Entanglement and Wigner Function Negativity of Multimode Non-Gaussian States

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Walschaers, Mattia; Fabre, Claude; Parigi, Valentina; Treps, Nicolas

2017-11-01

Non-Gaussian operations are essential to exploit the quantum advantages in optical continuous variable quantum information protocols. We focus on mode-selective photon addition and subtraction as experimentally promising processes to create multimode non-Gaussian states. Our approach is based on correlation functions, as is common in quantum statistical mechanics and condensed matter physics, mixed with quantum optics tools. We formulate an analytical expression of the Wigner function after the subtraction or addition of a single photon, for arbitrarily many modes. It is used to demonstrate entanglement properties specific to non-Gaussian states and also leads to a practical and elegant condition for Wigner function negativity. Finally, we analyze the potential of photon addition and subtraction for an experimentally generated multimode Gaussian state.

Entanglement and Wigner Function Negativity of Multimode Non-Gaussian States.

PubMed

Walschaers, Mattia; Fabre, Claude; Parigi, Valentina; Treps, Nicolas

2017-11-03

Non-Gaussian operations are essential to exploit the quantum advantages in optical continuous variable quantum information protocols. We focus on mode-selective photon addition and subtraction as experimentally promising processes to create multimode non-Gaussian states. Our approach is based on correlation functions, as is common in quantum statistical mechanics and condensed matter physics, mixed with quantum optics tools. We formulate an analytical expression of the Wigner function after the subtraction or addition of a single photon, for arbitrarily many modes. It is used to demonstrate entanglement properties specific to non-Gaussian states and also leads to a practical and elegant condition for Wigner function negativity. Finally, we analyze the potential of photon addition and subtraction for an experimentally generated multimode Gaussian state.

Online games: a novel approach to explore how partial information influences human random searches

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Martínez-García, Ricardo; Calabrese, Justin M.; López, Cristóbal

2017-01-01

Many natural processes rely on optimizing the success ratio of a search process. We use an experimental setup consisting of a simple online game in which players have to find a target hidden on a board, to investigate how the rounds are influenced by the detection of cues. We focus on the search duration and the statistics of the trajectories traced on the board. The experimental data are explained by a family of random-walk-based models and probabilistic analytical approximations. If no initial information is given to the players, the search is optimized for cues that cover an intermediate spatial scale. In addition, initial information about the extension of the cues results, in general, in faster searches. Finally, strategies used by informed players turn into non-stationary processes in which the length of e ach displacement evolves to show a well-defined characteristic scale that is not found in non-informed searches.

Online games: a novel approach to explore how partial information influences human random searches.

PubMed

Martínez-García, Ricardo; Calabrese, Justin M; López, Cristóbal

2017-01-06

Many natural processes rely on optimizing the success ratio of a search process. We use an experimental setup consisting of a simple online game in which players have to find a target hidden on a board, to investigate how the rounds are influenced by the detection of cues. We focus on the search duration and the statistics of the trajectories traced on the board. The experimental data are explained by a family of random-walk-based models and probabilistic analytical approximations. If no initial information is given to the players, the search is optimized for cues that cover an intermediate spatial scale. In addition, initial information about the extension of the cues results, in general, in faster searches. Finally, strategies used by informed players turn into non-stationary processes in which the length of e ach displacement evolves to show a well-defined characteristic scale that is not found in non-informed searches.

Minimum Information about a Spinal Cord Injury Experiment: A Proposed Reporting Standard for Spinal Cord Injury Experiments

PubMed Central

Ferguson, Adam R.; Popovich, Phillip G.; Xu, Xiao-Ming; Snow, Diane M.; Igarashi, Michihiro; Beattie, Christine E.; Bixby, John L.

2014-01-01

Abstract The lack of reproducibility in many areas of experimental science has a number of causes, including a lack of transparency and precision in the description of experimental approaches. This has far-reaching consequences, including wasted resources and slowing of progress. Additionally, the large number of laboratories around the world publishing articles on a given topic make it difficult, if not impossible, for individual researchers to read all of the relevant literature. Consequently, centralized databases are needed to facilitate the generation of new hypotheses for testing. One strategy to improve transparency in experimental description, and to allow the development of frameworks for computer-readable knowledge repositories, is the adoption of uniform reporting standards, such as common data elements (data elements used in multiple clinical studies) and minimum information standards. This article describes a minimum information standard for spinal cord injury (SCI) experiments, its major elements, and the approaches used to develop it. Transparent reporting standards for experiments using animal models of human SCI aim to reduce inherent bias and increase experimental value. PMID:24870067

Construction of an Exploratory List of Chemicals to Initiate the Search for Halon Alternatives

DTIC Science & Technology

1991-06-01

of owne-depletion effectiveness is based on atmospheric modeling. The only experimental work is the determination of possible reaction paths and...results, and additional relevant comments. These compounds should be tested in a selective series of experiments based on the insights used in the...will generate initial information with regard to the relative ordering of the compounds in terms of screen properties. Careful experimentation will

Experimentally feasible quantum-key-distribution scheme using qubit-like qudits and its comparison with existing qubit- and qudit-based protocols

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chau, H. F.; Wang, Qinan; Wong, Cardythy

2017-02-01

Recently, Chau [Phys. Rev. A 92, 062324 (2015), 10.1103/PhysRevA.92.062324] introduced an experimentally feasible qudit-based quantum-key-distribution (QKD) scheme. In that scheme, one bit of information is phase encoded in the prepared state in a 2n-dimensional Hilbert space in the form (|i > ±|j >) /√{2 } with n ≥2 . For each qudit prepared and measured in the same two-dimensional Hilbert subspace, one bit of raw secret key is obtained in the absence of transmission error. Here we show that by modifying the basis announcement procedure, the same experimental setup can generate n bits of raw key for each qudit prepared and measured in the same basis in the noiseless situation. The reason is that in addition to the phase information, each qudit also carries information on the Hilbert subspace used. The additional (n -1 ) bits of raw key comes from a clever utilization of this extra piece of information. We prove the unconditional security of this modified protocol and compare its performance with other existing provably secure qubit- and qudit-based protocols on market in the one-way classical communication setting. Interestingly, we find that for the case of n =2 , the secret key rate of this modified protocol using nondegenerate random quantum code to perform one-way entanglement distillation is equal to that of the six-state scheme.

"The Dose Makes the Poison": Informing Consumers About the Scientific Risk Assessment of Food Additives.

PubMed

Bearth, Angela; Cousin, Marie-Eve; Siegrist, Michael

2016-01-01

Intensive risk assessment is required before the approval of food additives. During this process, based on the toxicological principle of "the dose makes the poison,ˮ maximum usage doses are assessed. However, most consumers are not aware of these efforts to ensure the safety of food additives and are therefore sceptical, even though food additives bring certain benefits to consumers. This study investigated the effect of a short video, which explains the scientific risk assessment and regulation of food additives, on consumers' perceptions and acceptance of food additives. The primary goal of this study was to inform consumers and enable them to construct their own risk-benefit assessment and make informed decisions about food additives. The secondary goal was to investigate whether people have different perceptions of food additives of artificial (i.e., aspartame) or natural origin (i.e., steviolglycoside). To attain these research goals, an online experiment was conducted on 185 Swiss consumers. Participants were randomly assigned to either the experimental group, which was shown a video about the scientific risk assessment of food additives, or the control group, which was shown a video about a topic irrelevant to the study. After watching the video, the respondents knew significantly more, expressed more positive thoughts and feelings, had less risk perception, and more acceptance than prior to watching the video. Thus, it appears that informing consumers about complex food safety topics, such as the scientific risk assessment of food additives, is possible, and using a carefully developed information video is a successful strategy for informing consumers. © 2015 Society for Risk Analysis.

A combined experimental and in silico characterization to highlight additional structural features and properties of a potentially new drug

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bastos, Isadora T. S.; Costa, Fanny N.; Silva, Tiago F.; Barreiro, Eliezer J.; Lima, Lídia M.; Braz, Delson; Lombardo, Giuseppe M.; Punzo, Francesco; Ferreira, Fabio F.; Barroso, Regina C.

2017-10-01

LASSBio-1755 is a new cycloalkyl-N-acylhydrazone parent compound designed for the development of derivatives with antinociceptive and anti-inflammatory activities. Although single crystal X-ray diffraction has been considered as the golden standard in structure determination, we successfully used X-ray powder diffraction data in the structural determination of new synthesized compounds, in order to overcome the bottle-neck due to the difficulties experienced in harvesting good quality single crystals of the compounds. We therefore unequivocally assigned the relative configuration (E) to the imine double bond and a s-cis conformation of the amide function of the N-acylhydrazone compound. These features are confirmed by a computational analysis performed on the basis of molecular dynamics calculations, which are extended not only to the structural characteristics but also to the analysis of the anisotropic atomic displacement parameters, a further information - missed in a typical powder diffraction analysis. The so inferred data were used to perform additional cycles of refinement and eventually generate a new cif file with additional physical information. Furthermore, crystal morphology prediction was performed, which is in agreement with the experimental images acquired by scanning electron microscopy, thus providing useful information on possible alternative paths for better crystallization strategies.

Analysis techniques for residual acceleration data

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rogers, Melissa J. B.; Alexander, J. Iwan D.; Snyder, Robert S.

1990-01-01

Various aspects of residual acceleration data are of interest to low-gravity experimenters. Maximum and mean values and various other statistics can be obtained from data as collected in the time domain. Additional information may be obtained through manipulation of the data. Fourier analysis is discussed as a means of obtaining information about dominant frequency components of a given data window. Transformation of data into different coordinate axes is useful in the analysis of experiments with different orientations and can be achieved by the use of a transformation matrix. Application of such analysis techniques to residual acceleration data provides additional information than what is provided in a time history and increases the effectiveness of post-flight analysis of low-gravity experiments.

Experimental Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger-Type Six-Photon Quantum Nonlocality.

PubMed

Zhang, Chao; Huang, Yun-Feng; Wang, Zhao; Liu, Bi-Heng; Li, Chuan-Feng; Guo, Guang-Can

2015-12-31

Quantum nonlocality gives us deeper insight into quantum physics. In addition, quantum nonlocality has been further recognized as an essential resource for device-independent quantum information processing in recent years. Most experiments of nonlocality are performed using a photonic system. However, until now, photonic experiments of nonlocality have involved at most four photons. Here, for the first time, we experimentally demonstrate the six-photon quantum nonlocality in an all-versus-nothing manner based on a high-fidelity (88.4%) six-photon Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger state. Our experiment pushes multiphoton nonlocality studies forward to the six-photon region and might provide a larger photonic system for device-independent quantum information protocols.

Experimental aeroelasticity history, status and future in brief

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ricketts, Rodney H.

1990-01-01

NASA conducts wind tunnel experiments to determine and understand the aeroelastic characteristics of new and advanced flight vehicles, including fixed-wing, rotary-wing and space-launch configurations. Review and assessments are made of the state-of-the-art in experimental aeroelasticity regarding available facilities, measurement techniques, and other means and devices useful in testing. In addition, some past experimental programs are described which assisted in the development of new technology, validated new analysis codes, or provided needed information for clearing flight envelopes of unwanted aeroelastic response. Finally, needs and requirements for advances and improvements in testing capabilities for future experimental research and development programs are described.

Pilot performance and workload using simulated GPS track angle error displays

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1995-01-01

The effect on simulated GPS instrument approach performance and workload resulting from the addition of Track Angle Error (TAE) information to cockpit RNAV receiver displays in explicit analog form was studied experimentally (S display formats, 6 pil...

National Science Resources Center Project to Improve Science Teaching in Elementary Schools. Appendix C. Elementary Science Information Database

DTIC Science & Technology

1988-12-01

individual particles. They mix the powders with water and perform tests with heat, iodine, and vinegar in order to gain additional information about the...illusions ; light ; fermentation ; chromatography ; moon ; astronomy AN SCIENCE - A PROCESS APPROACH, PART G focuses on experimentation, incorporating all...skills ; flowers plants astronomy ; animals ; sensory perception ; vision ; optical illusions ; eyes ; density ; viscosity ; fermentation ; moon

Information sampling behavior with explicit sampling costs

PubMed Central

Juni, Mordechai Z.; Gureckis, Todd M.; Maloney, Laurence T.

2015-01-01

The decision to gather information should take into account both the value of information and its accrual costs in time, energy and money. Here we explore how people balance the monetary costs and benefits of gathering additional information in a perceptual-motor estimation task. Participants were rewarded for touching a hidden circular target on a touch-screen display. The target’s center coincided with the mean of a circular Gaussian distribution from which participants could sample repeatedly. Each “cue” — sampled one at a time — was plotted as a dot on the display. Participants had to repeatedly decide, after sampling each cue, whether to stop sampling and attempt to touch the hidden target or continue sampling. Each additional cue increased the participants’ probability of successfully touching the hidden target but reduced their potential reward. Two experimental conditions differed in the initial reward associated with touching the hidden target and the fixed cost per cue. For each condition we computed the optimal number of cues that participants should sample, before taking action, to maximize expected gain. Contrary to recent claims that people gather less information than they objectively should before taking action, we found that participants over-sampled in one experimental condition, and did not significantly under- or over-sample in the other. Additionally, while the ideal observer model ignores the current sample dispersion, we found that participants used it to decide whether to stop sampling and take action or continue sampling, a possible consequence of imperfect learning of the underlying population dispersion across trials. PMID:27429991

Databases and Associated Tools for Glycomics and Glycoproteomics.

PubMed

Lisacek, Frederique; Mariethoz, Julien; Alocci, Davide; Rudd, Pauline M; Abrahams, Jodie L; Campbell, Matthew P; Packer, Nicolle H; Ståhle, Jonas; Widmalm, Göran; Mullen, Elaine; Adamczyk, Barbara; Rojas-Macias, Miguel A; Jin, Chunsheng; Karlsson, Niclas G

2017-01-01

The access to biodatabases for glycomics and glycoproteomics has proven to be essential for current glycobiological research. This chapter presents available databases that are devoted to different aspects of glycobioinformatics. This includes oligosaccharide sequence databases, experimental databases, 3D structure databases (of both glycans and glycorelated proteins) and association of glycans with tissue, disease, and proteins. Specific search protocols are also provided using tools associated with experimental databases for converting primary glycoanalytical data to glycan structural information. In particular, researchers using glycoanalysis methods by U/HPLC (GlycoBase), MS (GlycoWorkbench, UniCarb-DB, GlycoDigest), and NMR (CASPER) will benefit from this chapter. In addition we also include information on how to utilize glycan structural information to query databases that associate glycans with proteins (UniCarbKB) and with interactions with pathogens (SugarBind).

Experimental and Computational Studies of Cortical Neural Network Properties Through Signal Processing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Clawson, Wesley Patrick

Previous studies, both theoretical and experimental, of network level dynamics in the cerebral cortex show evidence for a statistical phenomenon called criticality; a phenomenon originally studied in the context of phase transitions in physical systems and that is associated with favorable information processing in the context of the brain. The focus of this thesis is to expand upon past results with new experimentation and modeling to show a relationship between criticality and the ability to detect and discriminate sensory input. A line of theoretical work predicts maximal sensory discrimination as a functional benefit of criticality, which can then be characterized using mutual information between sensory input, visual stimulus, and neural response,. The primary finding of our experiments in the visual cortex in turtles and neuronal network modeling confirms this theoretical prediction. We show that sensory discrimination is maximized when visual cortex operates near criticality. In addition to presenting this primary finding in detail, this thesis will also address our preliminary results on change-point-detection in experimentally measured cortical dynamics.

Intuitive web-based experimental design for high-throughput biomedical data.

PubMed

Friedrich, Andreas; Kenar, Erhan; Kohlbacher, Oliver; Nahnsen, Sven

2015-01-01

Big data bioinformatics aims at drawing biological conclusions from huge and complex biological datasets. Added value from the analysis of big data, however, is only possible if the data is accompanied by accurate metadata annotation. Particularly in high-throughput experiments intelligent approaches are needed to keep track of the experimental design, including the conditions that are studied as well as information that might be interesting for failure analysis or further experiments in the future. In addition to the management of this information, means for an integrated design and interfaces for structured data annotation are urgently needed by researchers. Here, we propose a factor-based experimental design approach that enables scientists to easily create large-scale experiments with the help of a web-based system. We present a novel implementation of a web-based interface allowing the collection of arbitrary metadata. To exchange and edit information we provide a spreadsheet-based, humanly readable format. Subsequently, sample sheets with identifiers and metainformation for data generation facilities can be created. Data files created after measurement of the samples can be uploaded to a datastore, where they are automatically linked to the previously created experimental design model.

A Comparison of Experimental EPMA Data and Monte Carlo Simulations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Carpenter, P. K.

2004-01-01

Monte Carlo (MC) modeling shows excellent prospects for simulating electron scattering and x-ray emission from complex geometries, and can be compared to experimental measurements using electron-probe microanalysis (EPMA) and phi(rho z) correction algorithms. Experimental EPMA measurements made on NIST SRM 481 (AgAu) and 482 (CuAu) alloys, at a range of accelerating potential and instrument take-off angles, represent a formal microanalysis data set that has been used to develop phi(rho z) correction algorithms. The accuracy of MC calculations obtained using the NIST, WinCasino, WinXray, and Penelope MC packages will be evaluated relative to these experimental data. There is additional information contained in the extended abstract.

Additivity and Interactions in Ecotoxicity of Pollutant Mixtures: Some Patterns, Conclusions, and Open Questions

PubMed Central

Rodea-Palomares, Ismael; González-Pleiter, Miguel; Martín-Betancor, Keila; Rosal, Roberto; Fernández-Piñas, Francisca

2015-01-01

Understanding the effects of exposure to chemical mixtures is a common goal of pharmacology and ecotoxicology. In risk assessment-oriented ecotoxicology, defining the scope of application of additivity models has received utmost attention in the last 20 years, since they potentially allow one to predict the effect of any chemical mixture relying on individual chemical information only. The gold standard for additivity in ecotoxicology has demonstrated to be Loewe additivity which originated the so-called Concentration Addition (CA) additivity model. In pharmacology, the search for interactions or deviations from additivity (synergism and antagonism) has similarly captured the attention of researchers over the last 20 years and has resulted in the definition and application of the Combination Index (CI) Theorem. CI is based on Loewe additivity, but focused on the identification and quantification of synergism and antagonism. Despite additive models demonstrating a surprisingly good predictive power in chemical mixture risk assessment, concerns still exist due to the occurrence of unpredictable synergism or antagonism in certain experimental situations. In the present work, we summarize the parallel history of development of CA, IA, and CI models. We also summarize the applicability of these concepts in ecotoxicology and how their information may be integrated, as well as the possibility of prediction of synergism. Inside the box, the main question remaining is whether it is worthy to consider departures from additivity in mixture risk assessment and how to predict interactions among certain mixture components. Outside the box, the main question is whether the results observed under the experimental constraints imposed by fractional approaches are a de fide reflection of what it would be expected from chemical mixtures in real world circumstances. PMID:29051468

An experimental study of the Online Information Paradox: Does en-route information improve road network performance?

PubMed

Wijayaratna, Kasun P; Dixit, Vinayak V; Denant-Boemont, Laurent; Waller, S Travis

2017-01-01

This study investigates the empirical presence of a theoretical transportation paradox, defined as the "Online Information Paradox" (OIP). The paradox suggests that, for certain road networks, the provision of online information deteriorate travel conditions for all users of that network relative to the situation where no online information is provided to users. The analytical presence of the paradox was derived for a specific network structure by using two equilibrium models, the first being the Expected User Equilibrium (EUE) solution (no information scenario) and the other being the User Equilibrium with Recourse (UER) solution (with information scenario). An incentivised computerised route choice game was designed using the concepts of experimental economics and administered in a controlled laboratory environment to investigate the physical presence of the paradox. Aggregate statistics of path flows and Total System Travel Costs (TSTC) were used to compare the experimental results with the theoretical findings. A total of 12 groups of 12 participants completed the experiment and the OIP and the occurrence of the OIP being significant was observed in 11 of the 12 cases. Though information increased travel costs for users on average, it reduced the volatility of travel costs experienced in the no information scenario indicating that information can achieve a more reliable system. Further replications of similar experiments and more importantly field based identification of the phenomena will force transport professionals to be aware of the emergence of the paradox. In addition, studies such as this emphasise the need for the adoption of adaptive traffic assignment techniques to appropriately model the acquisition of information on a road network.

The impact of social and psychological consequences of disease on judgments of disease severity: An experimental study.

PubMed

King, Nicholas B; Harper, Sam; Young, Meredith; Berry, Sarah C; Voigt, Kristin

2018-01-01

The Global Burden of Disease (GBD) project systematically assesses mortality, healthy life expectancy, and disability across 195 countries and territories, using the disability-adjusted life year (DALY). Disability weights in the DALY are based upon surveys that ask users to rate health states based on lay descriptions. We conducted an experimental study to examine whether the inclusion or removal of psychological, social, or familial implications from a health state description might affect individual judgments about disease severity, and thus relative disability weights. We designed a survey consisting of 36 paired descriptions in which information about plausible psychological, social, or familial implications of a health condition was either present or absent. Using a Web-based platform, we recruited 1,592 participants, who were assigned to one of two experimental groups, each of which were asked to assign a value to the health state description from 0 to 100 using a slider, with 0 as the "worst possible health" and 100 as the "best possible health." We tested five hypotheses: (1) the inclusion of psychological, social, or familial consequences in health state descriptions will reduce the average rating of a health state; (2) the effect will be stronger for diseases with lower disability weights (i.e., less severe diseases); (3) the effect will vary across the type of additional information added to the health state description; (4) the impact of adding information on familial consequences will be stronger for female than male; (5) the effect of additional consequences on ratings of health state descriptions will not differ by levels of completed education and age. On average, adding social, psychological, or familial consequences to the health state description lowered individual ratings of that description by 0.78 points. The impact of adding information had a stronger impact on ratings of the least severe conditions, reducing average ratings in this category by 1.67 points. Addition of information about child-rearing had the strongest impact, reducing average ratings by 2.09 points. We found little evidence that the effect of adding information on ratings of health descriptions varied by gender, education, or age. Including information about health states not directly related to major functional consequences or symptoms, particularly with respect to child-rearing and specifically for descriptions of less severe conditions, can lead to lower ratings of health. However, this impact was not consistent across all conditions or types of information, and was most pronounced for inclusion of information about child-rearing, and among the least severe conditions.

Thermal Infrared Spectroscopy of Experimentally Shocked Anorthosite and Pyroxenite

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johnson, J. R.; Hoerz, F.; Christensen, P.; Lucey, P. G.

2001-01-01

We performed shock recovery experiments at JSC (17-63 GPa) on samples of Stillwater pyroxenite and anorthosite and acquired their thermal infrared spectra (3-50 micron) to investigate the degradation of spectral features at high pressures. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

Analytical Determination of Fluoride Ion Using Gran's Semi-Antilog Plot.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barnhard, Ralph J.

1983-01-01

A quantitative determination for fluoride ion using a commercially available fluoride electrode is described. The procedure referred to as known-addition is employed with the data processed on Gran's Plot Paper. Background information, experimental procedures, and advantages/disadvantages of the method are discussed. (JN)

Boston Community Information System 1986 Experimental Test Results.

DTIC Science & Technology

1987-08-01

self -selected participants have a strong technical orientation and high educational achievement. In addition, five visually impaired people use the...group. The experimental test of the system was performed on a self -selected population of computer literate volunteers. In order to simplify the test...for fat respose .’ - 1041 OI haven’t used it yet.’ - 1046 ’No modem yet. New version installed 11/2/86.0 - 1047 ’Not yet tried. Wil do so moon.’ - 1061

MushBase: A Mushroom Information Database Application

PubMed Central

Le, Vang Quy; Lee, Hyun-Sook

2007-01-01

A database application, namely MushBase, has been built based on Microsoft Access in order to store and manage different kinds of data about mushroom biological information of species, strains and their physiological characteristics such as geometries and growth condition(s). In addition, it is also designed to store another group of information that is experimental data about mushroom classification by Random Amplification of Polymorphic DNA (RAPD). These two groups of information are stored and managed in the way so that it is convenient to retrieve each group of data and to cross-refer between them as well. PMID:24015087

Simultaneous Production of Reduced Nitrogen Compounds and Hydrocarbons Using Amorphous Iron Silicate Smokes as a Catalyst

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nuth, Joseph A., III; Hill, Hugh G. M.

2001-01-01

Amorphous iron silicates efficiently catalyze formation of hydrocarbons and ammonia under conditions similar to that found in the solar nebula. Preliminary data and rates will be discussed, and much further experimentation is required. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

The Effect of Core-Mantle Differentiation on V, Cr, and Mn: Experimental Metal/Silicate Partitioning Results

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chabot, N. L.; Agee, C. B.

2001-01-01

The abundances of V, Cr, and Mn are similarly depleted in the Earth and Moon. We present metal/silicate partitioning results which examine if the depletions can be explained by a core formation event. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

Experimental Reproduction of Type 1B Chondrules

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lofgren, G. E.; Le, L.

2002-01-01

We have replicated type 1B chondrule textures and compositions with crystallization experiments in which UOC material was melted at 1400 deg.C and cooled at 5-1000 deg.C/hr using graphite crucibles in evacuated silica tubes to provide a reducing environment. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

Rhenium and Iridium Partitioning in Silicate and Magmatic Spinels: Implications for Planetary Magmatism and Mantles

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Righter, K.

2001-01-01

Highly siderophile elements Re, Ru and Ir partition strongly into spinel structures with large octahedral sites. New experimental results for both magmatic and silicate spinels will be presented with a few planetary implications. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

Interferometric sensitivity and entanglement by scanning through quantum phase transitions in spinor Bose-Einstein condensates

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Feldmann, P.; Gessner, M.; Gabbrielli, M.; Klempt, C.; Santos, L.; Pezzè, L.; Smerzi, A.

2018-03-01

Recent experiments demonstrated the generation of entanglement by quasiadiabatically driving through quantum phase transitions of a ferromagnetic spin-1 Bose-Einstein condensate in the presence of a tunable quadratic Zeeman shift. We analyze, in terms of the Fisher information, the interferometric value of the entanglement accessible by this approach. In addition to the Twin-Fock phase studied experimentally, we unveil a second regime, in the broken axisymmetry phase, which provides Heisenberg scaling of the quantum Fisher information and can be reached on shorter time scales. We identify optimal unitary transformations and an experimentally feasible optimal measurement prescription that maximize the interferometric sensitivity. We further ascertain that the Fisher information is robust with respect to nonadiabaticity and measurement noise. Finally, we show that the quasiadiabatic entanglement preparation schemes admit higher sensitivities than dynamical methods based on fast quenches.

Outcomes of Trauma-Informed Interventions for Incarcerated Women.

PubMed

King, Erin A

2017-05-01

The purpose of this article was to conduct a review of experimental, quasi-experimental, and pre-test/post-test studies using manualized, trauma-informed interventions with incarcerated women. A systematic search of electronic databases, reference harvesting, and communication with experts were used to identify relevant primary studies. Nine studies meeting the specified inclusion/exclusion criteria were identified. Three studies used random assignment and five used a comparison or waitlist group. Interventions identified included Seeking Safety, Helping Women Recover/Beyond Trauma, Esuba, and Beyond Violence. Results of the studies indicate a decrease in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptomatology and an additive effect to treatment as usual. Initial evidence for trauma-informed interventions for incarcerated women appears positive; however, replication using more rigorous research designs and inclusion of effect sizes are recommended. Limitations of this review include exclusion of the gray literature and lack of meta-analysis.

PubSearch and PubFetch: a simple management system for semiautomated retrieval and annotation of biological information from the literature.

PubMed

Yoo, Danny; Xu, Iris; Berardini, Tanya Z; Rhee, Seung Yon; Narayanasamy, Vijay; Twigger, Simon

2006-03-01

For most systems in biology, a large body of literature exists that describes the complexity of the system based on experimental results. Manual review of this literature to extract targeted information into biological databases is difficult and time consuming. To address this problem, we developed PubSearch and PubFetch, which store literature, keyword, and gene information in a relational database, index the literature with keywords and gene names, and provide a Web user interface for annotating the genes from experimental data found in the associated literature. A set of protocols is provided in this unit for installing, populating, running, and using PubSearch and PubFetch. In addition, we provide support protocols for performing controlled vocabulary annotations. Intended users of PubSearch and PubFetch are database curators and biology researchers interested in tracking the literature and capturing information about genes of interest in a more effective way than with conventional spreadsheets and lab notebooks.

HIPdb: a database of experimentally validated HIV inhibiting peptides.

PubMed

Qureshi, Abid; Thakur, Nishant; Kumar, Manoj

2013-01-01

Besides antiretroviral drugs, peptides have also demonstrated potential to inhibit the Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). For example, T20 has been discovered to effectively block the HIV entry and was approved by the FDA as a novel anti-HIV peptide (AHP). We have collated all experimental information on AHPs at a single platform. HIPdb is a manually curated database of experimentally verified HIV inhibiting peptides targeting various steps or proteins involved in the life cycle of HIV e.g. fusion, integration, reverse transcription etc. This database provides experimental information of 981 peptides. These are of varying length obtained from natural as well as synthetic sources and tested on different cell lines. Important fields included are peptide sequence, length, source, target, cell line, inhibition/IC(50), assay and reference. The database provides user friendly browse, search, sort and filter options. It also contains useful services like BLAST and 'Map' for alignment with user provided sequences. In addition, predicted structure and physicochemical properties of the peptides are also included. HIPdb database is freely available at http://crdd.osdd.net/servers/hipdb. Comprehensive information of this database will be helpful in selecting/designing effective anti-HIV peptides. Thus it may prove a useful resource to researchers for peptide based therapeutics development.

The flaws and human harms of animal experimentation.

PubMed

Akhtar, Aysha

2015-10-01

Nonhuman animal ("animal") experimentation is typically defended by arguments that it is reliable, that animals provide sufficiently good models of human biology and diseases to yield relevant information, and that, consequently, its use provides major human health benefits. I demonstrate that a growing body of scientific literature critically assessing the validity of animal experimentation generally (and animal modeling specifically) raises important concerns about its reliability and predictive value for human outcomes and for understanding human physiology. The unreliability of animal experimentation across a wide range of areas undermines scientific arguments in favor of the practice. Additionally, I show how animal experimentation often significantly harms humans through misleading safety studies, potential abandonment of effective therapeutics, and direction of resources away from more effective testing methods. The resulting evidence suggests that the collective harms and costs to humans from animal experimentation outweigh potential benefits and that resources would be better invested in developing human-based testing methods.

Global Snow from Space: Development of a Satellite-based, Terrestrial Snow Mission Planning Tool

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Forman, B. A.; Kumar, S.; LeMoigne, J.; Nag, S.

2017-12-01

A global, satellite-based, terrestrial snow mission planning tool is proposed to help inform experimental mission design with relevance to snow depth and snow water equivalent (SWE). The idea leverages the capabilities of NASA's Land Information System (LIS) and the Tradespace Analysis Tool for Constellations (TAT-C) to harness the information content of Earth science mission data across a suite of hypothetical sensor designs, orbital configurations, data assimilation algorithms, and optimization and uncertainty techniques, including cost estimates and risk assessments of each hypothetical permutation. One objective of the proposed observing system simulation experiment (OSSE) is to assess the complementary - or perhaps contradictory - information content derived from the simultaneous collection of passive microwave (radiometer), active microwave (radar), and LIDAR observations from space-based platforms. The integrated system will enable a true end-to-end OSSE that can help quantify the value of observations based on their utility towards both scientific research and applications as well as to better guide future mission design. Science and mission planning questions addressed as part of this concept include: What observational records are needed (in space and time) to maximize terrestrial snow experimental utility? How might observations be coordinated (in space and time) to maximize this utility? What is the additional utility associated with an additional observation? How can future mission costs be minimized while ensuring Science requirements are fulfilled?

Towards the Development of a Global, Satellite-based, Terrestrial Snow Mission Planning Tool

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Forman, Bart; Kumar, Sujay; Le Moigne, Jacqueline; Nag, Sreeja

2017-01-01

A global, satellite-based, terrestrial snow mission planning tool is proposed to help inform experimental mission design with relevance to snow depth and snow water equivalent (SWE). The idea leverages the capabilities of NASAs Land Information System (LIS) and the Tradespace Analysis Tool for Constellations (TAT C) to harness the information content of Earth science mission data across a suite of hypothetical sensor designs, orbital configurations, data assimilation algorithms, and optimization and uncertainty techniques, including cost estimates and risk assessments of each hypothetical orbital configuration.One objective the proposed observing system simulation experiment (OSSE) is to assess the complementary or perhaps contradictory information content derived from the simultaneous collection of passive microwave (radiometer), active microwave (radar), and LIDAR observations from space-based platforms. The integrated system will enable a true end-to-end OSSE that can help quantify the value of observations based on their utility towards both scientific research and applications as well as to better guide future mission design. Science and mission planning questions addressed as part of this concept include:1. What observational records are needed (in space and time) to maximize terrestrial snow experimental utility?2. How might observations be coordinated (in space and time) to maximize utility? 3. What is the additional utility associated with an additional observation?4. How can future mission costs being minimized while ensuring Science requirements are fulfilled?

Towards the Development of a Global, Satellite-Based, Terrestrial Snow Mission Planning Tool

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Forman, Bart; Kumar, Sujay; Le Moigne, Jacqueline; Nag, Sreeja

2017-01-01

A global, satellite-based, terrestrial snow mission planning tool is proposed to help inform experimental mission design with relevance to snow depth and snow water equivalent (SWE). The idea leverages the capabilities of NASA's Land Information System (LIS) and the Tradespace Analysis Tool for Constellations (TAT-C) to harness the information content of Earth science mission data across a suite of hypothetical sensor designs, orbital configurations, data assimilation algorithms, and optimization and uncertainty techniques, including cost estimates and risk assessments of each hypothetical permutation. One objective of the proposed observing system simulation experiment (OSSE) is to assess the complementary or perhaps contradictory information content derived from the simultaneous collection of passive microwave (radiometer), active microwave (radar), and LIDAR observations from space-based platforms. The integrated system will enable a true end-to-end OSSE that can help quantify the value of observations based on their utility towards both scientific research and applications as well as to better guide future mission design. Science and mission planning questions addressed as part of this concept include: What observational records are needed (in space and time) to maximize terrestrial snow experimental utility? How might observations be coordinated (in space and time) to maximize this utility? What is the additional utility associated with an additional observation? How can future mission costs be minimized while ensuring Science requirements are fulfilled?

Hybrid, experimental and computational, investigation of mechanical components

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Furlong, Cosme; Pryputniewicz, Ryszard J.

1996-07-01

Computational and experimental methodologies have unique features for the analysis and solution of a wide variety of engineering problems. Computations provide results that depend on selection of input parameters such as geometry, material constants, and boundary conditions which, for correct modeling purposes, have to be appropriately chosen. In addition, it is relatively easy to modify the input parameters in order to computationally investigate different conditions. Experiments provide solutions which characterize the actual behavior of the object of interest subjected to specific operating conditions. However, it is impractical to experimentally perform parametric investigations. This paper discusses the use of a hybrid, computational and experimental, approach for study and optimization of mechanical components. Computational techniques are used for modeling the behavior of the object of interest while it is experimentally tested using noninvasive optical techniques. Comparisons are performed through a fringe predictor program used to facilitate the correlation between both techniques. In addition, experimentally obtained quantitative information, such as displacements and shape, can be applied in the computational model in order to improve this correlation. The result is a validated computational model that can be used for performing quantitative analyses and structural optimization. Practical application of the hybrid approach is illustrated with a representative example which demonstrates the viability of the approach as an engineering tool for structural analysis and optimization.

Experimental QR code optical encryption: noise-free data recovering.

PubMed

Barrera, John Fredy; Mira-Agudelo, Alejandro; Torroba, Roberto

2014-05-15

We report, to our knowledge for the first time, the experimental implementation of a quick response (QR) code as a "container" in an optical encryption system. A joint transform correlator architecture in an interferometric configuration is chosen as the experimental scheme. As the implementation is not possible in a single step, a multiplexing procedure to encrypt the QR code of the original information is applied. Once the QR code is correctly decrypted, the speckle noise present in the recovered QR code is eliminated by a simple digital procedure. Finally, the original information is retrieved completely free of any kind of degradation after reading the QR code. Additionally, we propose and implement a new protocol in which the reception of the encrypted QR code and its decryption, the digital block processing, and the reading of the decrypted QR code are performed employing only one device (smartphone, tablet, or computer). The overall method probes to produce an outcome far more attractive to make the adoption of the technique a plausible option. Experimental results are presented to demonstrate the practicality of the proposed security system.

An experimental study of the Online Information Paradox: Does en-route information improve road network performance?

PubMed Central

2017-01-01

This study investigates the empirical presence of a theoretical transportation paradox, defined as the “Online Information Paradox” (OIP). The paradox suggests that, for certain road networks, the provision of online information deteriorate travel conditions for all users of that network relative to the situation where no online information is provided to users. The analytical presence of the paradox was derived for a specific network structure by using two equilibrium models, the first being the Expected User Equilibrium (EUE) solution (no information scenario) and the other being the User Equilibrium with Recourse (UER) solution (with information scenario). An incentivised computerised route choice game was designed using the concepts of experimental economics and administered in a controlled laboratory environment to investigate the physical presence of the paradox. Aggregate statistics of path flows and Total System Travel Costs (TSTC) were used to compare the experimental results with the theoretical findings. A total of 12 groups of 12 participants completed the experiment and the OIP and the occurrence of the OIP being significant was observed in 11 of the 12 cases. Though information increased travel costs for users on average, it reduced the volatility of travel costs experienced in the no information scenario indicating that information can achieve a more reliable system. Further replications of similar experiments and more importantly field based identification of the phenomena will force transport professionals to be aware of the emergence of the paradox. In addition, studies such as this emphasise the need for the adoption of adaptive traffic assignment techniques to appropriately model the acquisition of information on a road network. PMID:28902854

Moles of a Substance per Cell Is a Highly Informative Dosing Metric in Cell Culture

PubMed Central

Wagner, Brett A.; Buettner, Garry R.

2015-01-01

Background The biological consequences upon exposure of cells in culture to a dose of xenobiotic are not only dependent on biological variables, but also the physical aspects of experiments e.g. cell number and media volume. Dependence on physical aspects is often overlooked due to the unrecognized ambiguity in the dominant metric used to express exposure, i.e. initial concentration of xenobiotic delivered to the culture medium over the cells. We hypothesize that for many xenobiotics, specifying dose as moles per cell will reduce this ambiguity. Dose as moles per cell can also provide additional information not easily obtainable with traditional dosing metrics. Methods Here, 1,4-benzoquinone and oligomycin A are used as model compounds to investigate moles per cell as an informative dosing metric. Mechanistic insight into reactions with intracellular molecules, differences between sequential and bolus addition of xenobiotic and the influence of cell volume and protein content on toxicity are also investigated. Results When the dose of 1,4-benzoquinone or oligomycin A was specified as moles per cell, toxicity was independent of the physical conditions used (number of cells, volume of medium). When using moles per cell as a dose-metric, direct quantitative comparisons can be made between biochemical or biological endpoints and the dose of xenobiotic applied. For example, the toxicity of 1,4-benzoquinone correlated inversely with intracellular volume for all five cell lines exposed (C6, MDA-MB231, A549, MIA PaCa-2, and HepG2). Conclusions Moles per cell is a useful and informative dosing metric in cell culture. This dosing metric is a scalable parameter that: can reduce ambiguity between experiments having different physical conditions; provides additional mechanistic information; allows direct comparison between different cells; affords a more uniform platform for experimental design; addresses the important issue of repeatability of experimental results, and could increase the translatability of information gained from in vitro experiments. PMID:26172833

The impact of using visual images of the body within a personalized health risk assessment: an experimental study.

PubMed

Hollands, Gareth J; Marteau, Theresa M

2013-05-01

To examine the motivational impact of the addition of a visual image to a personalized health risk assessment and the underlying cognitive and emotional mechanisms. An online experimental study in which participants (n = 901; mean age = 27.2 years; 61.5% female) received an assessment and information focusing on the health implications of internal body fat and highlighting the protective benefits of physical activity. Participants were randomized to receive this in either (a) solely text form (control arm) or (b) text plus a visual image of predicted internal body fat (image arm). Participants received information representing one of three levels of health threat, determined by how physically active they were: high, moderate or benign. Main outcome measures were physical activity intentions (assessed pre- and post-intervention), worry, coherence and believability of the information. Intentions to undertake recommended levels of physical activity were significantly higher in the image arm, but only amongst those participants who received a high-threat communication. Believability of the results received was greater in the image arm and mediated the intervention effect on intentions. The addition of a visual image to a risk assessment led to small but significant increases in intentions to undertake recommended levels of physical activity in those at increased health risk. Limitations of the study and implications for future research are discussed. What is already known on this subject? Health risk information that is personalized to the individual may more strongly motivate risk-reducing behaviour change. Little prior research attention has been paid specifically to the motivational impact of personalized visual images and underlying mechanisms. What does this study add? In an experimental design, it is shown that receipt of visual images increases intentions to engage in risk-reducing behaviour, although only when a significant level of threat is presented. The study suggests that images increase the believability of health risk information and this may underlie motivational impact. © 2012 The British Psychological Society.

Mechanisms for Human Spatial Competence

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gunzelmann, Glenn; Lyon, Don R.

Research spanning decades has generated a long list of phenomena associated with human spatial information processing. Additionally, a number of theories have been proposed about the representation, organization and processing of spatial information by humans. This paper presents a broad account of human spatial competence, integrated with the ACT-R cognitive architecture. Using a cognitive architecture grounds the research in a validated theory of human cognition, enhancing the plausibility of the overall account. This work posits a close link of aspects of spatial information processing to vision and motor planning, and integrates theoretical perspectives that have been proposed over the history of research in this area. In addition, the account is supported by evidence from neuropsychological investigations of human spatial ability. The mechanisms provide a means of accounting for a broad range of phenomena described in the experimental literature.

Students' Reading Comprehension Performance with Emotional Literacy-Based Strategy Intervention

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Yussof, Yusfarina Mohd; Jamian, Abdul Rasid; Hamzah, Zaitul Azma Zainon; Roslan, Samsilah

2013-01-01

An effective reading comprehension process demands a strategy to enhance the cognitive ability to digest text information in the effort to elicit meaning contextually. In addition, the role of emotions also influences the efficacy of this process, especially in narrative text comprehension. This quasi-experimental study aims to observe students'…

75 FR 5732 - Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Establishment of a Nonessential Experimental...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-02-04

... this proposed action and to determine whether to prepare a finding of no significant impact or an environmental impact statement, we will take into consideration all comments and any additional information we... grazing in the United States and Mexico; military activities; recreation; poaching and hunting; clearing...

Programmable Quantum Photonic Processor Using Silicon Photonics

DTIC Science & Technology

2017-04-01

quantum information processing and quantum sensing, ranging from linear optics quantum computing and quantum simulation to quantum ...transformers have driven experimental and theoretical advances in quantum simulation, cluster-state quantum computing , all-optical quantum repeaters...neuromorphic computing , and other applications. In addition, we developed new schemes for ballistic quantum computation , new methods for

Organic Matter in SNC Meteorites: Is It Time to Re-Evaluate the Viking Biology Experimental Data?

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Warmflash, D.; Clemett, S. J.; McKay, D. S.

2001-01-01

New data from SNC meteorites suggests that organic material may be present in the martian upper crust. This adds to possibility that the Viking biology experiments may have plausible biological interpretations as well as inorganic chemical interpretations Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract..

The TRIPSE: A Process-Oriented Exam for Large Undergraduate Classes

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nastos, Stash; Rangachari, P. K.

2013-01-01

The TRIPSE (tri-partite problem solving exercise), a process-oriented exam that mimics the scientific process, was used previously in small classes (15-25). Provided limited data, students frame explanations and design experimental tests that they later revise with additional information. Our 6-year experience using it with larger numbers…

Vibration of middle ear with shape memory prosthesis - Experimental and numerical study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rafal, Rusinek; Szymanski, Marcin; Lajmert, Pawel

2018-01-01

The paper presents experimental investigations of ossicular chain vibrations using a Laser Doppler Vibrometer (LDV) for the intact middle ear and a reconstructed one by means of the new designed shape memory prosthesis. Vibrations of the round window are measured with the Laser Doppler vibrometer and studied classically by the transfer function analysis. Moreover, the recurrence plot technique and the Hilbert vibration decomposition method are used to extend the classical analysis. The new methods show additional vibrations components and provide more information about middle ear behaviour.

MsLDR-creator: a web service to design msLDR assays.

PubMed

Bormann, Felix; Dahl, Andreas; Sers, Christine

2012-03-01

MsLDR-creator is a free web service to design assays for the new DNA methylation detection method msLDR. The service provides the user with all necessary information about the oligonucleotides required for the measurement of a given CpG within a sequence of interest. The parameters are calculated by the nearest neighbour approach to achieve optimal behaviour during the experimental procedure. In addition, to guarantee a good start using msLDR, further information, like protocols and hints and tricks, are provided.

Report of the 1st Planning Workshop for CELSS Flight Experimentation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tremor, John W.; Macelroy, Robert D.

1988-01-01

A workshop held March 23 and 24, 1987 to establish a base upon which a CELSS flight experiment program will be developed, is summarized. The kind of information necessary for productivity assessment was determined. In addition, generic experiments necessary to gather that information were identified and prioritized. General problems of hardware and equipment were defined. The need for the hardware to provide a stress-free environment, not only for productivity, but also to make more readily identifiable disturbing mission factors, was recognized.

Superadditivity of two quantum information resources

PubMed Central

Nawareg, Mohamed; Muhammad, Sadiq; Horodecki, Pawel; Bourennane, Mohamed

2017-01-01

Entanglement is one of the most puzzling features of quantum theory and a principal resource for quantum information processing. It is well known that in classical information theory, the addition of two classical information resources will not lead to any extra advantages. On the contrary, in quantum information, a spectacular phenomenon of the superadditivity of two quantum information resources emerges. It shows that quantum entanglement, which was completely absent in any of the two resources separately, emerges as a result of combining them together. We present the first experimental demonstration of this quantum phenomenon with two photonic three-partite nondistillable entangled states shared between three parties Alice, Bob, and Charlie, where the entanglement was completely absent between Bob and Charlie. PMID:28951886

Bed inventory overturn in a circulating fluid bed riser with pant-leg structure

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jinjing Li; Wei Wang; Hairui Yang

2009-05-15

The special phenomenon, nominated as bed inventory overturn, in circulating fluid bed (CFB) riser with pant-leg structure was studied with model calculation and experimental work. A compounded pressure drop mathematic model was developed and validated with the experimental data in a cold experimental test rig. The model calculation results agree well with the measured data. In addition, the intensity of bed inventory overturn is directly proportional to the fluidizing velocity and is inversely proportional to the branch point height. The results in the present study provide significant information for the design and operation of a CFB boiler with pant-leg structure.more » 15 refs., 10 figs., 1 tab.« less

Experimental gas-fired pulse-combustion studies

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Blomquist, C. A.

1982-01-01

Experimental studies conducted at Argonne National Laboratory on a gas-fired, water-cooled, Helmholtz-type pulse combustion burner are discussed. In addition to the experimental work, information is presented on the evolution of pulse combustion, the types of pulse combustion burners and their applications, and the types of fuels used. Also included is a survey of other pertinent studies of gas-fired pulse combustion. The burner used in the Argonne research effort was equipped with adjustable air and gas flapper valves and was operated stably over a heat-input range of 30,000 to 200,000 Btu/h. The burner's overall heat transfer in the pulsating mode was 22 to 31% higher than when the unit was operated in the steady mode. Important phenomena discussed include (1) effects on performance produced by inserting a corebustor to change tailpipe diameter, (2) effects observed following addition of an air-inlet decoupling chamber to the unit, and (3) occurrence of carbon monoxide in the exhaust gas.

Airborne Use of Traffic Intent Information in a Distributed Air-Ground Traffic Management Concept: Experiment Design and Preliminary Results

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wing, David J.; Adams, Richard J.; Duley, Jacqueline A.; Legan, Brian M.; Barmore, Bryan E.; Moses, Donald

2001-01-01

A predominant research focus in the free flight community has been on the type of information required on the flight deck to enable pilots to "autonomously" maintain separation from other aircraft. At issue are the relative utility and requirement for information exchange between aircraft regarding the current "state" and/or the "intent" of each aircraft. This paper presents the experimental design and some initial findings of an experimental research study designed to provide insight into the issue of intent information exchange in constrained en-route operations and its effect on pilot decision making and flight performance. Two operational modes for autonomous operations were compared in a piloted simulation. The tactical mode was characterized primarily by the use of state information for conflict detection and resolution and an open-loop means for the pilot to meet operational constraints. The strategic mode involved the combined use of state and intent information, provided the pilot an additional level of alerting, and allowed a closed-loop approach to meeting operational constraints. Potential operational benefits of both modes are illustrated through several scenario case studies. Subjective data results are presented that generally indicate pilot consensus in favor of the strategic mode.

A computer-based education intervention to enhance surrogates' informed consent for genomics research.

PubMed

Shelton, Ann K; Freeman, Bradley D; Fish, Anne F; Bachman, Jean A; Richardson, Lloyd I

2015-03-01

Many research studies conducted today in critical care have a genomics component. Patients' surrogates asked to authorize participation in genomics research for a loved one in the intensive care unit may not be prepared to make informed decisions about a patient's participation in the research. To examine the effectiveness of a new, computer-based education module on surrogates' understanding of the process of informed consent for genomics research. A pilot study was conducted with visitors in the waiting rooms of 2 intensive care units in a Midwestern tertiary care medical center. Visitors were randomly assigned to the experimental (education module plus a sample genomics consent form; n = 65) or the control (sample genomics consent form only; n = 69) group. Participants later completed a test on informed genomics consent. Understanding the process of informed consent was greater (P = .001) in the experimental group than in the control group. Specifically, compared with the control group, the experimental group had a greater understanding of 8 of 13 elements of informed consent: intended benefits of research (P = .02), definition of surrogate consenter (P= .001), withdrawal from the study (P = .001), explanation of risk (P = .002), purpose of the institutional review board (P = .001), definition of substituted judgment (P = .03), compensation for harm (P = .001), and alternative treatments (P = .004). Computer-based education modules may be an important addition to conventional approaches for obtaining informed consent in the intensive care unit. Preparing patients' family members who may consider serving as surrogate consenters is critical to facilitating genomics research in critical care. ©2015 American Association of Critical-Care Nurses.

Improving the Effectiveness of Fundraising Messages: The Impact of Charity Goal Attainment, Message Framing, and Evidence on Persuasion

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Das, Enny; Kerkhof, Peter; Kuiper, Joyce

2008-01-01

This experimental study assessed the effectiveness of fundraising messages. Based on recent findings regarding the effects of message framing and evidence, effective fundraising messages should combine abstract, statistical information with a negative message frame and anecdotal evidence with a positive message frame. In addition, building on…

10 CFR 32.57 - Calibration or reference sources containing americium-241 or radium-226: Requirements for license...

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... design; (3) Details of the method of incorporation and binding of the americium-241 or radium-226 in the source; (4) Procedures for and results of prototype testing of sources, which are designed to contain... additional information, including experimental studies and tests, required by the Commission to facilitate a...

10 CFR 32.57 - Calibration or reference sources containing americium-241 or radium-226: Requirements for license...

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... design; (3) Details of the method of incorporation and binding of the americium-241 or radium-226 in the source; (4) Procedures for and results of prototype testing of sources, which are designed to contain... additional information, including experimental studies and tests, required by the Commission to facilitate a...

10 CFR 32.61 - Ice detection devices containing strontium-90; requirements for license to manufacture or...

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... physical form and maximum quantity of strontium-90 in the device; (2) Details of construction and design of... handling and installation of the device; (8) Any additional information, including experimental studies and... ordinary circumstances of use; (3) The device is so designed that it cannot be easily disassembled; (4) The...

10 CFR 32.57 - Calibration or reference sources containing americium-241 or radium-226: Requirements for license...

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... design; (3) Details of the method of incorporation and binding of the americium-241 or radium-226 in the source; (4) Procedures for and results of prototype testing of sources, which are designed to contain... additional information, including experimental studies and tests, required by the Commission to facilitate a...

10 CFR 32.57 - Calibration or reference sources containing americium-241 or radium-226: Requirements for license...

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... design; (3) Details of the method of incorporation and binding of the americium-241 or radium-226 in the source; (4) Procedures for and results of prototype testing of sources, which are designed to contain... additional information, including experimental studies and tests, required by the Commission to facilitate a...

10 CFR 32.57 - Calibration or reference sources containing americium-241 or radium-226: Requirements for license...

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... design; (3) Details of the method of incorporation and binding of the americium-241 or radium-226 in the source; (4) Procedures for and results of prototype testing of sources, which are designed to contain... additional information, including experimental studies and tests, required by the Commission to facilitate a...

Reverse-engineering of gene networks for regulating early blood development from single-cell measurements.

PubMed

Wei, Jiangyong; Hu, Xiaohua; Zou, Xiufen; Tian, Tianhai

2017-12-28

Recent advances in omics technologies have raised great opportunities to study large-scale regulatory networks inside the cell. In addition, single-cell experiments have measured the gene and protein activities in a large number of cells under the same experimental conditions. However, a significant challenge in computational biology and bioinformatics is how to derive quantitative information from the single-cell observations and how to develop sophisticated mathematical models to describe the dynamic properties of regulatory networks using the derived quantitative information. This work designs an integrated approach to reverse-engineer gene networks for regulating early blood development based on singel-cell experimental observations. The wanderlust algorithm is initially used to develop the pseudo-trajectory for the activities of a number of genes. Since the gene expression data in the developed pseudo-trajectory show large fluctuations, we then use Gaussian process regression methods to smooth the gene express data in order to obtain pseudo-trajectories with much less fluctuations. The proposed integrated framework consists of both bioinformatics algorithms to reconstruct the regulatory network and mathematical models using differential equations to describe the dynamics of gene expression. The developed approach is applied to study the network regulating early blood cell development. A graphic model is constructed for a regulatory network with forty genes and a dynamic model using differential equations is developed for a network of nine genes. Numerical results suggests that the proposed model is able to match experimental data very well. We also examine the networks with more regulatory relations and numerical results show that more regulations may exist. We test the possibility of auto-regulation but numerical simulations do not support the positive auto-regulation. In addition, robustness is used as an importantly additional criterion to select candidate networks. The research results in this work shows that the developed approach is an efficient and effective method to reverse-engineer gene networks using single-cell experimental observations.

Multi-task learning with group information for human action recognition

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Qian, Li; Wu, Song; Pu, Nan; Xu, Shulin; Xiao, Guoqiang

2018-04-01

Human action recognition is an important and challenging task in computer vision research, due to the variations in human motion performance, interpersonal differences and recording settings. In this paper, we propose a novel multi-task learning framework with group information (MTL-GI) for accurate and efficient human action recognition. Specifically, we firstly obtain group information through calculating the mutual information according to the latent relationship between Gaussian components and action categories, and clustering similar action categories into the same group by affinity propagation clustering. Additionally, in order to explore the relationships of related tasks, we incorporate group information into multi-task learning. Experimental results evaluated on two popular benchmarks (UCF50 and HMDB51 datasets) demonstrate the superiority of our proposed MTL-GI framework.

Topographic ERP analyses: a step-by-step tutorial review.

PubMed

Murray, Micah M; Brunet, Denis; Michel, Christoph M

2008-06-01

In this tutorial review, we detail both the rationale for as well as the implementation of a set of analyses of surface-recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) that uses the reference-free spatial (i.e. topographic) information available from high-density electrode montages to render statistical information concerning modulations in response strength, latency, and topography both between and within experimental conditions. In these and other ways these topographic analysis methods allow the experimenter to glean additional information and neurophysiologic interpretability beyond what is available from canonical waveform analyses. In this tutorial we present the example of somatosensory evoked potentials (SEPs) in response to stimulation of each hand to illustrate these points. For each step of these analyses, we provide the reader with both a conceptual and mathematical description of how the analysis is carried out, what it yields, and how to interpret its statistical outcome. We show that these topographic analysis methods are intuitive and easy-to-use approaches that can remove much of the guesswork often confronting ERP researchers and also assist in identifying the information contained within high-density ERP datasets.

Mathematical and computational approaches can complement experimental studies of host-pathogen interactions.

PubMed

Kirschner, Denise E; Linderman, Jennifer J

2009-04-01

In addition to traditional and novel experimental approaches to study host-pathogen interactions, mathematical and computer modelling have recently been applied to address open questions in this area. These modelling tools not only offer an additional avenue for exploring disease dynamics at multiple biological scales, but also complement and extend knowledge gained via experimental tools. In this review, we outline four examples where modelling has complemented current experimental techniques in a way that can or has already pushed our knowledge of host-pathogen dynamics forward. Two of the modelling approaches presented go hand in hand with articles in this issue exploring fluorescence resonance energy transfer and two-photon intravital microscopy. Two others explore virtual or 'in silico' deletion and depletion as well as a new method to understand and guide studies in genetic epidemiology. In each of these examples, the complementary nature of modelling and experiment is discussed. We further note that multi-scale modelling may allow us to integrate information across length (molecular, cellular, tissue, organism, population) and time (e.g. seconds to lifetimes). In sum, when combined, these compatible approaches offer new opportunities for understanding host-pathogen interactions.

Searching Online for Information About Vaccination: Assessing the Influence of User-Specific Cognitive Factors Using Eye-Tracking.

PubMed

Kessler, Sabrina Heike; Zillich, Arne Freya

2018-04-20

In Germany, the Internet is gaining increasing importance for laypeople as a source of health information, including information about vaccination. While previous research has focused on the characteristics of online information about vaccination, this study investigated the influence of relevant user-specific cognitive factors on users' search behavior for online information about vaccination. Additionally, it examined how searching online for information about vaccination influences users' attitudes toward vaccination. We conducted an experimental study with 56 undergraduate students from a German university that consisted of a survey and eye-tracking while browsing the Internet, followed by a content analysis of the eye-tracking data. The results show that the users exposed themselves to balanced and diverse online information about vaccination. However, none of the examined cognitive factors (attitude toward vaccination, attitude salience, prior knowledge about vaccination, need for cognition, and cognitive involvement) influenced the amount of time users spent searching the Internet for information about vaccination. Our study was not able to document any effects of attitude-consistent selective exposure to online information about vaccination. In addition, we found no effect on attitude change after having searched the Internet for vaccine-related information. Thus, users' search behavior regarding vaccination seems to be relatively stable.

Usefulness of multiqubit W-type states in quantum information processing

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Singh, P.; Adhikari, S.; Kumar, A., E-mail: atulk@iitj.ac.in

We analyze the efficiency of multiqubit W-type states as resources for quantum information. For this, we identify and generalize four-qubit W-type states. Our results show that these states can be used as resources for deterministic quantum information processing. The utility of results, however, is limited by the availability of experimental setups to perform and distinguish multiqubit measurements. We therefore emphasize protocols where two users want to establish an optimal bipartite entanglement using the partially entangled W-type states. We find that for such practical purposes, four-qubit W-type states can be a better resource in comparison to three-qubit W-type states. For amore » dense coding protocol, our states can be used deterministically to send two bits of classical message by locally manipulating a single qubit. In addition, we also propose a realistic experimental method to prepare the four-qubit W-type states using standard unitary operations and weak measurements.« less

On vital aid: the why, what and how of validation

PubMed Central

Kleywegt, Gerard J.

2009-01-01

Limitations to the data and subjectivity in the structure-determination process may cause errors in macromolecular crystal structures. Appropriate validation techniques may be used to reveal problems in structures, ideally before they are analysed, published or deposited. Additionally, such tech­niques may be used a posteriori to assess the (relative) merits of a model by potential users. Weak validation methods and statistics assess how well a model reproduces the information that was used in its construction (i.e. experimental data and prior knowledge). Strong methods and statistics, on the other hand, test how well a model predicts data or information that were not used in the structure-determination process. These may be data that were excluded from the process on purpose, general knowledge about macromolecular structure, information about the biological role and biochemical activity of the molecule under study or its mutants or complexes and predictions that are based on the model and that can be tested experimentally. PMID:19171968

Experimental demonstration of entanglement-assisted coding using a two-mode squeezed vacuum state

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mizuno, Jun; Wakui, Kentaro; Furusawa, Akira; Sasaki, Masahide

2005-01-01

We have experimentally realized the scheme initially proposed as quantum dense coding with continuous variables [

Extending the Applicability of Exact Nuclear Overhauser Enhancements to Large Proteins and RNA.

PubMed

Nichols, Parker; Born, Alexandra; Henen, Morkos; Strotz, Dean; Chi, Celestine N; Güntert, Peter; Vögeli, Beat Rolf

2018-06-08

Distance-dependent NOEs are one of the most popular and important experimental restraints for calculating NMR structures. Despite this, they are mostly employed as semi-quantitative upper distance bounds, which discards a wealth of information that is encoded in the cross-relaxation rate constant. Information that is lost includes exact distances between protons and dynamics that occur on the sub-millisecond time-scale. Our recently introduced exact measurement of the NOE (eNOE) requires little additional experimental effort relative to other NMR observables. So far, we have used eNOEs to calculate multi-state ensembles of proteins up to ~150 residues. Here, we briefly revisit the eNOE methodology and present two new directions for the use of eNOEs: Applications to large proteins and RNA. © 2018 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Information processing efficiency in patients with multiple sclerosis.

PubMed

Archibald, C J; Fisk, J D

2000-10-01

Reduced information processing efficiency, consequent to impaired neural transmission, has been proposed as underlying various cognitive problems in patients with Multiple Sclerosis (MS). This study employed two measures developed from experimental psychology that control for the potential confound of perceptual-motor abnormalities (Salthouse, Babcock, & Shaw, 1991; Sternberg, 1966, 1969) to assess the speed of information processing and working memory capacity in patients with mild to moderate MS. Although patients had significantly more cognitive complaints than neurologically intact matched controls, their performance on standard tests of immediate memory span did not differ from control participants and their word list learning was within normal limits. On the experimental measures, both relapsing-remitting and secondary-progressive patients exhibited significantly slowed information processing speed relative to controls. However, only the secondary-progressive patients had an additional decrement in working memory capacity. Depression, fatigue, or neurologic disability did not account for performance differences on these measures. While speed of information processing may be slowed early in the disease process, deficits in working memory capacity may appear only as there is progression of MS. It is these latter deficits, however, that may underlie the impairment of new learning that patients with MS demonstrate.

Incorporation of native antibodies and Fc-fusion proteins on DNA nanostructures via a modular conjugation strategy† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental methods, DNA origami design, DNA sequences, and additional experimental data. See DOI: 10.1039/c7cc04178k

PubMed Central

Rosier, Bas J. H. M.; Cremers, Glenn A. O.; Engelen, Wouter; Merkx, Maarten; Brunsveld, Luc

2017-01-01

A photocrosslinkable protein G variant was used as an adapter protein to covalently and site-specifically conjugate an antibody and an Fc-fusion protein to an oligonucleotide. This modular approach enables straightforward decoration of DNA nanostructures with complex native proteins while retaining their innate binding affinity, allowing precise control over the nanoscale spatial organization of such proteins for in vitro and in vivo biomedical applications. PMID:28617516

Trans-Pacific HDR Satellite Communications Experiment Phase-2 Project Plan and Experimental Network

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hsu, Eddie; Kadowaki, Naoto; Yoshimura, Naoko; Takahashi, Takashi; Yoshikawa, Makoto; Bergman, Larry; Bhasin, Kul

2000-01-01

The trans-Pacific high data rate (TP-HDR) satellite communications experiment was proposed at the Japan-U.S. Cooperation in Space (JUCS) Program Workshop held in Hawaii in 1993 and remote high definition video post-production was demonstrated as the first phase trial. ATM-based 45 Mbps trans-Pacific link was established in the first phase, and the following experiments with 155 Mbps was planned as the phase 2. This paper describes the experimental network configuration and project plan of TP-HDR experiment phase 2. Additional information is provided in the original.

Direction and Integration of Experimental Ground Test Capabilities and Computational Methods

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dunn, Steven C.

2016-01-01

This paper groups and summarizes the salient points and findings from two AIAA conference panels targeted at defining the direction, with associated key issues and recommendations, for the integration of experimental ground testing and computational methods. Each panel session utilized rapporteurs to capture comments from both the panel members and the audience. Additionally, a virtual panel of several experts were consulted between the two sessions and their comments were also captured. The information is organized into three time-based groupings, as well as by subject area. These panel sessions were designed to provide guidance to both researchers/developers and experimental/computational service providers in defining the future of ground testing, which will be inextricably integrated with the advancement of computational tools.

Addition and subtraction operation of optical orbital angular momentum with dielectric metasurfaces

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yi, Xunong; Li, Ying; Ling, Xiaohui; Liu, Yachao; Ke, Yougang; Fan, Dianyuan

2015-12-01

In this work, we propose a simple approach to realize addition and subtraction operation of optical orbital angular momentum (OAM) based on dielectric metasurfaces. The spin-orbit interaction of light in spatially inhomogeneous and anisotropic metasurfaces results in the spin-to-orbital angular momentum conversion. The subtraction system of OAM consists of two cascaded metasurfaces, while the addition system of OAM is constituted by inserting a half waveplate (HWP) between the two metasurfaces. Our experimental results are in good agreement with the theoretical calculation. These results could be useful for OAM-carrying beams applied in optical communication, information processing, etc.

Shannon entropy and particle decays

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Carrasco Millán, Pedro; García-Ferrero, M. Ángeles; Llanes-Estrada, Felipe J.; Porras Riojano, Ana; Sánchez García, Esteban M.

2018-05-01

We deploy Shannon's information entropy to the distribution of branching fractions in a particle decay. This serves to quantify how important a given new reported decay channel is, from the point of view of the information that it adds to the already known ones. Because the entropy is additive, one can subdivide the set of channels and discuss, for example, how much information the discovery of a new decay branching would add; or subdivide the decay distribution down to the level of individual quantum states (which can be quickly counted by the phase space). We illustrate the concept with some examples of experimentally known particle decay distributions.

Gene Function Hypotheses for the Campylobacter jejuni Glycome Generated by a Logic-Based Approach

PubMed Central

Sternberg, Michael J.E.; Tamaddoni-Nezhad, Alireza; Lesk, Victor I.; Kay, Emily; Hitchen, Paul G.; Cootes, Adrian; van Alphen, Lieke B.; Lamoureux, Marc P.; Jarrell, Harold C.; Rawlings, Christopher J.; Soo, Evelyn C.; Szymanski, Christine M.; Dell, Anne; Wren, Brendan W.; Muggleton, Stephen H.

2013-01-01

Increasingly, experimental data on biological systems are obtained from several sources and computational approaches are required to integrate this information and derive models for the function of the system. Here, we demonstrate the power of a logic-based machine learning approach to propose hypotheses for gene function integrating information from two diverse experimental approaches. Specifically, we use inductive logic programming that automatically proposes hypotheses explaining the empirical data with respect to logically encoded background knowledge. We study the capsular polysaccharide biosynthetic pathway of the major human gastrointestinal pathogen Campylobacter jejuni. We consider several key steps in the formation of capsular polysaccharide consisting of 15 genes of which 8 have assigned function, and we explore the extent to which functions can be hypothesised for the remaining 7. Two sources of experimental data provide the information for learning—the results of knockout experiments on the genes involved in capsule formation and the absence/presence of capsule genes in a multitude of strains of different serotypes. The machine learning uses the pathway structure as background knowledge. We propose assignments of specific genes to five previously unassigned reaction steps. For four of these steps, there was an unambiguous optimal assignment of gene to reaction, and to the fifth, there were three candidate genes. Several of these assignments were consistent with additional experimental results. We therefore show that the logic-based methodology provides a robust strategy to integrate results from different experimental approaches and propose hypotheses for the behaviour of a biological system. PMID:23103756

Gene function hypotheses for the Campylobacter jejuni glycome generated by a logic-based approach.

PubMed

Sternberg, Michael J E; Tamaddoni-Nezhad, Alireza; Lesk, Victor I; Kay, Emily; Hitchen, Paul G; Cootes, Adrian; van Alphen, Lieke B; Lamoureux, Marc P; Jarrell, Harold C; Rawlings, Christopher J; Soo, Evelyn C; Szymanski, Christine M; Dell, Anne; Wren, Brendan W; Muggleton, Stephen H

2013-01-09

Increasingly, experimental data on biological systems are obtained from several sources and computational approaches are required to integrate this information and derive models for the function of the system. Here, we demonstrate the power of a logic-based machine learning approach to propose hypotheses for gene function integrating information from two diverse experimental approaches. Specifically, we use inductive logic programming that automatically proposes hypotheses explaining the empirical data with respect to logically encoded background knowledge. We study the capsular polysaccharide biosynthetic pathway of the major human gastrointestinal pathogen Campylobacter jejuni. We consider several key steps in the formation of capsular polysaccharide consisting of 15 genes of which 8 have assigned function, and we explore the extent to which functions can be hypothesised for the remaining 7. Two sources of experimental data provide the information for learning-the results of knockout experiments on the genes involved in capsule formation and the absence/presence of capsule genes in a multitude of strains of different serotypes. The machine learning uses the pathway structure as background knowledge. We propose assignments of specific genes to five previously unassigned reaction steps. For four of these steps, there was an unambiguous optimal assignment of gene to reaction, and to the fifth, there were three candidate genes. Several of these assignments were consistent with additional experimental results. We therefore show that the logic-based methodology provides a robust strategy to integrate results from different experimental approaches and propose hypotheses for the behaviour of a biological system. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Applications of mass spectrometry techniques to autoclave curing of materials

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Smith, A. C.

1983-01-01

Mass spectrometer analysis of gases evolved from polymer materials during a cure cycle can provide a wealth of information useful for studying cure properties and procedures. In this paper data is presented for two materials to support the feasibility of using mass spectrometer gas analysis techniques to enhance the knowledge of autoclave curing of composite materials and provide additional information for process control evaluation. It is expected that this technique will also be useful in working out the details involved in determining the proper cure cycle for new or experimental materials.

Can snag creation benefit a primary cavity nester: response to an experimental pulse in snag abundance

Treesearch

John Kilgo; Mark Vukovich

2014-01-01

Thresholds in response by cavity-nesting bird populations to variations in the snag resource are poorly understood. In addition, limited information exists on the value of artificially created snags for cavity-nesting birds. Therefore, uncertainty exists in whether artificially created snags can yield a positive population response among snag-dependent birds. We used...

Exploring Natural Pedagogy in Play with Preschoolers: Cues Parents Use and Relations among Them

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sage, Kara; Baldwin, Dare

2012-01-01

Recent developmental work demonstrates a range of effects of pedagogical cues on childhood learning. The present work investigates natural pedagogy in informal parent-child play. Preschool-aged children participated in free play and a toy task with a parent in addition to a toy task with an experimenter. Sessions were extensively coded for use of…

Systematics of Ni, Co, Cr and V in Olivine from Planetary Melt Systems: Martian Basalts

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Herd, C. D. K.; Jones, J. H.; Shearer, C. K.; Papike, J. J.

2001-01-01

Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS) data for Ni, Co, Cr, and V in olivine in martian basalts is compared to data from lunar and terrestrial basalts. We use experimentally-derived and published D values to calculate as-yet unsampled, olivine-bearing, non-cumulus melt compositions. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

Partitioning of Nd, Tb, Lu, and Hf Between Garnet and Ordinary Chondrite Melt at 5 to 9 GPa: Applications to Martian Differentiation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Draper, D. S.; Chabot, N. L.; Xirouchakis, D.; Wasserman, A. A.; Agee, C. B.

2001-01-01

One explanation for Al and REE depletions in SNC meteorites is early majorite fractionation in a deep martian magma ocean. We report initial results from an experimental investigation of partitioning between majoritic garnet and ordinary chondrite liquid. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

Risk Factors for Antimicrobial Resistance in Escherichia coli in Pigs Receiving Oral Antimicrobial Treatment: A Systematic Review.

PubMed

Burow, Elke; Käsbohrer, Annemarie

2017-03-01

The aim of this literature review was to identify risk factors in addition to antimicrobial treatment for antimicrobial resistance (AMR) occurrence in commensal Escherichia coli in pigs. A variety of studies were searched in 2014 and 2015. Studies identified as potentially relevant were assessed against eligibility criteria such as observation or experiment (no review), presentation of risk factors in addition to (single dosage) antimicrobial use, risk factors for but not resulting from AMR, and the same antimicrobial used and tested. Thirteen articles (nine on observational, four on experimental studies) were finally selected as relevant. It was reported that space allowance, production size/stage, cleanliness, entry of animals and humans into herds, dosage/frequency/route of administration, time span between treatment and sampling date, herd size, distance to another farm, coldness, and season had an impact on AMR occurrence. Associations were shown by one to four studies per factor and differed in magnitude, direction, and level of significance. The risk of bias was unclear in nearly half of the information of observational studies and in most of the information from experimental studies. Further research on the effects of specific management practices is needed to develop well-founded management advice.

Computational study of single-expansion-ramp nozzles with external burning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yungster, Shaye; Trefny, Charles J.

1992-04-01

A computational investigation of the effects of external burning on the performance of single expansion ramp nozzles (SERN) operating at transonic speeds is presented. The study focuses on the effects of external heat addition and introduces a simplified injection and mixing model based on a control volume analysis. This simplified model permits parametric and scaling studies that would have been impossible to conduct with a detailed CFD analysis. The CFD model is validated by comparing the computed pressure distribution and thrust forces, for several nozzle configurations, with experimental data. Specific impulse calculations are also presented which indicate that external burning performance can be superior to other methods of thrust augmentation at transonic speeds. The effects of injection fuel pressure and nozzle pressure ratio on the performance of SERN nozzles with external burning are described. The results show trends similar to those reported in the experimental study, and provide additional information that complements the experimental data, improving our understanding of external burning flowfields. A study of the effect of scale is also presented. The results indicate that combustion kinetics do not make the flowfield sensitive to scale.

Computational study of single-expansion-ramp nozzles with external burning

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yungster, Shaye; Trefny, Charles J.

1992-01-01

A computational investigation of the effects of external burning on the performance of single expansion ramp nozzles (SERN) operating at transonic speeds is presented. The study focuses on the effects of external heat addition and introduces a simplified injection and mixing model based on a control volume analysis. This simplified model permits parametric and scaling studies that would have been impossible to conduct with a detailed CFD analysis. The CFD model is validated by comparing the computed pressure distribution and thrust forces, for several nozzle configurations, with experimental data. Specific impulse calculations are also presented which indicate that external burning performance can be superior to other methods of thrust augmentation at transonic speeds. The effects of injection fuel pressure and nozzle pressure ratio on the performance of SERN nozzles with external burning are described. The results show trends similar to those reported in the experimental study, and provide additional information that complements the experimental data, improving our understanding of external burning flowfields. A study of the effect of scale is also presented. The results indicate that combustion kinetics do not make the flowfield sensitive to scale.

Accelerated optimization and automated discovery with covariance matrix adaptation for experimental quantum control

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Roslund, Jonathan; Shir, Ofer M.; Bäck, Thomas; Rabitz, Herschel

2009-10-01

Optimization of quantum systems by closed-loop adaptive pulse shaping offers a rich domain for the development and application of specialized evolutionary algorithms. Derandomized evolution strategies (DESs) are presented here as a robust class of optimizers for experimental quantum control. The combination of stochastic and quasi-local search embodied by these algorithms is especially amenable to the inherent topology of quantum control landscapes. Implementation of DES in the laboratory results in efficiency gains of up to ˜9 times that of the standard genetic algorithm, and thus is a promising tool for optimization of unstable or fragile systems. The statistical learning upon which these algorithms are predicated also provide the means for obtaining a control problem’s Hessian matrix with no additional experimental overhead. The forced optimal covariance adaptive learning (FOCAL) method is introduced to enable retrieval of the Hessian matrix, which can reveal information about the landscape’s local structure and dynamic mechanism. Exploitation of such algorithms in quantum control experiments should enhance their efficiency and provide additional fundamental insights.

Experimental investigation of the no-signalling principle in parity-time symmetric theory using an open quantum system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tang, Jian-Shun; Wang, Yi-Tao; Yu, Shang; He, De-Yong; Xu, Jin-Shi; Liu, Bi-Heng; Chen, Geng; Sun, Yong-Nan; Sun, Kai; Han, Yong-Jian; Li, Chuan-Feng; Guo, Guang-Can

2016-10-01

The experimental progress achieved in parity-time () symmetry in classical optics is the most important accomplishment in the past decade and stimulates many new applications, such as unidirectional light transport and single-mode lasers. However, in the quantum regime, some controversial effects are proposed for -symmetric theory, for example, the potential violation of the no-signalling principle. It is therefore important to understand whether -symmetric theory is consistent with well-established principles. Here, we experimentally study this no-signalling problem related to the -symmetric theory using two space-like separated entangled photons, with one of them passing through a post-selected quantum gate, which effectively simulates a -symmetric evolution. Our results suggest that the superluminal information transmission can be simulated when the successfully -symmetrically evolved subspace is solely considered. However, considering this subspace is only a part of the full Hermitian system, additional information regarding whether the -symmetric evolution is successful is necessary, which transmits to the receiver at maximally light speed, maintaining the no-signalling principle.

Experimental investigation of the no-signalling principle in parity-time symmetric theory using an open quantum system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tang, Jian-Shun; Wang, Yi-Tao; Han, Yong-Jian; Li, Chuan-Feng; Guo, Guang-Can

The experimental progress achieved in parity-time (PT) symmetry in classical optics is the most important accomplishment in the past decade and stimulates many new applications, such as unidirectional light transport and single-mode lasers. However, in the quantum regime, some controversial effects are proposed for PT-symmetric theory, for example, the potential violation of the no-signalling principle. It is therefore important to understand whether PT-symmetric theory is consistent with well-established principles. Here, we experimentally study this no-signalling problem related to the PT-symmetric theory using two space-like separated entangled photons, with one of them passing through a post-selected quantum gate, which effectively simulates a PT-symmetric evolution. Our results suggest that the superluminal information transmission can be simulated when the successfully PT-symmetrically evolved subspace is solely considered. However, considering this subspace is only a part of the full Hermitian system, additional information regarding whether the PT-symmetric evolution is successful is necessary, which transmits to the receiver at maximally light speed, maintaining the no-signalling principle.

Design of 9.271-pressure-ratio 5-stage core compressor and overall performance for first 3 stages

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Steinke, Ronald J.

1986-01-01

Overall aerodynamic design information is given for all five stages of an axial flow core compressor (74A) having a 9.271 pressure ratio and 29.710 kg/sec flow. For the inlet stage group (first three stages), detailed blade element design information and experimental overall performance are given. At rotor 1 inlet tip speed was 430.291 m/sec, and hub to tip radius ratio was 0.488. A low number of blades per row was achieved by the use of low-aspect-ratio blading of moderate solidity. The high reaction stages have about equal energy addition. Radial energy varied to give constant total pressure at the rotor exit. The blade element profile and shock losses and the incidence and deviation angles were based on relevant experimental data. Blade shapes are mostly double circular arc. Analysis by a three-dimensional Euler code verified the experimentally measured high flow at design speed and IGV-stator setting angles. An optimization code gave an optimal IGV-stator reset schedule for higher measured efficiency at all speeds.

The effects of prior knowledge on study-time allocation and free recall: investigating the discrepancy reduction model.

PubMed

Verkoeijen, Peter P J L; Rikers, Remy M J P; Schmidt, Henk G

2005-01-01

In this study, the authors examined the influence of prior knowledge activation on information processing by means of a prior knowledge activation procedure adopted from the read-generate paradigm. On the basis of cue-target pairs, participants in the experimental groups generated two different sets of items before studying a relevant list. Subsequently, participants were informed that they had to study the items in the list and that they should try to remember as many items as possible. The authors assessed the processing time allocated to the items in the list and free recall of those items. The results revealed that the experimental groups spent less time on items that had already been activated. In addition, the experimental groups outperformed the control group in overall free recall and in free recall of the activated items. Between-group comparisons did not demonstrate significant effects with respect to the processing time and free recall of nonactivated items. The authors interpreted these results in terms of the discrepancy reduction model of regulating the amount of processing time allocated to different parts of the list.

Taguchi method of experimental design in materials education

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Weiser, Martin W.

1993-01-01

Some of the advantages and disadvantages of the Taguchi Method of experimental design as applied to Materials Science will be discussed. This is a fractional factorial method that employs the minimum number of experimental trials for the information obtained. The analysis is also very simple to use and teach, which is quite advantageous in the classroom. In addition, the Taguchi loss function can be easily incorporated to emphasize that improvements in reproducibility are often at least as important as optimization of the response. The disadvantages of the Taguchi Method include the fact that factor interactions are normally not accounted for, there are zero degrees of freedom if all of the possible factors are used, and randomization is normally not used to prevent environmental biasing. In spite of these disadvantages it is felt that the Taguchi Method is extremely useful for both teaching experimental design and as a research tool, as will be shown with a number of brief examples.

Computational modeling of RNA 3D structures, with the aid of experimental restraints

PubMed Central

Magnus, Marcin; Matelska, Dorota; Łach, Grzegorz; Chojnowski, Grzegorz; Boniecki, Michal J; Purta, Elzbieta; Dawson, Wayne; Dunin-Horkawicz, Stanislaw; Bujnicki, Janusz M

2014-01-01

In addition to mRNAs whose primary function is transmission of genetic information from DNA to proteins, numerous other classes of RNA molecules exist, which are involved in a variety of functions, such as catalyzing biochemical reactions or performing regulatory roles. In analogy to proteins, the function of RNAs depends on their structure and dynamics, which are largely determined by the ribonucleotide sequence. Experimental determination of high-resolution RNA structures is both laborious and difficult, and therefore, the majority of known RNAs remain structurally uncharacterized. To address this problem, computational structure prediction methods were developed that simulate either the physical process of RNA structure formation (“Greek science” approach) or utilize information derived from known structures of other RNA molecules (“Babylonian science” approach). All computational methods suffer from various limitations that make them generally unreliable for structure prediction of long RNA sequences. However, in many cases, the limitations of computational and experimental methods can be overcome by combining these two complementary approaches with each other. In this work, we review computational approaches for RNA structure prediction, with emphasis on implementations (particular programs) that can utilize restraints derived from experimental analyses. We also list experimental approaches, whose results can be relatively easily used by computational methods. Finally, we describe case studies where computational and experimental analyses were successfully combined to determine RNA structures that would remain out of reach for each of these approaches applied separately. PMID:24785264

Practical characterization of quantum devices without tomography

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Landon-Cardinal, Olivier; Flammia, Steven; Silva, Marcus; Liu, Yi-Kai; Poulin, David

2012-02-01

Quantum tomography is the main method used to assess the quality of quantum information processing devices, but its complexity presents a major obstacle for the characterization of even moderately large systems. Part of the reason for this complexity is that tomography generates much more information than is usually sought. Taking a more targeted approach, we develop schemes that enable (i) estimating the ?delity of an experiment to a theoretical ideal description, (ii) learning which description within a reduced subset best matches the experimental data. Both these approaches yield a signi?cant reduction in resources compared to tomography. In particular, we show how to estimate the ?delity between a predicted pure state and an arbitrary experimental state using only a constant number of Pauli expectation values selected at random according to an importance-weighting rule. In addition, we propose methods for certifying quantum circuits and learning continuous-time quantum dynamics that are described by local Hamiltonians or Lindbladians.

A simple and accurate method for calculation of the structure factor of interacting charged spheres.

PubMed

Wu, Chu; Chan, Derek Y C; Tabor, Rico F

2014-07-15

Calculation of the structure factor of a system of interacting charged spheres based on the Ginoza solution of the Ornstein-Zernike equation has been developed and implemented on a stand-alone spreadsheet. This facilitates direct interactive numerical and graphical comparisons between experimental structure factors with the pioneering theoretical model of Hayter-Penfold that uses the Hansen-Hayter renormalisation correction. The method is used to fit example experimental structure factors obtained from the small-angle neutron scattering of a well-characterised charged micelle system, demonstrating that this implementation, available in the supplementary information, gives identical results to the Hayter-Penfold-Hansen approach for the structure factor, S(q) and provides direct access to the pair correlation function, g(r). Additionally, the intermediate calculations and outputs can be readily accessed and modified within the familiar spreadsheet environment, along with information on the normalisation procedure. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The evaluation of experimental data in fast range for n + 56Fe(n,inl)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Qian, Jing; Herman, M.; Ge, Zhigang

Iron is one of the five materials selected for evaluation within the pilot international evaluation project CIELO. Analysis of experimental data for n+ 56Fe reaction is the basis for constraining theoretical calculations and eventual creation of the evaluated file. The detail analysis was performed for inelastic cross sections of neutron induced reactions with 56Fe in the fast range up to 20 MeV where there are significant differences among the main evaluated libraries, mainly caused by the different inelastic scattering cross section measurements. Gamma-ray production cross sections provide a way to gain experimental information about the inelastic cross section. Large discrepanciesmore » between experimental data for the 847-keV gamma ray produced in the 56Fe(n,n 1'γ) reaction were analyzed. In addition, experimental data for elastic scattering cross section between 9.41~11 MeV were used to deduce the inelastic cross section from the unitarity constrain.« less

The evaluation of experimental data in fast range for n + 56Fe(n,inl)

DOE PAGES

Qian, Jing; Herman, M.; Ge, Zhigang; ...

2017-09-13

Iron is one of the five materials selected for evaluation within the pilot international evaluation project CIELO. Analysis of experimental data for n+ 56Fe reaction is the basis for constraining theoretical calculations and eventual creation of the evaluated file. The detail analysis was performed for inelastic cross sections of neutron induced reactions with 56Fe in the fast range up to 20 MeV where there are significant differences among the main evaluated libraries, mainly caused by the different inelastic scattering cross section measurements. Gamma-ray production cross sections provide a way to gain experimental information about the inelastic cross section. Large discrepanciesmore » between experimental data for the 847-keV gamma ray produced in the 56Fe(n,n 1'γ) reaction were analyzed. In addition, experimental data for elastic scattering cross section between 9.41~11 MeV were used to deduce the inelastic cross section from the unitarity constrain.« less

Single-chain polybutadiene organometallic nanoparticles: an experimental and theoretical study† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Detailed experimental procedures and characterization of ONPs including: 1H and 13C NMR, SEC, DLS, DSC, TGA, UV-vis, GC-MS spectra and computational calculations. See DOI: 10.1039/c5sc04535e Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Berkovich, Inbal; Mavila, Sudheendran; Iliashevsky, Olga; Kozuch, Sebastian

2016-01-01

High molecular weight polybutadienes and rhodium complexes were used to produce single chain organometallic nanoparticles. Irradiation of high cis-polybutadiene in the presence of a photosensitizer isomerised the double bonds to produce differing cis/trans ratios within the polymer. Notably, a higher cis percentage of carbon–carbon double bonds within the polymer structure led to faster binding of metal ions, as well as their faster removal by competing phosphine ligands. The experimental results were supported and rationalized by DFT computations. PMID:28936327

Allosteric modulation model of the mu opioid receptor by herkinorin, a potent not alkaloidal agonist

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Marmolejo-Valencia, A. F.; Martínez-Mayorga, K.

2017-05-01

Modulation of opioid receptors is the primary choice for pain management and structural information studies have gained new horizons with the recently available X-ray crystal structures. Herkinorin is one of the most remarkable salvinorin A derivative with high affinity for the mu opioid receptor, moderate selectivity and lack of nitrogen atoms on its structure. Surprisingly, binding models for herkinorin are lacking. In this work, we explore binding models of herkinorin using automated docking, molecular dynamics simulations, free energy calculations and available experimental information. Our herkinorin D-ICM-1 binding model predicted a binding free energy of -11.52 ± 1.14 kcal mol-1 by alchemical free energy estimations, which is close to the experimental values -10.91 ± 0.2 and -10.80 ± 0.05 kcal mol-1 and is in agreement with experimental structural information. Specifically, D-ICM-1 molecular dynamics simulations showed a water-mediated interaction between D-ICM-1 and the amino acid H2976.52, this interaction coincides with the co-crystallized ligands. Another relevant interaction, with N1272.63, allowed to rationalize herkinorin's selectivity to mu over delta opioid receptors. Our suggested binding model for herkinorin is in agreement with this and additional experimental data. The most remarkable observation derived from our D-ICM-1 model is that herkinorin reaches an allosteric sodium ion binding site near N1503.35. Key interactions in that region appear relevant for the lack of β-arrestin recruitment by herkinorin. This interaction is key for downstream signaling pathways involved in the development of side effects, such as tolerance. Future SAR studies and medicinal chemistry efforts will benefit from the structural information presented in this work.

Unifying cost and information in information-theoretic competitive learning.

PubMed

Kamimura, Ryotaro

2005-01-01

In this paper, we introduce costs into the framework of information maximization and try to maximize the ratio of information to its associated cost. We have shown that competitive learning is realized by maximizing mutual information between input patterns and competitive units. One shortcoming of the method is that maximizing information does not necessarily produce representations faithful to input patterns. Information maximizing primarily focuses on some parts of input patterns that are used to distinguish between patterns. Therefore, we introduce the cost, which represents average distance between input patterns and connection weights. By minimizing the cost, final connection weights reflect input patterns well. We applied the method to a political data analysis, a voting attitude problem and a Wisconsin cancer problem. Experimental results confirmed that, when the cost was introduced, representations faithful to input patterns were obtained. In addition, improved generalization performance was obtained within a relatively short learning time.

Mands for information using "who?" and "which?" in the presence of establishing and abolishing operations.

PubMed

Shillingsburg, M Alice; Bowen, Crystal N; Valentino, Amber L; Pierce, Laura E

2014-01-01

Treatments designed to teach mands for information have included prompting and differential reinforcement, as well as procedures to manipulate the relevant establishing operation (EO). However, previous studies have not included relevant abolishing operation (AO) conditions to ensure that the mand is under relevant antecedent control. Data on listener responses (i.e., use of the information) are also absent in the literature. The current study shows differential responding under EO and AO conditions and reports listener responses that demonstrate use of the provided information. Three participants, diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder, learned to mand for information using "who?" and "which?" questions exclusively under EO conditions. In addition, each participant responded to the information provided to access a preferred item. Generalization of the "which?" mand for information was also demonstrated across novel stimuli. © Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior.

Comprehension by older people of medication information with or without supplementary pharmaceutical pictograms.

PubMed

Ng, Annie W Y; Chan, Alan H S; Ho, Vincy W S

2017-01-01

This study examined the benefits of pharmaceutical pictograms for improving comprehension of medication information for older people. Fifty Hong Kong Chinese older people completed a medical information comprehension task for five drugs. Participants in the control group were presented with text labels while those in the experimental group were given the text labels plus supplementary pharmaceutical pictograms, and then all reported their understanding of the medication information conveyed. Lower educated older people had poorer understanding of medication information. The addition of pharmaceutical pictograms significantly improved the comprehension of medication information for older people. The majority of older people tested with pictograms favored adding pictograms to text and thought the pictograms were useful for conveying medical information rather than using written text alone. The findings suggested that pharmaceutical and health care professionals should include pharmaceutical pictograms on labels to better convey instructions on medication to older people. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Design and Diagnosis Problem Solving with Multifunctional Technical Knowledge Bases

DTIC Science & Technology

1992-09-29

STRUCTURE METHODOLOGY Design problem solving is a complex activity involving a number of subtasks. and a number of alternative methods potentially available...Conference on Artificial Intelligence. London: The British Computer Society, pp. 621-633. Friedland, P. (1979). Knowledge-based experimental design ...Computing Milieuxl: Management of Computing and Information Systems- -ty,*m man- agement General Terms: Design . Methodology Additional Key Words and Phrases

Hydrogen Exchange Mass Spectrometry

PubMed Central

Mayne, Leland

2018-01-01

Hydrogen exchange (HX) methods can reveal much about the structure, energetics, and dynamics of proteins. The addition of mass spectrometry (MS) to an earlier fragmentation-separation HX analysis now extends HX studies to larger proteins at high structural resolution and can provide information not available before. This chapter discusses experimental aspects of HX labeling, especially with respect to the use of MS and the analysis of MS data. PMID:26791986

77 FR 74021 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Announcement of Office of Management and Budget...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-12-12

...; Experimental Study: Disease Information in Branded Promotional Material AGENCY: Food and Drug Administration... of information entitled ``Experimental Study: Disease Information in Branded Promotional Material... of information entitled ``Experimental Study: Disease Information in Branded Promotional Material...

Theoretical Models for Surface Forces and Adhesion and Their Measurement Using Atomic Force Microscopy

PubMed Central

Leite, Fabio L.; Bueno, Carolina C.; Da Róz, Alessandra L.; Ziemath, Ervino C.; Oliveira, Osvaldo N.

2012-01-01

The increasing importance of studies on soft matter and their impact on new technologies, including those associated with nanotechnology, has brought intermolecular and surface forces to the forefront of physics and materials science, for these are the prevailing forces in micro and nanosystems. With experimental methods such as the atomic force spectroscopy (AFS), it is now possible to measure these forces accurately, in addition to providing information on local material properties such as elasticity, hardness and adhesion. This review provides the theoretical and experimental background of AFS, adhesion forces, intermolecular interactions and surface forces in air, vacuum and in solution. PMID:23202925

Exploring the additive effects of stimulus quality and word frequency: the influence of local and list-wide prime relatedness.

PubMed

Scaltritti, Michele; Balota, David A; Peressotti, Francesca

2013-01-01

Stimulus quality and word frequency produce additive effects in lexical decision performance, whereas the semantic priming effect interacts with both stimulus quality and word frequency effects. This pattern places important constraints on models of visual word recognition. In Experiment 1, all three variables were investigated within a single speeded pronunciation study. The results indicated that the joint effects of stimulus quality and word frequency were dependent upon prime relatedness. In particular, an additive effect of stimulus quality and word frequency was found after related primes, and an interactive effect was found after unrelated primes. It was hypothesized that this pattern reflects an adaptive reliance on related prime information within the experimental context. In Experiment 2, related primes were eliminated from the list, and the interactive effects of stimulus quality and word frequency found following unrelated primes in Experiment 1 reverted to additive effects for the same unrelated prime conditions. The results are supportive of a flexible lexical processor that adapts to both local prime information and global list-wide context.

Indicators of suboptimal performance embedded in the Wechsler Memory Scale-Fourth Edition (WMS-IV).

PubMed

Bouman, Zita; Hendriks, Marc P H; Schmand, Ben A; Kessels, Roy P C; Aldenkamp, Albert P

2016-01-01

Recognition and visual working memory tasks from the Wechsler Memory Scale-Fourth Edition (WMS-IV) have previously been documented as useful indicators for suboptimal performance. The present study examined the clinical utility of the Dutch version of the WMS-IV (WMS-IV-NL) for the identification of suboptimal performance using an analogue study design. The patient group consisted of 59 mixed-etiology patients; the experimental malingerers were 50 healthy individuals who were asked to simulate cognitive impairment as a result of a traumatic brain injury; the last group consisted of 50 healthy controls who were instructed to put forth full effort. Experimental malingerers performed significantly lower on all WMS-IV-NL tasks than did the patients and healthy controls. A binary logistic regression analysis was performed on the experimental malingerers and the patients. The first model contained the visual working memory subtests (Spatial Addition and Symbol Span) and the recognition tasks of the following subtests: Logical Memory, Verbal Paired Associates, Designs, Visual Reproduction. The results showed an overall classification rate of 78.4%, and only Spatial Addition explained a significant amount of variation (p < .001). Subsequent logistic regression analysis and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis supported the discriminatory power of the subtest Spatial Addition. A scaled score cutoff of <4 produced 93% specificity and 52% sensitivity for detection of suboptimal performance. The WMS-IV-NL Spatial Addition subtest may provide clinically useful information for the detection of suboptimal performance.

A new online database of nuclear electromagnetic moments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mertzimekis, Theo J.

2017-09-01

Nuclear electromagnetic (EM) moments, i.e., the magnetic dipole and the electric quadrupole moments, provide important information of nuclear structure. As in other types of experimental data available to the community, measurements of nuclear EM moments have been organized systematically in compilations since the dawn of nuclear science. However, the wealth of recent moments measurements with radioactive beams, as well as earlier existing measurements, lack an online, easy-to-access, systematically organized presence to disseminate information to researchers. In addition, available printed compilations suffer a rather long life cycle, being left behind experimental measurements published in journals or elsewhere. A new, online database (http://magneticmoments.info) focusing on nuclear EM moments has been recently developed to disseminate experimental data to the community. The database includes non-evaluated experimental data of nuclear EM moments, giving strong emphasis on frequent updates (life cycle is 3 months) and direct connection to the sources via DOI and NSR hyperlinks. It has been recently integrated in IAEA LiveChart [1], but can also be found as a standalone webapp [2]. A detailed review of the database features, as well as plans for further development and expansion in the near future is discussed.

Single-exposure two-dimensional superresolution in digital holography using a vertical cavity surface-emitting laser source array.

PubMed

Granero, Luis; Zalevsky, Zeev; Micó, Vicente

2011-04-01

We present a new implementation capable of producing two-dimensional (2D) superresolution (SR) imaging in a single exposure by aperture synthesis in digital lensless Fourier holography when using angular multiplexing provided by a vertical cavity surface-emitting laser source array. The system performs the recording in a single CCD snapshot of a multiplexed hologram coming from the incoherent addition of multiple subholograms, where each contains information about a different 2D spatial frequency band of the object's spectrum. Thus, a set of nonoverlapping bandpass images of the input object can be recovered by Fourier transformation (FT) of the multiplexed hologram. The SR is obtained by coherent addition of the information contained in each bandpass image while generating an enlarged synthetic aperture. Experimental results demonstrate improvement in resolution and image quality.

An Information Theory Approach to Nonlinear, Nonequilibrium Thermodynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rogers, David M.; Beck, Thomas L.; Rempe, Susan B.

2011-10-01

Using the problem of ion channel thermodynamics as an example, we illustrate the idea of building up complex thermodynamic models by successively adding physical information. We present a new formulation of information algebra that generalizes methods of both information theory and statistical mechanics. From this foundation we derive a theory for ion channel kinetics, identifying a nonequilibrium `process' free energy functional in addition to the well-known integrated work functionals. The Gibbs-Maxwell relation for the free energy functional is a Green-Kubo relation, applicable arbitrarily far from equilibrium, that captures the effect of non-local and time-dependent behavior from transient thermal and mechanical driving forces. Comparing the physical significance of the Lagrange multipliers to the canonical ensemble suggests definitions of nonequilibrium ensembles at constant capacitance or inductance in addition to constant resistance. Our result is that statistical mechanical descriptions derived from a few primitive algebraic operations on information can be used to create experimentally-relevant and computable models. By construction, these models may use information from more detailed atomistic simulations. Two surprising consequences to be explored in further work are that (in)distinguishability factors are automatically predicted from the problem formulation and that a direct analogue of the second law for thermodynamic entropy production is found by considering information loss in stochastic processes. The information loss identifies a novel contribution from the instantaneous information entropy that ensures non-negative loss.

Exploring relations between task conflict and informational conflict in the Stroop task.

PubMed

Entel, Olga; Tzelgov, Joseph; Bereby-Meyer, Yoella; Shahar, Nitzan

2015-11-01

In this study, we tested the proposal that the Stroop task involves two conflicts--task conflict and informational conflict. Task conflict was defined as the latency difference between color words and non-letter neutrals, and manipulated by varying the proportion of color words versus non-letter neutrals. Informational conflict was defined as the latency difference between incongruent and congruent trials and manipulated by varying the congruent-to-incongruent trial ratio. We replicated previous findings showing that increasing the ratio of incongruent-to-congruent trials reduces the latency difference between the incongruent and congruent condition (i.e., informational conflict), as does increasing the proportion of color words (i.e., task conflict). A significant under-additive interaction between the two proportion manipulations (congruent vs. incongruent and color words vs. neutrals) indicated that the effects of task conflict and informational conflict were not additive. By assessing task conflict as the contrast between color words and neutrals, we found that task conflict existed in all of our experimental conditions. Under specific conditions, when task conflict dominated behavior by explaining most of the variability between congruency conditions, we also found negative facilitation, thus demonstrating that this effect is a special case of task conflict.

Multiple-reason decision making based on automatic processing.

PubMed

Glöckner, Andreas; Betsch, Tilmann

2008-09-01

It has been repeatedly shown that in decisions under time constraints, individuals predominantly use noncompensatory strategies rather than complex compensatory ones. The authors argue that these findings might be due not to limitations of cognitive capacity but instead to limitations of information search imposed by the commonly used experimental tool Mouselab (J. W. Payne, J. R. Bettman, & E. J. Johnson, 1988). The authors tested this assumption in 3 experiments. In the 1st experiment, information was openly presented, whereas in the 2nd experiment, the standard Mouselab program was used under different time limits. The results indicate that individuals are able to compute weighted additive decision strategies extremely quickly if information search is not restricted by the experimental procedure. In a 3rd experiment, these results were replicated using more complex decision tasks, and the major alternative explanations that individuals use more complex heuristics or that they merely encode the constellation of cues were ruled out. In sum, the findings challenge the fundaments of bounded rationality and highlight the importance of automatic processes in decision making. (c) 2008 APA, all rights reserved.

Estimating the mutual information of an EEG-based Brain-Computer Interface.

PubMed

Schlögl, A; Neuper, C; Pfurtscheller, G

2002-01-01

An EEG-based Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) could be used as an additional communication channel between human thoughts and the environment. The efficacy of such a BCI depends mainly on the transmitted information rate. Shannon's communication theory was used to quantify the information rate of BCI data. For this purpose, experimental EEG data from four BCI experiments was analyzed off-line. Subjects imaginated left and right hand movements during EEG recording from the sensorimotor area. Adaptive autoregressive (AAR) parameters were used as features of single trial EEG and classified with linear discriminant analysis. The intra-trial variation as well as the inter-trial variability, the signal-to-noise ratio, the entropy of information, and the information rate were estimated. The entropy difference was used as a measure of the separability of two classes of EEG patterns.

Adaptive format conversion for scalable video coding

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wan, Wade K.; Lim, Jae S.

2001-12-01

The enhancement layer in many scalable coding algorithms is composed of residual coding information. There is another type of information that can be transmitted instead of (or in addition to) residual coding. Since the encoder has access to the original sequence, it can utilize adaptive format conversion (AFC) to generate the enhancement layer and transmit the different format conversion methods as enhancement data. This paper investigates the use of adaptive format conversion information as enhancement data in scalable video coding. Experimental results are shown for a wide range of base layer qualities and enhancement bitrates to determine when AFC can improve video scalability. Since the parameters needed for AFC are small compared to residual coding, AFC can provide video scalability at low enhancement layer bitrates that are not possible with residual coding. In addition, AFC can also be used in addition to residual coding to improve video scalability at higher enhancement layer bitrates. Adaptive format conversion has not been studied in detail, but many scalable applications may benefit from it. An example of an application that AFC is well-suited for is the migration path for digital television where AFC can provide immediate video scalability as well as assist future migrations.

Scale effects on information theory-based measures applied to streamflow patterns in two rural watersheds

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pan, Feng; Pachepsky, Yakov A.; Guber, Andrey K.; McPherson, Brian J.; Hill, Robert L.

2012-01-01

SummaryUnderstanding streamflow patterns in space and time is important for improving flood and drought forecasting, water resources management, and predictions of ecological changes. Objectives of this work include (a) to characterize the spatial and temporal patterns of streamflow using information theory-based measures at two thoroughly-monitored agricultural watersheds located in different hydroclimatic zones with similar land use, and (b) to elucidate and quantify temporal and spatial scale effects on those measures. We selected two USDA experimental watersheds to serve as case study examples, including the Little River experimental watershed (LREW) in Tifton, Georgia and the Sleepers River experimental watershed (SREW) in North Danville, Vermont. Both watersheds possess several nested sub-watersheds and more than 30 years of continuous data records of precipitation and streamflow. Information content measures (metric entropy and mean information gain) and complexity measures (effective measure complexity and fluctuation complexity) were computed based on the binary encoding of 5-year streamflow and precipitation time series data. We quantified patterns of streamflow using probabilities of joint or sequential appearances of the binary symbol sequences. Results of our analysis illustrate that information content measures of streamflow time series are much smaller than those for precipitation data, and the streamflow data also exhibit higher complexity, suggesting that the watersheds effectively act as filters of the precipitation information that leads to the observed additional complexity in streamflow measures. Correlation coefficients between the information-theory-based measures and time intervals are close to 0.9, demonstrating the significance of temporal scale effects on streamflow patterns. Moderate spatial scale effects on streamflow patterns are observed with absolute values of correlation coefficients between the measures and sub-watershed area varying from 0.2 to 0.6 in the two watersheds. We conclude that temporal effects must be evaluated and accounted for when the information theory-based methods are used for performance evaluation and comparison of hydrological models.

[Technologies for Complex Intelligent Clinical Data Analysis].

PubMed

Baranov, A A; Namazova-Baranova, L S; Smirnov, I V; Devyatkin, D A; Shelmanov, A O; Vishneva, E A; Antonova, E V; Smirnov, V I

2016-01-01

The paper presents the system for intelligent analysis of clinical information. Authors describe methods implemented in the system for clinical information retrieval, intelligent diagnostics of chronic diseases, patient's features importance and for detection of hidden dependencies between features. Results of the experimental evaluation of these methods are also presented. Healthcare facilities generate a large flow of both structured and unstructured data which contain important information about patients. Test results are usually retained as structured data but some data is retained in the form of natural language texts (medical history, the results of physical examination, and the results of other examinations, such as ultrasound, ECG or X-ray studies). Many tasks arising in clinical practice can be automated applying methods for intelligent analysis of accumulated structured array and unstructured data that leads to improvement of the healthcare quality. the creation of the complex system for intelligent data analysis in the multi-disciplinary pediatric center. Authors propose methods for information extraction from clinical texts in Russian. The methods are carried out on the basis of deep linguistic analysis. They retrieve terms of diseases, symptoms, areas of the body and drugs. The methods can recognize additional attributes such as "negation" (indicates that the disease is absent), "no patient" (indicates that the disease refers to the patient's family member, but not to the patient), "severity of illness", disease course", "body region to which the disease refers". Authors use a set of hand-drawn templates and various techniques based on machine learning to retrieve information using a medical thesaurus. The extracted information is used to solve the problem of automatic diagnosis of chronic diseases. A machine learning method for classification of patients with similar nosology and the methodfor determining the most informative patients'features are also proposed. Authors have processed anonymized health records from the pediatric center to estimate the proposed methods. The results show the applicability of the information extracted from the texts for solving practical problems. The records ofpatients with allergic, glomerular and rheumatic diseases were used for experimental assessment of the method of automatic diagnostic. Authors have also determined the most appropriate machine learning methods for classification of patients for each group of diseases, as well as the most informative disease signs. It has been found that using additional information extracted from clinical texts, together with structured data helps to improve the quality of diagnosis of chronic diseases. Authors have also obtained pattern combinations of signs of diseases. The proposed methods have been implemented in the intelligent data processing system for a multidisciplinary pediatric center. The experimental results show the availability of the system to improve the quality of pediatric healthcare.

Dust Devils on Mars: Effects of Surface Roughness on Particle Threshold

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Neakrase, Lynn D.; Greeley, Ronald; Iversen, James D.; Balme, Matthew L.; Foley, Daniel J.; Eddlemon, Eric E.

2005-01-01

Dust devils have been proposed as effective mechanisms for lofting large quantities of dust into the martian atmosphere. Previous work showed that vortices lift dust more easily than simple boundary layer winds. The aim of this study is to determine experimentally the effects of non-erodable roughness elements on vortex particle threshold through laboratory simulations of natural surfaces. Additional information is included in the original extended abstract.

Evaluations of Energy Spectra of Neutrons Emitted Promptly in Neutron-induced Fission of 235 U and 239 Pu

DOE PAGES

Neudecker, Denise; Talou, Patrick; Kawano, Toshihiko; ...

2018-02-01

The energy spectra of neutrons emitted promptly in the neutron-induced fission reactions of 235U and 239Pu were re-evaluated for ENDF/B-VIII.0. The evaluations presented here are based on a careful modeling of all relevant physics processes, an extensive analysis of experimental data and a detailed quantification of pertinent uncertainties. Energy spectra of neutrons emitted in up to fourth chance fission are considered and both compound and pre-equilibrium processes are included. Also, important nuclear model parameters, such as the average total kinetic energy of the fission fragments and the multiple chance fission probabilities, and their uncertainties are estimated based on experimental knowledge,more » model information and evaluated data. In addition to experimental information already available for ENDF/B-VII.1, these new evaluations make use of recently published experimental data either of high precision or spanning a broad incident energy range, information on legacy measurements explaining discrepancies and recently measured data of the average total kinetic energy as a function of incident neutron energy. The resulting evaluated data and covariances agree well with the experimental database used for the evaluation. However, the evaluated spectra are softer than the 235U and 239Pu ENDF/B-VII.1, JENDL-4.0 and JEFF-3.2 evaluations for incident neutron energies E inc ≤ 1.5 MeV and E inc ≤ 5 MeV, respectively. For E inc > 5 MeV, the evaluated spectra show structures due to the improved modeling which are not present in ENDF/B-VII.1 and JEFF-3.2 but can be observed in JENDL-4.0 evaluations. Part of these new evaluations were adopted for ENDF/B-VIII.0, while the ENDF/B-VII.1 239Pu PFNS was retained for E inc ≤ 5 MeV awaiting more conclusive experimental evidence.« less

Evaluations of Energy Spectra of Neutrons Emitted Promptly in Neutron-induced Fission of 235U and 239Pu

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Neudecker, D.; Talou, P.; Kawano, T.; Kahler, A. C.; White, M. C.; Taddeucci, T. N.; Haight, R. C.; Kiedrowski, B.; O'Donnell, J. M.; Gomez, J. A.; Kelly, K. J.; Devlin, M.; Rising, M. E.

2018-02-01

The energy spectra of neutrons emitted promptly in the neutron-induced fission reactions of 235U and 239Pu were re-evaluated for ENDF/B-VIII.0. These evaluations are based on a careful modeling of all relevant physics processes, an extensive analysis of experimental data and a detailed quantification of pertinent uncertainties. Energy spectra of neutrons emitted in up to fourth chance fission are considered and both compound and pre-equilibrium processes are included. Also, important nuclear model parameters, such as the average total kinetic energy of the fission fragments and the multiple chance fission probabilities, and their uncertainties are estimated based on experimental knowledge, model information and evaluated data. In addition to experimental information already available for ENDF/B-VII.1, these new evaluations make use of recently published experimental data either of high precision or spanning a broad incident energy range, information on legacy measurements explaining discrepancies and recently measured data of the average total kinetic energy as a function of incident neutron energy. The resulting evaluated data and covariances agree well with the experimental database used for the evaluation. However, the evaluated spectra are softer than the 235U and 239Pu ENDF/B-VII.1, JENDL-4.0 and JEFF-3.2 evaluations for incident neutron energies Einc ≤ 1.5 MeV and Einc ≤ 5 MeV, respectively. For Einc > 5 MeV, the evaluated spectra show structures due to the improved modeling which are not present in ENDF/B-VII.1 and JEFF-3.2 but can be observed in JENDL-4.0 evaluations. Part of these new evaluations were adopted for ENDF/B-VIII.0, while the ENDF/B-VII.1 239Pu PFNS was retained for Einc ≤ 5 MeV awaiting more conclusive experimental evidence.

Evaluations of Energy Spectra of Neutrons Emitted Promptly in Neutron-induced Fission of 235 U and 239 Pu

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Neudecker, Denise; Talou, Patrick; Kawano, Toshihiko

The energy spectra of neutrons emitted promptly in the neutron-induced fission reactions of 235U and 239Pu were re-evaluated for ENDF/B-VIII.0. The evaluations presented here are based on a careful modeling of all relevant physics processes, an extensive analysis of experimental data and a detailed quantification of pertinent uncertainties. Energy spectra of neutrons emitted in up to fourth chance fission are considered and both compound and pre-equilibrium processes are included. Also, important nuclear model parameters, such as the average total kinetic energy of the fission fragments and the multiple chance fission probabilities, and their uncertainties are estimated based on experimental knowledge,more » model information and evaluated data. In addition to experimental information already available for ENDF/B-VII.1, these new evaluations make use of recently published experimental data either of high precision or spanning a broad incident energy range, information on legacy measurements explaining discrepancies and recently measured data of the average total kinetic energy as a function of incident neutron energy. The resulting evaluated data and covariances agree well with the experimental database used for the evaluation. However, the evaluated spectra are softer than the 235U and 239Pu ENDF/B-VII.1, JENDL-4.0 and JEFF-3.2 evaluations for incident neutron energies E inc ≤ 1.5 MeV and E inc ≤ 5 MeV, respectively. For E inc > 5 MeV, the evaluated spectra show structures due to the improved modeling which are not present in ENDF/B-VII.1 and JEFF-3.2 but can be observed in JENDL-4.0 evaluations. Part of these new evaluations were adopted for ENDF/B-VIII.0, while the ENDF/B-VII.1 239Pu PFNS was retained for E inc ≤ 5 MeV awaiting more conclusive experimental evidence.« less

PrimerDesign-M: A multiple-alignment based multiple-primer design tool for walking across variable genomes

DOE PAGES

Yoon, Hyejin; Leitner, Thomas

2014-12-17

Analyses of entire viral genomes or mtDNA requires comprehensive design of many primers across their genomes. In addition, simultaneous optimization of several DNA primer design criteria may improve overall experimental efficiency and downstream bioinformatic processing. To achieve these goals, we developed PrimerDesign-M. It includes several options for multiple-primer design, allowing researchers to efficiently design walking primers that cover long DNA targets, such as entire HIV-1 genomes, and that optimizes primers simultaneously informed by genetic diversity in multiple alignments and experimental design constraints given by the user. PrimerDesign-M can also design primers that include DNA barcodes and minimize primer dimerization. PrimerDesign-Mmore » finds optimal primers for highly variable DNA targets and facilitates design flexibility by suggesting alternative designs to adapt to experimental conditions.« less

Cell culture medium improvement by rigorous shuffling of components using media blending.

PubMed

Jordan, Martin; Voisard, Damien; Berthoud, Antoine; Tercier, Laetitia; Kleuser, Beate; Baer, Gianni; Broly, Hervé

2013-01-01

A novel high-throughput methodology for the simultaneous optimization of many cell culture media components is presented. The method is based on the media blending approach which has several advantages as it works with ready-to-use media. In particular it allows precise pH and osmolarity adjustments and eliminates the need of concentrated stock solutions, a frequent source of serious solubility issues. In addition, media blending easily generates a large number of new compositions providing a remarkable screening tool. However, media blending designs usually do not provide information on distinct factors or components that are causing the desired improvements. This paper addresses this last point by considering the concentration of individual medium components to fix the experimental design and for the interpretation of the results. The extended blending strategy was used to reshuffle the 20 amino acids in one round of experiments. A small set of 10 media was specifically designed to generate a large number of mixtures. 192 mixtures were then prepared by media blending and tested on a recombinant CHO cell line expressing a monoclonal antibody. A wide range of performances (titers and viable cell density) was achieved from the different mixtures with top titers significantly above our previous results seen with this cell line. In addition, information about major effects of key amino acids on cell densities and titers could be extracted from the experimental results. This demonstrates that the extended blending approach is a powerful experimental tool which allows systematic and simultaneous reshuffling of multiple medium components.

Armstrong Flight Research Center Research Technology and Engineering 2017

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Voracek, David F. (Editor)

2018-01-01

I am delighted to present this report of accomplishments at NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center. Our dedicated innovators possess a wealth of performance, safety, and technical capabilities spanning a wide variety of research areas involving aircraft, electronic sensors, instrumentation, environmental and earth science, celestial observations, and much more. They not only perform tasks necessary to safely and successfully accomplish Armstrong's flight research and test missions but also support NASA missions across the entire Agency. Armstrong's project teams have successfully accomplished many of the nation's most complex flight research projects by crafting creative solutions that advance emerging technologies from concept development and experimental formulation to final testing. We are developing and refining technologies for ultra-efficient aircraft, electric propulsion vehicles, a low boom flight demonstrator, air launch systems, and experimental x-planes, to name a few. Additionally, with our unique location and airborne research laboratories, we are testing and validating new research concepts. Summaries of each project highlighting key results and benefits of the effort are provided in the following pages. Technology areas for the projects include electric propulsion, vehicle efficiency, supersonics, space and hypersonics, autonomous systems, flight and ground experimental test technologies, and much more. Additional technical information is available in the appendix, as well as contact information for the Principal Investigator of each project. I am proud of the work we do here at Armstrong and am pleased to share these details with you. We welcome opportunities for partnership and collaboration, so please contact us to learn more about these cutting-edge innovations and how they might align with your needs.

Experimental Design for Parameter Estimation of Gene Regulatory Networks

PubMed Central

Timmer, Jens

2012-01-01

Systems biology aims for building quantitative models to address unresolved issues in molecular biology. In order to describe the behavior of biological cells adequately, gene regulatory networks (GRNs) are intensively investigated. As the validity of models built for GRNs depends crucially on the kinetic rates, various methods have been developed to estimate these parameters from experimental data. For this purpose, it is favorable to choose the experimental conditions yielding maximal information. However, existing experimental design principles often rely on unfulfilled mathematical assumptions or become computationally demanding with growing model complexity. To solve this problem, we combined advanced methods for parameter and uncertainty estimation with experimental design considerations. As a showcase, we optimized three simulated GRNs in one of the challenges from the Dialogue for Reverse Engineering Assessment and Methods (DREAM). This article presents our approach, which was awarded the best performing procedure at the DREAM6 Estimation of Model Parameters challenge. For fast and reliable parameter estimation, local deterministic optimization of the likelihood was applied. We analyzed identifiability and precision of the estimates by calculating the profile likelihood. Furthermore, the profiles provided a way to uncover a selection of most informative experiments, from which the optimal one was chosen using additional criteria at every step of the design process. In conclusion, we provide a strategy for optimal experimental design and show its successful application on three highly nonlinear dynamic models. Although presented in the context of the GRNs to be inferred for the DREAM6 challenge, the approach is generic and applicable to most types of quantitative models in systems biology and other disciplines. PMID:22815723

Autonomous frequency domain identification: Theory and experiment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yam, Yeung; Bayard, D. S.; Hadaegh, F. Y.; Mettler, E.; Milman, M. H.; Scheid, R. E.

1989-01-01

The analysis, design, and on-orbit tuning of robust controllers require more information about the plant than simply a nominal estimate of the plant transfer function. Information is also required concerning the uncertainty in the nominal estimate, or more generally, the identification of a model set within which the true plant is known to lie. The identification methodology that was developed and experimentally demonstrated makes use of a simple but useful characterization of the model uncertainty based on the output error. This is a characterization of the additive uncertainty in the plant model, which has found considerable use in many robust control analysis and synthesis techniques. The identification process is initiated by a stochastic input u which is applied to the plant p giving rise to the output. Spectral estimation (h = P sub uy/P sub uu) is used as an estimate of p and the model order is estimated using the produce moment matrix (PMM) method. A parametric model unit direction vector p is then determined by curve fitting the spectral estimate to a rational transfer function. The additive uncertainty delta sub m = p - unit direction vector p is then estimated by the cross spectral estimate delta = P sub ue/P sub uu where e = y - unit direction vectory y is the output error, and unit direction vector y = unit direction vector pu is the computed output of the parametric model subjected to the actual input u. The experimental results demonstrate the curve fitting algorithm produces the reduced-order plant model which minimizes the additive uncertainty. The nominal transfer function estimate unit direction vector p and the estimate delta of the additive uncertainty delta sub m are subsequently available to be used for optimization of robust controller performance and stability.

FCRD Advanced Reactor (Transmutation) Fuels Handbook

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Janney, Dawn Elizabeth; Papesch, Cynthia Ann

2016-09-01

Transmutation of minor actinides such as Np, Am, and Cm in spent nuclear fuel is of international interest because of its potential for reducing the long-term health and safety hazards caused by the radioactivity of the spent fuel. One important approach to transmutation (currently being pursued by the DOE Fuel Cycle Research & Development Advanced Fuels Campaign) involves incorporating the minor actinides into U-Pu-Zr alloys, which can be used as fuel in fast reactors. U-Pu-Zr alloys are well suited for electrolytic refining, which leads to incorporation rare-earth fission products such as La, Ce, Pr, and Nd. It is, therefore, importantmore » to understand not only the properties of U-Pu-Zr alloys but also those of U-Pu-Zr alloys with concentrations of minor actinides (Np, Am) and rare-earth elements (La, Ce, Pr, and Nd) similar to those in reprocessed fuel. In addition to requiring extensive safety precautions, alloys containing U, Pu, and minor actinides (Np and Am) are difficult to study for numerous reasons, including their complex phase transformations, characteristically sluggish phasetransformation kinetics, tendency to produce experimental results that vary depending on the histories of individual samples, rapid oxidation, and sensitivity to contaminants such as oxygen in concentrations below a hundred parts per million. Although less toxic, rare-earth elements such as La, Ce, Pr, and Nd are also difficult to study for similar reasons. Many of the experimental measurements were made before 1980, and the level of documentation for experimental methods and results varies widely. It is, therefore, not surprising that little is known with certainty about U-Pu-Zr alloys, particularly those that also contain minor actinides and rare-earth elements. General acceptance of results commonly indicates that there is only a single measurement for a particular property. This handbook summarizes currently available information about U, Pu, Zr, Np, Am, La, Ce, Pr, and Nd and alloys of two or three of these elements. It contains information about phase diagrams and related information (including phases and phase transformations); heat capacity, entropy, and enthalpy; thermal expansion; and thermal conductivity and diffusivity. In addition to presenting information about materials properties, the handbook attempts to provide information about how well the property is known and how much variation exists between measurements. Although it includes some results from models, its primary focus is experimental data. The Handbook is organized in two sections: one with information about the U-Pu-Zr ternary and one with information about other elements and binary and vi ternary alloys in the U-Np-Pu-Am-La-Ce-Pr-Nd-Zr system. Within each section, information about elements is presented first, followed by information about binary alloys, then information about ternary alloys. The order in which the elements in each alloy are mentioned follows the order in the first sentence of this paragraph. Much of the information on the U-Pu-Zr system repeats information from the FCRD Transmutation Fuels Handbook 2015. Most of the other data has been published elsewhere (although scattered throughout numerous references, some quite obscure); however, some data from Idaho National Laboratory is presented here for the first time. As the FCRD programmatic mission evolves, future editions of this handbook will begin to include other advanced reactor fuel designs and compositions. Hence, the title of the handbook will transition to the Advanced Reactor Fuels Handbook.« less

77 FR 18250 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-03-27

... of information technology. Experimental Study of Graphic Cigarette Warning Labels--(OMB Control... graphic warnings required by the Tobacco Control Act. The experimental study data will be collected from...] Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental Study of...

Assessment of Existing Data and Reports for System Evaluation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Matolak, David W.; Skidmore, Trent A.

2000-01-01

This report describes work done as part of the Weather Datalink Research project grant. We describe the work done under Task 1 of this project: the assessment of the suitability of available reports and data for use in evaluation of candidate weather datalink systems, and the development of a performance parameter set for comparative system evaluation. It was found that existing data and reports are inadequate for a complete physical layer characterization, but that these reports provide a good foundation for system comparison. In addition, these reports also contain some information useful for evaluation at higher layers. The performance parameter list compiled can be viewed as near complete-additional investigations, both analytical/simulation and experimental, will likely result in additions and improvements to this list.

Distributed memory parallel Markov random fields using graph partitioning

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Heinemann, C.; Perciano, T.; Ushizima, D.

Markov random fields (MRF) based algorithms have attracted a large amount of interest in image analysis due to their ability to exploit contextual information about data. Image data generated by experimental facilities, though, continues to grow larger and more complex, making it more difficult to analyze in a reasonable amount of time. Applying image processing algorithms to large datasets requires alternative approaches to circumvent performance problems. Aiming to provide scientists with a new tool to recover valuable information from such datasets, we developed a general purpose distributed memory parallel MRF-based image analysis framework (MPI-PMRF). MPI-PMRF overcomes performance and memory limitationsmore » by distributing data and computations across processors. The proposed approach was successfully tested with synthetic and experimental datasets. Additionally, the performance of the MPI-PMRF framework is analyzed through a detailed scalability study. We show that a performance increase is obtained while maintaining an accuracy of the segmentation results higher than 98%. The contributions of this paper are: (a) development of a distributed memory MRF framework; (b) measurement of the performance increase of the proposed approach; (c) verification of segmentation accuracy in both synthetic and experimental, real-world datasets« less

ATLAS experimental equipment. November 1983 workshop and present status

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Not Available

1984-01-01

The latest workshop was held in November 1983 with the purpose of presenting an overview of the experimental stations planned for ATLAS, describing the current status of each individual apparatus, soliciting final input on devices of the first phase (i.e. on those that will be ready when beams from ATLAS become available in late Spring of 1985), and discussing and collecting new ideas on equipment for the second phase. There were short presentations on the status of the various projects followed by informal discussions. The presentations mainly concentrated on new equipment for target area III, but included some descriptions ofmore » current apparatus in target area II that might also be of interest for experiments with the higher-energy beams available in area III. The meeting was well attended with approx. 50 scientists, approximately half of them from institutions outside Argonne. The present proceedings summarize the presentations and discussions of this one-day meeting. In addition we take the opportunity to include information about developments since this meeting and an update of the current status of the various experimental stations. We would like to emphasize again that outside-user input is extremely welcome.« less

Comparison of progressive addition lenses for general purpose and for computer vision: an office field study.

PubMed

Jaschinski, Wolfgang; König, Mirjam; Mekontso, Tiofil M; Ohlendorf, Arne; Welscher, Monique

2015-05-01

Two types of progressive addition lenses (PALs) were compared in an office field study: 1. General purpose PALs with continuous clear vision between infinity and near reading distances and 2. Computer vision PALs with a wider zone of clear vision at the monitor and in near vision but no clear distance vision. Twenty-three presbyopic participants wore each type of lens for two weeks in a double-masked four-week quasi-experimental procedure that included an adaptation phase (Weeks 1 and 2) and a test phase (Weeks 3 and 4). Questionnaires on visual and musculoskeletal conditions as well as preferences regarding the type of lenses were administered. After eight more weeks of free use of the spectacles, the preferences were assessed again. The ergonomic conditions were analysed from photographs. Head inclination when looking at the monitor was significantly lower by 2.3 degrees with the computer vision PALs than with the general purpose PALs. Vision at the monitor was judged significantly better with computer PALs, while distance vision was judged better with general purpose PALs; however, the reported advantage of computer vision PALs differed in extent between participants. Accordingly, 61 per cent of the participants preferred the computer vision PALs, when asked without information about lens design. After full information about lens characteristics and additional eight weeks of free spectacle use, 44 per cent preferred the computer vision PALs. On average, computer vision PALs were rated significantly better with respect to vision at the monitor during the experimental part of the study. In the final forced-choice ratings, approximately half of the participants preferred either the computer vision PAL or the general purpose PAL. Individual factors seem to play a role in this preference and in the rated advantage of computer vision PALs. © 2015 The Authors. Clinical and Experimental Optometry © 2015 Optometry Australia.

Simple method for experimentally testing any form of quantum contextuality

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cabello, Adán

2016-03-01

Contextuality provides a unifying paradigm for nonclassical aspects of quantum probabilities and resources of quantum information. Unfortunately, most forms of quantum contextuality remain experimentally unexplored due to the difficulty of performing sequences of projective measurements on individual quantum systems. Here we show that two-point correlations between binary compatible observables are sufficient to reveal any form of contextuality. This allows us to design simple experiments that are more robust against imperfections and easier to analyze, thus opening the door for observing interesting forms of contextuality, including those requiring quantum systems of high dimensions. In addition, it allows us to connect contextuality to communication complexity scenarios and reformulate a recent result relating contextuality and quantum computation.

Evaluation of high temperature superconductive thermal bridges for space-borne cryogenic infrared detectors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Scott, Elaine P.

1993-01-01

The focus of this research is on the reduction of the refrigeration requirements for infrared sensors operating in space through the use of high temperature superconductive (HTS) materials as electronic leads between the cooled sensors and the relatively warmer data acquisition components. Specifically, this initial study was directed towards the design of an experiment to quantify the thermal performance of these materials in the space environment. First, an intensive review of relevant literature was undertaken, and then, design requirements were formulated. From this background information, a preliminary experimental design was developed. Additional studies will involve a thermal analysis of the experiment and further modifications of the experimental design.

76 FR 50737 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2011-08-16

... notice solicits comments on research entitled ``Experimental Study: Disease Information in Branded Promotional Material.'' The proposed research will explore the nature of including information about a disease...] Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental Study...

Combustion properties of Kraft Black Liquors

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Frederick, W.J. Jr.; Hupa, M.

1993-04-01

In a previous study of the phenomena involved in the combustion of black liquor droplets a numerical model was developed. The model required certain black liquor specific combustion information which was then not currently available, and additional data were needed for evaluating the model. The overall objectives of the project reported here was to provide experimental data on key aspects of black liquor combustion, to interpret the data, and to put it into a form which would be useful for computational models for recovery boilers. The specific topics to be investigated were the volatiles and char carbon yields from pyrolysismore » of single black liquor droplets; a criterion for the onset of devolatilization and the accompanying rapid swelling; and the surface temperature of black liquor droplets during pyrolysis, combustion, and gasification. Additional information on the swelling characteristics of black liquor droplets was also obtained as part of the experiments conducted.« less

MS-Electronic Nose Performance Improvement Using GC Retention Times And 2-Way And 3-Way Data Processing Methods

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Burian, Cosmin; Llobet, Eduard; Vilanova, Xavier

We have designed a challenging experimental sample set in the form of 20 solutions with a high degree of similarity in order to study whether the addition of chromatographic separation information improves the performance of regular MS based electronic noses. In order to make an initial study of the approach, two different chromatographic methods were used. By processing the data of these experiments with 2 and 3-way algorithms, we have shown that the addition of chromatographic separation information improves the results compared to the 2-way analysis of mass spectra or total ion chromatogram treated separately. Our findings show that whenmore » the chromatographic peaks are resolved (longer measurement times), 2-way methods work better than 3-way methods, whereas in the case of a more challenging measurement (more coeluted chromatograms, much faster GC-MS measurements) 3-way methods work better.« less

Large-scale imputation of epigenomic datasets for systematic annotation of diverse human tissues.

PubMed

Ernst, Jason; Kellis, Manolis

2015-04-01

With hundreds of epigenomic maps, the opportunity arises to exploit the correlated nature of epigenetic signals, across both marks and samples, for large-scale prediction of additional datasets. Here, we undertake epigenome imputation by leveraging such correlations through an ensemble of regression trees. We impute 4,315 high-resolution signal maps, of which 26% are also experimentally observed. Imputed signal tracks show overall similarity to observed signals and surpass experimental datasets in consistency, recovery of gene annotations and enrichment for disease-associated variants. We use the imputed data to detect low-quality experimental datasets, to find genomic sites with unexpected epigenomic signals, to define high-priority marks for new experiments and to delineate chromatin states in 127 reference epigenomes spanning diverse tissues and cell types. Our imputed datasets provide the most comprehensive human regulatory region annotation to date, and our approach and the ChromImpute software constitute a useful complement to large-scale experimental mapping of epigenomic information.

Experimental research on the relation between food price changes and food-purchasing patterns: a targeted review.

PubMed

Epstein, Leonard H; Jankowiak, Noelle; Nederkoorn, Chantal; Raynor, Hollie A; French, Simone A; Finkelstein, Eric

2012-04-01

One way in which to modify food purchases is to change prices through tax policy, subsidy policy, or both. We reviewed the growing body of experimental research conducted in the laboratory and in the field that investigates the following: the extent to which price changes influence purchases of targeted and nontargeted foods, total energy, or macronutrients purchased; the interaction of price changes with adjunctive interventions; and moderators of sensitivity to price changes. After a brief overview of economic principles and observational research that addresses these issues, we present a targeted review of experimental research. Experimental research suggests that price changes modify purchases of targeted foods, but research on the overall nutritional quality of purchases is mixed because of substitution effects. There is mixed support for combining price changes with adjunctive interventions, and there are no replicated findings on moderators to price sensitivity in experiments. Additional focused research is needed to better inform food policy development with the aim of improving eating behavior and preventing obesity.

Depth-tunable three-dimensional display with interactive light field control

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xie, Songlin; Wang, Peng; Sang, Xinzhu; Li, Chenyu; Dou, Wenhua; Xiao, Liquan

2016-07-01

A software-defined depth-tunable three-dimensional (3D) display with interactive 3D depth control is presented. With the proposed post-processing system, the disparity of the multi-view media can be freely adjusted. Benefiting from a wealth of information inherently contains in dense multi-view images captured with parallel arrangement camera array, the 3D light field is built and the light field structure is controlled to adjust the disparity without additional acquired depth information since the light field structure itself contains depth information. A statistical analysis based on the least square is carried out to extract the depth information inherently exists in the light field structure and the accurate depth information can be used to re-parameterize light fields for the autostereoscopic display, and a smooth motion parallax can be guaranteed. Experimental results show that the system is convenient and effective to adjust the 3D scene performance in the 3D display.

Tactical Versus Strategic Behavior: General Aviation Piloting in Convective Weather Scenarios

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Latorella, Kara A.; Chamberlain, James P.

2002-01-01

We commonly describe environments and behavioral responses to environmental conditions as 'tactical' and 'strategic.' However theoretical research defining relevant environmental characteristics is rare, as are empirical investigations that would inform such theory. This paper discusses General Aviation (GA) pilots' descriptions of tactical/strategic conditions with respect to weather flying, and evaluates their ratings along a tactical/strategic scale in response to real convective weather scenarios experienced during a flight experiment with different weather information cues. Perceived risk was significantly associated with ratings for all experimental conditions. In addition, environmental characteristics were found to be predictive of ratings for Traditional IMC (instrument meteorological conditions), i.e., aural weather information only, and Traditional VMC (visual meteorological conditions), i.e., aural information and an external view. The paper also presents subjects' comments regarding use of Graphical Weather Information Systems (GWISs) to support tactical and strategic weather flying decisions and concludes with implications for the design and use of GWISs.

Infrared Ship Target Segmentation Based on Spatial Information Improved FCM.

PubMed

Bai, Xiangzhi; Chen, Zhiguo; Zhang, Yu; Liu, Zhaoying; Lu, Yi

2016-12-01

Segmentation of infrared (IR) ship images is always a challenging task, because of the intensity inhomogeneity and noise. The fuzzy C-means (FCM) clustering is a classical method widely used in image segmentation. However, it has some shortcomings, like not considering the spatial information or being sensitive to noise. In this paper, an improved FCM method based on the spatial information is proposed for IR ship target segmentation. The improvements include two parts: 1) adding the nonlocal spatial information based on the ship target and 2) using the spatial shape information of the contour of the ship target to refine the local spatial constraint by Markov random field. In addition, the results of K -means are used to initialize the improved FCM method. Experimental results show that the improved method is effective and performs better than the existing methods, including the existing FCM methods, for segmentation of the IR ship images.

Hybrid computational and experimental approach for the study and optimization of mechanical components

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Furlong, Cosme; Pryputniewicz, Ryszard J.

1998-05-01

Increased demands on the performance and efficiency of mechanical components impose challenges on their engineering design and optimization, especially when new and more demanding applications must be developed in relatively short periods of time while satisfying design objectives, as well as cost and manufacturability. In addition, reliability and durability must be taken into consideration. As a consequence, effective quantitative methodologies, computational and experimental, should be applied in the study and optimization of mechanical components. Computational investigations enable parametric studies and the determination of critical engineering design conditions, while experimental investigations, especially those using optical techniques, provide qualitative and quantitative information on the actual response of the structure of interest to the applied load and boundary conditions. We discuss a hybrid experimental and computational approach for investigation and optimization of mechanical components. The approach is based on analytical, computational, and experimental resolutions methodologies in the form of computational, noninvasive optical techniques, and fringe prediction analysis tools. Practical application of the hybrid approach is illustrated with representative examples that demonstrate the viability of the approach as an effective engineering tool for analysis and optimization.

Training haptic stiffness discrimination: time course of learning with or without visual information and knowledge of results.

PubMed

Teodorescu, Kinneret; Bouchigny, Sylvain; Korman, Maria

2013-08-01

In this study, we explored the time course of haptic stiffness discrimination learning and how it was affected by two experimental factors, the addition of visual information and/or knowledge of results (KR) during training. Stiffness perception may integrate both haptic and visual modalities. However, in many tasks, the visual field is typically occluded, forcing stiffness perception to be dependent exclusively on haptic information. No studies to date addressed the time course of haptic stiffness perceptual learning. Using a virtual environment (VE) haptic interface and a two-alternative forced-choice discrimination task, the haptic stiffness discrimination ability of 48 participants was tested across 2 days. Each day included two haptic test blocks separated by a training block Additional visual information and/or KR were manipulated between participants during training blocks. Practice repetitions alone induced significant improvement in haptic stiffness discrimination. Between days, accuracy was slightly improved, but decision time performance was deteriorated. The addition of visual information and/or KR had only temporary effects on decision time, without affecting the time course of haptic discrimination learning. Learning in haptic stiffness discrimination appears to evolve through at least two distinctive phases: A single training session resulted in both immediate and latent learning. This learning was not affected by the training manipulations inspected. Training skills in VE in spaced sessions can be beneficial for tasks in which haptic perception is critical, such as surgery procedures, when the visual field is occluded. However, training protocols for such tasks should account for low impact of multisensory information and KR.

Magnetic MOF microreactors for recyclable size-selective biocatalysis† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental procedures, calibration curves and additional figures relating to capsule characterisation and biocatalysis. See DOI: 10.1039/c4sc03367a Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Huo, Jia; Aguilera-Sigalat, Jordi; El-Hankari, Samir

2015-01-01

In this contribution we report a synthetic strategy for the encapsulation of functional biomolecules within MOF-based microcapsules. We employ an agarose hydrogel droplet Pickering-stabilised by UiO-66 and magnetite nanoparticles as a template around which to deposit a hierarchically structured ZIF-8 shell. The resulting microcapsules are robust, highly microporous and readily attracted to a magnet, where the hydrogel core provides a facile means to encapsulate enzymes for recyclable size-selective biocatalysis. PMID:28717454

The crystalline sponge method: MOF terminal ligand effects† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental and crystallographic procedures, and data tables. CCDC 1063685 and 1063686. For ESI and crystallographic data in CIF or other electronic format see DOI: 10.1039/c5cc03840e Click here for additional data file. Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Ramadhar, Timothy R.; Zheng, Shao-Liang; Chen, Yu-Sheng

2015-01-01

Bromide and chloride analogs of the commonly used zinc iodide-based metal organic framework for the crystalline sponge method were synthesized and evaluated. Inclusion of (1R)-(–)-menthyl acetate into these MOFs was analysed using third-generation synchrotron radiation, and the effects and potential benefits of varying the MOF terminal ligand are discussed. PMID:26081991

Tutorial for Thermophysics Universal Research Framework

DTIC Science & Technology

2017-07-30

DS1V are compared in Section 3.4.5. 3.4.2 Description of the Example Problem In a fluid, disturbance information is communicated within a medium at the...Universal Research Framework development (TURF-DEV) package on a case-by-case basis. Brief descriptions of the operations are provided in Tables 4.1 and...of additional experimental (E) and research (R) operations included in TURF-DEV. Module Operation Description DSMC SPDistDirectDSMCCellMergeOp (R

Nitrogen Solubility in Adipose Tissues of Diving Animals: Implications for Human Divers and for Modeling Diving Physiology

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-11-01

ORGANIZATION NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES) 8. PERFORMING ORGANIZATION Biology & Marine Biology , UNCW REPORT NUMBER 601 S. College Road Wi lmington, NC...Information PI: Dr. Heather Koopman Institution: Biology & Marine Biology , University of North Carolina Wilmington Award #: N000141210442 Title...both graduate and undergraduate) • 1 paper published in Journal of Experimental Biology (and picked up by the media; see X. G. below); 3 additional

Improving precise positioning of surgical robotic instruments by a three-side-view presentation system on telesurgery.

PubMed

Hori, Kenta; Kuroda, Tomohiro; Oyama, Hiroshi; Ozaki, Yasuhiko; Nakamura, Takehiko; Takahashi, Takashi

2005-12-01

For faultless collaboration among the surgeon, surgical staffs, and surgical robots in telesurgery, communication must include environmental information of the remote operating room, such as behavior of robots and staffs, vital information of a patient, named supporting information, in addition to view of surgical field. "Surgical Cockpit System, " which is a telesurgery support system that has been developed by the authors, is mainly focused on supporting information exchange between remote sites. Live video presentation is important technology for Surgical Cockpit System. Visualization method to give precise location/posture of surgical instruments is indispensable for accurate control and faultless operation. In this paper, the authors propose three-side-view presentation method for precise location/posture control of surgical instruments in telesurgery. The experimental results show that the proposed method improved accurate positioning of a telemanipulator.

Time-Resolved In Situ Measurements During Rapid Alloy Solidification: Experimental Insight for Additive Manufacturing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McKeown, Joseph T.; Zweiacker, Kai; Liu, Can; Coughlin, Daniel R.; Clarke, Amy J.; Baldwin, J. Kevin; Gibbs, John W.; Roehling, John D.; Imhoff, Seth D.; Gibbs, Paul J.; Tourret, Damien; Wiezorek, Jörg M. K.; Campbell, Geoffrey H.

2016-03-01

Additive manufacturing (AM) of metals and alloys is becoming a pervasive technology in both research and industrial environments, though significant challenges remain before widespread implementation of AM can be realized. In situ investigations of rapid alloy solidification with high spatial and temporal resolutions can provide unique experimental insight into microstructure evolution and kinetics that are relevant for AM processing. Hypoeutectic thin-film Al-Cu and Al-Si alloys were investigated using dynamic transmission electron microscopy to monitor pulsed-laser-induced rapid solidification across microsecond timescales. Solid-liquid interface velocities measured from time-resolved images revealed accelerating solidification fronts in both alloys. The observed microstructure evolution, solidification product, and presence of a morphological instability at the solid-liquid interface in the Al-4 at.%Cu alloy are related to the measured interface velocities and small differences in composition that affect the thermophysical properties of the alloys. These time-resolved in situ measurements can inform and validate predictive modeling efforts for AM.

Time-Resolved In Situ Measurements During Rapid Alloy Solidification: Experimental Insight for Additive Manufacturing

DOE PAGES

McKeown, Joseph T.; Zweiacker, Kai; Liu, Can; ...

2016-01-27

In research and industrial environments, additive manufacturing (AM) of metals and alloys is becoming a pervasive technology, though significant challenges remain before widespread implementation of AM can be realized. In situ investigations of rapid alloy solidification with high spatial and temporal resolutions can provide unique experimental insight into microstructure evolution and kinetics that are relevant for AM processing. Hypoeutectic thin-film Al–Cu and Al–Si alloys were investigated using dynamic transmission electron microscopy to monitor pulsed-laser-induced rapid solidification across microsecond timescales. Solid–liquid interface velocities measured from time-resolved images revealed accelerating solidification fronts in both alloys. We observed microstructure evolution, solidification product, andmore » presence of a morphological instability at the solid–liquid interface in the Al–4 at.%Cu alloy are related to the measured interface velocities and small differences in composition that affect the thermophysical properties of the alloys. These time-resolved in situ measurements can inform and validate predictive modeling efforts for AM.« less

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sciarrino, Fabio; Dipartimento di Fisica and Consorzio Nazionale Interuniversitario per le Scienze Fisiche della Materia, Universita 'La Sapienza', Rome 00185; De Martini, Francesco

The optimal phase-covariant quantum cloning machine (PQCM) broadcasts the information associated to an input qubit into a multiqubit system, exploiting a partial a priori knowledge of the input state. This additional a priori information leads to a higher fidelity than for the universal cloning. The present article first analyzes different innovative schemes to implement the 1{yields}3 PQCM. The method is then generalized to any 1{yields}M machine for an odd value of M by a theoretical approach based on the general angular momentum formalism. Finally different experimental schemes based either on linear or nonlinear methods and valid for single photon polarizationmore » encoded qubits are discussed.« less

Direct generation of spatial quadripartite continuous variable entanglement in an optical parametric oscillator.

PubMed

Liu, Kui; Guo, Jun; Cai, Chunxiao; Zhang, Junxiang; Gao, Jiangrui

2016-11-15

Multipartite entanglement is used for quantum information applications, such as building multipartite quantum communications. Generally, generation of multipartite entanglement is based on a complex beam-splitter network. Here, based on the spatial freedom of light, we experimentally demonstrated spatial quadripartite continuous variable entanglement among first-order Hermite-Gaussian modes using a single type II optical parametric oscillator operating below threshold with an HG0245° pump beam. The entanglement can be scalable for larger numbers of spatial modes by changing the spatial profile of the pump beam. In addition, spatial multipartite entanglement will be useful for future spatial multichannel quantum information applications.

Bayesian analyses of time-interval data for environmental radiation monitoring.

PubMed

Luo, Peng; Sharp, Julia L; DeVol, Timothy A

2013-01-01

Time-interval (time difference between two consecutive pulses) analysis based on the principles of Bayesian inference was investigated for online radiation monitoring. Using experimental and simulated data, Bayesian analysis of time-interval data [Bayesian (ti)] was compared with Bayesian and a conventional frequentist analysis of counts in a fixed count time [Bayesian (cnt) and single interval test (SIT), respectively]. The performances of the three methods were compared in terms of average run length (ARL) and detection probability for several simulated detection scenarios. Experimental data were acquired with a DGF-4C system in list mode. Simulated data were obtained using Monte Carlo techniques to obtain a random sampling of the Poisson distribution. All statistical algorithms were developed using the R Project for statistical computing. Bayesian analysis of time-interval information provided a similar detection probability as Bayesian analysis of count information, but the authors were able to make a decision with fewer pulses at relatively higher radiation levels. In addition, for the cases with very short presence of the source (< count time), time-interval information is more sensitive to detect a change than count information since the source data is averaged by the background data over the entire count time. The relationships of the source time, change points, and modifications to the Bayesian approach for increasing detection probability are presented.

Focusing on task conflict in the Stroop effect.

PubMed

Entel, Olga; Tzelgov, Joseph

2018-03-01

Two types of conflict underlie performance in the Stroop task-informational (between the incongruent word and its ink color) and task (between the relevant color-naming task and the irrelevant word-reading task). We manipulated congruent-to-neutral trial ratio in an attempt to reveal whether task conflict can be monitored and controlled in the absence of an informational conflict. In our first experiment, no incongruent trials were included, thus allowing examination of a pure task conflict situation. The results revealed an impressively large facilitation when most of the stimuli were congruent and a smaller yet significant facilitation when most of the stimuli were neutrals. In Experiments 2, exposing participants to incongruent trials during pre-experimental practice (but not during the experimental blocks) slowed down the responses to congruent trials, resulting in a reduced facilitation effect in the mostly congruent condition, and in a negative facilitation in the mostly neutral condition. In our third experiment, we replicated our results, eliminating possible contingency and frequency biases. Overall, our findings show that experiencing, or at least expecting, informational conflict is essential to reveal conflict, while control is recruited through task demands. This challenges previous findings and points out that additional research is needed to clarify the necessity of informational conflict for conflict detection.

Improved hybrid information filtering based on limited time window

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Song, Wen-Jun; Guo, Qiang; Liu, Jian-Guo

2014-12-01

Adopting the entire collecting information of users, the hybrid information filtering of heat conduction and mass diffusion (HHM) (Zhou et al., 2010) was successfully proposed to solve the apparent diversity-accuracy dilemma. Since the recent behaviors are more effective to capture the users' potential interests, we present an improved hybrid information filtering of adopting the partial recent information. We expand the time window to generate a series of training sets, each of which is treated as known information to predict the future links proven by the testing set. The experimental results on one benchmark dataset Netflix indicate that by only using approximately 31% recent rating records, the accuracy could be improved by an average of 4.22% and the diversity could be improved by 13.74%. In addition, the performance on the dataset MovieLens could be preserved by considering approximately 60% recent records. Furthermore, we find that the improved algorithm is effective to solve the cold-start problem. This work could improve the information filtering performance and shorten the computational time.

Applications of Experimental Suomi-NPP VIIRS Flood Inundation Maps in Operational Flood Forecasting

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Deweese, M. M.

2017-12-01

Flooding is the most costly natural disaster across the globe. In 2016 flooding caused more fatalities than any other natural disaster in the United States. The U.S. National Weather Service (NWS) is mandated to forecast rivers for the protection of life and property and the enhancement of the national economy. Since 2014, the NWS North Central River Forecast Center has utilized experimental near real time flood mapping products from the JPSS Suomi-NPP VIIRS satellite. These products have been demonstrated to provide reliable and high value information for forecasters in ice jam and snowmelt flooding in data sparse regions of the northern plains. In addition, they have proved valuable in rainfall induced flooding within the upper Mississippi River basin. Aerial photography and ground observations have validated the accuracy of the products. Examples are provided from numerous flooding events to demonstrate the operational application of this satellite derived information as a remotely sensed observational data source and it's utility in real time flood forecasting.

Bayesian inference for dynamic transcriptional regulation; the Hes1 system as a case study.

PubMed

Heron, Elizabeth A; Finkenstädt, Bärbel; Rand, David A

2007-10-01

In this study, we address the problem of estimating the parameters of regulatory networks and provide the first application of Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods to experimental data. As a case study, we consider a stochastic model of the Hes1 system expressed in terms of stochastic differential equations (SDEs) to which rigorous likelihood methods of inference can be applied. When fitting continuous-time stochastic models to discretely observed time series the lengths of the sampling intervals are important, and much of our study addresses the problem when the data are sparse. We estimate the parameters of an autoregulatory network providing results both for simulated and real experimental data from the Hes1 system. We develop an estimation algorithm using MCMC techniques which are flexible enough to allow for the imputation of latent data on a finer time scale and the presence of prior information about parameters which may be informed from other experiments as well as additional measurement error.

Gene Ontology annotations at SGD: new data sources and annotation methods

PubMed Central

Hong, Eurie L.; Balakrishnan, Rama; Dong, Qing; Christie, Karen R.; Park, Julie; Binkley, Gail; Costanzo, Maria C.; Dwight, Selina S.; Engel, Stacia R.; Fisk, Dianna G.; Hirschman, Jodi E.; Hitz, Benjamin C.; Krieger, Cynthia J.; Livstone, Michael S.; Miyasato, Stuart R.; Nash, Robert S.; Oughtred, Rose; Skrzypek, Marek S.; Weng, Shuai; Wong, Edith D.; Zhu, Kathy K.; Dolinski, Kara; Botstein, David; Cherry, J. Michael

2008-01-01

The Saccharomyces Genome Database (SGD; http://www.yeastgenome.org/) collects and organizes biological information about the chromosomal features and gene products of the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Although published data from traditional experimental methods are the primary sources of evidence supporting Gene Ontology (GO) annotations for a gene product, high-throughput experiments and computational predictions can also provide valuable insights in the absence of an extensive body of literature. Therefore, GO annotations available at SGD now include high-throughput data as well as computational predictions provided by the GO Annotation Project (GOA UniProt; http://www.ebi.ac.uk/GOA/). Because the annotation method used to assign GO annotations varies by data source, GO resources at SGD have been modified to distinguish data sources and annotation methods. In addition to providing information for genes that have not been experimentally characterized, GO annotations from independent sources can be compared to those made by SGD to help keep the literature-based GO annotations current. PMID:17982175

I said, you said: the production effect gets personal.

PubMed

MacLeod, Colin M

2011-12-01

Saying a word out loud makes it more memorable than simply reading it silently. This robust finding has been labeled the production effect and has been attributed to the enhanced distinctiveness of produced relative to unproduced items (MacLeod et al. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 36, 671-685, 2010). Produced items have the additional information that they were spoken aloud encoded in their representations, and this information is useful during retrieval in certifying prior encoding. The present study explored whether production must be self-performed to be beneficial, or whether another person's production also makes an item more memorable. In two experiments, the production effect was shown to be reliable when production was done by someone other than the rememberer (i.e., by the experimenter or by another participant), but substantially smaller than the benefit from self-performed production. Intriguingly, the effect was intermediate when production was done by both the rememberer and another person. Distinctiveness--and hence the production effect--is greatest to the extent that it is personal.

NPInter v3.0: an upgraded database of noncoding RNA-associated interactions

PubMed Central

Hao, Yajing; Wu, Wei; Li, Hui; Yuan, Jiao; Luo, Jianjun; Zhao, Yi; Chen, Runsheng

2016-01-01

Despite the fact that a large quantity of noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs) have been identified, their functions remain unclear. To enable researchers to have a better understanding of ncRNAs’ functions, we updated the NPInter database to version 3.0, which contains experimentally verified interactions between ncRNAs (excluding tRNAs and rRNAs), especially long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) and other biomolecules (proteins, mRNAs, miRNAs and genomic DNAs). In NPInter v3.0, interactions pertaining to ncRNAs are not only manually curated from scientific literature but also curated from high-throughput technologies. In addition, we also curated lncRNA–miRNA interactions from in silico predictions supported by AGO CLIP-seq data. When compared with NPInter v2.0, the interactions are more informative (with additional information on tissues or cell lines, binding sites, conservation, co-expression values and other features) and more organized (with divisions on data sets by data sources, tissues or cell lines, experiments and other criteria). NPInter v3.0 expands the data set to 491,416 interactions in 188 tissues (or cell lines) from 68 kinds of experimental technologies. NPInter v3.0 also improves the user interface and adds new web services, including a local UCSC Genome Browser to visualize binding sites. Additionally, NPInter v3.0 defined a high-confidence set of interactions and predicted the functions of lncRNAs in human and mouse based on the interactions curated in the database. NPInter v3.0 is available at http://www.bioinfo.org/NPInter/. Database URL: http://www.bioinfo.org/NPInter/ PMID:27087310

Experimental results on the ω- and η'-nucleus potential - on the way to mesic states

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nanova, Mariana

2015-06-01

Different experimental approaches to determine the meson-nucleus optical potential are discussed. The experiments have been performed with the Crystal Barrel/TAPS detector system at the ELSA accelerator in Bonn and the Crystal Ball/TAPS at the MAMI accelerator in Mainz. Experimental results about the real and imaginary part of the η'- and ω-nucleus optical potential are presented. The imaginary part of the meson-nucleus optical potential is determined from the in-medium width of the meson by the measurement of the transparency ratio. Information on the real part of the optical potential is deduced from measurements of the excitation function and momentum distribution which are sensitive to the sign and depth of the potential. The results are discussed and compared to theoretical predictions. The data for both mesons are consistent with a weakly attractive potential. The formation and population of ω-nucleus and η'-nucleus bound states is additionally discussed.

Experimental and Numerical Investigation of Adsorption/Desorption in Packed Sorption Beds Under Ideal and Non-Ideal Flows

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mohamadinejad, H.; Knox, J. C.; Smith, James E.

1999-01-01

The importance of the wall effect on packed beds in the adsorption and desorption of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and water on molecular sieve 5A of 0.127 cm in radius is examined experimentally and with one-dimensional computer simulations. Experimental results are presented for a 22.5-cm long by 4.5-cm diameter cylindrical column with concentration measurements taken at various radial locations. The set of partial differential equations are solved using finite differences and Newman's method. Comparison of test data with the axial-dispersed, non-isothermal, linear driving force model suggests that a two-dimensional model (submitted to Separation Science and Technology) is required for accurate simulation of the average column breakthrough concentration. Additional comparisons of test data with the model provided information on the interactive effects of carrier gas coadsorption with CO2, as well as CO2-H2O interactions.

Distribution of haemic neoplasia of soft-shelled clams in Prince Edward Island: an examination of anthropogenic factors and effects of experimental fungicide exposure.

PubMed

Mateo, D R; MacCallum, G S; McGladdery, S E; Davidson, J

2016-05-01

Haemic neoplasia was first considered a disease of concern for soft-shell clams in Prince Edward Island (PEI) when it was diagnosed as the cause of mass mortalities in 1999. The aetiology of the disease remains elusive, but has been associated with environmental degradation. In this study, a 2-year (2001-2002) geographic and seasonal survey was conducted for haemic neoplasia, using histology, in soft-shell clams from PEI. In addition, using geographic information system, the association between anthropogenic factors in the watersheds at sites affected by haemic neoplasia and the prevalence of the disease was investigated. Finally, histopathological changes were assessed in soft-shell clams experimentally exposed to four concentrations of chlorothalonil for 27 days. Haemic neoplasia could not be induced at any concentration of chlorothalonil. Clams exposed to a concentration of 1000 μg L(-1) of the fungicide, however, exhibited an LC50 of 17 days. Although this information provides additional toxicity information (LC50) for soft-shell clams, further experiments are required to assess longer term exposure to the fungicide. The highest prevalences of haemic neoplasia in PEI were found in North River and Miscouche (28.3-50.9% and 33.0-77.8%, respectively). No clear seasonal patterns were found. There was a correlation between haemic neoplasia prevalence and watersheds with a high percentage of potato acreage and forest coverage (P = 0.026 and P = 0.045, respectively), suggesting a link between anthropogenic activity and the prevalence of the disease. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

An experimental Investigation of the Impact of Personality Disorder Diagnosis on Clinicians: Can We See Past the Borderline?

PubMed

Lam, Danny C K; Poplavskaya, Elena V; Salkovskis, Paul M; Hogg, Lorna I; Panting, Holly

2016-05-01

There is concern that diagnostic labels for psychiatric disorders may invoke damaging stigma, stereotypes and misunderstanding. This study investigated clinicians' reactions to diagnostic labelling by examining their positive and negative reactions to the label borderline personality disorder (BPD). Mental health professionals (n = 265) viewed a videotape of a patient suffering from panic disorder and agoraphobia undergoing assessment. Prior to viewing the videotape, participants were randomly allocated to one of three conditions and were given the following information about the patient: (a) general background information; (b) additional descriptive information about behaviour corresponding to BPD; and (c) additional descriptive information about behaviour corresponding to BPD, but explicitly adding BPD as a possible comorbid diagnostic label. All participants were then asked to note things they had seen in the videotape that made them feel optimistic or pessimistic about treatment outcome. Participants in the group that were explicitly informed that the patient had a BPD diagnostic label reported significantly fewer reasons to be optimistic than the other two groups. Diagnostic labels may negatively impact on clinicians' judgments and perceptions of individuals and therefore clinicians should think carefully about whether, and how, they use diagnoses and efforts should be made to destigmatize diagnostic terms.

Social Influences in Sequential Decision Making

PubMed Central

Schöbel, Markus; Rieskamp, Jörg; Huber, Rafael

2016-01-01

People often make decisions in a social environment. The present work examines social influence on people’s decisions in a sequential decision-making situation. In the first experimental study, we implemented an information cascade paradigm, illustrating that people infer information from decisions of others and use this information to make their own decisions. We followed a cognitive modeling approach to elicit the weight people give to social as compared to private individual information. The proposed social influence model shows that participants overweight their own private information relative to social information, contrary to the normative Bayesian account. In our second study, we embedded the abstract decision problem of Study 1 in a medical decision-making problem. We examined whether in a medical situation people also take others’ authority into account in addition to the information that their decisions convey. The social influence model illustrates that people weight social information differentially according to the authority of other decision makers. The influence of authority was strongest when an authority's decision contrasted with private information. Both studies illustrate how the social environment provides sources of information that people integrate differently for their decisions. PMID:26784448

A privacy-preserved analytical method for ehealth database with minimized information loss.

PubMed

Chen, Ya-Ling; Cheng, Bo-Chao; Chen, Hsueh-Lin; Lin, Chia-I; Liao, Guo-Tan; Hou, Bo-Yu; Hsu, Shih-Chun

2012-01-01

Digitizing medical information is an emerging trend that employs information and communication technology (ICT) to manage health records, diagnostic reports, and other medical data more effectively, in order to improve the overall quality of medical services. However, medical information is highly confidential and involves private information, even legitimate access to data raises privacy concerns. Medical records provide health information on an as-needed basis for diagnosis and treatment, and the information is also important for medical research and other health management applications. Traditional privacy risk management systems have focused on reducing reidentification risk, and they do not consider information loss. In addition, such systems cannot identify and isolate data that carries high risk of privacy violations. This paper proposes the Hiatus Tailor (HT) system, which ensures low re-identification risk for medical records, while providing more authenticated information to database users and identifying high-risk data in the database for better system management. The experimental results demonstrate that the HT system achieves much lower information loss than traditional risk management methods, with the same risk of re-identification.

Social Influences in Sequential Decision Making.

PubMed

Schöbel, Markus; Rieskamp, Jörg; Huber, Rafael

2016-01-01

People often make decisions in a social environment. The present work examines social influence on people's decisions in a sequential decision-making situation. In the first experimental study, we implemented an information cascade paradigm, illustrating that people infer information from decisions of others and use this information to make their own decisions. We followed a cognitive modeling approach to elicit the weight people give to social as compared to private individual information. The proposed social influence model shows that participants overweight their own private information relative to social information, contrary to the normative Bayesian account. In our second study, we embedded the abstract decision problem of Study 1 in a medical decision-making problem. We examined whether in a medical situation people also take others' authority into account in addition to the information that their decisions convey. The social influence model illustrates that people weight social information differentially according to the authority of other decision makers. The influence of authority was strongest when an authority's decision contrasted with private information. Both studies illustrate how the social environment provides sources of information that people integrate differently for their decisions.

A laboratory study of supercritical CO2 adsorption on cap rocks in the geological storage conditions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jedli, Hedi; Jbara, Abdessalem; Hedfi, Hachem; Bouzgarrou, Souhail; Slimi, Khalifa

2017-04-01

In the present study, various cap rocks have been experimentally reacted in water with supercritical CO2 in geological storage conditions ( P = 8 × 106 Pa and T = 80 °C) for 25 days. To characterize the potential CO2-water-rock interactions, an experimental setup has been built to provide additional information concerning the effects of structure, thermal and surface characteristics changes due to CO2 injection with cap rocks. In addition, CO2 adsorption capacities of different materials (i.e., clay evaporate and sandstone) are measured. These samples were characterized by XRD technique. The BET specific surface area was determined by nitrogen isotherms. In addition, thermal characteristics of untreated adsorbents were analyzed via TGA method and topography surfaces are identified by Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM). Taking into account pressure and temperature, the physical as well as chemical mechanisms of CO2 retention were determined. Isotherm change profiles of samples for relative pressure range indicate clearly that CO2 was adsorbed in different quantities. In accordance with the X-ray diffraction, a crystalline phase was formed due to the carbonic acid attack and precipitation of some carbonate.

Visual processing in Alzheimer's disease: surface detail and colour fail to aid object identification.

PubMed

Adlington, Rebecca L; Laws, Keith R; Gale, Tim M

2009-10-01

It has been suggested that object recognition in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) may be strongly influenced both by image format (e.g. colour vs. line-drawn) and by low-level visual impairments. To examine these notions, we tested basic visual functioning and picture naming in 41 AD patients and 40 healthy elderly controls. Picture naming was examined using 105 images representing a wide range of living and nonliving subcategories (from the Hatfield image test [HIT]: [Adlington, R. A., Laws, K. R., & Gale, T. M. (in press). The Hatfield image test (HIT): A new picture test and norms for experimental and clinical use. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology]), with each item presented in colour, greyscale, or line-drawn formats. Whilst naming for elderly controls improved linearly with the addition of surface detail and colour, AD patients showed no benefit from the addition of either surface information or colour. Additionally, controls showed a significant category by format interaction; however, the same profile did not emerge for AD patients. Finally, AD patients showed widespread and significant impairment on tasks of visual functioning, and low-level visual impairment was predictive of patient naming.

Improving IMES Localization Accuracy by Integrating Dead Reckoning Information

PubMed Central

Fujii, Kenjiro; Arie, Hiroaki; Wang, Wei; Kaneko, Yuto; Sakamoto, Yoshihiro; Schmitz, Alexander; Sugano, Shigeki

2016-01-01

Indoor positioning remains an open problem, because it is difficult to achieve satisfactory accuracy within an indoor environment using current radio-based localization technology. In this study, we investigate the use of Indoor Messaging System (IMES) radio for high-accuracy indoor positioning. A hybrid positioning method combining IMES radio strength information and pedestrian dead reckoning information is proposed in order to improve IMES localization accuracy. For understanding the carrier noise ratio versus distance relation for IMES radio, the signal propagation of IMES radio is modeled and identified. Then, trilateration and extended Kalman filtering methods using the radio propagation model are developed for position estimation. These methods are evaluated through robot localization and pedestrian localization experiments. The experimental results show that the proposed hybrid positioning method achieved average estimation errors of 217 and 1846 mm in robot localization and pedestrian localization, respectively. In addition, in order to examine the reason for the positioning accuracy of pedestrian localization being much lower than that of robot localization, the influence of the human body on the radio propagation is experimentally evaluated. The result suggests that the influence of the human body can be modeled. PMID:26828492

X-ray phase contrast tomography by tracking near field speckle

PubMed Central

Wang, Hongchang; Berujon, Sebastien; Herzen, Julia; Atwood, Robert; Laundy, David; Hipp, Alexander; Sawhney, Kawal

2015-01-01

X-ray imaging techniques that capture variations in the x-ray phase can yield higher contrast images with lower x-ray dose than is possible with conventional absorption radiography. However, the extraction of phase information is often more difficult than the extraction of absorption information and requires a more sophisticated experimental arrangement. We here report a method for three-dimensional (3D) X-ray phase contrast computed tomography (CT) which gives quantitative volumetric information on the real part of the refractive index. The method is based on the recently developed X-ray speckle tracking technique in which the displacement of near field speckle is tracked using a digital image correlation algorithm. In addition to differential phase contrast projection images, the method allows the dark-field images to be simultaneously extracted. After reconstruction, compared to conventional absorption CT images, the 3D phase CT images show greatly enhanced contrast. This new imaging method has advantages compared to other X-ray imaging methods in simplicity of experimental arrangement, speed of measurement and relative insensitivity to beam movements. These features make the technique an attractive candidate for material imaging such as in-vivo imaging of biological systems containing soft tissue. PMID:25735237

HyRA: A Hybrid Recommendation Algorithm Focused on Smart POI. Ceutí as a Study Scenario.

PubMed

Alvarado-Uribe, Joanna; Gómez-Oliva, Andrea; Barrera-Animas, Ari Yair; Molina, Germán; Gonzalez-Mendoza, Miguel; Parra-Meroño, María Concepción; Jara, Antonio J

2018-03-17

Nowadays, Physical Web together with the increase in the use of mobile devices, Global Positioning System (GPS), and Social Networking Sites (SNS) have caused users to share enriched information on the Web such as their tourist experiences. Therefore, an area that has been significantly improved by using the contextual information provided by these technologies is tourism. In this way, the main goals of this work are to propose and develop an algorithm focused on the recommendation of Smart Point of Interaction (Smart POI) for a specific user according to his/her preferences and the Smart POIs' context. Hence, a novel Hybrid Recommendation Algorithm (HyRA) is presented by incorporating an aggregation operator into the user-based Collaborative Filtering (CF) algorithm as well as including the Smart POIs' categories and geographical information. For the experimental phase, two real-world datasets have been collected and preprocessed. In addition, one Smart POIs' categories dataset was built. As a result, a dataset composed of 16 Smart POIs, another constituted by the explicit preferences of 200 respondents, and the last dataset integrated by 13 Smart POIs' categories are provided. The experimental results show that the recommendations suggested by HyRA are promising.

HyRA: A Hybrid Recommendation Algorithm Focused on Smart POI. Ceutí as a Study Scenario

PubMed Central

Gómez-Oliva, Andrea; Molina, Germán

2018-01-01

Nowadays, Physical Web together with the increase in the use of mobile devices, Global Positioning System (GPS), and Social Networking Sites (SNS) have caused users to share enriched information on the Web such as their tourist experiences. Therefore, an area that has been significantly improved by using the contextual information provided by these technologies is tourism. In this way, the main goals of this work are to propose and develop an algorithm focused on the recommendation of Smart Point of Interaction (Smart POI) for a specific user according to his/her preferences and the Smart POIs’ context. Hence, a novel Hybrid Recommendation Algorithm (HyRA) is presented by incorporating an aggregation operator into the user-based Collaborative Filtering (CF) algorithm as well as including the Smart POIs’ categories and geographical information. For the experimental phase, two real-world datasets have been collected and preprocessed. In addition, one Smart POIs’ categories dataset was built. As a result, a dataset composed of 16 Smart POIs, another constituted by the explicit preferences of 200 respondents, and the last dataset integrated by 13 Smart POIs’ categories are provided. The experimental results show that the recommendations suggested by HyRA are promising. PMID:29562590

Testing whether decision aids introduce cognitive biases: results of a randomized trial.

PubMed

Ubel, Peter A; Smith, Dylan M; Zikmund-Fisher, Brian J; Derry, Holly A; McClure, Jennifer; Stark, Azadeh; Wiese, Cheryl; Greene, Sarah; Jankovic, Aleksandra; Fagerlin, Angela

2010-08-01

Women at high risk of breast cancer face a difficult decision whether to take medications like tamoxifen to prevent a first breast cancer diagnosis. Decision aids (DAs) offer a promising method of helping them make this decision. But concern lingers that DAs might introduce cognitive biases. We recruited 663 women at high risk of breast cancer and presented them with a DA designed to experimentally test potential methods of identifying and reducing cognitive biases that could influence this decision, by varying specific aspects of the DA across participants in a factorial design. Participants were susceptible to a cognitive bias - an order effect - such that those who learned first about the risks of tamoxifen thought more favorably of the drug than women who learned first about the benefits. This order effect was eliminated among women who received additional information about competing health risks. We discovered that the order of risk/benefit information influenced women's perceptions of tamoxifen. This bias was eliminated by providing contextual information about competing health risks. We have demonstrated the feasibility of using factorial experimental designs to test whether DAs introduce cognitive biases, and whether specific elements of DAs can reduce such biases. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd.

A novel method to measure regional muscle blood flow continuously using NIRS kinetics information

PubMed Central

Nioka, Shoko; Kime, Ryotaro; Sunar, Ulas; Im, Joohee; Izzetoglu, Meltem; Zhang, Jun; Alacam, Burak; Chance, Britton

2006-01-01

Background This article introduces a novel method to continuously monitor regional muscle blood flow by using Near Infrared Spectroscopy (NIRS). We demonstrate the feasibility of the new method in two ways: (1) by applying this new method of determining blood flow to experimental NIRS data during exercise and ischemia; and, (2) by simulating muscle oxygenation and blood flow values using these newly developed equations during recovery from exercise and ischemia. Methods Deoxy (Hb) and oxyhemoglobin (HbO2), located in the blood ofthe skeletal muscle, carry two internal relationships between blood flow and oxygen consumption. One is a mass transfer principle and the other describes a relationship between oxygen consumption and Hb kinetics in a two-compartment model. To monitor blood flow continuously, we transfer these two relationships into two equations and calculate the blood flow with the differential information of HbO2 and Hb. In addition, these equations are used to simulate the relationship between blood flow and reoxygenation kinetics after cuff ischemia and a light exercise. Nine healthy subjects volunteered for the cuff ischemia, light arm exercise and arm exercise with cuff ischemia for the experimental study. Results Analysis of experimental data of both cuff ischemia and light exercise using the new equations show greater blood flow (four to six times more than resting values) during recovery, agreeing with previous findings. Further, the simulation and experimental studies of cuff ischemia and light exercise agree with each other. Conclusion We demonstrate the accuracy of this new method by showing that the blood flow obtained from the method agrees with previous data as well as with simulated data. We conclude that this novel continuous blood flow monitoring method can provide blood flow information non-invasively with NIRS. PMID:16704736

Recovery of microbial communities and carbon cycling processes following drought manipulation in southern California

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Allison, S. D.; Martiny, J. B. H.; Martiny, A.; Berlemont, R.; Treseder, K. K.; Goulden, M.; Brodie, E.

2016-12-01

Predicting the functioning of microbial communities under changing environmental conditions remains a key challenge in Earth system science. Metagenomics and other high-throughput molecular approaches can help address this challenge by revealing the functional potential of microbial communities. We coupled metagenomics with models and experimental manipulations to address microbial responses to drought in a California grassland ecosystem along with the consequences for carbon cycling. We developed an approach for extracting trait information from metagenomic data and asked: 1) What is the phylogenetic structure of drought response traits? 2) What is the relationship between these traits and those involved in carbohydrate degradation? 3) How do both classes of traits vary seasonally and with precipitation manipulation? 4) How resilient are these traits in the face of perturbation? We found that drought response traits are phylogenetically conserved at an equivalent of 5-8% ribosomal RNA gene sequence dissimilarity. Experimental drought treatment selected for the genetic potential to degrade starch, xylan, and mixed polysaccharides, suggesting a link between drought response and carbon cycling traits. In addition, microbial communities exposed to experimental drought showed a reduced potential to degrade plant biomass. Particularly among bacteria, seasonal drought had a larger impact on microbial composition, abundance, and carbohydrate-degrading genes compared to experimental drought. Bacterial communities were also more resilient to drought perturbation than fungal communities, which showed legacies of drought perturbation for up to three years. Altogether, these findings imply that microbial communities exhibit trait diversity that facilitates resilience but with substantial time lags and consequences for carbon turnover. This information is being used to inform new trait-based models that address the challenge of predicting microbial functioning under precipitation change.

Report on carcinogens monograph on cumene.

PubMed

2013-09-01

The National Toxicology Program conducted a cancer evaluation on cumene for possible listing in the Report on Carcinogens (RoC). The cancer evaluation is captured in the RoC monograph, which was peer reviewed in a public forum. The monograph consists of two components: (Part 1) the cancer evaluation, which reviews the relevant scientific information, assesses its quality, applies the RoC listing criteria to the scientific information, and provides the NTP recommendation for listing status for cumene in the RoC, and (Part 2) the substance profile proposed for the RoC, containing the NTP's listing status recommendation, a summary of the scientific evidence considered key to reaching that decision, and data on properties, use, production, exposure, and Federal regulations and guidelines to reduce exposure to cumene. This monograph provides an assessment of the available scientific information on cumene, including human exposure and properties, disposition and toxicokinetics, cancer studies in experimental animals, and studies of mechanisms and other related effects, including relevant toxicological effects, genetic toxicology, and mechanisms of carcinogenicity. From this assessment, the NTP recommended that cumene be listed as reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen in the RoC based on sufficient evidence from studies in experimental animals, which found that cumene exposure caused lung tumors in male and female mice and liver tumors in female mice. Several proposed mechanisms of carcinogenesis support the relevance to humans of the lung and liver tumors observed in experimental animals. Specifically, there is evidence that humans and experimental animals metabolize cumene through similar metabolic pathways. In addition, mutations of the K-ras oncogene and p53 tumor-suppressor gene observed in cumene-induced lung tumors in mice, along with altered expression of many other genes, resemble molecular alterations found in human lung and other cancers.

Effect on signal-to-noise ratio of splitting the continuous contacts of cuff electrodes into smaller recording areas

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Cuff electrodes have been widely used chronically in different clinical applications. This neural interface has been dominantly used for nerve stimulation while interfering noise is the major issue when employed for recording purposes. Advancements have been made in rejecting extra-neural interference by using continuous ring contacts in tripolar topologies. Ring contacts provide an average of the neural activity, and thus reduce the information retrieved. Splitting these contacts into smaller recording areas could potentially increase the information content. In this study, we investigate the impact of such discretization on the Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR). The effect of contacts positioning and an additional short circuited pair of electrodes were also addressed. Methods Different recording configurations using ring, dot, and a mixed of both contacts were studied in vitro in a frog model. An interfering signal was induced in the medium to simulate myoelectric noise. The experimental setup was design in such a way that the only difference between recordings was the configuration used. The inter-session experimental differences were taken care of by a common configuration that allowed normalization between electrode designs. Results It was found that splitting all contacts into small recording areas had negative effects on noise rejection. However, if this is only applied to the central contact creating a mixed tripole configuration, a considerable and statistically significant improvement was observed. Moreover, the signal to noise ratio was equal or larger than what can be achieved with the best known configuration, namely the short circuited tripole. This suggests that for recording purposes, any tripole topology would benefit from splitting the central contact into one or more discrete contacts. Conclusions Our results showed that a mixed tripole configuration performs better than the configuration including only ring contacts. Therefore, splitting the central ring contact of a cuff electrode into a number of dot contacts not only provides additional information but also an improved SNR. In addition, the effect of an additional pair of short circuited electrodes and the “end effect” observed with the presented method are in line with previous findings by other authors. PMID:23433089

Web-Based STAR E-Learning Course Increases Empathy and Understanding in Dementia Caregivers: Results from a Randomized Controlled Trial in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.

PubMed

Hattink, Bart; Meiland, Franka; van der Roest, Henriëtte; Kevern, Peter; Abiuso, Francesca; Bengtsson, Johan; Giuliano, Angele; Duca, Annalise; Sanders, Jennifer; Basnett, Fern; Nugent, Chris; Kingston, Paul; Dröes, Rose-Marie

2015-10-30

The doubling of the number of people with dementia in the coming decades coupled with the rapid decline in the working population in our graying society is expected to result in a large decrease in the number of professionals available to provide care to people with dementia. As a result, care will be supplied increasingly by untrained informal caregivers and volunteers. To promote effective care and avoid overburdening of untrained and trained caregivers, they must become properly skilled. To this end, the European Skills Training and Reskilling (STAR) project, which comprised experts from the domains of education, technology, and dementia care from 6 countries (the Netherlands, Sweden, Italy, Malta, Romania, and the United Kingdom), worked together to create and evaluate a multilingual e-learning tool. The STAR training portal provides dementia care training both for informal and formal caregivers. The objective of the current study was to evaluate the user friendliness, usefulness, and impact of STAR with informal caregivers, volunteers, and professional caregivers. For 2 to 4 months, the experimental group had access to the STAR training portal, a Web-based portal consisting of 8 modules, 2 of which had a basic level and 6 additional modules at intermediate and advanced levels. The experimental group also had access to online peer and expert communities for support and information exchange. The control group received free access to STAR after the research had ended. The STAR training portal was evaluated in a randomized controlled trial among informal caregivers and volunteers in addition to professional caregivers (N=142) in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Assessments were performed with self-assessed, online, standardized questionnaires at baseline and after 2 to 4 months. Primary outcome measures were user friendliness, usefulness, and impact of STAR on knowledge, attitudes, and approaches of caregivers regarding dementia. Secondary outcome measures were empathy, quality of life, burden, and caregivers' sense of competence. STAR was rated positively by all user groups on both usefulness and user friendliness. Significant effects were found on a person-centered care approach and on the total score on positive attitudes to dementia; both the experimental and the control group increased in score. Regarding empathy, significant improvements were found in the STAR training group on distress, empathic concern, and taking the perspective of the person with dementia. In the experimental group, however, there was a significant reduction in self-reported sense of competence. The STAR training portal is a useful and user-friendly e-learning method, which has demonstrated its ability to provide significant positive effects on caregiver attitudes and empathy.

Web-Based STAR E-Learning Course Increases Empathy and Understanding in Dementia Caregivers: Results from a Randomized Controlled Trial in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom

PubMed Central

Meiland, Franka; van der Roest, Henriëtte; Kevern, Peter; Abiuso, Francesca; Bengtsson, Johan; Giuliano, Angele; Duca, Annalise; Sanders, Jennifer; Basnett, Fern; Nugent, Chris; Kingston, Paul; Dröes, Rose-Marie

2015-01-01

Background The doubling of the number of people with dementia in the coming decades coupled with the rapid decline in the working population in our graying society is expected to result in a large decrease in the number of professionals available to provide care to people with dementia. As a result, care will be supplied increasingly by untrained informal caregivers and volunteers. To promote effective care and avoid overburdening of untrained and trained caregivers, they must become properly skilled. To this end, the European Skills Training and Reskilling (STAR) project, which comprised experts from the domains of education, technology, and dementia care from 6 countries (the Netherlands, Sweden, Italy, Malta, Romania, and the United Kingdom), worked together to create and evaluate a multilingual e-learning tool. The STAR training portal provides dementia care training both for informal and formal caregivers. Objective The objective of the current study was to evaluate the user friendliness, usefulness, and impact of STAR with informal caregivers, volunteers, and professional caregivers. Methods For 2 to 4 months, the experimental group had access to the STAR training portal, a Web-based portal consisting of 8 modules, 2 of which had a basic level and 6 additional modules at intermediate and advanced levels. The experimental group also had access to online peer and expert communities for support and information exchange. The control group received free access to STAR after the research had ended. The STAR training portal was evaluated in a randomized controlled trial among informal caregivers and volunteers in addition to professional caregivers (N=142) in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Assessments were performed with self-assessed, online, standardized questionnaires at baseline and after 2 to 4 months. Primary outcome measures were user friendliness, usefulness, and impact of STAR on knowledge, attitudes, and approaches of caregivers regarding dementia. Secondary outcome measures were empathy, quality of life, burden, and caregivers’ sense of competence. Results STAR was rated positively by all user groups on both usefulness and user friendliness. Significant effects were found on a person-centered care approach and on the total score on positive attitudes to dementia; both the experimental and the control group increased in score. Regarding empathy, significant improvements were found in the STAR training group on distress, empathic concern, and taking the perspective of the person with dementia. In the experimental group, however, there was a significant reduction in self-reported sense of competence. Conclusions The STAR training portal is a useful and user-friendly e-learning method, which has demonstrated its ability to provide significant positive effects on caregiver attitudes and empathy. PMID:26519106

Metallic Fuels Handbook

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Janney, Dawn E.; Papesch, Cynthia A.; Burkes, Douglas E.

This is not a typical External Report--It is a Handbook. No Abstract is involved. This includes both Parts 1 and 2. The Metallic Fuels Handbook summarizes currently available information about phases and phase diagrams, heat capacity, thermal expansion, and thermal conductivity of elements and alloys in the U-Pu-Zr-Np-Am-La-Ce-Pr-Nd system. Although many sections are reviews and updates of material in previous versions of the Handbook [1, 2], this revision is the first to include alloys with four or more elements. In addition to presenting information about materials properties, the handbook attempts to provide information about how well each property is knownmore » and how much variation exists between measurements. Although it includes some results from models, its primary focus is experimental data.« less

Biogeochemical Processes in Microbial Ecosystems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

DesMarais, David J.

2001-01-01

The hierarchical organization of microbial ecosystems determines process rates that shape Earth's environment, create the biomarker sedimentary and atmospheric signatures of life, and define the stage upon which major evolutionary events occurred. In order to understand how microorganisms have shaped the global environment of Earth and, potentially, other worlds, we must develop an experimental paradigm that links biogeochemical processes with ever-changing temporal and spatial distributions of microbial populations and their metabolic properties. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

CVT/GPL phase 3 integrated testing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Shurney, R. E.; Cantrell, E.; Maybee, G.; Schmitt, S.

1975-01-01

The hardware for 20 candidate shuttle program life sciences experiments was installed in the GPL and experiments were conducted during a 5-day simulated mission. The experiments involved humans, primates, rats, chickens, and marigold plants. All experiments were completed to the satisfaction of the experimenters. In addition to the scientific data gathered for each experiment, information was obtained concerning experiment hardware design and integration, experiment procedures, GPL support systems, and test operations. The results of the integrated tests are presented.

Relevance and reliability of experimental data in human health risk assessment of pesticides.

PubMed

Kaltenhäuser, Johanna; Kneuer, Carsten; Marx-Stoelting, Philip; Niemann, Lars; Schubert, Jens; Stein, Bernd; Solecki, Roland

2017-08-01

Evaluation of data relevance, reliability and contribution to uncertainty is crucial in regulatory health risk assessment if robust conclusions are to be drawn. Whether a specific study is used as key study, as additional information or not accepted depends in part on the criteria according to which its relevance and reliability are judged. In addition to GLP-compliant regulatory studies following OECD Test Guidelines, data from peer-reviewed scientific literature have to be evaluated in regulatory risk assessment of pesticide active substances. Publications should be taken into account if they are of acceptable relevance and reliability. Their contribution to the overall weight of evidence is influenced by factors including test organism, study design and statistical methods, as well as test item identification, documentation and reporting of results. Various reports make recommendations for improving the quality of risk assessments and different criteria catalogues have been published to support evaluation of data relevance and reliability. Their intention was to guide transparent decision making on the integration of the respective information into the regulatory process. This article describes an approach to assess the relevance and reliability of experimental data from guideline-compliant studies as well as from non-guideline studies published in the scientific literature in the specific context of uncertainty and risk assessment of pesticides. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Echolocating bats use future-target information for optimal foraging.

PubMed

Fujioka, Emyo; Aihara, Ikkyu; Sumiya, Miwa; Aihara, Kazuyuki; Hiryu, Shizuko

2016-04-26

When seeing or listening to an object, we aim our attention toward it. While capturing prey, many animal species focus their visual or acoustic attention toward the prey. However, for multiple prey items, the direction and timing of attention for effective foraging remain unknown. In this study, we adopted both experimental and mathematical methodology with microphone-array measurements and mathematical modeling analysis to quantify the attention of echolocating bats that were repeatedly capturing airborne insects in the field. Here we show that bats select rational flight paths to consecutively capture multiple prey items. Microphone-array measurements showed that bats direct their sonar attention not only to the immediate prey but also to the next prey. In addition, we found that a bat's attention in terms of its flight also aims toward the next prey even when approaching the immediate prey. Numerical simulations revealed a possibility that bats shift their flight attention to control suitable flight paths for consecutive capture. When a bat only aims its flight attention toward its immediate prey, it rarely succeeds in capturing the next prey. These findings indicate that bats gain increased benefit by distributing their attention among multiple targets and planning the future flight path based on additional information of the next prey. These experimental and mathematical studies allowed us to observe the process of decision making by bats during their natural flight dynamics.

Predictive computation of genomic logic processing functions in embryonic development

PubMed Central

Peter, Isabelle S.; Faure, Emmanuel; Davidson, Eric H.

2012-01-01

Gene regulatory networks (GRNs) control the dynamic spatial patterns of regulatory gene expression in development. Thus, in principle, GRN models may provide system-level, causal explanations of developmental process. To test this assertion, we have transformed a relatively well-established GRN model into a predictive, dynamic Boolean computational model. This Boolean model computes spatial and temporal gene expression according to the regulatory logic and gene interactions specified in a GRN model for embryonic development in the sea urchin. Additional information input into the model included the progressive embryonic geometry and gene expression kinetics. The resulting model predicted gene expression patterns for a large number of individual regulatory genes each hour up to gastrulation (30 h) in four different spatial domains of the embryo. Direct comparison with experimental observations showed that the model predictively computed these patterns with remarkable spatial and temporal accuracy. In addition, we used this model to carry out in silico perturbations of regulatory functions and of embryonic spatial organization. The model computationally reproduced the altered developmental functions observed experimentally. Two major conclusions are that the starting GRN model contains sufficiently complete regulatory information to permit explanation of a complex developmental process of gene expression solely in terms of genomic regulatory code, and that the Boolean model provides a tool with which to test in silico regulatory circuitry and developmental perturbations. PMID:22927416

miRwayDB: a database for experimentally validated microRNA-pathway associations in pathophysiological conditions

PubMed Central

Das, Sankha Subhra; Saha, Pritam

2018-01-01

Abstract MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are well-known as key regulators of diverse biological pathways. A series of experimental evidences have shown that abnormal miRNA expression profiles are responsible for various pathophysiological conditions by modulating genes in disease associated pathways. In spite of the rapid increase in research data confirming such associations, scientists still do not have access to a consolidated database offering these miRNA-pathway association details for critical diseases. We have developed miRwayDB, a database providing comprehensive information of experimentally validated miRNA-pathway associations in various pathophysiological conditions utilizing data collected from published literature. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first database that provides information about experimentally validated miRNA mediated pathway dysregulation as seen specifically in critical human diseases and hence indicative of a cause-and-effect relationship in most cases. The current version of miRwayDB collects an exhaustive list of miRNA-pathway association entries for 76 critical disease conditions by reviewing 663 published articles. Each database entry contains complete information on the name of the pathophysiological condition, associated miRNA(s), experimental sample type(s), regulation pattern (up/down) of miRNA, pathway association(s), targeted member of dysregulated pathway(s) and a brief description. In addition, miRwayDB provides miRNA, gene and pathway score to evaluate the role of a miRNA regulated pathways in various pathophysiological conditions. The database can also be used for other biomedical approaches such as validation of computational analysis, integrated analysis and prediction of computational model. It also offers a submission page to submit novel data from recently published studies. We believe that miRwayDB will be a useful tool for miRNA research community. Database URL: http://www.mirway.iitkgp.ac.in PMID:29688364

Effectiveness of a nurse-led preadmission intervention for parents of children with profound multiple disabilities undergoing hip-joint surgery: A quasi-experimental pilot study.

PubMed

Seliner, Brigitte; Latal, Beatrice; Spirig, Rebecca

2017-07-01

The aim of this study was to assess the effectiveness of a family-centered care (FCC) intervention provided by an advanced practice nurse (APN) for parents of children with profound disabilities undergoing surgery. In a quasi-experimental design, we used the MPOC-20 to assess satisfaction with FCC and interviews to identify potential mechanisms for improving satisfaction. There was a positive effect on the MPOC-20 domain "general information," albeit with a small effect size (Cohen's d = 0.35). The interviewed parents expected additional support. Emphasis should be placed on providing comprehensive care coordination by an experienced APN. Shared care management is crucial in improving FCC. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Ion beam-based studies for tribological phenomena

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Racolta, P. M.; Popa-Simil, L.; Alexandreanu, B.

1996-06-01

Custom-designed experiments based on the Thin Layer Activation technique (TLA) were completed, providing information on the wear level of some engine components with additional data on transfer and adhesion of material between metallic friction couples using the RBS method. RBS experimental results concerning material transfer for a steel-brass friction couple are presented and discussed in the paper. Also, the types and concentrations of the wear products in used lubricant oils were determined by in-air PIXE. A sequential lubricant filtering-based procedure for determining the dimension distribution of the resulting radioactive wear particles by low level γ-spectrometry is presented. Experimental XRF spectra showing the non-homogeneous distribution of the retained waste particles on the filtering paper are shown.

An Experimental Study of the Effect of Shared Information on Pilot/Controller Re-Route Negotiation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Farley, Todd C.; Hansman, R. John

1999-01-01

Air-ground data link systems are being developed to enable pilots and air traffic controllers to share information more fully. The sharing of information is generally expected to enhance their shared situation awareness and foster more collaborative decision making. An exploratory, part-task simulator experiment is described which evaluates the extent to which shared information may lead pilots and controllers to cooperate or compete when negotiating route amendments. The results indicate an improvement in situation awareness for pilots and controllers and a willingness to work cooperatively. Independent of data link considerations, the experiment also demonstrates the value of providing controllers with a good-quality weather representation on their plan view displays. Observed improvements in situation awareness and separation assurance are discussed. It is argued that deployment of this relatively simple, low-risk addition to the plan view displays be accelerated.

Fast reversible learning based on neurons functioning as anisotropic multiplex hubs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vardi, Roni; Goldental, Amir; Sheinin, Anton; Sardi, Shira; Kanter, Ido

2017-05-01

Neural networks are composed of neurons and synapses, which are responsible for learning in a slow adaptive dynamical process. Here we experimentally show that neurons act like independent anisotropic multiplex hubs, which relay and mute incoming signals following their input directions. Theoretically, the observed information routing enriches the computational capabilities of neurons by allowing, for instance, equalization among different information routes in the network, as well as high-frequency transmission of complex time-dependent signals constructed via several parallel routes. In addition, this kind of hubs adaptively eliminate very noisy neurons from the dynamics of the network, preventing masking of information transmission. The timescales for these features are several seconds at most, as opposed to the imprint of information by the synaptic plasticity, a process which exceeds minutes. Results open the horizon to the understanding of fast and adaptive learning realities in higher cognitive brain's functionalities.

Virtual lab for learning equipment and treatment of experimental measurements of rainfall, runoff and erosion in small rural catchments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ángel Bajo, José; Redel-Macías, María Dolores; Nichols, Mary; Pérez, Rafael; Bellido, Francisco; Marín-Moreno, Víctor; Taguas, Encarnación V.

2017-04-01

A virtual lab for learning to use devices and to treat experimental measurements of hydrological and erosive processes in small agricultural catchments was created to support the practical content of the subject Restoration of Forest Ecosystems of the Master of Forest Engineer (University of Cordoba). The objective was to build a virtual place representing a real site equipped to make measurements of rainfall, runoff and sediment concentration. The virtual lab included pictures, videos and explanations that facilitate learning. Moreover, some practical cases were proposed to apply the explained terms. The structure of menu consisted of: Experimental measurements in catchments; Gallery of videos; Equipment; Practical case; Glossary and Additional Information. Their contents were carefully carried out by professors and scientists of Hydrology and Electronics. The main advantages of the virtual lab were its compatibility with on-line platforms such as Moodle and the presentation of examples for the direct analysis as a basis for solving the proposed practical cases. It has been successfully used for two years and was well-values by the students due the opportunities offered by self-access learning tools. In addition, constraints associated with field trips such as logistical complexity and economic aspects are removed.

Effect of nutrition education intervention based on Pender's Health Promotion Model in improving the frequency and nutrient intake of breakfast consumption among female Iranian students.

PubMed

Dehdari, Tahereh; Rahimi, Tahereh; Aryaeian, Naheed; Gohari, Mahmood Reza

2014-03-01

To determine the effectiveness of nutrition education intervention based on Pender's Health Promotion Model in improving the frequency and nutrient intake of breakfast consumption among female Iranian students. The quasi-experimental study based on Pender's Health Promotion Model was conducted during April-June 2011. Information (data) was collected by self-administered questionnaire. In addition, a 3 d breakfast record was analysed. P < 0·05 was considered significant. Two middle schools in average-income areas of Qom, Iran. One hundred female middle-school students. There was a significant reduction in immediate competing demands and preferences, perceived barriers and negative activity-related affect constructs in the experimental group after education compared with the control group. In addition, perceived benefit, perceived self-efficacy, positive activity-related affect, interpersonal influences, situational influences, commitment to a plan of action, frequency and intakes of macronutrients and most micronutrients of breakfast consumption were also significantly higher in the experimental group compared with the control group after the nutrition education intervention. Constructs of Pender's Health Promotion Model provide a suitable source for designing strategies and content of a nutrition education intervention for improving the frequency and nutrient intake of breakfast consumption among female students.

Identifying interactions in the time and frequency domains in local and global networks - A Granger Causality Approach.

PubMed

Zou, Cunlu; Ladroue, Christophe; Guo, Shuixia; Feng, Jianfeng

2010-06-21

Reverse-engineering approaches such as Bayesian network inference, ordinary differential equations (ODEs) and information theory are widely applied to deriving causal relationships among different elements such as genes, proteins, metabolites, neurons, brain areas and so on, based upon multi-dimensional spatial and temporal data. There are several well-established reverse-engineering approaches to explore causal relationships in a dynamic network, such as ordinary differential equations (ODE), Bayesian networks, information theory and Granger Causality. Here we focused on Granger causality both in the time and frequency domain and in local and global networks, and applied our approach to experimental data (genes and proteins). For a small gene network, Granger causality outperformed all the other three approaches mentioned above. A global protein network of 812 proteins was reconstructed, using a novel approach. The obtained results fitted well with known experimental findings and predicted many experimentally testable results. In addition to interactions in the time domain, interactions in the frequency domain were also recovered. The results on the proteomic data and gene data confirm that Granger causality is a simple and accurate approach to recover the network structure. Our approach is general and can be easily applied to other types of temporal data.

Quasi-experimental study designs series-paper 8: identifying quasi-experimental studies to inform systematic reviews.

PubMed

Glanville, Julie; Eyers, John; Jones, Andrew M; Shemilt, Ian; Wang, Grace; Johansen, Marit; Fiander, Michelle; Rothstein, Hannah

2017-09-01

This article reviews the available evidence and guidance on methods to identify reports of quasi-experimental (QE) studies to inform systematic reviews of health care, public health, international development, education, crime and justice, and social welfare. Research, guidance, and examples of search strategies were identified by searching a range of databases, key guidance documents, selected reviews, conference proceedings, and personal communication. Current practice and research evidence were summarized. Four thousand nine hundred twenty-four records were retrieved by database searches, and additional documents were obtained by other searches. QE studies are challenging to identify efficiently because they have no standardized nomenclature and may be indexed in various ways. Reliable search filters are not available. There is a lack of specific resources devoted to collecting QE studies and little evidence on where best to search. Searches to identify QE studies should search a range of resources and, until indexing improves, use strategies that focus on the topic rather than the study design. Better definitions, better indexing in databases, prospective registers, and reporting guidance are required to improve the retrieval of QE studies and promote systematic reviews of what works based on the evidence from such studies. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

A catalytic chiral gel microfluidic reactor assembled via dynamic covalent chemistry† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental details, additional characterization and catalytic data. See DOI: 10.1039/c5sc00314h Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Liu, Haoliang; Feng, Juan; Chen, Liuping

2015-01-01

A novel dynamic covalent gel strategy is reported to immobilize an asymmetric catalyst within the channels of a microfluidic flow reactor. A layer of a catalytically active Mn–salen dynamic covalent imine gel matrix was coated onto a functionalized capillary. Mn–salen active moiety was incorporated into dynamic covalent imine gel matrix via the reaction of a chiral Mn–salen dialdehyde unit with a tetraamine linker. The catalytic activity of the capillary reactor has been demonstrated in enantioselective kinetic resolution of secondary alcohols. PMID:28706652

Time-dependent spatial intensity profiles of near-infrared idler pulses from nanosecond optical parametric oscillators

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Olafsen, L. J.; Olafsen, J. S.; Eaves, I. K.

2018-06-01

We report on an experimental investigation of the time-dependent spatial intensity distribution of near-infrared idler pulses from an optical parametric oscillator measured using an infrared (IR) camera, in contrast to beam profiles obtained using traditional knife-edge techniques. Comparisons show the information gained by utilizing the thermal camera provides more detail than the spatially- or time-averaged measurements from a knife-edge profile. Synchronization, averaging, and thresholding techniques are applied to enhance the images acquired. The additional information obtained can improve the process by which semiconductor devices and other IR lasers are characterized for their beam quality and output response and thereby result in IR devices with higher performance.

Real-time new satellite product demonstration from microwave sensors and GOES-16 at NRL TC web

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cossuth, J.; Richardson, K.; Surratt, M. L.; Bankert, R.

2017-12-01

The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) Tropical Cyclone (TC) satellite webpage (https://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/TC.html) provides demonstration analyses of storm imagery to benefit operational TC forecast centers around the world. With the availability of new spectral information provided by GOES-16 satellite data and recent research into improved visualization methods of microwave data, experimental imagery was operationally tested to visualize the structural changes of TCs during the 2017 hurricane season. This presentation provides an introduction into these innovative satellite analysis methods, NRL's next generation satellite analysis system (the Geolocated Information Processing System, GeoIPSTM), and demonstration the added value of additional spectral frequencies when monitoring storms in near-realtime.

Auction fever: exploring informational social influences on bidder choices.

PubMed

Chen, Yi-Fen

2011-01-01

Previous investigations of herd behavior have identified the importance of informational social influences in consumer decision making. This research presents three studies examining herd behavior in online auctions. The three studies addressed the influence on bidder online choices of herd cues frequently found in online auctions, including bid number, feedback ratings, and number of questions and answers. This research also investigated the effect of different levels of herd cues on bidder online choices under high and low brand awareness in online auctions. The experimental results demonstrated that bidders use online herd cues when making decisions in online auctions. Additionally, different levels of herd cues influence bidder online choices in both high and low brand awareness product situations.

The impact of an environmental education program on children's and parents' knowledge, attitudes, motivation and behaviors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Legault, Louise M. R.

1999-11-01

Developments in the Quebec educational system enabled us to evaluate the impact of a new educational environmental program (EEP) on a group of children enrolled in this program for the first time (i.e., the experimental group). This EEP comprised a formal curriculum and environmental activities. A control group of children was enrolled in schools where environmental issues were confined to the natural sciences subject. The goals of this study were threefold. The first goal was to evaluate the impact of an EEP on children's and parents' ecological knowledge, attitudes, motivation, and behaviors. The second goal was to investigate if a motivational model of ecological behaviors observed in adult populations could be replicated with children. Part of this goal also included the comparison of path analyses results across experimental conditions, independently for children and parents. The third goal was to identify more clearly what specific children's characteristics influenced parents' ecological attitudes and motivation. Included in this goal was the investigation of possible differences in the strength of associations between constructs in paths analyses conducted in the experimental and control groups of parents. Results suggested that children in the experimental group were more likely to ask teachers and parents for ecological information and presented a more self-determined motivational profile. Additional analyses revealed that children enrolled in an EEP performed ecological behaviors less for extrinsic motives. Level of knowledge, other attitudes and behavioral measures did not differ significantly between the two groups. Parents of children in the experimental group reported lower levels of satisfaction towards the environment and were more likely to get information on ecological issues and strategies from children. No other significant differences between groups of parents were found. Path analyses results suggested that parents' perceptions of children's provision of autonomy support and of ecological information, as well as, joint child/parent involvement in ecological activities favored parents' ecological attitudes and motivation. These results were consistent across the experimental and the control groups. Future studies are necessary to identify optimal intervention strategies devised to foster in people a sense of personal responsibility and self-determination that may propel them into action.

Experimental results on the enhanced backscatter phenomenon and its dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wu, Chensheng; Nelson, William; Ko, Jonathan; Davis, Christopher C.

2014-10-01

Enhanced backscatter effects have long been predicted theoretically and experimentally demonstrated. The reciprocity of a turbulent channel generates a group of paired rays with identical trajectory and phase information that leads to a region in phase space with double intensity and scintillation index. Though simulation work based on phase screen models has demonstrated the existence of the phenomenon, few experimental results have been published describing its characteristics, and possible applications of the enhanced backscatter phenomenon are still unclear. With the development of commercially available high powered lasers and advanced cameras with high frame rates, we have successfully captured the enhanced backscatter effects from different reflection surfaces. In addition to static observations, we have also tilted and pre-distorted the transmitted beam at various frequencies to track the dynamic properties of the enhanced backscatter phenomenon to verify its possible application in guidance and beam and image correction through atmospheric turbulence. In this paper, experimental results will be described, and discussions on the principle and applications of the phenomenon will be included. Enhanced backscatter effects are best observed in certain levels of turbulence (Cn 2≍10-13 m-2/3), and show significant potential for providing self-guidance in beam correction that doesn't introduce additional costs (unlike providing a beacon laser). Possible applications of this phenomenon include tracking fast moving object with lasers, long distance (>1km) alignment, and focusing a high-power corrected laser beam over long distances.

Effect of Computer Support on Younger Women with Breast Cancer

PubMed Central

Gustafson, David H; Hawkins, Robert; Pingree, Suzanne; McTavish, Fiona; Arora, Neeraj K; Mendenhall, John; Cella, David F; Serlin, Ronald C; Apantaku, Funmi M; Stewart, James; Salner, Andrew

2001-01-01

OBJECTIVE Assess impact of a computer-based patient support system on quality of life in younger women with breast cancer, with particular emphasis on assisting the underserved. DESIGN Randomized controlled trial conducted between 1995 and 1998. SETTING Five sites: two teaching hospitals (Madison, Wis, and Chicago, Ill), two nonteaching hospitals (Chicago), and a cancer resource center (Indianapolis, Ill). The latter three sites treat many underserved patients. PARTICIPANTS Newly diagnosed breast cancer patients (N = 246) under age 60. INTERVENTIONS Experimental group received Comprehensive Health Enhancement Support System (CHESS), a home-based computer system providing information, decision-making, and emotional support. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS Pretest and two post-test surveys (at two- and five-month follow-up) measured aspects of participation in care, social/information support, and quality of life. At two-month follow-up, the CHESS group was significantly more competent at seeking information, more comfortable participating in care, and had greater confidence in doctor(s). At five-month follow-up, the CHESS group had significantly better social support and also greater information competence. In addition, experimental assignment interacted with several indicators of medical underservice (race, education, and lack of insurance), such that CHESS benefits were greater for the disadvantaged than the advantaged group. CONCLUSIONS Computer-based patient support systems such as CHESS may benefit patients by providing information and social support, and increasing their participation in health care. These benefits may be largest for currently underserved populations. PMID:11520380

Development plan for the External Hazards Experimental Group. Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Coleman, Justin Leigh; Smith, Curtis Lee; Burns, Douglas Edward

This report describes the development plan for a new multi-partner External Hazards Experimental Group (EHEG) coordinated by Idaho National Laboratory (INL) within the Risk-Informed Safety Margin Characterization (RISMC) technical pathway of the Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program. Currently, there is limited data available for development and validation of the tools and methods being developed in the RISMC Toolkit. The EHEG is being developed to obtain high-quality, small- and large-scale experimental data validation of RISMC tools and methods in a timely and cost-effective way. The group of universities and national laboratories that will eventually form the EHEG (which is ultimately expectedmore » to include both the initial participants and other universities and national laboratories that have been identified) have the expertise and experimental capabilities needed to both obtain and compile existing data archives and perform additional seismic and flooding experiments. The data developed by EHEG will be stored in databases for use within RISMC. These databases will be used to validate the advanced external hazard tools and methods.« less

Experimental research on the relation between food price changes and food-purchasing patterns: a targeted review1234

PubMed Central

Epstein, Leonard H; Jankowiak, Noelle; Nederkoorn, Chantal; Raynor, Hollie A; French, Simone A; Finkelstein, Eric

2012-01-01

One way in which to modify food purchases is to change prices through tax policy, subsidy policy, or both. We reviewed the growing body of experimental research conducted in the laboratory and in the field that investigates the following: the extent to which price changes influence purchases of targeted and nontargeted foods, total energy, or macronutrients purchased; the interaction of price changes with adjunctive interventions; and moderators of sensitivity to price changes. After a brief overview of economic principles and observational research that addresses these issues, we present a targeted review of experimental research. Experimental research suggests that price changes modify purchases of targeted foods, but research on the overall nutritional quality of purchases is mixed because of substitution effects. There is mixed support for combining price changes with adjunctive interventions, and there are no replicated findings on moderators to price sensitivity in experiments. Additional focused research is needed to better inform food policy development with the aim of improving eating behavior and preventing obesity. PMID:22378726

Solid-gas phase equilibria and thermodynamic properties of cadmium selenide.

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sigai, A. G.; Wiedemeier, H.

1972-01-01

Accurate vapor pressures are determined through direct weight loss measurements using the Knudsen effusion technique. The experimental data are evaluated by establishing the mode of vaporization and determining the heat capacity of cadmium selenide at elevated temperatures. Additional information is obtained through a second- and third-law evaluation of data, namely, the heat of formation and the absolute entropy of cadmium selenide. A preferential loss of selenium during the initial heating of CdSe is observed, which leads to a deviation in stoichiometry.

Recent advances in phase shifted time averaging and stroboscopic interferometry

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Styk, Adam; Józwik, Michał

2016-08-01

Classical Time Averaging and Stroboscopic Interferometry are widely used for MEMS/MOEMS dynamic behavior investigations. Unfortunately both methods require an extensive measurement and data processing strategies in order to evaluate the information on maximum amplitude at a given load of vibrating object. In this paper the modified strategies of data processing in both techniques are introduced. These modifications allow for fast and reliable calculation of searched value, without additional complication of measurement systems. Through the paper the both approaches are discussed and experimentally verified.

Ecogenomics: Ensemble Analysis of Gene Expression in Microbial Communities

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sogin, Mitchell; DesMarais, David J.; Stahl, D. A.; Pace, Norman R.

2001-01-01

The hierarchical organization of microbial ecosystems determines process rates that shape Earth's environment, create the biomarker sedimentary and atmospheric signatures of life, and define the stage upon which major evolutionary events occurred. In order to understand how microorganisms have shaped the global environment of Earth and, potentially, other worlds, we must develop an experimental paradigm that links biogeochemical processes with ever-changing temporal and spatial distributions of microbial populations and their metabolic properties. Additional information is contained in the original extended abstract.

MIPS plant genome information resources.

PubMed

Spannagl, Manuel; Haberer, Georg; Ernst, Rebecca; Schoof, Heiko; Mayer, Klaus F X

2007-01-01

The Munich Institute for Protein Sequences (MIPS) has been involved in maintaining plant genome databases since the Arabidopsis thaliana genome project. Genome databases and analysis resources have focused on individual genomes and aim to provide flexible and maintainable data sets for model plant genomes as a backbone against which experimental data, for example from high-throughput functional genomics, can be organized and evaluated. In addition, model genomes also form a scaffold for comparative genomics, and much can be learned from genome-wide evolutionary studies.

Indices of polarimetric purity for biological tissues inspection

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Van Eeckhout, Albert; Lizana, Angel; Garcia-Caurel, Enric; Gil, José J.; Sansa, Adrià; Rodríguez, Carla; Estévez, Irene; González, Emilio; Escalera, Juan C.; Moreno, Ignacio; Campos, Juan

2018-02-01

We highlight the interest of using the Indices of Polarimetric Purity (IPPs) for the biological tissue inspection. These are three polarimetric metrics focused on the study of the depolarizing behaviour of the sample. The IPPs have been recently proposed in the literature and provide different and synthetized information than the commonly used depolarizing indices, as depolarization index (PΔ) or depolarization power (Δ). Compared with the standard polarimetric images of biological samples, IPPs enhance the contrast between different tissues of the sample and show differences between similar tissues which are not observed using the other standard techniques. Moreover, they present further physical information related to the depolarization mechanisms inherent to different tissues. In addition, the algorithm does not require advanced calculations (as in the case of polar decompositions), being the indices of polarimetric purity fast and easy to implement. We also propose a pseudo-coloured image method which encodes the sample information as a function of the different indices weights. These images allow us to customize the visualization of samples and to highlight certain of their constitutive structures. The interest and potential of the IPP approach are experimentally illustrated throughout the manuscript by comparing polarimetric images of different ex-vivo samples obtained with standard polarimetric methods with those obtained from the IPPs analysis. Enhanced contrast and retrieval of new information are experimentally obtained from the different IPP based images.

Applicability of computational systems biology in toxicology.

PubMed

Kongsbak, Kristine; Hadrup, Niels; Audouze, Karine; Vinggaard, Anne Marie

2014-07-01

Systems biology as a research field has emerged within the last few decades. Systems biology, often defined as the antithesis of the reductionist approach, integrates information about individual components of a biological system. In integrative systems biology, large data sets from various sources and databases are used to model and predict effects of chemicals on, for instance, human health. In toxicology, computational systems biology enables identification of important pathways and molecules from large data sets; tasks that can be extremely laborious when performed by a classical literature search. However, computational systems biology offers more advantages than providing a high-throughput literature search; it may form the basis for establishment of hypotheses on potential links between environmental chemicals and human diseases, which would be very difficult to establish experimentally. This is possible due to the existence of comprehensive databases containing information on networks of human protein-protein interactions and protein-disease associations. Experimentally determined targets of the specific chemical of interest can be fed into these networks to obtain additional information that can be used to establish hypotheses on links between the chemical and human diseases. Such information can also be applied for designing more intelligent animal/cell experiments that can test the established hypotheses. Here, we describe how and why to apply an integrative systems biology method in the hypothesis-generating phase of toxicological research. © 2014 Nordic Association for the Publication of BCPT (former Nordic Pharmacological Society).

Intelligent wear mode identification system for marine diesel engines based on multi-level belief rule base methodology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yan, Xinping; Xu, Xiaojian; Sheng, Chenxing; Yuan, Chengqing; Li, Zhixiong

2018-01-01

Wear faults are among the chief causes of main-engine damage, significantly influencing the secure and economical operation of ships. It is difficult for engineers to utilize multi-source information to identify wear modes, so an intelligent wear mode identification model needs to be developed to assist engineers in diagnosing wear faults in diesel engines. For this purpose, a multi-level belief rule base (BBRB) system is proposed in this paper. The BBRB system consists of two-level belief rule bases, and the 2D and 3D characteristics of wear particles are used as antecedent attributes on each level. Quantitative and qualitative wear information with uncertainties can be processed simultaneously by the BBRB system. In order to enhance the efficiency of the BBRB, the silhouette value is adopted to determine referential points and the fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm is used to transform input wear information into belief degrees. In addition, the initial parameters of the BBRB system are constructed on the basis of expert-domain knowledge and then optimized by the genetic algorithm to ensure the robustness of the system. To verify the validity of the BBRB system, experimental data acquired from real-world diesel engines are analyzed. Five-fold cross-validation is conducted on the experimental data and the BBRB is compared with the other four models in the cross-validation. In addition, a verification dataset containing different wear particles is used to highlight the effectiveness of the BBRB system in wear mode identification. The verification results demonstrate that the proposed BBRB is effective and efficient for wear mode identification with better performance and stability than competing systems.

Phoning while driving I: a review of epidemiological, psychological, behavioural and physiological studies.

PubMed

Collet, C; Guillot, A; Petit, C

2010-05-01

The impact of cell (mobile) phone use on driving performance has been widely questioned for 20 years. This paper reviews the literature to evaluate the extent to which phoning may impact behaviour with a risk to affect safety. After analysing epidemiological studies that give an overview of cell phone use, this paper examines the experimental results and focuses on variables showing that driving is impacted by holding a mobile-phone conversation. Information processing (e.g. reaction time and detection rate of cues related to driving information) and variables associated with vehicle control (e.g. lane-keeping, headway and vehicle speed) seem the most relevant. Although less studied than behavioural indices, physiological data give information about the supplementary potential strain that the driver may undergo under dual-task conditions. This first part of the review highlights common findings, questionable results and differences among studies, which originate from specific experimental designs with particular dependent variables, i.e. self-report, behavioural and physiological indicators. Finally, how drivers try to compensate for the additional load brought by phone use is described. STATEMENT OF RELEVANCE: The two papers review the influence of mobile-phone use on driving performance. While there is ample evidence that this dual task is likely to increase the risk of car crash, the review analyses the variables eliciting detrimental conditions and, conversely, those that may preserve acceptable conditions for safety, close to usual driving. The decision of answering or initiating a cell phone call while driving depends upon the complex interaction among several variables, including driving conditions and driver's own characteristics. In addition, this decision remains under driver's awareness of being able or not to manage the two tasks simultaneously.

Secret Sharing of a Quantum State.

PubMed

Lu, He; Zhang, Zhen; Chen, Luo-Kan; Li, Zheng-Da; Liu, Chang; Li, Li; Liu, Nai-Le; Ma, Xiongfeng; Chen, Yu-Ao; Pan, Jian-Wei

2016-07-15

Secret sharing of a quantum state, or quantum secret sharing, in which a dealer wants to share a certain amount of quantum information with a few players, has wide applications in quantum information. The critical criterion in a threshold secret sharing scheme is confidentiality: with less than the designated number of players, no information can be recovered. Furthermore, in a quantum scenario, one additional critical criterion exists: the capability of sharing entangled and unknown quantum information. Here, by employing a six-photon entangled state, we demonstrate a quantum threshold scheme, where the shared quantum secrecy can be efficiently reconstructed with a state fidelity as high as 93%. By observing that any one or two parties cannot recover the secrecy, we show that our scheme meets the confidentiality criterion. Meanwhile, we also demonstrate that entangled quantum information can be shared and recovered via our setting, which shows that our implemented scheme is fully quantum. Moreover, our experimental setup can be treated as a decoding circuit of the five-qubit quantum error-correcting code with two erasure errors.

The potential to encode sex, age, and individual identity in the alarm calls of three species of Marmotinae.

PubMed

Matrosova, Vera A; Blumstein, Daniel T; Volodin, Ilya A; Volodina, Elena V

2011-03-01

In addition to encoding referential information and information about the sender's motivation, mammalian alarm calls may encode information about other attributes of the sender, providing the potential for recognition among kin, mates, and neighbors. Here, we examined 96 speckled ground squirrels (Spermophilus suslicus), 100 yellow ground squirrels (Spermophilus fulvus) and 85 yellow-bellied marmots (Marmota flaviventris) to determine whether their alarm calls differed between species in their ability to encode information about the caller's sex, age, and identity. Alarm calls were elicited by approaching individually identified animals in live-traps. We assume this experimental design modeled a naturally occurring predatory event, when receivers should acquire information about attributes of a caller from a single bout of alarm calls. In each species, variation that allows identification of the caller's identity was greater than variation allowing identification of age or sex. We discuss these results in relation to each species' biology and sociality.

Use of the PIXEL method to investigate gas adsorption in metal–organic frameworks† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available. See DOI: 10.1039/c6ce00555a Click here for additional data file. Click here for additional data file. Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Maloney, Andrew G. P.; Wood, Peter A.

2016-01-01

PIXEL has been used to perform calculations of adsorbate-adsorbent interaction energies between a range of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) and simple guest molecules. Interactions have been calculated for adsorption between MOF-5 and Ar, H2, and N2; Zn2(BDC)2(TED) (BDC = 1,4-benzenedicarboxylic acid, TED = triethylenediamine) and H2; and HKUST-1 and CO2. The locations of the adsorption sites and the calculated energies, which show differences in the Coulombic or dispersion characteristic of the interaction, compare favourably to experimental data and literature energy values calculated using density functional theory. PMID:28496380

Financial analysis of experimental releases conducted at Glen Canyon Dam during water years 1997 through 2005.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Veselka, T. D.; Poch, L. A.; Palmer, C. S.

2010-04-21

Because of concerns about the impact that Glen Canyon Dam (GCD) operations were having on downstream ecosystems and endangered species, the Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) conducted an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on dam operations (DOE 1996). New operating rules and management goals for GCD that had been specified in the Record of Decision (ROD) (Reclamation 1996) were adopted in February 1997. In addition to issuing new operating criteria, the ROD mandated experimental releases for the purpose of conducting scientific studies. This paper examines the financial implications of the experimental flows that were conducted at the GCD from 1997 to 2005.more » An experimental release may have either a positive or negative impact on the financial value of energy production. This study estimates the financial costs of experimental releases, identifies the main factors that contribute to these costs, and compares the interdependencies among these factors. An integrated set of tools was used to compute the financial impacts of the experimental releases by simulating the operation of the GCD under two scenarios, namely, (1) a baseline scenario that assumes operations comply with the ROD operating criteria and experimental releases that actually took place during the study period, and (2) a ''without experiments'' scenario that is identical to the baseline scenario of operations that comply with the GCD ROD, except it assumes that experimental releases did not occur. The Generation and Transmission Maximization (GTMax) model was the main simulation tool used to dispatch GCD and other hydropower plants that comprise the Salt Lake City Area Integrated Projects (SLCA/IP). Extensive data sets and historical information on SLCA/IP power plant characteristics, hydrologic conditions, and Western Area Power Administration's (Western's) power purchase prices were used for the simulation. In addition to estimating the financial impact of experimental releases, the GTMax model was also used to gain insights into the interplay among ROD operating criteria, exceptions that were made to criteria to accommodate the experimental releases, and Western operating practices. Experimental releases in some water years resulted in financial benefits to Western while others resulted in financial costs. During the study period, the total financial costs of all experimental releases were $11.9 million.« less

Revised financial analysis of experimental releases conducted at Glen Canyon Dam during water years 1997 through 2005.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Veselka, T. D.; Poch, L. A.; Palmer, C. S.

2011-01-11

Because of concerns about the impact that Glen Canyon Dam (GCD) operations were having on downstream ecosystems and endangered species, the Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) conducted an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on dam operations (DOE 1996). New operating rules and management goals for GCD that had been specified in the Record of Decision (ROD) (Reclamation 1996) were adopted in February 1997. In addition to issuing new operating criteria, the ROD mandated experimental releases for the purpose of conducting scientific studies. This paper examines the financial implications of the experimental flows that were conducted at the GCD from 1997 to 2005.more » An experimental release may have either a positive or negative impact on the financial value of energy production. This study estimates the financial costs of experimental releases, identifies the main factors that contribute to these costs, and compares the interdependencies among these factors. An integrated set of tools was used to compute the financial impacts of the experimental releases by simulating the operation of the GCD under two scenarios, namely, (1) a baseline scenario that assumes operations comply with the ROD operating criteria and experimental releases that actually took place during the study period, and (2) a 'without experiments' scenario that is identical to the baseline scenario of operations that comply with the GCD ROD, except it assumes that experimental releases did not occur. The Generation and Transmission Maximization (GTMax) model was the main simulation tool used to dispatch GCD and other hydropower plants that comprise the Salt Lake City Area Integrated Projects (SLCA/IP). Extensive data sets and historical information on SLCA/IP power plant characteristics, hydrologic conditions, and Western Area Power Administration's (Western's) power purchase prices were used for the simulation. In addition to estimating the financial impact of experimental releases, the GTMax model was also used to gain insights into the interplay among ROD operating criteria, exceptions that were made to criteria to accommodate the experimental releases, and Western operating practices. Experimental releases in some water years resulted in financial benefits to Western whileothers resulted in financial costs. During the study period, the total financial costs of all experimental releases were more than $23 million.« less

Color Restoration of RGBN Multispectral Filter Array Sensor Images Based on Spectral Decomposition.

PubMed

Park, Chulhee; Kang, Moon Gi

2016-05-18

A multispectral filter array (MSFA) image sensor with red, green, blue and near-infrared (NIR) filters is useful for various imaging applications with the advantages that it obtains color information and NIR information simultaneously. Because the MSFA image sensor needs to acquire invisible band information, it is necessary to remove the IR cut-offfilter (IRCF). However, without the IRCF, the color of the image is desaturated by the interference of the additional NIR component of each RGB color channel. To overcome color degradation, a signal processing approach is required to restore natural color by removing the unwanted NIR contribution to the RGB color channels while the additional NIR information remains in the N channel. Thus, in this paper, we propose a color restoration method for an imaging system based on the MSFA image sensor with RGBN filters. To remove the unnecessary NIR component in each RGB color channel, spectral estimation and spectral decomposition are performed based on the spectral characteristics of the MSFA sensor. The proposed color restoration method estimates the spectral intensity in NIR band and recovers hue and color saturation by decomposing the visible band component and the NIR band component in each RGB color channel. The experimental results show that the proposed method effectively restores natural color and minimizes angular errors.

Color Restoration of RGBN Multispectral Filter Array Sensor Images Based on Spectral Decomposition

PubMed Central

Park, Chulhee; Kang, Moon Gi

2016-01-01

A multispectral filter array (MSFA) image sensor with red, green, blue and near-infrared (NIR) filters is useful for various imaging applications with the advantages that it obtains color information and NIR information simultaneously. Because the MSFA image sensor needs to acquire invisible band information, it is necessary to remove the IR cut-offfilter (IRCF). However, without the IRCF, the color of the image is desaturated by the interference of the additional NIR component of each RGB color channel. To overcome color degradation, a signal processing approach is required to restore natural color by removing the unwanted NIR contribution to the RGB color channels while the additional NIR information remains in the N channel. Thus, in this paper, we propose a color restoration method for an imaging system based on the MSFA image sensor with RGBN filters. To remove the unnecessary NIR component in each RGB color channel, spectral estimation and spectral decomposition are performed based on the spectral characteristics of the MSFA sensor. The proposed color restoration method estimates the spectral intensity in NIR band and recovers hue and color saturation by decomposing the visible band component and the NIR band component in each RGB color channel. The experimental results show that the proposed method effectively restores natural color and minimizes angular errors. PMID:27213381

Distinguishing between direct and indirect directional couplings in large oscillator networks: Partial or non-partial phase analyses?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rings, Thorsten; Lehnertz, Klaus

2016-09-01

We investigate the relative merit of phase-based methods for inferring directional couplings in complex networks of weakly interacting dynamical systems from multivariate time-series data. We compare the evolution map approach and its partialized extension to each other with respect to their ability to correctly infer the network topology in the presence of indirect directional couplings for various simulated experimental situations using coupled model systems. In addition, we investigate whether the partialized approach allows for additional or complementary indications of directional interactions in evolving epileptic brain networks using intracranial electroencephalographic recordings from an epilepsy patient. For such networks, both direct and indirect directional couplings can be expected, given the brain's connection structure and effects that may arise from limitations inherent to the recording technique. Our findings indicate that particularly in larger networks (number of nodes ≫10 ), the partialized approach does not provide information about directional couplings extending the information gained with the evolution map approach.

Box Office Forecasting considering Competitive Environment and Word-of-Mouth in Social Networks: A Case Study of Korean Film Market.

PubMed

Kim, Taegu; Hong, Jungsik; Kang, Pilsung

2017-01-01

Accurate box office forecasting models are developed by considering competition and word-of-mouth (WOM) effects in addition to screening-related information. Nationality, genre, ratings, and distributors of motion pictures running concurrently with the target motion picture are used to describe the competition, whereas the numbers of informative, positive, and negative mentions posted on social network services (SNS) are used to gauge the atmosphere spread by WOM. Among these candidate variables, only significant variables are selected by genetic algorithm (GA), based on which machine learning algorithms are trained to build forecasting models. The forecasts are combined to improve forecasting performance. Experimental results on the Korean film market show that the forecasting accuracy in early screening periods can be significantly improved by considering competition. In addition, WOM has a stronger influence on total box office forecasting. Considering both competition and WOM improves forecasting performance to a larger extent than when only one of them is considered.

Development of a stereo 3-D pictorial primary flight display

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nataupsky, Mark; Turner, Timothy L.; Lane, Harold; Crittenden, Lucille

1989-01-01

Computer-generated displays are becoming increasingly popular in aerospace applications. The use of stereo 3-D technology provides an opportunity to present depth perceptions which otherwise might be lacking. In addition, the third dimension could also be used as an additional dimension along which information can be encoded. Historically, the stereo 3-D displays have been used in entertainment, in experimental facilities, and in the handling of hazardous waste. In the last example, the source of the stereo images generally has been remotely controlled television camera pairs. The development of a stereo 3-D pictorial primary flight display used in a flight simulation environment is described. The applicability of stereo 3-D displays for aerospace crew stations to meet the anticipated needs for 2000 to 2020 time frame is investigated. Although, the actual equipment that could be used in an aerospace vehicle is not currently available, the lab research is necessary to determine where stereo 3-D enhances the display of information and how the displays should be formatted.

Box Office Forecasting considering Competitive Environment and Word-of-Mouth in Social Networks: A Case Study of Korean Film Market

PubMed Central

Kim, Taegu; Hong, Jungsik

2017-01-01

Accurate box office forecasting models are developed by considering competition and word-of-mouth (WOM) effects in addition to screening-related information. Nationality, genre, ratings, and distributors of motion pictures running concurrently with the target motion picture are used to describe the competition, whereas the numbers of informative, positive, and negative mentions posted on social network services (SNS) are used to gauge the atmosphere spread by WOM. Among these candidate variables, only significant variables are selected by genetic algorithm (GA), based on which machine learning algorithms are trained to build forecasting models. The forecasts are combined to improve forecasting performance. Experimental results on the Korean film market show that the forecasting accuracy in early screening periods can be significantly improved by considering competition. In addition, WOM has a stronger influence on total box office forecasting. Considering both competition and WOM improves forecasting performance to a larger extent than when only one of them is considered. PMID:28819355

Discriminative analysis of lip motion features for speaker identification and speech-reading.

PubMed

Cetingül, H Ertan; Yemez, Yücel; Erzin, Engin; Tekalp, A Murat

2006-10-01

There have been several studies that jointly use audio, lip intensity, and lip geometry information for speaker identification and speech-reading applications. This paper proposes using explicit lip motion information, instead of or in addition to lip intensity and/or geometry information, for speaker identification and speech-reading within a unified feature selection and discrimination analysis framework, and addresses two important issues: 1) Is using explicit lip motion information useful, and, 2) if so, what are the best lip motion features for these two applications? The best lip motion features for speaker identification are considered to be those that result in the highest discrimination of individual speakers in a population, whereas for speech-reading, the best features are those providing the highest phoneme/word/phrase recognition rate. Several lip motion feature candidates have been considered including dense motion features within a bounding box about the lip, lip contour motion features, and combination of these with lip shape features. Furthermore, a novel two-stage, spatial, and temporal discrimination analysis is introduced to select the best lip motion features for speaker identification and speech-reading applications. Experimental results using an hidden-Markov-model-based recognition system indicate that using explicit lip motion information provides additional performance gains in both applications, and lip motion features prove more valuable in the case of speech-reading application.

Improving mammography screening among the medically underserved.

PubMed

Davis, Terry C; Rademaker, Alfred; Bennett, Charles L; Wolf, Michael S; Carias, Edson; Reynolds, Cristalyn; Liu, Dachao; Arnold, Connie L

2014-04-01

We evaluated the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of alternative interventions designed to promote mammography in safety-net settings. A three-arm, quasi-experimental evaluation was conducted among eight federally qualified health clinics in predominately rural Louisiana. Mammography screening efforts included: 1) enhanced care, 2) health literacy-informed education of patients, and 3) education plus nurse support. Outcomes included mammography screening completion within 6 months and incremental cost-effectiveness. Overall, 1,181 female patients ages 40 and over who were eligible for routine mammography were recruited. Baseline screening rates were < 10%. Post intervention screening rates were 55.7% with enhanced care, 51.8% with health literacy-informed education and 65.8% with education and nurse support. After adjusting for race, marital status, self-efficacy and literacy, patients receiving health-literacy informed education were not more likely to complete mammographic screening than those receiving enhanced care; those additionally receiving nurse support were 1.37-fold more likely to complete mammographic screening than those receiving the brief education (95% Confidence Interval 1.08-1.74, p = 0.01). The incremental cost per additional women screened was $2,457 for literacy-informed education with nurse support over literacy-informed education alone. Mammography rates were increased substantially over existing baseline rates in all three arms with the educational initiative, with nurse support and follow-up being the most effective option. However, it is not likely to be cost-effective or affordable in resource-limited clinics.

A Real-Time System for Lane Detection Based on FPGA and DSP

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xiao, Jing; Li, Shutao; Sun, Bin

2016-12-01

This paper presents a real-time lane detection system including edge detection and improved Hough Transform based lane detection algorithm and its hardware implementation with field programmable gate array (FPGA) and digital signal processor (DSP). Firstly, gradient amplitude and direction information are combined to extract lane edge information. Then, the information is used to determine the region of interest. Finally, the lanes are extracted by using improved Hough Transform. The image processing module of the system consists of FPGA and DSP. Particularly, the algorithms implemented in FPGA are working in pipeline and processing in parallel so that the system can run in real-time. In addition, DSP realizes lane line extraction and display function with an improved Hough Transform. The experimental results show that the proposed system is able to detect lanes under different road situations efficiently and effectively.

Mechanical break junctions: enormous information in a nanoscale package.

PubMed

Natelson, Douglas

2012-04-24

Mechanical break junctions, particularly those in which a metal tip is repeatedly moved in and out of contact with a metal film, have provided many insights into electronic conduction at the atomic and molecular scale, most often by averaging over many possible junction configurations. This averaging throws away a great deal of information, and Makk et al. in this issue of ACS Nano demonstrate that, with both simulated and real experimental data, more sophisticated two-dimensional analysis methods can reveal information otherwise obscured in simple histograms. As additional measured quantities come into play in break junction experiments, including thermopower, noise, and optical response, these more sophisticated analytic approaches are likely to become even more powerful. While break junctions are not directly practical for useful electronic devices, they are incredibly valuable tools for unraveling the electronic transport physics relevant for ultrascaled nanoelectronics.

Laser velocimetry in highly three-dimensional and vortical flows

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Novak, C. J.; Huie, C. R.; Cornelius, K. C.

1986-01-01

The need for experimentally determined 3-D velocity information is crucial to the understanding of highly 3-dimensional and vortical flow fields. In addition to gaining an understanding of the physics of flow fields, a correlation of velocity data is needed for advanced computational modelling. A double pass method for acquiring 3-D flow field information using a 2-D laser velocimeter (LV) is described. The design and implementation of a 3-D LV with expanded capabilities to acquire real-time 3-D flow field information are also described. Finally, the use of such an instrument in a wind tunnel study of a generic fighter configuration is described. The results of the wind tunnel study highlight the complexities of 3-D flow fields, particularly when the vortex behavior is examined over a range of angles of attack.

Chirality controlled responsive self-assembled nanotubes in water† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Detailed experimental procedures and analyses, UV-vis absorption and CD spectroscopy, cryo-TEM and widefield microscopy. See DOI: 10.1039/c6sc02935c Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

van Dijken, D. J.; Štacko, P.; Stuart, M. C. A.; Browne, W. R.

2017-01-01

The concept of using chirality to dictate dimensions and to store chiral information in self-assembled nanotubes in a fully controlled manner is presented. We report a photoresponsive amphiphile that co-assembles with its chiral counterpart to form nanotubes and demonstrate how chirality can be used to effect the formation of either micrometer long, achiral nanotubes or shorter (∼300 nm) chiral nanotubes that are bundled. The nature of these assemblies is studied using a variety of spectroscopic and microscopic techniques and it is shown that the tubes can be disassembled with light, thereby allowing the chiral information to be erased. PMID:28451300

Disregarding familiarity during recollection attempts: content-specific recapitulation as a retrieval orientation strategy.

PubMed

Gray, Stephen J; Gallo, David A

2015-01-01

People can use a content-specific recapitulation strategy to trigger memories (i.e., mentally reinstating encoding conditions), but how people deploy this strategy is unclear. Is recapitulation naturally used to guide all recollection attempts, or is it only used selectively, after retrieving incomplete information that requires additional monitoring? According to a retrieval orientation model, people use recapitulation whenever they search memory for specific information, regardless of what information might come to mind. In contrast, according to a postretrieval monitoring model, people selectively engage recapitulation only after retrieving ambiguous information in order to evaluate this information and guide additional retrieval attempts. We tested between these models using a criterial recollection task, and by manipulating the strength of ambiguous information associated with to-be-rejected foils (i.e., familiarity or noncriterial information). Replicating prior work, foil rejections were greater when people attempted to recollect targets studied at a semantic level (deep test) compared to an orthographic level (shallow test), implicating more accurate retrieval monitoring. To investigate the role of a recapitulation strategy in this monitoring process, a final test assessed memory for the foils that were earlier processed on these recollection tests. Performance on this foil recognition test suggested that people had engaged in more elaborative content-specific recapitulation when initially tested for deep compared to shallow recollections, and critically, this elaboration effect did not interact with the experimental manipulation of foil strength. These results support the retrieval orientation model, whereby a recapitulation strategy was used to orient retrieval toward specific information during every recollection attempt. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved.

Reconstruction of the regulatory network for Bacillus subtilis and reconciliation with gene expression data

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Faria, Jose P.; Overbeek, Ross; Taylor, Ronald C.

Here, we introduce a manually constructed and curated regulatory network model that describes the current state of knowledge of transcriptional regulation of B. subtilis. The model corresponds to an updated and enlarged version of the regulatory model of central metabolism originally proposed in 2008. We extended the original network to the whole genome by integration of information from DBTBS, a compendium of regulatory data that includes promoters, transcription factors (TFs), binding sites, motifs and regulated operons. Additionally, we consolidated our network with all the information on regulation included in the SporeWeb and Subtiwiki community-curated resources on B. subtilis. Finally, wemore » reconciled our network with data from RegPrecise, which recently released their own less comprehensive reconstruction of the regulatory network for B. subtilis. Our model describes 275 regulators and their target genes, representing 30 different mechanisms of regulation such as TFs, RNA switches, Riboswitches and small regulatory RNAs. Overall, regulatory information is included in the model for approximately 2500 of the ~4200 genes in B. subtilis 168. In an effort to further expand our knowledge of B. subtilis regulation, we reconciled our model with expression data. For this process, we reconstructed the Atomic Regulons (ARs) for B. subtilis, which are the sets of genes that share the same “ON” and “OFF” gene expression profiles across multiple samples of experimental data. We show how atomic regulons for B. subtilis are able to capture many sets of genes corresponding to regulated operons in our manually curated network. Additionally, we demonstrate how atomic regulons can be used to help expand or validate the knowledge of the regulatory networks by looking at highly correlated genes in the ARs for which regulatory information is lacking. During this process, we were also able to infer novel stimuli for hypothetical genes by exploring the genome expression metadata relating to experimental conditions, gaining insights into novel biology.« less

Reconstruction of the regulatory network for Bacillus subtilis and reconciliation with gene expression data

DOE PAGES

Faria, Jose P.; Overbeek, Ross; Taylor, Ronald C.; ...

2016-03-18

Here, we introduce a manually constructed and curated regulatory network model that describes the current state of knowledge of transcriptional regulation of B. subtilis. The model corresponds to an updated and enlarged version of the regulatory model of central metabolism originally proposed in 2008. We extended the original network to the whole genome by integration of information from DBTBS, a compendium of regulatory data that includes promoters, transcription factors (TFs), binding sites, motifs and regulated operons. Additionally, we consolidated our network with all the information on regulation included in the SporeWeb and Subtiwiki community-curated resources on B. subtilis. Finally, wemore » reconciled our network with data from RegPrecise, which recently released their own less comprehensive reconstruction of the regulatory network for B. subtilis. Our model describes 275 regulators and their target genes, representing 30 different mechanisms of regulation such as TFs, RNA switches, Riboswitches and small regulatory RNAs. Overall, regulatory information is included in the model for approximately 2500 of the ~4200 genes in B. subtilis 168. In an effort to further expand our knowledge of B. subtilis regulation, we reconciled our model with expression data. For this process, we reconstructed the Atomic Regulons (ARs) for B. subtilis, which are the sets of genes that share the same “ON” and “OFF” gene expression profiles across multiple samples of experimental data. We show how atomic regulons for B. subtilis are able to capture many sets of genes corresponding to regulated operons in our manually curated network. Additionally, we demonstrate how atomic regulons can be used to help expand or validate the knowledge of the regulatory networks by looking at highly correlated genes in the ARs for which regulatory information is lacking. During this process, we were also able to infer novel stimuli for hypothetical genes by exploring the genome expression metadata relating to experimental conditions, gaining insights into novel biology.« less

Complex magnetic orders in small cobalt-benzene molecules.

PubMed

González, J W; Alonso-Lanza, T; Delgado, F; Aguilera-Granja, F; Ayuela, A

2017-06-07

Organometallic clusters based on transition metal atoms are interesting because of their possible applications in spintronics and quantum information processing. In addition to the enhanced magnetism at the nanoscale, the organic ligands may provide a natural shield against unwanted magnetic interactions with the matrices required for applications. Here we show that the organic ligands may lead to non-collinear magnetic order as well as the expected quenching of the magnetic moments. We use different density functional theory (DFT) methods to study the experimentally relevant three cobalt atoms surrounded by benzene rings (Co 3 Bz 3 ). We found that the benzene rings induce a ground state with non-collinear magnetization, with the magnetic moments localized on the cobalt centers and lying on the plane formed by the three cobalt atoms. We further analyze the magnetism of such a cluster using an anisotropic Heisenberg model where the involved parameters are obtained by a comparison with the DFT results. These results may also explain the recent observation of the null magnetic moment of Co 3 Bz 3 + . Moreover, we propose an additional experimental verification based on electron paramagnetic resonance.

An experimental and kinetic modeling study on dimethyl carbonate (DMC) pyrolysis and combustion

DOE PAGES

Sun, Wenyu; Yang, Bin; Hansen, Nils; ...

2015-12-08

Because of the absence of C–C bonds and the large oxygen content in its molecular structure, dimethyl carbonate (DMC) is a promising oxygenated additive or substitute for hydrocarbon fuels. In order to understand its chemical oxidation and combustion kinetics, flow reactor pyrolysis at different pressures (40, 200 and 1040 mbar) and low-pressure laminar premixed flames with different equivalence ratios (1.0 and 1.5) were investigated. Mole fraction profiles of many reaction intermediates and products were obtained within estimated experimental uncertainties. From theoretical calculations and estimations, a detailed kinetic model for DMC pyrolysis and high-temperature combustion consisting of 257 species and 1563more » reactions was developed. The performance of the kinetic model was then analyzed using detailed chemical composition information, primarily from the present measurements. In addition, it was examined against the chemical structure of an opposed-flow diffusion flame, relying on global combustion properties such as the ignition delay times and laminar burning velocities. Furthermore, these extended comparisons yielded overall satisfactory agreement, demonstrating the applicability of the present model over a wide range of high-temperature conditions.« less

Proton-induced knockout reactions with polarized and unpolarized beams

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wakasa, T.; Ogata, K.; Noro, T.

2017-09-01

Proton-induced knockout reactions provide a direct means of studying the single particle or cluster structures of target nuclei. In addition, these knockout reactions are expected to play a unique role in investigations of the effects of the nuclear medium on nucleon-nucleon interactions as well as the properties of nucleons and mesons. However, due to the nature of hadron probes, these reactions can suffer significant disturbances from the nuclear surroundings and the quantitative theoretical treatment of such processes can also be challenging. In this article, we review the experimental and theoretical progress in this field, particularly focusing on the use of these reactions as a spectroscopic tool and as a way to examine the medium modification of nucleon-nucleon interactions. With regard to the former aspect, the review presents a semi-quantitative evaluation of these reactions based on existing experimental data. In terms of the latter point, we introduce a significant body of evidence that suggests, although does not conclusively prove, the existence of medium effects. In addition, this paper also provides information and comments on other related subjects.

Nonlinear Unsteady Aerodynamic Modeling Using Wind Tunnel and Computational Data

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Murphy, Patrick C.; Klein, Vladislav; Frink, Neal T.

2016-01-01

Extensions to conventional aircraft aerodynamic models are required to adequately predict responses when nonlinear unsteady flight regimes are encountered, especially at high incidence angles and under maneuvering conditions. For a number of reasons, such as loss of control, both military and civilian aircraft may extend beyond normal and benign aerodynamic flight conditions. In addition, military applications may require controlled flight beyond the normal envelope, and civilian flight may require adequate recovery or prevention methods from these adverse conditions. These requirements have led to the development of more general aerodynamic modeling methods and provided impetus for researchers to improve both techniques and the degree of collaboration between analytical and experimental research efforts. In addition to more general mathematical model structures, dynamic test methods have been designed to provide sufficient information to allow model identification. This paper summarizes research to develop a modeling methodology appropriate for modeling aircraft aerodynamics that include nonlinear unsteady behaviors using both experimental and computational test methods. This work was done at Langley Research Center, primarily under the NASA Aviation Safety Program, to address aircraft loss of control, prevention, and recovery aerodynamics.

PHI-base: a new interface and further additions for the multi-species pathogen–host interactions database

PubMed Central

Urban, Martin; Cuzick, Alayne; Rutherford, Kim; Irvine, Alistair; Pedro, Helder; Pant, Rashmi; Sadanadan, Vidyendra; Khamari, Lokanath; Billal, Santoshkumar; Mohanty, Sagar; Hammond-Kosack, Kim E.

2017-01-01

The pathogen–host interactions database (PHI-base) is available at www.phi-base.org. PHI-base contains expertly curated molecular and biological information on genes proven to affect the outcome of pathogen–host interactions reported in peer reviewed research articles. In addition, literature that indicates specific gene alterations that did not affect the disease interaction phenotype are curated to provide complete datasets for comparative purposes. Viruses are not included. Here we describe a revised PHI-base Version 4 data platform with improved search, filtering and extended data display functions. A PHIB-BLAST search function is provided and a link to PHI-Canto, a tool for authors to directly curate their own published data into PHI-base. The new release of PHI-base Version 4.2 (October 2016) has an increased data content containing information from 2219 manually curated references. The data provide information on 4460 genes from 264 pathogens tested on 176 hosts in 8046 interactions. Prokaryotic and eukaryotic pathogens are represented in almost equal numbers. Host species belong ∼70% to plants and 30% to other species of medical and/or environmental importance. Additional data types included into PHI-base 4 are the direct targets of pathogen effector proteins in experimental and natural host organisms. The curation problems encountered and the future directions of the PHI-base project are briefly discussed. PMID:27915230

Curriculum system for experimental teaching in optoelectronic information

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Di, Hongwei; Chen, Zhenqiang; Zhang, Jun; Luo, Yunhan

2017-08-01

The experimental curriculum system is directly related to talent training quality. Based on the careful investigation of the developing request of the optoelectronic information talents in the new century, the experimental teaching goal and the content, the teaching goal was set to cultivate students' innovative consciousness, innovative thinking, creativity and problem solving ability. Through straightening out the correlation among the experimental teaching in the main courses, the whole structure design was phased out, as well as the hierarchical curriculum connotation. According to the ideas of "basic, comprehensive, applied and innovative", the construction of experimental teaching system called "triple-three" was put forward for the optoelectronic information experimental teaching practice.

Jefferson Lab Experimental Hall C

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Carlini, Roger D.

1996-10-01

Jefferson Lab's Hall C went into initial operation in November 1995. The hall has a short orbit spectrometer (SOS) for short-lived particles such as pions and kaons and a high-momentum spectrometer (HMS) usually used for electrons. The SOS can also be used for protons. The HMS can range to 7 GeV/c. Both the SOS and HMS have typical resolutions of (10-3). Experiments for this hall range from measuring the neutron electric form factor, to color transparency, to creating strange nuclei. This paper will present the optical capabilities of the spectrometers, the parameters of the detection systems, and the overall beam line characteristics of the hall as determined from the results from the recent physics experiments along with the upcoming experimental schedule. Additional information is available at URL http://www.cebaf.gov/hallc.html.

Learning Contrast-Invariant Cancellation of Redundant Signals in Neural Systems

PubMed Central

Bol, Kieran; Maler, Leonard; Longtin, André

2013-01-01

Cancellation of redundant information is a highly desirable feature of sensory systems, since it would potentially lead to a more efficient detection of novel information. However, biologically plausible mechanisms responsible for such selective cancellation, and especially those robust to realistic variations in the intensity of the redundant signals, are mostly unknown. In this work, we study, via in vivo experimental recordings and computational models, the behavior of a cerebellar-like circuit in the weakly electric fish which is known to perform cancellation of redundant stimuli. We experimentally observe contrast invariance in the cancellation of spatially and temporally redundant stimuli in such a system. Our model, which incorporates heterogeneously-delayed feedback, bursting dynamics and burst-induced STDP, is in agreement with our in vivo observations. In addition, the model gives insight on the activity of granule cells and parallel fibers involved in the feedback pathway, and provides a strong prediction on the parallel fiber potentiation time scale. Finally, our model predicts the existence of an optimal learning contrast around 15% contrast levels, which are commonly experienced by interacting fish. PMID:24068898

The HADDOCK2.2 Web Server: User-Friendly Integrative Modeling of Biomolecular Complexes.

PubMed

van Zundert, G C P; Rodrigues, J P G L M; Trellet, M; Schmitz, C; Kastritis, P L; Karaca, E; Melquiond, A S J; van Dijk, M; de Vries, S J; Bonvin, A M J J

2016-02-22

The prediction of the quaternary structure of biomolecular macromolecules is of paramount importance for fundamental understanding of cellular processes and drug design. In the era of integrative structural biology, one way of increasing the accuracy of modeling methods used to predict the structure of biomolecular complexes is to include as much experimental or predictive information as possible in the process. This has been at the core of our information-driven docking approach HADDOCK. We present here the updated version 2.2 of the HADDOCK portal, which offers new features such as support for mixed molecule types, additional experimental restraints and improved protocols, all of this in a user-friendly interface. With well over 6000 registered users and 108,000 jobs served, an increasing fraction of which on grid resources, we hope that this timely upgrade will help the community to solve important biological questions and further advance the field. The HADDOCK2.2 Web server is freely accessible to non-profit users at http://haddock.science.uu.nl/services/HADDOCK2.2. Copyright © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

The importance of metadata to assess information content in digital reconstructions of neuronal morphology.

PubMed

Parekh, Ruchi; Armañanzas, Rubén; Ascoli, Giorgio A

2015-04-01

Digital reconstructions of axonal and dendritic arbors provide a powerful representation of neuronal morphology in formats amenable to quantitative analysis, computational modeling, and data mining. Reconstructed files, however, require adequate metadata to identify the appropriate animal species, developmental stage, brain region, and neuron type. Moreover, experimental details about tissue processing, neurite visualization and microscopic imaging are essential to assess the information content of digital morphologies. Typical morphological reconstructions only partially capture the underlying biological reality. Tracings are often limited to certain domains (e.g., dendrites and not axons), may be incomplete due to tissue sectioning, imperfect staining, and limited imaging resolution, or can disregard aspects irrelevant to their specific scientific focus (such as branch thickness or depth). Gauging these factors is critical in subsequent data reuse and comparison. NeuroMorpho.Org is a central repository of reconstructions from many laboratories and experimental conditions. Here, we introduce substantial additions to the existing metadata annotation aimed to describe the completeness of the reconstructed neurons in NeuroMorpho.Org. These expanded metadata form a suitable basis for effective description of neuromorphological data.

CCTOP: a Consensus Constrained TOPology prediction web server.

PubMed

Dobson, László; Reményi, István; Tusnády, Gábor E

2015-07-01

The Consensus Constrained TOPology prediction (CCTOP; http://cctop.enzim.ttk.mta.hu) server is a web-based application providing transmembrane topology prediction. In addition to utilizing 10 different state-of-the-art topology prediction methods, the CCTOP server incorporates topology information from existing experimental and computational sources available in the PDBTM, TOPDB and TOPDOM databases using the probabilistic framework of hidden Markov model. The server provides the option to precede the topology prediction with signal peptide prediction and transmembrane-globular protein discrimination. The initial result can be recalculated by (de)selecting any of the prediction methods or mapped experiments or by adding user specified constraints. CCTOP showed superior performance to existing approaches. The reliability of each prediction is also calculated, which correlates with the accuracy of the per protein topology prediction. The prediction results and the collected experimental information are visualized on the CCTOP home page and can be downloaded in XML format. Programmable access of the CCTOP server is also available, and an example of client-side script is provided. © The Author(s) 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

Quantitatively differentiating microstructural variations of skeletal muscle tissues by multispectral Mueller matrix imaging

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dong, Yang; He, Honghui; He, Chao; Ma, Hui

2016-10-01

Polarized light is sensitive to the microstructures of biological tissues and can be used to detect physiological changes. Meanwhile, spectral features of the scattered light can also provide abundant microstructural information of tissues. In this paper, we take the backscattering polarization Mueller matrix images of bovine skeletal muscle tissues during the 24-hour experimental time, and analyze their multispectral behavior using quantitative Mueller matrix parameters. In the processes of rigor mortis and proteolysis of muscle samples, multispectral frequency distribution histograms (FDHs) of the Mueller matrix elements can reveal rich qualitative structural information. In addition, we analyze the temporal variations of the sample using the multispectral Mueller matrix transformation (MMT) parameters. The experimental results indicate that the different stages of rigor mortis and proteolysis for bovine skeletal muscle samples can be judged by these MMT parameters. The results presented in this work show that combining with the multispectral technique, the FDHs and MMT parameters can characterize the microstructural variation features of skeletal muscle tissues. The techniques have the potential to be used as tools for quantitative assessment of meat qualities in food industry.

High-level waste borosilicate glass: A compendium of corrosion characteristics. Volume 2

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Cunnane, J.C.; Bates, J.K.; Bradley, C.R.

The objective of this document is to summarize scientific information pertinent to evaluating the extent to which high-level waste borosilicate glass corrosion and the associated radionuclide release processes are understood for the range of environmental conditions to which waste glass may be exposed in service. Alteration processes occurring within the bulk of the glass (e.g., devitrification and radiation-induced changes) are discussed insofar as they affect glass corrosion.This document is organized into three volumes. Volumes I and II represent a tiered set of information intended for somewhat different audiences. Volume I is intended to provide an overview of waste glass corrosion,more » and Volume 11 is intended to provide additional experimental details on experimental factors that influence waste glass corrosion. Volume III contains a bibliography of glass corrosion studies, including studies that are not cited in Volumes I and II. Volume I is intended for managers, decision makers, and modelers, the combined set of Volumes I, II, and III is intended for scientists and engineers working in the field of high-level waste.« less

75 FR 7604 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-02-22

... implement the mandatory graphic warnings required by the Tobacco Control Act. The experimental study data...] Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental Study of... on the Experimental Study of Graphic Cigarette Warning Labels that is being conducted in support of...

Discovering semantic features in the literature: a foundation for building functional associations

PubMed Central

Chagoyen, Monica; Carmona-Saez, Pedro; Shatkay, Hagit; Carazo, Jose M; Pascual-Montano, Alberto

2006-01-01

Background Experimental techniques such as DNA microarray, serial analysis of gene expression (SAGE) and mass spectrometry proteomics, among others, are generating large amounts of data related to genes and proteins at different levels. As in any other experimental approach, it is necessary to analyze these data in the context of previously known information about the biological entities under study. The literature is a particularly valuable source of information for experiment validation and interpretation. Therefore, the development of automated text mining tools to assist in such interpretation is one of the main challenges in current bioinformatics research. Results We present a method to create literature profiles for large sets of genes or proteins based on common semantic features extracted from a corpus of relevant documents. These profiles can be used to establish pair-wise similarities among genes, utilized in gene/protein classification or can be even combined with experimental measurements. Semantic features can be used by researchers to facilitate the understanding of the commonalities indicated by experimental results. Our approach is based on non-negative matrix factorization (NMF), a machine-learning algorithm for data analysis, capable of identifying local patterns that characterize a subset of the data. The literature is thus used to establish putative relationships among subsets of genes or proteins and to provide coherent justification for this clustering into subsets. We demonstrate the utility of the method by applying it to two independent and vastly different sets of genes. Conclusion The presented method can create literature profiles from documents relevant to sets of genes. The representation of genes as additive linear combinations of semantic features allows for the exploration of functional associations as well as for clustering, suggesting a valuable methodology for the validation and interpretation of high-throughput experimental data. PMID:16438716

Racemic hemiacetals as oxygen-centered pronucleophiles triggering cascade 1,4-addition/Michael reaction through dynamic kinetic resolution under iminium catalysis. Development and mechanistic insights† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Detailed experimental procedures and characterization of all new compounds, including copies of NMR spectra and HPLC chromatograms traces, computational details and Cartesian coordinates of all stationary points. CCDC 1525188 (4l), 1525189 (6a) and 1525190 (9a). For ESI and crystallographic data in CIF or other electronic format see DOI: 10.1039/c7sc00009j Click here for additional data file. Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Orue, Ane; Uria, Uxue; Roca-López, David; Delso, Ignacio; Reyes, Efraím; Carrillo, Luisa

2017-01-01

2-Hydroxydihydropyran-5-ones behave as excellent polyfunctional reagents able to react with enals through oxa-Michael/Michael process cascade under the combination of iminium and enamine catalysis. These racemic hemiacetalic compounds are used as unconventional O-pronucleophiles in the initial oxa-Michael reaction, also leading to the formation of a single stereoisomer under a dynamic kinetic resolution (DKR) process. Importantly, by using β-aryl or β-alkyl substituted α,β-unsaturated substrates as initial Michael acceptors either kinetically or thermodynamically controlled diastereoisomers were formed with high stereoselection through the careful selection of the reaction conditions. Finally, a complete experimental and computational study confirmed the initially proposed DKR process during the catalytic oxa-Michael/Michael cascade reaction and also explained the kinetic/thermodynamic pathway operating in each case. PMID:28451356

Improving practices in nanomedicine through near real-time pharmacokinetic analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Magafia, Isidro B.

More than a decade into the development of gold nanoparticles, with multiple clinical trials underway, ongoing pre-clinical research continues towards better understanding in vivo interactions. The goal is treatment optimization through improved best practices. In an effort to collect information for healthcare providers enabling informed decisions in a relevant time frame, instrumentation for real-time plasma concentration (multi-wavelength photoplethysmography) and protocols for rapid elemental analysis (energy dispersive X-Ray fluorescence) of biopsied tumor tissue have been developed in a murine model. An initial analysis, designed to demonstrate the robust nature and utility of the techniques, revealed that area under the bioavailability curve (AUC) alone does not currently inform tumor accumulation with a high degree of accuracy (R2=0.56), marginally better than injected dose (R2=0.46). This finding suggests that the control of additional experimental and physiological variables (chosen through modeling efforts) may yield more predictable tumor accumulation. Subject core temperature, blood pressure, and tumor perfusion are evaluated relative to particle uptake in a murine tumor model. New research efforts are also focused on adjuvant therapies that are employed to modify circulation parameters, including the AUC, of nanorods and gold nanoshells. Preliminary studies demonstrated a greater than 300% increase in average AUC using a reticuloendothelial blockade agent versus control groups. Given a better understanding of the relative importance of the physiological factors that influence rates of tumor accumulation, a set of experimental best practices is presented. This dissertation outlines the experimental protocols conducted, and discusses the real-world needs discovered and how these needs became specifications of developed protocols.

Experimental design for estimating unknown groundwater pumping using genetic algorithm and reduced order model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ushijima, Timothy T.; Yeh, William W.-G.

2013-10-01

An optimal experimental design algorithm is developed to select locations for a network of observation wells that provide maximum information about unknown groundwater pumping in a confined, anisotropic aquifer. The design uses a maximal information criterion that chooses, among competing designs, the design that maximizes the sum of squared sensitivities while conforming to specified design constraints. The formulated optimization problem is non-convex and contains integer variables necessitating a combinatorial search. Given a realistic large-scale model, the size of the combinatorial search required can make the problem difficult, if not impossible, to solve using traditional mathematical programming techniques. Genetic algorithms (GAs) can be used to perform the global search; however, because a GA requires a large number of calls to a groundwater model, the formulated optimization problem still may be infeasible to solve. As a result, proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) is applied to the groundwater model to reduce its dimensionality. Then, the information matrix in the full model space can be searched without solving the full model. Results from a small-scale test case show identical optimal solutions among the GA, integer programming, and exhaustive search methods. This demonstrates the GA's ability to determine the optimal solution. In addition, the results show that a GA with POD model reduction is several orders of magnitude faster in finding the optimal solution than a GA using the full model. The proposed experimental design algorithm is applied to a realistic, two-dimensional, large-scale groundwater problem. The GA converged to a solution for this large-scale problem.

Disease named entity recognition from biomedical literature using a novel convolutional neural network.

PubMed

Zhao, Zhehuan; Yang, Zhihao; Luo, Ling; Wang, Lei; Zhang, Yin; Lin, Hongfei; Wang, Jian

2017-12-28

Automatic disease named entity recognition (DNER) is of utmost importance for development of more sophisticated BioNLP tools. However, most conventional CRF based DNER systems rely on well-designed features whose selection is labor intensive and time-consuming. Though most deep learning methods can solve NER problems with little feature engineering, they employ additional CRF layer to capture the correlation information between labels in neighborhoods which makes them much complicated. In this paper, we propose a novel multiple label convolutional neural network (MCNN) based disease NER approach. In this approach, instead of the CRF layer, a multiple label strategy (MLS) first introduced by us, is employed. First, the character-level embedding, word-level embedding and lexicon feature embedding are concatenated. Then several convolutional layers are stacked over the concatenated embedding. Finally, MLS strategy is applied to the output layer to capture the correlation information between neighboring labels. As shown by the experimental results, MCNN can achieve the state-of-the-art performance on both NCBI and CDR corpora. The proposed MCNN based disease NER method achieves the state-of-the-art performance with little feature engineering. And the experimental results show the MLS strategy's effectiveness of capturing the correlation information between labels in the neighborhood.

Manganese complex-catalyzed oxidation and oxidative kinetic resolution of secondary alcohols by hydrogen peroxide† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Tables S1–S4 and additional data: NMR spectra of the products, GC and HPLC chromatograms in the OKR of secondary alcohols, key geometric information for DFT, etc. See DOI: 10.1039/c7sc00891k Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Miao, Chengxia; Li, Xiao-Xi; Lee, Yong-Min; Xia, Chungu; Wang, Yong

2017-01-01

The highly efficient catalytic oxidation and oxidative kinetic resolution (OKR) of secondary alcohols has been achieved using a synthetic manganese catalyst with low loading and hydrogen peroxide as an environmentally benign oxidant in the presence of a small amount of sulfuric acid as an additive. The product yields were high (up to 93%) for alcohol oxidation and the enantioselectivity was excellent (>90% ee) for the OKR of secondary alcohols. Mechanistic studies revealed that alcohol oxidation occurs via hydrogen atom (H-atom) abstraction from an α-CH bond of the alcohol substrate and a two-electron process by an electrophilic Mn–oxo species. Density functional theory calculations revealed the difference in reaction energy barriers for H-atom abstraction from the α-CH bonds of R- and S-enantiomers by a chiral high-valent manganese–oxo complex, supporting the experimental result from the OKR of secondary alcohols. PMID:29163900

Review of an initial experience with an experimental spectral photon-counting computed tomography system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Si-Mohamed, Salim; Bar-Ness, Daniel; Sigovan, Monica; Cormode, David P.; Coulon, Philippe; Coche, Emmanuel; Vlassenbroek, Alain; Normand, Gabrielle; Boussel, Loic; Douek, Philippe

2017-11-01

Spectral photon-counting CT (SPCCT) is an emerging X-ray imaging technology that extends the scope of available diagnostic imaging tools. The main advantage of photon-counting CT technology is better sampling of the spectral information from the transmitted spectrum in order to benefit from additional physical information being produced during matter interaction, including photo-electric and Compton effects, and the K-edge effect. The K-edge, which is specific for a given element, is the increase in X-ray absorption of the element above the binding energy between its inner electronic shell and the nucleus. Hence, the spectral information contributes to better characterization of tissues and materials of interest, explaining the excitement surrounding this area of X-ray imaging. Other improvements of SPCCT compared with conventional CT, such as higher spatial resolution, lower radiation exposure and lower noise are also expected to provide benefits for diagnostic imaging. In this review, we describe multi-energy CT imaging, from dual energy to photon counting technology, and our initial experience results using a clinical-scale spectral photon counting CT (SPCCT) prototype system in vitro and in vivo. In addition, possible clinical applications are introduced.

78 FR 63439 - Endangered and Threatened Species: Designation of a Nonessential Experimental Population of Upper...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-10-24

... Experimental Population of Upper Columbia Spring-Run Chinook Salmon in the Okanogan River Subbasin, Washington... authorize the release of a nonessential experimental population (NEP) of Upper Columbia River spring-run... (301-427-8403). SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Background Information Relevant to Experimental Population...

Cellular mechanisms responsible for cell-to-cell spreading of prions.

PubMed

Vilette, Didier; Courte, Josquin; Peyrin, Jean Michel; Coudert, Laurent; Schaeffer, Laurent; Andréoletti, Olivier; Leblanc, Pascal

2018-05-14

Prions are infectious agents that cause fatal neurodegenerative diseases. Current evidence indicates that they are essentially composed of an abnormally folded protein (PrP Sc ). These abnormal aggregated PrP Sc species multiply in infected cells by recruiting and converting the host PrP C protein into new PrP Sc . How prions move from cell to cell and progressively spread across the infected tissue is of crucial importance and may provide experimental opportunity to delay the progression of the disease. In infected cells, different mechanisms have been identified, including release of infectious extracellular vesicles and intercellular transfer of PrP Sc -containing organelles through tunneling nanotubes. These findings should allow manipulation of the intracellular trafficking events targeting PrP Sc in these particular subcellular compartments to experimentally address the relative contribution of these mechanisms to in vivo prion pathogenesis. In addition, such information may prompt further experimental strategies to decipher the causal roles of protein misfolding and aggregation in other human neurodegenerative diseases.

Computer Simulations to Study Diffraction Effects of Stacking Faults in Beta-SiC: II. Experimental Verification. 2; Experimental Verification

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pujar, Vijay V.; Cawley, James D.; Levine, S. (Technical Monitor)

2000-01-01

Earlier results from computer simulation studies suggest a correlation between the spatial distribution of stacking errors in the Beta-SiC structure and features observed in X-ray diffraction patterns of the material. Reported here are experimental results obtained from two types of nominally Beta-SiC specimens, which yield distinct XRD data. These samples were analyzed using high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) and the stacking error distribution was directly determined. The HRTEM results compare well to those deduced by matching the XRD data with simulated spectra, confirming the hypothesis that the XRD data is indicative not only of the presence and density of stacking errors, but also that it can yield information regarding their distribution. In addition, the stacking error population in both specimens is related to their synthesis conditions and it appears that it is similar to the relation developed by others to explain the formation of the corresponding polytypes.

Current and Future Research at DANCE

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jandel, M.; Baramsai, B.; Bredeweg, T. A.

2015-05-28

An overview of the current experimental program on measurements of neutron capture and neutron induced fission at the Detector for Advanced Neutron Capture Experiments (DANCE) is presented. Three major projects are currently under way: 1) high precision measurements of neutron capture cross sections on Uranium isotopes, 2) research aimed at studies of the short-lived actinide isomer production in neutron capture on 235U and 3) measurements of correlated data of fission observables. New projects include developments of auxiliary detectors to improve the capability of DANCE. We are building a compact, segmented NEUtron detector Array at DANCE (NEUANCE), which will be installedmore » in the central cavity of the DANCE array. It will thus provide experimental information on prompt fission neutrons in coincidence with the prompt fission gamma-rays measured by 160 BaF 2 crystals of DANCE. Additionally, unique correlated data will be obtained for neutron capture and neutron-induced fission using the DANCE-NEUANCE experimental set up in the future.« less

Experimental Methods for Trapping Ions Using Microfabricated Surface Ion Traps

PubMed Central

Hong, Seokjun; Lee, Minjae; Kwon, Yeong-Dae; Cho, Dong-il "Dan"; Kim, Taehyun

2017-01-01

Ions trapped in a quadrupole Paul trap have been considered one of the strong physical candidates to implement quantum information processing. This is due to their long coherence time and their capability to manipulate and detect individual quantum bits (qubits). In more recent years, microfabricated surface ion traps have received more attention for large-scale integrated qubit platforms. This paper presents a microfabrication methodology for ion traps using micro-electro-mechanical system (MEMS) technology, including the fabrication method for a 14 µm-thick dielectric layer and metal overhang structures atop the dielectric layer. In addition, an experimental procedure for trapping ytterbium (Yb) ions of isotope 174 (174Yb+) using 369.5 nm, 399 nm, and 935 nm diode lasers is described. These methodologies and procedures involve many scientific and engineering disciplines, and this paper first presents the detailed experimental procedures. The methods discussed in this paper can easily be extended to the trapping of Yb ions of isotope 171 (171Yb+) and to the manipulation of qubits. PMID:28872137

COMPARISON FRICTION: EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE FROM MEDICARE DRUG PLANS*

PubMed Central

Kling, Jeffrey R.; Mullainathan, Sendhil; Shafir, Eldar; Vermeulen, Lee; Wrobel, Marian V.

2011-01-01

Consumers need information to compare alternatives for markets to function efficiently. Recognizing this, public policies often pair competition with easy access to comparative information. The implicit assumption is that comparison friction—the wedge between the availability of comparative information and consumers’ use of it—is inconsequential because information is readily available and consumers will access this information and make effective choices. We examine the extent of comparison friction in the market for Medicare Part D prescription drug plans in the United States. In a randomized field experiment, an intervention group received a letter with personalized cost information. That information was readily available for free and widely advertised. However, this additional step—providing the information rather than having consumers actively access it—had an impact. Plan switching was 28 percent in the intervention group, versus 17 percent in the comparison group, and the intervention caused an average decline in predicted consumer cost of about $100 per year among letter recipients—roughly 5 percent of the cost in the comparison group. Our results suggest that comparison friction can be large even when the cost of acquiring information is small, and may be relevant for a wide range of public policies that incorporate consumer choice. PMID:22454838

Practical Approaches to Protein Folding and Assembly

PubMed Central

Walters, Jad; Milam, Sara L.; Clark, A. Clay

2009-01-01

We describe here the use of several spectroscopies, such as fluorescence emission, circular dichroism, and differential quenching by acrylamide, in examining the equilibrium and kinetic folding of proteins. The first section regarding equilibrium techniques provides practical information for determining the conformational stability of a protein. In addition, several equilibrium-folding models are discussed, from two-state monomer to four-state homodimer, providing a comprehensive protocol for interpretation of folding curves. The second section focuses on the experimental design and interpretation of kinetic data, such as burst-phase analysis and exponential fits, used in elucidating kinetic folding pathways. In addition, simulation programs are used routinely to support folding models generated by kinetic experiments, and the fundamentals of simulations are covered. PMID:19289201

Text mining for metabolic pathways, signaling cascades, and protein networks.

PubMed

Hoffmann, Robert; Krallinger, Martin; Andres, Eduardo; Tamames, Javier; Blaschke, Christian; Valencia, Alfonso

2005-05-10

The complexity of the information stored in databases and publications on metabolic and signaling pathways, the high throughput of experimental data, and the growing number of publications make it imperative to provide systems to help the researcher navigate through these interrelated information resources. Text-mining methods have started to play a key role in the creation and maintenance of links between the information stored in biological databases and its original sources in the literature. These links will be extremely useful for database updating and curation, especially if a number of technical problems can be solved satisfactorily, including the identification of protein and gene names (entities in general) and the characterization of their types of interactions. The first generation of openly accessible text-mining systems, such as iHOP (Information Hyperlinked over Proteins), provides additional functions to facilitate the reconstruction of protein interaction networks, combine database and text information, and support the scientist in the formulation of novel hypotheses. The next challenge is the generation of comprehensive information regarding the general function of signaling pathways and protein interaction networks.

MiMiR – an integrated platform for microarray data sharing, mining and analysis

PubMed Central

Tomlinson, Chris; Thimma, Manjula; Alexandrakis, Stelios; Castillo, Tito; Dennis, Jayne L; Brooks, Anthony; Bradley, Thomas; Turnbull, Carly; Blaveri, Ekaterini; Barton, Geraint; Chiba, Norie; Maratou, Klio; Soutter, Pat; Aitman, Tim; Game, Laurence

2008-01-01

Background Despite considerable efforts within the microarray community for standardising data format, content and description, microarray technologies present major challenges in managing, sharing, analysing and re-using the large amount of data generated locally or internationally. Additionally, it is recognised that inconsistent and low quality experimental annotation in public data repositories significantly compromises the re-use of microarray data for meta-analysis. MiMiR, the Microarray data Mining Resource was designed to tackle some of these limitations and challenges. Here we present new software components and enhancements to the original infrastructure that increase accessibility, utility and opportunities for large scale mining of experimental and clinical data. Results A user friendly Online Annotation Tool allows researchers to submit detailed experimental information via the web at the time of data generation rather than at the time of publication. This ensures the easy access and high accuracy of meta-data collected. Experiments are programmatically built in the MiMiR database from the submitted information and details are systematically curated and further annotated by a team of trained annotators using a new Curation and Annotation Tool. Clinical information can be annotated and coded with a clinical Data Mapping Tool within an appropriate ethical framework. Users can visualise experimental annotation, assess data quality, download and share data via a web-based experiment browser called MiMiR Online. All requests to access data in MiMiR are routed through a sophisticated middleware security layer thereby allowing secure data access and sharing amongst MiMiR registered users prior to publication. Data in MiMiR can be mined and analysed using the integrated EMAAS open source analysis web portal or via export of data and meta-data into Rosetta Resolver data analysis package. Conclusion The new MiMiR suite of software enables systematic and effective capture of extensive experimental and clinical information with the highest MIAME score, and secure data sharing prior to publication. MiMiR currently contains more than 150 experiments corresponding to over 3000 hybridisations and supports the Microarray Centre's large microarray user community and two international consortia. The MiMiR flexible and scalable hardware and software architecture enables secure warehousing of thousands of datasets, including clinical studies, from microarray and potentially other -omics technologies. PMID:18801157

MiMiR--an integrated platform for microarray data sharing, mining and analysis.

PubMed

Tomlinson, Chris; Thimma, Manjula; Alexandrakis, Stelios; Castillo, Tito; Dennis, Jayne L; Brooks, Anthony; Bradley, Thomas; Turnbull, Carly; Blaveri, Ekaterini; Barton, Geraint; Chiba, Norie; Maratou, Klio; Soutter, Pat; Aitman, Tim; Game, Laurence

2008-09-18

Despite considerable efforts within the microarray community for standardising data format, content and description, microarray technologies present major challenges in managing, sharing, analysing and re-using the large amount of data generated locally or internationally. Additionally, it is recognised that inconsistent and low quality experimental annotation in public data repositories significantly compromises the re-use of microarray data for meta-analysis. MiMiR, the Microarray data Mining Resource was designed to tackle some of these limitations and challenges. Here we present new software components and enhancements to the original infrastructure that increase accessibility, utility and opportunities for large scale mining of experimental and clinical data. A user friendly Online Annotation Tool allows researchers to submit detailed experimental information via the web at the time of data generation rather than at the time of publication. This ensures the easy access and high accuracy of meta-data collected. Experiments are programmatically built in the MiMiR database from the submitted information and details are systematically curated and further annotated by a team of trained annotators using a new Curation and Annotation Tool. Clinical information can be annotated and coded with a clinical Data Mapping Tool within an appropriate ethical framework. Users can visualise experimental annotation, assess data quality, download and share data via a web-based experiment browser called MiMiR Online. All requests to access data in MiMiR are routed through a sophisticated middleware security layer thereby allowing secure data access and sharing amongst MiMiR registered users prior to publication. Data in MiMiR can be mined and analysed using the integrated EMAAS open source analysis web portal or via export of data and meta-data into Rosetta Resolver data analysis package. The new MiMiR suite of software enables systematic and effective capture of extensive experimental and clinical information with the highest MIAME score, and secure data sharing prior to publication. MiMiR currently contains more than 150 experiments corresponding to over 3000 hybridisations and supports the Microarray Centre's large microarray user community and two international consortia. The MiMiR flexible and scalable hardware and software architecture enables secure warehousing of thousands of datasets, including clinical studies, from microarray and potentially other -omics technologies.

A Hierarchical multi-input and output Bi-GRU Model for Sentiment Analysis on Customer Reviews

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Liujie; Zhou, Yanquan; Duan, Xiuyu; Chen, Ruiqi

2018-03-01

Multi-label sentiment classification on customer reviews is a practical challenging task in Natural Language Processing. In this paper, we propose a hierarchical multi-input and output model based bi-directional recurrent neural network, which both considers the semantic and lexical information of emotional expression. Our model applies two independent Bi-GRU layer to generate part of speech and sentence representation. Then the lexical information is considered via attention over output of softmax activation on part of speech representation. In addition, we combine probability of auxiliary labels as feature with hidden layer to capturing crucial correlation between output labels. The experimental result shows that our model is computationally efficient and achieves breakthrough improvements on customer reviews dataset.

INTERRELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN IN-SITU GAS HYDRATES AND HEAVY OIL OCCURRENCES ON THE NORTH SLOPE OF ALASKA.

USGS Publications Warehouse

Collett, T.S.

1985-01-01

In 1973, during the drilling of the West Sak #1 well on the North Slope of Alaska, oil was first recovered from a shallow Cretaceous sand interval which was later informally named the West Sak sands by ARCO Alaska. Stratigraphically above the West Sak sands there are two additional oil bearing sands, and are informally referred to by ARCO as the Ugnu and the 2150 horizons. Gas hydrates are interpreted to exist in the West Sak #6 well in conjunction with heavy oil and the physical properties of this oil may have been influenced by the gas hydrate. Prior to this work, only experimental evidence suggested that hydrates and oil could exist in the same reservoir.

Negative inductance SQUID qubit operating in a quantum regime

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, W. Y.; Su, F. F.; Xu, H. K.; Li, Z. Y.; Tian, Ye; Zhu, X. B.; Lu, Li; Han, Siyuan; Zhao, S. P.

2018-04-01

Two-junction SQUIDs with negative mutual inductance between their two arms, called nSQUIDs, have been proposed for significantly improving quantum information transfer but their quantum nature has not been experimentally demonstrated. We have designed, fabricated, and characterized superconducting nSQUID qubits. Our results provide clear evidence of the quantum coherence of the device, whose properties are well described by theoretical calculations using parameters determined from spectroscopic measurement. In addition to their future application for fast quantum information transfer, the nSQUID qubits exhibit rich characteristics in their tunable two-dimensional (2D) potentials, energy levels, wave function symmetries, and dipole matrix elements, which are essential to the study of a wide variety of macroscopic quantum phenomena such as tunneling in 2D potential landscapes.

Earth based approaches to enhancing the health and safety of space operations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Koller, A. M., Jr.

1985-01-01

This paper provides an overview of the current state of our earth based knowledge of space safety hazards; identification of several key areas of concern for space operations; and proposed approaches to providing technology enhancement and information needed to improve the health and safety to those conducting space operations. Included are a review of the identified hazards for space oeprations by hazard classification; a summarization of the information currently available on space experiences and an assessment of potential hazards for long duration spaceflight; a discussion of potential failure modes and their significance for Space Station work: and an assessment of current work which indicates additional research and experimentation which can only be accomplished in actual space missions.

Experimental Design for Hanford Low-Activity Waste Glasses with High Waste Loading

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Piepel, Gregory F.; Cooley, Scott K.; Vienna, John D.

This report discusses the development of an experimental design for the initial phase of the Hanford low-activity waste (LAW) enhanced glass study. This report is based on a manuscript written for an applied statistics journal. Appendices A, B, and E include additional information relevant to the LAW enhanced glass experimental design that is not included in the journal manuscript. The glass composition experimental region is defined by single-component constraints (SCCs), linear multiple-component constraints (MCCs), and a nonlinear MCC involving 15 LAW glass components. Traditional methods and software for designing constrained mixture experiments with SCCs and linear MCCs are not directlymore » applicable because of the nonlinear MCC. A modification of existing methodology to account for the nonlinear MCC was developed and is described in this report. One of the glass components, SO 3, has a solubility limit in glass that depends on the composition of the balance of the glass. A goal was to design the experiment so that SO 3 would not exceed its predicted solubility limit for any of the experimental glasses. The SO 3 solubility limit had previously been modeled by a partial quadratic mixture model expressed in the relative proportions of the 14 other components. The partial quadratic mixture model was used to construct a nonlinear MCC in terms of all 15 components. In addition, there were SCCs and linear MCCs. This report describes how a layered design was generated to (i) account for the SCCs, linear MCCs, and nonlinear MCC and (ii) meet the goals of the study. A layered design consists of points on an outer layer, and inner layer, and a center point. There were 18 outer-layer glasses chosen using optimal experimental design software to augment 147 existing glass compositions that were within the LAW glass composition experimental region. Then 13 inner-layer glasses were chosen with the software to augment the existing and outer-layer glasses. The experimental design was completed by a center-point glass, a Vitreous State Laboratory glass, and replicates of the center point and Vitreous State Laboratory glasses.« less

Survey of basic medical researchers on the awareness of animal experimental designs and reporting standards in China.

PubMed

Ma, Bin; Xu, Jia-Ke; Wu, Wen-Jing; Liu, Hong-Yan; Kou, Cheng-Kun; Liu, Na; Zhao, Lulu

2017-01-01

To investigate the awareness and use of the Systematic Review Center for Laboratory Animal Experimentation's (SYRCLE) risk-of-bias tool, the Animal Research: Reporting of In Vivo Experiments (ARRIVE) reporting guidelines, and Gold Standard Publication Checklist (GSPC) in China in basic medical researchers of animal experimental studies. A national questionnaire-based survey targeting basic medical researchers was carried in China to investigate the basic information and awareness of SYRCLE's risk of bias tool, ARRIVE guidelines, GSPC, and animal experimental bias risk control factors. The EpiData3.1 software was used for data entry, and Microsoft Excel 2013 was used for statistical analysis in this study. The number of cases (n) and percentage (%) of classified information were statistically described, and the comparison between groups (i.e., current students vs. research staff) was performed using chi-square test. A total of 298 questionnaires were distributed, and 272 responses were received, which included 266 valid questionnaires (from 118 current students and 148 research staff). Among the 266 survey participants, only 15.8% was aware of the SYRCLE's risk of bias tool, with significant difference between the two groups (P = 0.003), and the awareness rates of ARRIVE guidelines and GSPC were only 9.4% and 9.0%, respectively; 58.6% survey participants believed that the reports of animal experimental studies in Chinese literature were inadequate, with significant difference between the two groups (P = 0.004). In addition, only approximately 1/3 of the survey participants had read systematic reviews and meta-analysis reports of animal experimental studies; only 16/266 (6.0%) had carried out/participated in and 11/266 (4.1%) had published systematic reviews/meta-analysis of animal experimental studies. The awareness and use rates of SYRCLE's risk-of-bias tool, the ARRIVE guidelines, and the GSPC were low among Chinese basic medical researchers. Therefore, specific measures are necessary to promote and popularize these standards and specifications and to introduce these standards into guidelines of Chinese domestic journals as soon as possible to raise awareness and increase use rates of researchers and journal editors, thereby improving the quality of animal experimental methods and reports.

Joint effects of heterogeneous estrogenic chemicals in the E-screen--exploring the applicability of concentration addition.

PubMed

Silva, Elisabete; Rajapakse, Nissanka; Scholze, Martin; Backhaus, Thomas; Ermler, Sibylle; Kortenkamp, Andreas

2011-08-01

In the last few years, significant advances have been made toward understanding the joint action of endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs). A number of studies have demonstrated that the combined effects of different types of EDCs (e.g., estrogenic, antiandrogenic, or thyroid-disrupting agents) can be predicted by the model of concentration addition (CA). However, there is still limited information on the effects of mixtures of large numbers of chemicals with varied structural features, which are more representative of realistic human exposure scenarios. The work presented here aims at filling this gap. Using a breast cancer cell proliferation assay (E-Screen), we assessed the joint effects of five mixtures, containing between 3 and 16 estrogenic agents, including compounds as diverse as steroidal hormones (endogenous and synthetic), pesticides, cosmetic additives, and phytoestrogens. CA was employed to predict mixture effects, which were then compared with experimental outcomes. The effects of two of the mixtures tested were additive, being accurately predicted by CA. However, for the three other mixtures, CA slightly overestimated the experimental observations. In view of these results, we hypothesized that the deviations were due to increased metabolism of steroidal estrogens in the mixture setting. We investigated this by testing the impact of two such mixtures on the activation and expression of steroidal estrogen metabolizing enzymes, such as cytochrome P450 (CYP) 1A1, CYP 1B1, and CYP 3A4. Activation of CYP 1B1 and, consequently, a reduction in the levels of steroidal estrogens in the mixture could contribute to the shortfall from the additivity prediction that we observed.

A genetic code Boolean structure. II. The genetic information system as a Boolean information system.

PubMed

Sanchez, Robersy; Grau, Ricardo

2005-09-01

A Boolean structure of the genetic code where Boolean deductions have biological and physicochemical meanings was discussed in a previous paper. Now, from these Boolean deductions we propose to define the value of amino acid information in order to consider the genetic information system as a communication system and to introduce the semantic content of information ignored by the conventional information theory. In this proposal, the value of amino acid information is proportional to the molecular weight of amino acids with a proportional constant of about 1.96 x 10(25) bits per kg. In addition to this, for the experimental estimations of the minimum energy dissipation in genetic logic operations, we present two postulates: (1) the energy Ei (i=1,2,...,20) of amino acids in the messages conveyed by proteins is proportional to the value of information, and (2) amino acids are distributed according to their energy Ei so the amino acid population in proteins follows a Boltzmann distribution. Specifically, in the genetic message carried by the DNA from the genomes of living organisms, we found that the minimum energy dissipation in genetic logic operations was close to kTLn(2) joules per bit.

Experimental validation of finite element model analysis of a steel frame in simulated post-earthquake fire environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Ying; Bevans, W. J.; Xiao, Hai; Zhou, Zhi; Chen, Genda

2012-04-01

During or after an earthquake event, building system often experiences large strains due to shaking effects as observed during recent earthquakes, causing permanent inelastic deformation. In addition to the inelastic deformation induced by the earthquake effect, the post-earthquake fires associated with short fuse of electrical systems and leakage of gas devices can further strain the already damaged structures during the earthquakes, potentially leading to a progressive collapse of buildings. Under these harsh environments, measurements on the involved building by various sensors could only provide limited structural health information. Finite element model analysis, on the other hand, if validated by predesigned experiments, can provide detail structural behavior information of the entire structures. In this paper, a temperature dependent nonlinear 3-D finite element model (FEM) of a one-story steel frame is set up by ABAQUS based on the cited material property of steel from EN 1993-1.2 and AISC manuals. The FEM is validated by testing the modeled steel frame in simulated post-earthquake environments. Comparisons between the FEM analysis and the experimental results show that the FEM predicts the structural behavior of the steel frame in post-earthquake fire conditions reasonably. With experimental validations, the FEM analysis of critical structures could be continuously predicted for structures in these harsh environments for a better assistant to fire fighters in their rescue efforts and save fire victims.

Data related to the experimental design for powder bed binder jetting additive manufacturing of silicone.

PubMed

Liravi, Farzad; Vlasea, Mihaela

2018-06-01

The data included in this article provides additional supporting information on our recent publication (Liravi et al., 2018 [1]) on a novel hybrid additive manufacturing (AM) method for fabrication of three-dimensional (3D) structures from silicone powder. A design of experiments (DoE) study has been carried out to optimize the geometrical fidelity of AM-made parts. This manuscript includes the details of a multi-level factorial DOE and the response optimization results. The variation in the temperature of powder-bed when exposed to heat is plotted as well. Furthermore, the effect of blending ratio of two parts of silicone binder on its curing speed was investigated by conducting DSC tests on a silicone binder with 100:2 precursor to curing agent ratio. The hardness of parts fabricated with non-optimum printing conditions are included and compared.

Progress in the Modeling of NiAl-Based Alloys Using the BFS Method

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bozzolo, Guillermo; Noebe, Ronald D.; Ferrante, John; Garg, Anita

1997-01-01

The BFS method has been applied to the study of NiAl-based materials to assess the effect of alloying additions on structure. Ternary, quaternary and even pent-alloys based on Ni-rich NiAl with additions of Ti, Cr and Cu were studied. Two approaches were used, Monte Carlo simulations to determine ground state structures and analytical calculations of high symmetry configurations which give physical insight into preferred bonding. Site occupancy energetics for ternary and the more complicated case of quaternary additions were determined, and solubility limits and precipitate formation with corresponding information concerning structure and lattice parameter were also 'observed' computationally. The method was also applied to determine the composition of alloy surfaces and interfaces. Overall, the results demonstrate that the BFS method for alloys is a powerful tool for alloy design and with its simplicity and obvious advantages can be used to complement any experimental alloy design program.

Single-molecule experiments in biological physics: methods and applications.

PubMed

Ritort, F

2006-08-16

I review single-molecule experiments (SMEs) in biological physics. Recent technological developments have provided the tools to design and build scientific instruments of high enough sensitivity and precision to manipulate and visualize individual molecules and measure microscopic forces. Using SMEs it is possible to manipulate molecules one at a time and measure distributions describing molecular properties, characterize the kinetics of biomolecular reactions and detect molecular intermediates. SMEs provide additional information about thermodynamics and kinetics of biomolecular processes. This complements information obtained in traditional bulk assays. In SMEs it is also possible to measure small energies and detect large Brownian deviations in biomolecular reactions, thereby offering new methods and systems to scrutinize the basic foundations of statistical mechanics. This review is written at a very introductory level, emphasizing the importance of SMEs to scientists interested in knowing the common playground of ideas and the interdisciplinary topics accessible by these techniques. The review discusses SMEs from an experimental perspective, first exposing the most common experimental methodologies and later presenting various molecular systems where such techniques have been applied. I briefly discuss experimental techniques such as atomic-force microscopy (AFM), laser optical tweezers (LOTs), magnetic tweezers (MTs), biomembrane force probes (BFPs) and single-molecule fluorescence (SMF). I then present several applications of SME to the study of nucleic acids (DNA, RNA and DNA condensation) and proteins (protein-protein interactions, protein folding and molecular motors). Finally, I discuss applications of SMEs to the study of the nonequilibrium thermodynamics of small systems and the experimental verification of fluctuation theorems. I conclude with a discussion of open questions and future perspectives.

TOPICAL REVIEW: Single-molecule experiments in biological physics: methods and applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ritort, F.

2006-08-01

I review single-molecule experiments (SMEs) in biological physics. Recent technological developments have provided the tools to design and build scientific instruments of high enough sensitivity and precision to manipulate and visualize individual molecules and measure microscopic forces. Using SMEs it is possible to manipulate molecules one at a time and measure distributions describing molecular properties, characterize the kinetics of biomolecular reactions and detect molecular intermediates. SMEs provide additional information about thermodynamics and kinetics of biomolecular processes. This complements information obtained in traditional bulk assays. In SMEs it is also possible to measure small energies and detect large Brownian deviations in biomolecular reactions, thereby offering new methods and systems to scrutinize the basic foundations of statistical mechanics. This review is written at a very introductory level, emphasizing the importance of SMEs to scientists interested in knowing the common playground of ideas and the interdisciplinary topics accessible by these techniques. The review discusses SMEs from an experimental perspective, first exposing the most common experimental methodologies and later presenting various molecular systems where such techniques have been applied. I briefly discuss experimental techniques such as atomic-force microscopy (AFM), laser optical tweezers (LOTs), magnetic tweezers (MTs), biomembrane force probes (BFPs) and single-molecule fluorescence (SMF). I then present several applications of SME to the study of nucleic acids (DNA, RNA and DNA condensation) and proteins (protein-protein interactions, protein folding and molecular motors). Finally, I discuss applications of SMEs to the study of the nonequilibrium thermodynamics of small systems and the experimental verification of fluctuation theorems. I conclude with a discussion of open questions and future perspectives.

75 FR 373 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission for Office of Management and Budget Review...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-01-05

... Request; Experimental Study: Presentation of Quantitative Effectiveness Information to Consumers in Direct... clearance. Experimental Study: Presentation of Quantitative Effectiveness Information to Consumers in Direct... research has proposed that providing quantitative information about product efficacy enables consumers to...

Reporting of Telehealth-Delivered Dietary Intervention Trials in Chronic Disease: Systematic Review.

PubMed

Warner, Molly M; Kelly, Jaimon T; Reidlinger, Dianne P; Hoffmann, Tammy C; Campbell, Katrina L

2017-12-11

Telehealth-delivered dietary interventions are effective for chronic disease management and are an emerging area of clinical practice. However, to apply interventions from the research setting in clinical practice, health professionals need details of each intervention component. The aim of this study was to evaluate the completeness of intervention reporting in published dietary chronic disease management trials that used telehealth delivery methods. Eligible randomized controlled trial publications were identified through a systematic review. The completeness of reporting of experimental and comparison interventions was assessed by two independent assessors using the Template for Intervention Description and Replication (TIDieR) checklist that consists of 12 items including intervention rationale, materials used, procedures, providers, delivery mode, location, when and how much intervention delivered, intervention tailoring, intervention modifications, and fidelity. Where reporting was incomplete, further information was sought from additional published material and through email correspondence with trial authors. Within the 37 eligible trials, there were 49 experimental interventions and 37 comparison interventions. One trial reported every TIDieR item for their experimental intervention. No publications reported every item for the comparison intervention. For the experimental interventions, the most commonly reported items were location (96%), mode of delivery (98%), and rationale for the essential intervention elements (96%). Least reported items for experimental interventions were modifications (2%) and intervention material descriptions (39%) and where to access them (20%). Of the 37 authors, 14 responded with further information, and 8 could not be contacted. Many details of the experimental and comparison interventions in telehealth-delivered dietary chronic disease management trials are incompletely reported. This prevents accurate interpretation of trial results and implementation of effective interventions in clinical practice. ©Molly M Warner, Jaimon T Kelly, Dianne P Reidlinger, Tammy C Hoffmann, Katrina L Campbell. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (http://www.jmir.org), 11.12.2017.

Room temperature decarboxylative cyanation of carboxylic acids using photoredox catalysis and cyanobenziodoxolones: a divergent mechanism compared to alkynylation† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available. See DOI: 10.1039/c6sc04907a Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Le Vaillant, Franck; Wodrich, Matthew D.

2017-01-01

The one-step conversion of aliphatic carboxylic acids to the corresponding nitriles has been accomplished via the merger of visible light mediated photoredox and cyanobenziodoxolones (CBX) reagents. The reaction proceeded in high yields with natural and non-natural α-amino and α-oxy acids, affording a broad scope of nitriles with excellent tolerance of the substituents in the α position. The direct cyanation of dipeptides and drug precursors was also achieved. The mechanism of the decarboxylative cyanation was investigated both computationally and experimentally and compared with the previously developed alkynylation reaction. Alkynylation was found to favor direct radical addition, whereas further oxidation by CBX to a carbocation and cyanide addition appeared more favorable for cyanation. A concerted mechanism is proposed for the reaction of radicals with EBX reagents, in contrast to the usually assumed addition elimination process. PMID:28451301

Financial analysis of experimental releases conducted at Glen Canyon Dam during water years 2006 through 2010.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Poch, L. A.; Veselka, T. D.; Palmer, C. S.

2011-08-22

Because of concerns about the impact that Glen Canyon Dam (GCD) operations were having on downstream ecosystems and endangered species, the Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) conducted an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on dam operations (DOE 1996). New operating rules and management goals for GCD that had been specified in the Record of Decision (ROD) (Reclamation 1996) were adopted in February 1997. In addition to issuing new operating criteria, the ROD mandated experimental releases for the purpose of conducting scientific studies. A report released in January 2011 examined the financial implications of the experimental flows that were conducted at the GCDmore » from 1997 to 2005. This report continues the analysis and examines the financial implications of the experimental flows conducted at the GCD from 2006 to 2010. An experimental release may have either a positive or negative impact on the financial value of energy production. This study estimates the financial costs of experimental releases, identifies the main factors that contribute to these costs, and compares the interdependencies among these factors. An integrated set of tools was used to compute the financial impacts of the experimental releases by simulating the operation of the GCD under two scenarios, namely, (1) a baseline scenario that assumes both that operations comply with the ROD operating criteria and the experimental releases that actually took place during the study period, and (2) a 'without experiments' scenario that is identical to the baseline scenario of operations that comply with the GCD ROD, except it assumes that experimental releases did not occur. The Generation and Transmission Maximization (GTMax) model was the main simulation tool used to dispatch GCD and other hydropower plants that comprise the Salt Lake City Area Integrated Projects (SLCA/IP). Extensive data sets and historical information on SLCA/IP powerplant characteristics, hydrologic conditions, and Western Area Power Administration's (Western's) power purchase prices were used for the simulation. In addition to estimating the financial impact of experimental releases, the GTMax model was also used to gain insights into the interplay among ROD operating criteria, exceptions that were made to criteria to accommodate the experimental releases, and Western operating practices. Experimental releases in some water years resulted in financial benefits to Western while others resulted in financial costs. During the study period, the total financial costs of all experimental releases were more than $4.8 million.« less

Accurate object tracking system by integrating texture and depth cues

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Ju-Chin; Lin, Yu-Hang

2016-03-01

A robust object tracking system that is invariant to object appearance variations and background clutter is proposed. Multiple instance learning with a boosting algorithm is applied to select discriminant texture information between the object and background data. Additionally, depth information, which is important to distinguish the object from a complicated background, is integrated. We propose two depth-based models that can compensate texture information to cope with both appearance variants and background clutter. Moreover, in order to reduce the risk of drifting problem increased for the textureless depth templates, an update mechanism is proposed to select more precise tracking results to avoid incorrect model updates. In the experiments, the robustness of the proposed system is evaluated and quantitative results are provided for performance analysis. Experimental results show that the proposed system can provide the best success rate and has more accurate tracking results than other well-known algorithms.

Manipulation of Unknown Objects to Improve the Grasp Quality Using Tactile Information.

PubMed

Montaño, Andrés; Suárez, Raúl

2018-05-03

This work presents a novel and simple approach in the area of manipulation of unknown objects considering both geometric and mechanical constraints of the robotic hand. Starting with an initial blind grasp, our method improves the grasp quality through manipulation considering the three common goals of the manipulation process: improving the hand configuration, the grasp quality and the object positioning, and, at the same time, prevents the object from falling. Tactile feedback is used to obtain local information of the contacts between the fingertips and the object, and no additional exteroceptive feedback sources are considered in the approach. The main novelty of this work lies in the fact that the grasp optimization is performed on-line as a reactive procedure using the tactile and kinematic information obtained during the manipulation. Experimental results are shown to illustrate the efficiency of the approach.

Deterministic realization of collective measurements via photonic quantum walks.

PubMed

Hou, Zhibo; Tang, Jun-Feng; Shang, Jiangwei; Zhu, Huangjun; Li, Jian; Yuan, Yuan; Wu, Kang-Da; Xiang, Guo-Yong; Li, Chuan-Feng; Guo, Guang-Can

2018-04-12

Collective measurements on identically prepared quantum systems can extract more information than local measurements, thereby enhancing information-processing efficiency. Although this nonclassical phenomenon has been known for two decades, it has remained a challenging task to demonstrate the advantage of collective measurements in experiments. Here, we introduce a general recipe for performing deterministic collective measurements on two identically prepared qubits based on quantum walks. Using photonic quantum walks, we realize experimentally an optimized collective measurement with fidelity 0.9946 without post selection. As an application, we achieve the highest tomographic efficiency in qubit state tomography to date. Our work offers an effective recipe for beating the precision limit of local measurements in quantum state tomography and metrology. In addition, our study opens an avenue for harvesting the power of collective measurements in quantum information-processing and for exploring the intriguing physics behind this power.

Data in support of dyslipidemia-associated alterations in B cell subpopulations frequency and phenotype during experimental atherosclerosis

PubMed Central

Rincón-Arévalo, Héctor; Castaño, Diana; Villa-Pulgarín, Janny; Rojas, Mauricio; Vásquez, Gloria; Correa, Luis A.; Ramírez-Pineda, José R.; Yassin, Lina M.

2016-01-01

Cardiovascular diseases are the most common cause of death in the world, atherosclerosis being its main underlying disease. Information about the role of B cells during atherosclerotic process is scarce, but both proatherogenic and atheroprotective properties have been described in the immunopathology of this disease. Frequency and phenotype of B cell subpopulations were studied in wild type and apolipoprotein-E-deficient (apoE−/−) mice fed or not with high-fat diet (HFD), by flow cytometry. Here, we provide the information about the materials, methods, analysis and additional information related to our study published in Atherosclerosis (DOI: 10.1016/j.atherosclerosis.2015.12.022, article reference: ATH14410) [1]. The data contained in this article shows and supports that mice with advanced atherosclerosis have a variety of alterations in frequency and phenotype of B cell subsets, most of which associated with dyslipidemia. PMID:27081674

A coherent graph-based semantic clustering and summarization approach for biomedical literature and a new summarization evaluation method.

PubMed

Yoo, Illhoi; Hu, Xiaohua; Song, Il-Yeol

2007-11-27

A huge amount of biomedical textual information has been produced and collected in MEDLINE for decades. In order to easily utilize biomedical information in the free text, document clustering and text summarization together are used as a solution for text information overload problem. In this paper, we introduce a coherent graph-based semantic clustering and summarization approach for biomedical literature. Our extensive experimental results show the approach shows 45% cluster quality improvement and 72% clustering reliability improvement, in terms of misclassification index, over Bisecting K-means as a leading document clustering approach. In addition, our approach provides concise but rich text summary in key concepts and sentences. Our coherent biomedical literature clustering and summarization approach that takes advantage of ontology-enriched graphical representations significantly improves the quality of document clusters and understandability of documents through summaries.

A coherent graph-based semantic clustering and summarization approach for biomedical literature and a new summarization evaluation method

PubMed Central

Yoo, Illhoi; Hu, Xiaohua; Song, Il-Yeol

2007-01-01

Background A huge amount of biomedical textual information has been produced and collected in MEDLINE for decades. In order to easily utilize biomedical information in the free text, document clustering and text summarization together are used as a solution for text information overload problem. In this paper, we introduce a coherent graph-based semantic clustering and summarization approach for biomedical literature. Results Our extensive experimental results show the approach shows 45% cluster quality improvement and 72% clustering reliability improvement, in terms of misclassification index, over Bisecting K-means as a leading document clustering approach. In addition, our approach provides concise but rich text summary in key concepts and sentences. Conclusion Our coherent biomedical literature clustering and summarization approach that takes advantage of ontology-enriched graphical representations significantly improves the quality of document clusters and understandability of documents through summaries. PMID:18047705

Interoperability between phenotype and anatomy ontologies.

PubMed

Hoehndorf, Robert; Oellrich, Anika; Rebholz-Schuhmann, Dietrich

2010-12-15

Phenotypic information is important for the analysis of the molecular mechanisms underlying disease. A formal ontological representation of phenotypic information can help to identify, interpret and infer phenotypic traits based on experimental findings. The methods that are currently used to represent data and information about phenotypes fail to make the semantics of the phenotypic trait explicit and do not interoperate with ontologies of anatomy and other domains. Therefore, valuable resources for the analysis of phenotype studies remain unconnected and inaccessible to automated analysis and reasoning. We provide a framework to formalize phenotypic descriptions and make their semantics explicit. Based on this formalization, we provide the means to integrate phenotypic descriptions with ontologies of other domains, in particular anatomy and physiology. We demonstrate how our framework leads to the capability to represent disease phenotypes, perform powerful queries that were not possible before and infer additional knowledge. http://bioonto.de/pmwiki.php/Main/PheneOntology.

Synthetic torpor: A method for safely and practically transporting experimental animals aboard spaceflight missions to deep space.

PubMed

Griko, Yuri; Regan, Matthew D

2018-02-01

Animal research aboard the Space Shuttle and International Space Station has provided vital information on the physiological, cellular, and molecular effects of spaceflight. The relevance of this information to human spaceflight is enhanced when it is coupled with information gleaned from human-based research. As NASA and other space agencies initiate plans for human exploration missions beyond low Earth orbit (LEO), incorporating animal research into these missions is vitally important to understanding the biological impacts of deep space. However, new technologies will be required to integrate experimental animals into spacecraft design and transport them beyond LEO in a safe and practical way. In this communication, we propose the use of metabolic control technologies to reversibly depress the metabolic rates of experimental animals while in transit aboard the spacecraft. Compared to holding experimental animals in active metabolic states, the advantages of artificially inducing regulated, depressed metabolic states (called synthetic torpor) include significantly reduced mass, volume, and power requirements within the spacecraft owing to reduced life support requirements, and mitigated radiation- and microgravity-induced negative health effects on the animals owing to intrinsic physiological properties of torpor. In addition to directly benefitting animal research, synthetic torpor-inducing systems will also serve as test beds for systems that may eventually hold human crewmembers in similar metabolic states on long-duration missions. The technologies for inducing synthetic torpor, which we discuss, are at relatively early stages of development, but there is ample evidence to show that this is a viable idea and one with very real benefits to spaceflight programs. The increasingly ambitious goals of world's many spaceflight programs will be most quickly and safely achieved with the help of animal research systems transported beyond LEO; synthetic torpor may enable this to be done as practically and inexpensively as possible. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Synthetic torpor: A method for safely and practically transporting experimental animals aboard spaceflight missions to deep space

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Griko, Yuri; Regan, Matthew D.

2018-02-01

Animal research aboard the Space Shuttle and International Space Station has provided vital information on the physiological, cellular, and molecular effects of spaceflight. The relevance of this information to human spaceflight is enhanced when it is coupled with information gleaned from human-based research. As NASA and other space agencies initiate plans for human exploration missions beyond low Earth orbit (LEO), incorporating animal research into these missions is vitally important to understanding the biological impacts of deep space. However, new technologies will be required to integrate experimental animals into spacecraft design and transport them beyond LEO in a safe and practical way. In this communication, we propose the use of metabolic control technologies to reversibly depress the metabolic rates of experimental animals while in transit aboard the spacecraft. Compared to holding experimental animals in active metabolic states, the advantages of artificially inducing regulated, depressed metabolic states (called synthetic torpor) include significantly reduced mass, volume, and power requirements within the spacecraft owing to reduced life support requirements, and mitigated radiation- and microgravity-induced negative health effects on the animals owing to intrinsic physiological properties of torpor. In addition to directly benefitting animal research, synthetic torpor-inducing systems will also serve as test beds for systems that may eventually hold human crewmembers in similar metabolic states on long-duration missions. The technologies for inducing synthetic torpor, which we discuss, are at relatively early stages of development, but there is ample evidence to show that this is a viable idea and one with very real benefits to spaceflight programs. The increasingly ambitious goals of world's many spaceflight programs will be most quickly and safely achieved with the help of animal research systems transported beyond LEO; synthetic torpor may enable this to be done as practically and inexpensively as possible.

Trends in animal experimentation.

PubMed

Monteiro, Rosangela; Brandau, Ricardo; Gomes, Walter J; Braile, Domingo M

2009-01-01

The search of the understanding of etiological factors, mechanisms and treatment of the diseases has been taking to the development of several animal models in the last decades. To discuss aspects related to animal models of experimentation, animal choice and current trends in this field in our country. In addition, this study evaluated the frequency of experimental articles in medical journals. Five Brazilian journals indexed by LILACS, SciELO, MEDLINE, and recently incorporate for Institute for Scientific Information Journal of Citation Reports were analyzed. All the papers published in those journals, between 2007 and 2008, that used animal models, were selected based on the abstracts. Of the total of 832 articles published in the period, 92 (11.1%) experimentation papers were selected. The number of experimental articles ranged from 5.2% to 17.9% of the global content of the journal. In the instructions to the authors, four (80%) journals presented explicit reference to the ethical principles in the conduction of studies with animals. The induced animal models represented 100% of the articles analyzed in this study. The rat was the most employed animal in the analyzed articles (78.3%). The present study can contribute, supplying subsidies for adoption of future editorials policies regarding the publication of animal research papers in Brazilian Journal of Cardiovascular Surgery.

Same but different: Comparative modes of information processing are implicated in the construction of perceptions of autonomy support.

PubMed

Lee, Rebecca Rachael; Chatzisarantis, Nikos L D

2017-11-01

An implicit assumption behind tenets of self-determination theory is that perceptions of autonomy support are a function of absolute modes of information processing. In this study, we examined whether comparative modes of information processing were implicated in the construction of perceptions of autonomy support. In an experimental study, we demonstrated that participants employed comparative modes of information processing in evaluating receipt of small, but not large, amounts of autonomy support. In addition, we found that social comparison processes influenced a number of outcomes that are empirically related to perceived autonomy support such as sense of autonomy, positive affect, perceived usefulness, and effort. Findings shed new light upon the processes underpinning construction of perceptions related to autonomy support and yield new insights into how to increase the predictive validity of models that use autonomy support as a determinant of motivation and psychological well-being. © 2017 The British Psychological Society.

Image processing of metal surface with structured light

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Luo, Cong; Feng, Chang; Wang, Congzheng

2014-09-01

In structured light vision measurement system, the ideal image of structured light strip, in addition to black background , contains only the gray information of the position of the stripe. However, the actual image contains image noise, complex background and so on, which does not belong to the stripe, and it will cause interference to useful information. To extract the stripe center of mental surface accurately, a new processing method was presented. Through adaptive median filtering, the noise can be preliminary removed, and the noise which introduced by CCD camera and measured environment can be further removed with difference image method. To highlight fine details and enhance the blurred regions between the stripe and noise, the sharping algorithm is used which combine the best features of Laplacian operator and Sobel operator. Morphological opening operation and closing operation are used to compensate the loss of information.Experimental results show that this method is effective in the image processing, not only to restrain the information but also heighten contrast. It is beneficial for the following processing.

Impact of mismatched and misaligned laser light sheet profiles on PIV performance

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grayson, K.; de Silva, C. M.; Hutchins, N.; Marusic, I.

2018-01-01

The effect of mismatched or misaligned laser light sheet profiles on the quality of particle image velocimetry (PIV) results is considered in this study. Light sheet profiles with differing widths, shapes, or alignment can reduce the correlation between PIV images and increase experimental errors. Systematic PIV simulations isolate these behaviours to assess the sensitivity and implications of light sheet mismatch on measurements. The simulations in this work use flow fields from a turbulent boundary layer; however, the behaviours and impacts of laser profile mismatch are highly relevant to any fluid flow or PIV application. Experimental measurements from a turbulent boundary layer facility are incorporated, as well as additional simulations matched to experimental image characteristics, to validate the synthetic image analysis. Experimental laser profiles are captured using a modular laser profiling camera, designed to quantify the distribution of laser light sheet intensities and inform any corrective adjustments to an experimental configuration. Results suggest that an offset of just 1.35 standard deviations in the Gaussian light sheet intensity distributions can cause a 40% reduction in the average correlation coefficient and a 45% increase in spurious vectors. Errors in measured flow statistics are also amplified when two successive laser profiles are no longer well matched in alignment or intensity distribution. Consequently, an awareness of how laser light sheet overlap influences PIV results can guide faster setup of an experiment, as well as achieve superior experimental measurements.

The efficacy of mobile application use on recall of surgical risks in nasal bone fracture reduction surgery

PubMed Central

Kim, Choong Hyeon; Cheon, Ji Seon; Choi, Woo Young; Son, Kyung Min

2018-01-01

Background The number of surgical risks recalled by a patient after surgery can be used as a parameter for assessing how well the patient has understood the informed consent process. No study has investigated the usefulness of a self-developed mobile application in the traditional informed consent process in patients with a nasal bone fracture. This study aimed to investigate whether delivery of information, such as surgical risks, through a mobile application is more effective than delivery of information through only verbal means and a paper. Methods This prospective, randomized study included 60 patients with a nasal bone fracture. The experimental group (n=30) received preoperative explanation with the traditional informed consent process in addition to a mobile application, while the control group (n=30) received preoperative explanation with only the traditional informed consent process. Four weeks after surgery, the number of recalled surgical risks was compared for analysis. The following six surgical risks were explained: pain, bleeding, nasal deformity, numbness, nasal obstruction, and nasal cartilage necrosis. Results The mean number of recalled surgical risks among all patients was 1.58±0.56. The most frequently recalled surgical risk was nasal deformity in both groups. The mean number of recalled surgical risks was 1.72±0.52 in the experimental group and 1.49±0.57 in the control group. There was a significant association between mobile application use and the mean number of recalled surgical risks (p=0.047). Age, sex, and the level of education were not significantly associated with the mean number of recalled surgical risks. Conclusion This study found that a mobile application could contribute to the efficient delivery of information during the informed consent process. With further improvement, it could be used in other plastic surgeries and other surgeries, and such an application can potentially be used for explaining risks as well as delivering other types of information. PMID:29609431

The efficacy of mobile application use on recall of surgical risks in nasal bone fracture reduction surgery.

PubMed

Kim, Choong Hyeon; Cheon, Ji Seon; Choi, Woo Young; Son, Kyung Min

2018-03-01

The number of surgical risks recalled by a patient after surgery can be used as a parameter for assessing how well the patient has understood the informed consent process. No study has investigated the usefulness of a self-developed mobile application in the traditional informed consent process in patients with a nasal bone fracture. This study aimed to investigate whether delivery of information, such as surgical risks, through a mobile application is more effective than delivery of information through only verbal means and a paper. This prospective, randomized study included 60 patients with a nasal bone fracture. The experimental group (n=30) received preoperative explanation with the traditional informed consent process in addition to a mobile application, while the control group (n=30) received preoperative explanation with only the traditional informed consent process. Four weeks after surgery, the number of recalled surgical risks was compared for analysis. The following six surgical risks were explained: pain, bleeding, nasal deformity, numbness, nasal obstruction, and nasal cartilage necrosis. The mean number of recalled surgical risks among all patients was 1.58±0.56. The most frequently recalled surgical risk was nasal deformity in both groups. The mean number of recalled surgical risks was 1.72±0.52 in the experimental group and 1.49±0.57 in the control group. There was a significant association between mobile application use and the mean number of recalled surgical risks ( p =0.047). Age, sex, and the level of education were not significantly associated with the mean number of recalled surgical risks. This study found that a mobile application could contribute to the efficient delivery of information during the informed consent process. With further improvement, it could be used in other plastic surgeries and other surgeries, and such an application can potentially be used for explaining risks as well as delivering other types of information.

Development and utilization of complementary communication channels for treatment decision making and survivorship issues among cancer patients: The CIS Research Consortium Experience.

PubMed

Fleisher, Linda; Wen, Kuang Yi; Miller, Suzanne M; Diefenbach, Michael; Stanton, Annette L; Ropka, Mary; Morra, Marion; Raich, Peter C

2015-11-01

Cancer patients and survivors are assuming active roles in decision-making and digital patient support tools are widely used to facilitate patient engagement. As part of Cancer Information Service Research Consortium's randomized controlled trials focused on the efficacy of eHealth interventions to promote informed treatment decision-making for newly diagnosed prostate and breast cancer patients, and post-treatment breast cancer, we conducted a rigorous process evaluation to examine the actual use of and perceived benefits of two complementary communication channels -- print and eHealth interventions. The three Virtual Cancer Information Service (V-CIS) interventions were developed through a rigorous developmental process, guided by self-regulatory theory, informed decision-making frameworks, and health communications best practices. Control arm participants received NCI print materials; experimental arm participants received the additional V-CIS patient support tool. Actual usage data from the web-based V-CIS was also obtained and reported. Print materials were highly used by all groups. About 60% of the experimental group reported using the V-CIS. Those who did use the V-CIS rated it highly on improvements in knowledge, patient-provider communication and decision-making. The findings show that how patients actually use eHealth interventions either singularly or within the context of other communication channels is complex. Integrating rigorous best practices and theoretical foundations is essential and multiple communication approaches should be considered to support patient preferences.

Structure elucidation of nigricanoside A through enantioselective total synthesis† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Complete experimental details and characterization data. See DOI: 10.1039/c5sc00281h Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Chen, Jie; Koswatta, Panduka; DeBergh, J. Robb; Fu, Peng; Pan, Ende

2015-01-01

Nigricanoside A was isolated from green alga, and its dimethyl ester was found to display potent cytotoxicity. Its scarcity prevented a full structure elucidation, leaving total synthesis as the only means to determine its relative and absolute stereochemistry and to explore its biological activity. Here we assign the stereochemistry of the natural product through enantioselective total synthesis and provide initial studies of its cytotoxicity. PMID:26877863

Bayesian Inference in the Modern Design of Experiments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

DeLoach, Richard

2008-01-01

This paper provides an elementary tutorial overview of Bayesian inference and its potential for application in aerospace experimentation in general and wind tunnel testing in particular. Bayes Theorem is reviewed and examples are provided to illustrate how it can be applied to objectively revise prior knowledge by incorporating insights subsequently obtained from additional observations, resulting in new (posterior) knowledge that combines information from both sources. A logical merger of Bayesian methods and certain aspects of Response Surface Modeling is explored. Specific applications to wind tunnel testing, computational code validation, and instrumentation calibration are discussed.

An inlet analysis for the NASA hypersonic research engine aerothermodynamic integration model

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Andrews, E. H., Jr.; Russell, J. W.; Mackley, E. A.; Simmonds, A. L.

1974-01-01

A theoretical analysis for the inlet of the NASA Hypersonic Research Engine (HRE) Aerothermodynamic Integration Model (AIM) has been undertaken by use of a method-of-characteristics computer program. The purpose of the analysis was to obtain pretest information on the full-scale HRE inlet in support of the experimental AIM program (completed May 1974). Mass-flow-ratio and additive-drag-coefficient schedules were obtained that well defined the range effected in the AIM tests. Mass-weighted average inlet total-pressure recovery, kinetic energy efficiency, and throat Mach numbers were obtained.

Performance of Dental Ceramics

PubMed Central

Rekow, E.D.; Silva, N.R.F.A.; Coelho, P.G.; Zhang, Y.; Guess, P.; Thompson, V.P.

2011-01-01

The clinical success of modern dental ceramics depends on an array of factors, ranging from initial physical properties of the material itself, to the fabrication and clinical procedures that inevitably damage these brittle materials, and the oral environment. Understanding the influence of these factors on clinical performance has engaged the dental, ceramics, and engineering communities alike. The objective of this review is to first summarize clinical, experimental, and analytic results reported in the recent literature. Additionally, it seeks to address how this new information adds insight into predictive test procedures and reveals challenges for future improvements. PMID:21224408

Possibility of measuring Adler angles in charged current single pion neutrino-nucleus interactions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sánchez, F.

2016-05-01

Uncertainties in modeling neutrino-nucleus interactions are a major contribution to systematic errors in long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. Accurate modeling of neutrino interactions requires additional experimental observables such as the Adler angles which carry information about the polarization of the Δ resonance and the interference with nonresonant single pion production. The Adler angles were measured with limited statistics in bubble chamber neutrino experiments as well as in electron-proton scattering experiments. We discuss the viability of measuring these angles in neutrino interactions with nuclei.

Semantic shape similarity-based contour tracking evaluation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Xiaoqin; Luo, Wenhan; Zhao, Li; Li, Wei; Hu, Weiming

2011-10-01

One major problem of contour-based tracking is how to evaluate the accuracy of tracking results due to nonrigid and deformative properties of contours. We propose a shape context-based evaluation measure that considers the semantic shape similarity between the tracked contour and ground-truth contour. In addition, a pyramid match kernel is introduced for shape histogram matching, which can effectively deal with the contours with different scales. Experimental results demonstrate, compared to two start-of-art evaluation measures, our measure effectively captures the local shape information and thus is more consistent with human vision.

Lonomia obliqua venom: In vivo effects and molecular aspects associated with the hemorrhagic syndrome.

PubMed

Pinto, Antônio F M; Berger, Markus; Reck, José; Terra, Renata M S; Guimarães, Jorge A

2010-12-15

Caterpillar envenomation has been an emergent health issue. Lonomia obliqua is a medically important animal that causes a hemorrhagic syndrome that can progress to acute renal failure, intracranial hemorrhage and death. In the past few years the molecular characterization of L. obliqua venom in addition to experimental models has provided fundamental information to the understanding of the envenomation syndrome. Herein studies from several authors which characterized the complex toxic-pharmacological actions of whole venom are reviewed. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Disclosure of the quackery: testing of the bactericidal action of products based on the "hydronic" technology ("informed glass") on ATCC strains of Enterococcus faecalis, Salmonella enteritidis and Candida albicans.

PubMed

Aleksandar, Racz; Josip, Cipriš; Olivera, Petrak

2011-01-01

To disclose a quackery called "revitalisation of tired water by hydronic technology", scientific experiments have been conducted with drinking water kept in "ordinary, everyday-use" drinking glasses and so-called 'informed' glasses, a patent-protected product supposed to have an effect on the "structure, vitality and memory of water". Drinking "informed" water is claimed to have a wide range of positive revitalising health effects (blue informed glass), to facilitate weight loss (red informed glass) and to have a stress-relieving action (green informed glass). Allegedly, by the use of the "orgon methodology", information is coded into the glass, which action is additionally enforced by the addition of the "magic life" symbol - a specially designed energy condenser which, together with the selected information, is permanently introduced into the liquid contained in the glass. Since the manufacturer claimed the products to have a broad bactericidal action, regardless of the external conditions and completely independent from additional factor that would lead to the activation of the system, the efficacy of the informed drinking glass was tested using standardised, microbiological tests. Respecting the principle of a single-blind test for each of 5 samples of each type of the informed glass, growth reduction factor (RF) (difference log cfu/ml - colony per unit/ml of control glass and log cfu/ml of each informed glass) was determined after 0,2,4,6 and 8 h in spring water experimentally contaminated with standardised ATCC strains of two types of bacteria and one yeast. The results showed a statistically significant bactericidal action of the blue informed glass with all strains-Enterococcus faecalis (RF 0.62/0.76), Salmonella enteritidis (RF 0.87/0.97), and Candida albicans (RF 0.5/0.60) - as opposed to the red and green glasses where this effect was negligible (RF < 0.1). However, when the tests were repeated in complete darkness, none of the three informed glasses showed any bactericidal action. The obtained results indicate a fraud: bactericidal effect is rather a result of photocatalytic action of a hidden component used on purpose in the production of glass or subsequently applied by the use of nanotechnology (possibly antimony trioxide or titanium oxide) than of the so-called "orgon and hydronic technology".

Spectroscopic investigation of carbon migration with tungsten walls in ASDEX Upgrade

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kallenbach, A.; Dux, R.; Harhausen, J.; Maggi, C. F.; Neu, R.; Pütterich, T.; Rohde, V.; Schmid, K.; Wolfrum, E.; ASDEX Upgrade Team

2007-06-01

Spectroscopic measurements of carbon fluxes in the mainly tungsten-coated ASDEX Upgrade tokamak are analysed with a particle transport and migration code. The transport parameters for deuterium and carbon are calibrated against flux measurements for different experimental conditions. Additional information is obtained from the re-appearance time of carbon after a boronisation. The code reproduces the experimental finding that despite a 85% (2006 campaign) tungsten coverage of the primary PFCs, the carbon concentration in the core and edge plasma is reduced by about a factor 2 only compared to full carbon PFCs. This behaviour is explained by the strong main chamber recycling of carbon in comparison with the loss flux to the inner divertor. The quick recovery of the carbon level in the plasma after a boronisation is explained by carbon influx from the outer divertor.

Understanding the Doppler effect by analysing spectrograms of the sound of a passing vehicle

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lubyako, Dmitry; Martinez-Piedra, Gordon; Ushenin, Arthur; Denvir, Patrick; Dunlop, John; Hall, Alex; Le Roux, Gus; van Someren, Laurence; Weinberger, Harvey

2017-11-01

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how the Doppler effect can be analysed to deduce information about a moving source of sound waves. Specifically, we find the speed of a car and the distance of its closest approach to an observer using sound recordings from smartphones. A key focus of this paper is how this can be achieved in a classroom, both theoretically and experimentally, to deepen students’ understanding of the Doppler effect. Included are our own experimental data (48 sound recordings) to allow others to reproduce the analysis, if they cannot repeat the whole experiment themselves. In addition to its educational purpose, this paper examines the percentage errors in our results. This enabled us to determine sources of error, allowing those conducting similar future investigations to optimize their accuracy.

Experimental Studies of the Effect of Intent Information on Cockpit Traffic Displays

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Barhydt, Richard; Hansman, R. John

1997-01-01

Intent information provides knowledge of another aircraft's current and future trajectory states. Prototype traffic displays were designed for four different levels of intent: Position, Rate, Commanded State, and FMS (Flight Management System)-Path. The current TCAS (traffic collision avoidance systems) Display, which shows altitude rate in addition to current position and altitude, was used as a baseline and represents the lowest level of intent. The Rate, Commanded State, and FMS-Path Displays show increasing levels of intent information using TCAS-like symbology in addition to incorporating a conflict probe and profile view display. An initial experiment was run on the MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Part Task Flight Simulator in which eight airline pilots flew five traffic scenarios with each of the four displays. Results show that pilots had fewer separation violations and maneuvered earlier with the three intent displays. Separation violations were reduced when pilots maneuvered earlier. A second experiment was run to compare performance between displaying intent information directly and incorporating it into a conflict probe. A different set of eight airline pilots flew four traffic scenarios with the TCAS and Commanded State Displays with and without the conflict probe. Conflict probes with two minute and long range look-ahead times were tested. Displaying conflict bands or showing intent information directly both led to fewer separation violations and earlier avoidance maneuvers than the base TCAS Display. Performance was similar between the two minute and long range look-ahead conflict probes. Pilots preferred all intent displays over the TCAS Display.

Does oral health counseling effectively improve oral hygiene of orthodontic patients?

PubMed

Lalic, M; Aleksic, E; Gajic, M; Milic, J; Malesevic, D

2012-09-01

The aim of this study was to compare the effectiveness of oral health counseling sessions with traditional oral hygiene education in orthodontic patients with fixed appliances. randomised control trial with experimental and control group. A group of 99 adolescents with fixed orthodontic appliances were randomly assigned to oral health counseling (experimental) or traditional health education (control) group. Subjects in the control group received verbal instructions and a demonstration of the modified Bass brushing technique on a model. The experimental group also received the verbal information with demonstration on the model and in addition a personalised 40-minutes counseling session on oral hygiene. Plaque Index (PI) and gingivitis (G) were recorded before, 1 and 6 months after the counseling session/traditional education. Oral health counseling and traditional education improved the oral hygiene of orthodontic patients. PI values were significantly lower after 6 months compared to the baseline in both groups, but the prevalence of gingival inflammation remained significantly lower only in the experimental group. Oral health counseling increased plaque removal efficacy and control of gingival inflammation. The efficiency of counseling and traditional education was similar. Counseling is a promising approach that warrants further attention in a variety of dental contexts.

Towards a new kind of experimental psycho-aesthetics? Reflections on the Parallellepipeda project

PubMed Central

Wagemans, Johan

2011-01-01

Experimental psycho-aesthetics—the science aimed at understanding the factors that determine aesthetic experience—is reviewed briefly as background to describe the Parallellepipeda project, a cross-over project between artists and scientists in Leuven. In particular, I sketch how it started and developed further, with close interactions between the participating artists and scientists. A few examples of specific research projects are mentioned to illustrate the kind of research questions we address and the methodological approach we have taken. We often found an effect of providing participants with additional information, a difference between novice and expert participants, and a shift with increasing experience with an artwork, in the direction of tolerating more complexity and acquiring more order from it. By establishing more connections between parts of an artwork and more associations to the artwork, it becomes a stronger Gestalt, which is more easily mastered by the viewer and leads to increased appreciation. In the final part of the paper, I extract some general lessons from the project regarding a possible new way of doing psycho-aesthetics research, which is able to solve some of the problems of traditional experimental psycho-aesthetics (eg, trade-off between experimental control and ecological validity). PMID:23145251

Effectiveness of adolescent suicide prevention e-learning modules that aim to improve knowledge and self-confidence of gatekeepers: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

PubMed

Ghoncheh, Rezvan; Kerkhof, Ad J F M; Koot, Hans M

2014-02-08

Providing e-learning modules can be an effective strategy for enhancing gatekeepers' knowledge, self-confidence and skills in adolescent suicide prevention. The aim of this study was to test the effectiveness of an online training program called Mental Health Online which consists of eight short e-learning modules, each capturing an important aspect of the process of recognition, guidance and referral of suicidal adolescents (12-20 years). The primary outcomes of this study are participant's ratings on perceived knowledge, perceived self-confidence, and actual knowledge regarding adolescent suicidality. A randomized controlled trial will be carried out among 154 gatekeepers. After completing the first assessment (pre-test), participants will be randomly assigned to either the experimental group or the waitlist control group. One week after completing the first assessment the experimental group will have access to the website Mental Health Online containing the eight e-learning modules and additional information on adolescent suicide prevention. Participants in both conditions will be assessed 4 weeks after completing the first assessment (post-test), and 12 weeks after completing the post-test (follow-up). At post-test, participants from the experimental group are asked to complete an evaluation questionnaire on the modules. The waitlist control group will have access to the modules and additional information on the website after completing the follow-up assessment. Gatekeepers can benefit from e-learning modules on adolescent suicide prevention. This approach allows them to learn about this sensitive subject at their own pace and from any given location, as long as they have access to the Internet. Given the flexible nature of the program, each participant can compose his/her own training creating an instant customized course with the required steps in adolescent suicide prevention. Netherlands Trial Register NTR3625.

LOW-TEMPERATURE ION TRAP STUDIES OF N{sup +}({sup 3} P{sub ja} ) + H{sub 2}(j) {yields} NH{sup +} + H

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Zymak, I.; Hejduk, M.; Mulin, D.

2013-05-01

Using a low-temperature 22-pole ion trap apparatus, detailed measurements for the title reaction have been performed between 10 K and 100 K in order to get some state specific information about this fundamental hydrogen abstraction process. The relative population of the two lowest H{sub 2} rotational states, j = 0 and 1, has been varied systematically. NH{sup +} formation is nearly thermo-neutral; however, to date, the energetics are not known with the accuracy required for low-temperature astrochemistry. Additional complications arise from the fact that, so far, there is no reliable theoretical or experimental information on how the reactivity of themore » N{sup +} ion depends on its fine-structure (FS) state {sup 3} P{sub ja} . Since in the present trapping experiment, thermalization of the initially hot FS population competes with hydrogen abstraction, the evaluation of the decay of N{sup +} ions over long storage times and at various He and H{sub 2} gas densities provides information on these processes. First assuming strict adiabatic behavior, a set of state specific rate coefficients is derived from the measured thermal rate coefficients. In addition, by recording the disappearance of the N{sup +} ions over several orders of magnitude, information on nonadiabatic transitions is extracted including FS-changing collisions.« less

Addition of aluminium, zinc and magnesium hydrides to rhodium(iii)† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available. CCDC 1047853–1047855 1056989. For ESI and crystallographic data in CIF or other electronic format see DOI: 10.1039/c5sc01309g Click here for additional data file. Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Ekkert, Olga; White, Andrew J. P.; Toms, Harold

2015-01-01

We report the addition of M–H bonds (M = Al, Zn, Mg) to a Rh(iii) intermediate generated from the reductive elimination of triethylsilane from [Cp*Rh(H)2(SiEt3)2]. A series of new heterobimetallic complexes possessing Rh–M bonds have been isolated and characterised by a number of spectroscopic (1H, 29Si, 13C, 103Rh NMR, infrared, and X-ray diffraction) and computational techniques (NBO and QTAIM analysis). Experimental and computational data are consistent with cleavage of the M–H bond upon addition to rhodium with formation of new Rh–M and Rh–H bonds. Upon photolysis the Al analogue of this series undergoes a further elimination reaction producing triethylsilane and a highly unusual Rh2Al2H4 containing cluster proposed to contain an Al(i) bridging ligand. PMID:28757949

D-OPTIMAL EXPERIMENTAL DESIGNS TO TEST FOR DEPARTURE FROM ADDITIVITY IN A FIXED-RATIO MIXTURE RAY.

EPA Science Inventory

Humans are exposed to mixtures of environmental compounds. A regulatory assumption is that the mixtures of chemicals act in an additive manner. However, this assumption requires experimental validation. Traditional experimental designs (full factorial) require a large number of e...

How events determine spreading patterns: information transmission via internal and external influences on social networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Chuang; Zhan, Xiu-Xiu; Zhang, Zi-Ke; Sun, Gui-Quan; Hui, Pak Ming

2015-11-01

Recently, information transmission models motivated by the classical epidemic propagation, have been applied to a wide-range of social systems, generally assume that information mainly transmits among individuals via peer-to-peer interactions on social networks. In this paper, we consider one more approach for users to get information: the out-of-social-network influence. Empirical analyzes of eight typical events’ diffusion on a very large micro-blogging system, Sina Weibo, show that the external influence has significant impact on information spreading along with social activities. In addition, we propose a theoretical model to interpret the spreading process via both internal and external channels, considering three essential properties: (i) memory effect; (ii) role of spreaders; and (iii) non-redundancy of contacts. Experimental and mathematical results indicate that the information indeed spreads much quicker and broader with mutual effects of the internal and external influences. More importantly, the present model reveals that the event characteristic would highly determine the essential spreading patterns once the network structure is established. The results may shed some light on the in-depth understanding of the underlying dynamics of information transmission on real social networks.

Comprehensive Experimental and Computational Analysis of Binding Energy Hot Spots at the NF-κB Essential Modulator (NEMO)/IKKβ Protein-Protein Interface

PubMed Central

Golden, Mary S.; Cote, Shaun M.; Sayeg, Marianna; Zerbe, Brandon S.; Villar, Elizabeth A.; Beglov, Dmitri; Sazinsky, Stephen L.; Georgiadis, Rosina M.; Vajda, Sandor; Kozakov, Dima; Whitty, Adrian

2013-01-01

We report a comprehensive analysis of binding energy hot spots at the protein-protein interaction (PPI) interface between NF-κB Essential Modulator (NEMO) and IκB kinase subunit β (IKKβ), an interaction that is critical for NF-κB pathway signaling, using experimental alanine scanning mutagenesis and also the FTMap method for computational fragment screening. The experimental results confirm that the previously identified NBD region of IKKβ contains the highest concentration of hot spot residues, the strongest of which are W739, W741 and L742 (ΔΔG = 4.3, 3.5 and 3.2 kcal/mol, respectively). The region occupied by these residues defines a potentially druggable binding site on NEMO that extends for ~16 Å to additionally include the regions that bind IKKβ L737 and F734. NBD residues D738 and S740 are also important for binding but do not make direct contact with NEMO, instead likely acting to stabilize the active conformation of surrounding residues. We additionally found two previously unknown hot spot regions centered on IKKβ residues L708/V709 and L719/I723. The computational approach successfully identified all three hot spot regions on IKKβ. Moreover, the method was able to accurately quantify the energetic importance of all hot spots residues involving direct contact with NEMO. Our results provide new information to guide the discovery of small molecule inhibitors that target the NEMO/IKKβ interaction. They additionally clarify the structural and energetic complementarity between “pocket-forming” and “pocket occupying” hot spot residues, and further validate computational fragment mapping as a method for identifying hot spots at PPI interfaces. PMID:23506214

PHI-base: a new interface and further additions for the multi-species pathogen-host interactions database.

PubMed

Urban, Martin; Cuzick, Alayne; Rutherford, Kim; Irvine, Alistair; Pedro, Helder; Pant, Rashmi; Sadanadan, Vidyendra; Khamari, Lokanath; Billal, Santoshkumar; Mohanty, Sagar; Hammond-Kosack, Kim E

2017-01-04

The pathogen-host interactions database (PHI-base) is available at www.phi-base.org PHI-base contains expertly curated molecular and biological information on genes proven to affect the outcome of pathogen-host interactions reported in peer reviewed research articles. In addition, literature that indicates specific gene alterations that did not affect the disease interaction phenotype are curated to provide complete datasets for comparative purposes. Viruses are not included. Here we describe a revised PHI-base Version 4 data platform with improved search, filtering and extended data display functions. A PHIB-BLAST search function is provided and a link to PHI-Canto, a tool for authors to directly curate their own published data into PHI-base. The new release of PHI-base Version 4.2 (October 2016) has an increased data content containing information from 2219 manually curated references. The data provide information on 4460 genes from 264 pathogens tested on 176 hosts in 8046 interactions. Prokaryotic and eukaryotic pathogens are represented in almost equal numbers. Host species belong ∼70% to plants and 30% to other species of medical and/or environmental importance. Additional data types included into PHI-base 4 are the direct targets of pathogen effector proteins in experimental and natural host organisms. The curation problems encountered and the future directions of the PHI-base project are briefly discussed. © The Author(s) 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

76 FR 76422 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2011-12-07

...] Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental Study on Comparing Data Obtained From Landline Telephone and Cell Phone Surveys AGENCY: Food and Drug Administration... notice. This notice solicits comments on a study entitled ``Experimental Study on Comparing Data Obtained...

Fruit for dessert. How people compose healthier meals.

PubMed

Bucher, T; van der Horst, K; Siegrist, M

2013-01-01

The present study assessed whether factual nutritional information on portion sizes helps consumers to select healthier meals. 124 people were invited to serve themselves lunch from a 'fake food buffet' containing 55 replica food items. Participants in the control group were instructed to serve themselves a meal, as they would normally eat from the given selections (control). Participants in the second condition were asked to select a healthy, balanced meal (instruction). People in the third group were also instructed to select a healthy meal, but in addition, they received nutrition information (instruction+information). The results suggest that participants in the instruction and instruction+information condition chose fewer sweets and desserts (F((2,121))=6.91, P<.05) but more fruits (F((2,121))=5.16, P<.05). This led to overall healthier meals than in the control group. All other food categories, including vegetables, were not altered. No difference was found between the two experimental groups. The results indicate that factual nutrition information does not help consumers compose healthier meals. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Cognitive Task Analysis of Business Jet Pilots' Weather Flying Behaviors: Preliminary Results

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Latorella, Kara; Pliske, Rebecca; Hutton, Robert; Chrenka, Jason

2001-01-01

This report presents preliminary findings from a cognitive task analysis (CTA) of business aviation piloting. Results describe challenging weather-related aviation decisions and the information and cues used to support these decisions. Further, these results demonstrate the role of expertise in business aviation decision-making in weather flying, and how weather information is acquired and assessed for reliability. The challenging weather scenarios and novice errors identified in the results provide the basis for experimental scenarios and dependent measures to be used in future flight simulation evaluations of candidate aviation weather information systems. Finally, we analyzed these preliminary results to recommend design and training interventions to improve business aviation decision-making with weather information. The primary objective of this report is to present these preliminary findings and to document the extended CTA methodology used to elicit and represent expert business aviator decision-making with weather information. These preliminary findings will be augmented with results from additional subjects using this methodology. A summary of the complete results, absent the detailed treatment of methodology provided in this report, will be documented in a separate publication.

Annotating novel genes by integrating synthetic lethals and genomic information

PubMed Central

Schöner, Daniel; Kalisch, Markus; Leisner, Christian; Meier, Lukas; Sohrmann, Marc; Faty, Mahamadou; Barral, Yves; Peter, Matthias; Gruissem, Wilhelm; Bühlmann, Peter

2008-01-01

Background Large scale screening for synthetic lethality serves as a common tool in yeast genetics to systematically search for genes that play a role in specific biological processes. Often the amounts of data resulting from a single large scale screen far exceed the capacities of experimental characterization of every identified target. Thus, there is need for computational tools that select promising candidate genes in order to reduce the number of follow-up experiments to a manageable size. Results We analyze synthetic lethality data for arp1 and jnm1, two spindle migration genes, in order to identify novel members in this process. To this end, we use an unsupervised statistical method that integrates additional information from biological data sources, such as gene expression, phenotypic profiling, RNA degradation and sequence similarity. Different from existing methods that require large amounts of synthetic lethal data, our method merely relies on synthetic lethality information from two single screens. Using a Multivariate Gaussian Mixture Model, we determine the best subset of features that assign the target genes to two groups. The approach identifies a small group of genes as candidates involved in spindle migration. Experimental testing confirms the majority of our candidates and we present she1 (YBL031W) as a novel gene involved in spindle migration. We applied the statistical methodology also to TOR2 signaling as another example. Conclusion We demonstrate the general use of Multivariate Gaussian Mixture Modeling for selecting candidate genes for experimental characterization from synthetic lethality data sets. For the given example, integration of different data sources contributes to the identification of genetic interaction partners of arp1 and jnm1 that play a role in the same biological process. PMID:18194531

Persistent four-coordinate iron-centered radical stabilized by π-donation† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental, crystallographic, computational details, and crystal data for 2, 4, 5 and 8. CCDC 1057111–1057113 and 1425703. For ESI and crystallographic data in CIF or other electronic format see DOI: 10.1039/c5sc02601f Click here for additional data file. Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Ishida, Shintaro; Hirakawa, Fumiya; Shiota, Yoshihito; Yoshizawa, Kazunari; Kanegawa, Shinji; Sato, Osamu; Nagashima, Hideo

2016-01-01

Dinuclear iron carbonyl complex 2, which contains an elongated unsupported Fe–Fe bond, was synthesized by the reaction between Fe2(CO)9 and phosphinyl radical 1. Thermal Fe–Fe bond homolysis led to the generation of a four-coordinate carbonyl-based iron-centered radical, 3, which is stabilized by π-donation. Complex 3 exhibited high reactivity toward organic radicals to form diamagnetic five-coordinate Fe(ii) complexes. PMID:28758000

Evaluation of diffusion kurtosis imaging in ex vivo hypomyelinated mouse brains.

PubMed

Kelm, Nathaniel D; West, Kathryn L; Carson, Robert P; Gochberg, Daniel F; Ess, Kevin C; Does, Mark D

2016-01-01

Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), diffusion kurtosis imaging (DKI), and DKI-derived white matter tract integrity metrics (WMTI) were experimentally evaluated ex vivo through comparisons to histological measurements and established magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) measures of myelin in two knockout mouse models with varying degrees of hypomyelination. DKI metrics of mean and radial kurtosis were found to be better indicators of myelin content than conventional DTI metrics. The biophysical WMTI model based on the DKI framework reported on axon water fraction with good accuracy in cases with near normal axon density, but did not provide additional specificity to myelination. Overall, DKI provided additional information regarding white matter microstructure compared with DTI, making it an attractive method for future assessments of white matter development and pathology. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

A multi-stimuli responsive switch as a fluorescent molecular analogue of transistors† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Detailed experimental procedures and additional data on the characterization of 1. See DOI: 10.1039/c5sc03395k Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Gallardo, Iluminada; Morais, Sandy; Prats, Gemma

2016-01-01

Although the quantum nature of molecules makes them specially suitable for mimicking the operation of digital electronic elements, molecular compounds can also be envisioned to emulate the behavior of analog devices. In this work we report a novel fluorescent three-state switch capable of reproducing the analog response of transistors, an ubiquitous device in modern electronics. Exploiting the redox and thermal sensitivity of this compound, the amplitude of its fluorescence emission can be continuously modulated, in a similar way as the output current in a transistor is amplified by the gate-to-source voltage. PMID:28959394

Redox-promoted associative assembly of metal–organic materials† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental procedures, compound characterization data, and X-ray crystallographic data for compounds 3–7 and 9–11. CCDC 1405641–1405645, 1429643, 1405647 and 1405648. For ESI and crystallographic data in CIF or other electronic format see DOI: 10.1039/c5sc02214b Click here for additional data file. Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Glavinović, Martin; Qi, Feng; Katsenis, Athanassios D.

2016-01-01

We develop an associative synthesis of metal–organic materials that combines solid-state metal oxidation and coordination-driven self-assembly into a one-step, waste-free transformation. The methodology hinges on the unique reactivity of ortho-quinones, which we introduce as versatile oxidants for mechanochemical synthesis. Our strategy opens a previously unexplored route to paramagnetic metal–organic materials from elementary metals. PMID:28791114

Modular chiral gold(i) phosphite complexes†Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental results and NMR data. CCDC 933751 (L11(AuCl)), 933752 (L12(AuCl)a), 933753 (L9(AuCl)), 933754 (L10(AuCl)), 933756 (L8(AuCl)), 933757 (L12(AuCl)e). For ESI and crystallographic data in CIF or other electronic format see DOI: 10.1039/c3cy00250kClick here for additional data file.Click here for additional data file.

PubMed

Delpont, Nicolas; Escofet, Imma; Pérez-Galán, Patricia; Spiegl, Dirk; Raducan, Mihai; Bour, Christophe; Sinisi, Riccardo; Echavarren, Antonio M

2013-10-07

Chiral gold(i) phosphite complexes are readily prepared modularly from 3,3'-bis(triphenylsilyl)-1,1'-bi-2-naphthol. These chiral gold(i) phosphite complexes are very reactive precatalysts for the [4+2] cycloaddition of aryl-substituted 1,6-enynes with enantiomeric ratios ranging from 86 : 14 up to 94 : 6.

14 CFR 437.95 - Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION LICENSING EXPERIMENTAL PERMITS Terms and Conditions of an Experimental Permit § 437.95 Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets. A permittee may launch or reenter additional reusable suborbital rockets of the same design under the permit after...

14 CFR 437.95 - Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION LICENSING EXPERIMENTAL PERMITS Terms and Conditions of an Experimental Permit § 437.95 Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets. A permittee may launch or reenter additional reusable suborbital rockets of the same design under the permit after...

14 CFR 437.95 - Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION LICENSING EXPERIMENTAL PERMITS Terms and Conditions of an Experimental Permit § 437.95 Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets. A permittee may launch or reenter additional reusable suborbital rockets of the same design under the permit after...

14 CFR 437.95 - Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION LICENSING EXPERIMENTAL PERMITS Terms and Conditions of an Experimental Permit § 437.95 Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets. A permittee may launch or reenter additional reusable suborbital rockets of the same design under the permit after...

14 CFR 437.95 - Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION LICENSING EXPERIMENTAL PERMITS Terms and Conditions of an Experimental Permit § 437.95 Inspection of additional reusable suborbital rockets. A permittee may launch or reenter additional reusable suborbital rockets of the same design under the permit after...

Developing a hybrid dictionary-based bio-entity recognition technique.

PubMed

Song, Min; Yu, Hwanjo; Han, Wook-Shin

2015-01-01

Bio-entity extraction is a pivotal component for information extraction from biomedical literature. The dictionary-based bio-entity extraction is the first generation of Named Entity Recognition (NER) techniques. This paper presents a hybrid dictionary-based bio-entity extraction technique. The approach expands the bio-entity dictionary by combining different data sources and improves the recall rate through the shortest path edit distance algorithm. In addition, the proposed technique adopts text mining techniques in the merging stage of similar entities such as Part of Speech (POS) expansion, stemming, and the exploitation of the contextual cues to further improve the performance. The experimental results show that the proposed technique achieves the best or at least equivalent performance among compared techniques, GENIA, MESH, UMLS, and combinations of these three resources in F-measure. The results imply that the performance of dictionary-based extraction techniques is largely influenced by information resources used to build the dictionary. In addition, the edit distance algorithm shows steady performance with three different dictionaries in precision whereas the context-only technique achieves a high-end performance with three difference dictionaries in recall.

An Improved Multi-Sensor Fusion Navigation Algorithm Based on the Factor Graph

PubMed Central

Zeng, Qinghua; Chen, Weina; Liu, Jianye; Wang, Huizhe

2017-01-01

An integrated navigation system coupled with additional sensors can be used in the Micro Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (MUAV) applications because the multi-sensor information is redundant and complementary, which can markedly improve the system accuracy. How to deal with the information gathered from different sensors efficiently is an important problem. The fact that different sensors provide measurements asynchronously may complicate the processing of these measurements. In addition, the output signals of some sensors appear to have a non-linear character. In order to incorporate these measurements and calculate a navigation solution in real time, the multi-sensor fusion algorithm based on factor graph is proposed. The global optimum solution is factorized according to the chain structure of the factor graph, which allows for a more general form of the conditional probability density. It can convert the fusion matter into connecting factors defined by these measurements to the graph without considering the relationship between the sensor update frequency and the fusion period. An experimental MUAV system has been built and some experiments have been performed to prove the effectiveness of the proposed method. PMID:28335570

Developing a hybrid dictionary-based bio-entity recognition technique

PubMed Central

2015-01-01

Background Bio-entity extraction is a pivotal component for information extraction from biomedical literature. The dictionary-based bio-entity extraction is the first generation of Named Entity Recognition (NER) techniques. Methods This paper presents a hybrid dictionary-based bio-entity extraction technique. The approach expands the bio-entity dictionary by combining different data sources and improves the recall rate through the shortest path edit distance algorithm. In addition, the proposed technique adopts text mining techniques in the merging stage of similar entities such as Part of Speech (POS) expansion, stemming, and the exploitation of the contextual cues to further improve the performance. Results The experimental results show that the proposed technique achieves the best or at least equivalent performance among compared techniques, GENIA, MESH, UMLS, and combinations of these three resources in F-measure. Conclusions The results imply that the performance of dictionary-based extraction techniques is largely influenced by information resources used to build the dictionary. In addition, the edit distance algorithm shows steady performance with three different dictionaries in precision whereas the context-only technique achieves a high-end performance with three difference dictionaries in recall. PMID:26043907

An Improved Multi-Sensor Fusion Navigation Algorithm Based on the Factor Graph.

PubMed

Zeng, Qinghua; Chen, Weina; Liu, Jianye; Wang, Huizhe

2017-03-21

An integrated navigation system coupled with additional sensors can be used in the Micro Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (MUAV) applications because the multi-sensor information is redundant and complementary, which can markedly improve the system accuracy. How to deal with the information gathered from different sensors efficiently is an important problem. The fact that different sensors provide measurements asynchronously may complicate the processing of these measurements. In addition, the output signals of some sensors appear to have a non-linear character. In order to incorporate these measurements and calculate a navigation solution in real time, the multi-sensor fusion algorithm based on factor graph is proposed. The global optimum solution is factorized according to the chain structure of the factor graph, which allows for a more general form of the conditional probability density. It can convert the fusion matter into connecting factors defined by these measurements to the graph without considering the relationship between the sensor update frequency and the fusion period. An experimental MUAV system has been built and some experiments have been performed to prove the effectiveness of the proposed method.

PROXiMATE: a database of mutant protein-protein complex thermodynamics and kinetics.

PubMed

Jemimah, Sherlyn; Yugandhar, K; Michael Gromiha, M

2017-09-01

We have developed PROXiMATE, a database of thermodynamic data for more than 6000 missense mutations in 174 heterodimeric protein-protein complexes, supplemented with interaction network data from STRING database, solvent accessibility, sequence, structural and functional information, experimental conditions and literature information. Additional features include complex structure visualization, search and display options, download options and a provision for users to upload their data. The database is freely available at http://www.iitm.ac.in/bioinfo/PROXiMATE/ . The website is implemented in Python, and supports recent versions of major browsers such as IE10, Firefox, Chrome and Opera. gromiha@iitm.ac.in. Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online. © The Author (2017). Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com

An information theory approach to the density of the earth

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Graber, M. A.

1977-01-01

Information theory can develop a technique which takes experimentally determined numbers and produces a uniquely specified best density model satisfying those numbers. A model was generated using five numerical parameters: the mass of the earth, its moment of inertia, three zero-node torsional normal modes (L = 2, 8, 26). In order to determine the stability of the solution, six additional densities were generated, in each of which the period of one of the three normal modes was increased or decreased by one standard deviation. The superposition of the seven models is shown. It indicates that current knowledge of the torsional modes is sufficient to specify the density in the upper mantle but that the lower mantle and core will require smaller standard deviations before they can be accurately specified.

Towards Emotion Detection in Educational Scenarios from Facial Expressions and Body Movements through Multimodal Approaches

PubMed Central

Saneiro, Mar; Salmeron-Majadas, Sergio

2014-01-01

We report current findings when considering video recordings of facial expressions and body movements to provide affective personalized support in an educational context from an enriched multimodal emotion detection approach. In particular, we describe an annotation methodology to tag facial expression and body movements that conform to changes in the affective states of learners while dealing with cognitive tasks in a learning process. The ultimate goal is to combine these annotations with additional affective information collected during experimental learning sessions from different sources such as qualitative, self-reported, physiological, and behavioral information. These data altogether are to train data mining algorithms that serve to automatically identify changes in the learners' affective states when dealing with cognitive tasks which help to provide emotional personalized support. PMID:24892055

High-fidelity video and still-image communication based on spectral information: natural vision system and its applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yamaguchi, Masahiro; Haneishi, Hideaki; Fukuda, Hiroyuki; Kishimoto, Junko; Kanazawa, Hiroshi; Tsuchida, Masaru; Iwama, Ryo; Ohyama, Nagaaki

2006-01-01

In addition to the great advancement of high-resolution and large-screen imaging technology, the issue of color is now receiving considerable attention as another aspect than the image resolution. It is difficult to reproduce the original color of subject in conventional imaging systems, and that obstructs the applications of visual communication systems in telemedicine, electronic commerce, and digital museum. To breakthrough the limitation of conventional RGB 3-primary systems, "Natural Vision" project aims at an innovative video and still-image communication technology with high-fidelity color reproduction capability, based on spectral information. This paper summarizes the results of NV project including the development of multispectral and multiprimary imaging technologies and the experimental investigations on the applications to medicine, digital archives, electronic commerce, and computer graphics.

Attributed community mining using joint general non-negative matrix factorization with graph Laplacian

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Zigang; Li, Lixiang; Peng, Haipeng; Liu, Yuhong; Yang, Yixian

2018-04-01

Community mining for complex social networks with link and attribute information plays an important role according to different application needs. In this paper, based on our proposed general non-negative matrix factorization (GNMF) algorithm without dimension matching constraints in our previous work, we propose the joint GNMF with graph Laplacian (LJGNMF) to implement community mining of complex social networks with link and attribute information according to different application needs. Theoretical derivation result shows that the proposed LJGNMF is fully compatible with previous methods of integrating traditional NMF and symmetric NMF. In addition, experimental results show that the proposed LJGNMF can meet the needs of different community minings by adjusting its parameters, and the effect is better than traditional NMF in the community vertices attributes entropy.

Towards emotion detection in educational scenarios from facial expressions and body movements through multimodal approaches.

PubMed

Saneiro, Mar; Santos, Olga C; Salmeron-Majadas, Sergio; Boticario, Jesus G

2014-01-01

We report current findings when considering video recordings of facial expressions and body movements to provide affective personalized support in an educational context from an enriched multimodal emotion detection approach. In particular, we describe an annotation methodology to tag facial expression and body movements that conform to changes in the affective states of learners while dealing with cognitive tasks in a learning process. The ultimate goal is to combine these annotations with additional affective information collected during experimental learning sessions from different sources such as qualitative, self-reported, physiological, and behavioral information. These data altogether are to train data mining algorithms that serve to automatically identify changes in the learners' affective states when dealing with cognitive tasks which help to provide emotional personalized support.

Effective presentation of health care performance information for consumer decision making: A systematic review.

PubMed

Kurtzman, Ellen T; Greene, Jessica

2016-01-01

This systematic review synthesizes what is known about the effective presentation of health care performance information for consumer decision making. Six databases were searched for articles published in English between September 2003 and April 2014. Experimental studies comparing consumers' responses to performance information when one or more presentation feature was altered were included. A thematic analysis was performed and practical guidelines derived. All 31 articles retained, the majority which tested responses to various presentations of health care cost and/or quality information, found that consumers better understand and make more informed choices when the information display is less complex. Simplification can be achieved by reducing the quantity of choices, displaying results in a positive direction, using non-technical language and evaluative elements, and situating results in common contexts. While findings do not offer a prescriptive design, this synthesis informs approaches to enhancing the presentation of health care performance information and areas that merit additional research. Guidelines derived from these results can be used to enhance health care performance reports for consumer decision making including using recognizable, evaluative graphics and customizable formats, limiting the amount of information presented, and testing presentation formats prior to use. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

The use of real-time optical feedback to improve outcomes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Magaña, Isidro B.; Adhikari, Pratik; Yendluri, Raghuvara B.; Goodrich, Glenn P.; Schwartz, Jon A.; O'Neal, D. P.

2014-03-01

More than a decade into the development of gold nanoparticles for cancer therapies, with multiple clinical trials underway, ongoing pre-clinical research continues towards better understanding in vivo interactions with the goal of treatment optimization through improved best practices. In an effort to collect information for healthcare providers, enabling informed decisions in a relevant time frame, instrumentation for real-time plasma concentration (multi-wavelength pulse photometry) and protocols for rapid elemental analysis (energy dispersive X-Ray fluorescence) of biopsied tumor tissue have been developed in a murine model. An initial analysis, designed to demonstrate the robust nature and utility of the techniques, revealed that area under the bioavailability curve (AUC) alone does not currently inform tumor accumulation with a high degree of accuracy (R2=0.32), This finding suggests that the control of additional experimental and physiological variables may yield more predictable tumor accumulation. Subject core temperature are blood pressure were monitored, but did not demonstrate clear trends. An effort to modulate AUC has produced an adjuvant therapy which is employed to enhance circulation parameters, including the AUC, of nanorods and gold nanoshells. Preliminary studies demonstrated a greater than 300% increase in average AUC through the use of a reticuloendothelial blockade agent versus control groups. Given a better understanding of the relative importance of the physiological factors which impact rates of tumor accumulation, a proposed set of experimental best practices is presented.

Food and the consumer: could labelling be the answer?

PubMed

Kerr, Maeve A; McCann, Mary T; Livingstone, M Barbara E

2015-05-01

Extensive research into the impact of nutrition labelling across Europe has shown that many consumers can effectively use a nutrition label to rank a food for healthiness. The present paper considers observational and laboratory evidence which has examined the impact of nutrition labelling (on food packaging and at point of purchase) on dietary behaviour. In addition, the potential counterproductive effects of foods bearing 'healthy' nutrition labels are examined. The observational evidence provides a useful insight into the key characteristics of nutrition label use. Those most likely to engage with nutrition labels are more likely to have a diet related disease and/or be on a weight loss diet and have a good overall diet quality. Experimental evidence, while limited, suggests that serving size information may be overlooked by consumers. In fact, there may be a tendency among consumers to overeat foods that are perceived to be healthier. The findings from the present paper suggest that if nutrition labelling is to be considered a strategy to facilitate consumers in managing their energy intake, it must coincide with salient, consistent and simple serving size information on the front of food packages and at the point of purchase. There is a clear need for more experimental research using robust methodologies, to examine the impact of nutrition information on dietary intake. In the meantime, there should be greater attention given to portion size within national dietary guidance.

A universal denoising and peak picking algorithm for LC-MS based on matched filtration in the chromatographic time domain.

PubMed

Andreev, Victor P; Rejtar, Tomas; Chen, Hsuan-Shen; Moskovets, Eugene V; Ivanov, Alexander R; Karger, Barry L

2003-11-15

A new denoising and peak picking algorithm (MEND, matched filtration with experimental noise determination) for analysis of LC-MS data is described. The algorithm minimizes both random and chemical noise in order to determine MS peaks corresponding to sample components. Noise characteristics in the data set are experimentally determined and used for efficient denoising. MEND is shown to enable low-intensity peaks to be detected, thus providing additional useful information for sample analysis. The process of denoising, performed in the chromatographic time domain, does not distort peak shapes in the m/z domain, allowing accurate determination of MS peak centroids, including low-intensity peaks. MEND has been applied to denoising of LC-MALDI-TOF-MS and LC-ESI-TOF-MS data for tryptic digests of protein mixtures. MEND is shown to suppress chemical and random noise and baseline fluctuations, as well as filter out false peaks originating from the matrix (MALDI) or mobile phase (ESI). In addition, MEND is shown to be effective for protein expression analysis by allowing selection of a large number of differentially expressed ICAT pairs, due to increased signal-to-noise ratio and mass accuracy.

Transatmospheric vehicle research

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Adelman, Henry G.; Cambier, Jean-Luc

1990-01-01

Research was conducted into the alternatives to the supersonic combustion ramjet (scramjet) engine for hypersonic flight. A new engine concept, the Oblique Detonation Wave Engine (ODWE) was proposed and explored analytically and experimentally. Codes were developed which can couple the fluid dynamics of supersonic flow with strong shock waves, with the finite rate chemistry necessary to model the detonation process. An additional study was conducted which compared the performance of a hypersonic vehicle powered by a scramjet or an ODWE. Engineering models of the overall performances of the two engines are included. This information was fed into a trajectory program which optimized the flight path to orbit. A third code calculated the vehicle size, weight, and aerodynamic characteristics. The experimental work was carried out in the Ames 20MW arc-jet wind tunnel, focusing on mixing and combustion of fuel injected into a supersonic airstream. Several injector designs were evaluated by sampling the stream behind the injectors and analyzing the mixture with an on-line mass spectrometer. In addition, an attempt was made to create a standing oblique detonation wave in the wind tunnel using hydrogen fuel. It appeared that the conditions in the test chamber were marginal for the generation of oblique detonation waves.

Lithium Battery Transient Response as a Diagnostic Tool

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Denisov, E.; Nigmatullin, R.; Evdokimov, Y.; Timergalina, G.

2018-05-01

Lithium batteries are currently used as the main energy storage for electronic devices. Progress in the field of portable electronic devices is significantly determined by the improvement of their weight/dimensional characteristics and specific capacity. In addition to the high reliability required of lithium batteries, in some critical applications proper diagnostics are required. Corresponding techniques allow prediction and prevention of operation interruption and avoidance of expensive battery replacement, and also provide additional benefits. Many effective diagnostic methods have been suggested; however, most of them require expensive experimental equipment, as well as interruption or strong perturbation of the operating mode. In the framework of this investigation, a simple diagnostic method based on analysis of transient processes is proposed. The transient response is considered as a reaction to an applied load variation that typically corresponds to normal operating conditions for most real applications. The transient response contains the same information as the impedance characteristic for the system operating in linear mode. Taking into account the large number of publications describing the impedance response associated with diagnostic methods, it can be assumed that the transient response contains a sufficient amount of information for creation of effective diagnostic systems. The proposed experimental installation is based on a controlled load, providing current variation, measuring equipment, and data processing electronics. It is proposed to use the second exponent parameters U 2 and β to estimate the state of charge for secondary lithium batteries. The proposed method improves the accuracy and reliability of a set of quantitative parameters associated with electrochemical energy sources.

Minor head injury: pathophysiological or iatrogenic sequelae?

PubMed Central

Newcombe, F; Rabbitt, P; Briggs, M

1994-01-01

This study addresses the possibility that cognitive sequelae--albeit of a transient or minor character--can be associated with mild head injury. Twenty men (aged 16-30 years of age), whose post-traumatic amnesia did not exceed eight hours, were examined within 48 hours of their accident and again one month later. This unselected sample had no previous history of head injury. A control group of 20 men of similar socioeconomic background, was selected from medical wards (where they had been admitted for orthopaedic treatment or a minor operation). They were also retested one month after the first examination. Neuropsychological tests were selected to measure abilities often compromised after significant head injury, namely memory and attention. The experimental component consisted of the fractionation of a complex skill (paced addition) to probe for deficits at different stages of information processing: perception and input into storage; search for and retrieval of information from working memory; and paced and unpaced addition. In general, no significant difference was found between the experimental and control groups, with the possible exception of an initial decrement on two working memory tasks: probe digits and a keeping track task (where the subject has to keep in mind and update a number of variables at the same time). The keeping track paradigm, ostensibly of ecological relevance, may well be worth further exploration in memory research, and in studies of more severely head-injured patients. It is further suggested that the appropriate management and counselling of mildly head-injured patients may help to avert symptoms that are of psychological rather than pathophysiological origin. PMID:8006652

SimRNA: a coarse-grained method for RNA folding simulations and 3D structure prediction.

PubMed

Boniecki, Michal J; Lach, Grzegorz; Dawson, Wayne K; Tomala, Konrad; Lukasz, Pawel; Soltysinski, Tomasz; Rother, Kristian M; Bujnicki, Janusz M

2016-04-20

RNA molecules play fundamental roles in cellular processes. Their function and interactions with other biomolecules are dependent on the ability to form complex three-dimensional (3D) structures. However, experimental determination of RNA 3D structures is laborious and challenging, and therefore, the majority of known RNAs remain structurally uncharacterized. Here, we present SimRNA: a new method for computational RNA 3D structure prediction, which uses a coarse-grained representation, relies on the Monte Carlo method for sampling the conformational space, and employs a statistical potential to approximate the energy and identify conformations that correspond to biologically relevant structures. SimRNA can fold RNA molecules using only sequence information, and, on established test sequences, it recapitulates secondary structure with high accuracy, including correct prediction of pseudoknots. For modeling of complex 3D structures, it can use additional restraints, derived from experimental or computational analyses, including information about secondary structure and/or long-range contacts. SimRNA also can be used to analyze conformational landscapes and identify potential alternative structures. © The Author(s) 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

Statistics of Scientific Procedures on Living Animals 2014: A new format, and hopefully a new era of diminishing animal experimentation?

PubMed

Hudson-Shore, Michelle

2016-03-01

The Annual Statistics of Scientific Procedures on Living Animals Great Britain 2014 reports a welcome decline in animal experimentation in the UK. However, caution has to be exercised when interpreting these most recent figures, due to the significant changes made to satisfy the requirements of Directive 2010/63/EU as to what information is reported and how it is reported. Comparisons to the figures and trends reported in previous years is difficult, so this paper focuses on the specifics of the current report, providing information on overall animal use and highlighting specific issues associated with genetically-altered animals, fish and primates. There is a detailed discussion of the extent of the changes, commenting on the benefits and disadvantages of the new format, in areas such as severity of procedures, legislation and techniques of special interest. It also considers the consequences of the changes on the effective monitoring of laboratory animal use, the openness and transparency regarding the impacts of animal use, and the implementation of Three Rs initiatives. In addition, suggestions for further improvements to the new format are made to the Home Office. 2016 FRAME.

FROGS (Friends of Granites) report

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Miller, Calvin

This VGP News, which is devoted to petrology, is a good one for noting the existence of FROGS. FROGS is, as the name suggests, an informal organization of people whose research relates in one way or another to granitic rocks. Its purpose has been to promote communication among geoscientists with different perspectives and concerns about felsic plutonism. Initially, a major focus was experimental petrology and integration of field-oriented and lab-oriented viewpoints; now that there is the opportunity to communicate with the Eos readership, an obvious additional goal will be to bring together volcanic and plutonic views of felsic magmatism.FROGS first gathered in late 1982 under the guidance of E-an Zen and Pete Toulmin (both at U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), Reston, Va.), who saw a need for greater interaction among those interested in granites and for renewed, focused experimental investigations. They produced two newsletters (which were sent out by direct mail) and organized an informal meeting at the Geological Society of America meeting at Indianapolis, Ind., and then turned over the FROG reins to Sue Kieffer (USGS, Flagstaff, Ariz.) and John Clemens (Arizona State University, Tempe). They generated another newsletter, which was directly mailed to a readership that had grown beyond 200.

Development and Evaluation of Sensor Concepts for Ageless Aerospace Vehicles: Report 5 - Phase 2 Implementation of the Concept Demonstrator

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Batten, Adam; Dunlop, John; Edwards, Graeme; Farmer, Tony; Gaffney, Bruce; Hedley, Mark; Hoschke, Nigel; Isaacs, Peter; Johnson, Mark; Lewis, Chris;

Quantification of Wear and Deformation in Different Configurations of Polyethylene Acetabular Cups Using Micro X-ray Computed Tomography

PubMed Central

Affatato, Saverio; Zanini, Filippo; Carmignato, Simone

2017-01-01

Wear is currently quantified as mass loss of the bearing materials measured using gravimetric methods. However, this method does not provide other information, such as volumetric loss or surface deviation. In this work, we validated a technique to quantify polyethylene wear in three different batches of ultrahigh-molecular-polyethylene acetabular cups used for hip implants using nondestructive microcomputed tomography. Three different configurations of polyethylene acetabular cups, previously tested under the ISO 14242 parameters, were tested on a hip simulator for an additional 2 million cycles using a modified ISO 14242 load waveform. In this context, a new approach was proposed in order to simulate, on a hip joint simulator, high-demand activities. In addition, the effects of these activities were analyzed in terms of wear and deformations of those polyethylenes by means of gravimetric method and micro X-ray computed tomography. In particular, while the gravimetric method was used for weight loss assessment, microcomputed tomography allowed for acquisition of additional quantitative information about the evolution of local wear and deformation through three-dimensional surface deviation maps for the entire cups’ surface. Experimental results showed that the wear and deformation behavior of these materials change according to different mechanical simulations. PMID:28772616

76 FR 11788 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Infant Formula...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2011-03-03

... technology. Infant Formula Label Statements Experimental Study--(OMB Control Number 0910-NEW) FDA is planning... Statements Experimental Study will collect information from four groups: Pregnant women, mothers of infants... Statements Experimental Study AGENCY: Food and Drug Administration, HHS. ACTION: Notice. SUMMARY: The Food...

75 FR 23775 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Collection; Comment Request; Experimental...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-05-04

... for research entitled ``Experimental Study of Patient Information Prototypes.'' This study is designed..., the working group refined several prototypes and designed a study to investigate the usefulness of... Design and Protocol The study is experimental and will have two independent variables in a 3 x 2 design...

Website Use and Effects of Online Information About Tobacco Additives Among the Dutch General Population: A Randomized Controlled Trial

PubMed Central

Crutzen, Rik; Kienhuis, Anne S; Talhout, Reinskje; de Vries, Hein

2017-01-01

Background As a legal obligation, the Dutch government publishes online information about tobacco additives to make sure that it is publicly available. Little is known about the influence this website (”tabakinfo”) has on visitors and how the website is evaluated by them. Objective This study assesses how visitors use the website and its effect on their knowledge, risk perception, attitude, and smoking behavior. The study will also assess how the website is evaluated by visitors using a sample of the Dutch general population, including smokers and nonsmokers. Methods A randomized controlled trial was conducted, recruiting participants from an online panel. At baseline, participants (N=672) were asked to fill out an online questionnaire about tobacco additives. Next, participants were randomly allocated to either one of two experimental groups and invited to visit the website providing information about tobacco additives (either with or without a database containing product-specific information) or to a control group that had no access to the website. After 3 months, follow-up measurements took place. Results At follow-up (n=492), no statistically significant differences were found for knowledge, risk perception, attitude, or smoking behavior between the intervention and control groups. Website visits were positively related to younger participants (B=–0.07, 95% CI –0.12 to –0.01; t11=–2.43, P=.02) and having a low risk perception toward tobacco additives (B=–0.32, 95% CI –0.63 to –0.02; t11=–2.07, P=.04). In comparison, having a lower education (B=–0.67, 95% CI –1.14 to –0.17; t11=–2.65, P=.01) was a significant predictor for making less use of the website. Furthermore, the website was evaluated less positively by smokers compared to nonsmokers (t324=–3.55, P<.001), and males compared to females (t324=–2.21, P=.02). Conclusions The website did not change perceptions of tobacco additives or smoking behavior. Further research is necessary to find out how online information can be used to effectively communication about the risks of tobacco additives. Trial Registration Nederlands Trial Register NTR4620; http://www.trialregister.nl/trialreg/admin/rctview.asp?TC=4620 (Archived by WebCite at http://www.webcitation.org/6oW7w4Gnj) PMID:28292739

Website Use and Effects of Online Information About Tobacco Additives Among the Dutch General Population: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

PubMed

Reinwand, Dominique A; Crutzen, Rik; Kienhuis, Anne S; Talhout, Reinskje; de Vries, Hein

2017-03-14

As a legal obligation, the Dutch government publishes online information about tobacco additives to make sure that it is publicly available. Little is known about the influence this website ("tabakinfo") has on visitors and how the website is evaluated by them. This study assesses how visitors use the website and its effect on their knowledge, risk perception, attitude, and smoking behavior. The study will also assess how the website is evaluated by visitors using a sample of the Dutch general population, including smokers and nonsmokers. A randomized controlled trial was conducted, recruiting participants from an online panel. At baseline, participants (N=672) were asked to fill out an online questionnaire about tobacco additives. Next, participants were randomly allocated to either one of two experimental groups and invited to visit the website providing information about tobacco additives (either with or without a database containing product-specific information) or to a control group that had no access to the website. After 3 months, follow-up measurements took place. At follow-up (n=492), no statistically significant differences were found for knowledge, risk perception, attitude, or smoking behavior between the intervention and control groups. Website visits were positively related to younger participants (B=-0.07, 95% CI -0.12 to -0.01; t 11 =-2.43, P=.02) and having a low risk perception toward tobacco additives (B=-0.32, 95% CI -0.63 to -0.02; t 11 =-2.07, P=.04). In comparison, having a lower education (B=-0.67, 95% CI -1.14 to -0.17; t 11 =-2.65, P=.01) was a significant predictor for making less use of the website. Furthermore, the website was evaluated less positively by smokers compared to nonsmokers (t 324 =-3.55, P<.001), and males compared to females (t 324 =-2.21, P=.02). The website did not change perceptions of tobacco additives or smoking behavior. Further research is necessary to find out how online information can be used to effectively communication about the risks of tobacco additives. Nederlands Trial Register NTR4620; http://www.trialregister.nl/trialreg/admin/rctview.asp?TC=4620 (Archived by WebCite at http://www.webcitation.org/6oW7w4Gnj). ©Dominique A Reinwand, Rik Crutzen, Anne S Kienhuis, Reinskje Talhout, Hein de Vries. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (http://www.jmir.org), 14.03.2017.

Investigation of unifying transcutaneous transformer for transmission of energy and information.

PubMed

Tamura, Nozomi; Yamamoto, Takahiko; Aoki, Hirooki; Koshiji, Kohji; Homma, Akihiko; Tatsumi, Eisuke; Taenaka, Yoshiyuki

2009-01-01

When patients are fitted with a totally implantable artificial heart (TAH), they need to be implanted with two additional devices: one for the transmission of energy and one for information. However, this is a cumbersome process that affects the quality of life of the recipient. Therefore, we investigated the use of electromagnetic coupling for the transmission of energy and information and the possibility of unifying two transcutaneous transformers for the simultaneous transmission of energy and information. While unifying the transformers, it is important to suppress the electromagnetic coupling between energy and information transmission. Therefore, we ensured that the electromagnetic fields generated from the transformer windings for the transmissions of information and energy intersected perpendicularly. If the fields are perpendicular, the electromagnetic coupling between the energy and information transmissions will be suppressed significantly. The characteristics of the simultaneous transmission of information and energy using the unified transcutaneous transformer, developed experimentally, were evaluated by changing the number of windings used for the transmission of information. The electromagnetic coupling between the energy and information transmissions was suppressed by determining the direction of the magnetic field. Moreover, the optimum number of transformer windings required for the simultaneous transmission of energy and information was determined. We concluded that the externally coupled transcutaneous transformer unified for the simultaneous transmission of energy and information performed with good transmission characteristics.

Insights into molecular interactions between CaM and its inhibitors from molecular dynamics simulations and experimental data.

PubMed

González-Andrade, Martin; Rodríguez-Sotres, Rogelio; Madariaga-Mazón, Abraham; Rivera-Chávez, José; Mata, Rachel; Sosa-Peinado, Alejandro; Del Pozo-Yauner, Luis; Arias-Olguín, Imilla I

2016-01-01

In order to contribute to the structural basis for rational design of calmodulin (CaM) inhibitors, we analyzed the interaction of CaM with 14 classic antagonists and two compounds that do not affect CaM, using docking and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, and the data were compared to available experimental data. The Ca(2+)-CaM-Ligands complexes were simulated 20 ns, with CaM starting in the "open" and "closed" conformations. The analysis of the MD simulations provided insight into the conformational changes undergone by CaM during its interaction with these ligands. These simulations were used to predict the binding free energies (ΔG) from contributions ΔH and ΔS, giving useful information about CaM ligand binding thermodynamics. The ΔG predicted for the CaM's inhibitors correlated well with available experimental data as the r(2) obtained was 0.76 and 0.82 for the group of xanthones. Additionally, valuable information is presented here: I) CaM has two preferred ligand binding sites in the open conformation known as site 1 and 4, II) CaM can bind ligands of diverse structural nature, III) the flexibility of CaM is reduced by the union of its ligands, leading to a reduction in the Ca(2+)-CaM entropy, IV) enthalpy dominates the molecular recognition process in the system Ca(2+)-CaM-Ligand, and V) the ligands making more extensive contact with the protein have higher affinity for Ca(2+)-CaM. Despite their limitations, docking and MD simulations in combination with experimental data continue to be excellent tools for research in pharmacology, toward a rational design of new drugs.

Thermal Imaging Applied to Cryocrystallography: Cryocooling and Beam Heating (Part I)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Snell, Edward; Bellamy, Henry; Rosenbaum, Gerd; vanderWoerd, Mark; Kazmierczak, Michael

2006-01-01

Thermal imaging provides a non-invasive method to study both the cryocooling process and the heating due to the X-ray beam interaction with a sample. The method has been used successfully to image cryocooling in a number of experimental situations, i.e. cooling as a function of sample volume and as a function of cryostream orientation. Although there are experimental limitations to the method, it has proved a powerful technique to aid cryocrystallography development. Due to the rapid spatial temperature information provided about the sample it is also a powerful tool in the testing of mathematical models. Recently thermal imaging has been used to measure the temperature distribution on both a model and typical crystal samples illuminated with an X-ray beam produced by an undulator. A brief overview of thermal imaging and previous results will be presented. In addition, a detailed description of the calibration and experimental aspects of the beam heating measurements will be described. This will complement the following talk on the mathematical modeling and analysis of the results.

A competing, dual mechanism for catalytic direct benzene hydroxylation from combined experimental-DFT studies† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: For experimental catalytic details and mechanistic procedures, including GC and GC-MS traces, additional figures (Fig. S1–S25), computational data including Cartesian coordinates and energies of all stationary points reported in the text. See DOI: 10.1039/c7sc02898a

PubMed Central

Vilella, Laia; Conde, Ana

2017-01-01

A dual mechanism for direct benzene catalytic hydroxylation is described. Experimental studies and DFT calculations have provided a mechanistic explanation for the acid-free, TpxCu-catalyzed hydroxylation of benzene with hydrogen peroxide (Tpx = hydrotrispyrazolylborate ligand). In contrast with other catalytic systems that promote this transformation through Fenton-like pathways, this system operates through a copper-oxyl intermediate that may interact with the arene ring following two different, competitive routes: (a) electrophilic aromatic substitution, with the copper-oxyl species acting as the formal electrophile, and (b) the so-called rebound mechanism, in which the hydrogen is abstracted by the Cu–O moiety prior to the C–O bond formation. Both pathways contribute to the global transformation albeit to different extents, the electrophilic substitution route seeming to be largely favoured. PMID:29619184

A Bayesian Attractor Model for Perceptual Decision Making

PubMed Central

Bitzer, Sebastian; Bruineberg, Jelle; Kiebel, Stefan J.

2015-01-01

Even for simple perceptual decisions, the mechanisms that the brain employs are still under debate. Although current consensus states that the brain accumulates evidence extracted from noisy sensory information, open questions remain about how this simple model relates to other perceptual phenomena such as flexibility in decisions, decision-dependent modulation of sensory gain, or confidence about a decision. We propose a novel approach of how perceptual decisions are made by combining two influential formalisms into a new model. Specifically, we embed an attractor model of decision making into a probabilistic framework that models decision making as Bayesian inference. We show that the new model can explain decision making behaviour by fitting it to experimental data. In addition, the new model combines for the first time three important features: First, the model can update decisions in response to switches in the underlying stimulus. Second, the probabilistic formulation accounts for top-down effects that may explain recent experimental findings of decision-related gain modulation of sensory neurons. Finally, the model computes an explicit measure of confidence which we relate to recent experimental evidence for confidence computations in perceptual decision tasks. PMID:26267143

Dynamic Stiffness Transfer Function of an Electromechanical Actuator Using System Identification

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, Sang Hwa; Tahk, Min-Jea

2018-04-01

In the aeroelastic analysis of flight vehicles with electromechanical actuators (EMAs), an accurate prediction of flutter requires dynamic stiffness characteristics of the EMA. The dynamic stiffness transfer function of the EMA with brushless direct current (BLDC) motor can be obtained by conducting complicated mathematical calculations of control algorithms and mechanical/electrical nonlinearities using linearization techniques. Thus, system identification approaches using experimental data, as an alternative, have considerable advantages. However, the test setup for system identification is expensive and complex, and experimental procedures for data collection are time-consuming tasks. To obtain the dynamic stiffness transfer function, this paper proposes a linear system identification method that uses information obtained from a reliable dynamic stiffness model with a control algorithm and nonlinearities. The results of this study show that the system identification procedure is compact, and the transfer function is able to describe the dynamic stiffness characteristics of the EMA. In addition, to verify the validity of the system identification method, the simulation results of the dynamic stiffness transfer function and the dynamic stiffness model were compared with the experimental data for various external loads.

Experimental Plan for EDF Energy Creep Rabbit Graphite Irradiations- Rev. 2 (replaces Rev. 0 ORNL/TM/2013/49).

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Burchell, Timothy D

2014-07-01

The experimental results obtained here will assist in the development and validation of future models of irradiation induced creep of graphite by providing the following data: Inert creep stain data from low to lifetime AGR fluence Inert creep-property data (especially CTE) from low to lifetime AGR fluence Effect of oxidation on creep modulus (by indirect comparison with experiment 1 and direct comparison with experiment 3 NB. Experiment 1 and 3 are not covered here) Data to develop a mechanistic understanding, including oAppropriate creep modulus (including pinning and high dose effects on structure) oInvestigation of CTE-creep strain behavior under inert conditionsmore » oInformation on the effect of applied stress/creep strain on crystallite orientation (requires XRD) oEffect of creep strain on micro-porosity (requires tomography & microscopy) This document describes the experimental work planned to meet the requirements of project technical specification [1] and EDF Energy requests for additional Pre-IE work. The PIE work is described in detail in this revision (Section 8 and 9).« less

Effect of experimental and sample factors on dehydration kinetics of mildronate dihydrate: mechanism of dehydration and determination of kinetic parameters.

PubMed

Bērziņš, Agris; Actiņš, Andris

2014-06-01

The dehydration kinetics of mildronate dihydrate [3-(1,1,1-trimethylhydrazin-1-ium-2-yl)propionate dihydrate] was analyzed in isothermal and nonisothermal modes. The particle size, sample preparation and storage, sample weight, nitrogen flow rate, relative humidity, and sample history were varied in order to evaluate the effect of these factors and to more accurately interpret the data obtained from such analysis. It was determined that comparable kinetic parameters can be obtained in both isothermal and nonisothermal mode. However, dehydration activation energy values obtained in nonisothermal mode showed variation with conversion degree because of different rate-limiting step energy at higher temperature. Moreover, carrying out experiments in this mode required consideration of additional experimental complications. Our study of the different sample and experimental factor effect revealed information about changes of the dehydration rate-limiting step energy, variable contribution from different rate limiting steps, as well as clarified the dehydration mechanism. Procedures for convenient and fast determination of dehydration kinetic parameters were offered. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. and the American Pharmacists Association.

Cross-correlation between EMG and center of gravity during quiet stance: theory and simulations.

PubMed

Kohn, André Fabio

2005-11-01

Several signal processing tools have been employed in the experimental study of the postural control system in humans. Among them, the cross-correlation function has been used to analyze the time relationship between signals such as the electromyogram and the horizontal projection of the center of gravity. The common finding is that the electromyogram precedes the biomechanical signal, a result that has been interpreted in different ways, for example, the existence of feedforward control or the preponderance of a velocity feedback. It is shown here, analytically and by simulation, that the cross-correlation function is dependent in a complicated way on system parameters and on noise spectra. Results similar to those found experimentally, e.g., electromyogram preceding the biomechanical signal may be obtained in a postural control model without any feedforward control and without any velocity feedback. Therefore, correct interpretations of experimentally obtained cross-correlation functions may require additional information about the system. The results extend to other biomedical applications where two signals from a closed loop system are cross-correlated.

The dye-sensitized solar cell database.

PubMed

Venkatraman, Vishwesh; Raju, Rajesh; Oikonomopoulos, Solon P; Alsberg, Bjørn K

2018-04-03

Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) have garnered a lot of attention in recent years. The solar energy to power conversion efficiency of a DSSC is influenced by various components of the cell such as the dye, electrolyte, electrodes and additives among others leading to varying experimental configurations. A large number of metal-based and metal-free dye sensitizers have now been reported and tools using such data to indicate new directions for design and development are on the rise. DSSCDB, the first of its kind dye-sensitized solar cell database, aims to provide users with up-to-date information from publications on the molecular structures of the dyes, experimental details and reported measurements (efficiencies and spectral properties) and thereby facilitate a comprehensive and critical evaluation of the data. Currently, the DSSCDB contains over 4000 experimental observations spanning multiple dye classes such as triphenylamines, carbazoles, coumarins, phenothiazines, ruthenium and porphyrins. The DSSCDB offers a web-based, comprehensive source of property data for dye sensitized solar cells. Access to the database is available through the following URL: www.dyedb.com .

The Importance of 'Likes': The Interplay of Message Framing, Source, and Social Endorsement on Credibility Perceptions of Health Information on Facebook.

PubMed

Borah, Porismita; Xiao, Xizhu

2018-01-01

Online sources not only permeate the information-seeking environment of the younger generation, but also have profound influence in shaping their beliefs and behaviors. In this landscape, examining the factors responsible for credibility perceptions of online information is fundamental, particularly for health-related information. Using a 2 (frames: gain vs. loss) × 2 (source: expert vs. non-expert) × 2 (social endorsement: high vs. low) randomized between-subjects experimental design, this study examines the effect of health message framing and the moderating effects of social endorsement and source type on credibility perceptions of Facebook posts. Testing across two issues--physical activity and alcohol consumption--findings indicate that the gain-framed message was perceived as most credible. Additionally, significant three-way interactions suggest that social endorsement and source type affect the relationship between message framing and credibility perceptions. Specifically, the findings demonstrate that a gain-framed message from an expert source with high number of 'likes' is considered the most credible message. These findings have significant implications for information gathering from social media sources, such as the influence of 'likes' on health information.

The NIF LinkOut broker: a web resource to facilitate federated data integration using NCBI identifiers.

PubMed

Marenco, Luis; Ascoli, Giorgio A; Martone, Maryann E; Shepherd, Gordon M; Miller, Perry L

2008-09-01

This paper describes the NIF LinkOut Broker (NLB) that has been built as part of the Neuroscience Information Framework (NIF) project. The NLB is designed to coordinate the assembly of links to neuroscience information items (e.g., experimental data, knowledge bases, and software tools) that are (1) accessible via the Web, and (2) related to entries in the National Center for Biotechnology Information's (NCBI's) Entrez system. The NLB collects these links from each resource and passes them to the NCBI which incorporates them into its Entrez LinkOut service. In this way, an Entrez user looking at a specific Entrez entry can LinkOut directly to related neuroscience information. The information stored in the NLB can also be utilized in other ways. A second approach, which is operational on a pilot basis, is for the NLB Web server to create dynamically its own Web page of LinkOut links for each NCBI identifier in the NLB database. This approach can allow other resources (in addition to the NCBI Entrez) to LinkOut to related neuroscience information. The paper describes the current NLB system and discusses certain design issues that arose during its implementation.

Augmenting matrix factorization technique with the combination of tags and genres

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ma, Tinghuai; Suo, Xiafei; Zhou, Jinjuan; Tang, Meili; Guan, Donghai; Tian, Yuan; Al-Dhelaan, Abdullah; Al-Rodhaan, Mznah

2016-11-01

Recommender systems play an important role in our daily life and are becoming popular tools for users to find what they are really interested in. Matrix factorization methods, which are popular recommendation methods, have gained high attention these years. With the rapid growth of the Internet, lots of information has been created, like social network information, tags and so on. Along with these, a few matrix factorization approaches have been proposed which incorporate the personalized information of users or items. However, except for ratings, most of the matrix factorization models have utilized only one kind of information to understand users' interests. Considering the sparsity of information, in this paper, we try to investigate the combination of different information, like tags and genres, to reveal users' interests accurately. With regard to the generalization of genres, a constraint is added when genres are utilized to find users' similar ;soulmates;. In addition, item regularizer is also considered based on latent semantic indexing (LSI) method with the item tags. Our experiments are conducted on two real datasets: Movielens dataset and Douban dataset. The experimental results demonstrate that the combination of tags and genres is really helpful to reveal users' interests.

Influence of boundary on the effect of double-layer polarization and the electrophoretic behavior of soft biocolloids.

PubMed

Yeh, Li-Hsien; Fang, Kuo-Ying; Hsu, Jyh-Ping; Tseng, Shiojenn

2011-12-01

The electrophoresis of a soft particle comprising a rigid core and a charged porous membrane layer in a narrow space is modeled. This simulates, for example, the capillary electrophoresis of biocolloids such as cells and microorganisms, and biosensor types of device. We show that, in addition to the boundary effect, the effects of double-layer polarization (DLP) and the electroosmotic retardation flow can be significant, yielding interesting electrophoretic behaviors. For example, if the friction coefficient of the membrane layer and/or the boundary is large, then the DLP effect can be offset by the electroosmotic retardation flow, making the particle mobility to decrease with increasing double layer thickness, which is qualitatively consistent with many experimental observations in the literature, but has not been explained clearly in previous analyses. In addition, depending upon the thickness of double layer, the friction of the membrane layer of a particle can either retard or accelerate its movement, an interesting result which has not been reported previously. This work is the first attempt to show solid evidence for the influence of a boundary on the effect of DLP and the electrophoretic behavior of soft particles. The model proposed is verified by the experimental data in the literature. The results of numerical simulation provide valuable information for the design of bio-analytical apparatus such as nanopore-based sensing applications and for the interpretation of relevant experimental data. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Effects of Kraft Mill effluent on the sexuality of fishes: An environmental early warning

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Davis, W.P.; Bortone, S.A.

1992-01-01

Arrhenoid or masculinized female fish species of the live-bearing family, Poeciliidae, have been observed for over thirteen years in specific southern streams which receive waste effluents from pulping mills. The complex mixture of organic compounds in kraft mill effluent (KME) has inhibited specific identification of causal agent(s). However, microbially degraded phytosterols (e.g. sitosterol or stigmastanol) in experimental exposures induce the same intersexual states that characterize affected female poeciliids sampled from KME streams. KME-polluted streams often exhibit a drastic reduction of fish species diversity and degrees of physiological stress, all of which suggests reduced reproduction in surviving forms. A potential ontogeneticmore » or developmental response is demonstrated in American eels captured in one of these streams as well. The authors examine available information, including laboratory and experimental field exposures, and suggest directions for additional research as well as the need for environmental concern.« less

Research subjects for analytical estimation of core degradation at Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nagase, F.; Ishikawa, J.; Kurata, M.

2013-07-01

Estimation of the accident progress and status inside the pressure vessels (RPV) and primary containment vessels (PCV) is required for appropriate conductance of decommissioning in the Fukushima-Daiichi NPP. For that, it is necessary to obtain additional experimental data and revised models for the estimation using computer codes with increased accuracies. The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) has selected phenomena to be reviewed and developed, considering previously obtained information, conditions specific to the Fukushima-Daiichi NPP accident, and recent progress of experimental and analytical technologies. As a result, research and development items have been picked up in terms of thermal-hydraulic behavior inmore » the RPV and PCV, progression of fuel bundle degradation, failure of the lower head of RPV, and analysis of the accident. This paper introduces the selected phenomena to be reviewed and developed, research plans and recent results from the JAEA's corresponding research programs. (authors)« less

Demonstration of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering with enhanced subchannel discrimination

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sun, Kai; Ye, Xiang-Jun; Xiao, Ya; Xu, Xiao-Ye; Wu, Yu-Chun; Xu, Jin-Shi; Chen, Jing-Ling; Li, Chuan-Feng; Guo, Guang-Can

2018-03-01

Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) steering describes a quantum nonlocal phenomenon in which one party can nonlocally affect the other's state through local measurements. It reveals an additional concept of quantum non-locality, which stands between quantum entanglement and Bell nonlocality. Recently, a quantum information task named as subchannel discrimination (SD) provides a necessary and sufficient characterization of EPR steering. The success probability of SD using steerable states is higher than using any unsteerable states, even when they are entangled. However, the detailed construction of such subchannels and the experimental realization of the corresponding task are still technologically challenging. In this work, we designed a feasible collection of subchannels for a quantum channel and experimentally demonstrated the corresponding SD task where the probabilities of correct discrimination are clearly enhanced by exploiting steerable states. Our results provide a concrete example to operationally demonstrate EPR steering and shine a new light on the potential application of EPR steering.

Rethinking Extinction

PubMed Central

Dunsmoor, Joseph E.; Niv, Yael; Daw, Nathaniel; Phelps, Elizabeth A.

2015-01-01

Extinction serves as the leading theoretical framework and experimental model to describe how learned behaviors diminish through absence of anticipated reinforcement. In the past decade, extinction has moved beyond the realm of associative learning theory and behavioral experimentation in animals and has become a topic of considerable interest in the neuroscience of learning, memory, and emotion. Here, we review research and theories of extinction, both as a learning process and as a behavioral technique, and consider whether traditional understandings warrant a re-examination. We discuss the neurobiology, cognitive factors, and major computational theories, and revisit the predominant view that extinction results in new learning that interferes with expression of the original memory. Additionally, we reconsider the limitations of extinction as a technique to prevent the relapse of maladaptive behavior, and discuss novel approaches, informed by contemporary theoretical advances, that augment traditional extinction methods to target and potentially alter maladaptive memories. PMID:26447572

Kinase Identification with Supervised Laplacian Regularized Least Squares

PubMed Central

Zhang, He; Wang, Minghui

2015-01-01

Phosphorylation is catalyzed by protein kinases and is irreplaceable in regulating biological processes. Identification of phosphorylation sites with their corresponding kinases contributes to the understanding of molecular mechanisms. Mass spectrometry analysis of phosphor-proteomes generates a large number of phosphorylated sites. However, experimental methods are costly and time-consuming, and most phosphorylation sites determined by experimental methods lack kinase information. Therefore, computational methods are urgently needed to address the kinase identification problem. To this end, we propose a new kernel-based machine learning method called Supervised Laplacian Regularized Least Squares (SLapRLS), which adopts a new method to construct kernels based on the similarity matrix and minimizes both structure risk and overall inconsistency between labels and similarities. The results predicted using both Phospho.ELM and an additional independent test dataset indicate that SLapRLS can more effectively identify kinases compared to other existing algorithms. PMID:26448296

U-238 fission and Pu-239 production in subcritical assembly

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grab, Magdalena; Wojciechowski, Andrzej

2018-04-01

The project touches upon an issue of U-238 fission reactions and Pu-239 production reactions in subcritical assembly. The experiment took place in November 2014 at the Dzhelepov Laboratory of Nuclear Problems (JINR, Dubna) using PHASOTRON.Data of this experiment were analyzed in Laboratory of Information Technologies (LIT). Four MCNPX models were considered for simulation: Bertini/Dresnen, Bertini/Abla, INCL4/Drensnen, INCL4/Abla. The main goal of the project was to compare the experimental data and simulation results. We obtain a good agreement of experimental data and computation results especially for detectors placed besides the assembly axis. In addition, the U-238 fission reactions are more probable to be observed in the region of a higher particle energy spectrum, located closer to the assembly axis and the particle beam as well and vice versa Pu-239 production reactions were dominant in the peripheral region of geometry.

The Importance of Experimental Design, Quality Assurance, and Control in Plant Metabolomics Experiments.

PubMed

Martins, Marina C M; Caldana, Camila; Wolf, Lucia Daniela; de Abreu, Luis Guilherme Furlan

2018-01-01

The output of metabolomics relies to a great extent upon the methods and instrumentation to identify, quantify, and access spatial information on as many metabolites as possible. However, the most modern machines and sophisticated tools for data analysis cannot compensate for inappropriate harvesting and/or sample preparation procedures that modify metabolic composition and can lead to erroneous interpretation of results. In addition, plant metabolism has a remarkable degree of complexity, and the number of identified compounds easily surpasses the number of samples in metabolomics analyses, increasing false discovery risk. These aspects pose a large challenge when carrying out plant metabolomics experiments. In this chapter, we address the importance of a proper experimental design taking into consideration preventable complications and unavoidable factors to achieve success in metabolomics analysis. We also focus on quality control and standardized procedures during the metabolomics workflow.

Kinase Identification with Supervised Laplacian Regularized Least Squares.

PubMed

Li, Ao; Xu, Xiaoyi; Zhang, He; Wang, Minghui

2015-01-01

Phosphorylation is catalyzed by protein kinases and is irreplaceable in regulating biological processes. Identification of phosphorylation sites with their corresponding kinases contributes to the understanding of molecular mechanisms. Mass spectrometry analysis of phosphor-proteomes generates a large number of phosphorylated sites. However, experimental methods are costly and time-consuming, and most phosphorylation sites determined by experimental methods lack kinase information. Therefore, computational methods are urgently needed to address the kinase identification problem. To this end, we propose a new kernel-based machine learning method called Supervised Laplacian Regularized Least Squares (SLapRLS), which adopts a new method to construct kernels based on the similarity matrix and minimizes both structure risk and overall inconsistency between labels and similarities. The results predicted using both Phospho.ELM and an additional independent test dataset indicate that SLapRLS can more effectively identify kinases compared to other existing algorithms.

Cognitive and affective determinants of generic drug acceptance and use: cross-sectional and experimental findings

PubMed Central

Dohle, Simone; Siegrist, Michael

2013-01-01

An increase in generic substitution could be a viable approach to reduce global healthcare expenditures. In many countries, however, generic drug use is rather low. This study examines cognitive predictors (knowledge and beliefs) and affective predictors (general affect and sacred values) to explain generic drug acceptance and use. Data for the study come from a random postal survey conducted in Switzerland (N = 668). A detailed knowledge scale about generic drugs was developed. In addition, an experimental choice task was constructed in which respondents chose between branded and generic drugs. Generic drug acceptance as well as drug choices were influenced by knowledge, beliefs, and affect. It was also found that generic substitution is chosen less frequently for a more severe illness. Key insights could be used for developing information material or interventions aimed at increasing the substitution of generic drugs in order to make health care more affordable. PMID:25632372

Computational Investigation of Fluidic Counterflow Thrust Vectoring

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hunter, Craig A.; Deere, Karen A.

1999-01-01

A computational study of fluidic counterflow thrust vectoring has been conducted. Two-dimensional numerical simulations were run using the computational fluid dynamics code PAB3D with two-equation turbulence closure and linear Reynolds stress modeling. For validation, computational results were compared to experimental data obtained at the NASA Langley Jet Exit Test Facility. In general, computational results were in good agreement with experimental performance data, indicating that efficient thrust vectoring can be obtained with low secondary flow requirements (less than 1% of the primary flow). An examination of the computational flowfield has revealed new details about the generation of a countercurrent shear layer, its relation to secondary suction, and its role in thrust vectoring. In addition to providing new information about the physics of counterflow thrust vectoring, this work appears to be the first documented attempt to simulate the counterflow thrust vectoring problem using computational fluid dynamics.

Light {xi} hypernuclei in four-body cluster models

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hiyama, E.; Yamamoto, Y.; Motoba, T.

Detailed structure calculations in {sub {xi}{sup -}}{sup 12}Be, {sub {xi}{sup -}}{sup 5}H, {sub {xi}{sup -}}{sup 9}Li, {sub {xi}{sup -}}{sup 7}H, and {sub {xi}{sup -}}{sup 10}Li are performed within the framework of the microscopic two-, three-, and four-body cluster models using the Gaussian expansion method. We adopted effective {xi}N interactions derived from the Nijmegen interaction models, which give rise to substantially attractive {xi}-nucleus potentials in accordance with the experimental indications. {sub {xi}{sup -}}{sup 7}H and {sub {xi}{sup -}}{sup 10}Li are predicted to have bound states. we propose to observe the bound states in future (K{sup -},K{sup +}) experiments using {sup 7}Limore » and {sup 10}B targets in addition to the standard {sup 12}C target. The experimental confirmation of these states will provide information on the spin- and isospin-averaged {xi}N interaction.« less

The Simple Video Coder: A free tool for efficiently coding social video data.

PubMed

Barto, Daniel; Bird, Clark W; Hamilton, Derek A; Fink, Brandi C

2017-08-01

Videotaping of experimental sessions is a common practice across many disciplines of psychology, ranging from clinical therapy, to developmental science, to animal research. Audio-visual data are a rich source of information that can be easily recorded; however, analysis of the recordings presents a major obstacle to project completion. Coding behavior is time-consuming and often requires ad-hoc training of a student coder. In addition, existing software is either prohibitively expensive or cumbersome, which leaves researchers with inadequate tools to quickly process video data. We offer the Simple Video Coder-free, open-source software for behavior coding that is flexible in accommodating different experimental designs, is intuitive for students to use, and produces outcome measures of event timing, frequency, and duration. Finally, the software also offers extraction tools to splice video into coded segments suitable for training future human coders or for use as input for pattern classification algorithms.

Pre-clinical research in small animals using radiotherapy technology--a bidirectional translational approach.

PubMed

Tillner, Falk; Thute, Prasad; Bütof, Rebecca; Krause, Mechthild; Enghardt, Wolfgang

2014-12-01

For translational cancer research, pre-clinical in-vivo studies using small animals have become indispensable in bridging the gap between in-vitro cell experiments and clinical implementation. When setting up such small animal experiments, various biological, technical and methodical aspects have to be considered. In this work we present a comprehensive topical review based on relevant publications on irradiation techniques used for pre-clinical cancer research in mice and rats. Clinical radiotherapy treatment devices for the application of external beam radiotherapy and brachytherapy as well as dedicated research irradiation devices are feasible for small animal irradiation depending on the animal model and the experimental goals. In this work, appropriate solutions for the technological transfer of human radiation oncology to small animal radiation research are summarised. Additionally, important information concerning the experimental design is provided such that reliable and clinically relevant results can be attained. Copyright © 2014. Published by Elsevier GmbH.

Evident or doubtful? How lexical hints in written information influence laypersons' understanding of influenza.

PubMed

Mayweg-Paus, Elisabeth; Jucks, Regina

2015-01-01

There are clear differences in the way written information on health issues presents research findings. In some cases, the source of a piece of information (e.g. "expert professor") is highlighted to emphasize its credibility and relevance. In other cases, the impact of a certain argument is stressed by avoiding hints on tentativeness such as "mostly" or "up to now." This article examines whether and how far such differences influence laypersons' comprehension of the contents provided. In an experimental setting, 157 laypersons were asked to read an online article on a new approach to preventing influenza. The texts manipulated whether there were (a) hints on the source of information and (b) lexical hints on the tentativeness of the information (hedges). After reading the text, participants were asked to write an essay reporting their opinion on the topic. Their argumentation on vaccination was assessed with content analysis and their attitudes toward vaccination were surveyed with a questionnaire. Results indicated that when lexical hints were given, tentativeness led participants to focus more on the actual information in the text. Additionally, decisions more strongly favored the direction implied in the text when the source of the medical information was not reported. Consequences for the way health information should be presented to laypersons are discussed.

Availability of MudPIT data for classification of biological samples.

PubMed

Silvestre, Dario Di; Zoppis, Italo; Brambilla, Francesca; Bellettato, Valeria; Mauri, Giancarlo; Mauri, Pierluigi

2013-01-14

Mass spectrometry is an important analytical tool for clinical proteomics. Primarily employed for biomarker discovery, it is increasingly used for developing methods which may help to provide unambiguous diagnosis of biological samples. In this context, we investigated the classification of phenotypes by applying support vector machine (SVM) on experimental data obtained by MudPIT approach. In particular, we compared the performance capabilities of SVM by using two independent collection of complex samples and different data-types, such as mass spectra (m/z), peptides and proteins. Globally, protein and peptide data allowed a better discriminant informative content than experimental mass spectra (overall accuracy higher than 87% in both collection 1 and 2). These results indicate that sequencing of peptides and proteins reduces the experimental noise affecting the raw mass spectra, and allows the extraction of more informative features available for the effective classification of samples. In addition, proteins and peptides features selected by SVM matched for 80% with the differentially expressed proteins identified by the MAProMa software. These findings confirm the availability of the most label-free quantitative methods based on processing of spectral count and SEQUEST-based SCORE values. On the other hand, it stresses the usefulness of MudPIT data for a correct grouping of sample phenotypes, by applying both supervised and unsupervised learning algorithms. This capacity permit the evaluation of actual samples and it is a good starting point to translate proteomic methodology to clinical application.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Denef, Vincent; Shah, Manesh B; Verberkmoes, Nathan C

The recent surge in microbial genomic sequencing, combined with the development of high-throughput liquid chromatography-mass-spectrometry-based (LC/LC-MS/MS) proteomics, has raised the question of the extent to which genomic information of one strain or environmental sample can be used to profile proteomes of related strains or samples. Even with decreasing sequencing costs, it remains impractical to obtain genomic sequence for every strain or sample analyzed. Here, we evaluate how shotgun proteomics is affected by amino acid divergence between the sample and the genomic database using a probability-based model and a random mutation simulation model constrained by experimental data. To assess the effectsmore » of nonrandom distribution of mutations, we also evaluated identification levels using in silico peptide data from sequenced isolates with average amino acid identities (AAI) varying between 76 and 98%. We compared the predictions to experimental protein identification levels for a sample that was evaluated using a database that included genomic information for the dominant organism and for a closely related variant (95% AAI). The range of models set the boundaries at which half of the proteins in a proteomic experiment can be identified to be 77-92% AAI between orthologs in the sample and database. Consistent with this prediction, experimental data indicated loss of half the identifiable proteins at 90% AAI. Additional analysis indicated a 6.4% reduction of the initial protein coverage per 1% amino acid divergence and total identification loss at 86% AAI. Consequently, shotgun proteomics is capable of cross-strain identifications but avoids most crossspecies false positives.« less

The MGED ontology: a framework for describing functional genomics experiments.

PubMed

Stoeckert, Christian J; Parkinson, Helen

2003-01-01

The Microarray Gene Expression Data (MGED) society was formed with an initial focus on experiments involving microarray technology. Despite the diversity of applications, there are common concepts used and a common need to capture experimental information in a standardized manner. In building the MGED ontology, it was recognized that it would be impractical to cover all the different types of experiments on all the different types of organisms by listing and defining all the types of organisms and their properties. Our solution was to create a framework for describing microarray experiments with an initial focus on the biological sample and its manipulation. For concepts that are common for many species, we could provide a manageable listing of controlled terms. For concepts that are species-specific or whose values cannot be readily listed, we created an 'OntologyEntry' concept that referenced an external resource. The MGED ontology is a work in progress that needs additional instances and particularly needs constraints to be added. The ontology currently covers the experimental sample and design, and we have begun capturing aspects of the microarrays themselves as well. The primary application of the ontology will be to develop forms for entering information into databases, and consequently allowing queries, taking advantage of the structure provided by the ontology. The application of an ontology of experimental conditions extends beyond microarray experiments and, as the scope of MGED includes other aspects of functional genomics, so too will the MGED ontology.

VIRmiRNA: a comprehensive resource for experimentally validated viral miRNAs and their targets.

PubMed

Qureshi, Abid; Thakur, Nishant; Monga, Isha; Thakur, Anamika; Kumar, Manoj

2014-01-01

Viral microRNAs (miRNAs) regulate gene expression of viral and/or host genes to benefit the virus. Hence, miRNAs play a key role in host-virus interactions and pathogenesis of viral diseases. Lately, miRNAs have also shown potential as important targets for the development of novel antiviral therapeutics. Although several miRNA and their target repositories are available for human and other organisms in literature, but a dedicated resource on viral miRNAs and their targets are lacking. Therefore, we have developed a comprehensive viral miRNA resource harboring information of 9133 entries in three subdatabases. This includes 1308 experimentally validated miRNA sequences with their isomiRs encoded by 44 viruses in viral miRNA ' VIRMIRNA: ' and 7283 of their target genes in ' VIRMIRTAR': . Additionally, there is information of 542 antiviral miRNAs encoded by the host against 24 viruses in antiviral miRNA ' AVIRMIR': . The web interface was developed using Linux-Apache-MySQL-PHP (LAMP) software bundle. User-friendly browse, search, advanced search and useful analysis tools are also provided on the web interface. VIRmiRNA is the first specialized resource of experimentally proven virus-encoded miRNAs and their associated targets. This database would enhance the understanding of viral/host gene regulation and may also prove beneficial in the development of antiviral therapeutics. Database URL: http://crdd.osdd.net/servers/virmirna. © The Author(s) 2014. Published by Oxford University Press.

A controlled experiment to evaluate the impact of summer research experiences on attitudes towards science in high school aged students

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

White, M. A.; Tcherednichenko, I.; Hamar, M.; Taylor, M. J.; Litizzette, L.

2006-12-01

United States funding agencies increasingly are supporting activities designed to increase the enrollment of United States high school students in science, math, or engineering careers. However, in many cases, the likely outcomes of educational activities are unknown. A common approach within the physical and natural sciences is to provide high school aged students with a summer research experience, with the expectation that such experiences will increase student interest in science, possibly as a career choice. With funding support from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration New Investigator Grant program, we conducted a controlled experiment to test this assumption. In collaboration with Mountain Crest High School in Logan, UT, we recruited 40 students currently enrolled in science courses, assessed attitudes towards science (with informed consent), and randomly assigned 20 students to a control group and 20 students to an experimental group. Students in the experimental group were paired with faculty and graduate students in a wide range of field and laboratory research groups in natural resources and biology. Students were employed in at least two different research groups for an average of 30-40 hours per week for eight weeks in the summer of 2006. Following the completion of the summer work experience, we again assessed attitudes towards science in both groups and gathered additional information from the experimental group on satisfaction with the work experience and reasons for participating. Results are presented and discussed.

Enhancing undergraduate students' chemistry understanding through project-based learning in an IT environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barak, Miri; Dori, Yehudit Judy

2005-01-01

Project-based learning (PBL), which is increasingly supported by information technologies (IT), contributes to fostering student-directed scientific inquiry of problems in a real-world setting. This study investigated the integration of PBL in an IT environment into three undergraduate chemistry courses, each including both experimental and control students. Students in the experimental group volunteered to carry out an individual IT-based project, whereas the control students solved only traditional problems. The project included constructing computerized molecular models, seeking information on scientific phenomena, and inquiring about chemistry theories. The effect of the PBL was examined both quantitatively and qualitatively. The quantitative analysis was based on a pretest, a posttest, and a final examination, which served for comparing the learning gains of the two research groups. For the qualitative analysis, we looked into the experimental students' performance, as reflected by the projects they had submitted. In addition, think alou interviews and observations helped us gain insight into the students' conceptual understanding of molecular structures. Students who participated in the IT-enhanced PBL performed significantly better than their control classmates not only on their posttest but also on their course final examination. Analyzing the qualitative findings, we concluded that the construction of computerized models and Web-based inquiry activities helped promote students' ability of mentally traversing the four levels of chemistry understanding: symbolic, macroscopic, microscopic, and process. More generally, our results indicated that incorporating IT-rich PBL into freshmen courses can enhance students' understanding of chemical concepts, theories, and molecular structures.

'Judging a book by its cover': An experimental study of the negative impact of a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder on clinicians' judgements of uncomplicated panic disorder.

PubMed

Lam, Danny C K; Salkovskis, Paul M; Hogg, Lorna I

2016-09-01

Diagnosis is ubiquitous in Psychiatry, and whilst it does bring benefits; adverse effects of 'labelling' may also be possible. This study aimed to evaluate experimentally whether clinicians' judgements about a patient with panic disorder were influenced by an inappropriately suggested diagnosis of comorbid borderline personality disorder (BPD). An experimental design was used to evaluate clinician's judgements when the nature of the information they were given was varied to imply BPD comorbidity. Two hundred and sixty-five clinicians watched a video-recorded assessment of a woman describing her experience of uncomplicated 'panic disorder' and then rated her present problems and likely prognosis. Prior to watching the video recording, participants were randomly allocated to one of three conditions with written information including the following: (1) her personal details and general background; (2) the addition of a behavioural description consistent with BPD; and (3) the further addition of a 'label' (past BPD diagnosis). The BPD label was associated with more negative ratings of the woman's problems and her prognosis than both information alone and a behavioural description of BPD 'symptoms'. Regardless of potential actuarial value of such diagnoses, it is concluded that clinicians can be overly influenced by past diagnostic labels in the context of an apparent current comorbid problem, although such biases appear to be less likely if a description of the relevant behaviours is used instead. Thus, the label, rather than the behaviour it denotes, may be stigmatizing in mental health professionals. Diagnostic labels can have an inappropriately negative effect on clinicians' judgements not only of treatment variables such as engagement and response but also risk issues and interpersonal effectiveness. Diagnostic labels can have a greater effect on clinicians' judgements than a behavioural description or clinical presentation. Clinicians should therefore be cautious both in the use of diagnostic labels to describe patients and ensure that these are still valid, and also be mindful of the influence that such labels can have on their own clinical judgements and constantly seek to challenge these. Behavioural descriptions of difficulties are less likely to result in such negative judgements and predictions. © 2015 The British Psychological Society.

NeoAnalysis: a Python-based toolbox for quick electrophysiological data processing and analysis.

PubMed

Zhang, Bo; Dai, Ji; Zhang, Tao

2017-11-13

In a typical electrophysiological experiment, especially one that includes studying animal behavior, the data collected normally contain spikes, local field potentials, behavioral responses and other associated data. In order to obtain informative results, the data must be analyzed simultaneously with the experimental settings. However, most open-source toolboxes currently available for data analysis were developed to handle only a portion of the data and did not take into account the sorting of experimental conditions. Additionally, these toolboxes require that the input data be in a specific format, which can be inconvenient to users. Therefore, the development of a highly integrated toolbox that can process multiple types of data regardless of input data format and perform basic analysis for general electrophysiological experiments is incredibly useful. Here, we report the development of a Python based open-source toolbox, referred to as NeoAnalysis, to be used for quick electrophysiological data processing and analysis. The toolbox can import data from different data acquisition systems regardless of their formats and automatically combine different types of data into a single file with a standardized format. In cases where additional spike sorting is needed, NeoAnalysis provides a module to perform efficient offline sorting with a user-friendly interface. Then, NeoAnalysis can perform regular analog signal processing, spike train, and local field potentials analysis, behavioral response (e.g. saccade) detection and extraction, with several options available for data plotting and statistics. Particularly, it can automatically generate sorted results without requiring users to manually sort data beforehand. In addition, NeoAnalysis can organize all of the relevant data into an informative table on a trial-by-trial basis for data visualization. Finally, NeoAnalysis supports analysis at the population level. With the multitude of general-purpose functions provided by NeoAnalysis, users can easily obtain publication-quality figures without writing complex codes. NeoAnalysis is a powerful and valuable toolbox for users doing electrophysiological experiments.

Mental health and morbidity of caregivers and co-residents of individuals with dementia: a quasi-experimental design.

PubMed

Maguire, Aideen; Rosato, Michael; O'Reilly, Dermot

2017-10-01

To determine if providing informal care to a co-resident with dementia symptoms places an additional risk on the likelihood of poor mental health or mortality compared with co-resident non-caregivers. A quasi-experimental design of caregiving and non-caregiving co-residents of individuals with dementia symptoms provides a natural comparator for the additive effects of caregiving on top of living with an individual with dementia symptoms. Census records, providing information on household structure, intensity of caregiving, presence of dementia symptoms and self-reported mental health were linked to mortality records over the following 33 months. Multi-level regression models were constructed to determine the risk of poor mental health and death in co-resident caregivers of individuals with dementia symptoms compared with co-resident non-caregivers, adjusting for the clustering of individuals within households. The cohort consisted of 10 982 co-residents (55.1% caregivers), with 12.1% of non-caregivers reporting poor mental health compared with 8.4% of intense caregivers (>20 h of care per week). During follow-up, the cohort experienced 560 deaths (245 to caregivers). Overall, caregiving co-residents were at no greater risk of poor mental health but had lower mortality risk than non-caregiving co-residents (adjusted odds ratio (ORadj) = 0.93, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.79, 1.10 and ORadj = 0.67, 95% CI 0.56, 0.81, respectively); this lower mortality risk was also seen amongst the most intensive caregivers (ORadj = 0.65, 95% CI 0.53, 0.79). Caregiving poses no additional risk to mental health over and above the risk associated with merely living with someone with dementia and is associated with a lower mortality risk compared with non-caregiving co-residents. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Preoperative Preparation for Cardiac Surgery Facilitates Recovery, Reduces Psychological Distress, and Reduces the Incidence of Acute Postoperative Hypertension.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Anderson, Erling A.

1987-01-01

Cardiac surgery patients were assigned to information-only, information-plus-coping, or control preoperative preparation groups. Preoperatively, both experimental groups were significantly less anxious than were controls. Both experimental groups increased patients' belief in control over recovery. Postoperatively, experimental patients were less…

EVLncRNAs: a manually curated database for long non-coding RNAs validated by low-throughput experiments.

PubMed

Zhou, Bailing; Zhao, Huiying; Yu, Jiafeng; Guo, Chengang; Dou, Xianghua; Song, Feng; Hu, Guodong; Cao, Zanxia; Qu, Yuanxu; Yang, Yuedong; Zhou, Yaoqi; Wang, Jihua

2018-01-04

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) play important functional roles in various biological processes. Early databases were utilized to deposit all lncRNA candidates produced by high-throughput experimental and/or computational techniques to facilitate classification, assessment and validation. As more lncRNAs are validated by low-throughput experiments, several databases were established for experimentally validated lncRNAs. However, these databases are small in scale (with a few hundreds of lncRNAs only) and specific in their focuses (plants, diseases or interactions). Thus, it is highly desirable to have a comprehensive dataset for experimentally validated lncRNAs as a central repository for all of their structures, functions and phenotypes. Here, we established EVLncRNAs by curating lncRNAs validated by low-throughput experiments (up to 1 May 2016) and integrating specific databases (lncRNAdb, LncRANDisease, Lnc2Cancer and PLNIncRBase) with additional functional and disease-specific information not covered previously. The current version of EVLncRNAs contains 1543 lncRNAs from 77 species that is 2.9 times larger than the current largest database for experimentally validated lncRNAs. Seventy-four percent lncRNA entries are partially or completely new, comparing to all existing experimentally validated databases. The established database allows users to browse, search and download as well as to submit experimentally validated lncRNAs. The database is available at http://biophy.dzu.edu.cn/EVLncRNAs. © The Author(s) 2017. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

EVLncRNAs: a manually curated database for long non-coding RNAs validated by low-throughput experiments

PubMed Central

Zhao, Huiying; Yu, Jiafeng; Guo, Chengang; Dou, Xianghua; Song, Feng; Hu, Guodong; Cao, Zanxia; Qu, Yuanxu

2018-01-01

Abstract Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) play important functional roles in various biological processes. Early databases were utilized to deposit all lncRNA candidates produced by high-throughput experimental and/or computational techniques to facilitate classification, assessment and validation. As more lncRNAs are validated by low-throughput experiments, several databases were established for experimentally validated lncRNAs. However, these databases are small in scale (with a few hundreds of lncRNAs only) and specific in their focuses (plants, diseases or interactions). Thus, it is highly desirable to have a comprehensive dataset for experimentally validated lncRNAs as a central repository for all of their structures, functions and phenotypes. Here, we established EVLncRNAs by curating lncRNAs validated by low-throughput experiments (up to 1 May 2016) and integrating specific databases (lncRNAdb, LncRANDisease, Lnc2Cancer and PLNIncRBase) with additional functional and disease-specific information not covered previously. The current version of EVLncRNAs contains 1543 lncRNAs from 77 species that is 2.9 times larger than the current largest database for experimentally validated lncRNAs. Seventy-four percent lncRNA entries are partially or completely new, comparing to all existing experimentally validated databases. The established database allows users to browse, search and download as well as to submit experimentally validated lncRNAs. The database is available at http://biophy.dzu.edu.cn/EVLncRNAs. PMID:28985416

Experimental Study of Large-Amplitude Faraday Waves in Rectangular Cylinders

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Iek, Chanthy; Alexander, Iwan J.; Tin, Padetha; Adamovsky, Gregory

2005-01-01

Experiment on single-mode Faraday waves having two, thee, and four wavelengths across a rectangular cylinder of high aspect ratio is the subject of discussion. Previous experiments recently done by Henderson & Miles (1989) and by Lei Jiang et. a1 (1996) focused on Faraday waves with one and two wavelengths across rectangular cylinders. In this experimental study the waves steepness ranges from small at threshold levels to a large amplitude which according to Penny & Price theory (1952) approaches the maximum sustainable amplitude for a standing wave. The waves characteristics for small amplitudes are evaluated against an existing well known linear theory by Benjamin & Ursell (l954) and against a weakly nonlinear theory by J. Miles (1984) which includes the effect of viscous damping. The evaluation includes the wave neutral stability and damping rate. In addition, a wave amplitude differential equation of a linear theory including viscous effect by Cerda & Tirapegui (1998) is solved numerically to yield prediction of temporal profiles of both wave damping and wave formation at the threshold. An interesting finding from this exercise is that the fluid kinematic viscosity needs to increase ten times in order to obtain good agreement between the theoretical prediction and the experimental data for both wave damping and wave starting. For large amplitude waves, the experimental data are evaluated against the theory of Penny & Price which predicts wave characteristics of any amplitude up to the point at which the wave reaches its maximum amplitude attainable for a standing wave. The theory yields two criteria to show the maximum wave steepness, the vertical acceleration at the wave crest of half the earth gravity field acceleration and the including angle at the crest of 90 degrees. Comparison with experimental data shows close agreement for the wave crest acceleration but a large discrepancy for the including angle. Additional information is included in the original extended abstract.

Idealized vs. Realistic Microstructures: An Atomistic Simulation Case Study on γ/γ′ Microstructures

PubMed Central

Prakash, Aruna; Bitzek, Erik

2017-01-01

Single-crystal Ni-base superalloys, consisting of a two-phase γ/γ′ microstructure, retain high strengths at elevated temperatures and are key materials for high temperature applications, like, e.g., turbine blades of aircraft engines. The lattice misfit between the γ and γ′ phases results in internal stresses, which significantly influence the deformation and creep behavior of the material. Large-scale atomistic simulations that are often used to enhance our understanding of the deformation mechanisms in such materials must accurately account for such misfit stresses. In this work, we compare the internal stresses in both idealized and experimentally-informed, i.e., more realistic, γ/γ′ microstructures. The idealized samples are generated by assuming, as is frequently done, a periodic arrangement of cube-shaped γ′ particles with planar γ/γ′ interfaces. The experimentally-informed samples are generated from two different sources to produce three different samples—the scanning electron microscopy micrograph-informed quasi-2D atomistic sample and atom probe tomography-informed stoichiometric and non-stoichiometric atomistic samples. Additionally, we compare the stress state of an idealized embedded cube microstructure with finite element simulations incorporating 3D periodic boundary conditions. Subsequently, we study the influence of the resulting stress state on the evolution of dislocation loops in the different samples. The results show that the stresses in the atomistic and finite element simulations are almost identical. Furthermore, quasi-2D boundary conditions lead to a significantly different stress state and, consequently, different evolution of the dislocation loop, when compared to samples with fully 3D boundary conditions. PMID:28772453

Idealized vs. Realistic Microstructures: An Atomistic Simulation Case Study on γ/γ' Microstructures.

PubMed

Prakash, Aruna; Bitzek, Erik

2017-01-23

Single-crystal Ni-base superalloys, consisting of a two-phase γ / γ ' microstructure, retain high strengths at elevated temperatures and are key materials for high temperature applications, like, e.g., turbine blades of aircraft engines. The lattice misfit between the γ and γ ' phases results in internal stresses, which significantly influence the deformation and creep behavior of the material. Large-scale atomistic simulations that are often used to enhance our understanding of the deformation mechanisms in such materials must accurately account for such misfit stresses. In this work, we compare the internal stresses in both idealized and experimentally-informed, i.e., more realistic, γ / γ ' microstructures. The idealized samples are generated by assuming, as is frequently done, a periodic arrangement of cube-shaped γ ' particles with planar γ / γ ' interfaces. The experimentally-informed samples are generated from two different sources to produce three different samples-the scanning electron microscopy micrograph-informed quasi-2D atomistic sample and atom probe tomography-informed stoichiometric and non-stoichiometric atomistic samples. Additionally, we compare the stress state of an idealized embedded cube microstructure with finite element simulations incorporating 3D periodic boundary conditions. Subsequently, we study the influence of the resulting stress state on the evolution of dislocation loops in the different samples. The results show that the stresses in the atomistic and finite element simulations are almost identical. Furthermore, quasi-2D boundary conditions lead to a significantly different stress state and, consequently, different evolution of the dislocation loop, when compared to samples with fully 3D boundary conditions.

Experimental characterization and constitutive modeling of the mechanical behavior of molybdenum under electromagnetically applied compression-shear ramp loading

DOE PAGES

Alexander, C. Scott; Ding, Jow -Lian; Asay, James Russell

2016-03-09

Magnetically applied pressure-shear (MAPS) is a new experimental technique that provides a platform for direct measurement of material strength at extreme pressures. The technique employs an imposed quasi-static magnetic field and a pulsed power generator that produces an intense current on a planar driver panel, which in turn generates high amplitude magnetically induced longitudinal compression and transverse shear waves into a planar sample mounted on the drive panel. In order to apply sufficiently high shear traction to the test sample, a high strength material must be used for the drive panel. Molybdenum is a potential driver material for the MAPSmore » experiment because of its high yield strength and sufficient electrical conductivity. To properly interpret the results and gain useful information from the experiments, it is critical to have a good understanding and a predictive capability of the mechanical response of the driver. In this work, the inelastic behavior of molybdenum under uniaxial compression and biaxial compression-shear ramp loading conditions is experimentally characterized. It is observed that an imposed uniaxial magnetic field ramped to approximately 10 T through a period of approximately 2500 μs and held near the peak for about 250 μs before being tested appears to anneal the molybdenum panel. In order to provide a physical basis for model development, a general theoretical framework that incorporates electromagnetic loading and the coupling between the imposed field and the inelasticity of molybdenum was developed. Based on this framework, a multi-axial continuum model for molybdenum under electromagnetic loading is presented. The model reasonably captures all of the material characteristics displayed by the experimental data obtained from various experimental configurations. Additionally, data generated from shear loading provide invaluable information not only for validating but also for guiding the development of the material model for multiaxial loadings.« less

From theory to experimental design-Quantifying a trait-based theory of predator-prey dynamics.

PubMed

Laubmeier, A N; Wootton, Kate; Banks, J E; Bommarco, Riccardo; Curtsdotter, Alva; Jonsson, Tomas; Roslin, Tomas; Banks, H T

2018-01-01

Successfully applying theoretical models to natural communities and predicting ecosystem behavior under changing conditions is the backbone of predictive ecology. However, the experiments required to test these models are dictated by practical constraints, and models are often opportunistically validated against data for which they were never intended. Alternatively, we can inform and improve experimental design by an in-depth pre-experimental analysis of the model, generating experiments better targeted at testing the validity of a theory. Here, we describe this process for a specific experiment. Starting from food web ecological theory, we formulate a model and design an experiment to optimally test the validity of the theory, supplementing traditional design considerations with model analysis. The experiment itself will be run and described in a separate paper. The theory we test is that trophic population dynamics are dictated by species traits, and we study this in a community of terrestrial arthropods. We depart from the Allometric Trophic Network (ATN) model and hypothesize that including habitat use, in addition to body mass, is necessary to better model trophic interactions. We therefore formulate new terms which account for micro-habitat use as well as intra- and interspecific interference in the ATN model. We design an experiment and an effective sampling regime to test this model and the underlying assumptions about the traits dominating trophic interactions. We arrive at a detailed sampling protocol to maximize information content in the empirical data obtained from the experiment and, relying on theoretical analysis of the proposed model, explore potential shortcomings of our design. Consequently, since this is a "pre-experimental" exercise aimed at improving the links between hypothesis formulation, model construction, experimental design and data collection, we hasten to publish our findings before analyzing data from the actual experiment, thus setting the stage for strong inference.

Beyond the bucket: testing the effect of experimental design on rate and sequence of decay

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gabbott, Sarah; Murdock, Duncan; Purnell, Mark

2016-04-01

Experimental decay has revealed the potential for profound biases in our interpretations of exceptionally preserved fossils, with non-random sequences of character loss distorting the position of fossil taxa in phylogenetic trees. By characterising these sequences we can rewind this distortion and make better-informed interpretations of the affinity of enigmatic fossil taxa. Equally, rate of character loss is crucial for estimating the preservation potential of phylogentically informative characters, and revealing the mechanisms of preservation themselves. However, experimental decay has been criticised for poorly modeling 'real' conditions, and dismissed as unsophisticated 'bucket science'. Here we test the effect of a differing experimental parameters on the rate and sequence of decay. By doing so, we can test the assumption that the results of decay experiments are applicable to informing interpretations of exceptionally preserved fossils from diverse preservational settings. The results of our experiments demonstrate the validity of using the sequence of character loss as a phylogenetic tool, and sheds light on the extent to which environment must be considered before making decay-informed interpretations, or reconstructing taphonomic pathways. With careful consideration of experimental design, driven by testable hypotheses, decay experiments are robust and informative - experimental taphonomy needn't kick the bucket just yet.

Movement Sonification: Effects on Motor Learning beyond Rhythmic Adjustments.

PubMed

Effenberg, Alfred O; Fehse, Ursula; Schmitz, Gerd; Krueger, Bjoern; Mechling, Heinz

2016-01-01

Motor learning is based on motor perception and emergent perceptual-motor representations. A lot of behavioral research is related to single perceptual modalities but during last two decades the contribution of multimodal perception on motor behavior was discovered more and more. A growing number of studies indicates an enhanced impact of multimodal stimuli on motor perception, motor control and motor learning in terms of better precision and higher reliability of the related actions. Behavioral research is supported by neurophysiological data, revealing that multisensory integration supports motor control and learning. But the overwhelming part of both research lines is dedicated to basic research. Besides research in the domains of music, dance and motor rehabilitation, there is almost no evidence for enhanced effectiveness of multisensory information on learning of gross motor skills. To reduce this gap, movement sonification is used here in applied research on motor learning in sports. Based on the current knowledge on the multimodal organization of the perceptual system, we generate additional real-time movement information being suitable for integration with perceptual feedback streams of visual and proprioceptive modality. With ongoing training, synchronously processed auditory information should be initially integrated into the emerging internal models, enhancing the efficacy of motor learning. This is achieved by a direct mapping of kinematic and dynamic motion parameters to electronic sounds, resulting in continuous auditory and convergent audiovisual or audio-proprioceptive stimulus arrays. In sharp contrast to other approaches using acoustic information as error-feedback in motor learning settings, we try to generate additional movement information suitable for acceleration and enhancement of adequate sensorimotor representations and processible below the level of consciousness. In the experimental setting, participants were asked to learn a closed motor skill (technique acquisition of indoor rowing). One group was treated with visual information and two groups with audiovisual information (sonification vs. natural sounds). For all three groups learning became evident and remained stable. Participants treated with additional movement sonification showed better performance compared to both other groups. Results indicate that movement sonification enhances motor learning of a complex gross motor skill-even exceeding usually expected acoustic rhythmic effects on motor learning.

Movement Sonification: Effects on Motor Learning beyond Rhythmic Adjustments

PubMed Central

Effenberg, Alfred O.; Fehse, Ursula; Schmitz, Gerd; Krueger, Bjoern; Mechling, Heinz

2016-01-01

Motor learning is based on motor perception and emergent perceptual-motor representations. A lot of behavioral research is related to single perceptual modalities but during last two decades the contribution of multimodal perception on motor behavior was discovered more and more. A growing number of studies indicates an enhanced impact of multimodal stimuli on motor perception, motor control and motor learning in terms of better precision and higher reliability of the related actions. Behavioral research is supported by neurophysiological data, revealing that multisensory integration supports motor control and learning. But the overwhelming part of both research lines is dedicated to basic research. Besides research in the domains of music, dance and motor rehabilitation, there is almost no evidence for enhanced effectiveness of multisensory information on learning of gross motor skills. To reduce this gap, movement sonification is used here in applied research on motor learning in sports. Based on the current knowledge on the multimodal organization of the perceptual system, we generate additional real-time movement information being suitable for integration with perceptual feedback streams of visual and proprioceptive modality. With ongoing training, synchronously processed auditory information should be initially integrated into the emerging internal models, enhancing the efficacy of motor learning. This is achieved by a direct mapping of kinematic and dynamic motion parameters to electronic sounds, resulting in continuous auditory and convergent audiovisual or audio-proprioceptive stimulus arrays. In sharp contrast to other approaches using acoustic information as error-feedback in motor learning settings, we try to generate additional movement information suitable for acceleration and enhancement of adequate sensorimotor representations and processible below the level of consciousness. In the experimental setting, participants were asked to learn a closed motor skill (technique acquisition of indoor rowing). One group was treated with visual information and two groups with audiovisual information (sonification vs. natural sounds). For all three groups learning became evident and remained stable. Participants treated with additional movement sonification showed better performance compared to both other groups. Results indicate that movement sonification enhances motor learning of a complex gross motor skill—even exceeding usually expected acoustic rhythmic effects on motor learning. PMID:27303255

An Apollo compatible cloud physics experiment.

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eaton, L. R.; Hollinden, A. B.; Satterblom, P. R.

1973-01-01

Consideration of the utilization of a low-gravity environment to obtain experimental information, in the area of cloud microphysics, which cannot be obtained in ground laboratories. The experiment discussed is designed to obtain quantitative answers about evaporation and breakup of salt particles from ocean spray and other sources. In addition to salt nuclei distribution mechanisms, this breakup has ecological importance in relation to the spreading of salt mists from salted highways and spreading of brine cooling tower spray from electrical power generation plants. This experiment is being submitted for consideration on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Program in 1975.

The Bgo-Od Experiment at Elsa

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bantes, B.; Bayadilov, D.; Beck, R.; Becker, M.; Bella, A.; Bieling, J.; Böse, S.; Braglieri, A.; Brinkmann, K.; Burdeynyi, D.; Curciarello, F.; de Leo, V.; di Salvo, R.; Dutz, H.; Elsner, D.; Fantini, A.; Frese, T.; Friedrick, S.; Frommberger, F.; Ganenko, V.; Gervino, G.; Ghio, F.; Giardina, G.; Girolami, B.; Glazier, D.; Goertz, S.; Gridnev, A.; Gutz, E.; Hammann, D.; Hannappel, J.; Hillert, W.; Ignatov, A.; Jahn, O.; Jahn, R.; Joosten, R.; Jude, T. C.; Klein, F.; Koop, K.; Krusche, B.; Lapik, A.; Levi Sandri, P.; Lopatin, I.; Mandaglio, G.; Messi, F.; Messi, R.; Metag, V.; Moricciani, D.; Nanova, M.; Nedorezov, V.; Noviskiy, D.; Pedroni, P.; Romaniuk, M.; Rostomyan, T.; Schaerf, C.; Schmieden, H.; Sumachev, V.; Tarakonov, V.; Vegna, V.; Vlasov, P.; Walther, D.; Watts, D.; Zaunick, H.-G.; Zimmermann, T.

2014-01-01

Meson photoproduction is a key tool for the experimental investigation of the nucleon excitation spectrum. To disentangle the specific couplings of resonances, in addition to the rather well measured pion and eta photoproduction channels it is mandatory to obtain information on channels involving strange and vector mesons and higher mass pseudoscalar mesons, and the associated multi-particle final states with both charged and neutral particles. In this respect, the new BGO-OD experiment at the ELSA accelerator of the University of Bonn's Physikalisches Institut provides unique instrumentation. We describe the experiment, present its status and the initial program of measurements.

Optimization of multicast optical networks with genetic algorithm

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lv, Bo; Mao, Xiangqiao; Zhang, Feng; Qin, Xi; Lu, Dan; Chen, Ming; Chen, Yong; Cao, Jihong; Jian, Shuisheng

2007-11-01

In this letter, aiming to obtain the best multicast performance of optical network in which the video conference information is carried by specified wavelength, we extend the solutions of matrix games with the network coding theory and devise a new method to solve the complex problems of multicast network switching. In addition, an experimental optical network has been testified with best switching strategies by employing the novel numerical solution designed with an effective way of genetic algorithm. The result shows that optimal solutions with genetic algorithm are accordance with the ones with the traditional fictitious play method.

Students' Understanding of Salt Dissolution: Visualizing Animation in the Chemistry Classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Malkoc, Ummuhan

The present study explored the effect of animation implementation in learning a chemistry topic. 135 high school students taking chemistry class were selected for this study (quasi-experimental groups = 67 and control groups = 68). Independent samples t-tests were run to compare animation and control groups between and within the schools. The over-arching finding of this research indicated that when science teachers used animations while teaching salt dissolution phenomena, students will benefit the application of animations. In addition, the findings informed the TPACK framework on the idea that visual tools are important in students' understanding of salt dissolution concepts.

Neuronavigation in the surgical management of brain tumors: current and future trends

PubMed Central

Orringer, Daniel A; Golby, Alexandra; Jolesz, Ferenc

2013-01-01

Neuronavigation has become an ubiquitous tool in the surgical management of brain tumors. This review describes the use and limitations of current neuronavigational systems for brain tumor biopsy and resection. Methods for integrating intraoperative imaging into neuronavigational datasets developed to address the diminishing accuracy of positional information that occurs over the course of brain tumor resection are discussed. In addition, the process of integration of functional MRI and tractography into navigational models is reviewed. Finally, emerging concepts and future challenges relating to the development and implementation of experimental imaging technologies in the navigational environment are explored. PMID:23116076

A structural and theoretical study of the alkylammonium nitrates forefather: Liquid methylammonium nitrate

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gontrani, Lorenzo; Caminiti, Ruggero; Salma, Umme; Campetella, Marco

2017-09-01

We present here a structural and vibrational analysis of melted methylammonium nitrate, the simplest compound of the family of alkylammonium nitrates. The static and dynamical features calculated were endorsed by comparing the experimental X-ray data with the theoretical ones. A reliable description cannot be obtained with classical molecular dynamics owing to polarization effects. Contrariwise, the structure factor and the vibrational frequencies obtained from ab initio molecular dynamics trajectories are in very good agreement with the experiment. A careful analysis has provided additional information on the complex hydrogen bonding network that exists in this liquid.

MSX-3D: a tool to validate 3D protein models using mass spectrometry.

PubMed

Heymann, Michaël; Paramelle, David; Subra, Gilles; Forest, Eric; Martinez, Jean; Geourjon, Christophe; Deléage, Gilbert

2008-12-01

The technique of chemical cross-linking followed by mass spectrometry has proven to bring valuable information about the protein structure and interactions between proteic subunits. It is an effective and efficient way to experimentally investigate some aspects of a protein structure when NMR and X-ray crystallography data are lacking. We introduce MSX-3D, a tool specifically geared to validate protein models using mass spectrometry. In addition to classical peptides identifications, it allows an interactive 3D visualization of the distance constraints derived from a cross-linking experiment. Freely available at http://proteomics-pbil.ibcp.fr

Magnetic droplet solitons generated by pure spin currents

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Divinskiy, B.; Urazhdin, S.; Demidov, V. E.; Kozhanov, A.; Nosov, A. P.; Rinkevich, A. B.; Demokritov, S. O.

2017-12-01

Magnetic droplets are dynamical solitons that can be generated by locally suppressing the dynamical damping in magnetic films with perpendicular anisotropy. To date, droplets have been observed only in nanocontact spin-torque oscillators operated by spin-polarized electrical currents. Here, we experimentally demonstrate that magnetic droplets can be nucleated and sustained by pure spin currents in nanoconstriction-based spin Hall devices. Micromagnetic simulations support our interpretation of the data, and indicate that in addition to the stationary droplets, propagating solitons can be also generated in the studied system, which can be utilized for the information transmission in spintronic applications.

Genetic programming for evolving due-date assignment models in job shop environments.

PubMed

Nguyen, Su; Zhang, Mengjie; Johnston, Mark; Tan, Kay Chen

2014-01-01

Due-date assignment plays an important role in scheduling systems and strongly influences the delivery performance of job shops. Because of the stochastic and dynamic nature of job shops, the development of general due-date assignment models (DDAMs) is complicated. In this study, two genetic programming (GP) methods are proposed to evolve DDAMs for job shop environments. The experimental results show that the evolved DDAMs can make more accurate estimates than other existing dynamic DDAMs with promising reusability. In addition, the evolved operation-based DDAMs show better performance than the evolved DDAMs employing aggregate information of jobs and machines.

Polarization holograms allow highly efficient generation of complex light beams.

PubMed

Ruiz, U; Pagliusi, P; Provenzano, C; Volke-Sepúlveda, K; Cipparrone, Gabriella

2013-03-25

We report a viable method to generate complex beams, such as the non-diffracting Bessel and Weber beams, which relies on the encoding of amplitude information, in addition to phase and polarization, using polarization holography. The holograms are recorded in polarization sensitive films by the interference of a reference plane wave with a tailored complex beam, having orthogonal circular polarizations. The high efficiency, the intrinsic achromaticity and the simplicity of use of the polarization holograms make them competitive with respect to existing methods and attractive for several applications. Theoretical analysis, based on the Jones formalism, and experimental results are shown.

Auditory models for speech analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maybury, Mark T.

This paper reviews the psychophysical basis for auditory models and discusses their application to automatic speech recognition. First an overview of the human auditory system is presented, followed by a review of current knowledge gleaned from neurological and psychoacoustic experimentation. Next, a general framework describes established peripheral auditory models which are based on well-understood properties of the peripheral auditory system. This is followed by a discussion of current enhancements to that models to include nonlinearities and synchrony information as well as other higher auditory functions. Finally, the initial performance of auditory models in the task of speech recognition is examined and additional applications are mentioned.

Cross domains Arabic named entity recognition system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Al-Ahmari, S. Saad; Abdullatif Al-Johar, B.

2016-07-01

Named Entity Recognition (NER) plays an important role in many Natural Language Processing (NLP) applications such as; Information Extraction (IE), Question Answering (QA), Text Clustering, Text Summarization and Word Sense Disambiguation. This paper presents the development and implementation of domain independent system to recognize three types of Arabic named entities. The system works based on a set of domain independent grammar-rules along with Arabic part of speech tagger in addition to gazetteers and lists of trigger words. The experimental results shown, that the system performed as good as other systems with better results in some cases of cross-domains corpora.

Development of the virtual experimental bench on the basis of modernized research centrifugal compressor stage test unit with the 3D impeller.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Aksenov, A. A.; Danilishin, A. M.; Dubenko, A. M.; Kozhukov, Y. V.

2017-08-01

Design modernization of the centrifugal compressor stage test bench with three dimensional impeller blades was carried out for the possibility of holding a series of experimental studies of different 3D impeller models. The studies relates to the problem of joint work of the impeller and the stationary channels of the housing when carrying out works on modernization with the aim of improving the parameters of the volumetric capacity or pressure in the presence of design constraints. The object of study is the experimental single end centrifugal compressor stage with the 3D impeller. Compressor stage consists of the 3D impeller, vaneless diffuser (VLD), outlet collector - folded side scroll and downstream pipe. The drive is a DC motor 75 kW. The increase gear (multiplier) was set between the compressor and DC motor, gear ratio is i = 9.8. To obtain the characteristics of the compressor and the flow area the following values were measured: total pressure, static pressure, direction (angles) of the stream in different cross sections. Additional pneumometric probes on the front wall of the VLD of the test bench have been installed. Total pressure probes and foster holes for the measurement of total and static pressure by the new drainage scheme. This allowed carrying out full experimental studies for two elements of centrifugal compressor stage. After the experimental tests the comprehensive information about the performance of model stage were obtained. Was measured geometric parameters and the constructed virtual model of the experimental bench flow part with the help of Creo Parametric 3.0 and ANSYS v. 16.2. Conducted CFD calculations and verification with experimental data. Identifies the steps for further experimental and virtual works.

EUROSCAN INTERNATIONAL NETWORK MEMBER AGENCIES: THEIR STRUCTURE, PROCESSES, AND OUTPUTS.

PubMed

Packer, Claire; Simpson, Sue; de Almeida, Rosimary Terezinha

2015-01-01

The EuroScan International Network is a global network of publicly funded early awareness and alert (EAA) systems for health technologies. We describe the EuroScan member agency systems and methods, and highlight the potential for increased collaboration. EuroScan members completed postal questionnaires supplemented with telephone interviews in 2012 to elicit additional information and check equivalence of responses. Information was updated between March and May 2013. Fifteen of the seventeen member agencies responded. The principal purpose of agencies is to inform decisions on coverage or reimbursement of health services and decisions on undertaking secondary research. The main users of information are national governments; health professionals; health services purchasers, commissioners, and decision makers; and healthcare providers. Most EuroScan agencies are small with almost half having fewer than two whole time equivalent staff. Ten agencies use both active and passive identification approaches, four use only active approaches. Most start identification in the experimental or investigational stages of the technology life cycle. All agencies assessed technologies when they are between the investigational and established, but under diffusion stages. Barriers to collaboration revolve around different system aims, purposes, and requirements; a lack of staff, finance, or opportunity; language differences; and restrictions on dissemination. Although many barriers to collaboration were identified, the majority of agencies were supportive of increased collaboration either involving the whole EuroScan Network or between individual agencies. Despite differences in the detailed identification processes, members thought that this was the most feasible phase to develop additional collaboration.

Microscopic full-field three-dimensional strain measurement during the mechanical testing of additively manufactured porous biomaterials.

PubMed

Genovese, Katia; Leeflang, Sander; Zadpoor, Amir A

2017-05-01

A custom-designed micro-digital image correlation system was used to track the evolution of the full-surface three-dimensional strain field of Ti6Al4V additively manufactured lattice samples under mechanical loading. The high-magnification capabilities of the method allowed to resolve the strain distribution down to the strut level and disclosed a highly heterogeneous mechanical response of the lattice structure with local strain concentrations well above the nominal global strain level. In particular, we quantified that strain heterogeneity appears at a very early stage of the deformation process and increases with load, showing a strain accumulation pattern with a clear correlation to the later onset of the fracture. The obtained results suggest that the unique opportunities offered by the proposed experimental method, in conjunction with analytical and computational models, could serve to provide novel important information for the rational design of additively manufactured porous biomaterials. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

UCSC genome browser: deep support for molecular biomedical research.

PubMed

Mangan, Mary E; Williams, Jennifer M; Lathe, Scott M; Karolchik, Donna; Lathe, Warren C

2008-01-01

The volume and complexity of genomic sequence data, and the additional experimental data required for annotation of the genomic context, pose a major challenge for display and access for biomedical researchers. Genome browsers organize this data and make it available in various ways to extract useful information to advance research projects. The UCSC Genome Browser is one of these resources. The official sequence data for a given species forms the framework to display many other types of data such as expression, variation, cross-species comparisons, and more. Visual representations of the data are available for exploration. Data can be queried with sequences. Complex database queries are also easily achieved with the Table Browser interface. Associated tools permit additional query types or access to additional data sources such as images of in situ localizations. Support for solving researcher's issues is provided with active discussion mailing lists and by providing updated training materials. The UCSC Genome Browser provides a source of deep support for a wide range of biomedical molecular research (http://genome.ucsc.edu).

Toxicity testing of chemical mixtures: some general aspects and need of international guidelines.

PubMed

Kappus, H; Yang, R S

1996-01-01

The topics discussed by the Working Group on Toxicity Testing of Chemical Mixtures included the following (1) the study designs and results from two real-life exposure scenarios as additional information to the various investigations reported at the conference; (2) the need to take into consideration low-level, long-term exposure (i.e. mimicking human exposure conditions) as well as the issue of limited resources in experimental toxicology studies; (3) the importance of exploring alternative and predictive toxicology methodologies to minimize animal use and to conserve resources; (4) the realization that interactive toxicity should include the consideration of physical and biological agents in addition to chemicals. Two specific studies reported at the conference were also discussed. A number of recommendations were made concerning the planning and implementation of toxicology studies on chemical mixtures.

Optimizing Multiple Analyte Injections in Surface Plasmon Resonance Biosensors with Analytes having Different Refractive Index Increments

PubMed Central

Mehand, Massinissa Si; Srinivasan, Bala; De Crescenzo, Gregory

2015-01-01

Surface plasmon resonance-based biosensors have been successfully applied to the study of the interactions between macromolecules and small molecular weight compounds. In an effort to increase the throughput of these SPR-based experiments, we have already proposed to inject multiple compounds simultaneously over the same surface. When specifically applied to small molecular weight compounds, such a strategy would however require prior knowledge of the refractive index increment of each compound in order to correctly interpret the recorded signal. An additional experiment is typically required to obtain this information. In this manuscript, we show that through the introduction of an additional global parameter corresponding to the ratio of the saturating signals associated with each molecule, the kinetic parameters could be identified with similar confidence intervals without any other experimentation. PMID:26515024

MoonProt: a database for proteins that are known to moonlight

PubMed Central

Mani, Mathew; Chen, Chang; Amblee, Vaishak; Liu, Haipeng; Mathur, Tanu; Zwicke, Grant; Zabad, Shadi; Patel, Bansi; Thakkar, Jagravi; Jeffery, Constance J.

2015-01-01

Moonlighting proteins comprise a class of multifunctional proteins in which a single polypeptide chain performs multiple biochemical functions that are not due to gene fusions, multiple RNA splice variants or pleiotropic effects. The known moonlighting proteins perform a variety of diverse functions in many different cell types and species, and information about their structures and functions is scattered in many publications. We have constructed the manually curated, searchable, internet-based MoonProt Database (http://www.moonlightingproteins.org) with information about the over 200 proteins that have been experimentally verified to be moonlighting proteins. The availability of this organized information provides a more complete picture of what is currently known about moonlighting proteins. The database will also aid researchers in other fields, including determining the functions of genes identified in genome sequencing projects, interpreting data from proteomics projects and annotating protein sequence and structural databases. In addition, information about the structures and functions of moonlighting proteins can be helpful in understanding how novel protein functional sites evolved on an ancient protein scaffold, which can also help in the design of proteins with novel functions. PMID:25324305

High-Speed Photonic Reservoir Computing Using a Time-Delay-Based Architecture: Million Words per Second Classification

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Larger, Laurent; Baylón-Fuentes, Antonio; Martinenghi, Romain; Udaltsov, Vladimir S.; Chembo, Yanne K.; Jacquot, Maxime

2017-01-01

Reservoir computing, originally referred to as an echo state network or a liquid state machine, is a brain-inspired paradigm for processing temporal information. It involves learning a "read-out" interpretation for nonlinear transients developed by high-dimensional dynamics when the latter is excited by the information signal to be processed. This novel computational paradigm is derived from recurrent neural network and machine learning techniques. It has recently been implemented in photonic hardware for a dynamical system, which opens the path to ultrafast brain-inspired computing. We report on a novel implementation involving an electro-optic phase-delay dynamics designed with off-the-shelf optoelectronic telecom devices, thus providing the targeted wide bandwidth. Computational efficiency is demonstrated experimentally with speech-recognition tasks. State-of-the-art speed performances reach one million words per second, with very low word error rate. Additionally, to record speed processing, our investigations have revealed computing-efficiency improvements through yet-unexplored temporal-information-processing techniques, such as simultaneous multisample injection and pitched sampling at the read-out compared to information "write-in".

Genome analysis of Excretory/Secretory proteins in Taenia solium reveals their Abundance of Antigenic Regions (AAR).

PubMed

Gomez, Sandra; Adalid-Peralta, Laura; Palafox-Fonseca, Hector; Cantu-Robles, Vito Adrian; Soberón, Xavier; Sciutto, Edda; Fragoso, Gladis; Bobes, Raúl J; Laclette, Juan P; Yauner, Luis del Pozo; Ochoa-Leyva, Adrián

2015-05-19

Excretory/Secretory (ES) proteins play an important role in the host-parasite interactions. Experimental identification of ES proteins is time-consuming and expensive. Alternative bioinformatics approaches are cost-effective and can be used to prioritize the experimental analysis of therapeutic targets for parasitic diseases. Here we predicted and functionally annotated the ES proteins in T. solium genome using an integration of bioinformatics tools. Additionally, we developed a novel measurement to evaluate the potential antigenicity of T. solium secretome using sequence length and number of antigenic regions of ES proteins. This measurement was formalized as the Abundance of Antigenic Regions (AAR) value. AAR value for secretome showed a similar value to that obtained for a set of experimentally determined antigenic proteins and was different to the calculated value for the non-ES proteins of T. solium genome. Furthermore, we calculated the AAR values for known helminth secretomes and they were similar to that obtained for T. solium. The results reveal the utility of AAR value as a novel genomic measurement to evaluate the potential antigenicity of secretomes. This comprehensive analysis of T. solium secretome provides functional information for future experimental studies, including the identification of novel ES proteins of therapeutic, diagnosis and immunological interest.

Genome analysis of Excretory/Secretory proteins in Taenia solium reveals their Abundance of Antigenic Regions (AAR)

PubMed Central

Gomez, Sandra; Adalid-Peralta, Laura; Palafox-Fonseca, Hector; Cantu-Robles, Vito Adrian; Soberón, Xavier; Sciutto, Edda; Fragoso, Gladis; Bobes, Raúl J.; Laclette, Juan P.; Yauner, Luis del Pozo; Ochoa-Leyva, Adrián

2015-01-01

Excretory/Secretory (ES) proteins play an important role in the host-parasite interactions. Experimental identification of ES proteins is time-consuming and expensive. Alternative bioinformatics approaches are cost-effective and can be used to prioritize the experimental analysis of therapeutic targets for parasitic diseases. Here we predicted and functionally annotated the ES proteins in T. solium genome using an integration of bioinformatics tools. Additionally, we developed a novel measurement to evaluate the potential antigenicity of T. solium secretome using sequence length and number of antigenic regions of ES proteins. This measurement was formalized as the Abundance of Antigenic Regions (AAR) value. AAR value for secretome showed a similar value to that obtained for a set of experimentally determined antigenic proteins and was different to the calculated value for the non-ES proteins of T. solium genome. Furthermore, we calculated the AAR values for known helminth secretomes and they were similar to that obtained for T. solium. The results reveal the utility of AAR value as a novel genomic measurement to evaluate the potential antigenicity of secretomes. This comprehensive analysis of T. solium secretome provides functional information for future experimental studies, including the identification of novel ES proteins of therapeutic, diagnosis and immunological interest. PMID:25989346

Multiscale Informatics for Low-Temperature Propane Oxidation: Further Complexities in Studies of Complex Reactions

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Burke, Michael P.; Goldsmith, C. Franklin; Klippenstein, Stephen J.

2015-07-16

We have developed a multi-scale approach (Burke, M. P.; Klippenstein, S. J.; Harding, L. B. Proc. Combust. Inst. 2013, 34, 547–555.) to kinetic model formulation that directly incorporates elementary kinetic theories as a means to provide reliable, physics-based extrapolation to unexplored conditions. Here, we extend and generalize the multi-scale modeling strategy to treat systems of considerable complexity – involving multi-well reactions, potentially missing reactions, non-statistical product branching ratios, and non-Boltzmann (i.e. non-thermal) reactant distributions. The methodology is demonstrated here for a subsystem of low-temperature propane oxidation, as a representative system for low-temperature fuel oxidation. A multi-scale model is assembled andmore » informed by a wide variety of targets that include ab initio calculations of molecular properties, rate constant measurements of isolated reactions, and complex systems measurements. Active model parameters are chosen to accommodate both “parametric” and “structural” uncertainties. Theoretical parameters (e.g. barrier heights) are included as active model parameters to account for parametric uncertainties in the theoretical treatment; experimental parameters (e.g. initial temperatures) are included to account for parametric uncertainties in the physical models of the experiments. RMG software is used to assess potential structural uncertainties due to missing reactions. Additionally, branching ratios among product channels are included as active model parameters to account for structural uncertainties related to difficulties in modeling sequences of multiple chemically activated steps. The approach is demonstrated here for interpreting time-resolved measurements of OH, HO2, n-propyl, i-propyl, propene, oxetane, and methyloxirane from photolysis-initiated low-temperature oxidation of propane at pressures from 4 to 60 Torr and temperatures from 300 to 700 K. In particular, the multi-scale informed model provides a consistent quantitative explanation of both ab initio calculations and time-resolved species measurements. The present results show that interpretations of OH measurements are significantly more complicated than previously thought – in addition to barrier heights for key transition states considered previously, OH profiles also depend on additional theoretical parameters for R + O2 reactions, secondary reactions, QOOH + O2 reactions, and treatment of non-Boltzmann reaction sequences. Extraction of physically rigorous information from those measurements may require more sophisticated treatment of all of those model aspects, as well as additional experimental data under more conditions, to discriminate among possible interpretations and ensure model reliability. Keywords: Optimization, Uncertainty quantification, Chemical mechanism, Low-Temperature Oxidation, Non-Boltzmann« less

Anaerobic sludge digestion with a biocatalytic additive

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ghosh, S.; Henry, M.P.; Fedde, P.A.

1982-01-01

The objective of this research was to evaluate the effects of a lactobacillus additive an anaerobic sludge digestion under normal, variable, and overload operating conditions. The additive was a whey fermentation product of an acid-tolerant strain of Lactobacillus acidophilus fortified with CaCO/sub 3/, (NH/sub 4/)/sub 2/HPO/sub 4/, ferrous lactate, and lactic acid. The lactobacillus additive is multifunctional in nature and provides growth factors, metabolic intermediates, and enzymes needed for substrate degradation and cellular synthesis. The experimental work consisted of several pairs of parallel mesophilic (35/sup 0/C) digestion runs (control and test) conducted in five experimental phases. Baseline runs without themore » additive showed that the two experimental digesters had the same methane content, gas production rate (GPR), and ethane yield. The effect of the additive was to increase methane yield and GPR by about 5% (which was statistically significant) during digester operation at a loading rate (LR) of 3.2 kg VS/m/sup 3/-day and a hydraulic retention time (HRT) of 14 days. Data collected from the various experimental phases showed that the biochemical additive increased methane yield, gas production rate, and VS reduction, and decreased volatile acids accumulation. In addition, it enhanced digester buffer capacity and improved the fertilizer value and dewatering characteristics of the digested residue.« less

Single-Atom Demonstration of the Quantum Landauer Principle

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yan, L. L.; Xiong, T. P.; Rehan, K.; Zhou, F.; Liang, D. F.; Chen, L.; Zhang, J. Q.; Yang, W. L.; Ma, Z. H.; Feng, M.

2018-05-01

One of the outstanding challenges to information processing is the eloquent suppression of energy consumption in the execution of logic operations. The Landauer principle sets an energy constraint in deletion of a classical bit of information. Although some attempts have been made to experimentally approach the fundamental limit restricted by this principle, exploring the Landauer principle in a purely quantum mechanical fashion is still an open question. Employing a trapped ultracold ion, we experimentally demonstrate a quantum version of the Landauer principle, i.e., an equality associated with the energy cost of information erasure in conjunction with the entropy change of the associated quantized environment. Our experimental investigation substantiates an intimate link between information thermodynamics and quantum candidate systems for information processing.

Trait Self-esteem Moderates Decreases in Self-control Following Rejection: An Information-processing Account.

PubMed

Vandellen, Michelle; Knowles, Megan L; Krusemark, Elizabeth; Sabet, Raha F; Campbell, W Keith; McDowell, Jennifer E; Clementz, Brett A

2012-03-01

In the current paper, the authors posit that trait self-esteem moderates the relationship between social rejection and decrements in self-control, propose an information-processing account of trait self-esteem's moderating influence and discuss three tests of this theory. The authors measured trait self-esteem, experimentally manipulated social rejection and assessed subsequent self-control in Studies 1 and 2. Additionally, Study 3 framed a self-control task as diagnostic of social skills to examine motivational influences. Together, the results reveal that rejection impairs self-control, but only among low self-esteem individuals. Moreover, this decrement in self-control only emerged when the task had no social implications-suggesting that low self-esteem individuals exert effort on tasks of social value and are otherwise preoccupied with belonging needs when completing nonsocial tasks.

An adaptive multi-feature segmentation model for infrared image

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Tingting; Han, Jin; Zhang, Yi; Bai, Lianfa

2016-04-01

Active contour models (ACM) have been extensively applied to image segmentation, conventional region-based active contour models only utilize global or local single feature information to minimize the energy functional to drive the contour evolution. Considering the limitations of original ACMs, an adaptive multi-feature segmentation model is proposed to handle infrared images with blurred boundaries and low contrast. In the proposed model, several essential local statistic features are introduced to construct a multi-feature signed pressure function (MFSPF). In addition, we draw upon the adaptive weight coefficient to modify the level set formulation, which is formed by integrating MFSPF with local statistic features and signed pressure function with global information. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method can make up for the inadequacy of the original method and get desirable results in segmenting infrared images.

Trait Self-esteem Moderates Decreases in Self-control Following Rejection: An Information-processing Account

PubMed Central

Vandellen, Michelle; Knowles, Megan L.; Krusemark, Elizabeth; Sabet, Raha F.; Campbell, W. Keith; McDowell, Jennifer E.; Clementz, Brett A.

2012-01-01

In the current paper, the authors posit that trait self-esteem moderates the relationship between social rejection and decrements in self-control, propose an information-processing account of trait self-esteem’s moderating influence and discuss three tests of this theory. The authors measured trait self-esteem, experimentally manipulated social rejection and assessed subsequent self-control in Studies 1 and 2. Additionally, Study 3 framed a self-control task as diagnostic of social skills to examine motivational influences. Together, the results reveal that rejection impairs self-control, but only among low self-esteem individuals. Moreover, this decrement in self-control only emerged when the task had no social implications—suggesting that low self-esteem individuals exert effort on tasks of social value and are otherwise preoccupied with belonging needs when completing nonsocial tasks. PMID:22611304

System-Level Design of a 64-Channel Low Power Neural Spike Recording Sensor.

PubMed

Delgado-Restituto, Manuel; Rodriguez-Perez, Alberto; Darie, Angela; Soto-Sanchez, Cristina; Fernandez-Jover, Eduardo; Rodriguez-Vazquez, Angel

2017-04-01

This paper reports an integrated 64-channel neural spike recording sensor, together with all the circuitry to process and configure the channels, process the neural data, transmit via a wireless link the information and receive the required instructions. Neural signals are acquired, filtered, digitized and compressed in the channels. Additionally, each channel implements an auto-calibration algorithm which individually configures the transfer characteristics of the recording site. The system has two transmission modes; in one case the information captured by the channels is sent as uncompressed raw data; in the other, feature vectors extracted from the detected neural spikes are released. Data streams coming from the channels are serialized by the embedded digital processor. Experimental results, including in vivo measurements, show that the power consumption of the complete system is lower than 330 μW.

Lost in the crowd? Using eye-tracking to investigate the effect of complexity on attribute non-attendance in discrete choice experiments.

PubMed

Spinks, Jean; Mortimer, Duncan

2016-02-03

The provision of additional information is often assumed to improve consumption decisions, allowing consumers to more accurately weigh the costs and benefits of alternatives. However, increasing the complexity of decision problems may prompt changes in information processing. This is particularly relevant for experimental methods such as discrete choice experiments (DCEs) where the researcher can manipulate the complexity of the decision problem. The primary aims of this study are (i) to test whether consumers actually process additional information in an already complex decision problem, and (ii) consider the implications of any such 'complexity-driven' changes in information processing for design and analysis of DCEs. A discrete choice experiment (DCE) is used to simulate a complex decision problem; here, the choice between complementary and conventional medicine for different health conditions. Eye-tracking technology is used to capture the number of times and the duration that a participant looks at any part of a computer screen during completion of DCE choice sets. From this we can analyse what has become known in the DCE literature as 'attribute non-attendance' (ANA). Using data from 32 participants, we model the likelihood of ANA as a function of choice set complexity and respondent characteristics using fixed and random effects models to account for repeated choice set completion. We also model whether participants are consistent with regard to which characteristics (attributes) they consider across choice sets. We find that complexity is the strongest predictor of ANA when other possible influences, such as time pressure, ordering effects, survey specific effects and socio-demographic variables (including proxies for prior experience with the decision problem) are considered. We also find that most participants do not apply a consistent information processing strategy across choice sets. Eye-tracking technology shows promise as a way of obtaining additional information from consumer research, improving DCE design, and informing the design of policy measures. With regards to DCE design, results from the present study suggest that eye-tracking data can identify the point at which adding complexity (and realism) to DCE choice scenarios becomes self-defeating due to unacceptable increases in ANA. Eye-tracking data therefore has clear application in the construction of guidelines for DCE design and during piloting of DCE choice scenarios. With regards to design of policy measures such as labelling requirements for CAM and conventional medicines, the provision of additional information has the potential to make difficult decisions even harder and may not have the desired effect on decision-making.

The evaluation of the National Long Term Care Demonstration. 1. An overview of the channeling demonstration and its evaluation.

PubMed

Carcagno, G J; Kemper, P

1988-04-01

The channeling demonstration sought to substitute community care for nursing home care to reduce long-term care costs and improve the quality of life of elderly clients and the family members and friends who care for them. Two interventions were tested, each in five sites; both had comprehensive case management at their core. One model added a small amount of additional funding for direct community services to fill the gaps in the existing system; the other substantially expanded coverage of community services regardless of categorical eligibility under existing programs. The demonstration was evaluated using a randomized experimental design to test the effects of channeling on use of community care, nursing homes, hospitals, and informal caregiving, and on measures of the quality of life of clients and their informal caregivers. Data were obtained from interviews with clients and informal caregivers; service use and cost records came from Medicare, Medicaid, channeling, and providers; and death records for an 18-month follow-up period were examined.

An effective biometric discretization approach to extract highly discriminative, informative, and privacy-protective binary representation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lim, Meng-Hui; Teoh, Andrew Beng Jin

2011-12-01

Biometric discretization derives a binary string for each user based on an ordered set of biometric features. This representative string ought to be discriminative, informative, and privacy protective when it is employed as a cryptographic key in various security applications upon error correction. However, it is commonly believed that satisfying the first and the second criteria simultaneously is not feasible, and a tradeoff between them is always definite. In this article, we propose an effective fixed bit allocation-based discretization approach which involves discriminative feature extraction, discriminative feature selection, unsupervised quantization (quantization that does not utilize class information), and linearly separable subcode (LSSC)-based encoding to fulfill all the ideal properties of a binary representation extracted for cryptographic applications. In addition, we examine a number of discriminative feature-selection measures for discretization and identify the proper way of setting an important feature-selection parameter. Encouraging experimental results vindicate the feasibility of our approach.

Intestinal ischemia-reperfusion injury in horses: pathogenesis and therapeutics.

PubMed

Wong, David M; Moore, Rustin M; Brockus, Charles W

2012-08-01

This article discusses the potential role of oxidative injury to the intestinal tract of horses and the therapeutic approaches that have been investigated to decrease cellular damage secondary to ischemia-reperfusion (IR) injury. Equine colic is a major concern for horse owners and veterinary practitioners. Strangulating and obstructive lesions of the small and large intestines commonly require intervention in patients via exploratory celiotomy. However, the application of information from experimentally induced IR injury in horses to clinical cases of naturally occurring equine colic is not clear. Thus, while the exact mechanisms and clinical significance of intestinal IR are being defined and may be matters of academic debate, a review of the available information may provide knowledge of potential underlying pathophysiologic mechanisms contributing to intestinal injury in equine colic. This information may allow clinicians to offer additional therapeutic strategies for horses with strangulating obstruction of the small or large intestine. Further clinical study of the therapeutic options for horses with naturally occurring disease is warranted.

Sharing mutants and experimental information prepublication using FgMutantDb (https://scabusa.org/FgMutantDb).

PubMed

Baldwin, Thomas T; Basenko, Evelina; Harb, Omar; Brown, Neil A; Urban, Martin; Hammond-Kosack, Kim E; Bregitzer, Phil P

2018-06-01

There is no comprehensive storage for generated mutants of Fusarium graminearum or data associated with these mutants. Instead, researchers relied on several independent and non-integrated databases. FgMutantDb was designed as a simple spreadsheet that is accessible globally on the web that will function as a centralized source of information on F. graminearum mutants. FgMutantDb aids in the maintenance and sharing of mutants within a research community. It will serve also as a platform for disseminating prepublication results as well as negative results that often go unreported. Additionally, the highly curated information on mutants in FgMutantDb will be shared with other databases (FungiDB, Ensembl, PhytoPath, and PHI-base) through updating reports. Here we describe the creation and potential usefulness of FgMutantDb to the F. graminearum research community, and provide a tutorial on its use. This type of database could be easily emulated for other fungal species. Published by Elsevier Inc.

Objective fitting of hemoglobin dynamics in traumatic bruises based on temperature depth profiling

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vidovič, Luka; Milanič, Matija; Majaron, Boris

2014-02-01

Pulsed photothermal radiometry (PPTR) allows noninvasive measurement of laser-induced temperature depth profiles. The obtained profiles provide information on depth distribution of absorbing chromophores, such as melanin and hemoglobin. We apply this technique to objectively characterize mass diffusion and decomposition rate of extravasated hemoglobin during the bruise healing process. In present study, we introduce objective fitting of PPTR data obtained over the course of the bruise healing process. By applying Monte Carlo simulation of laser energy deposition and simulation of the corresponding PPTR signal, quantitative analysis of underlying bruise healing processes is possible. Introduction of objective fitting enables an objective comparison between the simulated and experimental PPTR signals. In this manner, we avoid reconstruction of laser-induced depth profiles and thus inherent loss of information in the process. This approach enables us to determine the value of hemoglobin mass diffusivity, which is controversial in existing literature. Such information will be a valuable addition to existing bruise age determination techniques.

High-pressure structural and vibrational properties of monazite-type BiPO4, LaPO4, CePO4, and PrPO4

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Errandonea, D.; Gomis, O.; Rodríguez-Hernández, P.; Muñoz, A.; Ruiz-Fuertes, J.; Gupta, M.; Achary, S. N.; Hirsch, A.; Manjon, F. J.; Peters, L.; Roth, G.; Tyagi, A. K.; Bettinelli, M.

2018-02-01

Monazite-type BiPO4, LaPO4, CePO4, and PrPO4 have been studied under high pressure by ab initio simulations and Raman spectroscopy measurements in the pressure range of stability of the monazite structure. A good agreement between experimental and theoretical Raman-active mode frequencies and pressure coefficients has been found which has allowed us to discuss the nature of the Raman-active modes. Besides, calculations have provided us with information on how the crystal structure is modified by pressure. This information has allowed us to determine the equation of state and the isothermal compressibility tensor of the four studied compounds. In addition, the information obtained on the polyhedral compressibility has been used to explain the anisotropic axial compressibility and the bulk compressibility of monazite phosphates. Finally, we have carried out a systematic discussion on the high-pressure behavior of the four studied phosphates in comparison to results of previous studies.

Uses and Doses of Local Anesthetics in Fish, Amphibians, and Reptiles.

PubMed

Chatigny, Frederic; Kamunde, Collins; Creighton, Catherine M; Stevens, E Don

2017-05-01

Local anesthetics are an integral part of routine pain management in mammals, yet their use is relatively limited in fish, amphibians and reptiles. These animals frequently undergo potentially painful surgical procedures and therefore could possibly benefit from those drugs. Some recommendations are currently available in the literature concerning analgesic use in these animals. However the pharmacological properties, safety and often efficacy of local anesthetic drugs have not been investigated yet in fish, amphibians, or reptiles. This review compiled current information concerning the use of those agents in fish, reptiles and amphibians to help clinicians make an informed decision as to which dose and drug to use. The resulting literature search showed that the literature concerning use of local analgesics in fish and amphibians is very limited while the literature for reptiles is more extensive. We found few experimental studies evaluating the efficacy of local anesthetics. Further studies would provide additional information for developing guidelines to improve the welfare of fish, amphibians and reptiles.

Uses and Doses of Local Anesthetics in Fish, Amphibians, and Reptiles

PubMed Central

Chatigny, Frederic; Kamunde, Collins; Creighton, Catherine M; Stevens, E Don

2017-01-01

Local anesthetics are an integral part of routine pain management in mammals, yet their use is relatively limited in fish, amphibians and reptiles. These animals frequently undergo potentially painful surgical procedures and therefore could possibly benefit from those drugs. Some recommendations are currently available in the literature concerning analgesic use in these animals. However the pharmacological properties, safety and often efficacy of local anesthetic drugs have not been investigated yet in fish, amphibians, or reptiles. This review compiled current information concerning the use of those agents in fish, reptiles and amphibians to help clinicians make an informed decision as to which dose and drug to use. The resulting literature search showed that the literature concerning use of local analgesics in fish and amphibians is very limited while the literature for reptiles is more extensive. We found few experimental studies evaluating the efficacy of local anesthetics. Further studies would provide additional information for developing guidelines to improve the welfare of fish, amphibians and reptiles. PMID:28535859

FMT-XCT: in vivo animal studies with hybrid fluorescence molecular tomography-X-ray computed tomography.

PubMed

Ale, Angelique; Ermolayev, Vladimir; Herzog, Eva; Cohrs, Christian; de Angelis, Martin Hrabé; Ntziachristos, Vasilis

2012-06-01

The development of hybrid optical tomography methods to improve imaging performance has been suggested over a decade ago and has been experimentally demonstrated in animals and humans. Here we examined in vivo performance of a camera-based hybrid fluorescence molecular tomography (FMT) system for 360° imaging combined with X-ray computed tomography (XCT). Offering an accurately co-registered, information-rich hybrid data set, FMT-XCT has new imaging possibilities compared to stand-alone FMT and XCT. We applied FMT-XCT to a subcutaneous 4T1 tumor mouse model, an Aga2 osteogenesis imperfecta model and a Kras lung cancer mouse model, using XCT information during FMT inversion. We validated in vivo imaging results against post-mortem planar fluorescence images of cryoslices and histology data. Besides offering concurrent anatomical and functional information, FMT-XCT resulted in the most accurate FMT performance to date. These findings indicate that addition of FMT optics into the XCT gantry may be a potent upgrade for small-animal XCT systems.

Investigation of microstructure in additive manufactured Inconel 625 by spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy

DOE PAGES

Tremsin, Anton S.; Gao, Yan; Dial, Laura C.; ...

2016-07-08

Non-destructive testing techniques based on neutron imaging and diffraction can provide information on the internal structure of relatively thick metal samples (up to several cm), which are opaque to other conventional non-destructive methods. Spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy is an extension of traditional neutron radiography, where multiple images are acquired simultaneously, each corresponding to a narrow range of energy. The analysis of transmission spectra enables studies of bulk microstructures at the spatial resolution comparable to the detector pixel. In this study we demonstrate the possibility of imaging (with ~100 μm resolution) distribution of some microstructure properties, such as residual strain,more » texture, voids and impurities in Inconel 625 samples manufactured with an additive manufacturing method called direct metal laser melting (DMLM). Although this imaging technique can be implemented only in a few large-scale facilities, it can be a valuable tool for optimization of additive manufacturing techniques and materials and for correlating bulk microstructure properties to manufacturing process parameters. Additionally, the experimental strain distribution can help validate finite element models which many industries use to predict the residual stress distributions in additive manufactured components.« less

Investigation of microstructure in additive manufactured Inconel 625 by spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy.

PubMed

Tremsin, Anton S; Gao, Yan; Dial, Laura C; Grazzi, Francesco; Shinohara, Takenao

2016-01-01

Non-destructive testing techniques based on neutron imaging and diffraction can provide information on the internal structure of relatively thick metal samples (up to several cm), which are opaque to other conventional non-destructive methods. Spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy is an extension of traditional neutron radiography, where multiple images are acquired simultaneously, each corresponding to a narrow range of energy. The analysis of transmission spectra enables studies of bulk microstructures at the spatial resolution comparable to the detector pixel. In this study we demonstrate the possibility of imaging (with ~100 μm resolution) distribution of some microstructure properties, such as residual strain, texture, voids and impurities in Inconel 625 samples manufactured with an additive manufacturing method called direct metal laser melting (DMLM). Although this imaging technique can be implemented only in a few large-scale facilities, it can be a valuable tool for optimization of additive manufacturing techniques and materials and for correlating bulk microstructure properties to manufacturing process parameters. In addition, the experimental strain distribution can help validate finite element models which many industries use to predict the residual stress distributions in additive manufactured components.

Investigation of microstructure in additive manufactured Inconel 625 by spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tremsin, Anton S.; Gao, Yan; Dial, Laura C.; Grazzi, Francesco; Shinohara, Takenao

2016-01-01

Non-destructive testing techniques based on neutron imaging and diffraction can provide information on the internal structure of relatively thick metal samples (up to several cm), which are opaque to other conventional non-destructive methods. Spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy is an extension of traditional neutron radiography, where multiple images are acquired simultaneously, each corresponding to a narrow range of energy. The analysis of transmission spectra enables studies of bulk microstructures at the spatial resolution comparable to the detector pixel. In this study we demonstrate the possibility of imaging (with 100 μm resolution) distribution of some microstructure properties, such as residual strain, texture, voids and impurities in Inconel 625 samples manufactured with an additive manufacturing method called direct metal laser melting (DMLM). Although this imaging technique can be implemented only in a few large-scale facilities, it can be a valuable tool for optimization of additive manufacturing techniques and materials and for correlating bulk microstructure properties to manufacturing process parameters. In addition, the experimental strain distribution can help validate finite element models which many industries use to predict the residual stress distributions in additive manufactured components.

Investigation of microstructure in additive manufactured Inconel 625 by spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Tremsin, Anton S.; Gao, Yan; Dial, Laura C.

Non-destructive testing techniques based on neutron imaging and diffraction can provide information on the internal structure of relatively thick metal samples (up to several cm), which are opaque to other conventional non-destructive methods. Spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy is an extension of traditional neutron radiography, where multiple images are acquired simultaneously, each corresponding to a narrow range of energy. The analysis of transmission spectra enables studies of bulk microstructures at the spatial resolution comparable to the detector pixel. In this study we demonstrate the possibility of imaging (with ~100 μm resolution) distribution of some microstructure properties, such as residual strain,more » texture, voids and impurities in Inconel 625 samples manufactured with an additive manufacturing method called direct metal laser melting (DMLM). Although this imaging technique can be implemented only in a few large-scale facilities, it can be a valuable tool for optimization of additive manufacturing techniques and materials and for correlating bulk microstructure properties to manufacturing process parameters. Additionally, the experimental strain distribution can help validate finite element models which many industries use to predict the residual stress distributions in additive manufactured components.« less

Investigation of microstructure in additive manufactured Inconel 625 by spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy

PubMed Central

Tremsin, Anton S.; Gao, Yan; Dial, Laura C.; Grazzi, Francesco; Shinohara, Takenao

2016-01-01

Abstract Non-destructive testing techniques based on neutron imaging and diffraction can provide information on the internal structure of relatively thick metal samples (up to several cm), which are opaque to other conventional non-destructive methods. Spatially resolved neutron transmission spectroscopy is an extension of traditional neutron radiography, where multiple images are acquired simultaneously, each corresponding to a narrow range of energy. The analysis of transmission spectra enables studies of bulk microstructures at the spatial resolution comparable to the detector pixel. In this study we demonstrate the possibility of imaging (with ~100 μm resolution) distribution of some microstructure properties, such as residual strain, texture, voids and impurities in Inconel 625 samples manufactured with an additive manufacturing method called direct metal laser melting (DMLM). Although this imaging technique can be implemented only in a few large-scale facilities, it can be a valuable tool for optimization of additive manufacturing techniques and materials and for correlating bulk microstructure properties to manufacturing process parameters. In addition, the experimental strain distribution can help validate finite element models which many industries use to predict the residual stress distributions in additive manufactured components. PMID:27877885

What We Have Learned About the Existing Trace Element Partitioning data During the Population Phase of traceDs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nielsen, R. L.; Ghiorso, M. S.; Trischman, T.

2015-12-01

The database traceDs is designed to provide a transparent and accessible resource of experimental partitioning data. It now includes ~ 90% of all the experimental trace element partitioning data (~4000 experiments) produced over the past 45 years, and is accessible through a web based interface (using the portal lepr.ofm-research.org). We set a minimum standard for inclusion, with the threshold criteria being the inclusion of: Experimental conditions (temperature, pressure, device, container, time, etc.) Major element composition of the phases Trace element analyses of the phases Data sources that did not report these minimum components were not included. The rationale for not including such data is that the degree of equilibration is unknown, and more important, no rigorous approach to modeling the behavior of trace elements is possible without knowledge of composition of the phases, and the temperature and pressure of formation/equilibration. The data are stored using a schema derived from that of the Library of Experimental Phase Relations (LEPR), modified to account for additional metadata, and restructured to permit multiple analytical entries for various element/technique/standard combinations. In the process of populating the database, we have learned a number of things about the existing published experimental partitioning data. Most important are: ~ 20% of the papers do not satisfy one or more of the threshold criteria. The standard format for presenting data is the average. This was developed as the standard during the time where there were space constraints for publication in spite of fact that all the information can now be published as electronic supplements. The uncertainties that are published with the compositional data are often not adequately explained (e.g. 1 or 2 sigma, standard deviation of the average, etc.). We propose a new set of publication standards for experimental data that include the minimum criteria described above, the publication of all analyses with error based on peak count rates and background, plus information on the structural state of the mineral (e.g. orthopyroxene vs. pigeonite).

Testimonials and Informational Videos on Branded Prescription Drug Websites: Experimental Study to Assess Influence on Consumer Knowledge and Perceptions

PubMed Central

O'Donoghue, Amie C; Gard Read, Jennifer; Amoozegar, Jacqueline B; Aikin, Kathryn J; Rupert, Douglas J

2018-01-01

Background Direct-to-consumer (DTC) promotion of prescription drugs can affect consumer behaviors and health outcomes, and Internet drug promotion is growing rapidly. Branded drug websites often capitalize on the multimedia capabilities of the Internet by using videos to emphasize drug benefits and characteristics. However, it is unknown how such videos affect consumer processing of drug information. Objective This study aimed to examine how videos on prescription drug websites, and the inclusion of risk information in those videos, influence consumer knowledge and perceptions. Methods We conducted an experimental study in which online panel participants with acid reflux (n=1070) or high blood pressure (n=1055) were randomly assigned to view 1 of the 10 fictitious prescription drug websites and complete a short questionnaire. On each website, we manipulated the type of video (patient testimonial, mechanism of action animation, or none) and whether the video mentioned drug risks. Results Participants who viewed any video were less likely to recognize drug risks presented only in the website text (P≤.01). Including risk information in videos increased participants’ recognition of the risks presented in the videos (P≤.01). However, in some cases, including risk information in videos decreased participants’ recognition of the risks not presented in the videos (ie, risks presented in text only; P≤.04). Participants who viewed a video without drug risk information thought that the website placed more emphasis on benefits, compared with participants who viewed the video with drug risk information (P≤.01). Compared with participants who viewed a video without drug risk information, participants who viewed a video with drug risk information thought that the drug was less effective in the high blood pressure sample (P=.03) and thought that risks were more serious in the acid reflux sample (P=.01). There were no significant differences between risk and nonrisk video conditions on other perception measures (P>.05). In addition, we noted a few differences among the types of videos. Conclusions Including risks in branded drug website videos may increase in-video risk retention at the expense of text-only risk retention. PMID:29362205

Saxagliptin co-therapy in C-peptide negative Type 1 diabetes does not improve counter-regulatory responses to hypoglycaemia.

PubMed

George, P S; McCrimmon, R J

2016-09-01

To test the hypothesis that dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibition in C-peptide negative Type 1 diabetes would reduce glucose variability and exposure to hypoglycaemia and therefore may indirectly enhance counter-regulatory responses to subsequent hypoglycaemia. We conducted a 12-week double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled crossover study. The study was conducted in a tertiary hospital outpatient clinic, with additional studies performed in a clinical research centre. After obtaining informed consent, we recruited 14 subjects with moderately well controlled Type 1 diabetes (HbA1c 64 ± 2 mmol/mol) of long duration (20.5 ± 2.7 years). The subjects received 12 weeks' therapy with oral saxagliptin (5 mg) or placebo. Glucose variability, assessed via continuous glucose monitoring, together with frequency of hypoglycaemia, hypoglycaemia awareness and symptomatic, cognitive and counter-regulatory hormone responses to experimental hypoglycaemia, were assessed. Additional outcome measures included HbA1c level, weight, total daily insulin dose and adverse events. Saxagliptin co-therapy did not reduce glucose variability (low blood glucose index, average daily risk range), hypoglycaemia frequency or awareness and did not improve counter-regulatory hormonal responses during experimental hypoglycaemia (area under the curve for adrenaline 25 775 vs. 24 454, for placebo vs saxagliptin, respectively; P = 0.76). No additional benefit of dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibition co-therapy with saxagliptin in the management of Type 1 diabetes was observed. © 2015 Diabetes UK.

The NIF LinkOut Broker: A Web Resource to Facilitate Federated Data Integration using NCBI Identifiers

PubMed Central

Ascoli, Giorgio A.; Martone, Maryann E.; Shepherd, Gordon M.; Miller, Perry L.

2009-01-01

This paper describes the NIF LinkOut Broker (NLB) that has been built as part of the Neuroscience Information Framework (NIF) project. The NLB is designed to coordinate the assembly of links to neuroscience information items (e.g., experimental data, knowledge bases, and software tools) that are (1) accessible via the Web, and (2) related to entries in the National Center for Biotechnology Information’s (NCBI’s) Entrez system. The NLB collects these links from each resource and passes them to the NCBI which incorporates them into its Entrez LinkOut service. In this way, an Entrez user looking at a specific Entrez entry can LinkOut directly to related neuroscience information. The information stored in the NLB can also be utilized in other ways. A second approach, which is operational on a pilot basis, is for the NLB Web server to create dynamically its own Web page of LinkOut links for each NCBI identifier in the NLB database. This approach can allow other resources (in addition to the NCBI Entrez) to LinkOut to related neuroscience information. The paper describes the current NLB system and discusses certain design issues that arose during its implementation. PMID:18975149

A secure and robust information hiding technique for covert communication

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Parah, S. A.; Sheikh, J. A.; Hafiz, A. M.; Bhat, G. M.

2015-08-01

The unprecedented advancement of multimedia and growth of the internet has made it possible to reproduce and distribute digital media easier and faster. This has given birth to information security issues, especially when the information pertains to national security, e-banking transactions, etc. The disguised form of encrypted data makes an adversary suspicious and increases the chance of attack. Information hiding overcomes this inherent problem of cryptographic systems and is emerging as an effective means of securing sensitive data being transmitted over insecure channels. In this paper, a secure and robust information hiding technique referred to as Intermediate Significant Bit Plane Embedding (ISBPE) is presented. The data to be embedded is scrambled and embedding is carried out using the concept of Pseudorandom Address Vector (PAV) and Complementary Address Vector (CAV) to enhance the security of the embedded data. The proposed ISBPE technique is fully immune to Least Significant Bit (LSB) removal/replacement attack. Experimental investigations reveal that the proposed technique is more robust to various image processing attacks like JPEG compression, Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN), low pass filtering, etc. compared to conventional LSB techniques. The various advantages offered by ISBPE technique make it a good candidate for covert communication.

Mixture models for protein structure ensembles.

PubMed

Hirsch, Michael; Habeck, Michael

2008-10-01

Protein structure ensembles provide important insight into the dynamics and function of a protein and contain information that is not captured with a single static structure. However, it is not clear a priori to what extent the variability within an ensemble is caused by internal structural changes. Additional variability results from overall translations and rotations of the molecule. And most experimental data do not provide information to relate the structures to a common reference frame. To report meaningful values of intrinsic dynamics, structural precision, conformational entropy, etc., it is therefore important to disentangle local from global conformational heterogeneity. We consider the task of disentangling local from global heterogeneity as an inference problem. We use probabilistic methods to infer from the protein ensemble missing information on reference frames and stable conformational sub-states. To this end, we model a protein ensemble as a mixture of Gaussian probability distributions of either entire conformations or structural segments. We learn these models from a protein ensemble using the expectation-maximization algorithm. Our first model can be used to find multiple conformers in a structure ensemble. The second model partitions the protein chain into locally stable structural segments or core elements and less structured regions typically found in loops. Both models are simple to implement and contain only a single free parameter: the number of conformers or structural segments. Our models can be used to analyse experimental ensembles, molecular dynamics trajectories and conformational change in proteins. The Python source code for protein ensemble analysis is available from the authors upon request.

Sensitivity enhancement and contrasting information provided by free radicals in oriented-sample NMR of bicelle-reconstituted membrane proteins.

PubMed

Tesch, Deanna M; Nevzorov, Alexander A

2014-02-01

Elucidating structure and topology of membrane proteins (MPs) is essential for unveiling functionality of these important biological constituents. Oriented-sample solid-state NMR (OS-NMR) is capable of providing such information on MPs under nearly physiological conditions. However, two dimensional OS-NMR experiments can take several days to complete due to long longitudinal relaxation times combined with the large number of scans to achieve sufficient signal sensitivity in biological samples. Here, free radicals 5-DOXYL stearic acid, TEMPOL, and CAT-1 were added to uniformly (15)N-labeled Pf1 coat protein reconstituted in DMPC/DHPC bicelles, and their effect on the longitudinal relaxation times (T1Z) was investigated. The dramatically shortened T1Z's allowed for the signal gain per unit time to be used for either: (i) up to a threefold reduction of the total experimental time at 99% magnetization recovery or (ii) obtaining up to 74% signal enhancement between the control and radical samples during constant experimental time at "optimal" relaxation delays. In addition, through OS-NMR and high-field EPR studies, free radicals were able to provide positional constraints in the bicelle system, which provide a description of the location of each residue in Pf1 coat protein within the bicellar membranes. This information can be useful in the determination of oligomerization states and immersion depths of larger membrane proteins. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The future of drug discovery: enabling technologies for enhancing lead characterization and profiling therapeutic potential.

PubMed

Janero, David R

2014-08-01

Technology often serves as a handmaiden and catalyst of invention. The discovery of safe, effective medications depends critically upon experimental approaches capable of providing high-impact information on the biological effects of drug candidates early in the discovery pipeline. This information can enable reliable lead identification, pharmacological compound differentiation and successful translation of research output into clinically useful therapeutics. The shallow preclinical profiling of candidate compounds promulgates a minimalistic understanding of their biological effects and undermines the level of value creation necessary for finding quality leads worth moving forward within the development pipeline with efficiency and prognostic reliability sufficient to help remediate the current pharma-industry productivity drought. Three specific technologies discussed herein, in addition to experimental areas intimately associated with contemporary drug discovery, appear to hold particular promise for strengthening the preclinical valuation of drug candidates by deepening lead characterization. These are: i) hydrogen-deuterium exchange mass spectrometry for characterizing structural and ligand-interaction dynamics of disease-relevant proteins; ii) activity-based chemoproteomics for profiling the functional diversity of mammalian proteomes; and iii) nuclease-mediated precision gene editing for developing more translatable cellular and in vivo models of human diseases. When applied in an informed manner congruent with the clinical understanding of disease processes, technologies such as these that span levels of biological organization can serve as valuable enablers of drug discovery and potentially contribute to reducing the current, unacceptably high rates of compound clinical failure.

Uncertainty in dual permeability model parameters for structured soils.

PubMed

Arora, B; Mohanty, B P; McGuire, J T

2012-01-01

Successful application of dual permeability models (DPM) to predict contaminant transport is contingent upon measured or inversely estimated soil hydraulic and solute transport parameters. The difficulty in unique identification of parameters for the additional macropore- and matrix-macropore interface regions, and knowledge about requisite experimental data for DPM has not been resolved to date. Therefore, this study quantifies uncertainty in dual permeability model parameters of experimental soil columns with different macropore distributions (single macropore, and low- and high-density multiple macropores). Uncertainty evaluation is conducted using adaptive Markov chain Monte Carlo (AMCMC) and conventional Metropolis-Hastings (MH) algorithms while assuming 10 out of 17 parameters to be uncertain or random. Results indicate that AMCMC resolves parameter correlations and exhibits fast convergence for all DPM parameters while MH displays large posterior correlations for various parameters. This study demonstrates that the choice of parameter sampling algorithms is paramount in obtaining unique DPM parameters when information on covariance structure is lacking, or else additional information on parameter correlations must be supplied to resolve the problem of equifinality of DPM parameters. This study also highlights the placement and significance of matrix-macropore interface in flow experiments of soil columns with different macropore densities. Histograms for certain soil hydraulic parameters display tri-modal characteristics implying that macropores are drained first followed by the interface region and then by pores of the matrix domain in drainage experiments. Results indicate that hydraulic properties and behavior of the matrix-macropore interface is not only a function of saturated hydraulic conductivity of the macroporematrix interface ( K sa ) and macropore tortuosity ( l f ) but also of other parameters of the matrix and macropore domains.

Uncertainty in dual permeability model parameters for structured soils

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arora, B.; Mohanty, B. P.; McGuire, J. T.

2012-01-01

Successful application of dual permeability models (DPM) to predict contaminant transport is contingent upon measured or inversely estimated soil hydraulic and solute transport parameters. The difficulty in unique identification of parameters for the additional macropore- and matrix-macropore interface regions, and knowledge about requisite experimental data for DPM has not been resolved to date. Therefore, this study quantifies uncertainty in dual permeability model parameters of experimental soil columns with different macropore distributions (single macropore, and low- and high-density multiple macropores). Uncertainty evaluation is conducted using adaptive Markov chain Monte Carlo (AMCMC) and conventional Metropolis-Hastings (MH) algorithms while assuming 10 out of 17 parameters to be uncertain or random. Results indicate that AMCMC resolves parameter correlations and exhibits fast convergence for all DPM parameters while MH displays large posterior correlations for various parameters. This study demonstrates that the choice of parameter sampling algorithms is paramount in obtaining unique DPM parameters when information on covariance structure is lacking, or else additional information on parameter correlations must be supplied to resolve the problem of equifinality of DPM parameters. This study also highlights the placement and significance of matrix-macropore interface in flow experiments of soil columns with different macropore densities. Histograms for certain soil hydraulic parameters display tri-modal characteristics implying that macropores are drained first followed by the interface region and then by pores of the matrix domain in drainage experiments. Results indicate that hydraulic properties and behavior of the matrix-macropore interface is not only a function of saturated hydraulic conductivity of the macroporematrix interface (Ksa) and macropore tortuosity (lf) but also of other parameters of the matrix and macropore domains.

Enhanced sensitivity of CpG island search and primer design based on predicted CpG island position.

PubMed

Park, Hyun-Chul; Ahn, Eu-Ree; Jung, Ju Yeon; Park, Ji-Hye; Lee, Jee Won; Lim, Si-Keun; Kim, Won

2018-05-01

DNA methylation has important biological roles, such as gene expression regulation, as well as practical applications in forensics, such as in body fluid identification and age estimation. DNA methylation often occurs in the CpG site, and methylation within the CpG islands affects various cellular functions and is related to tissue-specific identification. Several programs have been developed to identify CpG islands; however, the size, location, and number of predicted CpG islands are not identical due to different search algorithms. In addition, they only provide structural information for predicted CpG islands without experimental information, such as primer design. We developed an analysis pipeline package, CpGPNP, to integrate CpG island prediction and primer design. CpGPNP predicts CpG islands more accurately and sensitively than other programs, and designs primers easily based on the predicted CpG island locations. The primer design function included standard, bisulfite, and methylation-specific PCR to identify the methylation of particular CpG sites. In this study, we performed CpG island prediction on all chromosomes and compared CpG island search performance of CpGPNP with other CpG island prediction programs. In addition, we compared the position of primers designed for a specific region within the predicted CpG island using other bisulfite PCR primer programs. The primers designed by CpGPNP were used to experimentally verify the amplification of the target region of markers for body fluid identification and age estimation. CpGPNP is freely available at http://forensicdna.kr/cpgpnp/. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

System Related Interventions to Reduce Diagnostic Error: A Narrative Review

PubMed Central

Singh, Hardeep; Graber, Mark L.; Kissam, Stephanie M.; Sorensen, Asta V.; Lenfestey, Nancy F.; Tant, Elizabeth M.; Henriksen, Kerm; LaBresh, Kenneth A.

2013-01-01

Background Diagnostic errors (missed, delayed, or wrong diagnosis) have gained recent attention and are associated with significant preventable morbidity and mortality. We reviewed the recent literature to identify interventions that have been, or could be, implemented to address systems-related factors that contribute directly to diagnostic error. Methods We conducted a comprehensive search using multiple search strategies. We first identified candidate articles in English between 2000 and 2009 from a PubMed search that exclusively evaluated for articles related to diagnostic error or delay. We then sought additional papers from references in the initial dataset, searches of additional databases, and subject matter experts. Articles were included if they formally evaluated an intervention to prevent or reduce diagnostic error; however, we also included papers if interventions were suggested and not tested in order to inform the state-of-the science on the topic. We categorized interventions according to the step in the diagnostic process they targeted: patient-provider encounter, performance and interpretation of diagnostic tests, follow-up and tracking of diagnostic information, subspecialty and referral-related; and patient-specific. Results We identified 43 articles for full review, of which 6 reported tested interventions and 37 contained suggestions for possible interventions. Empirical studies, though somewhat positive, were non-experimental or quasi-experimental and included a small number of clinicians or health care sites. Outcome measures in general were underdeveloped and varied markedly between studies, depending on the setting or step in the diagnostic process involved. Conclusions Despite a number of suggested interventions in the literature, few empirical studies have tested interventions to reduce diagnostic error in the last decade. Advancing the science of diagnostic error prevention will require more robust study designs and rigorous definitions of diagnostic processes and outcomes to measure intervention effects. PMID:22129930

Challenges of Obtaining Evidence-Based Information Regarding Medications and Male Fertility.

PubMed

Drobnis, Erma Z; Nangia, Ajay K

2017-01-01

In the clinic, the existing literature is insufficient to counsel our infertile men on medication use. Most studies have flaws that limit their application to evidence-based practice. In this chapter, we discuss the limitations of the current literature and the challenges to designing more useful studies. Among the most important weaknesses of existing studies is lack of power; that is, too few men are included to draw conclusions about the existence and size of medication effects. Adequate power is particularly important when confirming an absence of medication effect. Bias is also a problem in most studies. Early studies were rarely randomized, placebo-controlled, or blinded; a common example is patients receiving different medication regimes based on the severity of their symptoms-making it impossible to attribute differences between treated and untreated men to the medications. Additional bias is introduced by failing to include other factors that influence the outcome in the experimental design. A uniform population amenable to randomization and placebo-control are experimental species, and useful information has been gained from these models. However, application to humans is limited by differences from other species in route of drug administration, absorption of the drug, concentration in the male genital tract tissues, and genital tract physiology. To a lesser degree, there is variation among individual men in their response to drugs. In addition, drugs in the same class may have different effects, limiting the applicability of data across drugs of a single class. Complicating matters further, a toxic medication may seem to improve fertility endpoints by improving a disease condition that diminishes fertility. Finally, drug interactions have not been studied, and actual fertility data (pregnancy/fecundity) in humans are rare. A healthy dose of skepticism is warranted when evaluating studies of medications and male reproductive health.

Enhancing Information Systems Auditing Knowledge with Role-Playing Game: An Experimental Investigation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wongpinunwatana, Nitaya

2013-01-01

This study examined the use and effect of a role-playing game on learners' ability in information systems audit. The study is based on experimental research. Information systems control and audit case study and video had been developed. A total of 75 graduate students undertaking a Master's degree in accounting participated in the experiment. The…

Laboratory Spectroscopy of Ices of Astrophysical Interest

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hudson, Reggie; Moore, M. H.

2011-01-01

Ongoing and future NASA and ESA astronomy missions need detailed information on the spectra of a variety of molecular ices to help establish the identity and abundances of molecules observed in astronomical data. Examples of condensed-phase molecules already detected on cold surfaces include H2O, CO, CO2, N2, NH3, CH4, SO2, O2, and O3. In addition, strong evidence exists for the solid-phase nitriles HCN, HC3N, and C2N2 in Titan's atmosphere. The wavelength region over which these identifications have been made is roughly 0.5 to 100 micron. Searches for additional features of complex carbon-containing species are in progress. Existing and future observations often impose special requirements on the information that comes from the laboratory. For example, the measurement of spectra, determination of integrated band strengths, and extraction of complex refractive indices of ices (and icy mixtures) in both amorphous and crystalline phases at relevant temperatures are all important tasks. In addition, the determination of the index of refraction of amorphous and crystalline ices in the visible region is essential for the extraction of infrared optical constants. Similarly, the measurement of spectra of ions and molecules embedded in relevant ices is important. This laboratory review will examine some of the existing experimental work and capabilities in these areas along with what more may be needed to meet current and future NASA and ESA planetary needs.

Comparative meta-analysis and experimental kinetic investigation of column and batch bottle microcosm treatability studies informing in situ groundwater remedial design.

PubMed

Driver, Erin M; Roberts, Jeff; Dollar, Peter; Charles, Maurissa; Hurst, Paul; Halden, Rolf U

2017-02-05

A systematic comparison was performed between batch bottle and continuous-flow column microcosms (BMs and CMs, respectively) commonly used for in situ groundwater remedial design. Review of recent literature (2000-2014) showed a preference for reporting batch kinetics, even when corresponding column data were available. Additionally, CMs produced higher observed rate constants, exceeding those of BMs by a factor of 6.1±1.1 standard error. In a subsequent laboratory investigation, 12 equivalent microcosm pairs were constructed from fractured bedrock and perchloroethylene (PCE) impacted groundwater. First-order PCE transformation kinetics of CMs were 8.0±4.8 times faster than BMs (rates: 1.23±0.87 vs. 0.16±0.05d -1 , respectively). Additionally, CMs transformed 16.1±8.0-times more mass than BMs owing to continuous-feed operation. CMs are concluded to yield more reliable kinetic estimates because of much higher data density stemming from long-term, steady-state conditions. Since information from BMs and CMs is valuable and complementary, treatability studies should report kinetic data from both when available. This first systematic investigation of BMs and CMs highlights the need for a more unified framework for data use and reporting in treatability studies informing decision-making for field-scale groundwater remediation. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Composition-driven Cu-speciation and reducibility in Cu-CHA zeolite catalysts: a multivariate XAS/FTIR approach to complexity† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Sample description and synthesis details, experimental setup for in situ XAS and FTIR spectroscopy, details on the MCR-ALS method, details on DFT-assisted XANES simulations, details on the determination of N pure by PCA, MCR-ALS results for downsized and upsized component spaces, additional information to support the assignment of theoretical XANES curves, details on EXAFS analysis, details on IR spectral deconvolution. See DOI: 10.1039/c7sc02266b Click here for additional data file.

PubMed Central

Martini, A.; Lomachenko, K. A.; Pankin, I. A.; Negri, C.; Berlier, G.; Beato, P.; Falsig, H.; Bordiga, S.; Lamberti, C.

2017-01-01

The small pore Cu-CHA zeolite is attracting increasing attention as a versatile platform to design novel single-site catalysts for deNOx applications and for the direct conversion of methane to methanol. Understanding at the atomic scale how the catalyst composition influences the Cu-species formed during thermal activation is a key step to unveil the relevant composition–activity relationships. Herein, we explore by in situ XAS the impact of Cu-CHA catalyst composition on temperature-dependent Cu-speciation and reducibility. Advanced multivariate analysis of in situ XANES in combination with DFT-assisted simulation of XANES spectra and multi-component EXAFS fits as well as in situ FTIR spectroscopy of adsorbed N2 allow us to obtain unprecedented quantitative structural information on the complex dynamics during the speciation of Cu-sites inside the framework of the CHA zeolite. PMID:29147509

Touchscreen assays of learning, response inhibition, and motivation in the marmoset (Callithrix jacchus).

PubMed

Kangas, Brian D; Bergman, Jack; Coyle, Joseph T

2016-05-01

Recent developments in precision gene editing have led to the emergence of the marmoset as an experimental subject of considerable interest and translational value. A better understanding of behavioral phenotypes of the common marmoset will inform the extent to which forthcoming transgenic mutants are cognitively intact. Therefore, additional information regarding their learning, inhibitory control, and motivational abilities is needed. The present studies used touchscreen-based repeated acquisition and discrimination reversal tasks to examine basic dimensions of learning and response inhibition. Marmosets were trained daily to respond to one of the two simultaneously presented novel stimuli. Subjects learned to discriminate the two stimuli (acquisition) and, subsequently, with the contingencies switched (reversal). In addition, progressive ratio performance was used to measure the effort expended to obtain a highly palatable reinforcer varying in magnitude and, thereby, provide an index of relative motivational value. Results indicate that rates of both acquisition and reversal of novel discriminations increased across successive sessions, but that rate of reversal learning remained slower than acquisition learning, i.e., more trials were needed for mastery. A positive correlation was observed between progressive ratio break point and reinforcement magnitude. These results closely replicate previous findings with squirrel monkeys, thus providing evidence of similarity in learning processes across nonhuman primate species. Moreover, these data provide key information about the normative phenotype of wild-type marmosets using three relevant behavioral endpoints.

Benchmark Evaluation of Start-Up and Zero-Power Measurements at the High-Temperature Engineering Test Reactor

DOE PAGES

Bess, John D.; Fujimoto, Nozomu

2014-10-09

Benchmark models were developed to evaluate six cold-critical and two warm-critical, zero-power measurements of the HTTR. Additional measurements of a fully-loaded subcritical configuration, core excess reactivity, shutdown margins, six isothermal temperature coefficients, and axial reaction-rate distributions were also evaluated as acceptable benchmark experiments. Insufficient information is publicly available to develop finely-detailed models of the HTTR as much of the design information is still proprietary. However, the uncertainties in the benchmark models are judged to be of sufficient magnitude to encompass any biases and bias uncertainties incurred through the simplification process used to develop the benchmark models. Dominant uncertainties in themore » experimental keff for all core configurations come from uncertainties in the impurity content of the various graphite blocks that comprise the HTTR. Monte Carlo calculations of keff are between approximately 0.9 % and 2.7 % greater than the benchmark values. Reevaluation of the HTTR models as additional information becomes available could improve the quality of this benchmark and possibly reduce the computational biases. High-quality characterization of graphite impurities would significantly improve the quality of the HTTR benchmark assessment. Simulation of the other reactor physics measurements are in good agreement with the benchmark experiment values. The complete benchmark evaluation details are available in the 2014 edition of the International Handbook of Evaluated Reactor Physics Benchmark Experiments.« less

Manual therapy in addition to physiotherapy does not improve clinical or economic outcomes after ankle fracture.

PubMed

Lin, Chung-Wei Christine; Moseley, Anne M; Haas, Marion; Refshauge, Kathryn M; Herbert, Robert D

2008-06-01

The primary aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of adding manual therapy to a physiotherapy programme for ankle fracture. Assessor-blinded randomized controlled trial. Ninety-four adults were recruited within one week of cast removal for isolated ankle fracture. Inclusion criteria were: they were able to weight-bear as tolerated or partial weight-bear, were referred for physiotherapy, and experienced pain. Ninety-one participants completed the study. Participants were randomly allocated to receive manual therapy (anterior-posterior joint mobilization over the talus) plus a standard physiotherapy programme (experimental), or the standard physiotherapy programme only (control). They were assessed by a blinded assessor at baseline, and at 4, 12 and 24 weeks. The main outcomes were activity limitation and quality of life. Information on costs and healthcare utilization was collected every 4 weeks up to 24 weeks. There were no clinically worthwhile differences in activity limitation or quality of life between groups at any time-point. There was also no between-group difference in quality-adjusted life-years, but the experimental group incurred higher out-of-pocket costs (mean between-group difference = AU$200, 95% confidence interval 26-432). When provided in addition to a physiotherapy programme, manual therapy did not enhance outcome in adults after ankle fracture.

Noninvasive imaging of experimental lung fibrosis.

PubMed

Zhou, Yong; Chen, Huaping; Ambalavanan, Namasivayam; Liu, Gang; Antony, Veena B; Ding, Qiang; Nath, Hrudaya; Eary, Janet F; Thannickal, Victor J

2015-07-01

Small animal models of lung fibrosis are essential for unraveling the molecular mechanisms underlying human fibrotic lung diseases; additionally, they are useful for preclinical testing of candidate antifibrotic agents. The current end-point measures of experimental lung fibrosis involve labor-intensive histological and biochemical analyses. These measures fail to account for dynamic changes in the disease process in individual animals and are limited by the need for large numbers of animals for longitudinal studies. The emergence of noninvasive imaging technologies provides exciting opportunities to image lung fibrosis in live animals as often as needed and to longitudinally track the efficacy of novel antifibrotic compounds. Data obtained by noninvasive imaging provide complementary information to histological and biochemical measurements. In addition, the use of noninvasive imaging in animal studies reduces animal usage, thus satisfying animal welfare concerns. In this article, we review these new imaging modalities with the potential for evaluation of lung fibrosis in small animal models. Such techniques include micro-computed tomography (micro-CT), magnetic resonance imaging, positron emission tomography (PET), single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), and multimodal imaging systems including PET/CT and SPECT/CT. It is anticipated that noninvasive imaging will be increasingly used in animal models of fibrosis to gain insights into disease pathogenesis and as preclinical tools to assess drug efficacy.

microPIR2: a comprehensive database for human–mouse comparative study of microRNA–promoter interactions

PubMed Central

Piriyapongsa, Jittima; Bootchai, Chaiwat; Ngamphiw, Chumpol; Tongsima, Sissades

2014-01-01

microRNA (miRNA)–promoter interaction resource (microPIR) is a public database containing over 15 million predicted miRNA target sites located within human promoter sequences. These predicted targets are presented along with their related genomic and experimental data, making the microPIR database the most comprehensive repository of miRNA promoter target sites. Here, we describe major updates of the microPIR database including new target predictions in the mouse genome and revised human target predictions. The updated database (microPIR2) now provides ∼80 million human and 40 million mouse predicted target sites. In addition to being a reference database, microPIR2 is a tool for comparative analysis of target sites on the promoters of human–mouse orthologous genes. In particular, this new feature was designed to identify potential miRNA–promoter interactions conserved between species that could be stronger candidates for further experimental validation. We also incorporated additional supporting information to microPIR2 such as nuclear and cytoplasmic localization of miRNAs and miRNA–disease association. Extra search features were also implemented to enable various investigations of targets of interest. Database URL: http://www4a.biotec.or.th/micropir2 PMID:25425035

Modeling the erythemal surface diffuse irradiance fraction for Badajoz, Spain

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sanchez, Guadalupe; Serrano, Antonio; Cancillo, María Luisa

2017-10-01

Despite its important role on the human health and numerous biological processes, the diffuse component of the erythemal ultraviolet irradiance (UVER) is scarcely measured at standard radiometric stations and therefore needs to be estimated. This study proposes and compares 10 empirical models to estimate the UVER diffuse fraction. These models are inspired from mathematical expressions originally used to estimate total diffuse fraction, but, in this study, they are applied to the UVER case and tested against experimental measurements. In addition to adapting to the UVER range the various independent variables involved in these models, the total ozone column has been added in order to account for its strong impact on the attenuation of ultraviolet radiation. The proposed models are fitted to experimental measurements and validated against an independent subset. The best-performing model (RAU3) is based on a model proposed by Ruiz-Arias et al. (2010) and shows values of r2 equal to 0.91 and relative root-mean-square error (rRMSE) equal to 6.1 %. The performance achieved by this entirely empirical model is better than those obtained by previous semi-empirical approaches and therefore needs no additional information from other physically based models. This study expands on previous research to the ultraviolet range and provides reliable empirical models to accurately estimate the UVER diffuse fraction.

Bioreactor design for successive culture of anchorage-dependent cells operated in an automated manner.

PubMed

Kino-Oka, Masahiro; Ogawa, Natsuki; Umegaki, Ryota; Taya, Masahito

2005-01-01

A novel bioreactor system was designed to perform a series of batchwise cultures of anchorage-dependent cells by means of automated operations of medium change and passage for cell transfer. The experimental data on contamination frequency ensured the biological cleanliness in the bioreactor system, which facilitated the operations in a closed environment, as compared with that in flask culture system with manual handlings. In addition, the tools for growth prediction (based on growth kinetics) and real-time growth monitoring by measurement of medium components (based on small-volume analyzing machinery) were installed into the bioreactor system to schedule the operations of medium change and passage and to confirm that culture proceeds as scheduled, respectively. The successive culture of anchorage-dependent cells was conducted with the bioreactor running in an automated way. The automated bioreactor gave a successful culture performance with fair accordance to preset scheduling based on the information in the latest subculture, realizing 79- fold cell expansion for 169 h. In addition, the correlation factor between experimental data and scheduled values through the bioreactor performance was 0.998. It was concluded that the proposed bioreactor with the integration of the prediction and monitoring tools could offer a feasible system for the manufacturing process of cultured tissue products.

Just-in-time consent: The ethical case for an alternative to traditional informed consent in randomized trials comparing an experimental intervention with usual care.

PubMed

Vickers, Andrew J; Young-Afat, Danny A; Ehdaie, Behfar; Kim, Scott Yh

2018-02-01

Informed consent for randomized trials often causes significant and persistent anxiety, distress and confusion to patients. Where an experimental treatment is compared to a standard care control, much of this burden is potentially avoidable in the control group. We propose a "just-in-time" consent in which consent discussions take place in two stages: an initial consent to research from all participants and a later specific consent to randomized treatment only from those assigned to the experimental intervention. All patients are first approached and informed about research procedures, such as questionnaires or tests. They are also informed that they might be randomly selected to receive an experimental treatment and that, if selected, they can learn more about the treatment and decide whether or not to accept it at that time. After randomization, control patients undergo standard clinical consent whereas patients randomized to the experimental procedure undergo a second consent discussion. Analysis would be by intent-to-treat, which protects the trial from selection bias, although not from poor acceptance of experimental treatment. The advantages of just-in-time consent stem from the fact that only patients randomized to the experimental treatment are subject to a discussion of that intervention. We hypothesize that this will reduce much of the patient's burden associated with the consent process, such as decisional anxiety, confusion and information overload. We recommend well-controlled studies to compare just-in-time and traditional consent, with endpoints to include characteristics of participants, distress and anxiety and participants' understanding of research procedures.

A proposed simulation method for directed self-assembly of nanographene

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Geraets, J. A.; Baldwin, J. P. C.; Twarock, R.; Hancock, Y.

2017-09-01

A methodology for predictive kinetic self-assembly modeling of bottom-up chemical synthesis of nanographene is proposed. The method maintains physical transparency in using a novel array format to efficiently store molecule information and by using array operations to determine reaction possibilities. Within a minimal model approach, the parameter space for the bond activation energies (i.e. molecule functionalization) at fixed reaction temperature and initial molecule concentrations is explored. Directed self-assembly of nanographene from functionalized tetrabenzanthracene and benzene is studied with regions in the activation energy phase-space showing length-to-width ratio tunability. The degree of defects and reaction reproducibility in the simulations is also determined, with the rate of functionalized benzene addition providing additional control of the dimension and quality of the nanographene. Comparison of the reaction energetics to available density functional theory data suggests the synthesis may be experimentally tenable using aryl-halide cross-coupling and noble metal surface-assisted catalysis. With full access to the intermediate reaction network and with dynamic coupling to density functional theory-informed tight-binding simulation, the method is proposed as a computationally efficient means towards detailed simulation-driven design of new nanographene systems.

Using time-frequency analysis to determine time-resolved detonation velocity with microwave interferometry.

PubMed

Kittell, David E; Mares, Jesus O; Son, Steven F

2015-04-01

Two time-frequency analysis methods based on the short-time Fourier transform (STFT) and continuous wavelet transform (CWT) were used to determine time-resolved detonation velocities with microwave interferometry (MI). The results were directly compared to well-established analysis techniques consisting of a peak-picking routine as well as a phase unwrapping method (i.e., quadrature analysis). The comparison is conducted on experimental data consisting of transient detonation phenomena observed in triaminotrinitrobenzene and ammonium nitrate-urea explosives, representing high and low quality MI signals, respectively. Time-frequency analysis proved much more capable of extracting useful and highly resolved velocity information from low quality signals than the phase unwrapping and peak-picking methods. Additionally, control of the time-frequency methods is mainly constrained to a single parameter which allows for a highly unbiased analysis method to extract velocity information. In contrast, the phase unwrapping technique introduces user based variability while the peak-picking technique does not achieve a highly resolved velocity result. Both STFT and CWT methods are proposed as improved additions to the analysis methods applied to MI detonation experiments, and may be useful in similar applications.

Floor Sensing System Using Laser Reflectivity for Localizing Everyday Objects and Robot

PubMed Central

Pyo, Yoonseok; Hasegawa, Tsutomu; Tsuji, Tokuo; Kurazume, Ryo; Morooka, Ken'ichi

2014-01-01

This paper describes a new method of measuring the position of everyday objects and a robot on the floor using distance and reflectance acquired by laser range finder (LRF). The information obtained by this method is important for a service robot working in a human daily life environment. Our method uses only one LRF together with a mirror installed on the wall. Moreover, since the area of sensing is limited to a LRF scanning plane parallel to the floor and just a few centimeters above the floor, the scanning covers the whole room with minimal invasion of privacy of a resident, and occlusion problem is mitigated by using mirror. We use the reflection intensity and position information obtained from the target surface. Although it is not possible to identify all objects by additionally using reflection values, it would be easier to identify unknown objects if we can eliminate easily identifiable objects by reflectance. In addition, we propose a method for measuring the robot's pose using the tag which has the encoded reflection pattern optically identified by the LRF. Our experimental results validate the effectiveness of the proposed method. PMID:24763253