Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
COMPARATIVE STUDI OF DISTAL RADIUS FRACTURE TREATED WITH VOLAR PLATE OR EXTERNAL FIXATION

Fractures of the distal radius are the most common bony injuries in the upper extremity, and many treatment Methods: have been described in the literature. External fixation remains a highly versatile method to treat many fracture types involving the distal radius. The primary indications for external fixation include reduction of unstable extra-articular fractures and most intra-articular fractures. The use of adjuvant pinning or mini open procedures can be used when external fixation inadequately reduces the joint line alone, especially with central depressions and highly comminuted injuries. The ease of use of the implants and successful track record make it an extremely versatile tool for treating complex fractures of the distal radius. Purpose: To compare 2 Methods: of surgical treatment for displaced intra-articular fractures of the distal radius: open reduction and internal fixation with dorsal plating (Pi Plate; Synthes, Paoli, PA) versus external fixation with o without K-wires. Methods: We compare a retrospective study about AO type C intra-articular distal radius fractures. The fist group (40 patients) is treated with open reduction and internal fixation with DVR plate ande the second group (65 pacients) is treated with external fixation and K-wires and mini-open reduction. Objective, subjective, and radiographic outcomes were assessed at 2 weeks, 4 to 6 weeks, 10 to 12 weeks, 6 months, and 1- and 2-year intervals. The minimum follow-up period was 6 months; the average follow-up period was 18 months. The principal outcome analyzed was Jakim store that included pain, grip strength, range of motion, complications, and radiographic parameters. The groups were equal with respect to age, gender and fracture subtype. Results: No significant difference was found in the Jakim store outcome. The volar plate group, howevwe, showed a similar complication rate when compared with the external fixator group. The plate group also had similar levels of pain at 1 year when compared with the external fixator group. The external fixator group showed an average grip strength of 92% compared with the normal side and 86% in the volar plate group. Conclusions: At midterm analysis the volar plate group showed a significantly higher complication rate compared with the external fixator group; therefore enrollment in the study was terminated. The volar plate group also showed statistically significant higher levels of pain, and weaker grip strength. Based on these results we can recommend the use of volar plates in treating complex intraarticular fractures of the distal radius.
Search tools

applications to TextMiner – such as those for medical and healthcare record analysis or e-mail analysis for compliance or e-discovery – can only mine 5000 files per hour. The company says that complexity of analysis does not decrease the throughput rate, and data search, transform, filter and analysis speeds are independent of computational complexity. TextMiner supports searches with up to 50 regular expressions to identify text that fits a specific pattern, such as phone or credit card numbers – providing, for example, scanning of out-going e-mail streams for improper disclosure of social security numbers for legal compliance. Its new C and Cþþ Application Program Interfaces and IBM TotalStorage Proven help third-party applications and storage systems integrate with it, and each Exegy appliance has up to 4.8 terabytes of high-speed persistent cache, which can be used for creation of unstructured operational datastores, datamarts and caching of streaming data.
Ant Activity along Moisture Gradients in a Neotropical Forest 1

Insect activity often tracks moisture gradients. We studied ant activity, size, and diversity along three moisture gradients in a Panamanian rain forest. Ant activity at baits increased by 25 percent from the dry to the wet season, and > 200 percent on a topographical gradient from a ravine to an exposed plateau. Activity varied little from day to night. Three microhabitats–tree trunk, shrub, and litter–showed different responses to these three gradients. The size distribution of the species pool (N= 63) was right skewed, but the average size of ants at a bait was strongly bimodal. Ants active in moister times and places were not significantly smaller. We suggest that gradients of desiccation risk and food availability were the two most likely causes of these patterns. Two temporal niche axes (daily and seasonal) showed little species specialization, but half of the common species could be categorized as litter or plant microhabitat specialists.
Interclustering: innovate through diversification. The case of the Aerospace Valley competitiveness cluster in Aquitaine region

At the regional level, as in Aquitaine region, or at national and European levels, interclustering offers new opportunities to collaborate between clusters/clusters and their respective members. The interclustering steps identified in the literature start usually by exchanging best practices between members and cluster leaders to move towards the setting up collaborative innovation projects with a cross-sectoral dimension. In the case of major clusters, the abundance of technologies identified in the perimeter can limit the impact in its institutional scope. Technological diversification then appears as a new opportunity to foster cross-fertilization between market applications and complementary themes. The number of projects since 2010 in connection with Aerospace Valley competitiveness cluster seems to confirm our assumptions.
Dinámica Estacional del Banco de Semillas en una Sabana en los Llanos Centro‐Orientales de Venezuela 1

Little is known about seed bank dynamics in Neotropical savannas. We studied temporal variation in seed density, species richness, species composition, seed mass, and seed number in the topsoil seed bank of a savanna on “La Iguana” Experimental Station, Guárico State, Venezuela. Total soil surface sampled was 57,600 cm2, in 400 cm2 units, at four times of the year. Seeds from 124 plants from 20 families were encountered. Species composition varied seasonally, but grass seeds dominated almost all the year, both numerically and in species number. Seed density and species richness were highest in the dry season and declined to a minimum in early wet season. Mean density was 1702 seeds /m2, with a range of temporal variation from 235 to 4624 seeds/m2. Average seed mass across species by date ranged from 0.97 to 2.53 mg, but because tiny seeds were most numerous throughout the year, the abundance‐weighted averages only varied from 0.8 to 1.19 mg. We found a high spatial variability in the seed distribution in the soil throughout the year. There were also substantial changes in the topsoil seed bank among seasons, as a consequence of herbaceous plant phenology and germination strategies, which are tightly coupled with hydroperiodism in Venezuelan savannas. Based on the species‐area curves, we concluded that the minimal sampling effort needed to adequately estimate the species richness in the topsoil of this savanna is 11 fold higher than that used in most seed bank studies in tropical environments.
Birds of Mount Spec

An annotated checklist of the birds of the Mount Spec rainforest northwest of Townsville has been compiled from observations made in the area since July 1967. An average of eight visits a year have been made, many being weekend trips, but because of the distance from Townsville, regular observations and follow up of such activities as besting and behaviour at bowers has not been possible. Although the notes may thus be incomplete they will provide visitors with an indication of what they may hope to see and also serve as an introduction to the birds of this interesting area which has a number of species unique to north-east Queensland and of very limited range. In this respect the avifauna contrasts quite markedly with that of Townsville itself (see lists by Hopkins, 1948 and Lavery and Hopkins, 1963). The area is included in a regional survey of the Townsville district (Lavery, 1968) but there is no detailed account of the Mound Spec avifauna.
Power Management for Deep Submicron Microprocessors

As VLSI technology scales, the enhanced performance of smaller transistors comes at the expense of increased power consumption. In addition to the dynamic power consumed by the circuits there is a tremendous increase in the leakage power consumption which is further exacerbated by the increasing operating temperatures. The total power consumption of modern processors is distributed between the processor core, memory and interconnects. In this research two novel power management techniques are presented targeting the functional units and the global interconnects. First, since most leakage control schemes for processor functional units are based on circuit level techniques, such schemes inherently lack information about the operational profile of higher-level components of the system. This is a barrier to the pivotal task of predicting standby time. Without this prediction, it is extremely difficult to assess the value of any leakage control scheme. Consequently, a methodology that can predict the standby time is highly beneficial in bridging the gap between the information available at the application level and the circuit implementations. In this work, a novel Dynamic Sleep Signal Generator (DSSG) is presented. It utilizes the usage traces extracted from cycle accurate simulations of benchmark programs to predict the long standby periods associated with the various functional units. The DSSG bases its decisions on the current and previous standby state of the functional units to accurately predict the length of the next standby period. The DSSG presents an alternative to Static Sleep Signal Generation (SSSG) based on static counters that trigger the generation of the sleep signal when the functional units idle for a prespecified number of cycles. The test results of the DSSG are obtained by the use of a modified RISC superscalar processor, implemented by SimpleScalar, the most widely accepted open source vehicle for architectural analysis. In addition, the results are further verified by a Simultaneous Multithreading simulator implemented by SMTSIM. Leakage saving results shows an increase of up to 146% in leakage savings using the DSSG versus the SSSG, with an accuracy of 60-80% for predicting long standby periods. Second, chip designers in their effort to achieve timing closure, have focused on achieving the lowest possible interconnect delay through buffer insertion and routing techniques. This approach, though, taxes the power budget of modern ICs, especially those intended for wireless applications. Also, in order to achieve more functionality, die sizes are constantly increasing. This trend is leading to an increase in the average global interconnect length which, in turn, requires more buffers to achieve timing closure.
Lake and Reservoir Management

A review of literature published in 2005 on the subject of lake and reservoir management is presented. Three journals were exclusively attributed to lake and reservoir management, namely, Lake and Reservoir Management published by the North American Lake Management Society (NALMS), Lakes and Reservoirs; Research and Management, an official journal of the International Lake Environment Committee (ILEC) and Journal Great Lakes Research published by the International Association of Great Lakes Research. In this review, an attempt is made to cover, as much as possible, all topics directly related to the management of lakes and reservoirs. Papers of pure scientific nature on microbial isolation, enumeration, characterization, and population dynamics are not included.
Contribution to liquid lens technology

The interest on microfluidic systems based on electrowetting-on-dielectric (EWOD) and the miniaturization of such integrated devices, has increased significantly mainly due to the advent of mass market applications such as lab-on-chip, liquid lenses and reflective displays. The main objective of this work focuses on the scientific and technological challenges that the fabrication and optimization of liquid lens faces. Those are mainly related to the materials used and their associated fabrication techniques, in order to have stable devices with high performance for long term functionality. The work reported here contributes the research to reduce the actuation voltage and to increase stability and reliability of electrowetting devices such as liquid lenses at laboratory scale. We address various aspects related to liquid lenses: (a), improvement of the hydrophobic layer deposition process leading contact angle recovery enhancement, (b) investigation of the dielectric materials and deposition techniques to reduce the required applied voltage (c) specific design of electrodes for 2D movement of the liquid lens, and (d) investigation of nonaqueous liquids to improve the dynamic behavior and long term cycling functionality. (e) An attempt is made to develop behavioral models that can explain EWOD phenomena with an electronic circuit software. El interés en los sistemas microfluídicos basados en electrohumectación sobre un dieléctrico (electrowetting-on-dielectric, EWOD) y la miniaturización de dichos dispositivos integrados, ha aumentado significativamente, principalmente debido a la llegada de aplicaciones del mercado de masas, como lab-on-chip, lentes líquidas y pantallas reflectantes. El objetivo principal de este trabajo se centra en los retos científicos y tecnológicos de la fabricación y la optimización de una lente líquida. Principalmente, los que están relacionadas con los materiales utilizados y sus técnicas de fabricación asociadas, con el fin de tener dispositivos estables con un alto rendimiento para la funcionalidad a largo plazo. Este trabajo describe la investigación llevada a cabo para reducir la tensión de accionamiento y para aumentar la estabilidad y la fiabilidad de los dispositivos EWOD, tales como lentes líquidas, a escala de laboratorio. Los principales aspectos relacionados con lentes líquidas trabajados en esta tesis son los siguientes: (a) la mejora del proceso de depósito de la capa hidrofóbica que determina el ángulo de contacto y mejora su recuperación, (b) la investigación de los materiales dieléctricos y técnicas de depósito para reducir la tensión aplicada, (c) el diseño específico de electrodos para el movimiento en 2D de la lente líquida, y (d) la investigación de los líquidos no acuosos para mejorar el comportamiento dinámico y la funcionalidad en frecuencia a largo plazo. (e) También se ha iniciado el desarrollo de modelos de comportamiento que puedan explicar fenómenos EWOD con un software de circuitos electrónicos.
The use of polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) films as sensors for vibration measurement: A brief review

ABSTRACT Information about vibrating objects can be obtained by vibration measurements. Piezoelectric sensors made by piezoelectric ceramics, quartz, or organic piezoelectric materials, e. g. polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) have been adopted by many researchers to measure vibrations. Among these piezoelectric materials, PVDF has attracted much attention for its excellent properties such as outstanding chemical resistance, high thermal stability, low permitivities, low acoustic impedances, flexibility and membrane forming properties. In this paper, PVDF is introduced in brief. In addition, this paper briefly reviews the use of PVDF films as sensors for vibration measurement in the areas of portable medical detections, structural health monitoring, mechanical equipment vibration measurements and other applications. Meanwhile, some cases which have good low-frequency performances or novel features in structures will be especially introduced to provide helpful experiences for future applications. In the end, a spiral-shaped PVDF cantilever and a double-clamped PVDF beam of two piezoelectric energy harvesters are mentioned to provide ideas for reducing the resonant frequencies and enhancing the output signals of PVDF vibration sensors respectively. The idea of how to enhance the output signals of PVDF sensors for low frequency vibration measurements may be helpful to the development of geophone.
DC loop type quality control center for FRIENDS-system configuration and circuits of power factor correctors

Unbundled power quality service is paid much attention under the circumstances of deregulation and diversification of needs of customers for quality and price of electric power. Moreover, distributed generators will be introduced to distribution system more and more, and reverse flow of active power has possibility to cause new problems in the distribution system. FRIENDS (flexible, reliable and intelligent electrical energy delivery system) is proposed as one of promising distribution system for such requirements. One of the most important characteristics of FRIENDS is that the QCC (quality control center) is installed very closely to customers in order to supply unbundled power quality service. In this paper, DC loop type QCC is proposed as one of the configurations of QCCs. Moreover the circuit configurations, the control schemes, and the simulation results of two types of PFCs (power factor correctors) which are used in this system are presented.
Benefits of weight loss of 10% or more in patients with overweight or obesity: A review

Modest weight loss (5%‐10%) is clinically meaningful in patients with overweight or obesity. However, greater weight loss may be required to achieve improvements in or remission of certain weight‐related complications. Therefore, this study reviewed the effect of large weight loss (≥10%). Most studies reporting large weight loss and relevant outcomes used bariatric surgery or lifestyle modifications.
The effect of network coexistence on the performance of wireless sensor networks

With the coming growth in Internet of Things (IoT) applications, we can expect environments with many independent networks operating in nearby locations. Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN), which have become popular during the last few years, are the main type of networks used in IoT. The IEEE 802.15. 4 protocol designed for low-rate wireless personal area networks has been widely adopted for this kind of network. Together with ZigBee, this protocol is gaining increasing interest from the industry, as they are considered a universal solution for low-cost, low-power, wireless connected monitoring and control devices. Internetwork interference issues in IEEE 802.15. 4 networks can be a major problem because of the extensive use of wireless channels. In this thesis, an in-depth simulation study of the internetwork interferences is performed using Castalia, a widely used network simulator. We focus on the beacon collision problem, as it has been proved to be the main cause of performance degradation for coexisting networks. We carry out a prestudy of the main node simulation parameters to setup the different scenarios. Then, we evaluate how the overlap of the active periods and the location of the nodes affect the network performance. We continue with a network coexistence analysis to study the interaction of two networks of two nodes and their performance regarding the beacon reception rate. We show that there are significantly different operation regions, depending on the network location. Following this, a probabilistic analysis is carried out in order to obtain an average beacon reception rate depending on the size of the area considered. Finally, we discuss available beacon collisions avoidance methods, taking into account the detailed simulation results. Our conclusions have theoretical and practical implications for the design of wireless sensor networks, and for the evaluation of beacon collisions avoidance schemes.
Design and numerical simulation of a pixelated full stokes micropolarizer array

In this paper, we propose and demonstrate numerically a pixelated component for full Stokes polarization imaging by integrating linear polarizers and circular polarizers on a single silicon chip working in near infrared band (~1.6μm). The micro linear polarizers collect linear polarizing information from different orientations while the circular polarizers collect left-handed or right-handed circular polarization information such that full Stokes polarization imaging can be implemented on a single chip in real time. Numerical results show that the extinction ratio and TM transmission of linearly polarization can reach 45dB and 78%, respectively, with a linear metallic grating of period 300nm, and the dichroism of left-handed and right-handed circular polarization can reach 55% with a plasmonic chiral structure that is compatible with linear gratings in terms of structure and fabrication. The proposed structure is of significance in real-time full Stokes polarization imaging.
A microcontroller based automatic sun tracker combined with a new solar energy conversion unit

A microcontroller based automatic sun tracker combined with a new solar energy conversion unit is designed and implemented. The automatic sun tracker is implemented with a DC motor and a DC motor controller. The solar energy conversion unit consists of an array of solar panels, a step-up chopper, a single-phase inverter, an AC mains power source and a microcontroller based control unit. The novelty of this unit is that the switching device of the chopper is not only used for power conversion but also for maximum power point (MPP) detection. In the existing MPP trackers, the MPP is detected by hardware. The parameters of the hardware subject to the changes of the environmental conditions. In the new unit the MPP is determined by simple embedded software with a current sweep approach. With this new approach, the modularization of the conversion from solar power to electric power at its maximum power point can be made more compact and more reliable.
Cascade multilevel inverter with only one DC source

Multilevel converters are a very interesting solution for medium and high voltage applications. Because of its characteristic of synthesizing a sinusoidal voltage on several DC levels. The better topology for power quality and transmission systems applications is the cascade multilevel inverters. However, this topology presents a problem that consists in the use of several DC sources. This paper presents a solution to this problem, maintaining the advantages that offer multilevel topologies, such as, high quality in the output voltage and low voltages stress in the devices. Simulation and experimental results are also included.
Genetic analysis of end-use quality traits in soft white wheat (Triticum aestivum L.)

by Kendra Lyn Gregory Jernigan, Ph.D. Washington State University December 2015 Chair: Arron H. Carter Co-chair: Craig F. Morris Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is used in diverse baked products that require specific end-use quality traits. Kernel texture, flour water absorption capacity, gluten strength, starch composition, and other flour constituents all influence overall flour functionality and dough rheology, specifying both wheat market class and intended end product. Wheat breeders need to develop cultivars with superior end-use quality traits, while also optimizing important agronomic traits. Our first objective was to use a genetic linkage map and 207 recombinant inbred lines (RIL) from a soft white ‘Coda’ by ‘Brundage’ cross to identify quantitative trait loci (QTL) for grain, milling, and baking traits. The linkage map was developed using 570 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) and 136 simple sequence repeat markers. The RILs were grown in five locations in Idaho and Washington from 2006 to 2013. We detected three QTL on chromosomes 2D, 4B, and 6B that were consistently associated with multiple end-use quality traits. Our second objective was to use a genetic linkage map and 131 RILs from a soft white ‘Louise’ by ‘Alpowa’ cross to identify QTL associated with arabinoxylan content and milling traits. The