Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Tracing the Spatial Patterns of Innovation Determinants in Regional Economic Performance

In this paper, we investigate innovation factors and their role in regional economic performance for a sample of 261 EU NUTS 2 regions over the period 2009–2012. In our study, we identify regions with spillover as well as drain effects of innovation factors on economic performance. The spatial analysis indicates that both regional innovativeness and regional development are strongly determined by the region’s location and “neighbourhood”, with severe consequences for Central and Eastern Europe. We assessed the impact of innovation factors and their spatial counterparts on economic performance using a spatial Durbin panel model. The model is designed to test the existence and strength of the country‑effect of innovativeness on the level of regional economic status. This allows for controlling the country‑specific socio‑economic factors, without reducing the number of degrees of freedom. Our model shows that regions benefit economically from their locational spillovers in terms of social capital. However, the decomposition of R&D expenditures revealed competition effect between internal R&D and external technology acquisition, favouring in‑house over outsourced research.
ImdLMS: An Imputation Based LMS Algorithm for Linear System Identification With Missing Input Data

In many practical systems concerning linear system identification with adaptive filters, the performance of the system is intrinsically limited by the problem of missing data, which might arise either because the input or the output data is missing at random time instants or subsets of input or output data are missing. In this paper the problem of linear system identification is studied with only input data missing at random time instants while output data is obtained correctly at all time instants. To model the input data missing process, the available input data sequence is modeled as the product of the actual (unknown) input data sequence with an i.i. d. sequence of Bernoulli random variables with known mean. A new data sequence, called the imputed data sequence is created from the available data sequence where, at any time instant, the imputed data is either the available data at that instant, if it is nonzero, or is set to a constant factor times the imputed data at the previous time instance. This imputed sequence is then used to propose an LMS-type algorithm called Imputation based missing data LMS (ImdLMS). Performance analysis of the algorithm is carried out where the extreme complications and possible intractability vis-à-vis an exact mean square performance analysis is avoided by finding an upper bound of the mean square deviation of the algorithm. Simulation results demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed ImdLMS algorithm, especially when the actual (unknown) input data sequence is correlated.
Cumulative non-HDL-cholesterol burden in patients with hypertriglyceridemia receiving long-term fibrate therapy: Real life data from a lipid clinic cohort.

OBJECTIVE Though epidemiological data suggest that an elevated triglyceride (TG) level may be a risk factor for coronary artery disease (CAD), there is still insufficient clinical evidence. This study was designed to evaluate the real-life efficacy and side effects of fibrate treatment for hypertriglyceridemia seen in a lipid clinic, as well as cardiovascular and diabetic outcomes. METHODS This retrospective study evaluated patients who were followed-up for a diagnosis of hypertriglyceridemia at the lipid outpatient clinic of the Ege University Cardiology Department between 1997 and 2018. Data of demographic and clinical characteristics were obtained from hospital records. All patients (n=240) with at least 1 year of follow-up were included in the analysis. During follow-up, patients were treated with fenofibrate, and less frequently, gemfibrozile (14 patients), at different doses according to the TG level and disease severity. RESULTS Of the study population, 23% had CAD, 21% were diabetic, and 52% were obese. On admission, 20% were using fibrates and 17% were on statins. The mean admission lipid levels were TG: 281±194 mg/dL, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol: 115±37 mg/dL, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol: 43±13 mg/dL, and non-HDL cholesterol: 166±42 mg/dL. The mean length of follow-up was 5.3±4.7 years (range: 1-16 years). A total of 8 (4.3%) patients had adverse effects during follow-up (1 on statin combination and 7 on fibrates alone). The side effects observed were an elevation of liver enzymes in 3, myalgia in 2, insomnia in 1, malaise in 1, and a skin rash in 1 patient. No rhabdomyolysis or myopathy was seen. During follow-up, diabetes developed in 14 and cardiovascular disease (CVD) in 14 patients. The cumulative non-HDL cholesterol level was significantly high in patients who developed diabetes or CVD. Receiver operating curve analysis indicated that a cumulative non-HDL cholesterol value of 1016 mg/dL was predictive of the development of diabetes mellitus or CVD with 85% sensitivity and 70% specificity. CONCLUSION In real life, long-term fibrate use is effective and safe. The cumulative non-HDL cholesterol burden can be used to assess the efficacy of treatment as a simple and easily calculated method. Large studies are needed to further clarify the value of this parameter in predicting the development of both diabetes and CVD.
Increasing the Energy Cognizance of Electricity Consumers in Mexico: Results From a Field Experiment

We report on the results of a field experiment in Puebla, Mexico that informed randomly-selected households facing a nonlinear price schedule about how different electricity-consuming actions might change their electricity bills. Households that received this 20-minute, in-person intervention reduced their electricity use, with much of this reduction driven by those that paid the highest marginal price for electricity. The estimated impacts were durable with no observed rebound for at least a year. Households with less educational attainment reduced use the most, consistent with the conclusion that the intervention imparted new knowledge to consumers that led to this observed behavior change. The high rate at which customers accepted the intervention, the resulting consumption decrease, and low implementation costs make this intervention cost-effective relative to several previous energy conservation campaigns in Mexico.
Outphasing Amplifier System Performance VS Large Frequency Band

This work presents an examination of the outphasing amplification system called also LINC (Linear amplification using non linear components) with two kinds of Wilkinson combiners, one is matched and the other one is unmatched. The Wilkinson combiner is called unmatched when the one hundred ohms resistor at its inputs is eliminated. The study is done with a frequency band from 1 GHz to 4 GHz to show the performance response of the two systems in function of the signal phase variation. In section two, the system with matched combiner is studied and we present some graphics done on ADS simulator. These graphics show clearly the combiner input impedances, the drain current the power efficiency and the signal linearity of the system in function of the phase variation for the entire frequency band. In section three the same simulation is done to show the same graphics, but the outphasing system is using this time an unmatched Wilkinson combiner. The comparison of the two system behaviors demonstrates that the linearity is conserved very well in both but for the power efficiency the unmatched combiner behaves better.
Compact and Low Cost Linear Antenna Array for Millimeter Wave Automotive Radar Applications

A low-cost microstrip patch antenna array is proposed in this paper for automotive radar applications in ISM 24 GHz band. The elements of the center-fed array are connected in series to make a compact design with low complexity by obviating Wilkinson power divider. This approach also helps to reduce the dielectric losses of the array. A full-wave electromagnetics (EM) software EMPIRE XPU is used in the design process. The measurement results show 25 percent fractional bandwidth in terms of antenna impedance (23.75–30 GHz), 8.5 dBi maximum gain, 6 degrees half power beam width (HPBW), -12 dB side lobe level (SLL), and more than 50 dB isolation between TX/RX in the desired frequency range.
Chemical composition and fumigation toxicity of Laurus nobilis L. and Salvia officinalis L. essential oils on larvae of khapra beetle (Trogoderma granarium Everts)

The essential oil composition of bay laurel (Laurus nobilis L.), and sage (Salvia officinalis L.) leaves was investigated by GC and GC/MS. Composition of L nobilis essential oil included large amounts of monoterpenes 85.90%, wheras in S. officinalis, monoterpenes and sesquiterpenes were represented by 57.3% and 41.7%, respectively. Fumigant toxicity of the essential oils was tested against larvae of Trogoderma granarium insect. Exposure to vapours of essential oil from bay laurel and sage for 48 h resulted in about 98% and 100% mortality of the larvae at a concentration of 60 and 90 μL/160 cm3 air, respectively. Essential oils of bay laurel showed a higher lethal activity than that of sage with LC50 values of 37.9 and 50.7b μL/L air, respectively, following a 48 h-exposure. These results showed that the essential oil from L nobilis is potentially useful for management of T granarium insects populations in stored products.
Diagnostic and therapeutic procedures in lipid disorders in patients with diabetes – practical indications for physicians

Lipid disorders affect more than 50% of patients diagnosed with type 1 and type 2 diabetes. They are often associated with atherogenic dyslipidaemia with characteristic coexistence of elevated triglycerides, the presence of small, dense, low-density lipoprotein (LDL) molecules, and low concentration of high-density (HDL) cholesterol in the serum. Cholesterol disorders are an important risk factor for cardiovascular events. Statin monotherapy is often insufficient to effectively correct the lipidogram. Even though the target LDL
Characterization of a putative TonB deficient Porphyromonas gingivalis mutant

CHARACTERIZATION OF A PUTATIVE TONB DEFICIENT PORPHYROMONAS GINGIVALIS MUTANT By: Soheil Rostami, B.S. A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Masters of Science at Virginia Commonwealth University Virginia Commonwealth University, 2014 Major Director: Janina P. Lewis, Ph.D., Philips Institute of Oral Health Research Porphorymonas gingivalis is one of the major bacterial pathogens responsible for the initiation and progression of periodontal disease. The bacterium requires hemin uptake for its growth and has developed sophisticated mechanisms to extract hemin from hemin containing proteins in the oral cavity. Hemin first binds to receptors on the surface of P. gingivalis and is then taken up in an energy dependent manner. TonB is an inner membrane bound protein that spans the periplasm and is believed to be involved in the passage of hemin through the double membrane of P. gingivalis. However, the TonB protein in P. gingivalis is yet to be identified. We identified PG0785 as a possible P. gingivalis TonB based on its bioinformatics data showing similarity to other known TonB proteins. We generated a P. gingivalis mutant lacking a functional PG0785 and then characterized the mutant to determine the role of PG0785. We performed metal content and protease assays, virulence studies and transcriptional and translational analysis of our mutant and wild type P. gingivalis strains. Phenotypic studies showed that the mutant cannot accumulate hemin on its surface. The mutant has significantly lower levels of iron compared to wild type based on metal content assays. The mutant also has significantly lower protease activity compared to the wild type. Virulence studies showed that the mutant interacted and invaded eukaryotic cells at much lower levels than the wild type. These results allowed us to speculate that PG0785 is very important in binding of hemin to surface of P. gingivalis. PG0785 also plays an important role in iron uptake, protease activity and virulence of P. gingivalis. Transcriptional and translational analyses have shown that numerous TonB related genes, metal uptake genes, hemin uptake genes and genes related to virulence have been differentially regulated in the mutant lacking a functional PG0785 gene compared to the wild type strain. In conclusion we believe that based on our results PG0785 is a putative P. gingivalis TonB protein that plays a significant role in the biology of P. gingivalis.
VoxRec: Hybrid Convolutional Neural Network for Active 3D Object Recognition

Deep Neural Network methods have been used to a variety of challenges in automatic 3D recognition. Although discovered techniques provide many advantages in comparison with conventional methods, they still suffer from different drawbacks, e.g., a large number of pre-processing stages and time-consuming training. In this paper, an innovative approach has been suggested for recognizing 3D models. It contains encoding 3D point clouds, surface normal, and surface curvature, merge them to provide more effective input data, and train it via a deep convolutional neural network on Shapenetcore dataset. We also proposed a similar method for 3D segmentation using Octree coding method. Finally, comparing the accuracy with some of the state-of-the-art demonstrates the effectiveness of our proposed method.
Geostatistical inverse modeling with very large datasets: an example from the Orbiting Carbon Observatory 2 (OCO-2) satellite

Abstract. Geostatistical inverse modeling (GIM) has become a common approach to estimating greenhouse gas fluxes at the Earth's surface using atmospheric observations. GIMs are unique relative to other commonly used approaches because they do not require a single emissions inventory or a bottom–up model to serve as an initial guess of the fluxes. Instead, a modeler can incorporate a wide range of environmental, economic, and/or land use data to estimate the fluxes. Traditionally, GIMs have been paired with in situ observations that number in the thousands or tens of thousands. However, the number of available atmospheric greenhouse gas observations has been increasing enormously as the number of satellites, airborne measurement campaigns, and in situ monitoring stations continues to increase. This era of prolific greenhouse gas observations presents computational and statistical challenges for inverse modeling frameworks that have traditionally been paired with a limited number of in situ monitoring sites. In this article, we discuss the challenges of estimating greenhouse gas fluxes using large atmospheric datasets with a particular focus on GIMs. We subsequently discuss several strategies for estimating the fluxes and quantifying uncertainties, strategies that are adapted from hydrology, applied math, or other academic fields and are compatible with a wide variety of atmospheric models. We further evaluate the accuracy and computational burden of each strategy using a synthetic CO2 case study based upon NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory 2 (OCO-2) satellite. Specifically, we simultaneously estimate a full year of 3-hourly CO2 fluxes across North America in one case study – a total of 9.4×106 unknown fluxes using 9.9×104 synthetic observations. The strategies discussed here provide accurate estimates of CO2 fluxes that are comparable to fluxes calculated directly or analytically. We are also able to approximate posterior uncertainties in the fluxes, but these approximations are, typically, an over- or underestimate depending upon the strategy employed and the degree of approximation required to make the calculations manageable.
Variation among colletotrichum isolates associated with coffee berry disease in Ethiopia

Abstract Variations among the populations of Colletotrichum species from diseased coffee berries were studied. A total of 35 Colletotrichum isolates representing 24 districts from major coffee-producing regions of Ethiopia was studied on the basis of cultural, morphological, and pathological characteristics. The isolates differed significantly on their colony color, density, sector, and acervuli. Mycelial growth rate varied significantly (p < 0.05) among the isolates and ranged between 3.97 and 8.69 mm/day. Sporulation capacity, conidial length (12.3–17.7 μm) and conidia width (3.6–5.1 μm) also varied significantly (p < 0.05) among the isolates. The dominant forms of conidia were cylindrical and round at both ends followed by cylindrical acute at one and round at the other ends. Cluster analysis based on cultural, morphological, and pathological characteristics showed that isolates of Colletotrichum species associated diseased coffee berries fell into three distinct groups and were identified as C. kahawae, C. gloeosporioides, and C. acutatum. Among these fungal isolates, only C. kahawae was pathogenic to both detached coffee berries and coffee hypocotyls tested. The other Colletotrichum species exist as saprophytic or sequential colonizer of dead tissues. In conclusion, our study indicates the existence of variation in cultural, morphological characteristics and pathogenicity among the C. kahawae and the other related Colletotrichum isolates. However, molecular methods and other detail biochemical tests would provide the genetic diversity of the CBD pathogen populations in the country.
A 12-Bit 100-MS/s Pipelined-SAR ADC With PVT-Insensitive and Gain-Folding Dynamic Amplifier

This paper presents a process, voltage, and temperature (PVT)-insensitive dynamic amplifier (DA) with gain enhancement for a pipelined successive approximation register (SAR) analog-to-digital converter (ADC). The gain shift due to temperature and process variation is attenuated through the counteraction of input transconductance and delay-based integration time. Furthermore, based on charge conservation, a gain-folding technique is proposed to improve the gain limit of conventional DA, tripling the gain amplitude. The proposed DA is incorporated in a design of a 12-bit 100 MS/s SAR ADC. In 65 nm CMOS process, at 100 MS/s, the prototype ADC achieves an SNDR (signal-to-noise plus distortion ratio) of 65.7 dB and a Walden FoM of 12.06 fJ/conversion-step for a near-Nyquist input. The power dissipation is less than 1.9 mW. No more than 1.65 dB SNDR variations are obtained for supply voltage varying from 1.15 to 1.25 V and temperature varying from −20 °C to 125 °C with various process corners, respectively.
The share of the global energy mix: Signs of convergence?

This paper investigates the convergence behaviour regarding the share of global energy mix, as measured by primary energy consumption. Recent studies that employ stationary tests of panel data suggest that such data support the convergence hypothesis; however, some drawbacks exist, as these studies rely on methods that do not necessarily imply a sufficient condition for convergence. This paper adopts the concept of relative convergence as proposed by Phillips and Sul (2007), which employs a time-varying, idiosyncratic component. We choose to focus on various sources’ global primary energy consumption and investigate the long- run dynamic behaviour by source. The key finding of this paper is that two distinct clubs of convergence of energy can be determined: renewable and non-renewable energy clubs of convergence.
Capacity-Constrained Network Performance Model for Urban Rail Systems

This paper proposes a general network performance model (NPM) for monitoring the performance of urban rail systems using smart card data. NPM is a schedule-based network loading model with strict capacity constraints and boarding priorities. It distributes passengers over the network given origin-destination demand, operations, route choice, and effective train capacity. A Bayesian simulation-based optimization method for calibrating the effective train capacity is introduced, which explicitly recognizes that capacity may be different at different stations depending on congestion levels. Case studies with data from the Mass Transit Railway network in Hong Kong are used to validate the model and illustrate its applicability. NPM is validated using survey data on left-behind passengers and exiting passenger flow extracted from smart card data. The use of NPM for performance monitoring is demonstrated by analyzing the spatial-temporal crowding patterns in the system and evaluating dispatching strategies.
A Practical On-Board SiC MOSFET Condition Monitoring Technique for Aging Detection

In this article, an in situ SiC mosfet degradation monitoring method using readily available converter sensors is presented. Device's drain-source resistance in saturation and ohmic regions are employed as aging precursors to, respectively, indicate die and package-related degradations. The presented findings in this article are essential for low-cost and practical early warning systems in power electronics applications. To verify the effectiveness of the proposed method, a number of power-cycling tests are conducted to analyze aging process and fatigue mechanism. Device static parameters are measured throughout accelerated aging tests and the physical causes behind them are discussed in detail. It is shown that the drain-source resistance within saturation region at low gate bias can be used to indicate die-related degradation. Similarly, at full positive gate bias, device on-state drain-source resistance can be used to detect package-related degradation. In order to find out optimal variables such as applied gate bias, pulse duration, etc., a comprehensive single pulse test is conducted and the results are reported. Finally, the proposed degradation monitoring method is experimentally validated in the context of a three-phase inverter considering different sensor configurations and load types.
Estimation of maximum sustainable yield of Gelidium robustum seaweed fishery in Mexico

Surplus production models were used to assess the fishery condition of red seaweed Gelidium robustum off the west coast of the Baja California Peninsula from 1985 to 1997. The maximum sustainable yield and optimum effort estimated by the Schaefer model were 705 tn and 457 teams, while the Fox model estimated 670 tn and 510 teams. The determination coefficients were r2=0·62 for the Fox and r2=0·58 for the Schaefer model. These results suggest that the resource is not overexploited. Fitting the data to Hilborn & Walters' dynamic model was not satisfactory.
Security Provisioning for Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access Networks With Limited Feedback

In this letter, we investigate the information security problem for non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) networks against an external eavesdropper. Considering the overhead of the channel state information (CSI) feedback, we utilize the quantized CSI during the secure NOMA transmission, and derive the secrecy rate for each receiver by adopting the successive interference cancellation. In order to optimally allocate the transmit power, an optimization problem is formulated such that the minimum secrecy rate of the receivers is maximized. For the proposed scheme, we also analyze the secrecy outage and transmission outage probabilities, and their closed-form expressions are derived. In addition, the security-reliability tradeoff is analyzed. Numerical results are demonstrated to verify the analytical results.