Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Robust Measurement of the Cosmic Distance Scale Using Baryon Acoustic Oscillations

We present techniques for obtaining precision distance measurements using the baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) through controlling systematics and reducing statistical uncertainties. Using the resulting distance-redshift relation, we can infer cosmological parameters such as w, the equation of state of dark energy. We introduce a new statistic, ωl(rs), for BAO analysis that affords better control over systematics. It is computed by band-filtering the power spectrum P (k) or the correlation function ξ(r) to extract the BAO signal. This is conducive to several favourable outcomes. We compute ωl(rs) from 44 simulations and compare the results to P (k) and ξ(r). We find that the acoustic scales and theoretical errors we measure are consistent between all three statistics. We demonstrate the first application of reconstruction to a galaxy redshift survey. Reconstruction is designed to partially undo the effects of non-linear structure growth on the BAO, allowing more precise measurements of the acoustic scale. We also present a new method for deriving a smooth covariance matrix based on a Gaussian model. In addition, we develop and perform detailed robustness tests on the ξ(r) model we employ to extract the BAO scale from the data. Using these methods, we obtain spherically-averaged distances to z = 0.35 and z = 0.57 from SDSS DR7 and DR9 with 1.9% and 1.7% precision respectively. Combined with WMAP7 CMB observations, SNLS3 data and BAO measurements from 6dF, we measure w = −1.08± 0.08 assuming a wCDM cosmology. This represents a ∼ 8% measurement of w and is consistent with a cosmological constant. The preceding does not capture the expansion history of the universe, H(z), encoded in the line-of-sight distance scale. To disentangle H(z), we exploit the anisotropic BAO signal that arises if we assume the wrong cosmology when calcu-
Carbon composite plates for running shoes: a novel testing method for the measure of flexural stiffness, rebound and damping

Plates made of carbon-based composites are widely used in running disciplines such as marathon, speed running etc [1]. The mechanism of action and the real efficiency and advantages of these carbon plates as insoles or inside the midsole are still under discussion in the scientific literature and among athletes [1-4]. The mechanism of action has been ascribed to a spring effect [2] that provides an energy return after bending and/or to the modification of metatarsal–phalangeal and ankle joint bio-mechanics [1]. Some studies have pointed out that the design of the insole may have an effect on performances [1,4]. On the other hand, other studies [3] point out that the main improvement in the running efficiency is mainly connected with the foam used for the midsole and not to the carbon plate itself. Even if several designs and materials have been developed in the last few years, no scientific research has ever compared the effect of those designs and materials on the flexural stiffness, rebound and damping characteristics of the insole. For this reason, we have developed a new testing method for the measure of the characteristics (stiffness, rebound and damping) of the materials used at different temperatures. Due to the lack of studies on the mechanical properties on carbon insoles we have started our work testing the insoles by applying a perpendicular force to the sole. Indeed, this a simplification of the forces applied during running since the propulsive and braking forces during running occur in all direction at different loading rates. We therefore consider our present work as a starting point for a deeper investigation using more complex force application patterns. We have designed and built a test bench for measuring the flexural stiffness and
Dust-reddened Quasars

We have recently discovered evidence for a population of radio-loud quasars that is reddened by dust. The dust is either along the line of sight to the quasars or is associated with the quasars. In the latter case the dust may be in molecular clouds in the quasar’s host galaxy, or in a molecular torus around the nucleus. We are planning to use 3 mm observations to search for molecular absorption lines (CO and HCO+) associated with dust at the redshift of these quasars. If any absorption systems are detected we will be able to deduce detailed information about the physical state of the molecular gas, hopefully showing which of the proposed locations of the dust is most likely.
Asymptotic analysis in cardiac electrophysiology : applications in modeling and in data assimilation

This thesis aims at developing innovative mathematical tools to improve cardiac electrophysiological modeling. A detailed presentation of the bidomain model - a system of reaction-diffusion equations - with a fixed domain is given based on the literature and we mathematically justify the homogenization process using the 2-scale convergence. Then, a study of the impact of the mechanical deformations in the conservation laws is performed using the mixture theory.As the atria walls are very thin and generally appear as thick surfaces in medical imaging, a dimensional reduction of the bidomain model in a thin domain to a surface-based formulation is studied. The challenge is crucial in terms of computational efficiency. Following similar strategies used in shell mechanical modeling, an asymptotic analysis of the diffusion terms is done with assumptions of strong anisotropy through the thickness, as in the atria. Simulations in 2D and 3D illustrate these results. Then, a complete modeling of the heart - with the asymptotic model for the atria and the volume model for the ventricles - allow the simulation of full electrocardiogram cycles. Furthermore, the asymptotic methods are used to obtain strong convergence results for the 3D-shell models.Finally, a specific data assimilation method is proposed in order to «personalize» the electrophysiological models. The medical data assimilated in the model - using a Luenberger-like state filter specially designed - are the maps of electrical activation. The proposed methods can be used in other application fields where models (reaction-diffusion) and data (front position) are very similar, as for fire propagation or tumor growth.
The GALAH Survey and Galactic Archaeology in the next decade

The field of Galactic Archaeology aims to understand the origins and evolution of the stellar populations in the Milky Way, as a way to understand galaxy formation and evolution in general. The GALAH (Galactic Archaeology with HERMES) Survey is an ambitious Australian-led project to explore the Galactic history of star formation, chemical evolution, minor mergers and stellar migration. GALAH is using the HERMES spectrograph, a novel, highly multiplexed, four-channel high-resolution optical spectrograph, to collect high-quality R ~ 28,000 spectra for one million stars in the Milky Way. From these data we will determine stellar parameters, radial velocities and abundances for up to 29 elements per star, and carry out a thorough chemical tagging study of the nearby Galaxy. There are clear complementarities between GALAH and other ongoing and planned Galactic Archaeology surveys, and also with ancillary stellar data collected by of major cosmological surveys. Combined, these data sets will provide a revolutionary view of the structure and history of the Milky Way.
Evaluation of Spatiotemporal Patterns of the Spinal Muscle Coordination Output during Walking in the Exoskeleton

Recent advances in the performance and evaluation of walking in exoskeletons use various assessments based on kinematic/kinetic measurements. While such variables provide general characteristics of gait performance, only limited conclusions can be made about the neural control strategies. Moreover, some kinematic or kinetic parameters are a consequence of the control implemented on the exoskeleton. Therefore, standard indicators based on kinematic variables have limitations and need to be complemented by performance measures of muscle coordination and control strategy. Knowledge about what happens at the spinal cord output level might also be critical for rehabilitation since an abnormal spatiotemporal integration of activity in specific spinal segments may result in a risk for abnormalities in gait recovery. Here we present the PEPATO software, which is a benchmarking solution to assess changes in the spinal locomotor output during walking in the exoskeleton with respect to reference data on normal walking. In particular, functional and structural changes at the spinal cord level can be mapped into muscle synergies and spinal maps of motoneuron activity. A user-friendly software interface guides the user through several data processing steps leading to a set of performance indicators as output. We present an example of the usage of this software for evaluating walking in an unloading exoskeleton that allows a person to step in simulated reduced (the Moon’s) gravity. By analyzing the EMG activity from lower limb muscles, the algorithms detected several performance indicators demonstrating differential adaptation (shifts in the center of activity, prolonged activation) of specific muscle activation modules and spinal motor pools and increased coactivation of lumbar and sacral segments. The software is integrated at EUROBENCH facilities to benchmark the performance of walking in the exoskeleton from the point of view of changes in the spinal locomotor output.
Recherche de physique au-delà du Modèle Standard dans le secteur du quark top et calibration de l’échelle en énergie des jets avec l’expérience CMS du LHC

La premiere partie de cette these est dediee a l’extraction des corrections de l’echelle en energie des jets dans l’experience CMS du LHC. Les diverses methodes d’extraction sont detaillees, en insistant tout particulierement sur l’utilisation des evenements photon + jets. Les corrections ainsi extraites sont primordiales pour les analyses de physique utilisant des jets, et sont d’ores et deja utilisees par toute la collaboration.La deuxieme partie presente la recherche de physique au-dela du Modele Standard dans le secteur du quark top. De nombreux modeles de nouvelle physique predisent en effet de nouvelles particules, pouvant se manifester comme des resonances dans le spectre de masse top-antitop. Deux analyses sont presentees dans cette these, une dediee a la recherche des resonances de spin 1 et une dediee a la recherche de resonances de spin 0, ou les phenomenes d’interferences avec le Modele Standard sont pris en compte
Do Environmental Performance and Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosure Affect Financial Performance?

The Ministry of Environment determines the company's environmental management performance evaluation plan or PROPER in controlling environmental effects to improve the company's role in environmental protection plans. However, many companies still get a red or black PROPER rating. Therefore, this study aimed to test the effect of environmental performance and corporate social responsibility disclosure on the company's financial performance. The sample used in the mining sector companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange for the 2015-2019 period, amounting to 49 companies. The sampling technique in this study used a purposive sampling technique. The purposive sampling technique is a sample selection technique using criteria. According to the sample's criteria, this research selected 55 financial statements from 11 companies. The data in this study were analyzed using multiple linear regression. The results of this study indicate that environmental performance and CSR disclosure have a positive effect on the company's financial performance. Then, financial performance and Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosure have a simultaneous and positive impact on the company's financial performance. Research can be considered for mining companies to always pay attention to environmental performance due to company activities. In addition, companies must consistently implement Corporate Social Responsibility in carrying out their business activities. The implementation of sound environmental performance must also be accompanied by the implementation of good corporate social responsibility. The company's financial performance is getting better because these two things can synergistically affect the company's economic performance.
TEACHING EMOTIONAL ENGLISH INTONATION

This experimental research focuses on teaching emotional English intonation with video at university as this issue is not presented in scientific literature. The article aims to show a practical approach to teaching English intonation with ICT tools confirmed experimentally and in practice while conducting an English Phonetics course at university. The article is based on the author’s dissertation «Teaching emotional intonation with video (2-nd year students at Linguistic University)» (2009). Reaviling linguistic and psychological features of emotional intonation the article shows that emotional intonation teaching is a complex phenomenon including a system of interdependent features – linguistic, paralinguistic and extralinguistic. This approach to teaching intonation provides equal conditions for students with the visual and auditory types of speech information perception to perceive and recognise emotional intonation patterns in communication. Educational video courses are considered beneficial to demonstrate verbal and non-verbal features of emotional intonation in a communicative environment. Besides, the article presents step-by-step teaching of emotional intonation based on carefully designed exercises: pre-communicative (receptive: recognition, differentiation and reproductive: imitation, imitation with a key, substitution, transformation, sounding) and communicative (productive: sounding and dramatisation); paused and synchronous. The examples of exercises with detailed descriptions of activities are displayed as well. Furthermore, a model of teaching emotional intonation shows stages of using video and performing communicative activities. After experimental learning, all 60 (100%) students achieved proficiency levels, primarily «proficient», and «advanced». The research has demonstrated that the proposed method of training can result in better recognition and more accurate production of emotional intonation in speaking.
Development of Eco-Friendly Cutting Fluid for Machining of AISI 1010 Steel in Automotive Industry

In spite of better performance, the disposal of used petroleum-based cutting fluids threatens our environment. Thus, it is essential to develop eco-friendly cutting fluids for performing machining operations in industries. The main contribution of this paper is to develop an eco-friendly cutting fluid for the plain turning of AISI 1010 steel which is used in the automotive industry. In the present work, boric acid (H3BO3) was mixed with the neem seed. Neem seed oil is easily available in many countries including India. The effectiveness of the proposed cutting fluid was evaluated by conducting different tests as per the standards. The mean biodegradability value of the developed cutting fluid is 97% which is better than other cutting fluids. The average cutting force required by the proposed cutting fluid is only 127.2 N which is much less than the cutting force requirements of dry machining and conventional cutting fluids. The average surface roughness of the machined component using the proposed cutting fluid is 122.9 µm. The mean flank wear of the tool is only 289 µm. The flash point of the proposed cutting fluids is more than 250 °C which is better than the conventional cutting fluids. The fire point of the neem oil-based cutting fluids is 300 °C. The results of the stability test and the microhardness test revealed the effectiveness of the proposed cutting fluids. The results obtained in this work are superior to several other cutting fluids reported in the existing literature. Hence, it is suggested to replace the existing petroleum-based metal cutting fluid with this eco-friendly cutting fluid in the automotive industry in Hosur, India.
How Spatial Epidemiology Helps Understand Infectious Human Disease Transmission

Both directly and indirectly transmitted infectious diseases in humans are spatial-related. Spatial dimensions include: distances between susceptible humans and the environments shared by people, contaminated materials, and infectious animal species. Therefore, spatial concepts in managing and understanding emerging infectious diseases are crucial. Recently, due to the improvements in computing performance and statistical approaches, there are new possibilities regarding the visualization and analysis of disease spatial data. This review provides commonly used spatial or spatial-temporal approaches in managing infectious diseases. It covers four sections, namely: visualization, overall clustering, hot spot detection, and risk factor identification. The first three sections provide methods and epidemiological applications for both point data (i.e., individual data) and aggregate data (i.e., summaries of individual points). The last section focuses on the spatial regression methods adjusted for neighbour effects or spatial heterogeneity and their implementation. Understanding spatial-temporal variations in the spread of infectious diseases have three positive impacts on the management of diseases. These are: surveillance system improvements, the generation of hypotheses and approvals, and the establishment of prevention and control strategies. Notably, ethics and data quality have to be considered before applying spatial-temporal methods. Developing differential global positioning system methods and optimizing Bayesian estimations are future directions.
Basement Membrane of Tissue Engineered Extracellular Matrix Scaffolds Modulates Rapid Human Endothelial Cell Recellularization and Promote Quiescent Behavior After Monolayer Formation

Off-the-shelf small diameter vascular grafts are an attractive alternative to eliminate the shortcomings of autologous tissues for vascular grafting. Bovine saphenous vein (SV) extracellular matrix (ECM) scaffolds are potentially ideal small diameter vascular grafts, due to their inherent architecture and signaling molecules capable of driving repopulating cell behavior and regeneration. However, harnessing this potential is predicated on the ability of the scaffold generation technique to maintain the delicate structure, composition, and associated functions of native vascular ECM. Previous de-cellularization methods have been uniformly demonstrated to disrupt the delicate basement membrane components of native vascular ECM. The antigen removal (AR) tissue processing method utilizes the protein chemistry principle of differential solubility to achieve a step-wise removal of antigens with similar physiochemical properties. Briefly, the cellular components of SV are permeabilized and the actomyosin crossbridges are relaxed, followed by lipophilic antigen removal, sarcomeric disassembly, hydrophilic antigen removal, nuclease digestion, and washout. Here, we demonstrate that bovine SV ECM scaffolds generated using the novel AR approach results in the retention of native basement membrane protein structure, composition (e.g., Collagen IV and laminin), and associated cell modulatory function. Presence of basement membrane proteins in AR vascular ECM scaffolds increases the rate of endothelial cell monolayer formation by enhancing cell migration and proliferation. Following monolayer formation, basement membrane proteins promote appropriate formation of adherence junction and apicobasal polarization, increasing the secretion of nitric oxide, and driving repopulating endothelial cells toward a quiescent phenotype. We conclude that the presence of an intact native vascular basement membrane in the AR SV ECM scaffolds modulates human endothelial cell quiescent monolayer formation which is essential for vessel homeostasis.
Strategies for the Accurate Measurement of the Resonance Frequency in QCM-D Systems via Low-Cost Digital Techniques

In this paper, an FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array)-based digital architecture for the measurement of quartz crystal microbalance (QCM) oscillating frequency of transient responses, i.e., in QCM-D (QCM and Dissipation) applications, is presented. The measurement system is conceived for operations in liquid, with short QCM transient responses due to the large mechanical load. The proposed solution allows for avoiding the complex processing systems typically required by the QCM-D techniques and grants frequency resolutions better than 1 ppm. The core of the architecture is a reciprocal digital frequency meter, combined with the preprocessing of the QCM signal through mixing operations, such as a step-down of the input frequency and reducing the measurement error. The measurement error is further reduced through averaging. Different strategies are proposed to implement the proposed measurement solution, comprising an all-digital circuit and mixed analog/digital ones. The performance of the proposed architectures is theoretically derived, compared, and analyzed by means of experimental data obtained considering 10 MHz QCMs and 200 μs long transient responses. A frequency resolution of about 240 ppb, which corresponds to a Sauerbrey mass resolution of 8 ng/cm2, is obtained for the all-digital solution, whereas for the mixed solution the resolution halves to 120 ppb, with a measurement time of about one second over 100 repetitions.
minIL: A Simple and Small Index for String Similarity Search with Edit Distance

The string similarity search is core functionality in a range of applications, including data cleaning, near-duplicate object detection, and data integration. We study the problem of threshold similarity search with the edit distance, where given a set of strings, a threshold $k$, and a query string $q$, we aim to find all strings in the set whose edit distances to $q$ are no larger than $k$. Extensive studies have been proposed for the threshold similarity search problem with the edit distance. However, they suffer from a huge space consumption issue when achieving only an acceptable efficiency, especially for long strings. In this paper, we propose a simple yet small index, called minIL, to eliminate this issue. First, we adopt a minhash family to capture pivot characters and to construct sketch representations for strings. Second, we develop a multi-level inverted index to search sketches with a low space consumption. Finally, we apply a novel learned index technique on top of the index that further improves the query efficiency. Extensive experiments on real-world datasets offer insight into the performance of our method and show that it substantially reduces the index size, and is capable of outperforming the baseline approaches.
MVU-Net: a multi-view U-Net architecture for weakly supervised vortex detection

Vortex detection plays a fundamental role in turbulence research and engineering problems. However, due to the lack of a mathematically rigorous vortex definition, as well as the absence of any vortex-oriented database, both traditional and machine learning detection methods achieve only limited performance. In this paper, we develop a deep learning model for vortex detection using a weak supervision approach. In order to avoid the need for a vast amount of manual labeling work, we employ an automatic clustering approach to encode vortex-like behavior as the basis for programmatically generating large-scale, highly reliable training labels. Moreover, to speed up the clustering method, a multi-view U-Net (MVU-Net) model is proposed to approximate the clustering results using the knowledge distillation technique. A multi-view learning strategy is further applied to integrate the information across multiple variables. In addition, we propose a physics-informed loss function, which enables our model to explicitly consider the characteristics of flow fields. The results on eight real-world scientific simulation applications show that the proposed MVU-Net model significantly outperforms other state-of-the-art methods on both efficiency and accuracy.