Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Complex ecological associations: competition and facilitation in a sponge-algal interaction

Over the past few decades, Caribbean coral reefs have undergone a phase shift from coral-dominated to algal-dominated communities due to several factors, including increased input of anthropogenic nutrients. With the decline in coral cover, sponges have also become more dom- inant members of Caribbean coral reef communities. Increased algal and sponge dominance on Caribbean reefs has led to an increase in the frequency of interaction between these 2 groups. This study used a factorial design to assess the independent and interactive effects of contact and elevated nutrient levels on 2 common members of these communities, the sponge Aplysina cauli- formis, and the macroalga Microdictyon marinum. Algal contact had a significant negative phys- iological effect on A. cauliformis, affecting both the host sponge and its cyanobacterial symbionts. While elevated nutrient levels had some positive effects on the sponge photosymbionts, this only occurred in the absence of algal contact or a shading/abrasion control, and elevated nutrient lev- els had a negative effect on the sponge holobiont. In contrast, M. marinum responded positively to experimentally enhanced nutrient levels and to sponge contact under ambient nutrient regimes, but was not affected by sponge contact under elevated nutrient concentrations. Stable isotope enrichment experiments showed that the alga's positive response to sponge contact was associated with nitrogen transfer from the sponge over the course of the experiment. Thus, while A. cauliformis facilitates increased productivity in M. marinum, algal contact competitively inhibits sponge condition.
Perceived loudness of spatially distributed sound sources

In noise-control engineering, one is often faced with the task of identifying the most problematic of several simultaneous sound sources. Traditionally, this has been done by deriving sound pressure (or intensity) maps by means of a microphone array. This approach does not, however, take psychoacoustic attributes into account. Therefore, a method for deriving loudness maps was developed in an earlier study [Song, Internoise2004, paper 271]. In this study two experiments were done to investigate to which extent perceived loudness depends on the distribution of individual sound sources. Three loudspeakers were positioned 1.5 m from the centre of the listener’s head, one straight ahead, and two 10 degrees to the right and left, respectively. Six participants matched the loudness of either one, or two simultaneous sounds (narrow-band noises with 1-kHz, and 3.15-kHz centre frequencies) to a 2-kHz, 60-dB SPL narrow-band noise placed in the frontal loudspeaker. The two sounds were either originating from the central speaker, or from the two offset loudspeakers. It turned out that the subjects perceived the noises to be softer when they were distributed in space. In addition, loudness was calculated from the recordings of a microphone (monaural) and a dummy head (binaural) placed at the listening position. The results show that while loudness metrics fared well in predicting perceived loudness for any single-sound condition, they failed to predict loudness for two simultaneous sounds. This suggests that current loudness modelling will have to be extended to take the spatial distribution of sources into account.
Design of a Coupler with Three Reconfigurable Output Ports and a Beamwidth Reconfigurable Antenna

The design and fabrication of a coupler with three reconfigurable output ports have been proposed. The output ports of the proposed coupler can be adjusted by varying the number of shorting pins. An antenna with a reconfigurable beamwidth has been also involved in this paper. The proposed antenna has a coupler and a 1 × 3 array rectangular patch. The beamwidth is set by the number of output ports. The simulation and experiment show the verification of the proposed coupler and beamwidth variation of array antenna. The broadest measured beamwidth was 66.2° and the sharpest measured beamwidth was 24.1°.
A New Keynesian Model with Heterogeneous Price Setting

The Calvo contract pricing mechanism has become the most widely accepted microfoundation to the NK Phillips curve but unfortunately predicts that all firms in the economy face the same probability of price change. To better explain the stylized fact this paper relaxes the homogeneous firm assumption in the Calvo contract, to provide a macroeconomic explanation more consistent with recently available microeconomic evidence that suggests firms face differing probabilities of price change. A simple New Keynesian dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model with nominal rigidities and habit in consumption for the US is estimated using Bayesian techniques and finds evidence of a flexible price sector of around 6% and a sticky price sector of between 55% and 70% depending on model specification.
The influence of different PAST-based subspace trackers on DaPT parameter estimation

Abstract. In the context of parameter estimation, subspace-based methods like ESPRIT have become common. They require a subspace separation e.g. based on eigenvalue/-vector decomposition. In time-varying environments, this can be done by subspace trackers. One class of these is based on the PAST algorithm. Our non-linear parameter estimation algorithm DaPT builds on-top of the ESPRIT algorithm. Evaluation of the different variants of the PAST algorithm shows which variant of the PAST algorithm is worthwhile in the context of frequency estimation.
Contract choice, incentives and political capture in public transport services

We consider a framework of contractual interactions between public transport authorities and transport operators. We estimate simultaneously the contract choice by the authorities and the effect of regulation on the cost-reducing activity of the operators. We test whether the current regulatory schemes are the observable items of a complex menu of contracts, as proposed by Laffont and Tirole. We suggest that the generation process of the data we have in hand is better explained by a regulatory framework where an unsophisticated regulator is politically motivated. We show how these political preferences shape the contract choice and we shed light on how operating costs are affected. On average, operators' costs are 12.1% lower under fixed-plus regimes, compared to the cost-plus cases.
Characteristic TNT Differential Reflection Spectra on Common Substrates

This work describes an explosives detection technique utilizing differential reflectograms to identify the characteristic differential reflectivity spectra of TNT. It accomplishes this by measuring the characteristic differential reflectivity (essentially the absorption) of a specimen while being exposed to high intensity UV light. The differential reflectometer is able to achieve high sensitivity because it measures two adjacent parts of the specimen simultaneously. As a result, a normalized difference in reflectivity is recorded and trace quantities of materials become apparent. It is shown that traces of 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene (TNT) display a characteristic shoulder in differential reflectograms in the optical spectral range of 380-420 nm. This characteristic shoulder is not obscured if TNT is deposited on fabrics, luggage, office supplies, human skin, metallic foil, or various papers and plastics. These substrates were tested because they are typical materials seen by airport terminal security systems. Wood, particle board, and plywood showed characteristic features in the same spectral range as TNT. They are, however, considerably weaker than that for TNT. It is not anticipated that these substrates will conceal the TNT signature to such a degree as to camouflage it from detection or cause a false positive. In short, differential reflectometry is shown to be a contactless, portable, and inexpensive optical detection system which detects TNT (and other explosives) on a large number of common substrates and can therefore be used where a high degree of security is needed, such as in airport security scanning devices.
Robustness of complex networks to node and cluster damage

The goal of this investigation is to assess the robustness of two popular network structures – random networks and scale-free networks – to node and cluster damage. There is no previous work on the latter. For node damage, we remove nodes iteratively and for cluster damage, we first build a network of clusters and then remove the nodes (clusters).
Comparison and evaluation of 3D mobile game engines

Game engines are vital for developing 3D applications and games today. This is because the engines significantly reduce resources---time and manpower---to implement mandatory but complex functionalities. However, with over 100 engines available with highly different ranges of features, performance, license, and cost, selecting an appropriate game engine for a specific objective becomes a challenging problem. This thesis aims to mitigate this problem by developing a comparison matrix for selecting a game engine. We define criteria for selecting engines and critical aspects of mobile 3D game development to be included in the matrix. Then, we evaluate this matrix by a case study that is, from given requirements, selecting an engine by using the matrix. Evaluation of the comparison matrix is carried out through case study, that advocate the correctness, and robustness of the comparison matrix.
Evaluation of VIIRS, GOCI, and MODIS Collection 6 AOD retrievals against ground sunphotometer observations over East Asia

Abstract. Persistent high aerosol loadings together with extremely high population densities have raised serious air quality and public health concerns in many urban centers in East Asia. However, ground-based air quality monitoring is relatively limited in this area. Recently, satellite-retrieved Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) at high resolution has become a powerful tool to characterize aerosol patterns in space and time. Using ground AOD observations from the Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) and the Distributed Regional Aerosol Gridded Observation Networks (DRAGON)-Asia Campaign, as well as from handheld sunphotometers, we evaluated emerging aerosol products from the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) aboard the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (S-NPP), the Geostationary Ocean Color Imager (GOCI) aboard the Communication, Ocean, and Meteorology Satellite (COMS), and Terra and Aqua Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) (Collection 6) in East Asia in 2012 and 2013. In the case study in Beijing, when compared with AOD observations from handheld sunphotometers, 51 % of VIIRS Environmental Data Record (EDR) AOD, 37 % of GOCI AOD, 33 % of VIIRS Intermediate Product (IP) AOD, 26 % of Terra MODIS C6 3 km AOD, and 16 % of Aqua MODIS C6 3 km AOD fell within the reference expected error (EE) envelope (±0.05 ± 0.15 AOD). Comparing against AERONET AOD over the Japan–South Korea region, 64 % of EDR, 37 % of IP, 61 % of GOCI, 39 % of Terra MODIS, and 56 % of Aqua MODIS C6 3 km AOD fell within the EE. In general, satellite aerosol products performed better in tracking the day-to-day variability than tracking the spatial variability at high resolutions. The VIIRS EDR and GOCI products provided the most accurate AOD retrievals, while VIIRS IP and MODIS C6 3 km products had positive biases.
7. Embedding human rights mechanisms within Shell subsidiary in Nigeria

This chapter analyses how and to what degree an operating company of Shell implements and internalises human rights mechanisms in Nigeria and how this can be explained. This subsidiary is selected in this research because the materiality of the country to Shell Group, the sensitivity of Shell’s human rights performance and the use of human rights training as a tool. The bulk of the data used for this chapter was obtained in three field visits in the period August 2005 – July 2006 in the context of developing human rights and conflict resolution training for Shell’s operating company in Nigeria (see section 7.4.4). The data is based on field notes, participatory observation and semi-structured employees with 20 employees complemented with literature, as described in section 3.5. 4.
Formation of Hematite Nanotubes by Two-step Electrochemical Anodization for Efficient Degradation of Organic Pollutants.

Nowadays, hematite (α-Fe2O3) has emerged as a promising photocatalyst for efficient degradation of organic pollutants due to its properties such as suitable band-gap (~2.1 eV), stability against photocorrosion, abundance and low cost. However, some drawbacks such as low carrier mobility and short hole diffusion length limit its efficiency. In order to overcome these issues, self-ordered nanotubes can be synthetized. Anodization is one of the simplest and most economic techniques to produce nanostructures with high control. In the present study, self-ordered hematite nanotubes were synthetized by two-step electrochemical anodization. In two-step anodization, a first-step was actually a pretreatment to form well-ordered nanoporous template in which well-ordered nanotubes are grown by a second-step. The formed nanotubes were characterized by different methods such as Field Emission Scanning Microscopy and Raman spectroscopy to determine their morphology and crystalline structure, respectively. Furthermore, the obtained nanotubes were characterized by means of photocurrent density versus potential measurements (water splitting) to evaluate their efficiency as photocatalyst. Good results were obtained as the achieved photocurrent density was 0.079 mA cm at 0.58 V (vs. Ag/AgCl), which indicates that the nanotubes synthetized by two-step anodization are suitable photocatalysts for degradation of organic pollutants.
ANTIHEPATOTOXIC EFFECT

The objective of this study was to investigate the hepatoprotective activity of ethanolic extract of leaves of Holopetlea integrifolia(Roxb). againt paracetamol induce hepatic damage. There are lack of reliable hepatoprotective drugs in modern medicine to prevent and treat paracetamol induce liver damage. The ethanolic extract showed presence of flavonoid and steroids. The plant material was dried in shade, powdered and extracted with ethanol. The hepatoprotective activity of the ethanolic extract was assessed in paracetamol induced hepatotoxic rats. Biochemical parameters like SGOT, SGPT, ALP and Bilirubin were tested in drug induced and untreated groups of rats. Treatment of ethanolic extract of Holopetlea integrifolia(Roxb). leaves has brought back the altered level of biochemical parameter to the normal level in the dose dependent manner and also compared with silymarin used as standard drug.
A Critical Review of Home Range Studies

Abstract No consensus currently exists for the methods of estimation of home range size or for reporting home-range analysis results. Studies currently employ a variety of disparate methods or provide inadequate information for reproducing their analyses. We reviewed 161 home range studies published in 2004, 2005, and 2006 to assess what methods are currently employed and how results are reported. We found that home range reporting was generally inadequate for reproducing studies; that the methods employed varied considerably; that home range estimates were often reported and analyzed using inappropriate methods; and that many comparisons were made between studies that may produce spurious results. We urge for minimum editorial standards for reporting home range studies and we urge researchers to follow a unified methodology for estimating animal home ranges. We supply recommendations for such reporting and methodology. These recommendations will increase the reproducibility of studies and allow for more robust comparisons between studies.
A New Graphical Representation of DNA Sequences Using Symmetrical Vector Assignment

Analyzing the similarities between genomic sequences is one of the principal methods used to investigate the evolutionary relationships between species. For relatively short sequences, such as nucleotide sequences of genes or amino acid sequences of proteins, alignment is widely used to evaluate the sequence similarity. However, the alignment is not practical for comparing very long sequences, such as genome sequences, due to its time-consuming nature. In this article, we propose a new method for graphical representation of DNA sequences, which falls into one of the major categories of alignment-free sequence comparison. We introduce a practical method for the numerical conversion of DNA sequences, in which we assign three-dimensional vectors in a symmetrical manner to the bases of genome sequences. We confirm the usefulness of our method in terms of the intuitive assessment of sequence similarities.
Differential resilience of ancient sister lakes Ohrid and Prespa to environmental disturbances during the Late Pleistocene

Abstract. Ancient lakes, such as lakes Ohrid and Prespa on the Balkan Peninsula, have become model systems for studying the link between geological and biotic evolution. Recently, the scientific deep-drilling project Scientific Collaboration on Past Speciation Conditions in Lake Ohrid (SCOPSCO) was initiated to better understand the environmental, climatic, and limnological evolution of the lake. It revealed that Lake Ohrid experienced a number of environmental disturbances during its ca. 2.0 million year long history. These are comprised of disturbances that lasted over longer periods of time (“press events”) such as glacial–interglacial cycles and Heinrich events, as well as sudden and short disturbances (“pulse events”) like the deposition of landslides, earthquakes, and volcanic ash depositions. The latter includes one of the most severe volcanic episodes during the Late Pleistocene: the eruption of the Campanian Ignimbrite (known as Y-5 marine tephra layer) from the Campi Flegrei caldera, dated to 39.6 ± 0.1 thousand years ago. The event is recorded by the deposition of a ca. 15 cm thick tephra layer in sediment cores of lakes Ohrid (DEEP-5045-1) and Prespa (Co1204). Coincidently, this pulse event is superimposed by the Heinrich H4 event, 40.4–38.4 thousand years ago. In the current paper, diatoms were used as proxies to compare the responses of these lakes to the Y-5 (pulse) and the H4 (press) disturbances. Based on stratigraphically constrained incremental sum of squares cluster (CONISS) and unconstrained Partitioning Around Medoids (PAM) analyses, we found little evidence that diatom community compositions in either lake responded to the H4 event. However, the Y-5 influx caused clear and rapid diatom community changes. After the initial response, community compositions in Lake Ohrid and, to a lesser extent, in Lake Prespa slowly returned to their quasi pre-disturbance state. Moreover, there is no evidence for disturbance-related extinction events. The combined evidence from these findings suggests that lakes Ohrid and Prespa likely did not experience regime shifts. It is therefore concluded that both lakes show resilience to environmental disturbance. However, it seems that Lake Ohrid is more resilient than Lake Prespa, as the recovery of diatom communities is more pronounced and its estimated recovery time is only ca. 1100 years vs. ca. 4000 years in Lake Prespa. The reasons for the differential responses remain largely unknown, but differences in geology, lake age, limnology, and intrinsic parameters of the diatom proxies may play an important role.
A New Dual Band E-shaped Slot Antenna Design for Wireless Applications

An E-shaped printed slot antenna is presented as a candidate to cover dualband operation over the entire wireless local area network (WLAN) frequency bands of 2.4–2.5GHz and 4.9–5.8 GHz. The E-shaped slot structure has been etched in the ground plane, and the 50 microstrip line feed is etched on the reverse side of the substrate. An additional trapezoidal slot has been etched attached to the slot structure on the feeding side to facilitate tuning and the dual-band operation. The antenna structure has been modeled and its performance has been evaluated using a method of moment based electromagnetic simulator, IE3D from Zeland Software Inc. Simulation results show that, the proposed antenna offers good return loss response (for S11 less than −10 dB) at the two bands. The ratio of the two resonating frequencies f02/f01 could be varied in a considerable range, without changing the antenna external dimensions, making the antenna suitable for other dual band wireless applications.
Responses of Three Coral Communities to the 1997–98 El Niño–Southern Oscillation: Galápagos Islands, Ecuador

One deep (13-15 m depth) and two shallow water (1.5 and 7 m) coral communities in the Galapagos Islands, Ecuador were monitored for tissue response (bleaching, paling, morbidity) and secondary responses during and after elevated temperature stress associated with the 1997-98 El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) event. Between March and May 1998, the fungiid coral Diaseris distorta paled and bleached (up to 88.0% of all individuals bleached) at 13-15 m depth. The small branching colonial coral, Psammocora stellata, paled (79.2% of all colonies) with very little bleaching (11.1%), also at 13-15 m depth. However, by May 1998 colonies of this species in shallower water (7 m depth) suffered high mean mortality (72.4% of colony area, 85.1% decrease in numbers of live colonies). In March 1998, colonies of Pavona clavus, a massive coral species, were 100% bleached at 1.5 m depth and experienced subsequent partial mortality averaging 34.0% per colony. Both Diaseris and Psammocora in deeper water (13-15 m depth) recovered pigment by June 1999. Numbers of Diaseris individuals within permanent transect plots decreased 56.1% from March 1998 through August 2000, but this loss was most likely due to coral displacement by currents and surge rather than temperature-induced mortality. Numbers of Psammocora colonies in deep water did not change appreciably during the survey period (-16.1%). In contrast, surviving shallower water (7 m depth) Psammocora recovered pigment by June 1999, but numbers of live colonies remained low through August 2000 (-83.3% compared to March 1998). Initial recovery of pigmented tissue was evident in Pavona by June 1999, but a decline in live tissue again occurred by August 2000. Sea water temperature at the deeper site reached 28-30°C, but periods of semi-diurnal cooling may have mitigated the bleaching response. Highest temperatures occurred in shallower water (7 m), where Psammocora experienced high mortality and periodic subsurface cooling was suppressed. These data cannot be compared with those from the 1982-83 ENSO because of the lack of quantitative data from the earlier event. However, these observations provide a framework of comparison with other ENSO-affected eastern Pacific coral communities and reefs during the 1997-98 event.
Second-generation Greek-Australian and Italian-Australian students at Victoria University

This paper examines the academic performance of the second-generation Australians at Victoria University in 2007. The study utilises Australian Bureau of Statistics Census 2006 estimates of socio-economic status to investigate the roles of socio-economic background, and cultural and linguistic diversity (CALD). Attention is given to students of Greek and Italian ancestry. The study also accounts for selection bias, elite high school participation, gender, age, employment status, and study intensity. The evidence suggests that academic outcomes vary by sector, and languages-other-than- English (LOTE) are a key driver of the disadvantage observed in second-generation Australian students.