Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Charge pump with adaptive stages for non-volatile memories

A charge pump that changes its number of stages while maintaining the same total charge pump capacitances is presented. The charge pump dynamically modifies the number of stages through a feedback that rearranges the topology of the set capacitor minimising power consumption. The circuit is then discussed analytically and validated through transistor-level simulations by using 0.18 μm EEPROM technology.
Multiply robust estimators of causal effects for survival outcomes

Multiply robust estimators of the longitudinal g‐formula have recently been proposed to protect against model misspecification better than the standard augmented inverse probability weighted estimator (Rotnitzky et al., 2017; Luedtke et al., 2018). These multiply robust estimators ensure consistency if one of the models for the treatment process or outcome process is correctly specified at each time point. We study the multiply robust estimators of Rotnitzky et al. (2017) in the context of a survival outcome. Specifically, we compare various estimators of the g‐formula for survival outcomes in order to (1) understand how the estimators may be related to one another, (2) understand each estimator's robustness to model misspecification, and (3) construct estimators that can be more efficient than others in certain model misspecification scenarios. We propose a modification of the multiply robust estimators to gain efficiency under misspecification of the outcome model by using calibrated propensity scores over non‐calibrated propensity scores at each time point. Theoretical results are confirmed via simulation studies, and a practical comparison of these estimators is conducted through an application to the US Veterans Aging Cohort Study.
Design‐oriented elasto‐plastic analysis of reinforced concrete structures with in‐plane forces applying convex optimization

Assessment of the cracked behavior at service load and verification of sufficient deformation capacity in the ultimate state are often required when designing reinforced concrete structures. Most existing methods dedicated to nonlinear analysis of reinforced concrete, however, are not well‐suited in practice for use in design processes involving large‐scale structural problems due to an enormous modeling effort and lack of numerical stability. This paper presents a new finite element framework for efficient elasto‐plastic analysis of two‐dimensional reinforced concrete structures subjected to in‐plane forces. The basic concept is to adopt a stress‐based finite element formulation and cast the problem as a convex optimization problem where energy principles are invoked through a formalistic application of nonlinear‐elastic material models. The method accounts for reinforcement yielding and concrete crushing, including the strength reduction due to cracking, and can be used to imitate the elasto‐plastic response of fully‐cracked structures subjected to monotonic loading. The efficiency of the method is demonstrated, inter alia, by an analysis of a complex structure, where the discretized problem has more than 1 million variables and is solved within a few minutes on a standard personal computer.
Evaluation of building technology for mass producible millimetre-sized robots using flexible printed circuit boards

Initial tests of a building technology for a compact three-dimensional mass producible microrobot are presented. The 3.9 × 3.9 × 3.3 mm3 sized prototype robot represents a microsystem with actuators, sensors, energy management and integrated electronics. The weight of a folded robot is 65 mg and the total volume is less than 23 mm3. The design of the interfaces of the different modules in the robot, as well as the building technology, is described. The modules are assembled using conductive adhesive with industrial surface mounting technology on a thin double-sided flexible printed circuit board. The final shape of the microrobots is achieved by folding the flexible printed circuit board twice. Electrical and mechanical studies are performed to evaluate the assembly and it is concluded that the technology can be used for this type of microsystem. Several issues using the presented assembly technique are identified and addressed.
A Fourth-Order MASH Sigma-Delta Modulator in Inertial Sensors

The theory of a Sigma-Delta modulator is introduced in this paper. Based on this theory, a feedback 2-1-1 multi-stage-noise-shaping (MASH) sigma-delta modulator is designed, and the coefficients of the modulator are calculated. The system-level simulation results show that the effective number of bits (ENOB) is 24 bits when the signal bandwidth is 1 kHz and the over-sampling (OSR) rate is 128. Then the circuits of modulator are designed, including integrator, comparator, multi-phase clock and the noise cancelling logic. The whole modulator is simulated in Cadence, the signal to noise ratio (SNR) of the modulator is 125.4dB, and the ENOB is 21.1bits, which meet the technical requirements of the sensor.
Combined sewer overflow over an oblique weir at Rat Creek in Edmonton, Alberta

Oblique weirs are commonly used in urban drainage systems to remove excess flow from a sewer, in particular, a combined sewer system that has limited conveyance capacity. It is important to understand the hydraulics of these weirs to properly monitor the amount of the overflows as well as to design and improve sewer systems. The Rat Creek structure in Edmonton, Alberta, is a combined sewer overflow structure with a weir at an oblique alignment to the centerline of the sewer. A physical model study of the structure was conducted. The results show that both the approach flow conditions and the chamber geometry can significantly affect the hydraulic performance of the weir and invalidate the application of standard weir equations. A unique flow regime with a linear head–discharge rating curve was observed. The effects of modifying the weir and the hanging baffle wall downstream of the weir were also studied and reported. The results of this case study help to improve the understanding of the hydraulics of ob.
How much energetic trade‐offs limit selection? Insights from livestock and related laboratory model species

Trade‐offs between life history traits are expected to occur due to the limited amount of resources that organisms can obtain and share among biological functions, but are of least concern for selection responses in nutrient‐rich or benign environments. In domestic animals, selection limits have not yet been reached despite strong selection for higher meat, milk or egg yields. Yet, negative genetic correlations between productivity traits and health or fertility traits have often been reported, supporting the view that trade‐offs do occur in the context of nonlimiting resources. The importance of allocation mechanisms in limiting genetic changes can thus be questioned when animals are mostly constrained by their time to acquire and process energy rather than by feed availability. Selection for high productivity traits early in life should promote a fast metabolism with less energy allocated to self‐maintenance (contributing to soma preservation and repair). Consequently, the capacity to breed shortly after an intensive period of production or to remain healthy should be compromised. We assessed those predictions in mammalian and avian livestock and related laboratory model species. First, we surveyed studies that compared energy allocation to maintenance between breeds or lines of contrasting productivity but found little support for the occurrence of an energy allocation trade‐off. Second, selection experiments for lower feed intake per unit of product (i.e. higher feed efficiency) generally resulted in reduced allocation to maintenance, but this did not entail fitness costs in terms of survival or future reproduction. These findings indicate that the consequences of a particular selection in domestic animals are much more difficult to predict than one could anticipate from the energy allocation framework alone. Future developments to predict the contribution of time constraints and trade‐offs to selection limits will be insightful to breed livestock in increasingly challenging environments.
Application of Multiplex PCR for the Identification of Oxacillinase Genes and Determination of Antibiotic Resistance Pattern in Environmental Isolates of Acinetobacter baumannii in ICU

Background: Acinetobacter baumannii is a common cause of nosocomial infections. A prominent feature of these bacteria is resistance to carbapenems. This study aimed to identify OXA genes encoding oxacillinase in Acinetobacter baumannii isolates. Methods: This cross-sectional descriptive study was performed on 25 environmental A. baumannii isolates collected from ICU over 8 months. Definitive identification of isolates was performed by biochemical tests and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) of 16s rRNA gene. Antibiotic susceptibility testing was performed on Müller-Hinton agar medium by disk diffusion and E-test. Antibiogram and multiplex PCR data of beta-lactamase genes were collected and analyzed at a significance level of P<0.05 using SPSS 22.0. Results: Except for one isolate, all isolates (96%) were sensitive to polymyxin B and 80% of isolates were sensitive to oxacillin. All isolates were sensitive to meropenem, ampicillin/sulbactam, gentamicin, amikacin, piperacillin, and carbenicillin. The results showed that 25 isolates (100%) had OXA-51 gene, 21 isolates (84%) had OXA-58 gene, one isolate (4%) had OXA-24 gene, and none of the isolates contained OXA-23 gene. Only isolate No.10 had three oxacillinase genes simultaneously and it was resistant to oxacillin, polymyxin B, and cephalothin. Conclusions: The study showed that environmental isolates of ICU do not have pathogenic genes present in the clinical isolates, and how these genes are transferred to the peripheral isolates is an important point that should be studied. Identification of genes encoding carbapenem resistance may help to understand the mechanisms of resistance transfer in A. baumannii. The lack of the OXA-23 gene plays an important role in the susceptibility of isolates to antibiotics and non-emergence of resistant strains.
Performance evaluation of three-phase, neutral-point clamped bi-directional rectifier for supply and load perturbations

In this study, an improved performance three-phase neutral-point clamped bidirectional rectifier with modified control scheme is proposed. The proposed control strategy takes into consideration the amount/degree of deviation of source voltage from desired rated value during supply perturbation and accordingly modifies the reference current template for each phase individually which is termed as compensated reference current. In other words, magnitude, shape and phase of compensated reference current waveform for each phase are different depending on amount of deviation of that phase. A complete mathematical model of rectifier using pulse width modulation technique is developed. The performance of the converter is evaluated in terms of near unity input power factor, low input current total harmonic distortion, reduced ripple factor of the regulated DC output voltage and particularly the neutral-point voltage balance under different load conditions both for rectification and inversion modes of operation. It is shown that the three-level AC to DC converter with the proposed control scheme displays better performance under source voltage perturbations such as voltage sag, swell, unbalance, harmonics, frequency variations as well as phase angle deviations which are regularly encountered in practical environment.
TRACKING CHANGES IN USES AND USERS OF A WEB-BASED INFORMATION SYSTEM OVER TIME USING SERVER LOGS

This study analyzes the uses and users of the Strategic Soybean Information System (StratSoy). It identifies: the uses and users of StratSoy web site; patterns of use; and the determinants of use. Uses in eight content-based areas came from academia, countries, households, and businesses. After accounting for changes in consumer behavior over time, Poisson regression analysis reveals that freshness in the sense of new files, spillovers across areas, and marketing and promotion activities of site handlers increase hits to the site. Population, interest in soybean, and other motivational factors also increases the odds of hits to the web site.
SAW-grade SiO2 for advanced microfluidic devices

Acoustoelectronic devices based on surface acoustic wave (SAW) technology are primarily used in radio frequency filters, delay lines, duplexers, amplifiers and RFID tags. Thereby, SAW's are excited at the surface of piezoelectric materials (e.g. Quartz, LiTaO3, LiNbO3) by an RF signal applied via interdigital transducers (IDTs)1. Novel SAW applications that emerged recently in the field of microfluidics such as the handling of minimum quantities of fluids or gases2,3 require a fluid compatible design approach, high power durability and long lifetime of the devices. However, conventional SAW devices with finger electrodes arranged on top of the chip surface experience acoustomigration damage4,5 at high power input and/or higher operating temperature leading to failure of the device. Additionally, inappropriate material systems or chip surface topography can limit their performance in microfluidic application. To overcome these limitations the electrodes can be buried in an acoustically suited ("SAW-grade") functional layer which moreover should be adjustable to the specific biotechnological task. Depending on the properties of this layer, it can suppress the acoustomigration impact6 and improve the power durability of the device. Also, a reduction of the thermally-induced frequency shift is possible7. The present paper describes a novel SAW based chip technology approach using a modular concept. Here, the electrodes are buried in surface polished SAW-grade SiO2 fabricated by means of reactive RF magnetron sputtering from a SiO2- target. This approach will be demonstrated for two different metallization systems based on Al or Cu thin films on 128° YX-LiNbO3 substrates. We also show the application of the SiO2-layer with respect to compensation of thermallyinduced frequency shift and bio /chemical surface modification. Investigations were carried out using atomic force microscopy, laser-pulse acoustic measurement, glow-discharge optical emission spectroscopy, spectral reflectometry, variable angle ellipsometry and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The electrode edge covering of sputter deposited SiO2 layers and the reactive ion etching of the SiO2 layers are also discussed. This modular technology gives the possibility to improve the compatibility of surface acoustic wave devices to microfluidics and generally allows the integration of SAW driven actuators (pumps and mixing devices) and sensors (sensitive to surface mass change or complex viscosity change) together with other microfluidic elements (e.g. electrophoresis, heating elements) on one chip.
Cultural Topic Modelling over Novel Wikipedia Corpora for South-Slavic Languages

There is a shortage of high-quality corpora for South-Slavic languages. Such corpora are useful to computer scientists and researchers in social sciences and humanities alike, focusing on numerous linguistic, content analysis, and natural language processing applications. This paper presents a workflow for mining Wikipedia content and processing it into linguistically-processed corpora, applied on the Bosnian, Bulgarian, Croatian, Macedonian, Serbian, Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian Wikipedia. We make the resulting seven corpora publicly available. We showcase these corpora by comparing the content of the underlying Wikipedias, our assumption being that the content of the Wikipedias reflects broadly the interests in various topics in these Balkan nations. We perform the content comparison by using topic modelling algorithms and various distribution comparisons. The results show that all Wikipedias are topically rather similar, with all of them covering art, culture, and literature, whereas they contain differences in geography, politics, history and science.
Electromigration theory and its applications to integrated circuit metallization

The theory of electromigration-induced nano- and microprocesses that terminate in failure of thin-film conductors is given. These processes determine operational reliability of IC metallization system. The physical foundations of degradation and lifetime of interconnects are analyzed. The various mechanisms of their deformations and failures that are of practical importance for different types of multilevel arrangement and microstructure are studied. The full 3D theory developed considers the electromigration failures as a set of processes occurring at the nano-, micro- and mesoscale. We reduced the general equations in order to describe specific conducting systems, developed the methods of their numerical modeling, and created software packages. It allows carrying out the simulation of electromigration failures and performing the lifetime analysis for various interconnect systems that are of prime practical significance as regards the operation of IC metallization, the modeling being over a wide range of material, geometrical, structural, and operational parameters. Some examples of the reliability analysis and of the analysis of the most likely failure locations in dependence on the current density, parameters of multilevel metallization, temperature, and polycrystalline grain microstructure of interconnects are represented. We also put forward an approach to modeling the electromigration in conductors containing impurities.
A Study on Implementing a Phase-Shift Full-Bridge Converter Employing an Asynchronous Active Clamp Circuit

The conventional Phase-Shift Full-Bridge (PSFB) converter has a serious voltage spike because of the ringing between the leakage inductance of the transformer and the parasitic output capacitance of the secondary side rectifier switches. To overcome this problem, an asynchronous active clamp technique employing an auxiliary DC/DC converter has been proposed. However, an exact analyses for designing the auxiliary DC/DC converter has not been presented. Therefore, the amount of power that is supposed to be handled in the auxiliary DC/DC converter is calculated through a precise mode analyses in this paper. In addition, this paper proposes a lossy snubber circuit with hysteresis characteristics to reduce the burden that the auxiliary DC/DC converter should take during the starting interval. This technique results in optimizing the size of the magnetic component of the auxiliary DC/DC converter. The operational principles and the theoretical analyses are validated through experiments with a 48V-to-30V/15A prototype.
A New Theory of Broad-band Matching

This paper solves the problem of designing an optimum, passive, reactive two-port equalizer to match out a dissipative frequency sensitive load to a resistive generator. The method is simple and elementary and completely avoids any recourse to the Darlington equivalent of the load. Moreover the technique is also applicable to the design of active equalizers.
Using axiomatic design to improve conceptual design robustness in Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) methodology

Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) is a systematic process and a disciplined problem-prevention approach to achieve business excellence. Robust design is the heart of DFSS. To ensure the success of robust parameter design, one should start with good design concepts. Axiomatic Design, a fundamental set of principles that determine good design practice, can help to facilitate a project team to accelerate the generation of good design concepts. Axiomatic Design holds that uncoupled designs are to be preferred over coupled designs. Although uncoupled designs are not always possible, application of axiomatic design principles in DFSS presents an approach to help the DFSS team focus on functional requirements to achieve design intents and maximise product reliability. As a result of the application of axiomatic design followed by parameter design, the DFSS team achieved design robustness and reliability. A hydraulic lash adjuster case study will be presented.
Shifting from volume to value: a new era in perioperative care

The United States health care system is themost costly in the world, accounting for 20% of the gross domestic product. An aging population with chronic health problems in the setting of advances in technology and surgery hasmademanymore types of procedures and surgeries possible. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has moved toward alternative payment models (APMs) focusing on value-based payments and measurements. The Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) developed a framework for optimizing health systems called the “Triple Aim,” which includes improving patient experience of care (including quality and satisfaction), improving the health of populations, and reducing the per capita cost of health care. In 2015, the Medicare Access and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA) ushered a new system for physician payment inMedicare.MACRA focuses on quality, value, and accountability. With MACRA, most physician payment systems will be in the Merit-based Incentive Payment Systems (MIPS), a pay for performance system. There is also opportunity for bonus payments through participating in eligible APMs. These programs did not officially start until 2017, and payment adjustments according to performance for physicians were first made in 2019 (for the year 2017). Therefore, these programs reflect a relatively new payment model. Value is defined as outcomes that matter to patients relative to the cost of providing the outcome. Outcomes that matter to patients for a particular medical condition can fall into 3 categories: health status achieved or retained, process of recovery, and outcomes related to sustainability of health. Pursuing cost reduction alone without looking at the impact on outcomes does not result in a value-based care (VBC) model. In fact, with siloed budgets, costs in one budget may be cut without a careful analysis of downstream impacts, which can lead to undesirable outcomes and higher overall costs by not allocating resources where they will have the most benefit. Here, we will discuss the meaning of VBC and how a preoperative assessment and optimization clinic can become an essential part of collaborative, multidisciplinary care pathways to create value.
Research on Speech Intelligibility of Sound Field inside Passenger Car

Speech intelligibility is one of the most important aspects of the study of sound quality inside vehicle. Speech intelligibility test is the direct approach to decide whether the listening environment inside vehicle is superior or inferior, but it has many short-comings in the process of subjective evaluation which is time-consuming, laborious and difficult of accomplishment. In this article, speech intelligibility index which is an objective evaluation index, is used for analyzing and evaluating the sound quality inside passenger car, and is calculated separately by two methods. By analyzing the factors influencing the speech intelligibility inside vehicle under different conditions, the methods to improve the sound environment are proposed, which can provide a direct significance for improving sound quality inside vehicle.