Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Marginal methods of intensity‐duration‐frequency estimation in scaling and nonscaling rainfall

Practical methods for the estimation of the intensity‐duration‐frequency (IDF) curves are usually based on the observed annual maxima of the rainfall intensity I(d) in intervals of different duration d. Using these historical annual maxima, one estimates the IDF curves under the condition that the rainfall intensity in an interval of duration d with return period T is the product of a function a(T) of T and a function b(d) of d (separability condition). Various parametric or semiparametric assumptions on a(T) and b(d) produce different specific methods. As alternatives we develop IDF estimation procedures based on the marginal distribution of I(d). If the marginal distribution scales in a multifractal way with d, this condition can be incorporated. We also consider hybrid methods that estimate the IDF curves using both marginal and annual maximum rainfall information. We find that the separability condition does not hold and that the marginal and hybrid methods perform better than the annual maximum estimators in terms of accuracy and robustness relative to outlier rainfall events. This is especially true for long return periods and when the length of the available record is short. Marginal and hybrid methods produce accurate IDF estimates also when only a few years of continuous rainfall data are available.
Observational‐ and model‐based trends and projections of extreme precipitation over the contiguous United States

Historical and projected trends in extreme precipitation events are examined in Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 5 (CMIP5) models and observations, over the contiguous United States (CONUS), using several approaches. This study updates earlier studies that have used the extreme precipitation index (EPI) to assess observations and goes further by using the EPI to evaluate available climate model simulations. An increasing trend over the CONUS was found in the EPI, with large differences among seven subregions of the United States. Median of CMIP5 simulations also finds an increasing trend in the EPI, but with a smaller magnitude than the observations. Model spread is large and in most cases bigger than the model signal itself. Statistically significant (95th confidence level) increasing trends in the observational‐based EPI occur over the Midwest and Eastern regions, while most decreasing trends occur over Western regions. Some models give negative correlation coefficients relative to observations. However, some ensemble members, for most models, show correlation coefficients greater than 0.5. Projections of extreme precipitation event frequency, for representative concentration pathway (RCP) scenarios 4.5 and 8.5, show increasing trends over the CONUS. Both scenarios give a steady increase throughout the period but the RCP 4.5 signal is smaller in magnitude. Overall, the RCP scenarios show an increase across all regions with the exception of some variability between decades in some regions for RCP 4.5. For the CONUS model spread is smaller than the projected signal. Regional analyses show overall agreement among models of a future increase in extreme precipitation event frequency over most regions.
Lista comentada de los reptiles terrestres de Chile Continental

Se entrega una lista de los reptiles terrestres de Chile. Se comentan aspectos relevantes de la historia taxonómica de los géneros o especies. Se señalan 106 formas (binominales y trinominales, incluidas aquellas de existencia dudosa), repartidas en dos géneros de culebras con cinco especies y tres subespecies, para las que se indican dudas de su existencia, y 10 géneros de saurios con 83 especies y 18 subespecies. Se indican cuatro especies de Liolaenms y una de Microlophus (= Tropidunts) para las que se pone en duda su validez taxonómica; se señalan cambios taxonómicos en este género; una especie del género Ctenoblepharys no tiene relaciones genéricas claras. Se proponen nombres vernáculos para cada especie. Los principales cambios respecto de las listas anteriores son: a) la eliminación de la fauna nacional de la culebra Philodryas simonsii y de la lagartija Liolaemus darwini; b) la eliminación de las subespecies de L. nigroviridis consideradas aquí como sinónimos de la especie nominal; c) la proposición de elevar a especies plenas a las subespecies de L. leopardinas; d) la incorporación a la fauna nacional de tres especies señaladas sólo para Argentina; e) se coloca bajo la sinonimia de L. dorbignyi a L. puritamensis; f) los representantes del género Tropidunts en Chile quedan bajo la sinonimia del resurrecto género Microlophus, y se nominan dos subespecies; g) el género Gartliia es sinonimizado con Homonota.
What Drives Asian International Reserves Accumulation in the Post-financial Crisis of 1997-98

Global reserves accumulation experienced impressive gains following the late 1990s Asian financial crisis that undermined not only the Asian economies but also the world. Since then, only 49 Asian countries are contributing more than 60% of global hoarding and this trend has been considered from various insights of the international policy agenda. But the logic behind this enormous accumulation is still a matter of serious debate among researchers which is examined in this paper. The empirical estimation based on the unbalanced panel of 49 Asian countries from the period of 1999-2021 confirms precautionary motive as the best illustrator of holding reserves. Asian countries hold reserves as a safeguard against temporary external imbalances and uncertainty in the balance of payment. Against the popular myth that export, or GDP growth has no effect on reserve accumulation. However, exchange rate stability has some effect. Social Science Review, Vol. 40(1), Jun 2023 Page 203-221
Benefits and costs of provision of post-cyclone emergency services in Cairns

This report assesses whether it would be socially desirable to provide enhanced post-cyclone emergency services in towns such as Cairns. One means of addressing the issue is to estimate the net social benefit that would accrue to Cairns residents. Focus groups of residents identified four services as being the most relevant: accommodation of pets in shelters, police patrols for a longer period after a cyclone, faster resupply of fresh food to shops, and faster reconnection of utilities such as electricity and sewerage. A choice experiment indicated that Cairns households were on average prepared to pay about $124 per annum for faster resupply of fresh food, and almost three times more each year for faster reconnection of utilities, but only about $11 per annum for each additional day of police patrols. However, residents expressed an average negative willingness to pay about -$99 per annum per household for accommodation of pets in a shelter after a cyclone. It was not possible to obtain entirely satisfactory corresponding estimates of costs for these services. It was also clear that it might not always be possible to achieve faster provision of emergency services, given the post-cyclone logistical challenges faced by commercial organisations as well as government agencies. Nevertheless, estimated net present values for faster provision of fresh food, faster reconnection of utilities, and longer police patrols are all positive.
Intercomparison and validation of ILAS‐II version 1.4 target parameters with MIPAS‐B measurements

[1] A flight of the balloon-borne version of the Michelson Interferometer for Passive Atmospheric Sounding (MIPAS-B) was performed from Kiruna (Sweden, 68°N, 21°E) on 20/21 March 2003 as part of the validation program of the chemistry instruments MIPAS, GOMOS, and SCIAMACHY aboard the European environmental satellite ENVISAT. The 15 hour long duration of this flight provided a good match with the Japanese Improved Limb Atmospheric Spectrometer (ILAS)-II sensor aboard the ADEOS-II satellite, launched in December 2002, in addition to the primary goal of ENVISAT validation. The MIPAS-B flight data coincided nicely with one of the early operational periods of the ILAS-II instrument, offering one of the sparse opportunities to validate the whole set of trace species measured by ILAS-II during its unfortunately short lifetime. Radiance spectra were observed by MIPAS-B at nearly the same location that was observed by ILAS-II about 5.5 hours prior to the sampling of MIPAS-B. The intercomparison of ILAS-II atmospheric target parameters (version 1.4) to profiles measured by MIPAS-B has shown that for the species O3, N2O, CH4 (below about 22 km), HNO3, ClONO2, and CFC-11 (CCl3F), a predominantly good consistency with MIPAS-B has been achieved within the combined errors. However, atmospheric parameters like temperature, H2O, NO2, and N2O5 are widely characterized by low biases compared to MIPAS-B results while CFC-12 (CCl2F2) exhibits a high bias in comparison to the balloon-borne observations. Therefore ILAS-II profile retrievals of temperature, H2O, NO2, N2O5, and CFC-12 cannot be assumed to be validated at the present time.
Integrated Plant Nutrient Management in Sub-Saharan Africa: From Concept to Practice

Soil degradation and nutrient depletion have become serious threats to agricultural productivity in Africa. Soils cannot supply the quantities of nutrients required and yield levels decline rapidly once cropping commences. This book addresses these issues and includes papers from an international symposium held at Cotonou, Benin, October 9-12, 2000, organized by the International Tropical Agriculture, Ibadan, Nigeria and the Department of Land Management of the Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, Belgium. In five main parts it marks the end of a first phase of collaborative research on "Balanced Nutrient Management Systems for the Moist Savanna and Humid Forest Zones of Africa" and concludes with recommendations, providing reading for crop and soil scientists.
Steady state volcanism - Evidence from eruption histories of polygenetic volcanoes

Some volcanoes erupt magma at average rates which are constant over periods of many years, even though this magma may appear in a complex series of eruptions. This constancy of output is tested by construction of a curve of cumulative volume of erupted magma, which is linear for steady state volcanism, and whose gradient defines the steady state rate Qss. The assumption is made that Qss is the rate at which magma is supplied to these polygenetic volcanoes. Five general types of eruptive behavior can be distinguished from the cumulative volume curves studied. These types are interpreted in terms of a simple model of batches of magma rising buoyantly through the crust and interacting with a small-capacity subvolcanic magma reservoir. Recognition of previous steady state behavior at a volcano may enable the cumulative volume curve to be used empirically as a constraint on the timing and volume of the next eruption. The steady state model thus has a limited predictive capability. With the exception of Kilauea (Qss = 4 m3 s−1 ) all the identified steady state volcanoes have values of Qss of a few tenths of one cubic meter per second. These rates are consistent with the minimum flux rates required by theoretical cooling models of batches of magma traversing the crust. The similarity of these Qss values at a variety of volcanoes (producing basalt, andesite, and dacite magmas) in very different tectonic settings suggests that the common factors of crustal buoyancy forces and the geotherm-controlled cooling rates control the dynamics of magma supply through the crust. Long-term dormancy at active volcanoes may be a manifestation of the steady state accumulation of magma in large crustal reservoirs, a process that complements the intermittent periods of steady state output at the surface. This possibility has several implications, the most important of which is that it provides a constraint on the supply rate of new magma to the bases of plutons.
Screening and Validation of Appropriate Reference Genes for Real-Time Quantitative PCR under PEG, NaCl and ZnSO4 Treatments in Broussonetia papyrifera

Real-time quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) has a high sensitivity and strong specificity, and is widely used in the analysis of gene expression. Selecting appropriate internal reference genes is the key to accurately analyzing the expression changes of target genes by RT-qPCR. To find out the most suitable internal reference genes for studying the gene expression in Broussonetia papyrifera under abiotic stresses (including drought, salt, and ZnSO4 treatments), seven different tissues of B. papyrifera, as well as the roots, stems, and leaves of B. papyrifera under the abiotic stresses were used as test materials, and 15 candidate internal reference genes were screened based on the transcriptome data via RT-qPCR. Then, the expression stability of the candidate genes was comprehensively evaluated through the software geNorm (v3.5), NormFinder (v0.953), BestKeeper (v1.0), and RefFinder. The best internal reference genes and their combinations were screened out according to the analysis results. rRNA and Actin were the best reference genes under drought stress. Under salt stress, DOUB, HSP, NADH, and rRNA were the most stable reference genes. Under heavy metal stress, HSP and NADH were the most suitable reference genes. EIF3 and Actin were the most suitable internal reference genes in the different tissues of B. papyrifera. In addition, HSP, rRNA, NADH, and UBC were the most suitable internal reference genes for the abiotic stresses and the different tissues of B. papyrifera. The expression patterns of DREB and POD were analyzed by using the selected stable and unstable reference genes. This further verified the reliability of the screened internal reference genes. This study lays the foundation for the functional analysis and regulatory mechanism research of genes in B. papyrifera.
Ventilation of deep waters in the Adriatic and Ionian Seas following changes in thermohaline circulation of the Eastern Mediterranean

Hydrographic measurements obtained in March–April 2002 indicate a new ventilation of the deep layers in the Adriatic and Ionian Seas, following abrupt changes in the thermohaline circulation of the eastern Mediterranean observed since the beginning of the last decade. The water masses that reside in the Southern Adriatic basin were renewed by open ocean winter convection of water with potential density excess (σθ) > 29.18 kg m–3 at depths 600 to 800 m and by a vein of still denser (29.26 kg m–3) and oxygen-rich (230 to 232 mmol m–3) water flowing into the southern Adriatic depression (~1200 m), presumably from the north. When compared to 1999, a moderate increase in salinity (~0.05) and a much stronger dissolved oxygen increase (>29 mmol m–3) were found in the bottom layer of the southern Adriatic Sea. The cold, fresh and highly oxygenated water of Adriatic origin, overflowing the Otranto Strait sill (~935 m) with a potential density of 29.24 kg m–3, was dense enough to sink into the deep Ionian basin. Multiparameter analysis based on the fundamentals of the mixing processes was applied using temperature, salinity, oxygen and nutrient data to investigate the spatial distribution of water masses and to quantify the fractional contributions of distinctive source water types along specific sections running from the Adriatic to the Ionian Sea. The results clearly indicate that the dense water of Adriatic origin, which was recently in contact with the atmosphere, have again replenished the volume of the deep Ionian basin by more than 50%.
A Multi-City Investigation of the Effectiveness of Retrofit Emissions Controls in Reducing Exposures to Particulate Matter in School Buses

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Diesel exhaust is a major source of combustion particles that contribute to poor air quality nationwide. Since almost all school buses are operated with diesel engines, diesel engine exhaust can thus also be a source of concern, specifically with regard to exposure to children. Diesel particulate matter (DPM) is a complex and unhealthy mixture of inorganic and organic carbon particles with adhered toxic substances and metals. The purpose of the study was to investigate the causes of school bus self-pollution and to document in-cabin diesel particulate matter exposures in buses retrofit with a variety of available particulate matter emissions control combinations. 1 This is one of the first studies to report on the in-cabin benefits of retrofit technology. To date, our testing has been conducted on school bus fleets in three U.S. cities—Chicago, IL and Atlanta, GA in 2003 and in Ann Arbor, MI in 2004. Retrofit combinations tested included: • Conventional buses on conventional fuel • Conventional bus with ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel (ULSD) • Bus with diesel oxidation catalyst (DOC) and conventional fuel • Bus with Spiracle and ULSD fuel • Bus with diesel particulate filter (DPF) and ULSD fuel • Bus with DPF, Spiracle and ULSD fuel • Bus with DOC, Spiracle and ULSD fuel • Bus with DPF, ULSD and Enviroguard • Compressed natural gas (CNG) bus During all bus runs, a lead car with identical instrumentation was used as a control to characterize ambient air in the roadway in front of the bus. Actual school bus routes were followed in largely quiet residential neighborhoods with few nearby diesel sources thereby minimizing the confounding influence of sources of diesel emissions other than
Integration of multicriteria evaluation and cellular automata methods for landslide simulation modelling

The representation and modelling of physical and natural systems are mostly implemented using partial differential equations. Physical processes such as flooding, tsunamis, avalanches, earthquakes and landslides undeniably possess complex systems behaviour. Modelling such dynamic phenomena can be adequately addressed by using geocomplexity – complex systems theory and cellular automata (CA). This study develops a novel approach that couples geographic information systems (GIS), multicriteria evaluation (MCE) and CA to simulate shallow landslide flows occurring in urban areas. The landslide susceptibility map produced from the MCE model was used as one input for the CA model. The high-resolution digital elevation model (DEM) is used to calculate topographic variables such as slope gradient, aspect gradient, stream power index, topographic wetness index, and flow direction which were all used in model design. The developed MCE-CA simulation model was tested on historical landslide data in Metro Vancouver, Canada. The spatial extents of the landslide simulations were compared with actual data to test the model simulation outcomes. The developed model has a potential to become useful tool that can aid urban planners and emergency workers in identifying and mitigating threats due to landslides.
Searching for Pollution Havens

This study takes a fresh look at the regulatory determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) by asking whether the stringency and sustainability of environmental regulations affect FDI flows across 25 Western and Eastern European countries. Unlike the earlier literature, which considered only host country characteristics, this article focuses on the difference in the regulatory environments in home and host economies. The data suggest that more stringent environmental regulations in the investor's country relative to those in the potential host country are positively correlated with the probability of investment as well as with the volume of FDI. The results also show that firms in industries with higher abatement costs tend to invest more abroad.
Decadal changes in the North Pacific oceanic frontal zones as revealed in ship and satellite observations

[1] Influence of decadal climate changes upon the North Pacific subarctic and subtropical oceanic frontal zones (NP-SAFZ and NP-STFZ, respectively) is documented. Both satellite- and ship-measured sea surface temperature (SST) data reveal the strong confinement of wintertime decadal SST anomalies to those frontal zones. The satellite data indicate that the wintertime NP-SAFZ tended to be narrow and shift northward under the weakened surface westerlies during a warm event in the early 1990s. The opposite was the case under the enhanced westerlies during a cool event in the mid-1980s. Decadal-scale modulations in the frontal intensity are also evident in the satellite data. A diagnosis based on a simple linearized mixed layer model suggests that the observed anomalous frontal intensity was contributed by the sign reversal of anomalous wind stress curl through the Ekman processes and by an anomaly dipole of the net heat flux around the SAFZ. These decadal-scale modulations in the NP-SAFZ and their relationships with decadal fluctuations in the local surface westerlies are confirmed in the ship-measured data over the 4 recent decades. It is found that the SAFZ happens to be a region where the decadal variability in the surface westerlies are unlikely to be masked by the higher-frequency fluctuations, as it almost coincides with the ridge/trough line of the remote atmospheric response to the El Nino/Southern Oscillation.
A Large-Signal SPICE Model for a Dual-Gate GaN RF Switch With OFF-State Harmonic Control

For the first time, we present a large-signal width-scalable physics-based SPICE-compatible compact model for gallium nitride (GaN)-based dual-gate RF switches with improved harmonic control in the OFF-regime. The bias dependence of device capacitances is improved to offer accurate large-signal compression and harmonic-balance simulations in both the ON- and OFF-state. The distributed nature of the serpentine gate in these devices is captured using a robust gate network. Calibrated EM models have been used to incorporate the impact of manifolds on the RF performance of these devices. The model is validated against experimental data from multiple ${0.5}~\mu\text{m}$ node, dual-gate depletion-mode GaN-on-Si switch devices.
Undetectable high-performance liquid chromatography haemoglobin A1c on variant haemoglobin E phenotype: a case report

The gold standard for long-term monitoring of diabetic patients is glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c), which is routinely tested for glycaemic control. Furthermore, the National glycohemoglobin standardization program (NGSP) has designated high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) as the reference method for HbA1c measurement. A woman from the Sumba tribe, Indonesia, aged 52, visited the Internal Medicine Clinic for a routine check-up. She had been taking diabetic and hypertension medicines on a regular basis for over 10 years. The HPLC procedure yielded “no result” for the patient’s HbA1c assessment and there was no peak on the HPLC graphic. However, there was a discrepancy between the data history of HbA1c measured by turbidimetric method (average of 51 mmol/mol, reference range < 48 mmol/mol), fasting blood glucose (average of 7.7 mmol/L, reference range < 7.0 mmol/L) and 2-hour plasma glucose (average of 13 mmol/L, reference range < 11.1 mmol/L). Glycated albumin was 3.1 mmol/L (reference range 1.8-2.4 mmol/L). Haemoglobin electrophoresis identified homozygote haemoglobinopathy E (HbE). Patients with haemoglobin variants are proposed to utilize glycated albumin.