In the paper the influence of moisture content of wood on the heat losses and thermal efficiency of a boiler is analysed. The moisture content of wood has a negative effect, especially on flue gas loss. The mathematical dependence of the thermal efficiency of a boiler is presented for the following boundary conditions: the moisture content of wood 10–60%, range of temperatures of emitted flue gases from the boiler into the atmosphere 120–200 C, the emissions meeting the emission standards: carbon monoxide 250 mgm-3, fly ash 50 mgm-3and the heat power range 30–100%.

Natural resources and the extractive industries play a central role in the economy of developing countries and the lives of nearly half of the world’s population. The increasing demand for oil, gas, and mineral resources has led some countries to prioritize the extractive industries; yet, there is growing empirical evidence that in some cases governments have neglected other sectors of the economy, making them highly dependent and vulnerable to volatile commodity prices. Latin American countries face the challenge of changing their model of primary-export specialization and move away from their dependence on natural resource-intensive exports in order to avoid being vulnerable to commodity cycles. In this context, given the limited literature available on measuring the dependence on the extraction of oil, gas and minerals of the Ecuadorian economy, the objective of this article is to twofold. First, to provide a snapshot of the historical and current situation of Ecuador’s natural resource dependence. Second, to estimate the Extractives Dependence Index (EDI) scores for Ecuador for the years 2003 to 2017. The EDI is a generally accepted method for measuring a country’s aggregate dependence on natural and mineral resources. Based on the EDI scores obtained, we analyze the variation of this indicator and investigate the effect of extractives dependence on the Ecuadorian economy. Results show that despite the government’s significant efforts to diversify Ecuador’s economy, the country has a persistent dependence on the extractive sector.

For much of the last two decades, the Central and East European (CEE) economies have experienced a deep structural reform, moving away from a socialist economic system towards a market economy. The political situation of the second half of the 20th century had a significant impact on the economic development and competitiveness of these transition countries, when compared with their Western European counterparts. A vast number of studies have been conducted to analyze the structural changes required for resource-dependent economies to achieve long-term development and to understand the synergies between commodities and diversification. Yet, the dynamics of resource extraction and the resource dependence of regions that have experienced periods of sustained levels of growth have largely been overlooked, especially the Central and Eastern European region. In this context, this article presents an analysis of the level of resource dependence of six countries which joined the European Union between 2004 and 2007. Using data spanning from the year 2000 to 2017, we calculate the Extractives Dependence Index (EDI) of six former Soviet satellite nations and one former Soviet state. Our results indicate that the commodity structure of trade in the six countries which joined the European Union has changed considerably. These countries have reduced their economic dependence on extractive resources by developing their high value-added and technology-intensive sectors. Our findings also reveal that Poland experienced the highest decrease in EDI scores among the six CEE countries.

In the paper, we document how conditional dependencies observed in the FOREX market change during a trading day. The analysis is performed for the pairs (GBP/EUR, USD/EUR) and (GBP/USD, EUR/USD) of exchange rates. We consider daily returns calculated using the exchange rates quoted at different hours of a day. The dynamics of the dependencies is modeled by means of 3-regime Markov regime switching copula models, and the strength of the linkages is described using dynamic Spearman’s rho and the dynamic coefficients of tail dependence. The established approach allows us to monitor the changes in the dependence structure.

Various trading strategies have been proposed that use estimates of the Hurst coefficient, which is an indicator of long-range dependence, for the calculation of buy and sell signals. This paper introduces frequency-domain tests for long-range dependence which do, in contrast to conventional procedures, not assume that the number of used periodogram ordinates grow with the length of the time series. These tests are applied to series of gold price returns and stock index returns in a rolling analysis. The results suggest that there is no long-range dependence, indicating that trading strategies based on fractal dynamics have no sound statistical basis.

The main focus of this tutorial/review is on presenting Prospect Theory in the context of the still ongoing debate between the behavioral (mainly descriptive) and the classical (mainly normative) approach in decision theory under risk and uncertainty. The goal is to discuss Prospect Theory vs. Expected Utility in a comparative way. We discuss: a) which assumptions (implicit and explicit) of the classical theory are being questioned in Prospect Theory; b) how does the theory incorporate robust experimental evidence, striving, at the same time, to find the right balance between the basic rationality postulates of Expected Utility (e.g. monotonicity wrt. First-Order Stochastic Dominance), psychological plausibility and mathematical elegance; c) how are risk attitudes modeled in the theory. In particular we discuss prospect stochastic dominance and the three-pillar structure of modeling risk attitudes in Prospect Theory involving: the non-additive decision weights with lower and upper subadditivity and their relationship to the notions of pessimism and optimism, as well as preferences towards consequences separated into preferences within and across the domains of gains and losses (corresponding to basic utility and loss aversion), d) example applications of Prospect Theory.

An unsustainable energy mix and energy overconsumption contribute to negative processes such as environmental pressure or energy dependency. The aim of the article is to assess the European Union countries situation in terms of sustainable energy consumption. Eurostat was were used in the analyses. The research was based on synthetic indicators for 2017 data. A non-standard method was used. In accordance with the assumptions of sustainable energy consumption, six indicators were proposed: primary energy consumption (2005=100), final energy consumption (2005=100), share of renewable energy in energy consumption, deficit/surplus in the 2020 renewable energy sources consumption target, energy import dependency (%), greenhouse gas emissions intensity of energy consumption (2000=100). The share of renewable energy in energy consumption and deficit/ surplus in the 2020 renewable energy sources consumption target are stimulants, other features are destimulants. The European Union countries were classified into four groups due to the situation in terms of sustainable energy consumption (first class – favorable situation, second class – quite favorable situation, third class – rather unfavorable situation, fourth class – unfavorable situation). According to the results in twelve countries the situation was identified as favorable or quite favorable, while in the other sixteen countries as rather unfavorable and unfavorable. However, all countries have entered the path of necessary changes. It is important to continue monitoring and analyzing the progress of European Union countries in the field of energy and climate policy.

Time-dependent behavior of rock mass is important for long-term stability analysis in rock engineering. Extensive studies have been carried out on the creep properties and rheological models for variable kinds of rocks, however, the effects of initial damage state on the time-dependent behavior of rock has not yet been taken into consideration. In the present study, the authors proposed a creep test scheme with controlled initial damage to investigate the influence of initial damage on the time-dependent behavior of sandstone. In the test scheme, the initial states of damage were first determined via unloading the specimen from various stresses. Then, the creep test was conducted under different stress levels with specific initial damage. The experimental results show that there is a stress threshold for the initial damage to influence the behavior of the rock in the uniaxial compressive creep tests, which is the stress threshold of dilatancy of rock. When the creep stress is less than the stress threshold, the effect of the initial damage seems to be insignificant. However, if the creep stress is higher than the stress threshold, the initial damage has an important influence on the time-dependent deformation, especially the lateral and volumetric deformation. Moreover, the initial damage also has great influence on the creep failure stress and long-term strength, i.e., higher initial damage leading to lower creep failure stress and long-term strength. The experimental results can provide valuable data for the construction of a creep damage model and long-term stability analysis for rock engineering.

The aim of this article is to analyze the role of phraseological units (PhUs) in discourse and to investigate their co(n)textual dependency. The paper presents a typology of the lexical and phraseological units, labelled as co(n)textual supports and developed by Olza y Losada (2011): expressions that paraphrase the initial phraseological meaning; expressions that highlight a specific component of this meaning; lexical and phraseological units that are synonymous with the ‘central’ phraseological expression they co-occur with; and lexical and phraseological units that are antonymous with the ‘central’ expression. These units orient and specify the use and interpretation of PhUs. The analysis also focuses on the so-called markers of phraseological units that function as (quasi) PhUs that serve to introduce phraseology within discourse in a (more or less) explicit way and have pragmatic discursive value (cfr. Olza 2013). The last part of the article examines some PhUs whose implicatures can be affected by contextual circumstances and characterized by greater dependence on the general context of the statement despite showing some degree of conventionalization.

Traces of the idea of verbal valency structure in nineteenth-century grammars – This paper aims to show how K.F. Beckers’s notion of “subjektive” and “objektive Verben” (i.e. those always used with an “ergänzende Objekt”, a ‘completive object’) is a rough forerunner to the modern idea of dependency grammar. In Italy, this theoretical core was assumed by Raffaello Lambruschini in 1840 (and, after him, by the basic school grammar La grammatica del mio Felicino written by Ulisse Poggi, 1865, 18722), but with a huge trivialisation: subjective verbs were identified with intransitive verbs and objective verbs with transitive ones.

The aim of this paper is to describe selected syntactic phenomena concerning non-finiteness and to show the most frequent types of the non-finite subordinate clauses in the historical German language of the 17th century. The use of the non-finite constructions appears to be especially frequent in Early New High German. Also today, non-finite clauses can be observed. However, their role in the modern discourse is different to that of the diachronic constructions.

The pathogenesis of porcine contagious pleuropneumonia is poorly understood. In the present study, a mouse model of intranasal infection by Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae (App) was used to examine lung inflammation. The pathogical results of lung tissues showed that App-infected mice showed dyspnea and anorexia, with severe damage by acute hemorrhage, and infiltration of eosinophils and lymphocytes, as well as increased expression of caspase-1 p20, interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6, IL-8, IL-18 and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α. Caspase-1 inhibitors reduced both lung tissue damage and the expression of caspase-1 p20, IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8, TNF-α and IL-18 in infected mice. These findings suggest that the caspase-1 dependent pyroptosis involved in the pathogenesis of the mouse pleuropneumonia caused by App and the inhibition of caspase-1 reduced the lung injury of this pleuropneumonia