Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The response of Zigadenus fremontii to variation in fire regime

THE RESPONSE OF ZIGADENUS FREMONTII TO VARIATION IN FIRE REGIME by Shannon Elizabeth Dinis California’s chaparral shrub communities are naturally exposed to dry-season fire. It could be reasoned that prescription burns set during the wet season by land managers would have more detrimental effects on plant regeneration than dry season fires because wet season burns are more likely to kill newly emergent seedlings and damage newly emerged leaves of mature plants. Six field sites with flowering Zigadenus fremontii, an herbaceous perennial geophyte common to chapparal and part of the post-fire bloom, were established at Henry W. Coe State Park in Nothern California. Three sites were part of the September 2007 Lick Wildfire and three were part of a February 2007 prescription burn. The sites were monitored for Z. fremontii regeneration over two years. Z. fremontii exposed to the prescription burn fared better than the wildfire plants, with inflorescence height being significantly higher in prescribed burn sites. Bulbs were transplanted into soil from the prescription burn, wildfire, and unburned area to determine differences in regeneration due to soil characteristics. There were no significant differences due to soil types, but only bulbs from the prescription burn sites had the ability to produce flowers in multiple years subsequent to fire. Differences in germination rates between seeds grown in soil from the wildfire, prescription burn, and unburned soil were investigated via a controlled germination experiment. There was a trend for increased germination in burned soils compared to unburned soils. The evidence from this study suggests that geophytes can benefit from fires set outside of the natural fire season of chaparral. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank Dr. Winslow Briggs for his enthusiasm and support in the beginning stages of this project. His insight and novel ideas helped bring this project to life. I thank my advising committee, Dr. David Bruck, Dr. Susan Lambrecht, and Dr. M. Beth Dawson for ongoing support and helpful comments throughout this process. I thank Lucy Dinis, Joe Dinis, Daniel Johnson, Katie Rodriguez, and Carmel de Bertaut for their assistance in the field. Thank you to my funding sources for this project: San Jose State University Department of Biological Sciences Research Fellowship and the California Native Plant Society, Santa Clara Valley Chapter, Graduate Scholarship.
Antennas for 5G and 6G Communications

An antenna is of substantial importance for a communication system as the design of an air interface is mainly reliant on the antenna design. With the significant wireless evolution from 1G to 6G, technologies and network capacities are also evolving to fulfill the promptly growing customer demands. These continually increasing demands have gone concurrently with extensive technological accomplishments of the antenna design community. This chapter discusses the sub-6 GHz and millimeter-wave (mm-wave) fifth-generation (5G) antennas, including antenna arrays, multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO) technology, beam-steering techniques, metasurfaces, and other techniques to achieve the current and impending fast connectivity. Moreover, the design specifications, research directions, various technologies expected to be involved, and challenges in the design, fabrication, and measurement of the sixth-generation (6G) antennas at the THz band have also been presented. In addition, antenna-in-package (AiP) and antenna-on-chip (AoC) technologies with proper technology solutions have also been discussed.
PROCESO CUATRIETÁPICO DE ELECCIÓN DEL TURISTA

The aim of this study consist of proposing and testing a nested and hierarchical decision-making process of tourists divided into four stages: 1) going on holiday (or not); 2) choosing a national or international trip; 3) choosing a specific geographical area; and 4) choosing a type of trip ‐multidestination vs. single-destination‐ on this area. This analysis allows us to examine the sundry stages that a tourist follows until s/he chooses a type of trip on a destination, as well as to observe the determinants in each stage. The empirical application is carried out on a sample of 3,781 individuals, by estimating a Random Parameter Logit Model by applying Bayesian procedures. The results obtained reveal a nested non-independent character of the aforementioned decisions, which confirms the proposed four-stage nested and hierarchical decision-making process.
Central American biomass burning smoke can increase tornado severity in the U.S.

Tornadoes in the Southeast and central U.S. are episodically accompanied by smoke from biomass burning in central America. Analysis of the 27 April 2011 historical tornado outbreak shows that adding smoke to an environment already conducive to severe thunderstorm development can increase the likelihood of significant tornado occurrence. Numerical experiments indicate that the presence of smoke during this event leads to optical thickening of shallow clouds while soot within the smoke enhances the capping inversion through radiation absorption. The smoke effects are consistent with measurements of clouds and radiation before and during the outbreak. These effects result in lower cloud bases and stronger low‐level wind shear in the warm sector of the extratropical cyclone generating the outbreak, two indicators of higher probability of tornadogenesis and tornado intensity and longevity. These mechanisms may contribute to tornado modulation by aerosols, highlighting the need to consider aerosol feedbacks in numerical severe weather forecasting.
The Mechanics of Earthquakes and Faulting, Second Edition(C. H. Scholz)

Have you wondered why those short, en echelon , calcite-filled fractures that all geologists have seen have a mild “S” shape? Why are the en echelon fractures oriented at an angle to the trend of the fracture zone? Which came first, the fault or the shear zone? Why are map traces of strike-slip faults straighter than dip-slip faults? How are tension cracks and shear cracks related? Why are fault-bend folds more pronounced on thrust faults than on other fault types? The answers to these and other questions can be found in Christopher Scholz's 2003 book, The Mechanics of Earthquakes and Faulting , published by Cambridge University Press. The 2002 second edition was reprinted with corrections in 2003. This upper-division/graduate-level reference book is organized into seven chapters. Chapter 1 addresses brittle fracture of rock, including pore-fluid effects on fracture and brittle-plastic transitions caused by pressure and temperature, and extrapolates laboratory results to geological conditions. The three modes of crack propagation from fracture mechanics are described early in the chapter. These modes should be understood by all geologists working on ground-deformation problems, including landslides and subsidence, where the distribution and nature of cracks are fundamental to interpretation of process. Rock friction, the subject of Chapter 2, is a contact property of faults that already exists; it is not a bulk property. This chapter sets the stage for an understanding that seismic or aseismic fault motion is governed by the stability of friction. Fault surfaces have topography and touch only at asperities. Asperity area increases as shearing occurs, but other aspects of interaction contribute to actual friction: ploughing, riding up, and interlocking. Regular stick slip is a dynamic instability with all sliding occurring during the instability. A mechanism proposed for earthquakes is recurring slip instability on preexisting faults that remain stationary between earthquakes. …
Genetic characterization of root architectural traits in barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) using SNP markers

Increasing attention is paid to providing new tools to breeders for targeted breeding for specific root traits that are beneficial in low-fertility, drying soils; however, such information is not available for barley (Hordeum vulgare L.). A panel of 191 barley accessions (originating from Australia, Europe, and Africa) was phenotyped for 26 root and shoot traits using the semi-hydroponic system and genotyped using 21 062 high-quality single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers generated by genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS). The population structure analysis of the barley panel identified six distinct groups. We detected 1199 significant (P<0.001) marker-trait associations (MTAs) with r2 values up to 0.41. The strongest MTAs were found for root diameter in the top 20 cm and the longest root length. Based on the physical locations of these MTAs in the barley reference genome, we identified 37 putative QTLs for the root traits, and three QTLs for shoot traits, with nine QTLs located in the same physical regions. The genomic region 640-653 Mb on chromosome 7H was significant for five root length-related traits, where 440 annotated genes were located. The putative QTLs for various root traits identified in this study may be useful for genetic improvement regarding the adaptation of new barley cultivars to suboptimal environments and abiotic stresses.
Level of happiness among medical students in Bihar-An online survey

BACKGROUND: Happiness is a state of mental well-being and influences the learning and performance of an individual. Medical education due to its academic culture and longer course duration affects the performance and happiness of the students. So, this study was done to assess the level of happiness and the factors associated with it among medical students in Bihar. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A cross-sectional online survey was conducted among 321 medical students of all academic years from various medical colleges in Bihar. This study used a self-administered study tool using the online Google Form platform for data collection and assessed the level of happiness using Oxford Happiness Questionnaire. A multivariable binary logistic regression analysis was done to find out the predictors of happiness. RESULTS: A total of 34.6% (95% CI: 29.5–39.9%) medical students were happy. Male (38.2%) students were found to be happier than female (29.2%) students. Age, place of stay, physical activity, meditation and yoga, frequent socialization, absence of psychiatric illness, and stressful situation in the family were the independent predictors of happiness. Around 42.4% of students had another career option, and 32.1% had a second thought about a career due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The presence of any psychiatric illness had a significant effect on the happiness level of the students. CONCLUSION: Only one in three medical students is happy. Promotion of physical activity, meditation and yoga, and socialization will improve the happiness and thereby learning among medical students.
Height as a Proxy for Cognitive and Non-Cognitive Ability

Taller workers receive a substantial wage premium. Studies extending back to the middle of the last century attribute the premium to non-cognitive abilities, which are associated with stature and rewarded in the labor market. More recent research argues that cognitive abilities explain the stature-wage relationship. This paper reconciles the competing views by recognizing that net nutrition, a major determinant of adult height, is integral to our cognitive and non-cognitive development. Using data from Britain's National Childhood Development Study (NCDS), we show that taller children have higher average cognitive and non-cognitive test scores, and that each aptitude accounts for a substantial and roughly equal portion of the stature premium. Together these abilities explain why taller people have higher wages.
Dissecting the Interface Between Signaling and Transcriptional Regulation in Human B Cells

A key role of signal transduction pathways is to control transcriptional programs in the nucleus as a function of signals received by the cell via complex post-translational modification cascades. This determines cell-context specific responses to environmental stimuli. Given the difficulty of quantitating protein concentration and post-translational modifications, signaling pathway studies are still for the most part conducted one interaction at the time. Thus, genome-wide, cell-context specific dissection of signaling pathways is still an open challenge in molecular systems biology. In this manuscript we extend the MINDy algorithm for the identification of posttranslational modulators of transcription factor activity, to produce a first genome-wide map of the interface between signaling and transcriptional regulatory programs in human B cells. We show that the serine-threonine kinase STK38 emerges as the most pleiotropic signaling protein in this cellular context and we biochemically validate this finding by shRNA-mediated silencing of this kinase, followed by gene expression profile analysis. We also extensively validate the inferred interactions using protein-protein interaction databases and the kinase-substrate interaction prediction algorithm NetworKIN.
Doctor Code: A Machine Learning-Based Approach to Program Repair

In the last decade, several Automated Program Repair (APR) techniques have been proposed. Most of these techniques produce candidate patches using repair operators that apply changes to buggy programs. Therefore, to repair more bugs, a more extensive set of repair operators is required. However, more repair operators lead to long repair time and more overfitted patches. To address the mentioned above issues, we present Doctor Code, a new APR technique that chooses repair operators by systematically learning from the features of the most common bugs in different programs, based on machine learning. We compare our technique against Mutation repair by the Siemens suite. The experiment results indicate that our technique can fix 41 bugs while the baseline only repairs 22. In addition, Doctor Code can produce patches that do not exist in the search space of SPR, Prophet, and SemFix. We also experiment Doctor Code utilizing three buggy versions of a program called Space, to indicate its capability of repairing large-sized programs. Also, we compare Doctor Code against 7 state-of-the-art APR tools like Elixir, using the Defects4j dataset. The experiment results indicate that our technique outperforms the other tools in terms of the number of fixed bugs and overfitted patches.
A global study of Pn anisotropy beneath continents

We apply a two-station method of velocity determination to P n arrival times reported in the International Seismological Centre Bulletin during the period 1964-1993. The azimuthal variation of these velocities provides evidence of P n anisotropy as large as 9.6%. Anisotropic regions are identified by examination of the azimuthal variation of the P n velocities within circular caps of radius 1.5° and 3°, spaced at 1 intervals across the Earth. This procedure leads to 255 geographically distributed estimates of anisotropy. The length scale over which the anisotropy varies indicates that uppermost mantle anisotropy beneath continents is controlled by regional orogenic strains and is inconsistent with a general interpretation in terms of plate-scale mantle flow. In addition, the correlation between P n anisotropy and surficial tectonic features indicates that the anisotropy is primarily the result of the most recent deformation event. We compare our P n anisotropy results (fast directions and magnitudes) with those of SKS splitting studies to attempt to constrain the depth extent of the anisotropy. This comparison suggests that in some areas, where the fast directions agree, SKS splitting observations may arise from a layer beginning just below the Moho, whereas in others it must have a deeper origin. In these areas, the relative magnitudes of the measured anisotropy are consistent with a thin (100-150 km) lithospheric layer of anisotropy.
FIU Digital Commons FIU Digital Commons

With the growth of wireless data traffic, additional spectrum is required to meet consumer demands. Consequently, innovative approaches are needed for efficient management of the available limited spectrum. To double the achievable spectral efficiency, a transceiver can be designed to receive and transmit signals simultaneously (STAR) across the same frequency band. However, due to the coupling of the high power transmitted signal into the collocated receiver, the receiver’s performance is degraded. For successful STAR realization, the coupled high-power transmit (Tx) signal should be suppressed by 100-120 dB over the entire operational bandwidth. So far, most STAR implementations are narrowband, and not useful for ultra wideband (UWB) communications. In this paper, we present a review of novel approaches employed to achieve improved cancellation across wide bandwidths in RF and propagation domains. Both single and multi-antenna systems are considered. Measurements show an average cancellation of 50 dB using two stages of RF signal cancellation.
Elemental and Isotopic Composition of Siderite in the Kuparuk Formation, Alaska: Effect of Microbial Activity and Water/Sediment Interaction on Early Pore-Water Chemistry

ABSTRACT The Kuparuk Formation (Neocomian) consists of glauconitic sandstones and mudrocks of marine origin. Authigenic siderite is common throughout the formation, either concentrated in distinct layers or as isolated rhombs. Examination of siderite-rich samples with back-scattered electron imaging reveals complex compositional zonation in the siderite. The samples are principally composed of mixtures of relatively early-formed Fe-rich siderite and relatively late-formed Mg-rich siderite, with mean compositions of (Fe77.5Mg13.8Ca7.9Mn0.7 )CO3 and (Fe55.8Mg32.8Ca10.8Mn0.6 )CO3, respectively. Fe-rich siderites are most abundant in glauconitic sandstone intervals, whereas Mg-rich siderit s are most abundant in non-glauconitic sandstones and mudrocks. The whole-rock isotopic composition of the siderite is highly variable, with 13C values ranging from -20.3 to 7.9 PDB, and 18O values from 21.4 to 31.1 SMOW. This variation in isotopic composition correlates with the relative proportions of the two siderite types in a given sample. The Fe-rich siderites have low 13C and high 18O values, whereas the Mg-rich siderites have high 13C and low 18O values. Both the elemental and carbon isotopic compositions of the siderite result from modification of the original marine pore waters during successive stages of microbial decomposition of organic matter. The oxygen isotopic compositions of the siderite indicate that early pore waters were depleted in 18O, perhaps as a result of water/sediment interaction. Authigenic ankerite associated with the siderite-bearing samples is unzoned and has a mean composition of Ca1.11 Fe0.35Mg0. 53(CO3)2. The ankerites have higher 13C values and lower 18O values than the Fe-rich siderite, but have 13C values less than and 18O values greater than (with one exception) that of the Mg-rich siderite. The isotopic data suggest that ankerite precipitation began prior to precipitation of Mg-rich siderite and ended subsequent to or during Mg-rich side ite precipitation.
Domain Adaptation of Unreal Images for Image Classiﬁcation

Deep learning has been intensively researched in computer vision tasks like image classiﬁcation. Collecting and labeling images that these neural networks are trained on is labor-intensive, which is why alternative methods of collecting images are of interest. Virtual environments allow rendering images and automatic labeling, which could speed up the process of generating training data and reduce costs. This thesis studies the problem of transfer learning in image classiﬁcation when the classiﬁer has been trained on rendered images using a game engine and tested on real images. The goal is to render images using a game engine to create a classiﬁer that can separate images depicting people wearing civilian clothing or camouﬂage. The thesis also studies how domain adaptation techniques using generative adversarial networks could be used to improve the performance of the classiﬁer. Experiments show that it is possible to generate images that can be used for training a classiﬁer capable of separating the two classes. However, the experiments with domain adaptation were unsuccessful. It is instead recommended to improve the quality of the rendered images in terms of features used in the target domain to achieve better results.
Craters formed in mineral dust by hypervelocity microparticles

As a simulation of erosion processes on the lunar surface, impact craters were formed in dust targets by 2- to 5-/μm-diameter polystyrene spheres with velocities between 2.5 and 12 km/sec. For weakly cohesive, thick targets of basalt dust with a maximum grain size comparable to the projectile diameter, the craters had an average projectile-to-diameter diameter ratio of 25, and the displaced mass was 3 orders of magnitude greater than the projectile mass. The ratio of the displaced mass to the kinetic energy of the projectile was about 0.1 μg/μJ. These ratios decreased as the cohesiveness of the dust grains was increased. For grain sizes an order of magnitude larger, the craters were not well defined, but the ratios were about the same. No detectable raised rim was produced by ejecta or uplift of the surface in any of these cases. In a simulation of the effect of a dust covering on lunar rocks, a layer of cohesive, fine-grained basalt dust with a thickness nearly twice the projectile diameter protected a glass substrate from damage, but an area about 50 times the cross-sectional area of the projectile was cleared of all but a few grains. Impact damage was produced in glass under a thinner dust layer. The results are useful in studies of mixing of the fine fraction of the lunar regolith and shielding of dust-coated lunar rock surfaces under bombardment by micrometeoroids.
EVALUATION OF TURKEY'S LOGISTICS PERFORMANCE INDEX WITH A STRATEGIC PERSPECTIVE

Logistics plays a vital role in ensuring the competitiveness of countries in the international arena. The Logistics Performance Index, which reflects countries' global competitiveness, shows a country's efficiency in trade. Moreover, the Logistics Performance Index determines the countries' on-the-ground efficiency of trade supply chains or logistics services. This study aims to examine the effects of the Logistics Performance Index and its sub-dimensions on the logistics performance of logistics companies from a strategic point of view. The data related to the study is gathered from the World Bank database and the International Association of Forwarding and Logistics Service Providers sectoral databank. The robustness of the underlying data is related to individual logistics firms' factors. Variance-based structural equation modelling with regression analyses is used for measurements. Contrary to the joint logistics and supply chain literature, the results show that infrastructure and tracking sub-dimensions of the Logistics Performance Index negatively relate to firms' logistics performance in Turkey.