Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
CBA, ALARP and industrial safety in the United Kingdom—© Crown Copyright 2006

Abstract There is an expectation that ‘relevant good practice’ will be adopted to achieve acceptable industrial safety. Broadly, these good practices are embodied in professional, industrial and governmental codes and standards. Adoption of relevant good practice often achieves a satisfactory degree of protection where hazards are modest and where those hazards are found in simple, common working situations. Since 1974 the UK has required risk reduction so far as is reasonably practicable. This is not limited to low hazards or to simple and common working situations. To ensure that risks are reduced to a level as low as reasonably practicable (ALARP), there is an expectation that a proportionate search will be made for further risk reduction measures (especially where hazards are large, complex or unusual). Practicable measures should not be rejected unless there is a gross disproportion between the sacrifice (whether in money, time or trouble) in taking the measures and the risk reduction that would be achieved. This ‘ALARP test’ introduces a goal-setting element into the regulation of risk. The ALARP test shares the principal features of CBA, to the extent that the quantum of risk reduction achievable by a further measure can be viewed as a “benefit” and the sacrifice required to take that measure can be viewed as a “cost”. So CBA techniques can be adapted to support ALARP decisions. Essentially CBA helps to support a rational approach to deciding how low a risk is low enough, given that unless the hazard can be eliminated there will always be some risk remaining. In the ALARP decision context, there are several distinctions from the normal scope of CBA, most notably the requirement that there is ‘gross disproportion’ to support rejection of a risk reduction measure.
KUALITAS HIDUP LANJUT USIA DI DAERAH RAWAN BENCANA (Studi kasus di Desa Sukamanah Kecamatan Pangalengan)

Penelitian ini merupakan penelitian yang bertujuan untuk memperoleh data mengenai profil lanjut usia, untuk m emperoleh penjelasan empirik mengenai kualitas hidup lanjut usia di wilayah Desa, Sukamanah , Kecamatan Pangalengan, Kabupaten Bandung. Dan untuk mengkaji aspek kebijakan dan program perlindungan lanjut usia terutama menyangkut kualitas hidup lanjut usia di daerah rawan bencana. Jumlah sampel dalam penelitian ini 50 orang lansia yan terdiri dari 18% laki-laki dan 82% perempuan. Teknik penarikan sampel menggunakan teknik two stage cluster random sampling yaitu teknik penarikan sampel yang dilakukan dengan cara memilih kluster secara dua peringkat. Teknik pengumpulan data yang digunakan penelitian ini adalah wawancara berstruktur, yaitu pengumpulan data dengan mengajukan daftar pertanyaan yang telah dipersiapkan tim peneliti yaitu berdasarkan World Health Organization of Life Instrument – Bref (WHOQO-BREF). Data yang diperoleh diolah dengan program SPSS 19. Hasil penelitian mendapati tidak ada perbedaan kualitas hidup lansia berdasarkan jenis kelamin dan tahap pendidikan. Demikian pula ada 44% responden memiliki persepsi tentang kualitas hidup pada tahap biasa saja dan memandang kualitas hidup dengan baik sebanyak 34%. Selain itu ternyata program pelayanan sosial bagi lansia di desa sukamanah belum merupakan prioritas walaupun dari segi populasi lansia cukup besar. Rekomendasi yang diberikan perlu segera turun tangan pemerintah pusat dan daerah dalam menyusun program pelayanan sosial bagi lansia didaerah bencana. Selain itu perlu kajian lanjutan untuk mengetahui kontribusi pemerintah dalam meningkatkan kualitas hidup lansia. Kata kunci : Lanjut Usia, kualitas hidup, daerah bencana
Changes in water demand resulting from pandemic mitigations in Southeast Michigan

The COVID‐19 pandemic impacted many dimensions of daily life; including how and where people used water. These changes have important implications for water management and utility planning. This study quantifies regional water demand changes across 75 utilities in Southeast Michigan throughout 2020. Deviations were not uniform, with both increases and decreases noted in indoor base flow and average day demands. Effects on diurnal patterns included peak use decreasing but occurring later in the morning and lasting longer. Utility demand changes are statistically correlated to community characteristics of income, population density, job density, and daytime population as well as altered movement trends in response to shutdowns. Commuter communities and those with employment centers experienced greater demand deviations. Understanding the socio‐demographic factors behind the changes will help determine which patterns will be permanent or prevail post‐pandemic. Utilities will be able to better plan for water supplies, capital improvements, operations, and finances.
End-to-End Car Make and Model Classification using Compound Scaling and Transfer Learning

—Recently, Morocco has started to invest in IoT systems to transform our cities into smart cities that will promote economic growth and make life easier for citizens. One of the most vital addition is intelligent transportation systems which represent the foundation of a smart city. However, the problem often faced in such systems is the recognition of entities, in our case, car and model makes. This paper proposes an approach that identiﬁes makes and models for cars using transfer learning and a workﬂow that ﬁrst enhances image quality and quantity by data augmentation and then feeds the newly generated data into a deep learning model with a scaling feature–that is, compound scaling. In addition, we developed a web interface using the FLASK API to make real-time predictions. The results obtained were 80% accuracy, ﬁne-tuning it to an accuracy rate of 90% on unseen data. Our framework is trained on the commonly used Stanford Cars dataset.
The Race to Replace PDE5i: Recent Advances and Interventions to Treat or Manage Erectile Dysfunction: Evidence from Patent Landscape (2016–2021)

For a few decades, globally, erectile dysfunction (ED) has become more prominent even in young adults and represents a mounting health concern causing a significant effect on men’s quality of life. There is an expectation that by the end of 2025, the number of ED cases can rise to 322 million. We aimed to comprehensively analyze the scientific output of scholarly articles and studies in the field of ED (2016–2021). Data from scholarly articles were collected using Pubmed, and clinical trials-related information was accessed from the clinical trials website. An extensive patent search was conducted using databases such as USPTO (United States patent and trademark office) and EPO (European patent office), WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization), etc. Owing to the high market value of ED drugs, considerable interest was attained to grab the opportunities. The race to replace the phosphodiesterase type 5 inhibitor (PDE5 inhibitor-PDE5i) can be identified as evident from the significant number of patents filed and the inventions cleared with clinical trials. Some other intriguing interventions are identified for ED treatment but have yet to gain public acceptance. The current analysis confirms the overall evolution and unexplored corners of research on ED treatment strategies with a current global projection.
New Approaches to Manage Asian Soybean Rust (Phakopsora pachyrhizi) Using Trichoderma spp. or Their Antifungal Secondary Metabolites

Attempts have been made to determine the in vitro and in planta suppressive potential of particular Trichoderma strains (T16 and T23) and their secondary metabolites (SMs) against Asian soybean rust (ASR) incited by Phakopsora pachyrhizi. Aside from the previously identified SMs 6-pentyl-α-pyrone (6PAP) and viridiofungin A (VFA), the chemical structures of harzianic acid (HA), iso-harzianic acid (iso-HA), and harzianolide (HZL) were characterized in this study. Our results indicate that exposure of urediospores to 200 ppm 6PAP completely inhibits germination. A slightly higher dosage (250 ppm) of HZL and VFA reduces germination by 53.7% and 44%, respectively. Germ tube elongation seems more sensitive to 6PAP than urediospore germination. On detached leaves, application of conidia of T16 and T23 results in 81.4% and 74.3% protection, respectively. Likewise, 200 ppm 6PAP recorded the highest ASR suppression (98%), followed by HZL (78%) and HA (69%). Treatment of undetached leaves with 6PAP, HA, or HZL reduces ASR severity by 84.2%, 65.8%, and 50.4%, respectively. Disease reduction on the next, untreated trifoliate by T23 (53%), T16 (41%), HZL (42%), and 6PAP (32%) suggests a translocation or systemic activity of the SMs and their producers. To our knowledge, this study provides the first proof for controlling ASR using antifungal SMs of Trichoderma. Our findings strongly recommend the integration of these innovative metabolites, particularly 6PAP and/or their producers in ASR management strategies.
Application of the Point-Descriptor-Precedence representation for micro-scale traffic analysis at a non-signalized T-junction

ABSTRACT An intersection of two or more roads poses a risk for potential conflicts among vehicles. Often the reasons triggering such conflicts are not clear, as they might be too subtle for the human eye. The environment also plays a part in understanding where, when, and why a particular vehicle interaction has occurred in a certain way. Therefore, it is of paramount importance to dive deeper into the vehicle interaction at a micro-scale within the embedded geographical environment, particularly at the intersections. This would in turn assist in evaluating the association of vehicle interactions with conflict risks and near-miss accidents. Moreover, detection of such micro traffic interactions could also be used to improvise the complexity of the already established transport infrastructure. Conversely, traffic at intersections has been explored mainly for flow estimation, capacity and width measurements, and traffic congestion, etc., whereas the detection of micro-scale traffic interactions at intersections remains relatively under-explored. In this paper, we present a novel approach to retrieve and represent micro-scale traffic movement interactions at a non-signalized T-junction by extending a recently introduced qualitative spatiotemporal Point-Descriptor-Precedence (PDP) representation. We study how the PDP representation offers a fine solution to study the interaction of traffic flows at intersections. This permits tracking the micro-movement of vehicles in much finer detail, which is used later to retrieve movement patterns from a motion dataset. Unlike conventional approaches, we start our approach with the actual movements before modeling the static intersection environment. Additionally, with the aid of illustrative examples, we discuss how the length, width, and speed of the vehicles can be exploited in our approach to detect specific patterns more accurately. Additionally, we address the potential benefits of our approach for traffic safety assessment and how it can be extended to a network of intersections using different transport modes.
Doppler Shift Mitigation in Acoustic Positioning Based on Relative Speed of Base Station for Smartphones

To mitigate the tracking error of moving targets caused by the Doppler shift in acoustic indoor positioning system (AIPS), a novel mitigation method is proposed in this article. It first uses the audio arrival times (AATs) of two adjacent positioning cycles to estimate the relative speed of base station (RSoBS), then uses the estimated RSoBS to update the parameters of the reference signal, reconstructs a new reference signal that matches the received signal, and, finally, substitutes the reconstructed reference signal into the audio detection algorithm to obtain a new AAT estimation, which is then fed back to update the RSoBS estimation. The above process is repeated until a stable RSoBS is obtained, and the AAT estimation corresponding to the final stable RSoBS is the final corrected AAT estimation, which is used to estimate the position of the moving target, thereby improving the tracking accuracy of AIPS. Both simulations and on-site experiments are used to verify the performance of the proposed method. The simulation results show that the ranging deviation caused by the Doppler shift is close to a linear relationship with RSoBS, and the errors of the estimated positions can be effectively mitigated by the proposed method under a low noise level. The on-site experiments show that about 90% of the RSoBS estimation errors are within 0.25 m/s, and the positioning accuracy is improved by about 0.26 m@90%. The proposed method has important application value in improving the tracking accuracy of AIPS for moving targets.
Autonomous Learning of Page Flipping Movements via Tactile Feedback

Robotic manipulation is challenging when both the objects being manipulated and the tactile sensors are deformable. In this article, we addressed the interplay between the manipulation of deformable objects, tactile sensing, and model-free reinforcement learning on a real robot. We showed how a real robot can learn to manipulate a deformable, thin-shell object via feedback from deformable, multimodal tactile sensors. We addressed the learning of a page flipping task using a two-stage approach. For the first stage, we learned nominal page flipping trajectories for two page sizes by constructing a reward function that quantifies functional task performance from the perspective of tactile sensing. For the second stage, we learned adapted trajectories using tactile-driven perceptual coupling, with an intuitive assumption that, while the page flipping trajectories for different task contexts (page sizes) might differ, similar tactile feedback should be expected from functional trajectories for each context. We also investigated the quality of information encoded by two different representations of tactile sensing data: one based on the artificial apical tuft of bio-inspired tactile sensors, and another based on principal component analysis eigenvalues. The results and effectiveness of our learning framework were demonstrated on a real seven-degree of freedom robot arm and gripper outfitted with tactile sensors.
Motivation, A Key Booster for Teachers’ Performance: a Case Study on Public Schools in North Macedonia

The quality of an educational system is closely connected with the quality of its teachers. Thus, research into the elementary teachers’ motivation is of a high importance. The main purpose of this study is to describe and identify the level of teachers’ motivation, factors influencing teachers’ motivation and its impact on teachers’ job performance in public elementary schools in the municipality of Chair, Republic of North Macedonia. Furthermore, this study examines teachers’ work consumption and organizational engagement as they relate to teaching performance. Teachers’ motivation was examined through focus groups with the principles of 10 elementary schools and a questionnaire administered to the teachers of elementary education. A sample of 319 teachers participated in the survey. The questionnaire was developed based on literature review. The findings of the study revealed that teachers’ high motivation is closely related to their students’ result. The factors that influenced teachers’ motivation were their salary level, the working conditions related to infrastructure and the interpersonal relations and communication with the leaders of the institutions and/or colleagues. After analysis numerous recommendations were given to help educational institutions provide better support to teachers and improve their levels of motivation and their job performance, such as providing a satisfying work infrastructure, key resources, and professional development opportunities, increasing salaries and giving acknowledgments and recognitions to motivate teachers’ and thus increase their job performance and satisfaction.Keywords: teacher motivation, job performance, job satisfaction, Republic of North Macedonia
Social Factors and Warning Signs of Suicide in Adolescents

In focus of this paper is the analysis of political culture in Albania towards EU integration processes. To give as much of an inclusive a picture as possible, the recent views and positions of three categories of political communication have been addressed: political elites, the media and the public. Topics include issues such as the orientation and support of the country's European integration, attitudes towards the required reforms and obstacles and difficulties encountered in this process, attitudes towards EU co-operation and assistance regarding the consequences of the earthquake of 2019, the situation created by COVID 19 pandemic, etc. An in-depth analysis focused on some of the most important factors within each category, such as: opportunism, political use of this process, common features and differences in attitudes within political elites; the role and attitudes of the media; public perception, issues related to measuring public opinion, etc. This article briefly deals with the relationship and mutual influence between the aforementioned categories, especially between political actors and the media.
Analysis and Design of a Planar Rat-Race Coupler with Arbitrary Power Division Ratio and nth Harmonics Suppression

ABSTRACT In this article, a planar, unequal rat-race hybrid with harmonic suppression is presented. It is constructed by replacing the quarter-wavelength transmission lines of unequal rat-race coupler with their equivalent T-shaped transmission lines. Compared with the conventional coupler, the proposed structure can achieve arbitrary power division ratios, deep harmonic suppression, and size reduction. For verification, a prototype operating at 1 GHz with third-order harmonic suppression is designed, simulated, and measured. The validity of this design has been proved by the consistency of the simulation and measurement results. Moreover, the performance variations with the different parameters are mainly simulated and analyzed.
Model-Guided Metabolic Rewiring for Gamma-Aminobutyric Acid and Butyrolactam Biosynthesis in Corynebacterium glutamicum ATCC13032

Simple Summary The fermentative production of desired chemicals from renewable resources is one of the promising biosynthetic routes to replace the petrochemical-based process. Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) can be synthesized from l-glutamic acid and used as a building block for the synthesis of butyrolactam and polyamide 4 (nylon 4). The genome-scale metabolic model can predict the growth ability and metabolic flux distribution by genetic disturbances, which provides a strategy to construct a microbial cell factory for GABA and butyrolactam biosynthesis. Here, we performed model-guided metabolic engineering of Corynebacterium glutamicum ATCC13032 for GABA and butyrolactam fermentation from glucose. The biosynthetic pathways of GABA and butyrolactam were constructed by overexpressing the heterologous genes using a bi-cistronic expression cassette. The genetic modifications of the metabolic network cooperatively forced the carbon flux toward GABA and butyrolactam synthesis. This study provides new insights into engineering industrial microorganisms to produce target chemicals from renewable carbon sources. Abstract Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) can be used as a bioactive component in the pharmaceutical industry and a precursor for the synthesis of butyrolactam, which functions as a monomer for the synthesis of polyamide 4 (nylon 4) with improved thermal stability and high biodegradability. The bio-based fermentation production of chemicals using microbes as a cell factory provides an alternative to replace petrochemical-based processes. Here, we performed model-guided metabolic engineering of Corynebacterium glutamicum for GABA and butyrolactam fermentation. A GABA biosynthetic pathway was constructed using a bi-cistronic expression cassette containing mutant glutamate decarboxylase. An in silico simulation showed that the increase in the flux from acetyl-CoA to α-ketoglutarate and the decrease in the flux from α-ketoglutarate to succinate drove more flux toward GABA biosynthesis. The TCA cycle was reconstructed by increasing the expression of acn and icd genes and deleting the sucCD gene. Blocking GABA catabolism and rewiring the transport system of GABA further improved GABA production. An acetyl-CoA-dependent pathway for in vivo butyrolactam biosynthesis was constructed by overexpressing act-encoding ß-alanine CoA transferase. In fed-batch fermentation, the engineered strains produced 23.07 g/L of GABA with a yield of 0.52 mol/mol from glucose and 4.58 g/L of butyrolactam. The metabolic engineering strategies can be used for genetic modification of industrial strains to produce target chemicals from α-ketoglutarate as a precursor, and the engineered strains will be useful to synthesize the bio-based monomer of polyamide 4 from renewable resources.
Association of Intradialytic Hypotension and Ultrafiltration with AKI-D Outcomes in the Outpatient Dialysis Setting

Identifying modifiable predictors of outcomes for cases of acute kidney injury requiring hemodialysis (AKI-D) will allow better care of patients with AKI-D. All patients with AKI-D discharged to University of Virginia (UVA) outpatient HD units between 1 January 2017 to 31 December 2019 (n = 273) were followed- for up to six months. Dialysis-related parameters were measured during the first 4 weeks of outpatient HD to test the hypothesis that modifiable factors during dialysis are associated with AKI-D outcomes of recovery, End Stage Kidney Disease (ESKD), or death. Patients were 42% female, 67% Caucasian, with mean age 62.8 ± 15.4 years. Median number of dialysis sessions was 11 (6–15), lasting 3.6 ± 0.6 h. At 90 days after starting outpatient HD, 45% recovered, 45% were declared ESKD and 9.9% died, with no significant changes noted between three and six months. Patients who recovered, died or were declared ESKD experienced an average of 9, 10 and 16 intradialytic hypotensive (IDH) episodes, respectively. More frequent IDH episodes were associated with increased risk of ESKD (p = 0.01). A one liter increment in net ultrafiltration was associated with 54% increased ratio of ESKD (p = 0.048). Optimizing dialysis prescription to decrease frequency of IDH episodes and minimize UF, and close monitoring of outpatient dialysis for patients with AKI-D, are crucial and may improve outcomes for these patients.
Genetic Algorithm Optimization of an Energy Storage System Design and Fuzzy Logic Supervision for Battery Electric Vehicles

This chapter presents a methodology to optimize the capacity and power of the ultracapacitor (UC) energy storage device and also the fuzzy logic supervision strategy for a battery electric vehicle (BEV) equipped with electrochemical battery (EB). The aim of the optimization was to prolong the EB life and consequently to permit financial economies for the end-user of the BEV. Eight variables were used in the optimization process: two variables that control the energy storage capacity and power of the UC device and six variables that change the membership functions of the fuzzy logic supervisor. The results of the optimization, using a genetic algorithm from MAT‐ LAB®, are showing an increase of the financial economy of 16%.