Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Exoscarne: Assistive Strategies for an Industrial Meat Cutting System Based on Physical Human-Robot Interaction

Musculoskeletal disorders of the wrist are common in the meat industry. A proof of concept of a physical human-robot interaction (pHRI)-based assistive strategy for an industrial meat cutting system is demonstrated which can be transferred to an exoskeleton later. We discuss how a robot can assist a human in pHRI, specifically in the context of an industrial project i.e for the meat cutting industry. We developed an impedance control-based system that enables a KUKA LWR robot to provide assistive forces to a professional butcher while simultaneously allowing motion of the knife (tool) in all degrees of freedom. We developed two assistive strategies—a force amplification strategy and an intent prediction strategy—and integrated them into an impedance controller.
A Truthful Double Auction Mechanism for Multi-Resource Allocation in Crowd Sensing Systems

As a novel sensing paradigm, crowd sensing systems have gained great attention and been widely adopted in the environmental monitoring and calculation areas. In crowd sensing systems, mobile users provide their multiple resources to the requesters to execute tasks. Existing studies focus on the divisible task or one-to-one mapping for single resource allocation. However, this assumption does not hold for crowd sensing systems. Owing to the task attribute, some tasks cannot be divided into multiple parts to run on different devices. In addition, a high performance mobile device can execute multiple tasks simultaneously. We address the problem of multi-resource allocation in crowd sensing systems for the auction-based model considering many-to-one mapping for indivisible tasks, where many-to-one mapping allows one mobile device to provide multiple resources to execute one or more tasks. In this article, we study, for the first time to the best of our knowledge, a truthful mechanism that stimulates mobile users and requesters to declare their true values. We design a truthful double auction mechanism together with a payment scheme tailored to fit it that would help researchers understand how a truthful double auction mechanism can be designed. In addition, we prove that our proposed mechanism maintains budget-balance, individual rationality, and computational tractability. Furthermore, we analyze the approximation ratio of our proposed approximation algorithm. Experimental results demonstrate that our proposed mechanism has high computation efficiency and good performance.
Jogos On-line e Apps para consolidação dos princípios da contagem

Este artigo tem como objetivo apresentar um estudo experimental de intervenção em princípios da contagem, de modo a investigar a eficácia dos jogos didáticos virtuais e aplicativos como auxiliares. O processo de desenvolvimento matemático de uma criança se dá de maneira contínua e progressiva habilitando o indivíduo à capacidade de contar com sucesso devido a consolidação dos Princípios da Contagem, que são a correspondência termo a termo, a ordem estável, a cardinalidade, a irrelevância da ordem e a abstração. Quando dificuldades se apresentam ou os princípios não são consolidados, geram uma lacuna na aprendizagem matemática, ferramentas virtuais podem ser utilizadas como estratégia de ensino, estas ferramentas vêm na forma de jogos e apps que devem ser adequados e cumprirem efetivamente o papel de auxiliares na aprendizagem dos Princípios da Contagem; mas o uso da ferramenta não está condicionado somente a problemas de aprendizagem, pois as ferramentas digitais podem ser usadas a todo momento, durante o processo educacional de um indivíduo, basta ter um propósito lógico. Para tanto, se faz necessário analisar a real eficiência destes jogos e apps, que é o objetivo deste estudo, o qual será desenvolvido através de pesquisa de estudo de caso, de natureza aplicada, com o intuito de gerar informações sobre as ferramentas e a sua eficácia na consolidação dos princípios da contagem. A pesquisa será aplicada com uma aluna de 7 anos matriculada no 1o ano do ensino fundamental. Espera-se, com este estudo, responder à questão: Os Jogos Virtuais auxiliam na consolidação das habilidades relacionadas aos Princípios da Contagem na alfabetização matemática?
Capital Structure and Financial Performance: Evidence from Three Malaysian Industries

Millennials are typically fond of uploading their travel photos to social media to gain social recognition. Lombok is a tourist destination with considerable potential to increase the value and social status of its visitors, as it offers enough attractions to be considered among the world’s favorite celebrity tourist destinations; it is also globally renowned for its diverse natural and cultural beauty. This descriptive quantitative research aims to examine the effect of self-congruity, perceived social value, and experience satisfaction toward the intensity of using a digital social network to reinforce the identity of millennial users in Indonesia. This research involved 214 respondents who visited Lombok for leisure and used a digital social network to inform others of their tourism experience. After being analyzed with structural equation modelling as the data processor, the results show a direct and positive effect between perceived social value and the intensity of using a digital social network but no direct and positive effect between experience self-congruity and experience satisfaction on the intensity of using a digital social network.
EnGe-CSNet: A Trainable Image Compressed Sensing Model Based on Variational Encoder and Generative Networks

The present study primarily investigates the topic of image reconstruction at high compression rates. As proven from compressed sensing theory, an appropriate algorithm is capable of reconstructing natural images from a few measurements since they are sparse in several transform domains (e.g., Discrete Cosine Transform and Wavelet Transform). To enhance the quality of reconstructed images in specific applications, this paper builds a trainable deep compressed sensing model, termed as EnGe-CSNet, by combining Convolution Generative Adversarial Networks and a Variational Autoencoder. Given the significant structural similarity between a certain type of natural images collected with image sensors, deep convolutional networks are pre-trained on images that are set to learn the low dimensional manifolds of high dimensional images. The generative network is employed as the prior information, and it is used to reconstruct images from compressed measurements. As revealed from the experimental results, the proposed model exhibits a better performance than competitive algorithms at high compression rates. Furthermore, as indicated by several reconstructed samples of noisy images, the model here is robust to pattern noise. The present study is critical to facilitating the application of image compressed sensing.
Perspectives on organic transition from transitioning farmers and farmers who decided not to transition

Abstract Despite continuous growth in demand for organic food and farm products, US domestic supply is not keeping pace. Increasing domestic supply requires, in part, that more farms transition to certified organic production. This in turn requires a better understanding of the transition process. This paper reports on a national survey of farmers transitioning to organic certification through participation in the United States Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) Environmental Quality Incentives Program Organic Initiative (EQIP-OI). Our analysis focuses on what motivates farmers to undertake transition to organic certification and what obstacles they confront in the process. The survey population included farmers in the midst of the transition process and farmers who began transition but decided not to pursue organic farming, allowing us to compare both groups to farmers who successfully transitioned to certified organic. Because farmers do not control all of the factors that influence their success, we use a ‘spheres of influence’ framework to analyze obstacles at four levels: the farm, local and regional infrastructure, the marketplace and policy. Our results improve our understanding of the transition process and apply to a wide range of stakeholders and service providers who support farmers in different ways, through crop research, infrastructure development, market development and policy.
Neurotoxicity mechanism of Ochratoxin A

Mycotoxins, such as Ochratoxins, are widely distributed in nature and are common contaminants of human foodstuffs. Ochratoxins are a group of mycotoxins produced by a wide range of molds. Ochratoxin A (OTA), the most prominent member of this toxin family, is produced by various Aspergillus and Penicillium species. OTA is frequently found in foods such as cereals, oleaginous seeds, coffee, and meat products. This mycotoxin has been described as teratogenic, genotoxic, carcinogenic, and immunotoxic, and has been proven to be a potent neurotoxin. In the present study, the neurotoxicological perspective of OTA was reviewed and discussed. The main possible mechanisms of neurotoxicity are oxidative DNA, protein and lipid damage, and apoptosis. However, further studies are needed to conclude the exact neurotoxicity mechanism of OTA and find the approaches that reduce the neurotoxicity induced by OTA.
Sources of black carbon at residential and traffic environments

Abstract. This study investigated the sources of black carbon (BC) at two contrasting urban environments in Helsinki, Finland; residential area and street canyon. The sources of BC were explored by using positive matrix factorization (PMF) for the organic and refractory black carbon (rBC) mass spectra collected with a soot particle aerosol mass spectrometer (SP-AMS). Two sites had different local BC sources; the largest fraction of BC originated from biomass burning at the residential site (38 %) and from the vehicular emissions at the street canyon (57 %). Also, the mass size distribution of BC diverged at the sites as BC from traffic was found at the particle size of ~100–150 nm whereas BC from biomass combustion was detected at ~300 nm. At both sites, a large fraction of BC was associated with urban background or long-range transported BC indicated by the high oxidation state of organics related to those PMF factors. The results from the PMF analysis were compared with the source apportionment from the aethalometer model calculated with two pair of absorption Angstrom values. It was found that several PMF factors can be attributed to wood combustion and fossil fuel fraction of BC provided by the aethalometer model. In general, the aethalometer model showed less variation between the sources within a day than PMF being less responsive to the fast changes in the BC sources at the site. The results of this study increase understanding of the limitations and validity of the BC source apportionment methods in different environments. Moreover, this study advances the current knowledge of BC sources and especially the contribution of residential combustion in urban areas.
Three Wheeled Omnidirecional Mobile Robot - Design and Implementation

This article presents a study of the resources necessary to providemovement and localization in three wheeled omnidirectionalrobots, through the detailed presentation of the mathematical proceduresapplicable in the construction of the inverse kinematic model,the presentation of the main hardware and software componentsused for the construction of a functional prototype, and the testprocedure used to validate the assembly.The results demonstrate that the developed prototype is functional,as well as the developed kinematic equation, given the smallerror presented at the end of the validation procedure.
Influencing elements of technological adoption: Case study about management in an educational institution

This study sought to analyze, from the point of view of educational managers, and based on the TOE framework, the determinants, boosters, and creators of barriers to the adoption and implementation of information and communication technologies within an educational institution. A qualitative, descriptive, and exploratory study was conducted, adopting the single case study as the research strategy. The data were collected through interviews, documentary research, and direct observations, later submitted to content analysis. Considering the TOE framework, the results demonstrate that the main determinants of technological adoption are linked to the environmental context; that the boosting elements are arranged in the organizational context; and that the elements that create barriers involve the organizational and environmental contexts.
Application of discontinuity layout optimization method to bearing capacity of shallow foundations on rock masses

The discontinuity layout optimization (DLO) method is applied to obtain the bearing capacity of rock masses where it is necessary to consider a non‐linear resistance law. In rock mechanics, it is widely accepted the modified Hoek & Brown failure criterion, developed for homogeneous and isotropic rock masses. The results obtained with the DLO method are compared with those obtained from the analytical solution and using the finite differences method (FDM). To validate the DLO numerical method, the same hypotheses of the analytical solution are adopted: plane strain conditions, associated flow rule, Hoek & Brown material, and weightless rock. The research analyses the results of a numerical and analytical study based on a sensitivity study varying the three parameters that characterize the rock mass (rock type, uniaxial compressive strength, and geological strength index) and shows the need to adopt an adequate linearization of the non‐linear failure criterion in the numerical calculations. Furthermore, numerical results are obtained considering the self‐weight of the rock mass, using both DLO, considering the intermediate secant linearization proposed in this investigation, and FDM, implemented in a widely accepted geotechnical software. After comparing the results, the advantages and limitations of the DLO method are pointed out.
The relationship between cognitive function and performance in instrumental activities of daily living in older adults

Introduction Deficits in cognition have been found to be associated with problems in performing daily activities; however, it is unknown what specific domains of cognition are related to each daily activity. Method Thirty-six occupational therapists identified the 20 most important instrumental activities of daily living for older adults and the cognitive demands required. Thirty-two older adults rated the perceived mental effort when performing these activities. They were assessed on their cognitive functions. Descriptive statistics were used to report the results. The Pearson correlation coefficient was used to identify relationships between cognitive functions and perceived mental effort. Results Activities relating to ‘communication’, ‘financial management’, ‘health management’ and ‘safety and emergency management’ require more cognitive demands. Results from the older adults showed the highest significant correlations in immediate memory and ‘paying bills’ (r = 0.54), delayed memory and ‘following emergency procedures’ and ‘paying bills’ (rs = 0.52), and executive functioning and ‘making and keeping medical appointments’ (r = −0.49). Conclusion Findings contribute to the emerging understanding of specific cognitive domains related to the instrumental activities of daily living. The results can be used to reframe and improve intervention strategies for individuals with cognitive decline to maintain or improve performance in daily activities.
DFT Study of Interaction of Azoles with Cu(111) and Al(111) Surfaces: Role of Azole Nitrogen Atoms and Dipole–Dipole Interactions

Azoles and their derivatives are among the often used organic corrosion inhibitors for copper. For this reason, the adsorption of four azole molecules—imidazole, 1,2,3-triazole, tetrazole, and pentazole—on Cu(111) and Al(111) surfaces has been studied and characterized using density functional theory (DFT) calculations. We find that the molecules weakly adsorb in an upright geometry onto the top site of Cu(111) via single nitrogen atom; except for triazole the bonding with two nitrogen atoms to a bridge site becomes slightly preferred at very low coverage. Molecular electronic structure is only weakly perturbed upon adsorption and the molecule–surface interaction involves the hybridization between molecular σ orbitals and metal states, yet the main contribution to bonding comes from the electrostatic dipole interactions due to a large dipole moment of azole molecules. Also, the lateral intermolecular repulsion can be significant and very long ranged. With increasing the number of nitrogen atoms in azole r.
A survey of traditional and advanced automatic modulation classification techniques, challenges, and some novel trends

Automatic modulation classification (AMC) is an important stage in intelligent wireless communication receivers. It is a necessary process after signal detection, and before demodulation. It plays a vital role in various applications. Blind modulation classification is a very difficult task without information about the transmitted signal and the receiver parameters like carrier frequency, signal power, timing information, phase offset, existence of frequency‐selective multipath fading, and time‐varying channels in real‐world applications. The AMC methods are divided into traditional and advanced methods. Traditional methods include likelihood‐based (LB) and feature‐based (FB) methods. The advanced methods include deep learning (DL) methods. In addition, the AMC methods are used to classify different modulation schemes such as ASK, PSK, FSK, PAM, and QAM with different orders and different signal‐to‐noise ratios (SNRs). This paper focuses on summarizing the AMC methoods, comparing between them, presenting the commercial software packages for AMC, and finally considering the new challenges in the implementation of AMC.
Allopreening in the Black‐browed Albatross (
 Thalassarche
 melanophris
 ): an exploration of patterns and possible functions

The functions of display between breeding pairs of animals have been given little attention outside of sexual selection. Yet evidence suggests that display between partners is in fact most commonly observed following mate choice, and is often just as elaborate. In many bird species, allopreening, when one member of a pair preens the other, is a major component of display both pre-and post-pair formation. Despite this, there has been little investigation into its functions. Explanations that have been put forward tend to focus on its role in feather hygiene, which has limited phylogenetic support, or its function in the maintenance of the pair bond, though how this might occur or indeed what this actually represents has not been adequately explained. Phylogenetic evidence reveals that allopreening is most commonly observed in those species exhibiting high levels of partner retention and biparental care, and it appears to be functional in maintaining cooperation in parental behaviour in at least one species. In our observational study, we explored the patterns and putative functions of allopreening during the nest-relief displays of breeding pairs of Black-browed Albatrosses Thalassarche melanophris during incubation and chick-provisioning. Allopreening was an important feature of displays, constituting 30% of display time. We found that the bird returning from its foraging trip usually initiated allopreening, and preened more than its partner prior to change-over of nesting duties. We further found a positive relationship between the amount of time the pair spent in display and the duration of the subsequent foraging trip, providing tentative support for a function in maintaining cooperative parental behaviour between the parents. Although we cannot be conclusive as to its exact functions, we add to a limited literature the ﬁ rst exploration of functions for this conspicuous behaviour in albatrosses.
Linking spatial self-organization to community assembly and biodiversity

Drier climates impose environmental stresses on plant communities that may result in community reassembly and threatened ecosystem services, but also may trigger self-organization in spatial patterns of biota and resources, which act to relax these stresses. The complex relationships between these counteracting processes – community reassembly and spatial self-organization – have hardly been studied. Using a spatio-temporal model of dryland plant communities and a trait-based approach, we study the response of such communities to imposed water stress of increasing degrees. We first show that spatial patterning acts to reverse shifts from fast-growing species to stress-tolerant species, as well as to reverse functional-diversity loss. We then show that spatial re-patterning buffers the impact of further stress on community structure. Finally, we identify multistability ranges of uniform and patterned community states and use them to propose forms of non-uniform ecosystem management that integrate the need for provisioning ecosystem services with the need to preserve community structure.
Genipin‐crosslinked chitosan hydrogels: Preliminary evaluation of the in vitro biocompatibility and biodegradation

Funding information Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, Grant/Award Number: EP/N033655/1; Research Excellence Academy, Newcastle University Abstract Genipin-crosslinked chitosan hydrogels have gained attention as promising drug delivery vehicles. To bring them one step closer to clinical applications, this study evaluates the hydrogels' in vitro biocompatibility and biodegradation. Cytotoxicity test on 3T3 fibroblasts shows that the cells retain normal adhesive properties and high viability on gels with 3.1 and 4.4 mM genipin but not on gels with 1.7 mM genipin. The hydrogels with highest genipin content (4.4 mM) are studied further in the presence of RAW 264.7 macrophages and DC 2.4 dendritic cells. In both cases, cell viability is preserved and interferon-β gene transcription is enhanced while over-production of five inflammatory cytokines is not detected, suggesting the hydrogels' immune stimulating property and potential as vaccine carriers. The biodegradation is monitored efficiently using the hydrogels' intrinsic fluorescence upon crosslinking with genipin. Addition of poly (ethylene glycol) to form a semiinterpenetrating hydrogel is found to enhance the cytocompatibility to 3T3 cells and delay the degradation. Collectively, our findings suggest that chitosan-genipin hydrogels can be considered as biocompatible materials, with great potential for vaccine delivery applications.