Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Model Driven Engineering for Crop Monitoring Applications

Along with the boom of Mobile services and the thriving Model Driven Architecture (MDA), we must consider the growing significance and utility of modeling in the development of software and solutions. The main advantages of MDA are the ability to transform one PIM into several PSMs, one for each platform or technology in which the final system will be deployed, and the automatic code generation that implements the system for those platforms from the corresponding PSMs. Service-oriented architectures (SOA) are also touted as the key to business agility, especially when combined with a model-driven approach. Model-Driven Architecture (MDA) is a well-developed concept that fits well with SOA, but until now it has been a specialized technique that is beyond practical application scope of most enterprises. Model driven and Domain engineering is the foundation for emerging “product line” software development approaches and affects the maintainability, understandability, usability, and reusability characteristics of family of similar systems. However, the existing domain engineering methods do not elicit information necessary for the Component-based Software Development process, such as, selecting and configuring appropriate components. In this paper, we suggest a method that systematically defines, analyzes and designs a crop monitoring frameworks domain to enhance reusability effectively in Model Driven Engineering and Component-based Software Development. For this, we extract information objectively that can be reused in a crop monitoring domain from the requirement analysis phase. We sustain and refine crop monitoring information, and match them to artifacts of each phase in domain engineering. Through this method, reusable domain components and malleable domain architecture can be produced. In addition, we show the practical applicability and features of our approach via a new clouding and IOT technology.
‘ So Much More Than Something Vulgar : ” Social Construction of Breast Enhancement in Second Life

The virtual world of Second Life allows users to develop their own software creations to transcend constraints imposed by its avatar creation engine. One such group of users, who choose to present as exceptionally busty, has formed a community built on the software artifacts of their digital bodies and a narrative of resistance to the inscription upon those bodies of an abject status. This paper analyzes boundary work enacted at a wedding of two busty avatars as enabling maximization of member identity and agency within a social context while providing an anti-transgressive narrative of gender expression, refuting rather than embracing the abject status of the sexualized (digital) body.
Desperately Seeking Spillovers?: Increasing Returns, Industrial Organization and the Location of New Entrants in Geographic and Technological Space

Using detailed data on Canadian biotechnology firms during the 1990s, we explore the geographic scope of knowledge spillovers and the balance spillover-seeking and expropriation-avoidance in entrants’ locations. Our findings indicate that knowledge spillovers are highly localized, with entrants attracted to incumbents’ R&D employees and spending within 500 m, but not further. We also find that two local contextual factors enhance the tendency toward spillover seeking. One is increasing returns to positive information externalities that accompany concentrations of technologically similar firms. The other is the entrepreneurial and open industrial organization that arises when incumbents with direct ties to universities concentrate geographically. Our findings provide empirical evidence of forces promoting geographically concentrated and technologically specialized industrial micro-clusters, as well as factors reinforcing the significance of co-location for the creation of new knowledge. Copyright 2007 , Oxford University Press.
Employees Well-Being Based on Integrative and Innovative Model of Hrm

Abstract Economy, both as the daily practice and the theory, is too often considered as something of its own rather than as a tool serving human happiness and well-being. Humans are not only economic beings - producers, exchangers, and consumers - but miltilayered. Thus, it has to develop a modern model of human resources management, by which the gap between various educated personnel and the offer on the labour market shall exceed, and to ensure the top professionals. Changing values, higher education and experiences, as well as increasing needs and requirements of new consumers, require educated, communicative and innovative labour force capable of making value for the consumers. Thus, the activity of development and qualification of human resources aiming the improvement of individual’s efficiency becomes of key importance. For the layout of the model of HRmanagement the attention should be paid to other important aspects as well.
Acute Myocarditis – A Trigger of Cardiac Autoimmunity? Expected Insights from the Etiology, Titre-Course, and Effect on Survival of Cardiac Autoantibodies (ETiCS) Study

Progressive cardiac dilatation and pump failure of unknown aetiology termed “idiopathic” dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) (Richardson et al., 1996; Maron et al., 2006) represents one of the main causes of severe heart failure in Western populations with an annual incidence of about 100 and a prevalence of 300-400 patients per year (American Heart Association, 2009). The large majority of cases are thought to arise from an initial (mostly viral) infection leading to acute myocardial inflammation. Acute myocarditis may either heal (about one third of the cases) or progress to a chronic inflammatory process with continued fibrotic repair, subsequent dilatation of the left and/or right ventricle and –finally– severe congestive heart failure (about another third of the patients). Progression to DCM appears to occur particularly, when associated (a) with chronic inflammation of the myocardium due to viral persistence (Kuhl et al., 2005) and/or (b) with the development of autoantibodies directed against distinct sarcoplasmatic or myocyte membrane proteins that are essential for cardiac function (Freedman & Lefkowitz, 2004; Jahns et al., 2006). The latter findings are further strengthened by the fact that patients with DCM often have alterations in both, their innate and their adaptive immune system (Limas, 1997; Luppi et al., 1998; Jahns et al., 2006; Mahrholdt et al., 2006). Thus, under certain conditions an initial acute inflammatory reaction may proceed into a kind of low-grade inflammation (MacLellan & Lusis, 2003) facilitating the development of abnormal or misled immune responses to the primary (infectious)
Public Opinion on Corruption in Public Health Service at Hospital X in Kutai Kartanegara Regency: Perception Survey of Service Users

This research seeks to collect the opinions of health-care users at Hospital X in Kutai Kartanegara Regency on corrupt practices, and analyze it. This is a deductive-qualitative research by data collecting through observation and distributing questionnaires to healthcare users. Research respondents are 400 users of public service Hospital X in Kutai Kartanegara Regency, consisting of patients and families of patients. The survey focuses on a number of important aspects related to corruption including: the practice of commission requests in the maintenance of services, the practice of offering service delivery faster / easier with certain rewards, the practice of giving a sign of gratitude from service users to service providers for the services they have received, even without being asked, news of the involvement of hospital staff in corrupt acts that incur losses of the state and the acts of corruption. The research results showed that generally, the quality of public health service of HospitalX perceived to be free from corrupt practices.
RISK ADJUSTED PERFORMANCE MEASURES IN A PROPERTY FINANCE BUSINESS IN SOUTH AFRICA: A BANKING PERSPECTIVE

This research analyses risk adjusted performance measures in a South African Property Finance Business. This is performed through the application of the Treynor, Sharpe and Jensen measures, which are risk adjusted performance measures in finance, to banking. Conclusions are drawn on whether risk adjusted performance measures lead to materially different results on ranking of performance when compared with traditional measures such as return on equity and return on assets. The research also discusses the strategic decisions that would result from using risk adjusted performance measures. The study contrasts risk adjusted performance measures with non-risk adjusted traditional performance measures in a Property Finance business within the banking sector in South Africa. Following a literature review, the research proposes that risk adjusted performance measures, when compared with traditional non-risk based performance measures such as return on equity and return on assets, lead to different results on performance ranking of business units or activities within a business unit. Both quantitative and qualitative approaches to research are undertaken. We chose Nedbank Corporate Property Finance as a case study because of the simplicity for the researcher to access financial data for the quantitative part of the research and interviewees for the qualitative part of the research. The key findings in this research are that there are differences in performance rankings between traditional measures of performance and risk adjusted measures. Business activities that perform better on non-risk adjusted basis are not necessarily the best performing on a risk adjusted basis. Hypothesis testing also shows that the differences in performance rankings are material.
Investigation of a mesospheric bore event over northern China

Abstract. A mesospheric bore event was observed using an OH all-sky airglow imager (ASAI) at Xinglong (40.2° N, 117.4° E), in northern China, on the night of 8–9 January 2011. Simultaneous observations by a Doppler meteor radar, a broadband sodium lidar, and TIMED/SABER OH intensity and temperature measurements are used to investigate the characteristics and environment of the bore propagation and the possible relations with the Na density perturbations. The bore propagated from northeast to southwest and divided the sky into bright and dark halves. The calculations show that the bore has an average phase velocity of 68 m s−1. The crests following the bore have a horizontal wavelength of ~ 22 km. These parameters are consistent with the hydraulic jump theory proposed by Dewan and Picard, as well as the previous bore reports. Simultaneous wind measurements from the Doppler meteor radar at Shisanling (40.3° N, 116.2° E) and temperature data from SABER on board the TIMED satellite are used to characterize the propagating environment of the bore. The result shows that a thermal-Doppler duct exists near the OH layer that supports the horizontal propagation of the bore. Simultaneous Na lidar observations at Yanqing (40.4° N, 116.0° E) suggest that there is a downward displacement of Na density during the passage of the mesospheric bore event.
Assessment of Primary Health Care System Performance in Nigeria: Using the Primary Health Care Performance Indicator Conceptual Framework

Abstract Abstract—Health gains oftentimes associated with income growth have been stubbornly slow in Nigeria in the past 25 years. One plausible reason for this stagnation is underperformance in the country's primary health care (PHC) system. The Primary Health Care Performance Indicators conceptual framework is used to examine Nigeria's PHC system and possible causes of underperformance. Analysis was conducted using a variety of sources including recent facility level information from the World Bank Service Delivery Indicators Survey. Results show that Nigeria has a relative abundance of PHC centers, reasonable geographic access to PHC, and relatively high health worker density. However, the performance of the PHC system is hindered by (1) segmented supply chains; (2) a lack of financial access to PHC; (3) a lack of infrastructure, drugs, equipment, and vaccines at the facility level; and (4) poor health worker performance. Altogether, these factors reflect two overarching system-level challenges—financing and governance—that are key root causes of the dysfunctions observed in the PHC system in Nigeria. Compared with peer African countries, Nigeria ranks low on nearly all PHC performance indicators. The government has taken important steps to address these root causes of underperformance, but policy gaps remain in achieving sustainable and equitable provision of PHC for the people of Nigeria.
Invasive Pacific lionfish Pterois volitans reduce abundance and species richness of native Bahamian coral-reef fishes

Pacific red lionfish Pterois volitans, introduced to Atlantic waters in the 1980s, represent a particularly successful invasive marine predator with strong effects on native prey. Previous experiments examining the effects of lionfish on native fish communities have been conducted on small patch reefs. However, the effects of lionfish on native reef-fish communities over larger spatial scales — scales at which conservation and management efforts are typically applied — have not been examined experimentally. Beginning in June 2009, I conducted a large-scale field experiment near Lee Stocking Island, Bahamas. Ten large (1400 to 4000 m2) coral reefs were paired based on location and similarity of habitat, and baseline surveys of their fish communities were conducted. Quarterly removals of lionfish were then conducted on 1 reef in each pair, while the densities of lionfish on the other reefs were standardized at typical post-invasion levels. Through August 2010, quarterly surveys showed that lionfish caused significant changes in native reef-fish communities, including reductions in the total density (up to 46.3 ± 13.7%, mean ± SEM), biomass (31.9 ± 10.7%), and species richness (21.4 ± 9.1%) of prey-sized fishes (all individuals <10 cm total length). Lionfish also caused substantial reductions in the biomass of prey-sized herbivorous fishes (33.9 ± 16.0%) and piscivores (98.6 ± 39.5%). However, these negative effects on small fish did not translate to observable declines in a larger size-class (all individuals 10 to 20 cm total length) over the 14 mo study period.
Advances in Wildlife Immobilisation and Anaesthesia Clinical and Physiological Evaluation in Selec ted Species

Improvement of chemical capture is an important part of wildlife conservation and animal welfare to minimise distress for the animals and the risk of morbidity and mortality. The aim of this thesis was to improve wildlife immobilisation and anaesthesia by studying physiological variables and clinically evaluate different drug combinations and methods of capture in selected species. Reversible anaesthetic protocols were developed for use in free-ranging lions and four species of SouthEast Asian primates. Capture and anaesthesia of free-ranging wolverines, brown bears, black and white rhinoceros were physiologically evaluated. The effect of intranasal oxygen supplementation on arterial oxygenation was assessed in brown bears and rhinoceros. Partial reversal of the opioid effect and different body positions were evaluated in rhinoceros. Capture methods used included darting from a helicopter or the ground, and physical restraint followed by drug injection. Medetomidine-ketamine was used in wolverines and medetomidine-zolazepam-tiletamine in primates, lions and brown bears. Rhinoceros were immobilised with a combination of an opioid, azaperone and an alpha2-agonist. Body temperature and cardiorespiratory variables were monitored in all animals. Arterial blood samples were analysed to interpret pulmonary gas exchange and acid-base status in carnivores and rhinoceros. Low doses of medetomidine-zolazepam-tiletamine rapidly anaesthetised primates and lions, and reversal with atipamezole resulted in a smooth and calm recovery. Physiological alterations varied with different protocols and species and included changes in body temperature, respiratory and heart rates, gas exchange and acid-base balance. Hypoxaemia was recorded in all rhinoceros and most carnivore species. The major contributor to hypoxaemia was likely ventilation-perfusion mismatch including shunt. In rhinoceros, hypoventilation contributed to an impaired gas exchange and the animals remained hypoxaemic despite partial reversal. However, in black rhinoceros arterial oxygenation was higher during sternal compared to lateral recumbency. Capture-induced lactic acidaemia was recorded in carnivores and rhinoceros. Intranasal oxygen supplementation improved arterial oxygenation. In conclusion, this thesis increases the understanding of the effects of capture and anaesthesia in several wildlife species. Physiological derangements were identified, potential causative factors were investigated and methods for improvement were evaluated.
An Underactuated Linkage Finger Mechanism for Hand Prostheses

The underactuated fingers used in numerous robotic systems are evaluated by grasping force, configuration space, actuation method, precision of operation, compactness and weight. In consideration of all such factors a novel linkage based underactuated finger with a self-adaptive actuation mechanism is proposed to be used in prosthetics hands, where the finger can accomplish flexion and extension. Notably, the proposed mechanism can be characterized as a combination of parallel and series links. The mobility of the system has been analyzed according to the Chebychev-Grubler-Kutzbach criterion for a planar mechanism. With the intention of verifying the effectiveness of the mechanism, kinematics analysis has been carried out, by means of the geometric representation and Denavit-Hartenberg (D-H) parameter approach. The presented two-step analysis followed by a numerical study, eliminates the limitations of the D-H conversion method to analyze the robotics systems with both series and parallel links. In addition, the trajectories and configuration space of the proposed finger mechanism have been determined by the motion simulations. A prototype of the proposed finger mechanism has been fabricated using 3D printing and it has been experimentally tested to validate its functionality. The kinematic analysis, motion simulations, experimental investigations and finite element analysis have demonstrated the effectiveness of the proposed mechanism to gain the expected motions.
Consumer Preferences for Amount and Type of Fat in Ground Beef

Scientists and beef industry participants are investigating ways to improve the healthiness of beef. We report results of a nationwide mail survey developed to determine Consumers' preferences for fat content in ground beef and identify how consumers would most like to improve the healthiness of beef. The results from a choice-based conjoint experiment indicate that consumers place significant value on reducing saturated fat and the Omega 6:3 ratio in ground beef, but were relatively unconcerned about conjugated linoleic acid. The relatively new method of best-worst scaling was used to further identify which methods consumers most preferred producers use to improve fat content in beef. The results indicate consumers preferred feeding cattle a grass-fed diet as opposed to supplementing cattle feed with fish-meal or flaxseed to improve the fatty acid content in beef. Although consumers were receptive to the idea of using genetic testing to breed only those cattle with improved fatty acid content, using cloning to achieve this end, was viewed as very undesirable.
Experience Report on Formally Verifying Parts of OpenJDK's API with KeY

Deductive verification of software has not yet found its way into industry, as complexity and scalability issues require highly specialized experts. The long-term perspective is, however, to develop verification tools aiding industrial software developers to find bugs or bottlenecks in software systems faster and more easily. The KeY project constitutes a framework for specifying and verifying software systems, aiming at making formal verification tools applicable for mainstream software development. To help the developers of KeY, its users, and the deductive verification community, we summarize our experiences with KeY 2.6. 1 in specifying and verifying real-world Java code from a users perspective. To this end, we concentrate on parts of the Collections-API of OpenJDK 6, where an informal specification exists. While we describe how we bridged informal and formal specification, we also exhibit accompanied challenges that we encountered. Our experiences are that (a) in principle, deductive verification for API-like code bases is feasible, but requires high expertise, (b) developing formal specifications for existing code bases is still notoriously hard, and (c) the under-specification of certain language constructs in Java is challenging for tool builders. Our initial effort in specifying parts of OpenJDK 6 constitutes a stepping stone towards a case study for future research.
Domains of Archean mantle lithosphere deciphered by seismic anisotropy – inferences from the LAPNET array in northern Fennoscandia

Abstract. An international LAPNET array (2007–2009, http://www.oulu.fi/sgo-oty/lapnet ) of the POLENET/LAPNET sub-project of the POLENET-IPY consortium, related to seismic and geodetic studies in the Arctic regions, consisted of about 60 broadband seismic stations located on the territory of northern Finland and adjacent parts of Sweden, Norway and Russia. We analyze relative P-wave travel-time deviations evaluated for a subset of 90 teleseismic events recorded by the LAPNET array and show examples of lateral variations of shear-wave splitting to demonstrate variability of fabrics of the Archean mantle lithosphere. The initial results clearly demonstrate the Archean mantle lithosphere consists of domains with consistent fabrics reflecting fossil anisotropic structures. 3-D self-consistent anisotropic models with inclined symmetry axes accommodate two independent sets of body-wave anisotropic observations. Individual domains are delimited by boundaries (sutures), where the anisotropic parameters change. The results obtained from the LAPNET array fill a gap in structural studies of the upper mantle beneath northern Fennoscandia.