Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
2D material infrared and terahertz detectors: status and outlook

Article history: Received 05 May 2020 Received in revised form 16 Jun. 2020 Accepted 08 Jul. 2020 Graphene applications in electronic and optoelectronic devices have been thoroughly and intensively studied since graphene discovery. Thanks to the exceptional electronic and optical properties of graphene and other two-dimensional (2D) materials, they can become promising candidates for infrared and terahertz photodetectors. Quantity of the published papers devoted to 2D materials as sensors is huge. However, authors of these papers address them mainly to researches involved in investigations of 2D materials. In the present paper this topic is treated comprehensively with including both theoretical estimations and many experimental data. At the beginning fundamental properties and performance of graphene-based, as well as alternative 2D materials have been shortly described. Next, the position of 2D material detectors is considered in confrontation with the present stage of infrared and terahertz detectors offered on global market. A new benchmark, so-called “Law 19”, used for prediction of background limited HgCdTe photodiodes operated at near room temperature, is introduced. This law is next treated as the reference for alternative 2D material technologies. The performance comparison concerns the detector responsivity, detectivity and response time. Place of 2D material-based detectors in the near future in a wide infrared detector family is predicted in the final conclusions.
Reliability Assessment of Eurocode 7 Retaining Structures Design Methodology

This paper is a contribution for the application of Eurocode 7 design methodology, based on the limit state design (LSD) approach. The design methodology of Eurocode 7 is applied to a concrete gravity retaining structure resting on a relatively homogeneous c-φ soil, and the different design approaches are compared to deterministic and semi-probabilistic solutions, considering the bearing resistance failure of the foundation. A reliability assessment is performed for different conditions, selecting different geotechnical parameters, particularly characteristic values and coefficients of variation of soil properties, and taking into account the effects of vertical fluctuation scale by using a simplified approach. Several uncorrelated and correlated random variables are considered, and probabilistic solutions are achieved and compared with a target ultimate limit state reliability index β for a medium risk structure and fifty years reference period, considered as 3.8. For this purpose, reliability techniques such as the first-order reliability method (FORM) and the Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) are applied and compared to other methodologies. Based on the obtained results, the Eurocode 7 design methodology is discussed, and the indispensable engineering judgment is outlined.
Trace-Checking Signal-based Temporal Properties: A Model-Driven Approach

Signal-based temporal properties (SBTPs) characterize the behavior of a system when its inputs and outputs are signals over time; they are very common for the requirements specification of cyber-physical systems. Although there exist several specification languages for expressing SBTPs, such languages either do not easily allow the specification of important types of properties (such as spike or oscillatory behaviors), or are not supported by (efficient) trace-checking procedures. In this paper, we propose SB-TemPsy, a novel model-driven trace-checking approach for SBTPs. SB-TemPsy provides (i) SB-TemPsy-DSL, a domain-specific language that allows the specification of SBTPs covering the most frequent requirement types in cyber-physical systems, and (ii) SB-TemPsy-Check, an efficient, model-driven trace-checking procedure. This procedure reduces the problem of checking an SB-TemPsy-DSL property over an execution trace to the problem of evaluating an Object Constraint Language constraint on a model of the execution trace. We evaluated our contributions by assessing the expressiveness of SB-TemPsy-DSL and the applicability of SB-TemPsy-Check using a representative industrial case study in the satellite domain. SB-TemPsy-DSL could express 97% of the requirements of our case study and SB-TemPsy-Check yielded a trace-checking verdict in 87% of the cases, with an average checking time of 48.7 s. From a practical standpoint and compared to state-of-the-art alternatives, our approach strikes a better trade-off between expressiveness and performance as it supports a large set of property types that can be checked, in most cases, within practical time limits.
The Interaction of Leucocidin with the Cell Membrane of the Polymorphonuclear Leucocyte

1. When leucocidin is incubated with leucocytes it is inactivated in solution and only a little adsorption takes place. This reaction has been used to purify the cell membrane. 2. The interaction of the membrane with leucocidin is very complex and at least three phenomena occur: (a) An inactivation of leucocidin in solution by large amounts of membrane which is synergistic between the two components of leucocidin, is thermolabile and is not inhibited by electrolyte. (b) An adsorption of leucocidin which is synergistic between the two components of leucocidin, does not proceed to the same extent as the inactivation in solution and is a function of the phospholipid components. Phospholipids isolated from the membrane adsorb leucocidin but the adsorption requires the presence of several molecular species. (c) Polymerization of leucocidin induced by tenfold smaller amounts of membrane than are required to bring about the first two interactions. The polymerization is reversed by adjustment of the ionic strength. It is due to the presence of the lipid components of the membrane. Different lipids are equally effective in inducing the polymerization. 3. Each component of leucocidin will polymerize in the absence of membranes and lose biological activity at low ionic strength. This is reversed by electrolyte and it does not proceed to the same extent as in the presence of membranes. 4. The nature of the interaction of leucocidin with cells, membranes and lipids and the spontaneous polymerization indicate that each component of leucocidin can adopt different isomeric forms. 5. The relationship of the interaction with the membrane to the cytotoxic effect of leucocidin is discussed.
ヒノキ複層林の林内景観(平成3年度日本造園学会研究発表論文集(9))

森林施業が行われている既存の人工林を森林レクリエーションのための森林, すなわち景観的な価値が高い森林に改組する方法について検討している。 今回は笠間営林署筑波山国有林のヒノキ複層林試験地の林内景観と森林の構造との関係を, 写真および現地における景観評価試験により検討した。 写真と現地の試験結果は, おおむね一致した。 その結果, 複層林は一般の林分より美しく, 特に,(1) 林内相対照度が大きい,(2) 樹幹が通直である,(3) 奥行きが深い,(4) 奥行きが浅い林分では明るい林外が見通せる, などの条件をそなえた複層林が美しいと評価されることが明らかになった。
CHAPTER 2:Sodium. Its Role in Bacterial Metabolism

This chapter reviews the multiple roles of the sodium ion Na+ in the physiology of bacteria. Virtually all cells need to extrude Na+ in order to maintain a constant internal environment. In many bacteria, transport of Na+ out of the cell has an important additional role in harnessing energy and distributing it within the cell. In these cases, Na+ takes on the role otherwise played by H+ in chemiosmotic energetic functions. As a means of exploring these functions, we will examine a subset of Na+ transport enzymes that are prototypical of the various catalytic processes involved in Na+ homeostasis and Na+ chemiosmosis.
Development of a Circularity Impact and Failure Analysis: Obsolescence and Recyclability Integration

The paper presents the first stage of the development of an approach named Circularity Impact and Failure Analysis (CIFA) aiming to become an integral part of a design for circularity strategy. The paper presents the first results of the prescriptive work toward the development of CIFA, limiting the circularity considerations to the integration of obsolescence and recyclability considerations in the FMEA. The paper presents the logic and the rationale of the approach and exemplifies the application of the approach to the case of a bicycle V-brake.
Bald eagle population in Prince William Sound after the Exxon Valdez oil spill

We initiated studies to determine whether the Exxon Valdez oil spill influenced bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) demography in Prince William Sound (PWS), Alaska. Using fixed-wing aircraft, we surveyed bald eagle populations within random plots once each year and censused nearly all islands in PWS in 1989-91 and 1995 to estimate population size. We calculated population indices (uncorrected for birds not seen) of 2,199; 1,935; 2,116; and 2,641 adult eagles for the 4 years studied. Subsequent to the 1989 oil spill, the eagle population returned to its estimated pre-spill size by 1995. The PWS bald eagle population has increased at an average annual rate of 3.7% from 1982 to 1995. The proportion of immatures in the population averaged 29% and did not vary significantly among years.
Effect of Site-Specific Integrated Nutrient
Management on Soil Fertility under Cotton-Wheat
Cropping System of Punjab Pakistan

Cotton-wheat rotation is one of the profitable cropping systems under arid climatic conditions in the agro-ecosystem of Punjab, Pakistan. The cropping system’s productivity factor is decreasing and is considered primarily due to imbalanced and non-integrated use of nutrients without taking care of soil health measures. Exploring the role of integrated site-specific nutrient management plans, treatments containing 2 fertilizer doses, and 3 management techniques on soil organic matter (SOM), soil P & soil K were studied in the cotton-wheat system of Punjab Pakistan for six crop seasons on a permanent layout. Substantial increase of 54-70% in SOM over the initial level of 5.0 g Kg-1 in sandy loam soil was observed by adapting integrated nutrients management (INM) techniques. Similarly, significantly improved level of soil test phosphorus STP was observed at the end of the sixth crop season and INM techniques resulted in a 429% to 453% increase in STP. However, statistical analysis revealed a non-significant effect of doses, and a significant declining effect on soil K was observed with the applied technique of only mineral fertilizer application. Highly negative K balance suggests that the system will not be able to sustain the long-term supply of K. Ranking of indices from the best to the least favorable was recorded as P>SOM>K.
Advances in Studies on Aluminum Toxicity and Tolerance in Plants

In this paper the current advances in studies on aluminum stress in plants are reviewed. Al 3+ may adversely influence the function and morphogenesis of plant roots by acting on cytoskeleton and is harmful to many plant species. The plants may become tolerant to Al 3+ through secretion of organic acids or phosphate to bind with Al 3+ , by taking up H + to alkalize the rhizosphere to reduce the apoplastic Al 3+ activity, or by formation of nonphytotoxic complexes to reduce the symplastic Al 3+ activity. Genetic engineering and mutant selection have been employed in breeding for Al 3+ tolerance in plants. Tolerance to Al 3+ in plants may be controlled by a single gene or multigenes.
Detection of extended spectrum beta lactamase from multidrug resistance Escherichia coli from various clinical sample in District Peshawar, Pakistan

Gram negative bacteria’s such as Escherichia coli is one of the most common community-acquired as well as the nosocomial pathogen responsible for a large number of infections. Extendedspectrum beta-lactamase producing strains of Escherichia coli has become a great therapeutic challenge to the clinicians in managing such infections. This study was carried out in order to find out multidrug-resistant Escherichia coli from various clinical samples. A total of 70 E. coli isolates were obtained from various clinical samples. These already identified samples were obtained from Lady Reading Hospital. Antibiotic susceptibility test was done by disc diffusion method. The present study shows that (55.71%) samples were ESBL positive. The percentage of isolates sensitive to current antibiotics were highest for Polymyxin b (98.57%) and highest for Ceftriaxone (12.85%). While the percentage of isolates resistant to current antibiotics were highest for that Cotrimoxazole (84.28%), and lowest for Polymyxin b (1.42%). ESBL producing strains of E. coli causes therapeutic failure and also contribute to multidrug resistance. Therefore monitoring of antimicrobial resistance in developing countries is necessary to optimize empiric treatment and the prudent use of antimicrobials.
Tamaridus Indica and Balanites Eagyptiacabarks: The Bio – Indicator of Environmental Pollution

---------------------------------------------------ABSTRACT------------------------------------------------------Tamaridusindica and Balaniteseagyptiaca tree barks fromYobe State, north east, Nigeria, and the soils around them were analysed for their Zinc concentrations using atomic absorption spectrophotometry. The results of the analysis indicate various concentration levels obtained from soil solution through mineral uptake by plants. The mean values of Zn range between 0.52 8.13 μgg in the bark and 0.06 10.01μgg in the soil. All the values obtained correlate well with the anthropogenic activities in the study area and are below the recommended safe limits for heavy metals by WHO, FAO, EU, and NESREA guidelines. The statistical comparison of the values between the bark and soil shows correlation at P < 0.01 and significant difference at P < 0.05. The study further demonstrates the suitability of some of the trees as a good bio indicator.
Effects of dimethyl sulphonate on the morphological changes of Paulownia fortunei seedlings with witches' broom and their DNA base sequences

Effects of 0,15,25,50,75,100,125,150 mg·L-1 DMS on the morphological and phytoplasma changes of Paulownia fortunei seedlings with witches' broom and DNA base sequences were studied with nest-PCR and SSR.The results indicated that there existed phytoplasma in the infected seedlings treated with 15 mg·L-1 DMS for 3 h which might turn into healthy ones morphologically,but phytoplasma disappeared in the infected seedlings treated with 25～125 mg·L-1 DMS,and the seedling growth were inhibited with more than 125 mg·L-1 DMS.And the DNA base sequences of the healthy,infected and the infected-treated with DMS seedlings were the same with SSR analysis.The seedlings with witches' broom treated with appropriate concentrations of DMS might become healthy ones.And there existed the same DNA loci at SSR level among the healthy,infected and infected-treated with DMS seedlings.
Implementation of a Deep Learning Inference Accelerator on the FPGA

Today, Artificial Intelligence is one of the most important technologies, ubiquitous in our daily lives. Deep Neural Networks (DNN’s) have come up as state of art for various machine intelligence applications such as object detection, image classification, face recognition and performs myriad of activities with exceptional prediction accuracy. AI in this contemporary world is moving towards embedded platforms for inference on the edge. This is essential to avoid latency, enhance data security and realize real-time performance. However, these DNN algorithms are computational and memory intensive. Consequently, exploiting immense energy, compute resources and memory-bandwidth making it difficult to be deployed in embedded devices. To solve this problem and realize an on-device AI acceleration, dedicated energy-efficient hardware accelerators are paramount. This thesis involves the implementation of such a dedicated deep learning accelerator on the FPGA. The NVIDIA’s Deep Learning Accelerator (NVDLA), is encompassed in this research to explore SoC designs for integrated inference acceleration. NVDLA, an open-source architecture, standardizes deep learning inference acceleration on hardware. It optimizes inference acceleration all across the full stack from application through hardware to achieve energy efficiency synergy with the demanding throughput requirements. Therefore, the following thesis probes into the NVDLA framework to perceive the consistent workflow across the whole hardware-software programming hierarchies. Besides, the hardware design parameters, optimization features and system configurations of the NVDLA systems are analyzed for efficient implementations. Also, a comparative study of the diverse NVDLA SoC implementations (nv_small and nv_medium) with respect to performance metrics such as power, area, and throughput are discussed. Our approach engages prototyping of Nvidia’s Deep Learning Accelerator on a Zynq Ultrascale+ ZCU104 FPGA to examine its system functionality. The Hardware design of the system is carried out using Xilinx’s Vivado Design Suite 2018.3 in Verilog. While the on-device software runs Linux kernel 4.14 on Zynq MPSoC. Thus, the software ecosystem is built with PetaLinux tools from Xilinx. The entire system architecture is validated using the pre-built regression tests that verify individual CNN layers. Besides these NVDLA hardware design also runs pre-compiled AlexNet as a benchmark for performance evaluation and comparison.
Distribution and diversity of asteroids in atlantic abyssal basins

Abstract Since the last survey of the distribution of the echinoderm fauna in the deep sea, worked out by Madsen, more than 100 trawlings in various areas of the Atlantic Ocean give new possibilities of characterizing the faunal assemblages of several basins at depths greater than 1800 m. During 12 cruises conducted by the Centre Oceanologique de Bretagne, seven atlantic basins (Gape, Angola, European, Labrador, Greenland, and Norwegian Basins) have been intensively prospected. Comparisons of the asteroid faunas (43 species on the whole) are approached with appropriate similarity index, especially the second Kulczynski coefficient, and estimates of density and diversity of the fauna are analysed within each basin for two ranges of depths ( < and = 3000 m). The distinct fauna, and the correlation of low diversity with high densities observed in the Greenland, Norwegian, Mediterranean, and Gape Basins confirm the isolation of such areas either by topographic barriers or by special ecological conditions.
ACCUMULATION AND IMMUNOLOCALIZATION OF Maize dwarf mosaic virus HC-Pro IN INFECTED MAIZE LEAVES

The time course and sub cellular location of Maize dwarf mosaic virus (MDMV) and its helper component proteinase (HC Pro) in infected maize leaves were determined. Among the maize lines tested in the experiment, Ye107 and Mo17, were highly susceptible to MDMV, while Huangzao 4 was resistant. The results showed that the concentration of MDMV was higher in the upper leaves of inoculated Ye107 and Mo17 3 days after inoculation, and reached the maximum level 6 days after inoculation, while the concentration of MDMV in Huangzao 4 was always lower than that in Ye107 and Mo17. The level of MDMV HC Pro in the upper leaves just above the inoculated leaves of Ye107 and Mo17 reached maximum 6 days after inoculation, but in the corresponding leaves of Huangzao 4, it reached maximum 9 days after inoculation and kept lower thereafter. The changes of efficiency of MDMV transmission aphids were consistent with the level of MDMV and MDMV HC Pro in the leaves. The gold label was observed on pinwheel inclusion, laminated inclusion and virus particles in the cytoplasm, which suggested that MDMV HC Pro was present in these locations.
Parafunctions, Signs and Symptoms of Temporomandibular Disorders (TMD), in Children with Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

OBJECTIVES The aim of the study was to compare the prevalence of parafunctions and signs and symptoms of TMD in a population group of children with and without ADHD. METHODS The study included all 5th grade children of all public primary schools in Sopot (untreated, unguided children). The reporting rate was 91%. At the first stage of the psychological-psychiatric study both parents and children filled in the CBCLand YSR questionnaires. At the next stage, in the group of children selected during the screening, aqualified child psychiatrist conducted asemi-structured diagnostic interview K-SADS-PLand diagnosed ADHD. Parafunctions, signs and symptoms of TMD were assessed by conducting a direct interview with a child and a clinical examination by a dentist. RESULTS There were significant differences (p < 0.05) between children with ADHD and without ADHD associated with parafunctions such as chewing gum (76.47% vs. 46.07%), nail biting (70.59% vs. 40.45%) and bruxism (52.54% vs. 26.22%), the number of signs and symptoms of TMD (1 sign or symptom 0.0% vs. 32.21%; 4-7 signs or symptoms 17.65% vs. 3.75%). CONCLUSIONS In children with ADHD, symptoms of temporomandibular joint disorders and parafunctions were significantly more frequent. These studies suggest that children with ADHD constitute agroup of increased risk for TMD in the future. Interdisciplinary treatment of an ADHD patient by a psychiatrist and a dentist is necessary.
Analysis of yeast resistance to lignocellulosic-derived inhibitors

The rapid depletion of fossil fuel reserves and concurrent increase in global temperatures has resulted in global demand for the production of alternative environmentally friendly fuels. First-generation biofuels that utilise cash crops for the extraction of fermentable sugars currently exist, but are highly controversial due to socioeconomic and environmental reasons such as diverting food production or deforestation. Therefore, second-generation biofuels that utilise lignocellulosic waste materials are a more attractive prospect. In Europe, lignocellulosic biomass wastes such as wheat straw, display great potential for the production of alternative energy sources such as bioethanol for transportation. Conversion to this biofuel requires microorganisms that will effectively utilise the constituent sugars to produce a high yield of product. Saccharomyces cerevisiae (S. cerevisiae) strains possess the most desirable phenotypes for this objective. However, the components of wheat straw are difficult to break down, therefore pretreatment is required. Pretreatment methods vary but often utilise various chemicals that produce compounds that are inhibitory to yeast. This affects the efficiency of fermentations. The focus of this work is on formic acid and a synthetic media containing the main inhibitor compounds released during pre-treatment of steam exploded wheat straw. Six pair-wise F1 crosses between four distinct parental S. cerevisiae clean lineage populations have been generated previously by Cubillos et al., 2009. The 96 F1 progeny from each cross have been assayed for tolerance phenotypes in order to determine QTLs (Quantitative Trait Loci), which will enable us to map genes contributing to the multi-genic trait of inhibitor tolerance. Overall, three QTLs were identified for formic acid and five QTLs were identified from the synthetic inhibitor mix. Candidate genes were selected from the QTL analysis and were tested by performing reciprocal hemizygosity assays to determine which genes are responsible for inhibitor resistance to enable the development of yeast strains suitable for second-generation biofuel production.