Adaptive NN output-feedback control for stochastic time-delay nonlinear systems with unknown control coefficients and perturbations

This paper addresses the problem of adaptive output-feedback control for more general class of stochastic time-varying delay nonlinear systems with unknown control coefficients and perturbations. By using Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional, backstepping and tuning function technique, a novel adaptive neural network (NN) output-feedback controller is constructed with fewer learning parameters. The designed controller guarantees that all the signals in the closed-loop system are 4-moment (or mean square) semi-globally uniformly ultimately bounded (SGUUB). Finally, a simulation example is shown to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control scheme

Predicting Factors that Affect East Asian Students’ Reading Proficiency in PISA

Teachers, schools, and parents contribute to equipping students with essential knowledge and skills during their education years. When students are approaching the end of their education, they are randomly selected to participate in Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) to assess their reading proficiency. Existing work on analyzing PISA achievement results concentrates solely on identifying factors related to Parent or in combination with Student. Limited work has been proposed on how factors related to Teacher and School affect the students’ reading proficiency in PISA. This study focuses on identifying the factors related to Teacher and/or School that affect East Asian students’ reading proficiency in PISA. The PISA achievement results from East Asian students are chosen as the domain study because they are consistently the top performers in PISA in the past decade. Decision Tree (DT), Naïve Bayes (NB), K-Nearest Neighbors (KNN) and Random Forest (RF) are compared. Hamming score is used as the evaluation metric. The results indicate that RF produces the best predictive models with highest Hamming score of 0.8427. Based on the findings, School-related factors such as the number of school’s disciplinary cases, size of the school, the availability of computers with Internet facilities, the quality and educational qualifications of teachers have higher impact on the PISA achievement results. The identified factors can be used as a reference in assessing the current school’s teaching, learning environment, and organizing extra activities as part of intervention programs to cultivate reading habits and enhance reading abilities among students

Exploring Online Double Deviation Effect from Psychological Contract Violation, Emotion, and Power Perspectives

Service recovery is a critical moment of truth in retaining customers and reinforcing customer relationships, and has been considered as an “Achilles\u27 heel” in online marketplaces. Poor service recoveries exacerbate the negative effects of the failure, producing a “double deviation” effect. The double deviation effect may arise from the seller’s power misuse and then dissolve the buyer-seller relationship (e.g., violate consumer psychological contract), elicit consumer negative emotions which lead to customer coping behaviors. This study links the theories of psychological contract violation (PCV), emotion, and coping from the power perspective to investigate the double deviation scenario in online auction marketplaces. Two moderators (perceived power and perceived consumer empowerment) are considered in our proposed model. Data collected from 190 consumers of one auction website provide support for the proposed model. The results shed light on what constitutes the determinants of consumer judgments while facing double deviation scenario and how consumers react to and cope with it in online marketplaces. Finally, implications and limitations are discussed in the last part of this paper. Available at: https://aisel.aisnet.org/pajais/vol6/iss1/4

ANTECEDENTS OF CITIZENSHIP BEHAVIORS IN OPEN PROFESSIONAL VIRTUAL COMMUNITIES

As with organizational development, citizenship behavior should be central to the development and success of open professional virtual communities (OPVC). An increasing literature emphasizes on predicting knowledge contribution behaviors in virtual communities from the extrinsic and intrinsic motivation or benefit perspectives. In line with the consumer behavior literature that distinguishes between hedonic and utilitarian shopping values, we classify these motivations or benefits of knowledge sharing into either hedonic or utilitarian. We propose and test a theoretical model in which hedonic value and utilitarian value are operationalized as formative second-order constructs and examine their effects on members’ satisfaction with sharing knowledge and citizenship behaviors in an open professional virtual community. Data collected from 428 members of one OPVC provide support for the proposed model. The results help understanding how utilitarian value and hedonic value differ in their relationships with satisfaction and VCCB of knowledge contributors. Implications for theory and practice and limitations are discussed

Exploring Consumers’ Coping Behaviors in Online Double Deviation Scenarios: From Power Perspective

Service recovery is a critical moment of truth in retaining customers and reinforcing customer relationships, and has been considered as an “Achilles\u27 heel” in online marketplaces. Poor service recoveries exacerbate the negative effects of the failure, producing a “double deviation” effect. The double deviation effect may arise from the seller’s power misuse and then dissolve the buyer-seller relationship (e.g., violate consumer psychological contract), elicit consumer negative emotions which lead to customer coping behaviors. This study links the theories of psychological contract violation (PCV), emotion, and coping from the power perspective to investigate the double deviation scenario in online auction marketplaces. Two moderators (perceived power and perceived consumer empowerment) are considered in our proposed model. Data collected from 181 consumers of one auction website provide support for the proposed model. The results shed light on what constitutes the determinants of consumer judgments while facing double deviation scenario and how consumers react to and cope with it in online marketplaces. Implications and limitations are discussed

4-Amino-3-(4-pyrid­yl)-1,2,4-triazole-5(4H)-thione

In the title mol­ecule, C7H7N5S, the pyridyl and triazole rings form a dihedral angle of 20.07 (6)°. Inter­molecular N—H⋯N hydrogen bonds link the mol­ecules into chains extended in the direction [10]. Further stability is provided by π⋯π stacking inter­actions, indicated by short distances between the centroids of triazole rings [3.480 (5) Å] and pyridyl rings [3.574 (5) Å] of neighbouring mol­ecules

Tetra­imidazole­bis(trichloro­acetato)copper(II)

The title compound, [Cu(C2Cl3O2)2(C3H4N2)4], was prepared by the reaction of imidazole and trichloro­acetatocopper(II). The CuII atom adopts a distorted octa­hedral coordination geometry, binding the N atoms of four imidazole ligands and the carboxyl­ate O atoms of two trichloro­acetate anions. The mol­ecular structure and packing are stabilized by N—H⋯O hydrogen-bonding inter­actions. Close inter­molecular Cl⋯Cl contacts [3.498 (3) Å] are also found in the structure

Categorical Colormap Optimization with Visualization Case Studies

—Mapping a set of categorical values to different colors is an elementary technique in data visualization. Users of visualization software routinely rely on the default colormaps provided by a system, or colormaps suggested by software such as ColorBrewer. In practice, users often have to select a set of colors in a semantically meaningful way (e.g., based on conventions, color metaphors, and logological associations), and consequently would like to ensure their perceptual differentiation is optimized. In this paper, we present an algorithmic approach for maximizing the perceptual distances among a set of given colors. We address two technical problems in optimization, i.e., (i) the phenomena of local maxima that halt the optimization too soon, and (ii) the arbitrary reassignment of colors that leads to the loss of the original semantic association. We paid particular attention to different types of constraints that users may wish to impose during the optimization process. To demonstrate the effectiveness of this work, we tested this technique in two case studies. To reach out to a wider range of users, we also developed a web application called Colourmap Hospital

Role of SiNx Barrier Layer on the Performances of Polyimide Ga2O3-doped ZnO p-i-n Hydrogenated Amorphous Silicon Thin Film Solar Cells

In this study, silicon nitride (SiNx) thin films were deposited on polyimide (PI) substrates as barrier layers by a plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) system. The gallium-doped zinc oxide (GZO) thin films were deposited on PI and SiNx/PI substrates at room temperature (RT), 100 and 200 °C by radio frequency (RF) magnetron sputtering. The thicknesses of the GZO and SiNx thin films were controlled at around 160 ± 12 nm and 150 ± 10 nm, respectively. The optimal deposition parameters for the SiNx thin films were a working pressure of 800 × 10−3 Torr, a deposition power of 20 W, a deposition temperature of 200 °C, and gas flowing rates of SiH4 = 20 sccm and NH3 = 210 sccm, respectively. For the GZO/PI and GZO-SiNx/PI structures we had found that the GZO thin films deposited at 100 and 200 °C had higher crystallinity, higher electron mobility, larger carrier concentration, smaller resistivity, and higher optical transmittance ratio. For that, the GZO thin films deposited at 100 and 200 °C on PI and SiNx/PI substrates with thickness of ~1000 nm were used to fabricate p-i-n hydrogenated amorphous silicon (α-Si) thin film solar cells. 0.5% HCl solution was used to etch the surfaces of the GZO/PI and GZO-SiNx/PI substrates. Finally, PECVD system was used to deposit α-Si thin film onto the etched surfaces of the GZO/PI and GZO-SiNx/PI substrates to fabricate α-Si thin film solar cells, and the solar cells’ properties were also investigated. We had found that substrates to get the optimally solar cells’ efficiency were 200 °C-deposited GZO-SiNx/PI

CD73 promotes proliferation and migration of human cervical cancer cells independent of its enzyme activity

100 ΟM Adenosine treatment did not change the expression of EGFR, VEGF and Akt. (JPG 335 kb