Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Distributions of total and size-fractionated particulate 210Po and 210Pb activities along the North Atlantic GEOTRACES GA01 transect: GEOVIDE cruise

Abstract. Vertical distributions of total and particulate polonium-210 (210Po) and lead-210 (210Pb) activities in the water column were measured at 11 stations in the North Atlantic during the GEOTRACES GA01 transect: GEOVIDE cruise in May–June 2014. Total 210Po activity was on average 24 % lower than 210Pb activity in the upper 100 m, and it was closer to unity in the mesopelagic (100–1000 m). The partitioning coefficients (Kd) along the transect suggest the preferential association of 210Po relative to 210Pb onto particles. The prominent role of small particles in sorption was confirmed by the observation that over 80 % of the particulate radionuclide activity was on small particles. To account for the observed surface water 210Po ∕ 210Pb disequilibria, particulate radionuclide activities and export of both small (1–53 µm) and large (>53 µm) particles must be considered. A comparison between the GEOVIDE total particulate 210Po ∕ 210Pb activity ratios (ARs) and the ratios in previous studies revealed a distinct geographic distribution, with lower particulate ARs in the high-latitude North Atlantic (including this study) and Arctic in relation to all other samples. For the samples where apparent oxygen utilization (AOU) was calculated at the same depth and time as the 210Po ∕ 210Pb AR (40 stations including this study), there was a two-phase correlation between the total particulate AR and AOU, likely reflecting the nature of the particles and demonstrating the forces of remineralization and radionuclide decay from particles as they age.
Two new theropod egg sites from the Late Jurassic Lourinhã Formation, Portugal

Two new Late Jurassic (uppermost Late Kimmeridgian) dinosaur eggshell sites are described, Casal da Rola and Porto das Barcas, both near Lourinhã, central-west Portugal. Casal da Rola yields eggshells with an obliquiprismatic morphotype comparable to those from a nest with the associated fossil embryos from Paimogo, tentatively assigned to the theropod Lourinhanosaurus antunesi. The Porto das Barcas eggshells have a dendrospherulitic morphotype with a prolatocanaliculate pore system. This morphotype was also recognised in eggshells from a clutch with associated Torvosaurus embryos at the Porto das Barcas locality. A preliminary cladistic analysis of eggshell morphology suggests theropod affinities for the Casal da Rola eggs, but is unable to resolve the phylogenetic position of the Porto das Barcas eggs. The eggshells at both sites are preserved in distal flood plain mudstones and siltstones. Carbonate concretions within the deposits indicate paleosol development.
Interactions between Employment and Training Policies 19 November 2007 preliminary-not for citation

This paper o¤ers a methodology to analyze whether there are complementarities between di¤erent labor market policies. When analyzing the impact of policies, it is important to take into account the possibility of complementarities, in the sense that the impact of each policy could be greater when it is implemented in conjunction with other policies than in isolation. Ignoring this possibility could distort the evaluation of the performance of policies. In this context, we analyze exemplarily whether there are complementarities between training subsidies and employment subsidies. Both policies address a serious labor market problem: high unemployment of low-skilled. For this purpose, we construct a simple, dynamic model of hiring decisions, derived from microfoundations. Workers are heterogenous with respect to their productivity. The model is calibrated with German data. The simulation shows that for reasonable parameter values the complementarities are weak or even do not exist. However, the analysis delivers an idea which important features of the economy have to be taken into account when analyzing complementarities. Keywords: complementarities; hiring subsidies; training subsidies; vocational training; employment; unemployment; JEL classi cation: J21, J23, J24, J64, J68 Address: Kiel Institute for the World Economy Telephone: +49 431 8814272 Duesternbrooker Weg 120 Fax: +49 431 8814525 24105 Kiel E-Mail: frank.oskamp@ifw-kiel.de Germany dennis.snower@ifw-kiel.de
Review of Recent Advances in Electrically Conductive Adhesive Materials and Technologies in Electronic Packaging

Electrically Conductive Adhesives (ICAs: Isotropic Conductive Adhesives; ACAs: An-isotropic Conductive Adhesives; and NCAs: Non-conductive Adhesives) offer promising material solutions for fine pitch interconnects, low cost, low-temperature process and environmentally clean approaches in the electronic packaging technology. ICAs have been developed and used widely for traditional solder replacement, especially in surface mount devices and flip chip application. These also need to be lower cost with higher electrical/mechanical and reliability performances. ACAs have been widely used in flat panel display modules for high resolution, lightweight, thin profile and low power consumption in film forms (Anisotropic Conductive Films: ACFs) for last decades. Multi-layered ACF structures such as double and triple-layered ACFs were developed to meet fine pitch interconnection, low-temperature curing and strong adhesion requirements. Also, ACAs have been attracting much attention for their simple and lead-free processing as well as cost-effective packaging method for semiconductor packaging applications. High mechanical reliability, good electrical performance at high frequency level and effective thermal conductivity for high current density are some of required properties for ACF materials to be pursued for a wide usage in flip chip technology. Recently, NCAs are becoming promising for ultra-fine pitch interconnection and low cost joining materials in electronic packaging applications. In this paper, an overview of the recent developments and applications of electrically conductive adhesives for electronic packaging with focus on fine pitch capability, electrical/mechanical/thermal performance and wafer level packaging application is presented.
FFT-based Poisson Solver for large scale numerical simulations of incompressible flows

In the context of time-accurate numerical simulation of incompressible flows, a Poisson equation needs to be solved at least once per time-step to project the velocity field onto a divergence-free space. Due to the non-local nature of its solution, this elliptic system is one of the most time consuming and difficult to parallelise parts of the code. In this paper, a parallel direct Poisson solver restricted to problems with one uniform periodic direction is presented. It is a combination of a Direct Schur-complement based Decomposition (DSD) and a Fourier diagonalisation. The latter decomposes the original system into a set of mutually independent 2D systems which are solved by means of the DSD algorithm. Since no restrictions are imposed in the non-periodic directions, the overall algorithm is well-suited for solving problems discretised on extruded 2D unstructured meshes. A new overall parallelisation strategy with respect to our earlier works is presented. This has allowed us to solve discrete Poisson equations with up to 109 grid points in less than half a second, using up to 8192 CPU cores of the MareNostrum Supercomputer.
Modeling and Simulation of Biaxial Strained P-MOSFETs: Application to a Single and Dual Channel Heterostructure

The objectives of this work are focused on the application of strained silicon on MOSFET transistor. To do this, impact and benefits obtained with the use of strained silicon technology on p-channel MOSFETs are presented. This research attempt to create conventional and two-strained silicon MOSFETs fabricated from the use of TCAD, which is a simulation tool from Silvaco. In our research, two-dimensional simulation of conventional MOSFET, biaxial strained PMOSFET and dual channel strained P-MOSFET has been achieved to extract their characteristics. ATHENA and ATLAS have been used to simulate the process and validate the electronic characteristics. Our results allow showing improvements obtained by comparing the three structures and their characteristics. The maximum of carrier mobility improvement is achieved with percentage of 35.29 % and 70.59 % respectively, by result an improvement in drive current with percentage of 36.54 % and 236.71 %, and reduction of leakage current with percentage of 59.45 % and 82.75 %, the threshold voltage is also enhaced with percentage of: 60 % and 61.4%. Our simulation results highlight the importance of incorporating strain technology in MOSFET transistors.
A general framework for denoising phaseless diffraction measurements

Author(s): Chang, Huibin; Marchesini, Stefano | Abstract: We propose a general framework to recover underlying images from noisy phaseless diffraction measurements based on the alternating directional method of multipliers and the plug-and-play technique. The algorithm consists of three-step iterations: (i) Solving a generalized least square problem with the maximum a posteriori (MAP) estimate of the noise, (ii) Gaussian denoising and (iii) updating the multipliers. The denoising step utilizes higher order filters such as total generalized variation and nonlocal sparsity based filters including nonlocal mean (NLM) and Block-matching and 3D filtering (BM3D) filters. The multipliers are updated by a symmetric technique to increase convergence speed. The proposed method with low computational complexity is provided with theoretical convergence guarantee, and it enables recovering images with sharp edges, clean background and repetitive features from noisy phaseless measurements. Numerous numerical experiments for Fourier phase retrieval (PR) as coded diffraction and ptychographic patterns are performed to verify the convergence and efficiency, showing that our proposed method outperforms the state-of-art PR algorithms without any regularization and those with total variational regularization.
ASSESSMENT OF AGE-RELATED CARDIO- VASCULAR DISEASE USING REDOX STRESS MARKERS

The general ageing of the population is considered one of the most important issues of the current medical research, several studies being devoted to finding the parameters that would allow a precise evaluation of the health status of the patients. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the main co-morbidity of the ageing process. Glycation of proteins and redox mechanisms are mainly involved in its development. In the present study we were focused on evaluating the level of advanced glycation end products (AGEs) as well as the susceptibility of serum lipids to induced peroxidation in samples from patients diagnosed with cardio-vascular disease compared to controls. Results show that the two evaluated markers are significantly increased in CVD patients. Rezumat Imbătrânirea generală a populaţiei este considerată una dintre problemele medicale majore in cercetarea medicală; in prezent se află in desfăsurare numeroase studii care au ca scop identificarea unor markeri care să permită evaluarea cât mai precisă a stării de sănătate a pacienţilor vârstnici. Maladiile cardio-vasculare reprezintă principala comorbiditate asociată imbătrânirii. Glicarea proteinelor si mecanismele redox sunt direct implicate in dezvoltarea acestor afecţiuni. In prezentul studiu ne-am propus evaluarea nivelului produsilor finali de glicare avansată precum si a susceptibilităţii lipidelor serice la peroxidarea indusă exogen, la pacienţi diagnosticaţi cu maladii cardio-vasculare, comparativ cu subiecţi de control. Rezultatele obţinute au demonstrat că cei doi markeri sunt semnificativi crescuţi la pacienţii cu boală cardio-vasculară.
Fashion Leadership, Market Mavenism, and Store Evaluative Criteria

This study compares fashion leaders and market mavens by examining the demographic characteristics of fashion leaders and market mavens and how they differ in their evaluation of store and shopping related attributes. Data originated from a national consumer mail survey in the United States. The survey included items measuring market mavenism, fashion leadership, store evaluative attributes, and personal information. Responses from 380 consumers were used for data analysis. Female consumers were found to be more active in word-of-mouth activities in general. Young consumers were more inclined to express fashion leadership while age was not related to market mavenism. A lower level of education increased tendencies for both market mavenism and fashion leadership. In terms of store evaluative criteria, the majority of items in the survey were more important as fashion leadership and market mavenism tendencies increased. Interestingly, the need for knowledgeable or helpful salespeople did not increase with fashion leadership tendencies. Also, fashion leaders were interested in easy return of merchandise and were likely to spend more time in the stores. This study sheds important light on how fashion leadership differ compared to market mavenism. By simultaneously examining fashion leadership and market mavenism using a strong sample base, this study provides sound evidence of how consumers interested in fashion may have differing needs for shopping.
The Taylor–Couette motor: spontaneous flows of active polar fluids between two coaxial cylinders

We study the dynamics of active polar fluids in a Taylor–Couette geometry where the fluid is confined between two rotating coaxial cylinders. This system can spontaneously generate flow fields and thereby set the two cylinders into relative rotation either by spontaneous symmetry breaking or via asymmetric boundary conditions on the polarization field at the cylinder surfaces. In the presence of an externally applied torque, the system can act as a rotatory motor and perform mechanical work. The relation between the relative angular velocity of the cylinders and the externally applied torque exhibits rich behaviors such as dynamic instabilities and the coexistence of multiple stable steady states for certain ranges of parameter values and boundary conditions.
Prepivoting by weighted bootstrap iteration B

Prepivoting by conventional bootstrap iteration is known to yield a progressively more accurate pivot in certain problems, and has important application in the construction of confidence limits and estimation of null distributions. We investigate the theoretical effects of weighted bootstrap iteration on prepivoting and show that each weighted bootstrap iteration, with weights chosen carefully but empirically, is asymptotically equivalent to two consecutive conventional bootstrap iterations. In terms of reducing the order of error, prepivoting can therefore be carried out much more efficiently if based on weighted bootstrap iterations. This is shown for a variety of problem settings, including the smooth function model, M-estimation and the regression context. A numerical illustration is provided, demonstrating the potential practical usefulness of weighted prepivoting.
The staggered vertex model and its applications

New solvable vertex models can be easily obtained by staggering the spectral parameter in already known ones. This simple construction reveals some surprises: for appropriate values of the staggering, highly non-trivial continuum limits can be obtained. The simplest case of staggering with period 2 (the case) for the six-vertex model was shown to be related, in one regime of the spectral parameter, to the critical antiferromagnetic Potts model on the square lattice, and has a non-compact continuum limit. Here we study the other regime: in the very anisotropic limit, it can be viewed as a zig–zag spin chain with spin anisotropy. From the Bethe–Ansatz solution, we obtain the central charge c = 2, the conformal spectrum and the continuum partition function, corresponding to one free boson and two Majorana fermions. Finally, moving in more physical territory, we obtain a massive integrable deformation of the model on the lattice. Interestingly, its scattering theory is a massive version of the one for the flow between minimal models. The corresponding field theory is argued to be a complex version of the C(2)2 Toda theory.
IMPLEMENTATION ON THE CUSTOMER SERVICE DELIVERY IN THE INSURANCE INDUSTRY IN KENYA BY MARTIN KIMANI

iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENT . vi DEDICATION. vii LIST OF FIGURES . x LIST OF TABLES . xi CHAPTER ONE . 1 1.0 INTRODUCTION. 1 1.1 Background of the Problem . 1 1.2 Statement of the Problem . 4 1.3 Purpose of the Study . 5 1.4 Research Questions . 6 1.5 Importance of the Study . 6 1.7 Definition of Terms. 8 1.8 Chapter Summary . 10 CHAPTER TWO . 11 2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW . 11 2.
Predicting Intentions to Take Medication in Patients with Pulmonary Tuberculosis: Moderating Role of Subjective Norms

Aim: The present study aimed to assess medication adherence intentions in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis. Method: The sample consisted of 147 patients with pulmonary TB, taken from Gulab Devi Chest Hospital, Lahore. Demographic information questionnaire and clinical/ Performa and Urdu Translated Theory of Planned Behavior Questionnaire was used for assessment. The statistical analysis were used to Descriptive statistics, pearson correlation, regression and moderation analysis were used to assess statistical significance between variables Results: The results showed that Monthly family income, Attitude towards medication, Subjective norms and Perceived behavioral control significantly positively related with Intentions to take medication. Regression moderation analysis showed that Subjective Norms significantly moderate the relationship between Perceived behavioral control and Intentions. Furthermore, Linear Regression for indirect measures (Behavioral beliefs, normative belief and Control beliefs) showed that behavioral beliefs positive predicted Attitude towards taking medication. Motivation to Comply significantly predicted Subjective norms. Finally, there was significant relationship between Perceived behavioral control and control beliefs. Conclusion: Results of the current study highlighted that people perceive social pressure from their significant others regarding taking medication.
On angles determined by fractal subsets of the Euclidean space via Sobolev bounds for bi-linear operators

We prove that if the Hausdorff dimension of a compact subset of ${\mathbb R}^d$ is greater than $\frac{d+1}{2}$, then the set of angles determined by triples of points from this set has positive Lebesgue measure. Sobolev bounds for bi-linear analogs of generalized Radon transforms and the method of stationary phase play a key role. These results complement those of V. Harangi, T. Keleti, G. Kiss, P. Maga, P. Mattila and B. Stenner in (\cite{HKKMMS10}). We also obtain new upper bounds for the number of times an angle can occur among $N$ points in ${\mathbb R}^d$, $d \ge 4$, motivated by the results of Apfelbaum and Sharir (\cite{AS05}) and Pach and Sharir (\cite{PS92}). We then use this result to establish sharpness results in the continuous setting. Another sharpness result relies on the distribution of lattice points on large spheres in higher dimensions.
Erasmus MC Approaches to the i 2 b 2 Challenge

Erasmus MC participated in the concept annotation and assertion classification subtasks of the fourth i2b2 challenge. For concept annotation, our approach consisted of tagging the clinical data with a variety of named entity recognizers and combining the resulting annotations into a final annotation set by means of a simple voting scheme. For assertion classification, we manually crafted decision rules using tools from a text engineering package. Our results show that a combined annotation system performs significantly better than any of the individual systems. The assertion classification system shows a good overall performance, but performs less well for “possible” and “conditional” assertions.
Using sets of combs to control pitch estimation errors

We analyze the errors of a Pitch Estimation Algorithm using the Pitch Function (response of the periodicity estimator as a function of the frequency parameter Fc). The estimator's maximum response for a single signal of fundamental frequency F0 is expected to occur for Fc=F0. Actually the pitch function exhibits many secondary peaks which occasionally cause the errors. When several signals are mixed the main peaks do not reliably represent the F0s of the component signals. By taking as periodicity estimator the correlation of the spectrum module with a uniform infinite spectral comb of fundamental frequency Fc we show that each peak corresponds to a particular value of the ratio Fc/F0=p/q (p and q positive integers). It follows that some secondary peaks can be cancelled either by augmenting the comb with intermediary negative teeth, or by setting to zero some of its teeth. These modified combs can be viewed as combinations of uniform combs of different Fcs. The present study aims at precisely defining and.
The Joys of Industrial Diversification in the Stock and Eurobond Markets

Although the positive effect of international diversification on portfolio risk is well understood what causes it is still an open issue. Several studies find that the difference in industrial structure across countries explains little of the total risk reduction achievable in international portfolios. In this paper we re-appraise the extend of industry effects in the return volatility of stock portfolios and find them to be substantially larger than it was previously thought. We also find that both geographical and industrial diversification cause a significant reduction in the spread return volatility of bond portfolios while their impact on interest rate risk is much weaker. Maturity, seniority and rating diversification effects are also investigated. JEL Classification: G11, G15.
A Hesitant Fuzzy Linguistic Multicriteria Decision-Making Method with Interactive Criteria and Its Application to Renewable Energy Projects Selection

A variety of multicriteria decision-making (MCDM) methods for renewable energy projects evaluation have been proposed, of which the premise of using these methods is to assume that the criteria are independent of each other. However, it may be difficult or costly to build independent criteria set in some cases because renewable energy planning is to pursue a balance of economic, social, and environmental goals, which makes the existence of interaction among criteria be of great possibility. In this paper, we consider a highly ambiguous decision situation, where the experts are allowed to give the evaluations in the form of hesitant fuzzy linguistic terms set (HFLTS). We build a hesitant fuzzy linguistic decision-making model handling the interaction among criteria from the perspective of distance measure and apply it to renewable energy projects selection. The proposed method can consider more fuzzy factors and deal with the interaction among criteria more approximately. It can reduce the decision pressure and improve the decision-making efficiency because the decision makers are allowed to express their preference in form of HFLTS and a decision criteria set of which the criteria are independent of each other is not necessary.
Gasoline and diesel demand in Europe : New insights

This study utilizes a panel data set from 14 European countries over the period 1990-2004 to estimate a dynamic model specification for gasoline and diesel demand. Previous studies estimating gasoline consumption per total passenger cars ignore the recent increase in the number of diesel cars in most European countries leading to biased elasticity estimates. We apply several common dynamic panel estimators to our small sample. Results show that specifications neglecting the share of diesel cars overestimate short-run income, price and car ownership elasticities. It appears that the results of standard pooled estimators are more reliable than common IV/GMM estimators applied to our small data set.