Boundary singularities of N -harmonic functions

We construct N-harmonic functions in a domain with one isolated singularity on the boundary of the domain. By using solutions of the spherical p-harmonic spectral problem, we give an inductive method to produce a large variety of separable p-harmonic functions.Comment: 14 pages. To appear in Communications in Partial Differential equation

The Untold Story of the Clones: Content-agnostic Factors that Impact YouTube Video Popularity

Video dissemination through sites such as YouTube can have widespread impacts on opinions, thoughts, and cultures. Not all videos will reach the same popularity and have the same impact. Popularity differences arise not only because of differences in video content, but also because of other "content-agnostic" factors. The latter factors are of considerable interest but it has been difficult to accurately study them. For example, videos uploaded by users with large social networks may tend to be more popular because they tend to have more interesting content, not because social network size has a substantial direct impact on popularity. In this paper, we develop and apply a methodology that is able to accurately assess, both qualitatively and quantitatively, the impacts of various content-agnostic factors on video popularity. When controlling for video content, we observe a strong linear "rich-get-richer" behavior, with the total number of previous views as the most important factor except for very young videos. The second most important factor is found to be video age. We analyze a number of phenomena that may contribute to rich-get-richer, including the first-mover advantage, and search bias towards popular videos. For young videos we find that factors other than the total number of previous views, such as uploader characteristics and number of keywords, become relatively more important. Our findings also confirm that inaccurate conclusions can be reached when not controlling for content.Comment: Dataset available at: http://www.ida.liu.se/~nikca/papers/kdd12.htm

Boundary Harnack inequality and a priori estimates of singular solutions of quasilinear elliptic equations

We extend some classical results dealing with boundary Harnack inequatilities to a class of quasilinear elliptic equations and derive some new estimates for solutions of such equations with an isolated singularity on the boundary of a domain.Comment: 17 page

EFFECTS OF CORPORAL PUNISHMENT ON PARENTS

There has been limited research regarding the effects of corporal punishment on parents. This qualitative study examined the effects of corporal punishment on parents and the reasoning behind their particular discipline practices. The study provides an overview of the thoughts and emotions parents feel before and after utilizing corporal punishment. The data were collected through interviews of parents who utilized corporal punishment as their main form of discipline. We interviewed parents through Zoom meetings in order to gather data that would help this study. Researchers interviewed eight parents who expressed the effects they experienced from utilizing corporal punishment. Analysis of the interviews found that parents utilized corporal punishment due to different factors such as generational use of corporal punishment, emotional stressors, personal daily life stressors, or lack of knowledge of other forms of discipline. We found that parents regretfully utilized corporal punishment and viewed it as a negative form of discipline. Parents were interested in looking for alternative forms of discipline to utilize in order to have their children grow and be independent individuals in society

A Lightweight Security Protocol for NFC-based Mobile Payments

© 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V. In this work, we describe a security solution that can be used to securely establish mobile payment transactions over the Near-Field Communication (NFC) radio interface. The proposed solution is very lightweight one; it uses symmetric cryptographic primitives on devices having memory and CPU resources limitations. We show that our approach maintains the security of NFC communications and we further demonstrate that our solution is simple, scalable, cost-effective, and incurs minimal computational processing overheads

DocCert: Nostrification, Document Verification and Authenticity Blockchain Solution

Many institutions and organizations require nostrification and verification of qualification as a prerequisite for hiring. The idea is to recognize the authenticity of a copy or digital document issued by an institution in a foreign country and detect forgeries. Certificates, financial records, health records, official papers and others are often required to be attested from multiple entities in distinct locations. However, in this digital era where most applications happen online, and document copies are uploaded, the traditional signature and seal methods are obsolete. In a matter of minutes and with a simple photo editor, a certificate or document copy may be plagiarized or forged. Blockchain technology offers a decentralized approach to record and verify transactions without the need for huge infrastructure investment. In this paper, we propose a blockchain based nostrification system, where awarding institutions generate a digital certificate, store in a public but permissioned blockchain, where students and other stakeholders may verify. We present a thorough discussion and formal evaluation of the proposed system.Comment: The Fifth International Conference on Blockchain Computing and Applications (BCCA 2023), held in Conjunction with Kuwait Fintech and Blockchain Summit 2023, 24,26 Oct 2023, Kuwait City, Kuwai

تقويم الأداء التدريسي لأعضاء الهيئة التدريسية في كلية التربية في جامعة تشرين من وجهة نظر الطلبة

تهدفَ الدراسة إلى التعرف على واقع الأداء التدريسي لأعضاء الهيئة التدريسية من وجهة نظر الطلبة في جامعة تشرين، وقد تم استخدام المنهج الوصفي التحليلي، حيث استخدمت استبانة مكونة من (30) فقرة موزعة على المجالات التالية: الإعداد والتخطيط للتدريس، البحث العلمي، القياس والتقويم، الحوار والمناقشة مع الطلبة، وتكونت عينة الدراسة من (811) طالباً وطالبة، تم اختيارهم بطريقة عشوائية من طلبة كلية التربية في جامعة تشرين. وتوصلت الدراسة إلى أن متوسط  تقييم واقع الأداء التدريسي لأعضاء هيئة التدريس في كلية التربية في جامعة تشرين قد بلغ (3.60)، بدرجة كبيرة، وكشفت النتائج عن عدم وجود فروق في تقديرات طلبة كلية التربية في جامعة تشرين لواقع الأداء التدريسي لأعضاء هيئة التدريس تعزى لمتغير الجنس، والمستوى الدراسي، ووجدت فروق  في تقديراتهم تعزى لمتغير البحث العلمي، والحوار والمناقشة مع الطلبة

Characterizing popularity dynamics of online videos

Online popularity has a major impact on videos, music, news and other contexts in online systems. Characterizing online popularity dynamics is nature to explain the observed properties in terms of the already acquired popularity of each individual. In this paper, we provide a quantitative, large scale, temporal analysis of the popularity dynamics in two online video-provided websites, namely MovieLens and Netflix. The two collected data sets contain over 100 million records and even span a decade. We characterize that the popularity dynamics of online videos evolve over time, and find that the dynamics of the online video popularity can be characterized by the burst behaviors, typically occurring in the early life span of a video, and later restricting to the classic preferential popularity increase mechanism

Hydrothermal conversion of micro-algae as new biomaterials for pavement

Bitumen is a non-renewable petroleum-derived product whose market is under pressure due to the fossil fuel depletion and the environmental pollution concerns. It is therefore important to anticipate the replacement of this material, heavy fraction of petroleum distillation, used mostly in road construction as a matrix of an aggregate composite material. In that context, it is necessary to look for alternatives or substitution products and find processes that can valorize new renewable biomasses. Please click Additional Files below to see the full abstract