Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Deep Learning Based Signal Detection in Dual Mode Generalized Spatial Modulation

This paper proposes a kind of deep learning (DL) based signal detection in dual mode generalized spatial modulation (DM-GSM) system, which aims to balance the detection performance and the complexity. Specifically, two neural networks, deep neural network (DNN) and convolutional neural network (CNN), are utilized to gain the mapping relationship among the received symbols, the channel matrix, and the transmitted bits. After offline training, the trained network is deployed for the online signal detection according to the input feature vector. Simulation results illustrate that the proposed DL detection can obtain the approximate performance of maximum likelihood (ML) detection at lower complexity and can provide better robustness compared with the conventional detection algorithms in the presence of various noise deviating from the standard Gaussian distribution.
Application of Big Data Analysis on the Relationship between Career Delayed Gratification and Organizational Socialization Outcomes for New Generation Employees

The effect of occupational delayed gratification is that it can prompt individuals to postpone short-term instant gratification in order to pursue more valuable long-term career goals when they encounter a choice of interests, which is very beneficial to the career development of the new generation of employees. Based on extensive literature review and interviews, this paper compiles a pretest questionnaire for investigation and proposes models and hypotheses. For the data of the pretest questionnaire, big data item discrimination analysis, Cronbach's alpha internal consistency reliability test, and exploratory factor analysis were used to eliminate unreasonable items. From the four aspects of self-evaluation, self-efficacy, self-esteem, and social support, it explains how to cultivate and improve the career delayed gratification of the new generation of employees, so that they can make the right choice between short-term and long-term benefits, setbacks, and success, thereby improving the organizational socialization outcome relationship.
Inkjet-Printed ON/OFF Force Sensor on Flexible Substrate for Ultra-Low Power Applications

An ON/OFF force sensor is fabricated by inkjet-printing process on flexible substrates. The goal is to obtain two distinct impedance states respectively to the applied force in order to be easily identifiable by a conditioning electronics for ultra-low power applications, and to avoid the use of an analog-to-digital convertor (ADC) in particular. The sensor is composed of two electrodes separated by a spacer. The elastomer layer constituting the spacer is in polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS). An opening is created in this spacer between the two electrodes in order to define an active area. The force is applied perpendicularly to the surface of the sensor. When no force is applied, the sensor’s electrodes are not in contact, and the resistance ROFF tends toward infinity. When a force is applied, the sensor’s electrodes are in contact, and the resistance RON tends toward 0. The minimal actuation force is as low as 0.01N.
Influence of climate stress on technical efficiency and economic downside risk exposure of EU dairy farms

Abstract This paper assesses the influence of heat and drought stress on the economic performance of the European dairy sector. Climatic data from the Gridded Agro-Meteorological data in Europe were combined with dairy enterprise data from the Farm Accountancy Data Network, resulting in a data set of 4412 farms in 22 European Union (EU) countries over the period 2007–2013. Since the performance of dairy farms is influenced by the context in which they operate, farms were grouped into areas representing similar climatic conditions through the use of a latent class analysis. Technical efficiency (TE) and economic downside risk were used as performance indicators against which the effect of climatic stress factors was evaluated. TE was estimated using a ‘true-fixed’ effect stochastic frontier model. Economic downside risk was based on gross margin deviations. Regression analysis suggests a significant negative effect of drought and heat stress on both TE and the downside gross margin difference in most climatic classes, with few exceptions. Results imply that both drought and heat stress-related issues need to be considered when designing adaptation strategies to address threats to the economic performance of the EU dairy sector.
Measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution robust against environmental disturbances

Measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution (MDI QKD) is a promising protocol for removing all detector side channel attacks. However, the variation of reference frames, e.g., polarization and phase reference, would be an acute threat to the performance of MDI systems. Here, based on polarization scrambling units, we demonstrate a reference-frame-independent MDI QKD scheme that is inherently stable against volatile channel conditions; therefore, the final secure key rate will be insensitive to the random disturbances of polarization and the drifts of phase reference. Thus, calibrations of the primary reference frames are intrinsically removed in our scheme, which essentially reduces potential vulnerabilities as well as the resource consumption of the whole system. In addition, a proof-of-principle experiment with an improved fluctuation analysis method is demonstrated to verify the feasibility and advantages of the proposed scheme.
Extended Scale Length Theory for Low-Dimensional Field-Effect Transistors

Low-dimensional (low-D) semiconductors such as carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and 2-D materials are promising channel materials for nanoscale field-effect transistors (FETs) due to their superior electrostatic control. However, classical scale length theory (SLT) does not incorporate the effect of channel extensions, which becomes crucial for thin channels (< 10 nm) and short gate lengths. Here, we extend the classical SLT by introducing two boundary coupling parameters, which describe the impact of gate and drain biases on the source- and drain-channel junction potentials. Moreover, we introduce a general expression for the scale length specifically for low-D FETs. This extended SLT accurately describes electrostatic short-channel effects (SCEs) of low-D FETs, with < 5% error in subthreshold slope over a wide range of parameters versus > $2\times $ error using the classical SLT. The extended SLT is based on three parameters (scale length, gate, and drain boundary coupling parameters) which can be extracted from potential profiles or FET transfer characteristics. In addition, the extended SLT uses analytical closed-form expressions that can be easily included in a compact model to facilitate design-technology co-optimization (DTCO) with low-D FETs to leverage the crucial role of their extensions.
Heuristic optimization of bone cement distribution for prevention of osteoporotic hip fractures

Osteoporosis is a disease characterised by reduction of Bone Mineral Density (BMD) and micro-architectural deterioration of bone tissue. From all the osteoporotic fractures, hip fractures are the ones with most serious consequences. A new treatment to prevent these fractures is femoroplasty, consisting of the injection of bone cement into an osteoporotic femur in order to improve its mechanical properties. Injecting large amounts of cement can lead to bone thermal necrosis or create regions of stress concentration. The present study introduces a new evolutionary method for the optimization of the injected bone cement distribution and the minimization of its volume. The new method was numerically applied in a typical case of an osteoporotic femoral augmentation and compared to a powerful deterministic optimization method.
Influence of S100A2 in Human Diseases

S100 proteins are a family of low-molecular-weight proteins characterized by two calcium-binding sites with a helix-loop-helix (“EF-hand-type”) domain. The S100 family of proteins is distributed across various organs and can interact with diverse molecules. Among the proteins of the S100 family, S100 calcium-binding protein A2 (S100A2) has been identified in mammary epithelial cells, glands, lungs, kidneys, and prostate gland, exhibiting various physiological and pathological actions in human disorders, such as inflammatory diseases and malignant tumors. In this review, we introduce basic knowledge regarding S100A2 regulatory mechanisms. Although S100A2 is a tumor suppressor, we describe the various influences of S100A2 on cancer and inflammatory diseases.
Upskilling as an Internationally Recognized System of a Resilient Education Society

The objective of the research project is a comprehensive look at the international requirements of further education and its pain points in the age of digitalization. The Prior work of the upskilling survey serves the aspect that society is becoming more individualistic and less predictable in terms of educational opportunities. It is the biggest challenge in the organization of continuing education for adults to achieve their interest and benefits for larger target groups by taking into account their individual situations. The approach of the panel study series, which has been published annually since 2019, is based in its 2021 edition on a partially standardized questionnaire of 2000 participants, in which 10 countries were represented. Each European, African, Asian, or South American country participated with 200 respondents each. The results show that digitization is playing an increasing role in the acceptance of continuing education because nowadays teaching with flexible teaching via online teaching is the clear preference. The implications of this upskilling study are that a large proportion of respondents are looking for personal fulfillment as a basis for professional change. Not the primary perspective on job openings is relevant in education because skills and individualistic preferences lead to a change of sectors or a higher position being achieved. The value of the paper lies in the proof of the connection that remote-controlled and flexible continuing education courses are an opportunity to integrate personal and professional development into the everyday life of modern and individual society.
Genetic and morphological variation of Woodland Kingfisher Halcyon senegalensis reveals cryptic mitochondrial lineages and patterns of mitochondrial–nuclear discordance

The Woodland Kingfisher Halcyon senegalensis is widely distributed throughout sub-Saharan Africa and occupies a wide variety of woodland and savannah habitat. Thus far, three subspecies have been described based on morphological variation. In the present study, using western, eastern and southern African populations, we examined the relationship between morphological and genetic divergence among two named subspecies, H. s. cyanoleuca and H. s. senegalensis, using three mitochondrial markers (CO1, Cytb, 16S) and two nuclear markers (FIB5 and RAG1). Southern birds showed clear evidence for morphological divergence, with a longer wing and tail length, when compared with eastern and western birds. Phylogenetic analyses using Bayesian methods identified two well-characterised genetic clusters, representing the two subspecies. We determined that H. s. senegalensis and H. s. cyanoleuca are closely related subspecies that split recently, approximately 0.66–1.31 MYA in the Pleistocene. Furthermore, genetic substructure was evident within H. s. senegalensis, with three distinct genetic clusters in each region. The separation between the Ghana+Gabon and Uganda lineages of H. s. senegalensis occurred approximately 0.12–0.57 MYA. Nuclear–mitochondrial discordance was detected, however, wherein the pattern of divergence was not detected in the RAG1 and FIB5 sequences. Our results suggest that climate change, biogeographic barriers and local adaptation has played a role in the diversification of Woodland Kingfishers in Africa.
In Vivo and Ex Vivo Mitochondrial Function in COVID-19 Patients on the Intensive Care Unit

Mitochondrial dysfunction has been linked to disease progression in COVID-19 patients. This observational pilot study aimed to assess mitochondrial function in COVID-19 patients at intensive care unit (ICU) admission (T1), seven days thereafter (T2), and in healthy controls and a general anesthesia group. Measurements consisted of in vivo mitochondrial oxygenation and oxygen consumption, in vitro assessment of mitochondrial respiration in platelet-rich plasma (PRP) and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs), and the ex vivo quantity of circulating cell-free mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). The median mitoVO2 of COVID-19 patients on T1 and T2 was similar and tended to be lower than the mitoVO2 in the healthy controls, whilst the mitoVO2 in the general anesthesia group was significantly lower than that of all other groups. Basal platelet (PLT) respiration did not differ substantially between the measurements. PBMC basal respiration was increased by approximately 80% in the T1 group when contrasted to T2 and the healthy controls. Cell-free mtDNA was eight times higher in the COVID-T1 samples when compared to the healthy controls samples. In the COVID-T2 samples, mtDNA was twofold lower when compared to the COVID-T1 samples. mtDNA levels were increased in COVID-19 patients but were not associated with decreased mitochondrial O2 consumption in vivo in the skin, and ex vivo in PLT or PBMC. This suggests the presence of increased metabolism and mitochondrial damage.
Emerging Roles of the Iron Chelators in Inflammation

Iron is a crucial element for mammalian cells, considering its intervention in several physiologic processes. Its homeostasis is finely regulated, and its alteration could be responsible for the onset of several disorders. Iron is closely related to inflammation; indeed, during inflammation high levels of interleukin-6 cause an increased production of hepcidin which induces a degradation of ferroportin. Ferroportin degradation leads to decreased iron efflux that culminates in elevated intracellular iron concentration and consequently iron toxicity in cells and tissues. Therefore, iron chelation could be considered a novel and useful therapeutic strategy in order to counteract the inflammation in several autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. Several iron chelators are already known to have anti-inflammatory effects, among them deferiprone, deferoxamine, deferasirox, and Dp44mT are noteworthy. Recently, eltrombopag has been reported to have an important role in reducing inflammation, acting both directly by chelating iron, and indirectly by modulating iron efflux. This review offers an overview of the possible novel biological effects of the iron chelators in inflammation, suggesting them as novel anti-inflammatory molecules.
Reduction of Common-Mode Voltage in Cascaded H-Bridge Inverter Under Faulty Conditions

This paper proposes a new fault-tolerant method for cascaded H-bridge multilevel inverters (CHB-MLIs) to reduce the common-mode voltage (CMV) and improve its performance under faulty conditions. As injected CMV can affect the proper operation of the inverter, especially in AC motor drives, it should be decreased as much as possible. So, after balancing the line-to-line voltages in post-fault conditions, one of the significant challenges is reducing CMV. In the presented method, it has been proven that the average of the down-boundary of CMV is negative, while the average of its up-boundary is positive. Using this fact, the CMV reference is generated to take the minimum fundamental component compared to the existing fault-tolerant methods. The effectiveness of the proposed method is verified in MATLAB/SIMULINK on II-level CHB-MLIs, and a comparative analysis is provided with the current methods.
Financial development and business growth: A case of the Southern Key Economic Region

Abstract This paper employs generalized methods of moment (GMM) to analyze the enterprise data set collected from the General Statistics Office in the period 2005–2018 to provide insight on the influence of financial development on business growth: the case of the Southern Key Economic Zone (SKEZ). The empirical results indicate that financial development plays an important role in business growth. However, providing financing to offset scale has the potential to increase sales but reduce business growth. Thus, businesses in the SKEZ need to carry out some following points. First, corporate managers not only focus on growth and considering as important as sales and productivity throughout their operations but on strengthening the depth of the financial system to allow businesses to get favorable conditions to receive external financial sources. Second, policymakers should promote a well-developed financial system that can ease credit constraints for businesses.
Analysis of Consensus Adaptive Filters Over Directed and Markovian Switching Networks

The problem of distributed adaptive filtering is considered in this paper, where all the nodes in the network will estimate an unknown parameter from noisy measurements cooperatively. In this work, we mainly focus on consensus strategies and normalized least mean squares (NLMS)-based adaptive filters, where the network is described by directed and Markovian switching graphs. The stability results of the above distributed adaptive filters are established under directed Markovian switching networks and a general cooperative information assumption, without independence and stationarity signal conditions which are widely used in the literature. Moreover, the stability results also indicate that even any node can not estimate the unknown parameter individually, the estimation task can still be fulfilled through local communications among nodes in the network.
The Effect of Electroacupuncture Preconditioning on Regional Cerebral Oxygen Saturation Levels in Elderly Patients with Diabetes

Objective This study aimed to evaluate the effect of electroacupuncture preconditioning on regional cerebral oxygen saturation (rSO2) levels in elderly patients with diabetes. Methods Forty patients undergoing elective diabetic foot surgery were enrolled in this study. All patients were aged 65 years and above and weighed 45–75 kg. All were characterized as class II or III according to the American Society of Anesthesiologists’ physical status classification system. Patients were divided randomly into an electroacupuncture group (group E) and a control group (group C); both groups comprised 20 patients. In group E, the DU20 (Baihui), DU24 (Shenting), and EX-HN1 (Sishencong) acupoints were selected for electroacupuncture 30 min prior to administering anesthesia, while in group C, patients underwent routine anesthesia without electroacupuncture. The patients in both groups were anesthetized using a sciatic nerve block. The number of cases with increased or decreased regional oxygen saturation (rSO2) compared with the baseline as well as rSO2 variability in the two groups were recorded and compared. Results There was no significant difference in the preoperative rSO2 values between the two groups (54.4 ± 4.8 (L), 53.9 ± 5.2 (R) [group C] vs 54.1 ± 5.2 (L), 54.5 ± 4.6 (R)[group E]). Compared with group C, the rSO2 in group E increased (50.3 ± 3.9 [group C] vs 58.4 ± 3.2[group E]), and this difference was statistically significant (P < 0.001). Conclusion Electroacupuncture stimulation can increase rSO2 levels in patients with diabetes. Clinical Registration Number ChiCTR2100048783 (http://www.chictr.org.cn).
Teacher’s Perceptions of Electronic Multi Representation STEM based Worksheet to Improve Student’s Metacognitive Ability

Science teachers often conduct a teacher-centered learning process without analyzing the essential needs of each student. Yet, it may not support student to enhance their cognition ability in 21th century era. This study aimed to describe teachers' perception toward usage of electronic multi representation-STEM based worksheet. The study was conducted in February 2021, involving 245 student and 15 science teachers of junior high school. The research used a mixed method with Sequential Explanatory Design. Data were taken using Questionnaire, interview, and to analyze current student worksheet. Data were analyzed descriptively. The data analysis techniques are data collection, data reduction, data display, and verification. The result shows that student have a positive perception toward usage of the electronic multi representation-STEM based worksheet. Almost all the teachers did not use the STEM approach to teach science. The current worksheets has not completely train students' metacognitive abilities and the students` metacognition was in low category, teacher has not use proper learning strategies, method, and visualize concepts in multi representation. It can be concluded that a STEM-based multi-representation worksheet is needed to improve students` metacognitive abilities of junior high school
Assessing the Biodegradation of BTEX and Stress Response in a Bio-Permeable Reactive Barrier Using Compound-Specific Isotope Analysis

By using compound-specific isotope analysis (CSIA) in combination with high-throughput sequencing analysis (HTS), we successfully evaluated the benzene and toluene biodegradation in a bio-permeable reactive barrier (bio-PRB) and the stress response of the microbial community. Under stress conditions, a greater decline in the biodegradation rate of BTEX was observed compared with the apparent removal rate. Both an increase in the influent concentration and the addition of trichloroethylene (TCE) inhibited benzene biodegradation, while toluene biodegradation was inhibited by TCE. Regarding the stress response, the relative abundance of the dominant bacterial community responsible for the biodegradation of BTEX increased with the influent concentration. However, the dominant bacterial community did not change, and its relative abundance was restored after the influent concentration decreased. On the contrary, the addition of TCE significantly changed the bacterial community, with Aminicenantes becoming the dominant phyla for co-metabolizing TCE and BTEX. Thus, TCE had a more significant influence on the bio-PRB than an increasing influent concentration, although these two stress conditions showed a similar degree of influence on the apparent removal rate of benzene and toluene. The present work not only provides a new method for accurately evaluating the biodegradation performance and microbial community in a bio-PRB, but also expands the application of compound-specific isotope analysis in the biological treatment of wastewater.
Osteoporosis among Postmenopausal Women in Jordan: A National Cross-Sectional Study

Osteoporosis is considered a widespread health problem that affects senior citizens, particularly older women, after the menopause. This national study aimed to estimate the prevalence of osteoporosis among Jordanian postmenopausal women and to determine the association of demographic and nutritional factors, such as calcium and vitamin D supplement intake, with osteoporosis in postmenopausal women. A cross-sectional study was conducted among 884 postmenopausal women aged ≥50 years. A multistage sampling technique was used to select participants from three geographic regions of Jordan (north, middle, and south). The data were collected from the participants by a team of field researchers comprising men and women through a standard questionnaire. The prevalence of osteoporosis was 19.8% among postmenopausal Jordanian women. The study results showed that age (p ˂ 0.001), geographic region (p = 0.019), occupation (p = 0.002), and educational level (p = 0.001) were significantly associated with osteoporosis. Moreover, osteoporosis was significantly associated with calcium and vitamin D supplement intake (p < 0.05). There is a high prevalence of osteoporosis among postmenopausal Jordanian women. Therefore, there is a need to educate women at this age, and probably at an earlier age, to prevent or reduce the development of osteoporosis.