Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Study on the Characteristics of Carbon Dioxide Emissions Factors from Passenger Cars

Abstract : Emission regulations on greenhouse gas(GHG) in automobiles have been stringent because of global warming effect. Over 90% of total GHG emission are carbon dioxides and about 20% of this CO 2 emission are emitted from automobiles. In this study, 110 vehicles were tested on a chassis dynamometer and CO 2 emissions and fuel economy were measured in order to investigate the characteristics of CO 2 emission factor from passenger vehicles which are the most dominant vehicle type in Korea. The characteristics of emissions in accordance with displacements, gross vehicle weight, NIER and CVS-75 speed mode were discussed. It was found that vehicles having larger displacement, heavier gross vehicle weight, automatic transmission and specially at cold start emitted more CO 2 emissions. From these results, correlation between CO 2 emission and fuel economy was also obtained. This study may contribute to evaluate domestic greenhouse gas emissions and establish national policies on climate changes in future.
Lifelong Learning Courses Recommendation System to Improve Professional Skills Using Ontology and Machine Learning

Lifelong learning enables professionals to update their skills to face challenges in their changing work environments. In view of the wide range of courses on offer, it is important for professionals to have recommendation systems that can link them to suitable courses. Based on this premise and on our previous research, this paper proposes the use of ontology to model job sectors and areas of knowledge, and to represent professional skills that can be automatically updated using the profiled data and machine learning for clustering entities. A three-stage hybrid system is proposed for the recommendation process: semantic filtering, content filtering and heuristics. The proposed system was evaluated with a set of more than 100 user profiles that were used in a previous version of the proposed recommendation system, which allowed the two systems to be compared. The proposed recommender showed 15% improvement when using ontology and clustering with DBSCAN in recall and serendipity metrics, and a six-point increase in harmonic mean over the stored data-based recommender system.
Footprint II- Long Term Pavement Performance and Environmental monitoring on A1

Phase 11 of the Footprint project has continued monitoring the environmental footprint of heavy vehicles on the A1 motorway defined as dynamic load (WIM), noise, vibration and pollutant emissions based on criteria set by the European project Eureka Logehain Footprint. WIM measurements have shown that on weekdays about 6000 heavy vehicles pass the footprint site out of which about 10% could potentially be overloaded. In order to accurately identify overloaded vehicles detailed vehicle data is needed. To this end, footprint parameters were measured for freight vehicles selected from the traffic stream statically and dynamically and results were compared to the criteria set up as a result of current Swiss policy. The data shows that identifying the environmental footprint of heavy goods vehicles is not straight forward. Vehicles that based on the Swiss heavy vehicle fee (LSVA) criteria would pay a reduced heavy vehicle fee, due to their engine type, are not necessarily environmentally friendly when the footprint parameters are considered. Footprint monitoring has shown that parameters that are currently controlled and their reduction encouraged such as gaseous emissions, axle loads and gross weight are for the most part below or close to acceptable limits. However other important parameters such as tire pressure and noise remain to be higher than acceptable limits.
Computer Program for Estimating Stability Derivatives of Missile Configurations - Users Manual.

Abstract : This report is intended to be a users manual for a computer program called AERODSN, which estimates the stability coefficients of typical missile configurations with wings or tail fins or both. The Mach range is from zero to approximately 4.0. The roll orientation is zero (plus configuration). Wings and tails must be in line. Control deflections are allowed. A limited amount of body alone experimental data is included (ogive cylinder or cone cylinder); however, body alone tables can be input if desired. A conical boattail segment can be added. This program does not predict drag. Static stability and damping derivatives at zero angle of attack are predicted. (Author)
Attitudes to formal Quality Management Systems: An Empirical Study in Norwegian Software Industry

Quality Management in software development is a topic that has become very important. A lot of resources and effort has been invested in making formal routines and process descriptions, which have resulted in extensive systems, so-called Quality Management Systems(QMS). This thesis investigates attitudes towards such systems, seen from both software developers and quality managers points of view. During the fall of 2005, a student project in the subject Depth Study in Software Engineering TDT4735, in form of a qualitative empirical study was performed. Through interviews with developers and quality managers in different Norwegian software companies, it identified some interesting issues to further investigate. As an extension of that depth project, this Masters' Thesis goes further into the area of Quality Management Systems, by presenting a quantitative study. The main research questions for this thesis are: RQ1 Certification today, a must or just more work? RQ2 Developers vs Managers. A battle for quality? RQ3 How make a QMS work? In addition to the main empirical study, the thesis also consists of a brief field study towards two of the largest ICT organisations in Norway, and describes what they consider to be the most interesting and challenging aspects of quality assurance and process improvement in Norwegian software industry.
The Optimal Reward Problem: Designing Effective Reward for Bounded Agents

In the field of reinforcement learning, agent designers build agents which seek to maximize reward. In standard practice, one reward function serves two purposes. It is used to evaluate the agent and is used to directly guide agent behavior in the agent's learning algorithm. This dissertation makes four main contributions to the theory and practice of reward function design. The first is a demonstration that if an agent is bounded—if it is limited in its ability to maximize expected reward—the designer may benefit by considering two reward functions. A designer reward function is used to evaluate the agent, while a separate agent reward function is used to guide agent behavior. The designer can then solve the Optimal Reward Problem (ORP): choose the agent reward function which leads to the greatest expected reward for the designer. The second contribution is the demonstration through examples that good reward functions are chosen by assessing an agent's limitations and how they interact with the environment. An agent which maintains knowledge of the environment in the form of a Bayesian posterior distribution, but lacks adequate planning resources, can be given a reward proportional to the variance of the posterior, resulting in provably efficient exploration. An agent with poor modeling assumptions can be punished for visiting the areas of the state space it has trouble modeling, resulting in better performance. The third contribution is the Policy Gradient for Reward Design (PGRD) algorithm, a convergent gradient ascent algorithm for learning good reward functions. Experiments in multiple environments demonstrate that using PGRD for reward optimization yields better agents than using the designer's reward directly as the agent's reward. It also outperforms the use of an evaluation function at the leaf-states of the planning tree. Finally, this dissertation shows that the ORP differs from the popular work on potential-based reward shaping. Shaping rewards are constrained by properties of the environment and the designer's reward function, but they generally are defined irrespective of properties of the agent. The best shaping reward functions are suboptimal for some agents and environments.
Serving alcohol to pseudo-intoxicated guests in bars: designing the most reliable protocol for utilization in The Netherlands

Excessive alcohol consumption is a problem for all ages. Availability of alcohol plays an important role with this. Previous research showed that actors in bars, who pretended to be obviously intoxicated guests, were served alcohol in most purchase attempts, despite existing laws that prohibit this service. This study examined which over serving protocol from previous research is the most reliable to use and gives a first impression of over serving situations in The Netherlands
Supporting Communication Within Domestic Settings

Current research has identified social communication as a primary area of technological development in the networked home of the future. The primary research focus is on supporting ! phatic" communication - i.e., on supporting communication that is mediated by words, whether spoken or written and co-located or distributed. We provide an ethnographic study of mail use in the home to show that phatic communication is itself mediated through the social construction of visual displays that support the at-a-glance coordination of practical action and the management of domestic affairs. These ! coordinate displays" are distributed around the geography or ecology of the domestic space. Their explication opens up new possibilities for the development of communication technologies for domestic employment, particularly the design of networks of ecologically situated and mobile displays that support the visible and timely flow of information around the home.
Nytänkande inom miljöbilsområdet

Abstract Today's cars are often oversized and often have top speeds of over 120 mph. This is a speed at which very few people have ever driven and it is also illegal in Sweden and in most European countries. The purpose of this project was to find out how the average Swede uses her car and along this find out what type of powertrain that is best suited from an environmental view and design this. To find out how the average Swede uses her car, a literature study on Swedes' driving habits was made. From this, it was established that the average car trip in Sweden was 11 miles long and that a Swedish average daily route was 25 miles. Terms of reference were set up with the Swedes' driving habits as a basis which, among other things, established that the car's range of electric power would be at least 50 miles, this in order to cover the majority of the population's daily itinerary. A series hybrid with hub motors was chosen as the preferred drive system, and for designing this a Toyota Prius Five was used as a model for a standard hybrid car. From calculations, two electric motors with an output of 13.5 kilowatts each would be connected through a transmission to the wheels. The electric motors are driven in turn by a battery with a capacity of 8 kilowatt hours. The battery provides a range of electric power at a constant speed of 45 mph on approximately 68 miles. When the battery runs out the electric motors are powered by a so-called range extender which consists of a gasoline engine and a generator. The petrol engine has a constant power output of 20 kilowatts, which via a generator is transformed into electrical energy that drives the two motors. The advantage of running the engine with constant power output is that the efficiency of petrol engine can be about 37 percent compared with an efficiency of 15-20 percent when the output power is varied. Because of internal losses in the generator and electric motors as well as losses in gear contact the gasoline engine converted energy is only pushing the car forward with an output of about 18 kilowatts. However, this is enough to drive the car forward at a speed of 75 mph.Calculations show that the gasoline consumption is about 0.36 liters per 6.21 miles at 45 mph during efficient driving using the range extender. At 19 mph fuel consumption is about 0.5 liters per 6.21 miles and at 68 mph 0.45 liters per 6.21 miles.
A Study of Course Design Factors That Influence E-Learning Course Completion Rates

Abstract : E-learning has been defined as "the use of network technologies to create, foster, deliver, and facilitate learning, anytime and anywhere" (Linezine, 2000). E-learning is on of the fastest growing services on the Internet today with revenues between 6 billion and 7 billion dollars (Bizreport, 2003). This growth comes with a peculiar problem - many students never complete their e-learning courses. Although there is significant variation among institutions - with some reporting course-completion rates of more than 80 percent and others finding that fewer than 50 percent of distance-education students finish their course.course-completion rates are often 10 to 20 percentage points higher in traditional courses than in distance offerings" (Carr, 2000). There have been few credible studies investigating actual non-completion rates and factors that affect these dropout rates (O'Connor et al., 2003). This study seeks to apply Human-Computer Interaction theory, through use of usability inspection method called Heuristic Evaluation, to identify course design characteristics that may influence course completion rates. A research instrument was developed and applied to twenty (20 courses offered by the Air Force Institute of Technology's School of Systems and Logistics, and a Pearson Correlation was performed to identify any relationships between design factors and course completion rats. Analysis indicated some support for using the Heuristic Evaluation method. Practical and theoretical implications for this research are discussed.
Applying the User-Centered Design Method to A Perinatal Depression Website Design

The Internet has become the most useful channel for people to access information. Many websites have very useful or comprehensive content. However, some users are not willing to read them, because they feel overwhelmed by reading text-based websites. User-experience design plays a crucial part in building a bridge between users and the website. With a good design, websites make the user experience more enjoyable. This thesis is about applying the user-centered design method (UCD) to websites about perinatal depression. for Depression Pregnant Women” is an interactive graphics design project that uses interactive methods and data to show information about during
¿Existe una asociación entre la concentración de vitamina D y la alergia a la proteína de la leche de vaca durante la lactancia?

a. Universidad de Ciencias de la Salud, Hospital de Formación e Investigación de Gülhane, Departamento de Alergia e Inmunología Pediátricas. b. Hospital de Formación e Investigación en Salud Infantil y Enfermedades Pediátricas, Ginecología y Obstetricia Dr. Sami Ulus, Departamento de Alergia e Inmunología Pediátricas. c. Escuela de Medicina de Başkent Üniversitesi, Departamento de Bioestadística. Ankara, Turquía.
Towards persistent control over shared information in a collaborative environment

In a complex collaborative environment, such as healthcare, where Multi-Disciplinary care Team (MDT) members and information come from independent organisational domains, there is a need for information-sharing across the organizations’ information systems in order to achieve the overall goal of collaboration. Inability to provide a secure communication method, giving local/global protection is affecting inter-professional communications and hindering sharing among MDT members. This research aims to facilitate a secure collaborative environment enabling persistent control over shared information across boundaries of the organisations that own the data. This paper is based on the early stages of the research and its results will feed into following stages. It looks at the structure of a healthcare system to understand the types of inter-professional communication and information exchange that occur in practice. Additionally it presents an initial assessment identifying the Information Security (IS) needs and challenges faced in providing persistent control in a shared collaborative environment by using conceptual modelling of a selected medical scenario (breast cancer in Wales). The results show that a considerable number of professionals are involved in a patient’s treatment. Each plays a well-defined role, but often uses different Healthcare Information Systems (HIS) to store sensitive and confidential patient medical information. These HIS cannot provide secure multi-organisational information-sharing to support collaboration among the MDT members. This causes inter-professional communication issues among team members that inhibit decision-making using the information. The findings from this study show how to improve information support from HIS stored information for MDT members. Also the resulting IS functions will be described which facilitate establishing secure collaborative environments guaranteeing persistent control over shared information.
Power Electronics: Computer Simulation and Analysis

Power electronics is interdisciplinary and is at the confluence of three fundamental technical areas - power, electronics and control, . and is used in a wide variety of industries from computers to chemical plants to rolling mills. The importance of power electronics has grown over the years due to several factors. Computer simulation can greatly aid in the analysis, design and education of Power Electronics. A computer simulation (or "sim") is an attempt to model a real-life or hypothetical situation on a computer so that it can be studied to see how the system works. By changing variables, predictions may be made about the behavior of the system. In our work towards this we have ensured to bring out the different responses of current and voltage in the power electronics circuits. However, simulation of power electronics systems is made challenging by the following factors: 1) Extreme non-linearity presented by switches, 2) Time constants within the system may differ by several orders of magnitude and 3) A lack of models. Therefore, it is important that the objective of the computer analysis be evaluated carefully and an appropriate simulation package be chosen. In view of the above considerations, a SPICE based simulation package PSpice and PSIM have been chosen by us for this very purpose. They have had the detailed device models and have been able to represent the controller portion of the converter system by its functional features in as simplified a manner as possible.
The Relationship between Road Design and Driving Behavior

Speed is a substantial factor contributing to road safety. Currently, speed reduction is mainly achieved through law enforcement and the implementation of traffic calming measures. An alternative speed reducing approach is to encourage drivers to voluntarily choose an appropriate driving speed. Improving road infrastructure safety can be achieved by making roads forgiving and self-explaining. This could be done by clarifying the road design characteristics for each road category. The effect on driver behavior by varying road-shoulders and presence of roadside trees was tested by means of a fixed-driving simulator experiment. Speed and lateral position were used as performance indicators. The results indicated that shoulders might not be applied to decrease the speed on the experimental road stretch, but their presence cause drivers to drive closer to the road edge, hence eliminating the probability of head-on collisions. Roadside trees did not cause drivers to adjust their driving speed; possibly due to trees not being perceived as a threat to safety by the drivers. Due to a relatively small sample size the findings of this study should be considered provisional and as pilot results for further simulator experiments using larger sample sizes to visualize the impact of different road designs on the driving behavior prior to costly deployment. However, the results are highly relevant for the understanding of the influence of road design features on driver behavior as well as for the understanding of the use of the simulator in this field of road safety research.
Ruolo del feedforward nell'apprendimento di task motori

Lo scopo di questo studio e quello di investigare gli effetti che il feedforward potrebbe portare nell’esecuzione di alcuni movimenti riabilitativi da parte dei pazienti, si e cercato inoltre di fare chiarezza riguardo le specifiche dei modelli di controllo, presentando alcune varianti e alcuni schemi che potrebbero aiutare a capire in maniera migliore come funziona l’apprendimento motorio. Dopo aver analizzato i modelli piu importanti presenti in letteratura, ne sono stati ideati alcuni prendendo spunto dalla ricerca bibliografica eseguita. Questi si sono basati soprattutto sui dati sperimentali precedenti che hanno fornito un ottimo punto di partenza per questa tesi
Position Characteristics and Their Relationship to Selection for Promotion

Abstract : It is clear that job characteristics are key selection criteria for upward mobility. However, there are questions as to what types of position details facilitate individual objective success within an organization like the United States Air Force that relies solely on an internal labor market. While it is an individual responsibility to develop an employment plan, there are particular duties that are more desirable for continuation. This thesis looked at the professional records of a sample of officers to assess what position characteristics led to more advancement opportunities. It examined what duty experiences fared well for one measure of career progression that lends favorably to promotion in the Air Force: school in-residence selection. This study found that there was some support for the notion that proximity to mission enhanced opportunities for individual achievement in an internal labor market. The research better supported the theories that exposure to senior leadership and service overseas improved the likelihood of upward mobility.
An investigation of milk powder deposition on parallel fins

One method to reduce the energy consumption of industrial milk spray dryers is to recover waste heat from the exhaust dryer air. A significant challenge associated with this opportunity is the air contains a small amount of powder that may deposit on the face and surfaces of a recuperator. This paper introduces a novel lab based test that simulates powder deposition on a bank of parallel plate fins at exhaust dryer air conditions. The fin bank acts like the face of a typical finned tube row in a recuperator. The aim of this study is to look at how deposition on the front of fins is affected by the air conditions. Results show similar characteristics to other milk powder deposition studies that exhibit a dramatic increase in deposition once critical stickiness levels are reached. As powder deposits on the face of the fins, the pressure drop across the bank increases until eventually an asymptote occurs, at which point the rates of deposition and removal are similar. For very sticky conditions, deposition on the face of the fins can cause a rise in the pressure drop by as much as 65%. The pressure drop has also been successfully related to the percentage of open frontal area of the fins with and without deposition. Deposition inside and at the rear of the fin bank was found to be minimal.