Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Examining the Impact of Novel Pre-activity Tasks on Macro-Skills: The Case of Visual Aids Strategy on Writing Ability

The main concern of most researchers in the field of second and foreign language teaching is lessening the problems and eliminating the hinders on the way of learning a language. Writing is considered as one of the most challenging and complicated tasks for learners to perform particularly when they have to write in a second or foreign language. In fact, writing is difficult for students as it demands other linguistic, cognitive and metacognitive strategies to be used (Rao, 2007). Numerous studies were done on the importance of the pre-writing stage and activities which are directly and indirectly related to the theme of the writing. Go (1994) states that teachers of English as a Second Language can use prewriting activities at the earliest stages of instruction to help their students acquire good language skills. The main aim of this study was to examine the effects of visual aids as a pre- activity task on writing ability. To this aim 25 Iranian EFL learners, who are at the same level –intermediate- studying at Shokuh and Safir Institutes, Birjand, Iran were chosen. Two groups- one control and one experimental group- were studied. In control group the conventional method was used, while in experimental group, visual aids pre-activity task was administered. Both groups met the same level -Intermediate. At the end, the obtained data of the tests was analyzed by SPSS software. According to the obtained data researcher strongly concluded that visual aids had strongly a positive effect on the learners’ writing ability. This study can help teachers and syllabus designers in choosing and applying an effective pre-activity task.
Tagset Reductions in Morphosyntactic Tagging of Croatian Texts

Morphosyntactic tagging of Croatian texts is performed with stochastic taggersby using a language model built on a manually annotated corpus implementingthe Multext East version 3 specifications for Croatian. Tagging accuracy in thisframework is basically predefined, i.e. proportionally dependent of two things:the size of the training corpus and the number of different morphosyntactic tagsencompassed by that corpus. Being that the 100 kw Croatia Weekly newspapercorpus by definition makes a rather small language model in terms of stochastictagging of free domain texts, the paper presents an approach dealing withtagset reductions. Several meaningful subsets of the Croatian Multext-East version3 morphosyntactic tagset specifications are created and applied on Croatiantexts with the CroTag stochastic tagger, measuring overall tagging accuracyand F1-measures. Obtained results are discussed in terms of applying differentreductions in different natural language processing systems and specifictasks defined by specific user requirements.
Generative linear mixture modelling.

For multivariate data with a low–dimensional latent structure, a novel approach to linear dimension reduction based on Gaussian mixture models is pro- posed. A generative model is assumed for the data, where the mixture centres (or ‘mass points’) are positioned along lines or planes spanned through the data cloud. All involved parameters are estimated simultaneously through the EM al- gorithm, requiring an additional iteration within each M-step. Data points can be projected onto the low–dimensional space by taking the posterior mean over the estimated mass points. The compressed data can then be used for further pro- cessing, for instance as a low–dimensional predictor in a multivariate regression problem.
A fragmentary dinosaur femur and the presence of Neotheropoda in the upper Triassic of Brazil

Although already widespread in Laurasia, the Gondwanan Norian record of Neotheropoda (Dinosauria) is scarce, with a single taxon reported for the Los Colorados Formation of Argentina. Here the distal end of a dinosaur left femur from the Riograndia Assemblage Zone of Brazil (Norian, Candelaria Sequence, Parana Basin) is described and compared. Although fragmentary, the specimen has a morphology compatible with its attribution to Neotheropoda, being this the first record of the clade from the Brazilian Triassic. The new specimen supports a cosmopolitan distribution of Neotheropoda during the Late Triassic and highlights the potential for the discovery of additional dinosaur clades in Norian rocks of southern Brazil.
Igneous Rock Associations 17. Advances in the Textural Quantification of Crystalline Rocks

During the last 20 years, textural (microstructural) studies have regained their place in the pantheon of petrographic methods. This has happened by quantifying textures, so that models can be developed and tested – an approach that has proved to be so successful for chemical and isotopic studies. The combination of chemical, isotopic and textural methods, especially if applied to different crystal populations, can be a very powerful tool in the clarification of petrologic histories of rocks. Here, I will discuss some recent advances in the application of textural studies to crystalline rocks. RESUME Au cours des 20 dernieres annees, les etudes de texture (microstructure) ont retrouve leur place au pantheon des methodes petrographiques. Cela a pu se produire grâce a la quantification des textures, permettant ainsi de developper et tester des modeles – une approche qui s’est averee tres benefique pour les etudes chimiques et isotopiques. La combinaison de methodes chimiques, isotopiques et d’analyse texturale, en particulier si elles sont appliquees a des populations distinctes de cristaux, peut etre un outil tres puissant permettant de definir l’histoire petrologique des roches. Dans le present article, je vais discuter de certaines percees recentes dans l'application d’etudes texturales de roches cristallines.
HADOOP FILE SYSTEM AND FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPT OF MAPREDUCE INTERIOR AND CLOSURE ROUGH SET APPROXIMATIONS

2 Abstract: A massive data mining and knowledge discovery present a huge challenge with the volume of data growing at an unprecented approximation value. MapReduce has been implemented in manage many large-scale computation. The recently introduced MapReduce technique has received much consideration from both scientific community and industry for its applicability in big data analysis. The effective computation of approximation is essential improving the performance of data mining and other related task. For the purpose of data mining for massive data, parallel computing modes and algorithms are typical methods in these research fields. To mine knowledge from big data, we present consequently algorithm corresponding to the MapReduce based on roughest theory are put forward to deal with the massive data, in this paper comprehensive to evaluate the performances on the large data sets show that the proposed demonstrated can effectively process of big data.
A study of the relative and incremental information content of financial statements in forecasting stock price: Iranian evidence

The aims of this study is to determine and compare the relative and incremental information content of accounting variables in relation to the stock price or stock return. For this purpose, operating profit variables, net profit and the ratio of debit to stockholders’ equity has been taken into consideration as independent variables and stock return as a dependent variable. Data were collected from Tehran Stock Exchange by accessible information. Statistical population of the study contains listed companies on Tehran Stock Exchange for the period of 2006 to 2010. The results indicate the correlation ratio of net profit and partial correlation of operational profit in relation to stock return and indicate unrelated quotient of debit to stockholder’s equity in relation to dependent variable. The results also indicate that the net profit has information content in proportion to other two variables. Key words: Relative content, incremental content, balance sheet, profit and loss statement.
Virtual Training Samples and CRC based Test Sample Reconstruction and Face Recognition Experiments

Sparse Representation (SR) has the merit to associate each test sample properly with the training samples. Collaborative representation classification (CRC) is a well-known generalized SR method and has achieved outstanding performance in Face Recognition (FR). In this paper, we propose an improvement to CRC, which combines the original training sample and mirror virtual face to form a new training set, uses this new training set to rebuild the test sample and then performs a two-step classification. The face recognition experiments show that the proposed method outperforms CRC and has certain robustness.
Endogamia en rodeos seleccionadores de la raza Nelore en Brasil.

The aim of this work was to analyze the effect of inbreeding in 7258 animals belonging to two herds of Nellore breed born among 1964 and 1999. The characteristics analyzed were weights adjusted to 120, 240, 365, 450 and 550 days of age, respectively. The inbreeding coefficients were calculated by inversion of the diagonal of the inverse from relationship matrix. The number of endogamic animals, as well as, the inbreeding coefficients of all animals increased over the years. However, the level of average inbreeding observed in the population was low (2.84%). In an effort to evaluate the effects of inbreeding on animal performance, data weights were analyzed by regression methods through the generalized linear model procedure. For analysis, values of weights that were in the range of 0 to 7% of inbreeding were considered. The weights for all age groups studied showed a cubic behavior related to the studied values of inbreeding, but it was not an important source of variation regarding to the total variation observed in the weights.
Control of wheat stink bugs (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae) in southern Brazil using the fungus Metarhizium anisopliae

Stink bugs of the species Nezara viridula and Dichelops melacanthus are considered as some of the main insect pests associated with wheat production in Brazil. The use of the entomopathogenic fungus Metarhizium anisopliae might be an alternative for the management of these insects with chemical insecticides. Thus, the aim of this study was to evaluate and ascertain the pathogenicity of different isolates of M. anisopliae on N. viridula and D. melacanthus adults under laboratory and greenhouse conditions. In the laboratory, the fungal isolates 05RA, 11RA, 08RA, and 02RA, which were collected in the field from adults of N. viridula and D. melacanthus infected with M. anisopliae, were highly pathogenic, leading to 100% mortality in adults of N. viridula and D. melacanthus at 8 days after application (DAA). However, the isolate 08RA presented higher pathogenicity in a shorter period of time for N. viridula (mean mortality time “MMT” = 2.8 days) and D. melacanthus (MMT = 4.0 days) than the remaining isolates. At the greenhouse, the isolate 08RA led to a mortality of 44.9% (N. viridula) and 35.7% (D. melacanthus) at eight DAA; however, the mortality was 100% for both species at 14 DAA, with an MMT of 8 and 10 days for N. viridula and D. melacanthus, respectively. The fungus M. anisopliae constitutes a promising alternative agent to control the growth of adult populations of N. viridula and D. melacanthus in wheat cultures.
EFFECT OF SAUROPUS ANDROGYNUS LEAVES EXTRACT (SALE) ON FAT DEPOSITION IN BROILER FED LOW PROTEIN DIETS

The present study was designed to evaluate the effect of Sauropus Androgynus Leaves Extract(SALE) on broiler chickens fed low protein diets. Eighty four mixed broiler chickens (male:female =1:1) aged 20 days were distributed to seven treatment groups as follows: 1) Broilers fed 19% proteinwithout SALE (P0); 2) Broilers fed 19% protein plus 4.5 g SALE/kg (P1); 3) Broilers fed 17% proteinplus 4,5 g SALE/kg (P2); 4) Broilers fed 15% protein plus 4.5 g SALE/kg (P3); 5) Broilers fed 19%protein plus 9 g SALE/kg (P4); 6) Broilers fed 17% protein plus 9 g SALE/kg (P5); 7) Broilers fed15% protein plus 9 g SALE/kg (P6). Experimental results showed that supplementation of Sauropusandrogynus extract to low protein diets had no effect on meat colour, haemorrhages scale in breastmeat, and fatty liver score (P>0.05), but it significantly affected haemorrhages scale in thigh meat(P 0.05). It can be concluded that the leaves extract of Sauropusandrogynus supplementation at level of 9 g/kg diets normalized fat deposition in broiler chickens fedlow protein diets. SALE improved broiler meat qualities.
Factors Associated With Complementary and Alternative Medicine Use in Irritable Bowel Syndrome: A Literature Review

Aim: Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) is a chronic functional bowel condition, which has substantial impact on quality of life and use of healthcare services. Patients often report using complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) for symptom management despite limited evidence to support its use. Psychological factors have been shown to be important in both influencing CAM use and as avenues of intervention to assist in managing IBS symptoms. Therefore, this review assessed prevalence of and psychological factors associated with CAM use by people with IBS. Method: Five electronic databases (including AMED, EMBASE and PsychINFO) were searched for studies that examined both the extent of and the reasons for CAM use. Five studies met the inclusion criteria. Results: Prevalence of CAM use ranged from 9% to 38%. CAM use was associated with psychosocial factors, including concerns about conventional medical care (i.e., the perceived harmful effects of medication, perception that conventional medicine had failed, and lack of satisfaction with conventional care) and anxiety. Conclusion: These findings identify psychological factors associated with CAM use which could be targeted through psychologically oriented management strategies for those affected with IBS.
An assessment of the evolution of the skid resistance of proprietary asphalt surfacings in the UK

This paper presents a laboratory and field study of the evolution of the skid resistance of different asphalt surfacing materials. A trial section was laid in September 2006 on a dual carriageway road located in the UK and subjected to heavy traffic conditions. Three different types of mixtures with 14, 10 and 6 mm maximum aggregate sizes and two different aggregate sources were used in the trial. In-situ measurements of skid resistance were carried out periodically using SCRIM and GripTester. Surface texture was also monitored using a laser sensor fitted to the SCRIM machine. Skid resistance values showed good material performance during the first 4 years since installation. Furthermore, surface texture values showed a decrease in texture for the relatively open 14 mm materials whereas no change in texture was practically observed for the denser 10 mm materials. Laboratory measurements of skid resistance were also carried out using the Wehner-Schulze (WS) device. This device is used to determine the friction of an aggregate or asphalt specimen after a polishing period. It was found that the WS ranked the mixtures in the same way as the in-situ methods whereas the PSV test did not. The WS was also used to predict the evolution of the skid resistance with traffic loading. Comparisons were then made between the predicted and measured skid resistance values. It was found that the WS device is a reliable tool for predicting the deterioration of friction due to traffic. Further work is, however, needed to relate laboratory measurements to in-situ methods.
Bayesian Inference on Technology and Cost Efficiency of Bank Branches

We present Bayesian statistics and Gibbs sampling, an MCMC simulation technique, as tools for making inferences in stochastic frontier models for panel data from the banking sector. In our empirical example, the Bayesian approach is applied to estimate a short-run frontier cost function for N = 58 branches of a Polish commercial bank, observed over T = 4 quarters of one year. We use a translog cost function (with regularity conditions imposed for an ’average’ branch) and treat inefficiency as a random individual effect, assuming a varying efficiency distribution (VED) specification proposed by Koop, Osiewalski and Steel (1997).
Experimental Evaluation of PARSISS Image Guided Surgery System

Purpose : In this report, a thorough validation of PARSISS Image Guided Surgery has beenpresented. Methods : Different experiments have been designed to evaluate Parsiss navigation system under three main scopes: first, a phantom study using a sophisticated precise phantom with 732 landmarks was constructed by 3d printing with layers of 16 micron thickness and 0.1 mm precision; second, performing preclinical cadaver experiment with titanium placed markers; and third, clinical evaluation which was carried out on 957 cases from 2010 to 2014. Results : Results obtained from three evaluation methods showed that the system was foundreliable and usable. Briefly, the average registration error in PARSISS precise phantom test was reported lower than 2 mm this which is clinically acceptable and reasonable in neurosurgery and ENT surgeries. In clinical evaluation, surgeons approved the accuracy and reliability of the system in thorough clinical evaluation in 94% of cases of 957 patients. Conclusion : In this study, the results of all three approaches were positive and reliable. Especially, evaluations using a large number of patients showed that the PARSISS surgical navigation system has shown high level of reliability in clinical procedures.
Drought and vegetation change in the central Rocky Mountains : Potential climatic mechanisms associated with the mega drought conditions at 4200 cal yr BP .

Droughts are a naturally re-occurring phenomena that result in economic and societal losses. Yet, the most historic droughts that occurred in the 1930s and 1950s in the Great Plains and western United States were both shorter in duration, and less severe than mega droughts that have plagued the region in the past. Roughly 4200 years ago, a ~150-year long mega drought occurred in the central Rocky Mountains, as indicated by sedimentary pollen evidence from lake sediments from Long Lake, south-eastern Wyoming. However, pollen evidence does not record the climate mechanisms that caused the drought; 15 they only provide evidence that the drought occurred. A modern climate analogue technique using North American Regional Reanalysis data was applied to the sedimentary pollen data to provide a conceptual framework for exploring possible mechanisms responsible for the observed ecological changes. in order to identify possible synoptic and dynamic patterns that may have caused the mega drought at 4200 cal yr BP. The Our results modern climate analogues illustrate demonstrate the that persistent warm and dry conditions throughout the growing season were a result of anomalously higher-than-normal 20 geopotential heights that were centred over the Great Plains, which beginning in spring and persisting until the fall. Drought conditions during the growing seasons was the result of the anomalous high-pressure ridge, which suppressed moisture transport via the low level jet from the Gulf of Mexico, as well as brought in dry continental air from in the interior region of North America. Associated climatic responses are consistent with local and regional proxy data suggesting regional drought conditions ~4200 cal yr BP in the central Rocky Mountains and central Great Plains. Persistent drought-like cConditions 25 provide insight as to the mechanisms that facilitated abrupt changes in associated with the mega drought likely led to the changes in vegetation composition in the past in our study region of south-eastern Wyoming. as evidenced by the pollen record.
Time Orientation and Decision Making Styles: the case of Vietnamese customers’ purchase of audiovisual products

This research aims to investigate the relationship between time orientation (past, future, and present orientation) and the decision making styles of Vietnamese customers when they decide to purchase a audiovisual product. A survey was conducted on 423 Vietnamese customers in Hanoi in 2016. The results demonstrate significant relationships between perspectives of time orientation and customer’s decision-making styles. Among the three time perspectives, the past and future orientation manifest a significant difference between decision making styles (customer segments). The present orientation was shown to have significant relationships with some individual characteristics of decision-making styles, but no significant difference found between decision-making styles.
Relationship between Temperature, Ph and Population of Selected Microbial Indicators during Anaerobic Digestion of Guinea Grass ( Panicum Maximum )

In this study, the relationship between process temperature, process pH and population of selected microbial indicators during anaerobic digestion of guinea grass (Panicum maximum) at ambient condition was investigated. A one stage batch-type mesophilic anaerobic digestion system was configured using rumen fluid (RF) as inoculums (ADRF) and a low solid loading of approximately 7.0% total solid (TS). Physicochemical parameters such as process temperature (PTMRF), process pHRF and volatile fatty acid (VFARF) were monitored with time. Selected indicator microbial populations were monitored by standard cultural techniques based on metabolic capacity and oxygen sensitivity with respect to time. Result showed that average PTMRF increased from 27.5°C to 35.2°C, average process pHRF ranged from 6.5 to 7.9 and VFARF ranged from 1,080.00 mg/L to 4,800.33 mg/L with time. In terms of metabolic capacity and oxygen sensitivity, the populations of cellulolytic bacteria (CBRF), lactose and glucose fermenting (acidogenic) bacteria (LFBRF and GFBRF), propionate and ethanol oxidizing (acetogenic) bacteria (POBRF and EOBRF), acetate oxidizing methanogens (AOMRF), obligate anaerobic bacteria (OABRF) and total facultative bacteria (FAABRF) increased (about 10-fold) respectively with time. Correlation analysis showed positive relationships between the process temperature (PTMRF) and the population of selected microbial indicators with time. However, there were negative relationships between the process pHRF and the population of selected microbial indicators with time. Furthermore, there were positive relationships between the populations of selected microbial indicators with time. Rumen fluid significantly (P < 0.05) affected the dynamics of the process temperature (PTMRF) and process pHRF inside the ADRF system with time respectively. These kinds of relationships between biotic factors and between biotic and abiotic factors could be used to monitor the state of anaerobic digestion process with respect to time.