Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Social and Hydrological Responses to Extreme Precipitations: An Interdisciplinary Strategy for Postflood Investigation

This paper describes and illustrates a methodology to conduct postflood investigations based on interdisciplinary collaboration between social and physical scientists. The method, designed to explore the link between crisis behavioral response and hydrometeorological dynamics, aims at understanding the spatial and temporal capacities and constraints on human behaviors in fast-evolving hydrometeorological conditions. It builds on methods coming from both geosciences and transportations studies to complement existing post-flood field investigation methodology used by hydrometeorologists. The authors propose an interview framework, structured around a chronological guideline to allow people who experienced the flood firsthand to tell the stories of the circumstances in which their activities were affected during the flash flood. This paper applies the data collection method to the case of the 15 June 2010 flash flood event that killed 26 people in the Draguignan area (Var, France). As a first step, based on the collected narratives, an abductive approach allowed the identification of the possible factors influencing individual responses to flash floods. As a second step, behavioral responses were classified into categories of activities based on the respondents' narratives. Then, aspatial and temporal analysis of the sequences made of the categories of action to contextualize the set of coping responses with respect to local hydrometeorological conditions is proposed. During this event, the respondents mostly follow the pace of change in their local environmental conditions as the flash flood occurs, official flood anticipation being rather limited and based on a large-scale weather watch. Therefore, contextual factors appear as strongly influencing the individual's ability to cope with the event in such a situation.
Nests and nest-sites of the House Sparrow Passer domesticus (LINNAEUS, 1758) in urban, suburban and rural environments

Abstract. Nesting of Passer domesticus in the urban (879 nests), suburban (162 nests) and rural (191 nests) environments in Central Poland is discussed. Out of the 19 types of nest-sites disting guished, 18 were noted in towns, 11 in suburban areas and 12 in the country. The mean height of nest-sites above the ground was, respectively, 7.3,3.9, and 5.8 m. The size of nests was determined by the spatial conditions of the places in which they were situated: the largest nests were found in towns, the smallest in suburbs and those of medium size in the country. While the nest size is generally marked by great variation, the dimensions of the nest cup show the smallest fluctuations. The amounts of building materials used range within very wide limits and so does their weight (from 15.3 to 616.2 g). A great variety of materials, dependent on the environment, was also observed.
The power spectrum and bispectrum of SDSS DR11 BOSS galaxies – I. Bias and gravity

We analyse the anisotropic clustering of the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) CMASS Data Release 11 sample, which consists of $690 827$ galaxies in the redshift range 0.43 < z < 0.70 and has a sky coverage of 8498 deg2 corresponding to an effective volume of ˜ 6 Gpc3. We fit the Fourier space statistics, the power spectrum and bispectrum monopoles to measure the linear and quadratic bias parameters, b1 and b2, for a non-linear non-local bias model, the growth of structure parameter f and the amplitude of dark matter density fluctuations parametrized by sigma8. We obtain b1(zeff)1.40sigma8(zeff) = 1.672 ± 0.060 and b_2^{0.30}(z_eff)sigma _8(z_eff)=0.579± 0.082 at the effective redshift of the survey, zeff = 0.57. The main cosmological result is the constraint on the combination f 0.43(zeff)sigma8(zeff) = 0.582 ± 0.084, which is complementary to fsigma8 constraints obtained from two-point redshift-space distortion analyses. A less conservative analysis yields f 0.43(zeff)sigma8(zeff) = 0.584 ± 0.051. We ensure that our result is robust by performing detailed systematic tests using a large suite of survey galaxy mock catalogues and N-body simulations. The constraints on f 0.43sigma8 are useful for setting additional constraints on neutrino mass, gravity, curvature as well as the number of neutrino species from galaxy surveys analyses (as presented in a companion paper).
Comparison of the Results of Token Test and Sentence Comprehension Test in Pre‐school Czech Children with Typical Language Development and with Speech‐Language Disorders

27 pre-school (26 native Czech-speaking and 1 native Russian-speaking) children (age 4; 6–7; 9 and gender 18 m; 9 f); 17 children with speech and language disorders from speech and language kindergarten (SLK) and 10 children with typical language development (TLD) from a kindergarten of common type, received two tests of language comprehension, the Token Test (TT) and the subtest from the Heidelberg Language Development Test (H-S-E-T) called The Sentence Comprehension Test (SCT). The results of the TT (success rate of children with TLD was 77%; children from SLK scored 70%) surpassed the results of the SCT (children with TLD 59%; children from SLK 44%) in both groups. The most severe deficiencies have been observed in children with SLI and a boy with severe bilateral sensorineural hearing loss. The observed differences between the means in both groups (TLD, N = 10; SLD, N = 17) were not statistically significant, using Student’s t-test (TT, p = 0.28; SCT, p = 0.11). There were not statistically significant differences between the means in children from three compared groups (TLD, N = 10; SLI, N = 8; articulation disorders, N = 6), using the ANOVA (TT, p = 0.60; SCT, p = 0.23).
A deterrent effect of the electorate's disappointment on candidates' over-promise

We develop a model of campaign promise competition between electoral candidates. Each candidate has a different ability, which determines his achievement if he wins, and which is his private information. Each sends a message about his own ability to the electorate simultaneously, and a generous promise increases a candidate’s winning probability. However, once he wins, an over-promise elicits the electorate’s disappointment and injures his reputation. We find that a higher disappointment tendency is sometimes profitable for the electorate, even taking the disappointment damage into account. This is because it will deter candidates’ over-promise and bring about a more efficient winner selection.
PRELIMINARY DATA ON SEROLOGICAL INVESTIGATION TO Q FEVER, LYME DISEASE AND ECHINOCOCCUS IN ALBANIA

The aim of this study is to present the results on serological surveys of Lyme borreliosis, Q fever and echinococcus infection in northern Albania. In total we analyzed 200 sera blood samples collected from cattle, sheep and goats, and X fecal samples from red foxes. We used appropriate ELISA tests, commercially available to evaluate the presence of anti-Borrelia IgG, specific antibody against Coxiella burnetii, and coproantigen for echinococcus. In total 11.66% of sheep, 14.5% of goats and 6% of cattle had antibody against Borrelia sp; 13.3% of sheep, 17.7 % of goats and 4% of cattle had specific IgG against Coxiella burnetii, and 27% of fecal red fox samples were positive to echinococcus. As a conclusion, both two above bacterial zoonotic diseases, and echinococcosis as an important parasitic zoonosis are present in Albania. They are a serious threat to public health, and may be largely underestimated in Albania. This paper includes the full results relating to Q fever and some recent, unpublished data from our group concerning with Borreliozis and echinococcus infections.
Cosmic web-type classification using decision theory

We propose a decision criterion for segmenting the cosmic web into different structure types (voids, sheets, filaments, and clusters) on the basis of their respective probabilities and the strength of data constraints. Our approach is inspired by an analysis of games of chance where the gambler only plays if a positive expected net gain can be achieved based on some degree of privileged information. The result is a general solution for classification problems in the face of uncertainty, including the option of not committing to a class for a candidate object. As an illustration, we produce high-resolution maps of web-type constituents in the nearby Universe as probed by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey main galaxy sample. Other possible applications include the selection and labelling of objects in catalogues derived from astronomical survey data.
Scale Expansion of Community Investigations and Integration of the Effects of Abiotic and Biotic Processes on Maintenance of Species Diversity

Information on the maintenance of diversity patterns from regional to local scales is dispersed among academic fields due to the local focus of community ecology. To better understand these patterns, the study of ecological communities needs to be expanded to larger scales and the various processes affecting them need to be integrated using a suitable quantitative method. We determined a range of communities on a flora-subregional scale in Yunnan province, China (383210.02 km2). A series of species pools were delimited from the regional to plot scales. Plant diversity was evaluated and abiotic and biotic processes identified at each pool level. The species pool effect was calculated using an innovative model, and the contribution of these processes to the maintenance of plant species diversity was determined and integrated: climate had the greatest effect at the flora-subregional scale, with historical and evolutionary processes contributing ∼11%; climate and human disturbance had the greatest effect at the local site pool scale; competition exclusion and stress limitation explained strong filtering at the successional stage pool scale; biotic processes contributed more on the local community scale than on the regional scale. Scale expansion combined with the filtering model approach solves the local problem in community ecology.
Herbalism and resources for the development of ethnopharmacology in Mount Cameroon region.

Tropical forests are a biologically lavish and diverse ecosystem with plants whose potential value as a natural pharmacy is yet to be discovered. The native people have for centuries used plants as medicine. There is a need to stimulate traditional healers to evaluate the strong and weak aspects of indigenous knowledge base and to devise methods to test and improve knowledge. The study uses a combination of primary and secondary data to provide baseline knowledge on the concept of herbalism, endogenous knowledge of medicinal plants, pharmaceutical uses, marketing status and threats to sustainable development. It establishes an ethno-medicinal plant inventory consisting of a total of 30 plants with major ailments. In terms of life form, 70% were composed of trees, 6.6% shrubs, 10% climbers and 13.3% herbs. Some 70% of these plants are locally marketed and 66.6% have other nonmedicinal uses. The paper identifies the stresses and vulnerabilities of the plants and the scope for western biomedical practitioners to assess this traditional knowledge, that is, methods of testing, refining and validating indigenous knowledge in traditional medicine in order to support the process of integration. It finally posits that since different paradigms of health and illness stand in the way of real integration, western biomedicine and African traditional medicine may remain apart as two parallel systems hence the need to locate and catalog these plants for the identification of their pharmaceutical properties.
Effect of precipitation on the yield of hay meadows with contrasting nutrient supply

Ragalyi, P., i. KadaR and P. Csontos, 2014. Effect of precipitation on the yield of hay meadows with contrasting nutrient supply. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 20: 779-785 Available nutrients and water are known as major factors influencing the production of grasslands. In the present paper effects of precipitation on hay production was studied on nutrient-rich (NR) and nutrient-poor (NP) soils, in a long-term field experiment from 2002 to 2012. the most effective period of precipitation was also investigated. Using a mixture of 8 grass species, we established a grassland (near to sarbogard, Hungary) where 16 permanent quadrates each 6 m by 6 m in area were marked out, of which 8 were abundantly and other 8 were poorly supplied with n, P and K nutrients. Quadrates were harvested in early June, and air dried hay production were measured. Precipitation was recorded by a Hellmann rain meter established in the experimental area. air dried hay production was 92 g m-2 for the nP and 572 g m-2 for the nR treatments as the average of eleven years. Winter season precipitation showed no effect on biomass production. increasing rainfall of the spring season significantly raised the air-dried hay biomass on NR treatments. Focusing the monthly precipitations of spring, rainfall in March increased considerably the biomass only on NR plots. Precipitation in April had significant effect on both NR and NP quadrates. Rainfall of May had no significant positive effect on the hay production. The most effective period on the increment of hay production was the total precipitation of March and April which had significantly positive effect on the production of both NP and NR quadrates; moreover the coefficients were statistically different from each other with a steeper slope for the nR quadrates. it seems that there is a critical amount of nutrient supply above which precipitation becomes increasingly effective on elevating hay production of mixed grass meadows.
Patterns of scale-dependency and the influence of map resolution on the seascape ecology of reef fish

Detection and perception of ecological relationships between biota and their surround- ing habitats is sensitive to analysis scale and resolution of habitat data. We measured strength of uni- variate linear correlations between reef fish and seascape variables at multiple spatial scales (25 to 800 m). Correlation strength was used to identify the scale that best associates fish to their surround- ing habitat. To evaluate the influence of map resolution, seascape variables were calculated based on 4 separate benthic maps produced using 2 levels of spatial and thematic resolution, respectively. Indi- vidual seascape variables explained only 25% of the variability in fish distributions. Length of reef edge was correlated with more aspects of the fish assemblage than other features. Area of seagrass and bare sand correlated with distribution of many fish, not just obligate users. No fish variables cor- related with habitat diversity. Individual fish species achieved a wider range of correlations than mobility guilds or the entire fish assemblage. Scales of peak correlation were the same for juveniles and adults in a majority of comparisons. Highly mobile species exhibited broader scales of peak cor- relation than either resident or moderately mobile fish. Use of different input maps changed percep- tion of the strength and even the scale of peak correlations for many comparisons involving hard bot- tom edge length and area of sand, whereas results were consistent regardless of map type for comparisons involving area of seagrass and habitat diversity.
Consolidating Information in Option Transactions

Underlying each stock trades hundreds of options at different strike prices and maturities. The order flows from these option transactions reveal important information about the underlying stock price. How to aggregate the trade information of different option contracts underlying the same stock presents an interesting and important question for developing microstructure theories and price discovery mechanisms in the derivatives markets. This paper takes options on QQQQ, the Nasdaq 100 tracking stock, as an example and examines different order flow consolidation mechanisms in terms of their effectiveness in extracting information about the underlying stock price and volatility movements. The analysis leads us to propose an aggregation weighting scheme that depends both on the liquidity of each option contract and the contract's risk exposure, delta for stock price movement information and vega for volatility movement information. Based on this weighting scheme, we identify significantly positive correlations between the aggregate option order flows and the realized returns and volatilities. In particular, the delta buy pressure positively predicts the underlying return and the vega buy pressure positively predicts the change of volatilities.
Application of Corpus Analysis Tool in Investigating Listening Proficiency: Under the Perspective of TEM-8 Testing by RANGE

With the development of the computer and the processing technology, various text analysis tools have been created. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how students can apply the software RANGE to the test-oriented education, helping them to improve their vocabulary levels in their listening tests. We used qualitative and quantitative approaches to analyze the listening exam items in Test for English Majors-Band 8 (TEM-8) from 1996 to 2010. The main findings are as follows: (1) The frequency of the tokens and types in the entire listening tests is found; (2) The common features in the vocabulary and the language of the listening tests become obvious; (3) The principles and features of the resources of the listening tests are known; and (4) Some of the strategies when taking TEM-8 listening tests should be exerted. This study can not only give some implications in TEM-8 listening testing but also shed some light on the development of students' English comprehensive ability.
Transfer of diazotrophic nitrogen to mesozooplankton in Kiel Fjord, Western Baltic Sea: a mesocosm study

In a mesocosm experiment in Kiel Fjord, the plankton community <250 µm was exposed to a mesozooplankton density gradient (5 to 80 individuals l–1) dominated by the calanoid copepod Acartia clausi. Over the experimental period (9 d), the diazotrophic cyanobacterium Nodularia spumigena increased exponentially, irrespective of mesozooplankton densities, attaining maximum concentrations of 1200 cells ml–1 (3700 filaments l–1). At the end of the experiment, the δ15N of particulate organic matter was negatively correlated with N. spumigena concentrations, indicating the fixation of isotopically ‘light’, diazotrophic nitrogen. In all treatments, final copepod δ15N were lower (–0.7 to –2.7‰) than initial copepod δ15N, indicating the transfer of diazotrophic nitrogen to mesozooplankton. Based on a simple isotopic mixing model, diazotrophic nitrogen was calculated to contribute 45 to 6% to final copepod δ15N along the mesozooplankton gradient. This translates to a transfer of 2 to 24% of net nitrogen fixation to the mesozooplankton standing stock. The absence of any mesozooplankton impact on N. spumigena, and the negative impact found for other microplankton, including diatoms and ciliates, suggest that diazotrophically fixed nitrogen reached mesozooplankton indirectly through trophic vectors. This is consistent with the fact that copepod δ15N decreased with decreasing mesozooplankton densities, since only a quantitatively limited dietary source may be expected to result in density-dependent changes in copepod δ15N. Considering that natural mesozooplankton densities in the Baltic Sea rarely exceed 10 ind. l–1, the contribution of diazotrophically fixed nitrogen to mesozooplankton may be substantial (23 to 45%) during summer blooms of diazotrophic cyanobacteria.
Do Families on Welfare in the Post-TANF Era Differ from Their Pre-TANF Counterparts? Discussion Papers. Assessing the New Federalism: An Urban Institute Program To Assess Changing Social Policies.

While the recent, dramatic exodus from welfare is well known, relatively little is known about those who continue to receive welfare. The number receiving cash assistance from the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program dropped from 4.1 to 2.4 million families over the three-year period ending December 1999. While the best studies provide somewhat different explanations of the causes of caseload decline, it seems safe to conclude that new policies combined with the exceptionally strong economy have substantially increased work among low-income single mothers and decreased their reliance on welfare.
The ambiguous image of linz: Linz09 - European capital of culture.

The importance of destination image is widely recognised for its significant effect on the behavioural intentions of tourists. As such, efforts to build and/or improve destination images are critical to the success of destination tourism development. An important prerequisite for the successful long- term destination image improvement and promotion is the knowledge of tourists' perceptions of the attributes of the destination's image. This exploratory paper seeks to obtain some insight into this par- ticular knowledge and to provoke discussions by contrasting the projected image of Linz as a tourist destination promoted by its policy makers with the perceived image held by Linz's potential tourists in the context of the European initiative, "Cultural Capital of Europe" 2009. The paper juxtaposes the re- sults of Linz's 2008 image monitoring survey conducted by its policy makers with those of an explora- tory survey conducted for this study. The latter was designed to capture the image components of Linz held by a convenient sample of domestic and foreign potential tourists to Linz.
Investigating the Interrelationships between Adverse Developmental Experience, Emotion Regulation Strategies, and Mental Health

Background: Adverse developmental experiences influence the development of emotion regulation (ER) strategies; and ER strategies are associated with individual differences in mental health. This study’s sought to determine if: (1) sex, age, peer-rejection, parental supervision, childhood adversities, and attachment styles were associated with adaptive and maladaptive ER strategies; and (2) ER strategies were significantly associated with anxiety/depression symptoms and psychological wellbeing, respectively, after controlling for sex, age, and adverse developmental experiences. Methods: A non-probability convenience sample was used including participants from a forum for victims of childhood abuse (N = 235). Self-report measures were employed and data were analyzed using standard and hierarchical multiple regression analyses. Findings: In the case of objective 1, the standard multiple regression models explained 11% and 32% of variance in cognitive reappraisal (adaptive ER) and expressive suppression (maladaptive ER), respectively. Peer-rejection and anxious attachment were negatively associated with cognitive reappraisal; and secure attachment was negatively associated with expressive suppression. In the case of objective 2, hierarchical multiple regression results found that ER strategies significantly contributed to the explanation of anxiety/depression symptoms and psychological wellbeing scores, after controlling for demographic and developmental factors. Cognitive reappraisal, but not expressive suppression, was associated with positive and negative psychological health. Discussion: Attachment styles and peer-rejection are particularly important correlates of adaptive and maladaptive ER strategies. Furthermore, ER evidenced incremental validity in the prediction of mental health status. Clinical interventions seeking to improve mental health should pay particular attention to cognitive appraisal.