Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Searching for salt tolerance among wild relatives of wheat: What should we look for?

Common strategies for identifying new genetic sources for crop salt tolerance have had limited success. One of the problems lies in the focusing on the seedling vegetative stage, despite the fact that tolerance at the reproductive stages is different. This article highlights a new strategy for such research. The first phase of this study focused on finding closely-related genotypes that differed in a key trait related to salt tolerance. Four hundred lines of four species were subjected to 150 mM NaCl in sand culture. Four Aegilops kotchyi lines were selected in this phase. Two tolerant lines (Ak3390 and Ak3393) showed salinity tolerance to 150 mM NaCl both in the vegetative and the reproductive phase. The other two sensitive lines (Ak3511 and Ak4533) reached flowering but failed to produce viable seeds under salt. The four lines were compared during the second phase of the study in terms of ion accumulation and other processes leading to grain production. All lines exhibited decreasing ion content along the spike with no Na+ reaching the stigma. No significant difference was found between the tolerant and sensitive lines in pollen production and fertilization processes. The sensitive lines did not fill the seed endosperm under salt, and the seeds produced by the salt-treated plants were not viable; while the tolerant lines produced viable seeds with solid full endosperm. It is suggested that future studies will use this two-phase selection strategy in order to identify those genotypes that could be used for the study of key processes related to salt tolerance.
Effects of Chalk Use on Dust Exposure and Classroom Air Quality

This study explores human exposure to harmful dust when antidust chalk is used for teaching, as well as dust particle size distribution and how chalk dust affects indoor air quality. In this study, a classroom with 5 ventilation modes was selected. A dust size analyzer and a scanning mobility particle sizer were employed to measure the mass concentration and particle size distribution of chalk dust based on the frequency of chalk use during classes. The results indicate that antidust chalk can generate considerable quantities of dust particles and substantially increase the mass concentration of dust in the proximity of the chalkboard. Approximately 15% of observed chalk dust particles were respirable and high concentrations of chalk dust deteriorated the indoor air quality. Moreover, chalk dust was the primary source of indoor coarse particles. Mechanical ventilation resuspended the settled chalk dust particles, thereby increasing the mass concentration of airborne dust. Using antidust chalk generates coarse, fine, and ultrafine particles, particularly when cleaning the chalkboard. The best ventilation mode to reduce dust accumulated in the chalk teaching classroom was to open doors and turn on ceiling fans. Wearing face masks and increasing distance between seats and blackboard can also prevent teachers and students from chalk dust hazard. The results of this study should serve as a reference for improving indoor air quality and protecting teachers and students from harmful dust particles in classrooms.
A Characterization of Dimension Functions of Wavelets

Abstract This paper is devoted to the study of the dimension functions of (multi)wavelets, which was introduced and investigated by P. Auscher in 1995 (J. Geom. Anal.5, 181–236). Our main result provides a characterization of functions which are dimension functions of a (multi)wavelet. As a corollary, we obtain that for every function D that is the dimension function of a (multi)wavelet, there is a minimally supported frequency (multi)wavelet whose dimension function is D. In addition, we show that if a dimension function of a wavelet not associated with a multiresolution analysis (MRA) attains the value K, then it attains all integer values from 0 to K. Moreover, we prove that every expansive matrix which preserves Z N admits an MRA structure with an analytic (multi)wavelet.
New Approaches and Tools in Teaching Programming

Teaching programming at university beginner's level has some specific problems like wide diversity of student's previous knowledge, fear of programming, problems with programming language syntax etc., as shown in many previous researches and our on-line questionnaire. There are already some approaches and tools developed to make programming concepts easier to understand for students, like different visual tools, tutorials, video lectures and even new programming languages, developed to learn programming concepts. Our approach is based on development of specific learning interface to standard programming languages, like C++, instead of standard IDE-s. That interface should prevent many mistakes students often do in learning programming and make easier for teachers to help their students before they collect to many syntax and logical errors.
A view from the bottom of the pyramid: drivers of corporate environmentalism in developing countries

Drawing on perspectives from stakeholder, resource dependence, institutional and resource based theories and using a multiple-case inductive study, this research examines the drivers of corporate environmentalism in developing countries. Based on case analysis of 11 environmentally responsive organizations in India, corporate environmentalism in this research has been operationalized as a two stage construct, involving first and second order responsiveness. First order environmental responsiveness in organizations in India was found to be driven by pressures arising out of internationalization. The drivers for second order responsiveness were found to be distinctly associated with organizational identities rooted in a history of social responsiveness.
Implementation and Analysis of a Support Tool for the Persuasive System Design Model

The primary objective of this study was to develop a novel artifact to provide categorized and ethical examples of design principles of Persuasive System Design (PSD) model. PSD model is considered as a fundamental design and analysis tool for creating systems that aim at behavior and attitude change ethically. With the increased attention in persuasive system design field and rise in Behavior Change Support Systems (BCSS), we can expect an in increase in adoption of PSD model in design and development of such systems. Despite these developments, examples of design principles from PSD model are neither readily available nor categorized. In response to this obstacle, we created and evaluated a support tool where users could share, obtain, and rate examples from each design principle. We utilized design principles from PSD model to implement the rating feature. We used Design Science Research Methodology (DSRM) to create the artifact. We tested desirability using Product Reaction Cards to understand user’s feeling about the support tool. We also evaluated perceived effectiveness of both rating feature and app as a whole to identify the perceived effectiveness. From the results, we deduced intention to use and predicted actual usage in the future. The support tool may be useful for persuasive system designers, researchers or beginners on this field to see real life examples of design principles of PSD model. Hopefully, it could support them on designing more ethical persuasive system or contribute towards the persuasive system design area.
Half-Bridge Zero Voltage Switching Converter with Three Resonant Tanks

This paper presents a zero voltage switching (ZVS) converter with three resonant tanks. The main advantages of the proposed converter are its ability to reduce the switching losses on the power semiconductors, decrease the current stress of the passive components at the primary side, and reduce the transformer secondary windings. Three resonant converters with the same power switches are adopted at the low voltage side to reduce the current rating on the transformer windings. Using a series-connection of the transformer secondary windings, the primary side currents of the three resonant circuits are balanced to share the load power. As a result, the size of both the transformer core and the bobbin are reduced. Based on the circuit characteristics of the resonant converter, the power switches are turned on at ZVS. The rectifier diodes can be turned off at zero current switching (ZCS) if the switching frequency is less than the series resonant frequency. Therefore, the reverse recovery losses on the rectifier diodes are overcome. Experiments with a 1.6kW prototype are presented to verify the effectiveness of the proposed converter.
The Influence of Information Sharing on Supply Chain Management

Problem statement: Implementing information sharing and coordination can enhance the performance of supply chain management, such as a short response time, minimum cost, low inventory and joint production and transportation. Approach: Through information sharing among all supply chain members, stable long-term relationships can be established and maintained. Results: This study uses a quantitative cost model to identify the interaction among the supply chain members and to analyze the benefits of implementing information sharing. Conclusion: Through the joint procurement, production and transportation that is made possible under information sharing, the total cost of supply chain collaboration can be optimized for better supply chain management. Moreover, a successful supply chain management system with effective strategies can also be facilitated.
DATA MINING FOR KNOWLEDGE DISCOVERY FROM OBJECT-BASED SEGMENTATION OF VHR REMOTELY SENSED IMAGERY

Abstract. The success of the object-based image analysis (OBIA) paradigm can be attributed to the fact that regions obtained by means of segmentation process are depicted with a variety of spectral, shape, texture and context characteristics. These representative objectsattributes can be assigned to different land-cover/land-use types by means of two options. The first is to use supervised classifiers such as K-nearest neighbors (KNN) and Support Vector Machine (SVM), the second is to create classification rules. Supervised classifiers perform very well and have generally higher accuracies. However one of their drawbacks is that they provide no explicit knowledge in understandable and interpretable forms. The building of the rule set is generally based on the domain expert knowledge when dealing with a small number of classes and a small number of attributes, but having a dozens of continuously valued attributes attached to each image object makes it a tedious task and experts quickly get overwhelmed and become totally helpless. This is where data mining techniques for knowledge discovering help to understand the hidden relationships between classes and their attached attributes. The aim of this paper is to highlight the benefits of using knowledge discovery and data-mining tools, especially rule induction algorithms for useful and accurate information extraction from high spatial resolution remotely sensed imagery.
Valuing Health Effects: The Case of Ozone and Fine Particles in Southern California

This study presents a conservative estimate of the health benefits that would result from attainment of the federal ozone and fine particle (PM) standards in the South Coast Air Basin of southern California. A three‐stage approach is used that links pollution exposures to adverse health outcomes to economic values. The annual value of the aggregate health benefits approaches $500 million (with a range of $295–$646 million) for ozone and exceeds $21 billion (with a range of $12.85–$34.22 billion) for fine particles. Such results are useful to regulatory agencies and other policy makers when evaluating the merits of various air pollution reduction strategies.
Link prediction in author collaboration network based on BP neural network

Recently, more and more authors have been encouraged for collaboration because it often produces good results. However, the author collaboration network contains experts in various research directions within various fields, and it is difficult for individual authors to decide which authors are best suited to their expertise. This paper uses the relationships among authors to predict new relationships that may arise, recommending each author with the collaborators they may be interested in. The data source comes from 4-year data in DBLP from 2001 to 2004. After data cleaning, the training set and test set are constructed and then used BP neural network to build model. At the same time, this article compares the performance with Logistic Regression, SVM and Random Forest. The experiment shows that the BP neural network can get better result, and it is feasible to predict links in the author collaboration network.
Penta-Band Dielectric Loaded Folded Loop Antenna for Mobile Handset

A compact internal penta-band folded loop antenna for LTE1600/2600/WIMAX3.5/WLAN2.4/5.2 multiple mobile operations is proposed and investigated. The whole antenna structure is formed of a single folded meander loop pattern mount on the surfaces of a dielectric carrier with L-shape have a volume of 20 mm×17mm×5 mm, and ground plane of length 110mm is used. The size of the total structure is 110 × 50 × 5mm 3 . The compact structure makes it very suitable for today's mobile phones applications. With 6 dB return loss, five operating frequency bands covering LTE/WLAN/WiMAX MHz can be achieved with our design. Also, the resonant characteristics of the antenna can be tuned by using various strip dimensions and also the dielectric material of the carrier. Moreover, simulated results exhibit that the proposed folded loop antenna features nearly good omnidirectional radiation patterns with proper gain. The design and optimizing of the performance of the proposed antenna are performed by using a high frequency structure simulator HFSS. Details of the various antenna parameters are presented and discussed in this paper.
Bull and Bear Markets in Commodity Prices and Commodity Stocks: Is There a Relation?

The extent to which prices of commodities such as oil and gold affect stock prices of firms engaged in their production, and in the stock market in general, has received attention in both the theoretical and empirical literature with mixed results. Instead of focusing on the direct relation between prices, this paper investigates the relation between different market phases. Specifically, it identifies bull and bear markets in commodity prices and in stock prices of firms whose primary business involves mining and marketing the relevant commodities, and investigates whether a relationship between them exists. The aggregate indices of the sectors related to commodities and the market overall are also considered. The empirical analysis is conducted for the Canadian stock market due to the importance that mining and energy stocks have in its composition. The results suggest that there is little evidence that the market phases identified for the individual stocks are related to those for the commodity prices.
Changes in the Shadow: The Shifting Role of Shaded Leaves in Global Carbon and Water Cycles Under Climate Change

Globally shaded leaves contribute to more than a half of the total increase in gross primary production (GPP; 7.6 Pg C) for 1982–2016. During 1982–2016, the fraction of shaded GPP increases by 1.1% (p < 0.01) in tropical forests and decreases by 1.4% (p < 0.01) and 1.8% (p < 0.01) in evergreen needleleaf and deciduous needleleaf boreal forests, respectively, suggesting an ecological niche of certain canopy structure for ecosystems to achieve maximum GPP. Unlike transpiration from sunlit leaves that has a turning point in the trend in 2003, global transpiration from shaded leaves steadily increased at the rate of 34 km3/year (p < 0.0001) during 1982–2016. Our study therefore suggests that shaded leaves have an increasing role in buffering the adverse impact of climate change and extremes. Further studies are still needed to reduce the uncertainties in reported trends arisen from climate forcing data, leaf area index, and land cover and land change products.
Gamma-Ray Bursts: A Radio Perspective

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are extremely energetic events at cosmological distances. They provide unique laboratory to investigate fundamental physical processes under extreme conditions. Due to extreme luminosities, GRBs are detectable at very high redshifts and potential tracers of cosmic star formation rate at early epoch. While the launch of Swift and Fermi has increased our understanding of GRBs tremendously, many new questions have opened up. Radio observations of GRBs uniquely probe the energetics and environments of the explosion. However, currently only 30% of the bursts are detected in radio bands. Radio observations with upcoming sensitive telescopes will potentially increase the sample size significantly and allow one to follow the individual bursts for a much longer duration and be able to answer some of the important issues related to true calorimetry, reverse shock emission, and environments around the massive stars exploding as GRBs in the early Universe.
Anibacterial, antibiofilm and antioxidant activity of Potamogeton nodosus Poir. extracts

Antibacterial, antibiofilm and antioxidant activity of acetone, ethanol, ethyl acetate and diethyl ether extracts of P. nodosus Poir. were tested. In vitro antibacterial activity was investigated by microdilution method. Minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) have been determined. The values were in the range from 5 to > 5 mg/ml. Antibiofilm activity was tested by crystal violet assay. The biofilm inhibitory concentration (BIC) values were from 2.03 to > 10 mg/ml. The best results against biofilm formation had ethanol and ethyl acetate extracts. The total phenolic content was established by using Folin-Ciocalteu method. The highest total phenol content was found in the ethyl acetate extract (28.45 mg GA/g) while the lowest content in the ethanol extract (22.74 mg GA/g). The concentrations of flavonoids were determined using aluminium chloride method. The concentration of total flavonoid content was 102.09 mg RU/g for the ethyl acetate extract, while the lowest content was noticed in diethyl ether extract (32.93 mg RU/g). The antioxidant activity was determined by the DPPH free radicals assay. Antioxidative efficiency was in the range from 641.77 to 8811.63 μg/ml. The tested extracts showed weak antioxidant activity (AAI < 0.5).
Price Asymmetry in the United States Fresh Tomato Market

This paper analyzes pricing relationships between the producer, wholesale and retail levels of the U.S. fresh tomato industry. The results indicate that price transmission is unidirectional from producer to retail. There was no asymmetric response for the producer-retail price relationship. Asymmetric price response was exhibited between wholesalers and both producers and retailers. Retail prices respond more to rising wholesale prices than to falling prices. Wholesales prices, however, respond more to declining producer price than to rising producer price.
Organic acid coated-slow-release phosphorus fertilizers improve P availability and maize growth in a tropical soil

In this paper, we report the results of studies on the solubility (water solubility trial) and the response by plants (greenhouse pot experiment using Zea mays) for four types of monoammonium phosphate fertilizers (Conventional MAP MAP1, MAP coated with a natural organic acid MAP2, MAP coated with a synthetic organic acid MAP3, and MAP coated with a peat humic organic acid MAP4) applied at five increasing doses (0, 100, 300, 600 and 1200 mg P dm-3) and pre-incubated with the soil for five lengths of time before planting (0, 15, 30 and 60 d). The coating with organic acids reduced the water solubility of the P fertilizers MAP4 provided a more gradual release of P over time. In the soil pot experiment, it was found that MAP1 required the highest dose to reach 90% of dry matter accumulation by the maize plant, followed by the Coated-Slow-Release Fertilizers (CSRF). The agronomic efficiency (AE) of P applied as the CSRF was 3 to 13% greater than that of MAP1. In addition, MAP4 led to higher values of AE (+11%) and apparent P recovery by maize (+41%) in comparison to MAP1. The physicochemical properties imposed by the chemical composition of the organic acid coatings generated fertilizers with distinct release rates and improved agronomic efficiencies.
Studies on Biochemical alteration in Fasciola hepatica infected Capra hircus (goats)

The present study was aimed with study the biochemical alteration in Fasciola hepatica infected goats. The study duration was one year in which summer, rainy and winter season included. Total 60 goats were included for this study. Goats were divided in two groups one was slaughter house and second was house hold. Blood samples were taken from the jugular vein into without evacuated EDTA tubes and stored at 4°C. Samples were analyzed within 12 h. In Serum samples were stored at - 20°C until the biochemical analysis Total protein, Blood glucose, ALT (Alanine Aminotransferase test) or SGPT (Serum glutamic pyruvic transaminase) and Serum bilirubin were observed. In all three season Total protein and Blood glucose value was decreased as compared to control value. ALT (Alanine Aminotransferase test) or SGPT (Serum glutamic pyruvic transaminase) and Serum bilirubin value was increased as compared to control value in house hold and slaughter house goats. Biochemical values highly altered in rainy season then winter and followed by summer season. Keywords: Fascioliasis, Capra hircus (Goat),serum biochemical, Total protein, Blood glucose, ALT and SGP
Secondary organic aerosol formation during June 2010 in Central Europe: measurements and modelling studies with a mixed thermodynamic-kinetic approach

Abstract. Until recently secondary organic carbon aerosol (SOA) mass concentrations have been systematically underestimated by three-dimensional atmospheric-chemistry-aerosol models. With a newly proposed concept of aging of organic vapours, more realistic model results for organic carbon aerosol mass concentrations can be achieved. Applying a mixed thermodynamic-kinetic approach for SOA formation shifted the aerosol size distribution towards particles in the cloud condensation nuclei size range, thereby emphasising the importance of SOA formation schemes for modelling realistic cloud and precipitation formation. The additional importance of hetero-molecular nucleation between H2SO4 and organic vapours remains to be evaluated in three-dimensional atmospheric-chemistry-aerosol models. Here a case study is presented focusing on Puy-de-Dome, France in June 2010. The measurements indicate a considerable increase in SOA mass concentration during the measurement campaign, which could be reproduced by modelling using a simplified thermodynamic-kinetic approach for SOA formation and increased biogenic volatile organic compound (VOC) precursor emissions. Comparison with a thermodynamic SOA formation approach shows a huge improvement in modelled SOA mass concentration with the thermodynamic-kinetic approach for SOA formation. SOA mass concentration increases by a factor of up to 6 accompanied by a slight improvement of modelled particle size distribution. Even though nucleation events at Puy-de-Dome were rare during the chosen period of investigation, a weak event in the boundary layer could be reproduced by the model in a sensitivity study when nucleation of low-volatile secondary organic vapour is included. Differences in the model results with and without nucleation of organic vapour are visible in the lower free troposphere over several days. Taking into account the nucleation of organic vapour leads to an increase in accumulation mode particles due to coagulation and condensational growth of nucleation and Aitken mode particles.