Donation-based crowdfunding platform Kiva seems to hold the promise of peer-to-peer lending with zero interest rate to help the poor. However, it is actually intermediated by microfinance institutions, which raise funds from Kiva lenders, disburse the funds to borrowers and collect high interest. Later Kiva launched another platform Kiva Zip that implements interest-free loans directly from len...

BACKGROUND Vertebral compression fractures (VCFs) are the most common osteoporotic fractures and cause persistent pain, kyphotic deformity, weight loss, depression, reduced quality of life, and even death. Current surgical approaches for the treatment of VCF include vertebroplasty (VP) and balloon kyphoplasty (BK). The Kiva® VCF Treatment System (Kiva System) is a next-generation alternative su...

BACKGROUND Bullying is a major problem worldwide and Chile is no exception. Bullying is defined as a systematic aggressive behavior against a victim who cannot defend him or herself. Victims suffer social isolation and psychological maladjustment, while bullies have a higher risk for conduct problems and substance use disorders. These problems appear to last over time. The KiVa antibullying pro...

BACKGROUND Vertebral compression fractures are common among the elderly, which is conditioned by osteoporosis. They cause back pain and limit the patient's activities. The Kiva® VCF Treatment System is a new device to treat vertebral compression fractures. Compared to other methods, the utilization of the Kiva System reduces the risk for complications and delivers improvements in back pain redu...

Three different approaches for modeling diesel engine combustion are compared against cylinder pressure, NOx emissions, and simultaneous optical diagnostic images from a heavy-duty, DI diesel engine. A characteristic time combustion (KIVA-CTC) model, a representative interactive flamelet (KIVA-RIF) model, and direct integration using detailed chemistry (KIVA-CHEMKIN) were integrated into the sa...

To properly simulate the highly anisotropic turbulent engine flows, higher order turbulence model should be used to correctly reproduce flow physics inside the engine. The popular KIVA computer code has been modified to include the Reynolds-stress turbulence model (RSTM) for this purpose. The objective of this paper is to present our recent research on the use of RSTM and the KIVA code for engi...

The use of social networks have become an extremely important part of the lives of most teenagers in the developed world. Teens are constantly connected to their peers to share various aspects of their lives via cyberspace. Being bullied in cyberspace thus have an extremely negative impact on the lives of the victims of such bullying. Most anti-cyberbully campaigns are not very effective. Howev...

We present a system which simulates the interpretation of archaeological sites. Previous systems in archaeology have performed lower-level classificatory tasks. The present system KIVA combines data-driven and expectation-based reasoning to produce an overall interpretation of a given site (i.e., a cultural profile). In this approach, a model of a typical archaeological site is utilized in orde...

In the era of e-commerce, the logistic distribution center is put in the center role of order picking for the sake of meeting the needs of different customer orders, hence, improving the automation and work capacity of distribution center becomes research priority in the fields of logistics and warehousing. The objective of this article is to solve the shortcomings of currently traditional dist...