cometadata/datacite-rtg-text-other-reclassification-records huggingface dataset:
PIPO-Net: A Penalty-based Independent Parameters Optimization Deep Unfolding Network
Creators: name: Li, Xiumei
name: Zhang, Zhijie
name: Bai, Huang
name: Stanković, Ljubiša
name: Hao, Junpeng
name: Sun, Junmei
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Signal Processing (eess.SP)
subject: FOS: Electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering

description: Compressive sensing (CS) has been widely applied in signal and image processing fields. Traditional CS reconstruction algorithms have a complete theoretical foundation but suffer from the high computational complexity, while fashionable deep network-based methods can achieve high-accuracy reconstruction of CS but are short of interpretability. These facts motivate us to develop a deep unfolding network named the penalty-based independent parameters optimization network (PIPO-Net) to combine the merits of the above mentioned two kinds of CS methods. Each module of PIPO-Net can be viewed separately as an optimization problem with respective penalty function. The main characteristic of PIPO-Net is that, in each round of training, the learnable parameters in one module are updated independently from those of other modules. This makes the network more flexible to find the optimal solutions of the corresponding problems. Moreover, the mean-subtraction sampling and the high-frequency complementary blocks are developed to improve the performance of PIPO-Net. Experiments on reconstructing CS images demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed PIPO-Net.
Study of the Instability and Dynamics of Detonation Waves using Fickett's Analogue to the Reactive Euler Equations
Creators: name: Tang, Justin
Publisher: name: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa
Year: 2013
Subjects: Fickett
Fickett's model
detonation analogue
detonation instability

description: The instability behaviour of detonation waves are studied using Fickett's model with a 2-step reaction model with separately controlled induction and reaction zones. This model acts as a simplified toy-model to the reactive Euler equations allowing for more clarity of the detonation phenomenon. We numerically simulate a 1D self-supported detonation and investigate the pulsating instability behaviour. We are able to clarify the governing mechanism behind the pulsations through a characteristic analysis describing the coupling that takes place between the amplification of the compressions waves and the alteration to the induction timing. We examine the acceleration phase of the pulsations and determine an analytical solution to describe the strength of the amplification. Fickett's model is as well shown to reproduce the same period doubling bifurcation with increasing sensitivity of the induction rate, and route to chaos as seen in the full reactive Euler equations.
Pinning of Vortices by impurities in Unconventional superconductors
Creators: name: Mahato, Chiranjit
name: Yang, Kun
name: Ghosal, Amit
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Superconductivity (cond-mat.supr-con)
subject: Strongly Correlated Electrons (cond-mat.str-el)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We carry out a microscopic study of a vortex lattice in a strongly correlated, type-II, d-wave superconductor(SC) using Bogoliubov de Gennes (BDG) formalism. In weak-coupling theory, commonly accepted truism is that a vortex binds to impurity. We demonstrate that in unconventional SCs, the binding of vortex to an impurity depends on relevant parameters. In particular, we illustrate such dependency on the sign of impurity, i.e. attractive or repulsive, as well as doping. We emphasize that this seemingly unanticipated behavior arises from strong correlation effects and is absent in weak coupling descriptions.
description: 10 pages, 8 figures
Advanced unsteady aerodynamics and numerical modelling in axial turbine rim sealing flows
Creators: name: PALERMO, DONATO MARIA
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2021

description: This thesis presents CFD assessments of axial turbine chute rim sealing flows. Firstly, a systematic study of the performance of an axial turbine chute rim seal using unsteady Reynolds averaged Navier Stokes (URANS) methods is reported. This extends previous studies from a configuration without external flow in the main annulus to cases with a circumferentially uniform axial flow and vane generated swirling annulus flow (but without rotor blades). This includes variation of the mean seal to rotor velocity ratio, main annulus to rotor velocity ratio, and seal clearance. The effects on the unsteady flow structures and the degree of main annulus flow ingestion into the rim seal cavity are examined. Sealing effectiveness is quantified by modeling a passive scalar, and the timescales for the convergence of this solution are considered. It is found that intrinsic flow unsteadiness occurs in most cases, with the presence of vanes and external flow modifying the associated flow structures and frequencies. Some sensitivities to the annulus flow conditions are identified. The circumferential pressure asymmetry generated by the vanes has a clear influence on the flow structure but does not lead to higher ingestion rates than the other conditions studied at high rotational Reynolds numbers.
description: Next, the wall modelled large eddy simulation (WMLES) methodology is considered since it requires considerably less computational resources compared to wall resolved LES, and has the potential for extension to representative engine conditions. Therefore, this methodology is implemented, validated and adapted for the assessment of the sealing effectiveness at representative experimental test conditions. The WMLES approach is shown to be effective, giving significant improvements over an eddy viscosity turbulence model in prediction of rim seal effectiveness compared to research rig measurements. When the cavity is not fully sealed, all the WMLES solutions show rotating inertial waves in the chute seal. Good agreement between WMLES and measurements for sealing effectiveness in the configuration without vanes is found at relatively low and medium sealing flow rates. For cases with vanes fitted, the WMLES simulation predicted a lower ingress compared to the measurements in the inner part of cavity and possible reasons of these mismatches can be explained by the use of a limited sector size and from the failure of WMLES to capture the flow separation in the mid part of the cavity.
description: Finally, for the vaned configuration, a CFD assessment of the purge flow distribution over the main annulus is reported and compared against experimental measurements at a representative turbine rotor blade leading edge axial position. WMLES has proven to be effective in the resolution of the turbulence associated with the interaction between the main annulus and cavity flow as opposed to URANS in which the sealing flow is mostly entrained on the rotor hub boundary layer.
Discursive Politics of Studentship: Representation of Higher Education Students in the News Media Across Europe
Creators: name: Lainio, Anu Ida Emilia
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2024

description: The number of higher education students (HE) has significantly grown in recent decades, yet the extent to which understandings of ‘the student’ are shared nationally and globally is not clear. Existing scholarship on this topic centres on social actors within HE, but matters related to students are not confined to its circles alone – they are also discussed in mainstream media. Representation of HE students in the news media remains an under-researched area, with a notable absence of cross-national comparative analyses. This study explores how students are constructed in the news media within and across six European states: Denmark, England, Germany, Ireland, Poland and Spain. Drawing inspiration from post-structuralist discourse theory, it involves a textual analysis of 1159 news articles published between 2014-2016 in 12 different tabloid or broadsheet national newspapers. The analysis indicates that the constructions of students in the news media are multiple and complex. It reveals important commonalities in the understandings of students within and across the national contexts, while also documenting significant enduring differences between nations, and to a lesser extent, within them. These findings contest arguments about a strong convergence of understandings of HE students in Europe. I argue that what it means to be a student is represented in the news media in contingent and, at times, contradictory ways, constituted through political and ideological negotiations. These negotiations of what it means to be a student can be understood as a discursive politics of studentship in action, determining who is deemed a legitimate student, which activities are considered acceptable, and what expectations and values are placed on current and future students. This contingent and contradictory representation of studentship in the news media can have implications for the public perception of students within and beyond HE, as well as for students’ everyday lives as they navigate this discursive space.
Responsabilità “amministrativa” ex d. lgs. n. 231 del 2001 ed enti ecclesiastici civilmente riconosciuti
Creators: name: Fondaroli, Desirée
name: Astrologo, Annamaria
name: Silvestri, Giuseppe
Publisher: name: Stato, Chiese e pluralismo confessionale
Year: 2012

description: Contributo sottoposto a valutazione SOMMARIO: 1. Premessa - 2. Gli enti ecclesiastici civilmente riconosciuti - 3. (segue) Natura giuridica. Le attività di “religione o di culto” e le “attività diverse” – 4. (segue) L’ente ecclesiastico civilmente riconosciuto che svolge attività d’impresa – 5. Brevi riflessioni in ordine alla riconducibilità degli enti ecclesiastici al novero dei “soggetti” di cui all’art. 1 d.lgs. n. 231 del 2001 - 6. (segue) Gli enti ecclesiastici e la disciplina della responsabilità “amministrativa” dei soggetti collettivi: i reati-presupposto commessi all’estero.ABSTRACT: This research is focused on bodies’ administrative liability ex d. lgs. n. 231 del 2001 and ecclesiastical boards which are civilly recognized. In particular we examine Italian regulations suitable for the mentioned boards. As a consequence we try to find the limits of d. lgs. n. 231 del 2001 application’s. This legislative decree regulates bodies’ liability for unlawful administrative (but substantial penal) acts relating to offences. The provisions set out therein apply to corporate entities and companies and associations including those which are not bodies corporate. However, the decree do not mention any ecclesiastical boards which are civilly recognized.KEYWORDS: Ecclesiastical boards which are civilly recognized; Personae iuridicae canonicae; d.lgs. n. 231 del 2001.
description: Stato, Chiese e pluralismo confessionale, 2012: 10 dicembre
Barriers and drivers to capacity-building in global mental health projects
Creators: name: Endale, Tarik
name: Qureshi, Onaiza
name: Ryan, Grace K.
name: Esponda, Georgina M.
name: Verhey, Ruth
name: Eaton, Julian
name: De Silva, Mary
name: Murphy, Jill K.
Publisher: name: BioMed Central
Year: 2020

description: Background: The global shortage of mental health workers is a significant barrier to the implementation and scale-up of mental health services. Partially as a result of this shortage, approximately 85% of people with mental, neurological and substance-use disorders in low- and middle-income countries do not receive care. Consequently, developing and implementing scalable solutions for mental health capacity-building has been identified as a priority in global mental health. There remains limited evidence to inform best practices for capacity building in global mental health. As one in a series of four papers on factors affecting the implementation of mental health projects in low- and middle-income countries, this paper reflects on the experiences of global mental health grantees funded by Grand Challenges Canada, focusing on the barriers to and drivers of capacity-building. Methods: Between June 2014 and May 2017, current or former Grand Challenges Canada Global Mental Health grantees were recruited using purposive sampling. N = 29 grantees participated in semi-structured qualitative interviews, representing projects in Central America and the Caribbean (n = 4), South America (n = 1), West Africa (n = 4), East Africa (n = 6), South Asia (n = 11) and Southeast Asia (n = 3). Based on the results of a quantitative analysis of project outcomes using a portfolio-level Theory of Change framework, six key themes were identified as important to implementation success. As part of a larger multi-method study, this paper utilized a framework analysis to explore the themes related to capacity-building. Results: Study participants described barriers and facilitators to capacity building within three broad themes: (1) training, (2) supervision, and (3) quality assurance. Running throughout these thematic areas were the crosscutting themes of contextual understanding, human resources, and sustainability. Additionally, participants described approaches and mechanisms for successful capacity building. Conclusions: This study demonstrates the importance of capacity building to global mental health research and implementation, its relationship to stakeholder engagement and service delivery, and the implications for funders, implementers, and researchers alike. Investment in formative research, contextual understanding, stakeholder engagement, policy influence, and integration into existing systems of education and service delivery is crucial for the success of capacity building efforts.
Piecewise convex embeddability on linear orders
Creators: name: Iannella, Martina
name: Marcone, Alberto
name: Ros, Luca Motto
name: Weinstein, Vadim
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Logic (math.LO)
subject: Combinatorics (math.CO)
subject: FOS: Mathematics
subject: 03E15, 06A05, 06A07

description: Given a nonempty set $\mathcal{L}$ of linear orders, we say that the linear order $L$ is $\mathcal{L}$-convex embeddable into the linear order $L'$ if it is possible to partition $L$ into convex sets indexed by some element of $\mathcal{L}$ which are isomorphic to convex subsets of $L'$ ordered in the same way. This notion generalizes convex embeddability and (finite) piecewise convex embeddability (both studied in arXiv:2309.09910), which are the special cases $\mathcal{L} = \{\mathbf{1}\}$ and $\mathcal{L} = \mathsf{Fin}$. We focus mainly on the behavior of these relations on the set of countable linear orders, first characterizing when they are transitive, and hence a quasi-order. We then study these quasi-orders from a combinatorial point of view, and analyze their complexity with respect to Borel reducibility. Finally, we extend our analysis to uncountable linear orders.
description: 34 pages
CSO (Canadian Society of Otolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery) position paper on rhinologic and skull base surgery during the COVID-19 pandemic
Creators: name: Chan, Yvonne
name: Banglawala, Sarfaraz M
name: Chin, Christopher J
name: Côté, David W J
name: Dalgorf, Dustin
name: De Almeida, John R
name: Desrosiers, Martin
name: Gall, Richard M
name: Gevorgyan, Artur
name: Hassan Hassan, A.
name: Janjua, Arif
name: Lee, John M
name: Leung, Randy M
name: Mechor, Bradford D
name: Mertz, Dominik
name: Monteiro, Eric
name: Nayan, Smriti
name: Rotenberg, Brian
name: Scott, John
name: Smith, Kristine A
name: Sommer, Doron D
name: Sowerby, Leigh
name: Tewfik, Marc A
name: Thamboo, Andrew
name: Vescan, Allan
name: Witterick, Ian J
Publisher: name: BioMed Central
Year: 2020

description: Healthcare services in many countries have been partially or completely disrupted by the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic since its onset in the end of 2019. Amongst the most impacted are the elective medical and surgical services in order to conserve resources to care for COVID-19 patients. As the number of infected patients decrease across Canada, elective surgeries are being restarted in a staged manner. Since Otolaryngologists – Head & Neck Surgeons manage surgical diseases of the upper aerodigestive tract where the highest viral load reside, it is imperative that these surgeries resume in a safe manner. The aim of this document is to compile the current best evidence available and provide expert consensus on the safe restart of rhinologic and skull base surgeries while discussing the pre-operative, intra-operative, and post-operative care and tips. Risk assessment, patient selection, case triage, and pre-operative COVID-19 testing will be analyzed and discussed. These guidelines will also consider the optimal use of personal protective equipment for specific cases, general and specific operative room precautions, and practical tips of intra-operative maneuvers to optimize patient and provider safety. Given that the literature surrounding COVID-19 is rapidly evolving, these recommendations will serve to start our specialty back into elective rhinologic surgeries over the next months and they may change as we learn more about this disease.
Essays on Power in Digital Platforms
Creators: name: Harracá, Martín
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2023

description: This thesis investigates power in a new organisational form: the digital platform. Platforms have disrupted our societies by creating and coordinating novel, flexible, and shifting forms of social interaction, changing how we trade, work, and communicate. The profound and abrupt economic transformation brought by platform companies like Amazon, Google, and Meta, while carrying initial expectations of increased freedom of choice, higher social cohesion, and power distribution, was soon shadowed by the growing evidence of platform power concentration and abuse. This research critically examines the characteristics and dynamics of power within digital platforms, specifically focusing on platforms’ organising structures and influence.

description:

description: This problem is approached from three different dimensions. The first dimension pertains to the structure of social interactions, recognising the mechanisms through which platforms shape power relations and autonomy by influencing agents’ interactions and modulating participatory practices. The subsequent dimension is centred on the platform's governance, contrasting the principles guiding the governance and how it is enacted, and how this shapes power dynamics within the platform. Lastly, the third dimension focuses on the interplay between firms, assessing the extent of influence wielded by the platform's owner in directing shifts in the value creation and capture strategies of other participant firms.

description:

description: Each dimension of the research problem is addressed in one study in a dedicated chapter, after charting the foundational concepts that characterise digital platforms and summarising extant research on platform power. The first study is based exclusively on conceptual development, while the second and third are a qualitative case study of the Amazon Marketplace, focused on Amazon’s and the sellers’ practices and how these affect each other.
description: Overall, this thesis contributes to advancing our knowledge of how we understand platforms and provides new ways to characterise platform power, its dynamics, and its consequences.
Ubiquitous Biofeedback Multimedia Systems
Creators: name: Al Osman, Hussein
Publisher: name: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa
Year: 2014
Subjects: Biofeedback
Heart Rate Variability
Serious Games
Ubiquitous Biofeedback
Games for Health
Health Informatics

description: Human wellbeing, in a large component, relies on the harmony between the body and the mind. Unfortunately, we often miss or ignore important signals from our bodies, and sometimes this can negatively impact our health. Therefore, the use of intelligent systems that grasp such signals and convey them in an intuitive manner to our minds can result in great health benefits. In this Thesis, we introduce a family of multimedia technologies and techniques aimed at realizing such systems. We call them: Ubiquitous Biofeedback Multimedia Systems. Although the notion of clinical biofeedback has been around for years, we introduce the concept of Ubiquitous Biofeedback where the biofeedback operation is given geographical and temporal ubiquity attributes. A Ubiquitous Biofeedback reference model is introduced in the Thesis to provide an abstract structural representation of the various components at play in a typical non-clinical biofeedback environment. Two systems that implement the reference model’s components are presented. These systems implement the concept of Ubiquitous Biofeedback through the introduction of innovative stress management methods. An important component of these systems guides users through a relaxation routine. Therefore, a mathematical model is developed in the goal of personalizing the relaxation process. Its objective is to suggest relaxation techniques to a user during a stressful episode based on her or his preferences, history of what worked well and appropriateness for the context. The mental stress monitoring mechanism built into the Ubiquitous Biofeedback systems presented in this Thesis relies on the measurement of Heart Rate Variability (HRV). Therefore, HRV based methods for tracking mental stress accumulation and acute manifestations during long term monitoring have been devised. Also, since HRV signals can be plagued by artifacts, several algorithms are contributed to the effort of correcting such occurrences.
Relative Rota-Baxter operators of weight 0 on groups, pre-groups, braces, the Yang-Baxter equation and $T$-structures
Creators: name: Li, Yunnan
name: Sheng, Yunhe
name: Tang, Rong
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Mathematical Physics (math-ph)
subject: Group Theory (math.GR)
subject: Rings and Algebras (math.RA)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences
subject: FOS: Mathematics

description: In this paper, we study relative Rota-Baxter operators of weight $0$ on groups and give various examples. In particular, we propose different approaches to study Rota-Baxter operators of weight $0$ on groups and Lie groups. We establish various explicit relations among relative Rota-Baxter operators of weight $0$ on groups, pre-groups, braces, set-theoretic solutions of the Yang-Baxter equation and $T$-structures.
description: 21 pages
Lo status giuridico degli insegnanti di religione cattolica
Creators: name: Bettetini, Andrea
Publisher: name: Stato, Chiese e pluralismo confessionale
Year: 2012

description: Il contributo, sottoposto a valutazione, riproduce il testo della relazione tenuta al Convegno nazionale ADEC "Insegnamenti e insegnanti di religione nella scuola pubblica italiana" (Catanzaro, 25-27 ottobre 2012); destinato alla pubblicazione nei relativi atti, si anticipa per gentile concessione dei Curatori.SOMMARIO: 1. Uguaglianza sostanziale e parità di trattamento nell’insegnamento della religione – 2. Il regime giuridico dei docenti di religione nella scuola pubblica statale. L’idoneità canonica all’insegnamento della religione cattolica – 3. Rilevanza civile del provvedimento canonico di idoneità e controlli dello Stato – 4. Analogia (identità e diversità) del docente di religione cattolica con i docenti della materie curriculari – 5. La mobilità degli insegnanti di religione (art. 4, 3° comma l. 186 del 2003) – 6. Conclusioni.
description: Stato, Chiese e pluralismo confessionale, 2012: 17 dicembre
Perspectives on remote medical interpreting: a mixed-methods approach
Creators: name: Zhang, Wei
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2023

description: This research focuses on remote medical interpreting (RMI). Drawing on a mixed-methods design, it develops a panoramic picture of RMI research and practice with a view to developing a future research agenda. Stage-1 of the research provides an in-depth critical review of contemporary RMI literature relying on an innovative use of qualitative analytical tools, gathering secondary evidence of patients’, medical providers’ and interpreters’ perspectives. Stage-2 is a subsequent international survey (questionnaire, follow-up interviews) informed by the Stage-1 findings, obtaining primary evidence of interpreters’ perspectives. The Stage-1 was instrumental in developing a first preliminary taxonomy of RMI, and in identifying and ranking eight themes reflecting the most researched aspects of RMI. Furthermore, several research gaps and shortcomings of contemporary RMI research were identified, e.g., a lack of description of RMI configurations and of telephone interpreting (TI)/ video interpreting (VI) specific benefits or challenges, and the limited coverage of geographic regions and speciality settings. The Stage-2 survey (questionnaire sample N=47, interview subsample n=16) is the largest survey of interpreters working in RMI within the field of public service interpreting studies to date, providing a panorama of current practice: healthcare interpreters frequently work in both TI and VI while experiencing a wide range of interlocutor distributions and technologies; within this variety, interpreters encounter four similar normative configurations of interlocutor distribution in both TI/VI, but using slightly different normative technologies; VI gained overall more positive evaluation than TI in relation to six aspects of RMI practice, including the interpreting in/output processes (suggesting five potential factors important to the interpreter’s practice of RMI), rapport, concentration, stress, and fatigue; apart from the preponderance of shared challenges over benefits, the respective pros and cons of the two modalities suggest that they are suitable for settings of different medical specialities and/or communicative goals; the COVID-19 pandemic aggravated shared prominent challenges in TI/VI (e.g. sound quality issues, provider/patient lack of training in technology or appropriate behaviours). The two-stage combined findings indicate further need to confirm and explore the RMI configurations, the factors affecting the interpreter’s practice of RMI, and the suitability of TI/VI to different medical settings.
Few-Shot Image Anomaly Detection in Manufacturing
Creators: name: Xie, Guoyang
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2024

description: Image anomaly detection (IAD) is an important computer vision task for industrial man- ufacturing applications like battery surface anomaly detection, ceramic defect detection, food inspection, and so on. In the computer vision community, there is a primary focus on unsupervised methods, but few of them are used in real manufacturing. Because there is little analysis of the industry’s needs, i.e, the number of training images are limited. Because of this, it is important and urgent to design a few-shot IAD algorithm to adapt the demands of industrial manufacturing. Accordingly, this thesis aims to fill the above gaps.

description:

description: To begin with, we propose a uniform benchmark to assess the capability of the existing IAD algorithms, which includes several aspects, i.e., few-shot learning, continual learning, noisy labels, various levels of supervision, memory usage, and inference speed. Specifically, we skillfully build a comprehensive image anomaly detection benchmark (IM-IAD) with 16 algorithms on 7 mainstream datasets with few-shot anomaly detection scenarios. Our ex- tensive experiments (17,017 in total) provide in-depth insights for few-shot IAD algorithm redesign or selection. Next, the proposed benchmark IM-IAD gives challenges as well as directions for the future, especially for few-shot IAD.

description:

description: After that, a new feature representation method has been proposed to address the demands of manufacturing-based few-shot IAD. We reveal that the rotation-invariant feature has a significant impact on few-shot IAD. Hence, we construct a graph-based model (GraphCore) to provide a novel visual isometric invariant feature (VIIF) as an anomaly measurement feature. As a result, VIIF can robustly improve the anomaly-discriminating ability and can further remove redundant features by a significant amount. Extensive experiments on MVTec AD and MPDD verify the effectiveness of GraphCore.

description:

description: Furthermore, we tackle the problem of few-shot IAD in the changeover procedure. We introduce the COAD dataset, the first comprehensive dataset for this task. Specifically, the CO-AD dataset contains similar objects spanning 21 domains, multiple anomalies (up to 4) with different locations in a single view, and multiple defect types (up to 5) for each object. Moreover, we reveal that existing few-shot IAD methods do not perform well in COAD. To this end, we propose a simple but effective anomaly transfer method(Transfer- AD), which fully utilizes the anomalies of the source domain dataset by copy-pasting them into the normal dataset of the target domain. Comprehensive experiments on the CO-AD dataset clearly demonstrate the effectiveness of Transfer-AD.
Confessionismo e “libertad de cultos” nell’ordinamento della Repubblica Dominicana
Creators: name: Ingoglia, Antonio
Publisher: name: Stato, Chiese e pluralismo confessionale
Year: 2012

description: Contributo sottoposto a valutazioneSOMMARIO: 1. Il sistema costituzionale e concordatario – 2. Brevi cenni sulle radici storiche del confessionismo dominicano - 3. Il sindacato di costituzionalità sulle norme concordatarie, alla luce della sentenza della “Suprema Corte de Justicia” n. 6 del 2008 – 4. Verso una soluzione della questione matrimoniale: la legge n. 198 del 2011 sui matrimoni religiosi civilmente trascritti.
description: Stato, Chiese e pluralismo confessionale, 2012: 17 dicembre
Experimental Demonstration and Characterisation of Amines as Alternative Propellants for Electric Propulsion
Creators: name: Moloney, Rachel
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2023

description: Electric propulsion (EP) is a proven solution for many space applications; its low thrust and high specific impulse allows for delicate, repeatable manoeuvres and long-distance travel. However, its capabilities are limited by the available power, resulting in the continued need for chemical propulsion (CP) to perform high thrust, rapid manoeuvres. Combined chemical-electric propulsion provides an attractive solution, but the need for multiple propellants and feed systems results in increased mass, cost, and complexity of the system. In addition, established EP technologies face significant challenges with the most common propellant, xenon, due to its increasingly high cost and limited availability. This research investigates two propellants identified as “green” alternatives to hydrazine for CP in a novel application to EP, to address the need for alternative propellants to alleviate the reliance of EP on xenon, while enabling hybrid chemical-electric propulsion systems to operate on a single propellant with the potential of delivering the benefits of both CP and EP from the same propulsion architecture. The first candidate, triethylamine (TEA), was demonstrated in the 1960’s as a feasible alternative to hydrazine in CP. It presents similar mass and ionisation potential to xenon; however, its molecular nature may lead to fragmentation in EP and, thus, reduced performance. The second candidate, tripropylamine (TPA), is chemically similar to TEA and has higher mass, which may counteract any potential fragmentation.

description:

description: The propellant candidates are investigated and demonstrated for the first time with EP technology. Performance of these tertiary amines is directly measured using a pendulum-type thrust balance and characterised with a low-power Cylindrical Hall Thruster over a range of operating conditions and mass flow rates. Both propellants show overall reduced performance compared to xenon, with a decrease in thrust of ~32% (TEA) and ~22% (TPA) observed at ~100 W and 0.2 mg/s, and further reductions at higher mass flow rates. The existence of molecular fragmentation is observed within the thruster’s exhaust plume using optical emission spectroscopy and confirmed through analysis of deposits generated by the amine plasmas. The fragmentation processes occurring within the plasmas are investigated in a dedicated experimental setup, using mass spectrometry, indicating the most probable ion masses to be expected are 86 amu (TEA) and 114 amu (TPA).
supplementary figures and tables from Lineage-specific patterns of chromosome evolution are the rule not the exception in Polyneoptera insects
Creators: name: Sylvester, Terrence
name: Hjelmen, Carl E.
name: Hanrahan, Shawn J.
name: Lenhart, Paul A.
name: J. Spencer Johnston
name: Blackmon, Heath
Publisher: name: The Royal Society
Year: 2020
Subjects: subject: Evolutionary Biology
subject: FOS: Biological sciences

description: The structure of a genome can be described at its simplest by the number of chromosomes and the sex chromosome system it contains. Despite over a century of study, the evolution of genome structure on this scale remains recalcitrant to broad generalizations that can be applied across clades. To address this issue, we have assembled a dataset of 823 karyotypes from the insect group Polyneoptera. This group contains orders with a range of variations in chromosome number, and offer the opportunity to explore the possible causes of these differences. We have analysed this data using both phylogenetic and taxonomic approaches. Our analysis allows us to assess the importance of rates of evolution, phylogenetic history, sex chromosome systems, parthenogenesis and genome size on variation in chromosome number within clades. We find that fusions play a key role in the origin of new sex chromosomes, and that orders exhibit striking differences in rates of fusions, fissions and polyploidy. Our results suggest that the difficulty in finding consistent rules that govern evolution at this scale may be due to the presence of many interacting forces that can lead to variation among groups.
Economic and Environmental Performance in Bangladesh’s Manufacturing: Measurement, Policy Responses, and the Way Forward
Creators: name: Hossain, Mohammad Alamgir
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2024

description: Assessing productive efficiency is vital for enhancing the manufacturing sector’s contribution to economic and environmental sustainability. This study examines Bangladesh’s manufacturing sector, concentrating on technical and environmental performance. Through analysing measurement, dependence, and responses of performance scores to policy shifts, it uncovers reasons for the sector's limited contribution to the nation's industrial foundation. Nonparametric frontier models were employed to estimate economic and environmental efficiency, revealing compelling insights via diverse econometric techniques.

description:

description: This research has generated five types of analytical results utilising three distinct datasets – two are quantitative, and one is qualitative. The quantitative datasets comprise subsector and individual firm-level data for 2012 and 2019. The qualitative data encompasses viewpoints from 32 stakeholders.

description:

description: Results show that subsector-level average economic and environmental efficiency notably fell in recent years, with a higher disparity. Organisational practices minimally affected performance, except labour intensity. Export-oriented sectors like apparel performed poorly, while jute industries remained consistently successful.

description:

description: Individual firms also witnessed a remarkable fall in overall efficiency, reflecting dispersed performance. Larger enterprises showed dominance, while smaller ones faced marginalisation. Export processing zones excelled as prime sites, while government-private partnerships demonstrated enhanced performance. Unlike tax payments and labour intensity, incentives and social security impacted firm-level outcomes nominally. Furthermore, firms’ average environmental efficiency decreased from 0.25 in 2012 to 0.12 in 2019.

description:

description: Examining the prioritised industries classified as ‘thrust’ sectors showcased that fiscal support benefitted micro and small firms but harmed medium and large ones. Another case study found that brick manufacturing performance rose despite strict environmental regulations. Stakeholder interviews also generated background information and suggestions for future progress.

description:

description: The recommendations emphasise improving managerial skills, restoring trust in authorities, exploring diversification through jute, cocoa, and polyethene, giving special attention to micro and small firms, implementing a decentralised enforcement system, and introducing market-based tools. Additionally, industry-specific regulations should be considered.
A Novel Thiolated Hyaluronic acid Hydrogel for Spinal Cord Injury Repair
Creators: name: Li, Ruifu
Publisher: name: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa
Year: 2014
Subjects: Hyaluronic acid
Spinal cord injury

description: Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) often causes cell death, demyelination, axonal degeneration and cavitation, resulting in functional motor and sensory loss below the site of injury. In an attempt to overcome SCI, the regenerating neurons require a permissive environment to promote their ability to reconnect. We report a novel thiolated hyaluronic acid (HA) hydrogel scaffold that can be used to repair the injured spinal cord. More specifically, thiolated hyaluronic acid hydrogels with varying thiol concentrations were successfully synthesized. The amount of thiol groups was measured spectrophotometrically using Ellman’s test. HA gels with different crosslinking densities were synthesized and the water content of the hydrogels was determined. The thermal behavior of the HA gels were studied by DSC. The strength of the hydrogels with varying thiol group content was evaluated by a rheometer. In addition, in vitro enzymatic degradation was performed through submerge the hydrogels in 200U/ml of hyaluronidase solution and incubate at 37°C. According to the result of the present study, this novel hydrogel shows great potential to serve as a 3D cell-patterning scaffold which can be inserted into a hollow fiber channel that could be used to promote regeneration after the SCI.
Mid-infrared optical coherence tomography with MHz axial line rate for real-time non-destructive testing
Creators: name: Yagi, Satoko
name: Nakamura, Takuma
name: Hashimoto, Kazuki
name: Kawano, Shotaro
name: Ideguchi, Takuro
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Optics (physics.optics)
subject: Instrumentation and Detectors (physics.ins-det)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Non-destructive testing (NDT) is crucial for ensuring product quality and safety across various industries. Conventional methods such as ultrasonic, terahertz, and X-ray imaging have limitations in terms of probe-contact requirement, depth resolution, or radiation risks. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a promising alternative to solve these limitations, but it suffers from strong scattering, limiting its penetration depth. Recently, OCT in the mid-infrared (MIR) spectral region has attracted attention with a significantly lower scattering rate than in the near-infrared region. However, the highest reported A-scan rate of MIR-OCT has been 3 kHz, which requires long data acquisition time to take an image, unsatisfying industrial demands for real-time diagnosis. Here, we present a high-speed MIR-OCT system operating in the 3-4 um region that employs the swept-source OCT technique based on time-stretch infrared spectroscopy. By integrating a broadband femtosecond MIR pulsed laser operating at a repetition rate of 50 MHz, we achieved an A-scan rate of 1 MHz with an axial resolution of 11.6 um and a sensitivity of 55 dB. As a proof-of-concept demonstration, we imaged the surface of substrates covered by highly scattering paint coatings. The demonstrated A-scan rate surpasses previous state-of-the-art by more than two orders of magnitude, paving the way for real-time NDT of industrial products, cultural assets, and structures.
Varieties of historical justice
Creators: name: Neumann, Klaus
Publisher: name: Swinburne
Year: 2024

description: The Nuremberg trials were not typical of how the Allies dispensed justice after the second world war, writes Klaus Neumann, in his review of the book 'The Mauthausen Trial: American military justice in Germany', by Tomaz Jardim, published by Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 2012.
Novel Roles of SOCS3 as a Tumour Suppressor
Creators: name: Jewers, Chloe
Publisher: name: Lancaster University
Year: 2024

description: Cancer is a collection of diseases that were responsible for approximately
 ten million deaths in 2020. Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most
 common type of cancer; it occurs following the transformation of normal
 epithelial cells to adenocarcinoma which can eventually result in
 metastasis. Treatments are continuously being researched and developed,
 with immunotherapy becoming an increasingly common area of research
 against cancer. The enzyme indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) has been
 identified as a cause of tumour immune tolerance through the creation of a
 tryptophan-starved state in cells. Hence, blockers to IDO have been
 studied to test their efficacy in treating cancers. IDO blocker
 Epacadostat has been found to be effective in mice but has proven to be
 variable in success in human trials. Another IDO blocker under
 investigation is 1-methyl-D-tryptophan (1-MT). This project aimed to
 investigate the impact of the loss of tumour suppressor, SOCS3, on 1-MT
 treatment due to its ability to regulate IDO expression. SOCS3 silencing
 has been associated with some human cancers, therefore this study used
 conditional intestinal epithelial SOCS3 knockout mice (IECS3-/-) to
 recapitulate the loss of SOCS3 in intestinal adenocarcinoma. An
 azoxymethane/ dextran sodium sulphate (AOM/DSS) model was used to induce
 colon cancer and conditional knockout, or wild-type mice were administered
 either 1-MT or water. Analysis of the intestinal macrophages was performed
 using immunohistochemistry, IDO activity assessed using HPLC, and cell
 culture techniques to investigate impact of 1-MT in vitro. A decrease in
 M1 pro-inflammatory macrophages was found in the colon of IECS3 -/- 1-MT
 treated mice, and an increase in CD206+ IBA1- cells (potential immature
 dendritic cells (IDCs)) in IECS3-/- H2O treated mice. These findings
 indicate that a SOCS3 deficiency may play a role in reducing the efficacy
 of 1-MT immunotherapy treatment, presenting itself as a potential
 biomarker that could help identify patients who are likely to see improved
 prognosis following IDO-inhibitor treatment.
Table S1: Results of the model-fitting from Eyes are essential for magnetoreception in a mammal
Creators: name: Caspar, Kai R.
name: Moldenhauer, Katrin
name: Moritz, Regina E.
name: Němec, Pavel
name: E. Pascal Malkemper
name: Begall, Sabine
Publisher: name: The Royal Society
Year: 2020
Subjects: Biophysics

description: Table S1: Results of model-fitting using the CircMLE package (1) in R. The difference in the Akaike Information Criterion (delta AIC) is given with respect to a uniform (random) distribution. mN = magnetic north, tN = topographic north
Supporting International Scientific Communication: The development of a Writing Assistant powered by an Intralingual Translation Engine for users of English as a Second Language
Creators: name: Zomer, Gustavo Anselmo Da Silva
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2023

description: Academic English writing poses additional barriers for researchers with
description: English as a second language (L2 researchers), including linguistic and cognitive
description: challenges. Writing assistants offer the opportunity to offer multiple solutions in
description: an integrated environment to help writers improve their English. However,
description: existing solutions are not suitable for L2 researchers for a variety of reasons,
description: including use of L1-English training data and focus on grammar and spelling
description: checking. As such, this research proposes the development of Scrido: an L2 writing
description: assistant. The proposed tool will be first-language oriented and target an academic
description: audience, offering high-level style and usage suggestions, empowered by lexical
description: resources, and having an easy-to-use yet comprehensive user interface.

description:

description: Instead of manually crafting text improvement rules, an automated method
description: for detecting and suggesting improvements on the academic writing of L2
description: researchers was developed. The method uses machine-learning to develop an
description: intralingual neural machine translation model that translates problematic L1-
description: influenced sentences into improved English sentences. Training data was
description: automatically compiled by machine-translating the non-English text of a parallel
description: corpus and using the translated text as a proxy for L1-influenced sentences
description: aligned with the reference translation. In order to provide examples of authentic
description: usage in the scientific community and decrease the cognitive burden of referring
description: to external resources, the writing assistant also includes features developed using
description: a corpus of high-impact papers that was purpose-built for this study.

description:

description: Using both automated and human evaluation, the study indicates that
description: machine translated text can be effectively used as training data for the
description: development of an intralingual translation engine for L2 users. In addition, this
description: research revealed how user perceptions varied across participants’ demographics
description: and provided recommendations for developing further improvements in writing
description: assistants that are personalised according to users’ L2, research area, and level of
description: English.
Rank-two reflexive sheaves on the projective space with second Chern class equal to four
Creators: name: Jardim, Marcos
name: Muniz, Alan
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Algebraic Geometry (math.AG)
subject: FOS: Mathematics
subject: 14F06, 14D20

description: We study rank-two reflexive sheaves on $\mathbb{P}^3$ with $c_2 =4$, expanding on previous results for $c_2\le3$. We show that every spectrum not previously ruled out is realized. Moreover, moduli spaces are studied and described in detail for $c_1=-1$ or $0$ and $c_3\ge8$.
description: Minor changes in exposition suggested by an anonymous referee. Comments are still very welcome!
Development of an Acid Gas Adsorbent for CO2 Removal with Increased Performance in the Presence of Moisture
Creators: name: Harlick, Peter
Publisher: name: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa
Year: 2015
Subjects: MCM-41
PE-MCM-41
CO2
Amine
Silane
Grafting
humidity
adsorption

description: At the author’s request, the abstract has been removed due to the confidential nature of the thesis. It will be added once the embargo period has passed.