Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Discharge characterization of a multi-anode electrode geometry for vacuum arc thruster

Vacuum arc thrusters (VATs) have the potential to be used in nanosatellites and a multi-anode electrode geometry (MAEG) suitable for VATs is proposed in this paper. A unique electric field distribution is formed in the MAEG because of its anode configuration, which is different from conventional electrode geometry (CEG). There exists a region where the electric field vector has opposite directions in the electrode geometry. This region affects the directional drift of electrons in the initial stage of the discharge, thereby changing the process of vacuum breakdown. The variation of the discharge process affects the generation and propagation mechanism of the plasma, forming a plasma plume in favor of the propulsion performance of thrusters. The photographs of the plasma plume are captured and the electron density distributions are measured, which prove the pinch effect on the plasma plume of the MAEG. The propulsion performance of MAEG VATs is found to be superior to CEG VATs with the same discharge condition and increases radically with the increase of discharge power. The impulse bit and thrust-to-power ratio of MAEG VATs have been found to increase by a factor of 26 and 4.5 at most compared with the CEG VAT. It is found that MAEG VATs have a potential application advantage in the field of nanosatellite propulsion.
The impact of antiretroviral therapy used in pregnancy on the health of HIV-positive women

In the UK, antiretroviral therapy (ART) is used during the vast majority of pregnancies among women living with HIV. This thesis aims to examine some of the consequences of antenatal ART use on women’s health during and after pregnancy. Initially, a linkage was developed between two well established studies, the UK Collaborative HIV Cohort (UK CHIC) Study and the UK and Ireland’s National Study of HIV in Pregnancy and Childhood (NSHPC). The resultant dataset was used to assess pregnancy incidence in women attending HIV clinical care at UK CHIC sites in 2000- 2009. The overall pregnancy incidence increased. The rate of increase did not significantly differ between ethnic groups, age groups or according to ART use. In women starting life-long cART at least one year after HIV diagnosis, those who had previously used short-course cART in pregnancy were more likely to experience viral rebound and interrupt their treatment compared to those who had never previously used ART. Levels of the liver enzyme alanine transaminase (ALT) were assessed in women on combination ART (cART). The risk of liver enzyme elevation (LEE) was higher during pregnancy than at other times in women who started ART during pregnancy and in women who conceived on ART. The risk of viral rebound (HIV-RNA >200 copies/ml) whilst on cART was higher in women who had recently had a pregnancy than in similar women who had not recently been pregnant. In post-pregnant women remaining on cART, the risk of viral rebound was higher in women who had started cART during their pregnancy than in women who had conceived on cART. The findings presented in this thesis contribute to the evidence-base for the management of pregnant women living with HIV and highlight the need for close monitoring of toxicity in pregnancy and additional drug adherence support following pregnancy.
The Influence Cash Position Analysis over Debt to Equity Ratio, Return On Assets, And Inventory Turnover on Dividend Payout Ratio: Consumer Goods Companies in Indonesia Stock Exchange 2012-2017 Case Study

Dividend policy is the most controversial topic in the context of corporate finance, where the variables that influence it are still uncertain in the literature. This study aims to analyze the effect of cash position, debt to equity ratio, return on assets and inventory turnover to the dividend payout ratio, as well as providing information and description to investors whose investment objectives to pursue dividends based on variables. Here, we analyze the panel data regression over 11 consumer goods industries in the Indonesia Stock Exchange from 2012 to 2017. The results shows that the variable return on assets and inventory turnover had a positive and significant effect on the dividend payout ratio, and also the debt to equity ratio had a negative and significant effect on the dividend payout ratio. While the cash position had not significantly affect on the dividend payout ratio
Climate policy co-benefits: a review

ABSTRACT Concern over mitigation costs impedes the adoption of the climate policies needed to achieve agreed global warming targets. While costs are important to consider, so are benefits. However, the evidence for climate policy co-benefits, that is, the benefits in addition to avoided climate change costs, is commonly overlooked in policy-making. In many areas, the research is limited and not comprehensively synthesised. This article counters that problem and reviews 239 peer-reviewed articles, selected from 1,749 hits from a literature search covering ‘co-benefits’ and related terms. Aiming to aid policy-makers and to identify research gaps, we structure, describe, analyse and synthesize the rapidly expanding knowledge on climate policy co-benefits. Improved air quality is the co-benefit category dominating the literature, but studies covering a broad geographic range also focus on diet, physical activity, soil and water quality, biodiversity, economic performance, and energy security. In these areas, co-benefits are shown to be of substantial economic value, regarding air quality often of the same order of magnitude as mitigation costs, in some instances even larger. However, the share of studies quantifying or monetizing co-benefits is limited, and the empirical evidence is small, in particular for areas besides air quality and health. Furthermore, the knowledge is seldom used in policy-making, meaning that decision-making is often biased and overly concerned with costs, leading to suboptimal climate policies and goal failures. Evidently, more research is needed, as well as improved decision-making. Understanding and acting on climate policy co-benefits can promote policies that better mitigate climate change and improve overall welfare. Key policy insights Climate policy co-benefits in well-researched fields such as air quality and health are large, often equalling or exceeding mitigation costs. Despite their significance, co-benefits are seldom considered in decision-making, leading to biased policies and goal failures. In several areas, such as diet and energy security, co-benefits are sparsely researched, but emerging evidence points to high values. More research is needed, including on how to describe the total value of different co-benefits. Improved processes, documentation requirements and criteria in decision-making are needed, in order to ensure that political decision-makers consider co-benefits.
Corporate Spin-Offs, Product Market Competition, and Innovation

We develop a theory of the interaction between product market competition, corporate spin-offs, and innovation. In our model, a conglomerate firm operates a profitable existing technology, but has access to a new technology into which it must invest to develop a commercially viable product. While new technology development has synergies with the existing firm, the new technology will cannibalize profits from the firm's existing technology if successfully developed into a viable product. We show that, in the absence of competition, the conglomerate firm has an incentive to underinvest in the new technology. The entry of a competing firm, however, defeats the above incentive, forcing the conglomerate firm to spin off its new technology division, after which the spun-off firm invests optimally in developing and commercializing the innovation. In our two-stage model, we endogenize new technology development, analyzing the interaction between competition, corporate spin-offs, and the development and commercialization of innovations.
Trust in Local Government: Service Satisfaction, Culture, and Demography

Trust in government is expected to promote effective implementation of public services. However, people in different cultures and on different levels do not always recognize the same concept of trust. Using a survey for Japanese and Norwegian citizens, the primary factors determining trust on the local level are examined. The analysis shows that the satisfaction with public service performance is highly influential in both countries, which is partly also true for political-cultural factors, while demographical factors are of minor influence. There are also variations in trust toward different institutions and actors, and the national factor is also significant.
MR spectroscopy in Alzheimer’s disease

MR Spectroscopy (MRS) has been used for diagnosis of many neurological disorders such as central nervous system tumors and neuro-inflammatory diseases. Despite many studies on MRS in neurodegenerative disorders and particularly Alzheimer’s disease, its utility has been hampered by lack of standard techniques across studies and limited data on the association between the level of metabolites in MRS and pathological changes of AD. In this review we have summarized the findings of MRS in Alzheimer’s disease, discussed the limitation of the current data and the pitfalls in interpretation of the MRS results and also we presented the latest developments in this field and potential future steps in order to utilize MRS more effectively in clinical practice.
Russian Listed Companies: Controlling Shareholders and Their Conduct

The high concentration of ownership has remained the key feature of Russian companies, including publicly traded companies. Even at the peak of the romance with Western portfolio investors, the controlling shareholders of Russian listed companies put the full control at the top of their priorities. In the 2000s, the Russian listed companies’ controlling shareholders sought gradual accommodation with minority shareholders and a gradual acceptance of Western corporate governance practices and thus espoused market capitalization as an important strategic goal. This was reversed in the 2010s as the rapidly tightening grip of the state on private business and mounting restrictions on Western investment in the Russian economy took hold. It has also reduced a market demand for Western best corporate governance practices on the part of Russian controlling shareholders. After 2014, most controlling shareholders of Russian listed companies have switched to the strategy of acting as junior partners of the state. This switch has largely diminished their market orientation and the demand for Western-style corporate governance. The future of the large Russian listed companies fully depends on the relations of their majority owners with the Russian state and thus remains uncertain.
On bias reduction estimators of skew-normal and skew-t distributions

A particular concerns of researchers in statistical inference is bias in parameters estimation. Maximum likelihood estimators are often biased and for small sample size, the first order bias of them can be large and so it may influence the efficiency of the estimator. There are different methods for reduction of this bias. In this paper, we proposed a modified maximum likelihood estimator for the shape parameter of two popular skew distributions, namely skew-normal and skew-t, by offering a new method. We show that this estimator has lower asymptotic bias than the maximum likelihood estimator and is more efficient than those based on the existing methods.
Nephroprotective Effects of Cinnamon and/or Parsley Oils against Gentamicin-Induced Nephrotoxicity in Rats

: In the present study, the nephroprotective potentials of cinnamon and/or parsley oils was assessed on gentamicin (GM)-induced nephrotoxicity in rats. About 49 male rats were assigned randomly into 7 equal groups (7 rats each). Group 1-3: were orally administered normal saline, cinnamon oil (400 mg kg G 1 b.wt.) and parsley oil (200 mg kg G 1 b.wt.), respectively, once daily for 30 consecutive days. Group 4: rats in this group were intraperitoneally injected with GM (100 mg kg G 1 b.wt.) in the last 10 days (20-30 th day) of the experiment. Group 5: rats in this group were given cinnamon and GM while rats in group 6 were administered parsley and GM. Group 7: rats in this group were administered cinnamon and parsley plus GM. At the end of the experiment, rats were sacrificed, serum samples and kidney specimens were collected for biochemical and oxidative status evaluation. Rats administered GM alone showed significant increases in serum concentrations of creatinine, urea and glucose while renal tissue levels of superoxide dismutase, catalase and glutathione reductase were significantly declined. Additionally, the malondialdehyde level was significantly elevated in kidney tissues. Also, GM administration caused renal histopathological alterations. The altered levels of various parameters provoked by GM toxicity were restored towards normal levels by cinnamon and/or parsley oils administration. These results suggested the nephroprotective potentials of cinnamon and/or parsley oils in rats, probably triggered by their antioxidant phytoconstituents.
"We have been magnified for years - Now you are under the microscope!": Co-researchers with Learning Disabilities Created an Online Survey to Challenge Public Understanding of Learning Disabilities

Public attitudes towards learning disabilities (LDs) are generally reported as positive, inclusive and empathetic. However, these findings do not reflect the lived experiences of people with LDs. To shed light on this disparity, a team of co-researchers with LDs created the first online survey to challenge public understanding of LDs, asking questions in ways that are important to them and represent how they see themselves. Here, we describe and evaluate the process of creating an accessible survey platform and an online survey in a research team consisting of academic and non-academic professionals with and without LDs or autism. Through this inclusive research process, the co-designed survey met the expectations of the co-researchers and was well-received by the initial survey respondents. We reflect on the co-researchers' perspectives following the study completion, and consider the difficulties and advantages we encountered deploying such approaches and their potential implications on future survey data analysis.
When Logic Gives Out. Frege on Basic Logical Laws

At the end of Grundgesetze Frege tells us that the Urproblem of arithmetic is the question of how we apprehend logical objects. The success of Frege’s logicist enterprise thus essentially depends on the provision of a satisfactory answer to the question of how we can justifiedly hold certain basic truths to be logical, since for Frege it is only through those laws that we can come to grasp logical objects by purely logical means. And yet, despite its crucial importance, the question of what kind of justification we might provide for basic logical laws is one that Frege never fully addressed. In this chapter, I critically examine, and dismiss, three justificatory strategies briefly canvassed, but not wholly endorsed by Frege (respectively, the appeal to constitutivity, self-evidence, and sense-compositionality). I close by discussing a position that I label pragmatic foundationalism, a position that includes a strong externalist component. I claim that pragmatic foundationalism provides the best attempt one could make, on behalf of Frege, towards answering what he took to be the fundamental problem facing a mature philosophy of arithmetic.
Sportmedizinische Verbandskonzepte als Eckpfeiler für die Qualitätssicherung der Athletenbetreuung

Der Spitzensport entspricht in mancher Hinsicht einer Gratwanderung. Die fokussierte Optik auf die über dem Abgrund balancierenden Athleten scheint wohl gerade einen Teil der Faszination des Spitzensports auszumachen, und sie wird deshalb der medialen Betrachtung gerne aufgesetzt. Auch die Wahrnehmung der Sportmedizin unterliegt oft diesem eingeschränkten Blickfeld. Schon fast unglaubliche Heilungsverläufe oder Leistungsmanipulationen durch Doping lassen den Sportmediziner entweder zum gefeierten «Wunderheiler» oder aber zum Buhmann werden. Es ist klar, dass dieser einseitige Fokus das Wesentliche der medizinische Athletenbetreuung völlig ausblendet. Kaum eine andere medizinische Spezialität schliesst nämlich derart viele und verschiedene Disziplinen ein. Überdies beinhaltet eine optimale Athletenbetreuung neben der Behandlung von Verletzungen und Krankheiten auch leistungsdiagnostische Abklärungen, präventive Routineuntersuchungen, Massnahmen gegen den Dopingmissbrauch sowie die Vermittlung von medizinischen Basisinformationen an Trainer und Athleten [1, 2, 3]. Es erscheint verständlich, dass dadurch die Anforderungen an die medizinischen Betreuer überaus komplex sind. Zudem sind sich auch Athleten und Trainer über den hohen Stellenwert der sportmedizinischen Betreuung einig, und die Erwartungen sind entsprechend hoch [4, 5, 6]. Im Rahmen des Qualitätssicherungsprojektes von Swiss Olympic, der obersten Dachorganisation des Schweizer Sportes, zusammen mit der SGSM, dessen Inhalte in einer vorangegangenen Ausgabe dieser Zeitschrift vorgestellt wurden [7], wird versucht, sowohl den in der Athletenbetreuung involvierten Fachkräften Unterstützung zu bieten als auch den Anforderungen der Athleten und der Trainer immer näher zu kommen. Die Bestrebungen gehen dahin, die vorhandenen Qualitätsstandards weiter zu implementieren, indem den Verbandsärzten Richtlinien und Hilfsinstrumente zum Erstellen eines sportmedizinischen Verbandskonzeptes angeboten werden. Nachfolgend sollen die wichtigsten Elemente eines umfassenden sportmedizinischen Betreuungskonzepts dargestellt werden.
ROLE OF VITAMIN C AND VITAMIN E ON HYPERTENSION

Objective: Both Vitamin C and Vitamin E supplementation were associated with reduction in blood pressure (BP) in observational studies, although, results of clinical trials are inconsistent. The objective of our study is to conduct a clinical trial to observe the effects of oral supplementation of Vitamin C and Vitamin E on BP. Methods: About 60 non-teaching staffs of our college with systolic BP more than 130 mmHg and diastolic BP more than 90 mmHg were taken as subjects and divided into two groups. Initial BP and BP after oral Vitamin C, 500 mg/day for a period of 12weeks to Group 1 and initial BP and BP after oral Vitamin E, 200 IU/day, for a period of 12 weeks to Group 2 were recorded. Results: Statistical analysis was done by paired t-test, analysis of variance (ANOVA), and least significant difference (LSD) tests. *p<0.05 was considered statistically significant. Systolic 2 and diastolic 2 – after 3 months of supplementation showed 0.161 and 0.161 which is not significant. ANOVA and LSD tests show no significant results. Conclusion: Long-term trials on the effects of Vitamin C and Vitamin E supplementation on BP and clinical events are needed.
Efecto de anandamida sobre la capacitación prematura de espermatozoides porcinos sometidos a congelación

El objetivo del presente trabajo fue evaluar el efecto de diferentes concentraciones de Anandamida (AEA) como factor anticapacitante del espermatozoide congelado-descongelado. Se uso el semen de 12 reproductores porcinos, cada eyaculado se dividio en 4 fracciones correspondientes a 4 tratamientos, de los cuales hubo un control y tres concentraciones de AEA (1 μM-A1-, 10 μM-A10- y 100 μM-A100-), Se procedio a la congelacion. En el semen pos-descongelacion se evaluaron los siguientes parametros: movilidad total (MT), movilidad progresiva (MP), integridad de membrana plasmatica (IMP), funcionalidad de membrana plasmatica (HOST), espermatozoides sin reaccion acrosomica (NRA), espermatozoides no capacitados (NCAP), parametros de velocidad, parametros de angularidad y oscilacion de la cabeza . En los resultados obtenidos del semen congelado – descongelado, no se encontraron diferencias significativas en las variables evaluadas (p0,05). Se encontro correlacion de NCAP, HOST, NRA y IMP con los parametros cineticos, indicando la importancia de la integridad y funcionalidad de las membranas espermaticas para activar su funcion de capacitarse, tener reaccion acrosomica y fertilizar. No hubo correlacion entre HOST con NCAP, NRA e IMP. Como conclusion, la AEA puede ser utilizada en los procesos de crio-congelacion de espermatozoides porcinos para controlar la presentacion de crio–capacitacion de espermatozoides congelados - descongelados.
Toward Edge-Based Deep Learning in Industrial Internet of Things

As a typical application of the Internet of Things (IoT), the Industrial IoT (IIoT) connects all the related IoT sensing and actuating devices ubiquitously so that the monitoring and control of numerous industrial systems can be realized. Deep learning, as one viable way to carry out big-data-driven modeling and analysis, could be integrated in IIoT systems to aid the automation and intelligence of IIoT systems. As deep learning requires large computation power, it is commonly deployed in cloud servers. Thus, the data collected by IoT devices must be transmitted to the cloud for training process, contributing to network congestion and affecting the IoT network performance as well as the supported applications. To address this issue, in this article, we leverage the fog/edge computing paradigm and propose an edge computing-based deep learning model, which utilizes edge computing to migrate the deep learning process from cloud servers to edge nodes, reducing data transmission demands in the IIoT network and mitigating network congestion. Since edge nodes have limited computation ability compared to servers, we design a mechanism to optimize the deep learning model so that its requirements for computational power can be reduced. To evaluate our proposed solution, we design a testbed implemented in the Google cloud and deploy the proposed convolutional neural network (CNN) model, utilizing a real-world IIoT data set to evaluate our approach.1 Our experimental results confirm the effectiveness of our approach, which cannot only reduce the network traffic overhead for IIoT but also maintain the classification accuracy in comparison with several baseline schemes.1Certain commercial equipment, instruments, or materials are identified in this article in order to specify the experimental procedure adequately. Such identification is not intended to imply recommendation or endorsement by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, nor is it intended to imply that the materials or equipment identified are necessarily the best available for the purpose.
The Concept and Development Application Prospect of Intelligent Sports in China

The concept of intelligent sports is along with the Internet, big data, cloud computing, VR, AR, 5G communications, artificial intelligence and this new concepts in the field of sports have been put forward with the development of science and technology. Under the background of China’s policy of invigorating sports by science and technology, promoting sports industry in an all-round way and building a strong sports country, this paper takes intelligent sports as the research object. By using the methods of documentation, case study, interview and investigation, and mathematical statistics, the paper puts forward are analyzed the concept of smart sports, produces the background and changes of intelligent sports, the future development, research field, application field and future prospect of sports. Finally, the countermeasures and suggestions for the development of wisdom sports are put forward in order to provide theoretical reference for the development and construction of sports science and technology and intelligent sports in China.