changes with increased porosity depending on the changes in the value of P-wave moduli. The reflection coefficients at an interface of the fractured medium with an isotropic medium change in accordance with the above observations and lead to an increase in anisotropic amplitude variation with offset (AVO) gradient with porosity. Additionally, we observe a maximum increase in P-wave modulus and velocity by 30% and 8%, respectively, with a 100% increase in water saturation. Water saturation also changes the anisotropic parameters and reflection coefficients. Increase in water saturation considerably increases the magnitude of the anisotropic AVO gradient irrespective of fracture density. From this study, we conclude that porosity and water saturation have a significant impact on the four studied parameters and the impacts are seismically detectable.
Participatory Scenario Planning for Protected Areas Management under the Ecosystem Services Framework: the Doñana Social-Ecological System in Southwestern Spain

Conservation and development visions in and around protected areas generate confrontation and uncertainty that damage the biodiversity and ecosystem services which maintain human well-being. To address this issue, we applied the participatory scenario planning framework to the protected area of the Donana social-ecological system in southwestern Spain. This work explores the social perceptions regarding the conditions, trends, trade-offs, and future of ecosystem services and human well-being, and seeks management strategies for the Donana social-ecological system and its protected areas. We found that participatory scenario planning (1) can create different visions of the future of the system addressing its uncertainty and the main ecosystem services trade-offs, and (2) can propose consensual management strategies to determine a path toward a desirable future.
Decoherence under many-body system-environment interactions: A stroboscopic representation based on a fictitiously homogenized interaction rate

An environment interacting with portions of a system leads to multiexponential interaction rates. Within the Keldysh formalism, we fictitiously homogenize the system-environment interaction yielding a uniform decay rate facilitating the evaluation of the propagators. Through an injection procedure we neutralize the fictitious interactions. This technique justifies a stroboscopic representation of the system-environment interaction which is useful for numerical implementation and converges to the natural continuous process. We apply this procedure to a fermionic two-level system and use the Jordan-Wigner transformation to solve a two-spin swapping gate in the presence of a spin environment.
reLated tO science centre exhibits – a prOgress repOrt OF recent research LiteratUre and pOssibLe FUtUre research FOci

sammanFattning Forskningsfältet som rör lärande i informella miljöer växter ständigt och under den senaste tiden har antalet artiklar som fokuserar lärande i relation till ett besök på ett science center eller museum ökat kraftigt. Men vilka slutsatser kan man dra när det gäller utställningar och besökares lärande? Vilka metodologiska trender kan man se och vilka framtida forskningsområden kan tänkas utgöra intressanta fält? Denna forskningsgenomgång analyserar och diskuterar olika forskningsstudier som fokuserar besökares lärande och deras interaktioner med utställningar samt studier som utvärderar utställningsmiljöer. Vidare diskuteras trender med avseende på olika metodologiska ansatser samt föreslår framtida forskningsfokus inom fältet.
An Efficient Approach to De-noising Mammogram Images

: The noisy nature of digital mammograms and low contrast of doubtful areas which make medical images de-noising a challenging problem. In the field of image processing, different types of denoising algorithm are used to remove the unnecessary noise such as additive white Gaussian noise, salt and pepper noise, impulsive noise, as well used to smoothen the image. In the existing work, a novel gradient histogram preservation (GHP) algorithm was developed to improve the texture which exhibits the reduced quality in recognition of human image experiments. To remove the noise, Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) algorithm is used to eliminate the noisiness present in the medical image to preserve the texture structures. Proposed approach will efficiently calculate peak signal noise ratio (PSNR) parameters and make the enhanced image without noise and obtains the quality of image without any loss of data.
THE ECOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES OF FLOWERING ASYNCHRONY IN MONOECIOUS FIGS: A SIMULATION STUDY'

For plants with temporally separate sexual phases to outcross, population- level flowering asynchrony is necessary, but this can decrease the resource base available for pollinators. We developed a simulation model to examine the consequences of such asynchrony for individual reproductive success and long-term pollinator maintenance with- in monoecious fig populations. In figs, flowering is synchronous within a tree and the specialist pollinators/seed predators can only survive briefly away from trees. Consequently, population-level flowering asynchrony must extend year-round for pollinators to persist locally. In repeated stochastic simulations using phenological traits of one well-studied species (Ficus natalensis), a median of 95 trees was required to produce an asynchronous sequence that could maintain local pollinator populations for 4 yr. However, many trees in those simulated populations were either male-sterile (10%) or both male- and female- sterile (35%), because their sexual phases were not well timed with the opposite phases of other trees. Sterility within a population approached zero at 2-3 times the critical population size. Both the predicted critical population size and frequency of success of the trees within it depended strongly on the duration of reproductive episodes and the intervals between episodes. The level of within-tree reproductive synchrony was also critical: doubling the length of time over which individuals could donate pollen resulted in a 39% decrease in critical population size and a 27% increased likelihood that individuals would achieve at least some reproductive success. These results point to the need for precise phenological data for estimating plant fitness and population structure both in models and in the field.
INTAKE , GROWTH AND FEED PREFERENCE BY STEERS FED COMBINATIONS OF ALFALFA AND ANNUAL RYEGRASS SILAGE

14-35 ABSTRACT Nutritive value and intake of legumes is generally considered superior to grasses when ensiled at similar digestibility. The objectives of this experiment were to determine the optimum combination of annual ryegrass (Lolium multiflorum) and alfalfa (Medicago sativa) silages to maximize growth rate of steers fed silage, determine chemical components which influenced performance, and to determine if steers selected the optimum mixture when given a choice. Both silages contained similar concentrations of dry matter, acid detergent fibre and organic acids, but alfalfa silage had higher concentrations of nitrogen (N), soluble N and ammonia N. Annual ryegrass contained more neutral detergent fibre. In a 12-wk growth trial, voluntary intake by steers was not influenced when the proportion of the two silages was changed from 0 to 1 in 0.25 increments. However, rate of gain increased linearly (P<0.001) as the proportion of ryegrass silage was increased. When conditioned to either of the two silages, steers showed a significant preference for ryegrass over alfalfa (P<0.5). However, when conditioned to a mixture of both silages no preference was elicited. The results suggested that extensive solubilization and deamination of protein in alfalfa silage nullified the expected intake and performance advantage to feeding a legume.
Geologic map of the Keweenaw Peninsula and adjacent area, Michigan

The area of this map includes the classic geology and mineral deposits of the Keweenaw Peninsula in northern Michigan, renowned for the occurrence of great volumes of Middle Proterozoic flood basalts and the world's largest concentration of native copper. Native copper was mined there continuously from the 1840's to the 1960's. For the earlier part of that period the Keweenawan native copper district was the principal source of copper for the United States. This map is intended to summarize and update a wealth of very detailed geologic maps of the region. This 1: 100,000-scale map is part of a set of maps portraying the regional geology of the Midcontinent rift on the southern shore of Lake Superior. The geology and mineral deposits of the district have been painstakingly studied for many years. Especially significant were the extensive report of Butler and Burbank (1929) and the detailed geologic maps produced by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in the 1950's (see index of mapping). The USGS was aided greatly by the Calumet and Hecla Copper Company which provided USGS geologists with a wealth of exploration and production data that allowed construction of detailed 1:24,000-scale maps for the entire peninsula. These maps are the principal sources of information used to compile this map. We have attempted to preserve as much detail as possible at 1:100,000 scale. For rocks northwest of the Keweenaw fault we have made few changes to previously mapped geology. New data are limited to (1) deposits of chalcocite and native copper discovered since the previous mapping in the 1950's, (2) a more detailed study of rhyolite bodies, and (3) radiometric age determinations. For areas southeast of the Keweenaw fault, new geophysical data and drillholes allow some new inferences about the geology of volcanic rocks covered by a thin veneer of Jacobsville Sandstone.
Sound wave acceleration in granular materials

The goal of this study is a better understanding of the numerous sound propagation mechanisms in granular materials. In a static, regular (crystal), three-dimensional packing, a small perturbation is created on one side and examined during its propagation through frictionless and frictional packings. The perturbation can be applied in longitudinal and shear directions in order to excite different modes of information propagation, including rotational modes. The wave speed and dispersion relation derived from simulation data are compared to those given by a theoretical approach based on a micro–macro transition. The detailed analysis of the wave velocity reveals an interesting acceleration close to the source. Finally a step towards real packings is made by introducing either friction or a tiny (but decisive) polydispersity in the particle size.
Automatic Recognition and Modeling of Piping System from Large-scale Terrestrial Laser Scanned Point Cloud

In recent years, constructing 3D as-built models of existing plants from large-scale laser scanned data has been expected to make rebuilding processes more efficient. However, laser scanned data consists of a massive number of points and includes a high noise level, so that the manual reconstruction of a 3D model is very time-consuming. Among plant equipment, piping systems especially account for the greatest proportion. Therefore, the purpose of this research was to propose an algorithm which can automatically recognize a piping system from terrestrial laser scan data of plants. The straight portion of pipes, connecting parts and connection relationship of the piping system can be automatically recognized. Normal-based region-growing can extract points of the piping system. Eigen analysis of the normal tensor and cylinder surface fitting allows for the recognition of portions of straight pipes. Tracing the axes of the piping system can derive connecting parts and connection relationships between elements of the piping system. The algorithm was applied to large-scale scanned data of an oil rig and an air-condition machine room. The results of the recognition rate of straight pipes, elbows, junctions were achieved at 87%, 77% and 75% respectively.
Firms and Labor Market Inequality: Evidence and Some Theory

We synthesize two related literatures on firm-level drivers of wage inequality. Studies of rent sharing that use matched worker-firm data find elasticities of wages with respect to value added per worker in the range of 0.05–0.15. Studies of wage determination with worker and firm fixed effects typically find that firm-specific premiums explain 20% of overall wage variation. To interpret these findings, we develop a model of wage setting in which workers have idiosyncratic tastes for different workplaces. Simple versions of this model can rationalize standard fixed effects specifications and also match the typical rent-sharing elasticities in the literature.
Effect of Long-chain Branching on the Foaming of Polypropylene with

In this article the influence of long-chain branching on the foaming behavior of polypropylene (PP) is investigated. Different branching contents are achieved by blending a linear PP (L-PP) and a long-chain branched PP (LCB-PP). Whereas, the L-PP does not exhibit any strain hardening in laboratory stretching experiments, blends with amounts of the LCB-PP higher than 2wt% already show a pronounced strain-hardening behavior. The strain hardening increased with a growing amount of the long-chain branched PP. A laboratory scale foaming apparatus based on a capillary rheometer is developed for the foaming experiments. In foaming tests with azodicarbonamide as chemical blowing agent, a significant improvement of the foaming behavior with respect to a higher expansion ratio, a lower amount of connected cells, and a more homogeneous cell size distribution is found with increasing content of the LCB-PP up to a concentration of 50wt%. At this concentration, the foaming behavior of the LCB-PP is reached. The results demonstrate that low amounts of long-chain branching can significantly improve the optimal foaming process of PPs with a chemical blowing agent, and that additions of the linear material up to 50wt% to the LCB-PP do not have any influence on the favorable foaming performance of the long-chain branched PP.
Use of Candida rugosa lipase immobilized on sepabeads for the amyl caprylate synthesis: Batch and fluidized bed reactor study

Lipase from Candida rugosa was covalently immobilized on Sepabeads EC-EP for application for amyl caprylate synthesis in an organic solvent system. Several solvents were tested in terms of biocatalyst stability and the best result was obtained with isooctane. The lipase-catalyzed esterification in the selected system was performed in batch and fluidized bed reactor systems. The influence of several important reaction parameters including temperature, initial water content, enzyme loading, acid/alcohol molar ratio, and time of addition of molecular sieves is carefully analyzed by means of an experimental design. Almost complete conversion (> 99%) of the substrate to ester could be performed in a batch reactor system, using lipase loading as low as 37 mg g -1 dry support and in a relatively short time (24 hrs) at 37oC, when high initial substrate molar ratio of 2.2 is used. Kinetics in a fluidized bed reactor system seems to still have a slightly better profile than in the batch system (90.2% yields after 14 hrs). The fluidized bed reactor operated for up 70 hrs almost with no loss in productivity, implying that the proposed process and the immobilized system could provide a promising approach for the amyl caprylate synthesis at the industrial scale.
Detection of Biofilm Genes ( gtf ) in Streptococcus mutans Isolated from Human Dental Caries

Sixty samples from saliva and dental plaque were selected from patients with caries active at ages from 4-65years. 22 isolates belong to Streptococcus mutans. All isolates pronounced adhesion and biofilm formation in various degrees. By using Polymerase Chain Reaction ﴾PCR﴿ Techniques, it was found that these isolates had gtfB encode GtfB with 80 bp, gtfC encode GtfC with 81 bp, and gtfD with 324 bp which explain their potential of biofilm formation.
Topkapi: Parallel and Fast Sketches for Finding Top-K Frequent Elements

Identifying the top-K frequent items is one of the most common and important operations in large data processing systems. As a result, several solutions have been proposed to solve this problem approximately. In this paper, we identify that in modern distributed settings with both multi-node as well as multi-core parallelism, existing algorithms, although theoretically sound, are suboptimal from the performance perspective. In particular, for identifying top-K frequent items, Count-Min Sketch (CMS) has fantastic update time but lack the important property of reducibility which is needed for exploiting available massive data parallelism. On the other end, popular Frequent algorithm (FA) leads to reducible summaries but the update costs are significant. In this paper, we present Topkapi, a fast and parallel algorithm for finding top-K frequent items, which gives the best of both worlds, i.e., it is reducible as well as efficient update time similar to CMS. Topkapi possesses strong theoretical guarantees and leads to significant performance gains due to increased parallelism, relative to past work.
CORRELATION BETWEEN SEGMENTAL REDUCTION AND PROSODIC FEATURES IN SPONTANEOUS SPEECH : THE ROLE OF TEMPO .

This work aims to point out some relations between segmental reduction and suprasegmental structures in Italian. Following a previous study that observed an increase of reduction probability to occur after a pitch or nuclear accent in the tone-unit, we tried to verify the existence of relations between the amount of reduction and speech-rate variation in pre-accent and post-accent positions, introducing the notion of local speech rate (l-SR) as the pattern of the inverse values of syllable duration. In a first stage, we classified three different l-SR patterns in the considered positions. In a second stage, we calculated the percentage of reductions occurring in each part of the scheme and the relation with the l-SR patterns. Final results show that, although a coincidence of greater amount of reduction in post-accent positions with increasing tendency of l-SR does exist, it is not systematic; l-SR decrease is not able to inhibit reduction.
A Novel Joint Tracker Combined by Occlusion Detection

Visual object tracking methods can be roughly categorized into generative method or discriminative method.Each of the two methods has its advantages and negative factors wh ic may result in occlusion or drifting problems. In order to deal with the occlusion and drifting problem better, we combine the two different methods together by the occlusion information, which is obtained from an occlusion detection mechanism. In this pap er, first, we propose a novel mechanism which can predict occlusi on accurately and sensitively with MIL and SVM classifiers. Sec ond, we combine the discriminative method and the generative met hod in a joint-probability model and use the occlusion information to adjust the weights of the methods, which are complementary. Third, we propose a classified template updating method, in which we divide the templates into two groups according to occlusion information and use opposite probability distribution to update the two groups. The experiment results of our tracker on several challenging datasets demostrate that our approa ches is effective and outperforms the state-of-the-art approac hes.
Evaluation of antibacterial activity of some non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs againstEscherichia coli causing urinary tract infection

Extensive use of antibiotics for urinary tract infections has led to the emergence of drug-resistant microorganisms and one solution to this problem is to search for non-antibiotic compounds that exert anti-bacterial activity through different mechanisms such as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). In this study, out of 100 urine samples; 48 Escherichia coli strains were detected, 47.9% were multi-drug resistant. The antibiogram resistance pattern of the strains was carried out by agar dilution method. Diclofenac sodium, indomethacin, aspirin and ibuprofen were tested against the E. coli isolates. Diclofenac sodium showed the lowest MIC50 and MIC90; 8 and 256 mg/ml, respectively. Aspirin showed MIC50 of 64 mg/ml, while both indomethacin and ibuprofen showed MIC50 of 256 mg/ml. Indomethacin, aspirin and ibuprofen showed the same MIC90 of 1024 mg/ml. The combined effects of the four NSAIDs and five antibiotics (Amoxicillin, Augmentin, Cefotaxime, Ciprofloxacin and Gentamicin) were tested on five resistant clinical E. coli strains by checkerboard dilution technique. All the tested NSAIDs significantly reduced the minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of antibiotics against the tested bacteria and fractional inhibitory concentration indices (FICIs) for this combination ranged from 0.03 to 0.5. In this study, leakage of intracellular components suggests that the effect of NSAIDs on E. coli could be the formation of pores in the plasma membrane and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) observations confirmed the damage to the structural integrity of the tested bacteria. In conclusion, NSAIDs showed antibacterial activity against E. coli causing urinary tract infections (UTIs), a combination of them and antibiotics exhibited good synergism and the mechanism of their action was by damaging the bacterial cell membrane. Key words: Urinary tract infection (UTI), Escherichia coli, NSAIDs, antibacterial resistance, antibacterial activity, synergism.
Agroecology as a Transdisciplinary, Participatory, and Action-Oriented Approach

This article traces multiple directions in the evolution of agroecology, from its early emphasis on ecological processes in agricultural systems, to its emergence as a multidimensional approach focusing on broader agro-food systems. This review is timely, as agroecology is being increasingly applied within a diversity of scientific-, policy-, and farmer-based initiatives. We contrast different agroecological perspectives or “agroecologies” and discuss the characteristics of an agroecology characterized by a transdisciplinary, participatory and action-oriented approach. Our final discussion describes the contents of the special issue, and states our goal for this compilation, which is to encourage future work that embraces an agroecological approach grounded in transdisciplinarity, participation, and transformative action.