Topological Interference Management for K-User Downlink Massive MIMO Relay Network Channel.

PubMed

Selvaprabhu, Poongundran; Chinnadurai, Sunil; Li, Jun; Lee, Moon Ho

2017-08-17

In this paper, we study the emergence of topological interference alignment and the characterizing features of a multi-user broadcast interference relay channel. We propose an alternative transmission strategy named the relay space-time interference alignment (R-STIA) technique, in which a K -user multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) interference channel has massive antennas at the transmitter and relay. Severe interference from unknown transmitters affects the downlink relay network channel and degrades the system performance. An additional (unintended) receiver is introduced in the proposed R-STIA technique to overcome the above problem, since it has the ability to decode the desired signals for the intended receiver by considering cooperation between the receivers. The additional receiver also helps in recovering and reconstructing the interference signals with limited channel state information at the relay (CSIR). The Alamouti space-time transmission technique and minimum mean square error (MMSE) linear precoder are also used in the proposed scheme to detect the presence of interference signals. Numerical results show that the proposed R-STIA technique achieves a better performance in terms of the bit error rate (BER) and sum-rate compared to the existing broadcast channel schemes.

Topological Interference Management for K-User Downlink Massive MIMO Relay Network Channel

PubMed Central

Li, Jun; Lee, Moon Ho

2017-01-01

In this paper, we study the emergence of topological interference alignment and the characterizing features of a multi-user broadcast interference relay channel. We propose an alternative transmission strategy named the relay space-time interference alignment (R-STIA) technique, in which a K-user multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) interference channel has massive antennas at the transmitter and relay. Severe interference from unknown transmitters affects the downlink relay network channel and degrades the system performance. An additional (unintended) receiver is introduced in the proposed R-STIA technique to overcome the above problem, since it has the ability to decode the desired signals for the intended receiver by considering cooperation between the receivers. The additional receiver also helps in recovering and reconstructing the interference signals with limited channel state information at the relay (CSIR). The Alamouti space-time transmission technique and minimum mean square error (MMSE) linear precoder are also used in the proposed scheme to detect the presence of interference signals. Numerical results show that the proposed R-STIA technique achieves a better performance in terms of the bit error rate (BER) and sum-rate compared to the existing broadcast channel schemes. PMID:28817071

A joint precoding scheme for indoor downlink multi-user MIMO VLC systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Qiong; Fan, Yangyu; Kang, Bochao

2017-11-01

In this study, we aim to improve the system performance and reduce the implementation complexity of precoding scheme for visible light communication (VLC) systems. By incorporating the power-method algorithm and the block diagonalization (BD) algorithm, we propose a joint precoding scheme for indoor downlink multi-user multi-input-multi-output (MU-MIMO) VLC systems. In this scheme, we apply the BD algorithm to eliminate the co-channel interference (CCI) among users firstly. Secondly, the power-method algorithm is used to search the precoding weight for each user based on the optimal criterion of signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR) maximization. Finally, the optical power restrictions of VLC systems are taken into account to constrain the precoding weight matrix. Comprehensive computer simulations in two scenarios indicate that the proposed scheme always has better bit error rate (BER) performance and lower computation complexity than that of the traditional scheme.

Chaotic reconfigurable ZCMT precoder for OFDM data encryption and PAPR reduction

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Han; Yang, Xuelin; Hu, Weisheng

2017-12-01

A secure orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) transmission scheme precoded by chaotic Zadoff-Chu matrix transform (ZCMT) is proposed and demonstrated. It is proved that the reconfigurable ZCMT matrices after row/column permutations can be applied as an alternative precoder for peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) reduction. The permutations and the reconfigurable parameters in ZCMT matrix are generated by a hyper digital chaos, in which a huge key space of ∼ 10800 is created for physical-layer OFDM data encryption. An encrypted data transmission of 8.9 Gb/s optical OFDM signals is successfully demonstrated over 20 km standard single-mode fiber (SSMF) for 16-QAM. The BER performance of the encrypted signals is improved by ∼ 2 dB (BER@ 10-3), which is mainly attributed to the effective reduction of PAPR via chaotic ZCMT precoding. Moreover, the chaotic ZCMT precoding scheme requires no sideband information, thus the spectrum efficiency is enhanced during transmission.

A power-efficient ZF precoding scheme for multi-user indoor visible light communication systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Qiong; Fan, Yangyu; Deng, Lijun; Kang, Bochao

2017-02-01

In this study, we propose a power-efficient ZF precoding scheme for visible light communication (VLC) downlink multi-user multiple-input-single-output (MU-MISO) systems, which incorporates the zero-forcing (ZF) and the characteristics of VLC systems. The main idea of this scheme is that the channel matrix used to perform pseudoinverse comes from the set of optical Access Points (APs) shared by more than one user, instead of the set of all involved serving APs as the existing ZF precoding schemes often used. By doing this, the waste of power, which is caused by the transmission of one user's data in the un-serving APs, can be avoided. In addition, the size of the channel matrix needs to perform pseudoinverse becomes smaller, which helps to reduce the computation complexity. Simulation results in two scenarios show that the proposed ZF precoding scheme has higher power efficiency, better bit error rate (BER) performance and lower computation complexity compared with traditional ZF precoding schemes.

Semiblind channel estimation for MIMO-OFDM systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Yi-Sheng; Song, Jyu-Han

2012-12-01

This article proposes a semiblind channel estimation method for multiple-input multiple-output orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing systems based on circular precoding. Relying on the precoding scheme at the transmitters, the autocorrelation matrix of the received data induces a structure relating the outer product of the channel frequency response matrix and precoding coefficients. This structure makes it possible to extract information about channel product matrices, which can be used to form a Hermitian matrix whose positive eigenvalues and corresponding eigenvectors yield the channel impulse response matrix. This article also tests the resistance of the precoding design to finite-sample estimation errors, and explores the effects of the precoding scheme on channel equalization by performing pairwise error probability analysis. The proposed method is immune to channel zero locations, and is reasonably robust to channel order overestimation. The proposed method is applicable to the scenarios in which the number of transmitters exceeds that of the receivers. Simulation results demonstrate the performance of the proposed method and compare it with some existing methods.

AMLSA Algorithm for Hybrid Precoding in Millimeter Wave MIMO Systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Fulai; Sun, Zhenxing; Du, Ruiyan; Bai, Xiaoyu

2017-10-01

In this paper, an effective algorithm will be proposed for hybrid precoding in mmWave MIMO systems, referred to as alternating minimization algorithm with the least squares amendment (AMLSA algorithm). To be specific, for the fully-connected structure, the presented algorithm is exploited to minimize the classical objective function and obtain the hybrid precoding matrix. It introduces an orthogonal constraint to the digital precoding matrix which is amended subsequently by the least squares after obtaining its alternating minimization iterative result. Simulation results confirm that the achievable spectral efficiency of our proposed algorithm is better to some extent than that of the existing algorithm without the least squares amendment. Furthermore, the number of iterations is reduced slightly via improving the initialization procedure.

Assessing the blood volume and heart rate responses during haemodialysis in fluid overloaded patients using support vector regression.

PubMed

Javed, Faizan; Savkin, Andrey V; Chan, Gregory S H; Middleton, Paul M; Malouf, Philip; Steel, Elizabeth; Mackie, James; Lovell, Nigel H

2009-11-01

This study aims to assess the blood volume and heart rate (HR) responses during haemodialysis in fluid overloaded patients by a nonparametric nonlinear regression approach based on a support vector machine (SVM). Relative blood volume (RBV) and electrocardiogram (ECG) was recorded from 23 haemodynamically stable renal failure patients during regular haemodialysis. Modelling was performed on 18 fluid overloaded patients (fluid removal of >2 L). SVM-based regression was used to obtain the models of RBV change with time as well as the percentage change in HR with respect to RBV. Mean squared error (MSE) and goodness of fit (R(2)) were used for comparison among different kernel functions. The design parameters were estimated using a grid search approach and the selected models were validated by a k-fold cross-validation technique. For the model of HR versus RBV change, a radial basis function (RBF) kernel (MSE = 17.37 and R(2) = 0.932) gave the least MSE compared to linear (MSE = 25.97 and R(2) = 0.898) and polynomial (MSE = 18.18 and R(2)= 0.929). The MSE was significantly lower for training data set when using RBF kernel compared to other kernels (p < 0.01). The RBF kernel also provided a slightly better fit of RBV change with time (MSE = 1.12 and R(2) = 0.91) compared to a linear kernel (MSE = 1.46 and R(2) = 0.88). The modelled HR response was characterized by an initial drop and a subsequent rise during progressive reduction in RBV, which may be interpreted as the reflex response to a transition from central hypervolaemia to hypovolaemia. These modelled curves can be used as references to a controller that can be designed to regulate the haemodynamic variables to ensure the stability of patients undergoing haemodialysis.

Digital transceiver design for two-way AF-MIMO relay systems with imperfect CSI

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hu, Chia-Chang; Chou, Yu-Fei; Chen, Kui-He

2013-09-01

In the paper, combined optimization of the terminal precoders/equalizers and single-relay precoder is proposed for an amplify-and-forward (AF) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) two-way single-relay system with correlated channel uncertainties. Both terminal transceivers and relay precoding matrix are designed based on the minimum mean square error (MMSE) criterion when terminals are unable to erase completely self-interference due to imperfect correlated channel state information (CSI). This robust joint optimization problem of beamforming and precoding matrices under power constraints belongs to neither concave nor convex so that a nonlinear matrix-form conjugate gradient (MCG) algorithm is applied to explore local optimal solutions. Simulation results show that the robust transceiver design is able to overcome effectively the loss of bit-error-rate (BER) due to inclusion of correlated channel uncertainties and residual self-interference.

Precoding based channel prediction for underwater acoustic OFDM

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cheng, En; Lin, Na; Sun, Hai-xin; Yan, Jia-quan; Qi, Jie

2017-04-01

The life duration of underwater cooperative network has been the hot topic in recent years. And the problem of node energy consuming is the key technology to maintain the energy balance among all nodes. To ensure energy efficiency of some special nodes and obtain a longer lifetime of the underwater cooperative network, this paper focuses on adopting precoding strategy to preprocess the signal at the transmitter and simplify the receiver structure. Meanwhile, it takes into account the presence of Doppler shifts and long feedback transmission delay in an underwater acoustic communication system. Precoding technique is applied based on channel prediction to realize energy saving and improve system performance. Different precoding methods are compared. Simulated results and experimental results show that the proposed scheme has a better performance, and it can provide a simple receiver and realize energy saving for some special nodes in a cooperative communication.

Quantum State Tomography via Linear Regression Estimation

PubMed Central

Qi, Bo; Hou, Zhibo; Li, Li; Dong, Daoyi; Xiang, Guoyong; Guo, Guangcan

2013-01-01

A simple yet efficient state reconstruction algorithm of linear regression estimation (LRE) is presented for quantum state tomography. In this method, quantum state reconstruction is converted into a parameter estimation problem of a linear regression model and the least-squares method is employed to estimate the unknown parameters. An asymptotic mean squared error (MSE) upper bound for all possible states to be estimated is given analytically, which depends explicitly upon the involved measurement bases. This analytical MSE upper bound can guide one to choose optimal measurement sets. The computational complexity of LRE is O(d4) where d is the dimension of the quantum state. Numerical examples show that LRE is much faster than maximum-likelihood estimation for quantum state tomography. PMID:24336519

Incorporation of prior information on parameters into nonlinear regression groundwater flow models: 2. Applications

USGS Publications Warehouse

Cooley, Richard L.

1983-01-01

This paper investigates factors influencing the degree of improvement in estimates of parameters of a nonlinear regression groundwater flow model by incorporating prior information of unknown reliability. Consideration of expected behavior of the regression solutions and results of a hypothetical modeling problem lead to several general conclusions. First, if the parameters are properly scaled, linearized expressions for the mean square error (MSE) in parameter estimates of a nonlinear model will often behave very nearly as if the model were linear. Second, by using prior information, the MSE in properly scaled parameters can be reduced greatly over the MSE of ordinary least squares estimates of parameters. Third, plots of estimated MSE and the estimated standard deviation of MSE versus an auxiliary parameter (the ridge parameter) specifying the degree of influence of the prior information on regression results can help determine the potential for improvement of parameter estimates. Fourth, proposed criteria can be used to make appropriate choices for the ridge parameter and another parameter expressing degree of overall bias in the prior information. Results of a case study of Truckee Meadows, Reno-Sparks area, Washoe County, Nevada, conform closely to the results of the hypothetical problem. In the Truckee Meadows case, incorporation of prior information did not greatly change the parameter estimates from those obtained by ordinary least squares. However, the analysis showed that both sets of estimates are more reliable than suggested by the standard errors from ordinary least squares.

CSI Feedback Reduction for MIMO Interference Alignment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rao, Xiongbin; Ruan, Liangzhong; Lau, Vincent K. N.

2013-09-01

Interference alignment (IA) is a linear precoding strategy that can achieve optimal capacity scaling at high SNR in interference networks. Most of the existing IA designs require full channel state information (CSI) at the transmitters, which induces a huge CSI signaling cost. Hence it is desirable to improve the feedback efficiency for IA and in this paper, we propose a novel IA scheme with a significantly reduced CSI feedback. To quantify the CSI feedback cost, we introduce a novel metric, namely the feedback dimension. This metric serves as a first-order measurement of CSI feedback overhead. Due to the partial CSI feedback constraint, conventional IA schemes can not be applied and hence, we develop a novel IA precoder / decorrelator design and establish new IA feasibility conditions. Via dynamic feedback profile design, the proposed IA scheme can also achieve a flexible tradeoff between the degree of freedom (DoF) requirements for data streams, the antenna resources and the CSI feedback cost. We show by analysis and simulations that the proposed scheme achieves substantial reductions of CSI feedback overhead under the same DoF requirement in MIMO interference networks.

Small area estimation for semicontinuous data.

PubMed

Chandra, Hukum; Chambers, Ray

2016-03-01

Survey data often contain measurements for variables that are semicontinuous in nature, i.e. they either take a single fixed value (we assume this is zero) or they have a continuous, often skewed, distribution on the positive real line. Standard methods for small area estimation (SAE) based on the use of linear mixed models can be inefficient for such variables. We discuss SAE techniques for semicontinuous variables under a two part random effects model that allows for the presence of excess zeros as well as the skewed nature of the nonzero values of the response variable. In particular, we first model the excess zeros via a generalized linear mixed model fitted to the probability of a nonzero, i.e. strictly positive, value being observed, and then model the response, given that it is strictly positive, using a linear mixed model fitted on the logarithmic scale. Empirical results suggest that the proposed method leads to efficient small area estimates for semicontinuous data of this type. We also propose a parametric bootstrap method to estimate the MSE of the proposed small area estimator. These bootstrap estimates of the MSE are compared to the true MSE in a simulation study. © 2014 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

A two layer chaotic encryption scheme of secure image transmission for DCT precoded OFDM-VLC transmission

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Zhongpeng; Chen, Fangni; Qiu, Weiwei; Chen, Shoufa; Ren, Dongxiao

2018-03-01

In this paper, a two-layer image encryption scheme for a discrete cosine transform (DCT) precoded orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) visible light communication (VLC) system is proposed. Firstly, in the proposed scheme the transmitted image is first encrypted by a chaos scrambling sequence,which is generated from the hybrid 4-D hyper- and Arnold map in the upper-layer. After that, the encrypted image is converted into digital QAM modulation signal, which is re-encrypted by chaos scrambling sequence based on Arnold map in physical layer to further enhance the security of the transmitted image. Moreover, DCT precoding is employed to improve BER performance of the proposed system and reduce the PAPR of OFDM signal. The BER and PAPR performances of the proposed system are evaluated by simulation experiments. The experiment results show that the proposed two-layer chaos scrambling schemes achieve image secure transmission for image-based OFDM VLC. Furthermore, DCT precoding can reduce the PAPR and improve the BER performance of OFDM-based VLC.

Estimation and Mitigation of Channel Non-Reciprocity in Massive MIMO

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Raeesi, Orod; Gokceoglu, Ahmet; Valkama, Mikko

2018-05-01

Time-division duplex (TDD) based massive MIMO systems rely on the reciprocity of the wireless propagation channels when calculating the downlink precoders based on uplink pilots. However, the effective uplink and downlink channels incorporating the analog radio front-ends of the base station (BS) and user equipments (UEs) exhibit non-reciprocity due to non-identical behavior of the individual transmit and receive chains. When downlink precoder is not aware of such channel non-reciprocity (NRC), system performance can be significantly degraded due to NRC induced interference terms. In this work, we consider a general TDD-based massive MIMO system where frequency-response mismatches at both the BS and UEs, as well as the mutual coupling mismatch at the BS large-array system all coexist and induce channel NRC. Based on the NRC-impaired signal models, we first propose a novel iterative estimation method for acquiring both the BS and UE side NRC matrices and then also propose a novel NRC-aware downlink precoder design which utilizes the obtained estimates. Furthermore, an efficient pilot signaling scheme between the BS and UEs is introduced in order to facilitate executing the proposed estimation method and the NRC-aware precoding technique in practical systems. Comprehensive numerical results indicate substantially improved spectral efficiency performance when the proposed NRC estimation and NRC-aware precoding methods are adopted, compared to the existing state-of-the-art methods.

Long-lasting effects of a new memory self-efficacy training for stroke patients: a randomized controlled trial.

PubMed

Aben, Laurien; Heijenbrok-Kal, Majanka H; Ponds, Rudolf W H M; Busschbach, Jan J V; Ribbers, Gerard M

2014-01-01

This study aims to determine the long-term effects of a new Memory Self-efficacy (MSE) training program for stroke patients on MSE, depression, and quality of life. In a randomized controlled trial, patients were allocated to a MSE training or a peer support group. Outcome measures were MSE, depression, and quality of life, measured with the Metamemory-In-Adulthood questionnaire, Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression Scale (CES-D), and the Who-Qol Bref questionnaire, respectively. We used linear mixed models to compare the outcomes of both groups immediately after training, after 6 months, and after 12 months, adjusted for baseline. In total, 153 former inpatients from 2 rehabilitation centers were randomized-77 to the experimental and 76 to the control group. MSE increased significantly more in the experimental group and remained significantly higher than in the control group after 6 and 12 months (B = 0.42; P = .010). Psychological quality of life also increased more in the experimental group but not significantly (B = 0.09; P = .077). However, in the younger subgroup of patients (<65 years old), psychological quality of life significantly improved in the experimental group compared to the control group and remained significantly higher over time (B = 0.14; P = .030). Other outcome measures were not significantly different between both groups. An MSE training program improved MSE and psychological quality of life in stroke patients aged <65 years. These effects persisted during 12 months of follow-up.

Filter-based multiscale entropy analysis of complex physiological time series.

PubMed

Xu, Yuesheng; Zhao, Liang

2013-08-01

Multiscale entropy (MSE) has been widely and successfully used in analyzing the complexity of physiological time series. We reinterpret the averaging process in MSE as filtering a time series by a filter of a piecewise constant type. From this viewpoint, we introduce filter-based multiscale entropy (FME), which filters a time series to generate multiple frequency components, and then we compute the blockwise entropy of the resulting components. By choosing filters adapted to the feature of a given time series, FME is able to better capture its multiscale information and to provide more flexibility for studying its complexity. Motivated by the heart rate turbulence theory, which suggests that the human heartbeat interval time series can be described in piecewise linear patterns, we propose piecewise linear filter multiscale entropy (PLFME) for the complexity analysis of the time series. Numerical results from PLFME are more robust to data of various lengths than those from MSE. The numerical performance of the adaptive piecewise constant filter multiscale entropy without prior information is comparable to that of PLFME, whose design takes prior information into account.

Investigation of dose characteristics in three-dimensional MAGAT-type polymer gel dosimetry with MSE MR imaging

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, Jason J. S.; Tsai, Chia-Jung; Lo, Man-Kuok; Huang, Yung-Hui; Chen, Chien-Chuan; Wu, Jay; Tyan, Yeu-Sheng; Wu, Tung-Hsin

2008-05-01

A new type of normoxic polymer gel dosimeter, named MAGAT responses well to absorbed dose even when manufacturing in the presence of normal levels of oxygen. The aim of this study was to evaluate dose response, diffusion effect and cumulated dose response under multiple fractional irradiations of the MAGAT gel dosimeter using Multiple Spin-Echo (MSE) Magnetic Resonance (MR) sequence. Dose response was performed by irradiating MAGAT-gel-filled testing vials with a 6 MV linear accelerator and a linear relationship was present with doses from 0 to 6 Gy, but gradually, a bi-exponential function result was obtained with given doses up to 20 Gy. No significant difference in dose response was present between single and cumulated doses (p > 0.05). For study of diffusion effect, edge sharpness of the R2 map imaging between two split doses was smaller than 1 cm of dose profile penumbra between 20% and 80%. In conclusion, the MAGAT polymer gel dosimeter with MSE MR imaging is a promising method for dose verification in clinical radiation therapy practice.

The Forgotten Women of Pre-Code: An Annotated Filmography and Bibliography

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Tang, Jennifer

2010-01-01

In recent years, "pre-code" films have been re-discovered and applauded by film scholars and feminists. The term refers to the period between 1929 and 1934 when many Hollywood studios openly disregarded the censorship restrictions of the Hays Code. Named after censorship czar William H. Hays, the Code forbade nudity, cursing, sexual innuendo,…

Construction of Protograph LDPC Codes with Linear Minimum Distance

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Divsalar, Dariush; Dolinar, Sam; Jones, Christopher

2006-01-01

A construction method for protograph-based LDPC codes that simultaneously achieve low iterative decoding threshold and linear minimum distance is proposed. We start with a high-rate protograph LDPC code with variable node degrees of at least 3. Lower rate codes are obtained by splitting check nodes and connecting them by degree-2 nodes. This guarantees the linear minimum distance property for the lower-rate codes. Excluding checks connected to degree-1 nodes, we show that the number of degree-2 nodes should be at most one less than the number of checks for the protograph LDPC code to have linear minimum distance. Iterative decoding thresholds are obtained by using the reciprocal channel approximation. Thresholds are lowered by using either precoding or at least one very high-degree node in the base protograph. A family of high- to low-rate codes with minimum distance linearly increasing in block size and with capacity-approaching performance thresholds is presented. FPGA simulation results for a few example codes show that the proposed codes perform as predicted.

SU-C-207B-06: Comparison of Registration Methods for Modeling Pathologic Response of Esophageal Cancer to Chemoradiation Therapy

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

Riyahi, S; Choi, W; Bhooshan, N

2016-06-15

Purpose: To compare linear and deformable registration methods for evaluation of tumor response to Chemoradiation therapy (CRT) in patients with esophageal cancer. Methods: Linear and multi-resolution BSpline deformable registration were performed on Pre-Post-CRT CT/PET images of 20 patients with esophageal cancer. For both registration methods, we registered CT using Mean Square Error (MSE) metric, however to register PET we used transformation obtained using Mutual Information (MI) from the same CT due to being multi-modality. Similarity of Warped-CT/PET was quantitatively evaluated using Normalized Mutual Information and plausibility of DF was assessed using inverse consistency Error. To evaluate tumor response four groupsmore » of tumor features were examined: (1) Conventional PET/CT e.g. SUV, diameter (2) Clinical parameters e.g. TNM stage, histology (3)spatial-temporal PET features that describe intensity, texture and geometry of tumor (4)all features combined. Dominant features were identified using 10-fold cross-validation and Support Vector Machine (SVM) was deployed for tumor response prediction while the accuracy was evaluated by ROC Area Under Curve (AUC). Results: Average and standard deviation of Normalized mutual information for deformable registration using MSE was 0.2±0.054 and for linear registration was 0.1±0.026, showing higher NMI for deformable registration. Likewise for MI metric, deformable registration had 0.13±0.035 comparing to linear counterpart with 0.12±0.037. Inverse consistency error for deformable registration for MSE metric was 4.65±2.49 and for linear was 1.32±2.3 showing smaller value for linear registration. The same conclusion was obtained for MI in terms of inverse consistency error. AUC for both linear and deformable registration was 1 showing no absolute difference in terms of response evaluation. Conclusion: Deformable registration showed better NMI comparing to linear registration, however inverse consistency of transformation was lower in linear registration. We do not expect to see significant difference when warping PET images using deformable or linear registration. This work was supported in part by the National Cancer Institute Grants R01CA172638.« less

Sugar snack consumption in Ugandan schoolchildren: Validity and reliability of a food frequency questionnaire.

PubMed

Kiwanuka, S N; Astrøm, A N; Trovik, T A

2006-10-01

This study assessed the reproducibility and relative validity of an eight-item self-administered food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) on intake of sugared snacks in Ugandan schoolchildren. A 5-day precoded food behaviour checklist (FBC) was used as validation criteria. Sociodemographic correlates of a sum frequency sugar score were explored. The study was conducted in Kampala, Uganda, in 2004. Six hundred and fourteen schoolchildren (mean age 12.4 years) completed the FFQ on cakes/biscuits, chocolate, ice sticks, soft drinks, coffee, tea, sugared desserts and sweets/candies at school. They were examined clinically for dental caries. Forty students completed the FFQ twice, 1 week apart and 325 students completed the 5 day FBC at school. The mean decayed, missing and filled tooth index score was 0.98 (SD 1.6, range 0-15). Reproducibility scores (Cohen's kappa) for the sugar items ranged from 0.17 (ice sticks) to 0.55 (biscuits). No differences were seen between the average intakes at test and retest. Higher intake was reported in FFQ than in FBC across all sugar items. Crude agreement between students reporting intake at least 3-5 times a week/less than three times a week ranged from 50% to 55% (e.g. biscuits, chocolate) to 87% (tea). Spearman's correlation coefficients ranged from 0.14 (desserts) to 0.27 (sweets). anova revealed significant increase (P = 0.001) in the mean FBC sum scores by increasing quartiles of the FFQ sum scores. The average sum FFQ sugar scores were higher in girls than in boys and higher in older than in younger students. Fair reproducibility was established for the FFQ sugar items. The FFQ was acceptable in classifying individuals into broad categories of low and high sugar consumption.

Refractive Status at Birth: Its Relation to Newborn Physical Parameters at Birth and Gestational Age

PubMed Central

Varghese, Raji Mathew; Sreenivas, Vishnubhatla; Puliyel, Jacob Mammen; Varughese, Sara

2009-01-01

Background Refractive status at birth is related to gestational age. Preterm babies have myopia which decreases as gestational age increases and term babies are known to be hypermetropic. This study looked at the correlation of refractive status with birth weight in term and preterm babies, and with physical indicators of intra-uterine growth such as the head circumference and length of the baby at birth. Methods All babies delivered at St. Stephens Hospital and admitted in the nursery were eligible for the study. Refraction was performed within the first week of life. 0.8% tropicamide with 0.5% phenylephrine was used to achieve cycloplegia and paralysis of accommodation. 599 newborn babies participated in the study. Data pertaining to the right eye is utilized for all the analyses except that for anisometropia where the two eyes were compared. Growth parameters were measured soon after birth. Simple linear regression analysis was performed to see the association of refractive status, (mean spherical equivalent (MSE), astigmatism and anisometropia) with each of the study variables, namely gestation, length, weight and head circumference. Subsequently, multiple linear regression was carried out to identify the independent predictors for each of the outcome parameters. Results Simple linear regression showed a significant relation between all 4 study variables and refractive error but in multiple regression only gestational age and weight were related to refractive error. The partial correlation of weight with MSE adjusted for gestation was 0.28 and that of gestation with MSE adjusted for weight was 0.10. Birth weight had a higher correlation to MSE than gestational age. Conclusion This is the first study to look at refractive error against all these growth parameters, in preterm and term babies at birth. It would appear from this study that birth weight rather than gestation should be used as criteria for screening for refractive error, especially in developing countries where the incidence of intrauterine malnutrition is higher. PMID:19214228

Using the Moist Static Energy Budget to Understand Storm Track Shifts across a Range of Timescales

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barpanda, P.; Shaw, T.

2017-12-01

Storm tracks shift meridionally in response to forcing across a range of time scales. Here we formulate a moist static energy (MSE) framework for storm track position and use it to understand storm track shifts in response to seasonal insolation, El Niño minus La Niña conditions, and direct (increased CO2 over land) and indirect (increased sea surface temperature) effects of increased CO2. Two methods (linearized Taylor series and imposed MSE flux divergence) are developed to quantify storm track shifts and decompose them into contributions from net energy (MSE input to the atmosphere minus atmospheric storage) and MSE flux divergence by the mean meridional circulation and stationary eddies. Net energy is not a dominant contribution across the time scales considered. The stationary eddy contribution dominates the storm-track shift in response to seasonal insolation, El Niño minus La Niña conditions, and CO2 direct effect in the Northern Hemisphere, whereas the mean meridional circulation contribution dominates the shift in response to CO2 indirect effect during northern winter and in the Southern Hemisphere during May and October. Overall, the MSE framework shows the seasonal storm-track shift in the Northern Hemisphere is connected to the stationary eddy MSE flux evolution. Furthermore, the equatorward storm-track shift during northern winter in response to El Niño minus La Niña conditions involves a different regime than the poleward shift in response to increased CO2 even though the tropical upper troposphere warms in both cases.

Neurophysiological Basis of Multi-Scale Entropy of Brain Complexity and Its Relationship With Functional Connectivity.

PubMed

Wang, Danny J J; Jann, Kay; Fan, Chang; Qiao, Yang; Zang, Yu-Feng; Lu, Hanbing; Yang, Yihong

2018-01-01

Recently, non-linear statistical measures such as multi-scale entropy (MSE) have been introduced as indices of the complexity of electrophysiology and fMRI time-series across multiple time scales. In this work, we investigated the neurophysiological underpinnings of complexity (MSE) of electrophysiology and fMRI signals and their relations to functional connectivity (FC). MSE and FC analyses were performed on simulated data using neural mass model based brain network model with the Brain Dynamics Toolbox, on animal models with concurrent recording of fMRI and electrophysiology in conjunction with pharmacological manipulations, and on resting-state fMRI data from the Human Connectome Project. Our results show that the complexity of regional electrophysiology and fMRI signals is positively correlated with network FC. The associations between MSE and FC are dependent on the temporal scales or frequencies, with higher associations between MSE and FC at lower temporal frequencies. Our results from theoretical modeling, animal experiment and human fMRI indicate that (1) Regional neural complexity and network FC may be two related aspects of brain's information processing: the more complex regional neural activity, the higher FC this region has with other brain regions; (2) MSE at high and low frequencies may represent local and distributed information processing across brain regions. Based on literature and our data, we propose that the complexity of regional neural signals may serve as an index of the brain's capacity of information processing-increased complexity may indicate greater transition or exploration between different states of brain networks, thereby a greater propensity for information processing.

Zero-forcing pre-coding for MIMO WiMAX transceivers: Performance analysis and implementation issues

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cattoni, A. F.; Le Moullec, Y.; Sacchi, C.

Next generation wireless communication networks are expected to achieve ever increasing data rates. Multi-User Multiple-Input-Multiple-Output (MU-MIMO) is a key technique to obtain the expected performance, because such a technique combines the high capacity achievable using MIMO channel with the benefits of space division multiple access. In MU-MIMO systems, the base stations transmit signals to two or more users over the same channel, for this reason every user can experience inter-user interference. This paper provides a capacity analysis of an online, interference-based pre-coding algorithm able to mitigate the multi-user interference of the MU-MIMO systems in the context of a realistic WiMAX application scenario. Simulation results show that pre-coding can significantly increase the channel capacity. Furthermore, the paper presents several feasibility considerations for implementation of the analyzed technique in a possible FPGA-based software defined radio.

High-Lift Flight Tunnel - Phase II Report. Phase 2 Report

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lofftus, David; Lund, Thomas; Rote, Donald; Bushnell, Dennis M. (Technical Monitor)

2000-01-01

The High-Lift Flight Tunnel (HiLiFT) concept is a revolutionary approach to aerodynamic ground testing. This concept utilizes magnetic levitation and linear motors to propel an aerodynamic model through a tube containing a quiescent test medium. This medium (nitrogen) is cryogenic and pressurized to achieve full flight Reynolds numbers higher than any existing ground test facility world-wide for the range of 0.05 to 0.50 Mach. The results of the Phase II study provide excellent assurance that the HiLiFT concept will provide a valuable low-speed, high Reynolds number ground test facility. The design studies concluded that the HiLiFT facility is feasible to build and operate and the analytical studies revealed no insurmountable difficulties to realizing a practical high Reynolds number ground test facility. It was determined that a national HiLiFT facility, including development, would cost approximately $400M and could be operational by 2013 if fully funded. Study participants included National Aeronautics and Space Administration Langley Research Center as the Program Manager and MSE Technology Applications, Inc., (MSE) of Butte, Montana as the prime contractor and study integrator. MSE#s subcontractors included the University of Texas at Arlington for aerodynamic analyses and the Argonne National Laboratory for magnetic levitation and linear motor technology support.

On the time-weighted quadratic sum of linear discrete systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jury, E. I.; Gutman, S.

1975-01-01

A method is proposed for obtaining the time-weighted quadratic sum for linear discrete systems. The formula of the weighted quadratic sum is obtained from matrix z-transform formulation. In addition, it is shown that this quadratic sum can be derived in a recursive form for several useful weighted functions. The discussion presented parallels that of MacFarlane (1963) for weighted quadratic integral for linear continuous systems.

Minimum mean squared error (MSE) adjustment and the optimal Tykhonov-Phillips regularization parameter via reproducing best invariant quadratic uniformly unbiased estimates (repro-BIQUUE)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schaffrin, Burkhard

2008-02-01

In a linear Gauss-Markov model, the parameter estimates from BLUUE (Best Linear Uniformly Unbiased Estimate) are not robust against possible outliers in the observations. Moreover, by giving up the unbiasedness constraint, the mean squared error (MSE) risk may be further reduced, in particular when the problem is ill-posed. In this paper, the α-weighted S-homBLE (Best homogeneously Linear Estimate) is derived via formulas originally used for variance component estimation on the basis of the repro-BIQUUE (reproducing Best Invariant Quadratic Uniformly Unbiased Estimate) principle in a model with stochastic prior information. In the present model, however, such prior information is not included, which allows the comparison of the stochastic approach (α-weighted S-homBLE) with the well-established algebraic approach of Tykhonov-Phillips regularization, also known as R-HAPS (Hybrid APproximation Solution), whenever the inverse of the “substitute matrix” S exists and is chosen as the R matrix that defines the relative impact of the regularizing term on the final result.

Interference Alignment With Partial CSI Feedback in MIMO Cellular Networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rao, Xiongbin; Lau, Vincent K. N.

2014-04-01

Interference alignment (IA) is a linear precoding strategy that can achieve optimal capacity scaling at high SNR in interference networks. However, most existing IA designs require full channel state information (CSI) at the transmitters, which would lead to significant CSI signaling overhead. There are two techniques, namely CSI quantization and CSI feedback filtering, to reduce the CSI feedback overhead. In this paper, we consider IA processing with CSI feedback filtering in MIMO cellular networks. We introduce a novel metric, namely the feedback dimension, to quantify the first order CSI feedback cost associated with the CSI feedback filtering. The CSI feedback filtering poses several important challenges in IA processing. First, there is a hidden partial CSI knowledge constraint in IA precoder design which cannot be handled using conventional IA design methodology. Furthermore, existing results on the feasibility conditions of IA cannot be applied due to the partial CSI knowledge. Finally, it is very challenging to find out how much CSI feedback is actually needed to support IA processing. We shall address the above challenges and propose a new IA feasibility condition under partial CSIT knowledge in MIMO cellular networks. Based on this, we consider the CSI feedback profile design subject to the degrees of freedom requirements, and we derive closed-form trade-off results between the CSI feedback cost and IA performance in MIMO cellular networks.

Equivalent ZF precoding scheme for downlink indoor MU-MIMO VLC systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fan, YangYu; Zhao, Qiong; Kang, BoChao; Deng, LiJun

2018-01-01

In indoor visible light communication (VLC) systems, the channels of photo detectors (PDs) at one user are highly correlated, which determines the choice of spatial diversity model for individual users. In a spatial diversity model, the signals received by PDs belonging to one user carry the same information, and can be combined directly. Based on the above, we propose an equivalent zero-forcing (ZF) precoding scheme for multiple-user multiple-input single-output (MU-MIMO) VLC systems by transforming an indoor MU-MIMO VLC system into an indoor multiple-user multiple-input single-output (MU-MISO) VLC system through simply processing. The power constraints of light emitting diodes (LEDs) are also taken into account. Comprehensive computer simulations in three scenarios indicate that our scheme can not only reduce the computational complexity, but also guarantee the system performance. Furthermore, the proposed scheme does not require noise information in the calculating of the precoding weights, and has no restrictions on the numbers of APs and PDs.

Pre-coding assisted generation of a frequency quadrupled optical vector D-band millimeter wave with one Mach-Zehnder modulator.

PubMed

Zhou, Wen; Li, Xinying; Yu, Jianjun

2017-10-30

We propose QPSK millimeter-wave (mm-wave) vector signal generation for D-band based on balanced precoding-assisted photonic frequency quadrupling technology employing a single intensity modulator without an optical filter. The intensity MZM is driven by a balanced pre-coding 37-GHz QPSK RF signal. The modulated optical subcarriers are directly sent into the single ended photodiode to generate 148-GHz QPSK vector signal. We experimentally demonstrate 1-Gbaud 148-GHz QPSK mm-wave vector signal generation, and investigate the bit-error-rate (BER) performance of the vector signals at 148-GHz. The experimental results show that the BER value can be achieved as low as 1.448 × 10 -3 when the optical power into photodiode is 8.8dBm. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first time to realize the frequency-quadrupling vector mm-wave signal generation at D-band based on only one MZM without an optical filter.

Maximum likelihood decoding analysis of Accumulate-Repeat-Accumulate Codes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Abbasfar, Aliazam; Divsalar, Dariush; Yao, Kung

2004-01-01

Repeat-Accumulate (RA) codes are the simplest turbo-like codes that achieve good performance. However, they cannot compete with Turbo codes or low-density parity check codes (LDPC) as far as performance is concerned. The Accumulate Repeat Accumulate (ARA) codes, as a subclass of LDPC codes, are obtained by adding a pre-coder in front of RA codes with puncturing where an accumulator is chosen as a precoder. These codes not only are very simple, but also achieve excellent performance with iterative decoding. In this paper, the performance of these codes with (ML) decoding are analyzed and compared to random codes by very tight bounds. The weight distribution of some simple ARA codes is obtained, and through existing tightest bounds we have shown the ML SNR threshold of ARA codes approaches very closely to the performance of random codes. We have shown that the use of precoder improves the SNR threshold but interleaving gain remains unchanged with respect to RA code with puncturing.

Pre-coding method and apparatus for multiple source or time-shifted single source data and corresponding inverse post-decoding method and apparatus

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yeh, Pen-Shu (Inventor)

1997-01-01

A pre-coding method and device for improving data compression performance by removing correlation between a first original data set and a second original data set, each having M members, respectively. The pre-coding method produces a compression-efficiency-enhancing double-difference data set. The method and device produce a double-difference data set, i.e., an adjacent-delta calculation performed on a cross-delta data set or a cross-delta calculation performed on two adjacent-delta data sets, from either one of (1) two adjacent spectral bands coming from two discrete sources, respectively, or (2) two time-shifted data sets coming from a single source. The resulting double-difference data set is then coded using either a distortionless data encoding scheme (entropy encoding) or a lossy data compression scheme. Also, a post-decoding method and device for recovering a second original data set having been represented by such a double-difference data set.

Pre-coding method and apparatus for multiple source or time-shifted single source data and corresponding inverse post-decoding method and apparatus

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yeh, Pen-Shu (Inventor)

1998-01-01

A pre-coding method and device for improving data compression performance by removing correlation between a first original data set and a second original data set, each having M members, respectively. The pre-coding method produces a compression-efficiency-enhancing double-difference data set. The method and device produce a double-difference data set, i.e., an adjacent-delta calculation performed on a cross-delta data set or a cross-delta calculation performed on two adjacent-delta data sets, from either one of (1) two adjacent spectral bands coming from two discrete sources, respectively, or (2) two time-shifted data sets coming from a single source. The resulting double-difference data set is then coded using either a distortionless data encoding scheme (entropy encoding) or a lossy data compression scheme. Also, a post-decoding method and device for recovering a second original data set having been represented by such a double-difference data set.

Use of magnetic resonance imaging to predict the body composition of pigs in vivo.

PubMed

Kremer, P V; Förster, M; Scholz, A M

2013-06-01

The objective of the study was to evaluate whether magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) offers the opportunity to reliably analyze body composition of pigs in vivo. Therefore, the relation between areas of loin eye muscle and its back fat based on MRI images were used to predict body composition values measured by dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA). During the study, a total of 77 pigs were studied by MRI and DXA, with a BW ranging between 42 and 102 kg. The pigs originated from different extensive or conventional breeds or crossbreds such as Cerdo Iberico, Duroc, German Landrace, German Large White, Hampshire and Pietrain. A Siemens Magnetom Open was used for MRI in the thorax region between 13th and 14th vertebrae in order to measure the loin eye area (MRI-LA) and the above back fat area (MRI-FA) of both body sides, whereas a whole body scan was performed by DXA with a GE Lunar DPX-IQ in order to measure the amount and percentage of fat tissue (DXA-FM; DXA-%FM) and lean tissue mass (DXA-LM; DXA-%LM). A linear single regression analysis was performed to quantify the linear relationships between MRI- and DXA-derived traits. In addition, a stepwise regression procedure was carried out to calculate (multiple) regression equations between MRI and DXA variables (including BW). Single regression analyses showed high relationships between DXA-%FM and MRI-FA (R 2 = 0.89, √MSE = 2.39%), DXA-FM and MRI-FA (R 2 = 0.82, √MSE = 2757 g) and DXA-LM and MRI-LA (R 2 = 0.82, √MSE = 4018 g). Only DXA-%LM and MRI-LA did not show any relationship (R 2 = 0). As a result of the multiple regression analysis, DXA-LM and DXA-FM were both highly related to MRI-LA, MRI-FA and BW (R 2 = 0.96; √MSE = 1784 g, and R 2 = 0.95, √MSE = 1496 g). Therefore, it can be concluded that the use of MRI-derived images provides exact information about important 'carcass-traits' in pigs and may be used to reliably predict the body composition in vivo.

Nonlinearities of heart rate variability in animal models of impaired cardiac control: contribution of different time scales.

PubMed

Silva, Luiz Eduardo Virgilio; Lataro, Renata Maria; Castania, Jaci Airton; Silva, Carlos Alberto Aguiar; Salgado, Helio Cesar; Fazan, Rubens; Porta, Alberto

2017-08-01

Heart rate variability (HRV) has been extensively explored by traditional linear approaches (e.g., spectral analysis); however, several studies have pointed to the presence of nonlinear features in HRV, suggesting that linear tools might fail to account for the complexity of the HRV dynamics. Even though the prevalent notion is that HRV is nonlinear, the actual presence of nonlinear features is rarely verified. In this study, the presence of nonlinear dynamics was checked as a function of time scales in three experimental models of rats with different impairment of the cardiac control: namely, rats with heart failure (HF), spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHRs), and sinoaortic denervated (SAD) rats. Multiscale entropy (MSE) and refined MSE (RMSE) were chosen as the discriminating statistic for the surrogate test utilized to detect nonlinearity. Nonlinear dynamics is less present in HF animals at both short and long time scales compared with controls. A similar finding was found in SHR only at short time scales. SAD increased the presence of nonlinear dynamics exclusively at short time scales. Those findings suggest that a working baroreflex contributes to linearize HRV and to reduce the likelihood to observe nonlinear components of the cardiac control at short time scales. In addition, an increased sympathetic modulation seems to be a source of nonlinear dynamics at long time scales. Testing nonlinear dynamics as a function of the time scales can provide a characterization of the cardiac control complementary to more traditional markers in time, frequency, and information domains. NEW & NOTEWORTHY Although heart rate variability (HRV) dynamics is widely assumed to be nonlinear, nonlinearity tests are rarely used to check this hypothesis. By adopting multiscale entropy (MSE) and refined MSE (RMSE) as the discriminating statistic for the nonlinearity test, we show that nonlinear dynamics varies with time scale and the type of cardiac dysfunction. Moreover, as complexity metrics and nonlinearities provide complementary information, we strongly recommend using the test for nonlinearity as an additional index to characterize HRV. Copyright © 2017 the American Physiological Society.

Implementation of a diode-pumped Nd:YAG laser with quick-change output couplers for high-beam quality 1064 or 532 nm wavelength generation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Li, Chun-Hao; Tsai, Ming-Jong

2009-06-01

A novel diode-pumped Nd:YAG laser system that employs a fixed active laser medium and a pair of quick-change output couplers on a precision linear stage for 1064 or 532 nm wavelength generation is presented. Fixed elements include a rear mirror, an acousto-optical Q-switch, and a diode-pumped solid-state laser (DPSSL). Movable elements for 1064 nm generation include an intra-cavity aperture as a mode selection element (MSE) and an output coupler. Movable elements for 532 nm generation include an intra-cavity frequency conversion with KTP, an intra-cavity aperture as a mode selection element (MSE), and an output coupler. Under stable operating conditions, the 1064 nm configuration produced a beam propagation ratio of 1.18 whereas the 532 nm configuration produced a beam propagation ratio of 1.1, both of which used an intra-cavity MSE with an aperture of 1.2 mm and a length of 5 mm.

FORMAC integration program: A special applications package used in developing techniques of orbital decay and long term ephemeris prediction for satellites in earth orbit

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rowe, C. K.

1971-01-01

The symbolic manipulation capabilities of the FORMAC (Formula Manipulation Compiler) language are employed to expand and analytically evaluate integrals. The program integration is effected by expanding the integral(s) into a series of subintegrals and then substituting a pre-derived and pre-coded solution for that particular subintegral. Derivation of the integral solutions necessary for precoding is included, as is a discussion of the FORMAC system limitations encountered in the programming effort.

Zero Forcing Conditions for Nonlinear channel Equalisation using a pre-coding scheme

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

Arfa, Hichem; Belghith, Safya; El Asmi, Sadok

2009-03-05

This paper shows how we can present a zero forcing conditions for a nonlinear channel equalisation. These zero forcing conditions based on the rank of nonlinear system are issued from an algebraic approach based on the module theoretical approach, in which the rank of nonlinear channel is clearly defined. In order to improve the performance of equalisation and reduce the complexity of used nonlinear systems, we will apply a pre-coding scheme. Theoretical results are given and computer simulation is used to corroborate the theory.

Fault tolerant linear actuator

DOEpatents

Tesar, Delbert

2004-09-14

In varying embodiments, the fault tolerant linear actuator of the present invention is a new and improved linear actuator with fault tolerance and positional control that may incorporate velocity summing, force summing, or a combination of the two. In one embodiment, the invention offers a velocity summing arrangement with a differential gear between two prime movers driving a cage, which then drives a linear spindle screw transmission. Other embodiments feature two prime movers driving separate linear spindle screw transmissions, one internal and one external, in a totally concentric and compact integrated module.

Clique-Based Neural Associative Memories with Local Coding and Precoding.

PubMed

Mofrad, Asieh Abolpour; Parker, Matthew G; Ferdosi, Zahra; Tadayon, Mohammad H

2016-08-01

Techniques from coding theory are able to improve the efficiency of neuroinspired and neural associative memories by forcing some construction and constraints on the network. In this letter, the approach is to embed coding techniques into neural associative memory in order to increase their performance in the presence of partial erasures. The motivation comes from recent work by Gripon, Berrou, and coauthors, which revisited Willshaw networks and presented a neural network with interacting neurons that partitioned into clusters. The model introduced stores patterns as small-size cliques that can be retrieved in spite of partial error. We focus on improving the success of retrieval by applying two techniques: doing a local coding in each cluster and then applying a precoding step. We use a slightly different decoding scheme, which is appropriate for partial erasures and converges faster. Although the ideas of local coding and precoding are not new, the way we apply them is different. Simulations show an increase in the pattern retrieval capacity for both techniques. Moreover, we use self-dual additive codes over field [Formula: see text], which have very interesting properties and a simple-graph representation.

A Practical Model for Forecasting New Freshman Enrollment during the Application Period.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Paulsen, Michael B.

1989-01-01

A simple and effective model for forecasting freshman enrollment during the application period is presented step by step. The model requires minimal and readily available information, uses a simple linear regression analysis on a personal computer, and provides updated monthly forecasts. (MSE)

Heart rhythm complexity impairment in patients undergoing peritoneal dialysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lin, Yen-Hung; Lin, Chen; Ho, Yi-Heng; Wu, Vin-Cent; Lo, Men-Tzung; Hung, Kuan-Yu; Liu, Li-Yu Daisy; Lin, Lian-Yu; Huang, Jenq-Wen; Peng, Chung-Kang

2016-06-01

Cardiovascular disease is one of the leading causes of death in patients with advanced renal disease. The objective of this study was to investigate impairments in heart rhythm complexity in patients with end-stage renal disease. We prospectively analyzed 65 patients undergoing peritoneal dialysis (PD) without prior cardiovascular disease and 72 individuals with normal renal function as the control group. Heart rhythm analysis including complexity analysis by including detrended fractal analysis (DFA) and multiscale entropy (MSE) were performed. In linear analysis, the PD patients had a significantly lower standard deviation of normal RR intervals (SDRR) and percentage of absolute differences in normal RR intervals greater than 20 ms (pNN20). Of the nonlinear analysis indicators, scale 5, area under the MSE curve for scale 1 to 5 (area 1-5) and 6 to 20 (area 6-20) were significantly lower than those in the control group. In DFA anaylsis, both DFA α1 and DFA α2 were comparable in both groups. In receiver operating characteristic curve analysis, scale 5 had the greatest discriminatory power for two groups. In both net reclassification improvement model and integrated discrimination improvement models, MSE parameters significantly improved the discriminatory power of SDRR, pNN20, and pNN50. In conclusion, PD patients had worse cardiac complexity parameters. MSE parameters are useful to discriminate PD patients from patients with normal renal function.

Protograph based LDPC codes with minimum distance linearly growing with block size

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Divsalar, Dariush; Jones, Christopher; Dolinar, Sam; Thorpe, Jeremy

2005-01-01

We propose several LDPC code constructions that simultaneously achieve good threshold and error floor performance. Minimum distance is shown to grow linearly with block size (similar to regular codes of variable degree at least 3) by considering ensemble average weight enumerators. Our constructions are based on projected graph, or protograph, structures that support high-speed decoder implementations. As with irregular ensembles, our constructions are sensitive to the proportion of degree-2 variable nodes. A code with too few such nodes tends to have an iterative decoding threshold that is far from the capacity threshold. A code with too many such nodes tends to not exhibit a minimum distance that grows linearly in block length. In this paper we also show that precoding can be used to lower the threshold of regular LDPC codes. The decoding thresholds of the proposed codes, which have linearly increasing minimum distance in block size, outperform that of regular LDPC codes. Furthermore, a family of low to high rate codes, with thresholds that adhere closely to their respective channel capacity thresholds, is presented. Simulation results for a few example codes show that the proposed codes have low error floors as well as good threshold SNFt performance.

A Rapid Convergent Low Complexity Interference Alignment Algorithm for Wireless Sensor Networks.

PubMed

Jiang, Lihui; Wu, Zhilu; Ren, Guanghui; Wang, Gangyi; Zhao, Nan

2015-07-29

Interference alignment (IA) is a novel technique that can effectively eliminate the interference and approach the sum capacity of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) when the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is high, by casting the desired signal and interference into different signal subspaces. The traditional alternating minimization interference leakage (AMIL) algorithm for IA shows good performance in high SNR regimes, however, the complexity of the AMIL algorithm increases dramatically as the number of users and antennas increases, posing limits to its applications in the practical systems. In this paper, a novel IA algorithm, called directional quartic optimal (DQO) algorithm, is proposed to minimize the interference leakage with rapid convergence and low complexity. The properties of the AMIL algorithm are investigated, and it is discovered that the difference between the two consecutive iteration results of the AMIL algorithm will approximately point to the convergence solution when the precoding and decoding matrices obtained from the intermediate iterations are sufficiently close to their convergence values. Based on this important property, the proposed DQO algorithm employs the line search procedure so that it can converge to the destination directly. In addition, the optimal step size can be determined analytically by optimizing a quartic function. Numerical results show that the proposed DQO algorithm can suppress the interference leakage more rapidly than the traditional AMIL algorithm, and can achieve the same level of sum rate as that of AMIL algorithm with far less iterations and execution time.

Sum of top-hat transform based algorithm for vessel enhancement in MRA images

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ouazaa, Hibet-Allah; Jlassi, Hajer; Hamrouni, Kamel

2018-04-01

The Magnetic Resonance Angiography (MRA) is rich with information's. But, they suffer from poor contrast, illumination and noise. Thus, it is required to enhance the images. But, these significant information can be lost if improper techniques are applied. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a new method of enhancement. We applied firstly the CLAHE method to increase the contrast of the image. Then, we applied the sum of Top-Hat Transform to increase the brightness of vessels. It is performed with the structuring element oriented in different angles. The methodology is tested and evaluated on the publicly available database BRAINIX. And, we used the measurement methods MSE (Mean Square Error), PSNR (Peak Signal to Noise Ratio) and SNR (Signal to Noise Ratio) for the evaluation. The results demonstrate that the proposed method could efficiently enhance the image details and is comparable with state of the art algorithms. Hence, the proposed method could be broadly used in various applications.

Energy Efficiency Optimization in Relay-Assisted MIMO Systems With Perfect and Statistical CSI

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zappone, Alessio; Cao, Pan; Jorswieck, Eduard A.

2014-01-01

A framework for energy-efficient resource allocation in a single-user, amplify-and-forward relay-assisted MIMO system is devised in this paper. Previous results in this area have focused on rate maximization or sum power minimization problems, whereas fewer results are available when bits/Joule energy efficiency (EE) optimization is the goal. The performance metric to optimize is the ratio between the system's achievable rate and the total consumed power. The optimization is carried out with respect to the source and relay precoding matrices, subject to QoS and power constraints. Such a challenging non-convex problem is tackled by means of fractional programming and and alternating maximization algorithms, for various CSI assumptions at the source and relay. In particular the scenarios of perfect CSI and those of statistical CSI for either the source-relay or the relay-destination channel are addressed. Moreover, sufficient conditions for beamforming optimality are derived, which is useful in simplifying the system design. Numerical results are provided to corroborate the validity of the theoretical findings.

Cortical Decoding of Individual Finger and Wrist Kinematics for an Upper-Limb Neuroprosthesis

PubMed Central

Aggarwal, Vikram; Tenore, Francesco; Acharya, Soumyadipta; Schieber, Marc H.; Thakor, Nitish V.

2010-01-01

Previous research has shown that neuronal activity can be used to continuously decode the kinematics of gross movements involving arm and hand trajectory. However, decoding the kinematics of fine motor movements, such as the manipulation of individual fingers, has not been demonstrated. In this study, single unit activities were recorded from task-related neurons in M1 of two trained rhesus monkey as they performed individuated movements of the fingers and wrist. The primates’ hand was placed in a manipulandum, and strain gauges at the tips of each finger were used to track the digit’s position. Both linear and non-linear filters were designed to simultaneously predict kinematics of each digit and the wrist, and their performance compared using mean squared error and correlation coefficients. All models had high decoding accuracy, but the feedforward ANN (R=0.76–0.86, MSE=0.04–0.05) and Kalman filter (R=0.68–0.86, MSE=0.04–0.07) performed better than a simple linear regression filter (0.58–0.81, 0.05–0.07). These results suggest that individual finger and wrist kinematics can be decoded with high accuracy, and be used to control a multi-fingered prosthetic hand in real-time. PMID:19964645

Precluding nonlinear ISI in direct detection long-haul fiber optic systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Swenson, Norman L.; Shoop, Barry L.; Cioffi, John M.

1991-01-01

Long-distance, high-rate fiber optic systems employing directly modulated 1.55-micron single-mode lasers and conventional single-mode fiber suffer severe intersymbol interference (ISI) with a large nonlinear component. A method of reducing the nonlinearity of the ISI, thereby making linear equalization more viable, is investigated. It is shown that the degree of nonlinearity is highly dependent on the choice of laser bias current, and that in some cases the ISI nonlinearity can be significantly reduced by biasing the laser substantially above threshold. Simulation results predict that an increase in signal-to-nonlinear-distortion ratio as high as 25 dB can be achieved for synchronously spaced samples at an optimal sampling phase by increasing the bias current from 1.2 times threshold to 3.5 times threshold. The high SDR indicates that a linear tapped delay line equalizer could be used to mitigate ISI. Furthermore, the shape of the pulse response suggests that partial response precoding and digital feedback equalization would be particularly effective for this channel.

Modelling Schumann resonances from ELF measurements using non-linear optimization methods

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Castro, Francisco; Toledo-Redondo, Sergio; Fornieles, Jesús; Salinas, Alfonso; Portí, Jorge; Navarro, Enrique; Sierra, Pablo

2017-04-01

Schumann resonances (SR) can be found in planetary atmospheres, inside the cavity formed by the conducting surface of the planet and the lower ionosphere. They are a powerful tool to investigate both the electric processes that occur in the atmosphere and the characteristics of the surface and the lower ionosphere. In this study, the measurements are obtained in the ELF (Extremely Low Frequency) Juan Antonio Morente station located in the national park of Sierra Nevada. The three first modes, contained in the frequency band between 6 to 25 Hz, will be considered. For each time series recorded by the station, the amplitude spectrum was estimated by using Bartlett averaging. Then, the central frequencies and amplitudes of the SRs were obtained by fitting the spectrum with non-linear functions. In the poster, a study of nonlinear unconstrained optimization methods applied to the estimation of the Schumann Resonances will be presented. Non-linear fit, also known as optimization process, is the procedure followed in obtaining Schumann Resonances from the natural electromagnetic noise. The optimization methods that have been analysed are: Levenberg-Marquardt, Conjugate Gradient, Gradient, Newton and Quasi-Newton. The functions that the different methods fit to data are three lorentzian curves plus a straight line. Gaussian curves have also been considered. The conclusions of this study are outlined in the following paragraphs: i) Natural electromagnetic noise is better fitted using Lorentzian functions; ii) the measurement bandwidth can accelerate the convergence of the optimization method; iii) Gradient method has less convergence and has a highest mean squared error (MSE) between measurement and the fitted function, whereas Levenberg-Marquad, Gradient conjugate method and Cuasi-Newton method give similar results (Newton method presents higher MSE); v) There are differences in the MSE between the parameters that define the fit function, and an interval from 1% to 5% has been found.

A unified frame of predicting side effects of drugs by using linear neighborhood similarity.

PubMed

Zhang, Wen; Yue, Xiang; Liu, Feng; Chen, Yanlin; Tu, Shikui; Zhang, Xining

2017-12-14

Drug side effects are one of main concerns in the drug discovery, which gains wide attentions. Investigating drug side effects is of great importance, and the computational prediction can help to guide wet experiments. As far as we known, a great number of computational methods have been proposed for the side effect predictions. The assumption that similar drugs may induce same side effects is usually employed for modeling, and how to calculate the drug-drug similarity is critical in the side effect predictions. In this paper, we present a novel measure of drug-drug similarity named "linear neighborhood similarity", which is calculated in a drug feature space by exploring linear neighborhood relationship. Then, we transfer the similarity from the feature space into the side effect space, and predict drug side effects by propagating known side effect information through a similarity-based graph. Under a unified frame based on the linear neighborhood similarity, we propose method "LNSM" and its extension "LNSM-SMI" to predict side effects of new drugs, and propose the method "LNSM-MSE" to predict unobserved side effect of approved drugs. We evaluate the performances of LNSM and LNSM-SMI in predicting side effects of new drugs, and evaluate the performances of LNSM-MSE in predicting missing side effects of approved drugs. The results demonstrate that the linear neighborhood similarity can improve the performances of side effect prediction, and the linear neighborhood similarity-based methods can outperform existing side effect prediction methods. More importantly, the proposed methods can predict side effects of new drugs as well as unobserved side effects of approved drugs under a unified frame.

MSE55, a Cdc42 effector protein, induces long cellular extensions in fibroblasts

PubMed Central

Burbelo, Peter D.; Snow, Dianne M.; Bahou, Wadie; Spiegel, Sarah

1999-01-01

Cdc42 is a member of the Rho GTPase family that regulates multiple cellular activities, including actin polymerization, kinase-signaling activation, and cell polarization. MSE55 is a nonkinase CRIB (Cdc42/Rac interactive-binding) domain-containing molecule of unknown function. Using glutathione S-transferase-capture experiments, we show that MSE55 binds to Cdc42 in a GTP-dependent manner. MSE55 binding to Cdc42 required an intact CRIB domain, because a MSE55 CRIB domain mutant no longer interacted with Cdc42. To study the function of MSE55 we transfected either wild-type MSE55 or a MSE55 CRIB mutant into mammalian cells. In Cos-7 cells, wild-type MSE55 localized at membrane ruffles and increased membrane actin polymerization, whereas expression of the MSE55 CRIB mutant showed fewer membrane ruffles. In contrast to these results, MSE55 induced the formation of long, actin-based protrusions in NIH 3T3 cells as detected by immunofluorescence and live-cell video microscopy. MSE55-induced protrusion formation was blocked by expression of dominant-negative N17Cdc42, but not by expression of dominant-negative N17Rac. These findings indicate that MSE55 is a Cdc42 effector protein that mediates actin cytoskeleton reorganization at the plasma membrane. PMID:10430899

A new precoding scheme for spectral efficient optical OFDM systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hardan, Saad Mshhain; Bayat, Oguz; Abdulkafi, Ayad Atiyah

2018-07-01

Achieving high spectral efficiency is the key requirement of 5G and optical wireless communication systems and has recently attracted much attention, aiming to satisfy the ever increasing demand for high data rates in communications systems. In this paper, we propose a new precoding/decoding algorithm for spectral efficient optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) scheme based visible light communication (VLC) systems. The proposed coded modulated optical (CMO) based OFDM system can be applied for both single input single output (SISO) and multiple input multiple-output (MIMO) architectures. Firstly, the real OFDM time domain signal is obtained through invoking the precoding/decoding algorithm without the Hermitian symmetry. After that, the positive signal is achieved either by adding a DC-bias or by using the spatial multiplexing technique. The proposed CMO-OFDM scheme efficiently improves the spectral efficiency of the VLC system as it does not require the Hermitian symmetry constraint to yield real signals. A comparison of the performance improvement of the proposed scheme with other OFDM approaches is also presented in this work. Simulation results show that the proposed CMO-OFDM scheme can not only enhance the spectral efficiency of OFDM-based VLC systems but also improve bit error rate (BER) performance compared with other optical OFDM schemes.

How you ask matters: an experimental investigation of the influence of mood on memory self-perceptions and their relationship with objective memory.

PubMed

Lineweaver, Tara T; Brolsma, Jessica W

2014-01-01

Stronger relationships often emerge between mood and memory self-efficacy (MSE) than between MSE and memory abilities. We examined how social desirability, mood congruency and framing influence the mood-MSE relationship. Social desirability correlated with all self-report measures, and covarying social desirability diminished the mood-MSE relationship while enhancing the relationship between MSE and objective memory. Participants rated their memory more harshly on positively than neutrally or negatively worded MSE items. Current mood state did not affect MSE overall or when items were worded positively or neutrally. However, on negatively worded items, participants in a negative mood exhibited lower MSE than participants in a positive mood. Thus, both MSE and the mood-MSE relationship depended upon question wording. These results indicate that controlling social desirability and item framing on MSE questionnaires may reduce their confounding influence on memory self-perceptions and the influence of mood on self-reported abilities, allowing subjective memory to more accurately reflect objective memory in healthy and clinical populations.

Tokamak Equilibrium Reconstruction with MSE-LS Data in DIII-D

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lao, L.; Grierson, B.; Burrell, K. H.

2016-10-01

Equilibrium analysis of plasmas in DIII-D using EFIT was upgraded to include the internal magnetic field determined from spectroscopic measurements of motional-Stark-effect line-splitting (MSE-LS). MSE-LS provides measurements of the magnitude of the internal magnetic field, rather than the pitch angle as provided by MSE line-polarization (MSE-LP) used in most tokamaks to date. EFIT MSE-LS reconstruction algorithms and verifications are described. The capability of MSE-LS to provide significant constraints on the equilibrium analysis is evaluated. Reconstruction results with both synthetic and experimental MSE-LS data from 10 DIII-D discharges run over a range of conditions show that MSE-LS measurements can contribute to the equilibrium reconstruction of pressure and safety factor profiles. Adequate MSE-LS measurement accuracy and number of spatial locations are necessary. The 7 available experimental measurements provide useful additional constraints when used with other internal measurements. Using MSE-LS as the only internal measurement yields less current profile information. Work supported by the PPPL Subcontract S013769-F and US DOE under DE-FC02-04ER54698.

Measuring Dispersion Effects of Factors in Factorial Experiments.

DTIC Science & Technology

1988-01-01

error is MSE =i=l j=1 i n r (SSE/(N-p)), the sum of squares of pure error is SSPE = Z E Y i=1 j=1 and the mean square of pure error is MSPE - ( SSPE /n...the level of the factor in the ith run is 0. 3.1. First Measure We have n r n r SSPE = 1 Is it -yi) 2 + E r (1-8 )(yjj li-l j=l (iYjj +i= j=l l - i...The first component in SSPE corresponds to level I of the factor and has n degrees of freedom ( E 6i)(r-I). The second component corresponds to i=l n

The phase transition of matrix recovery from Gaussian measurements matches the minimax MSE of matrix denoising.

PubMed

Donoho, David L; Gavish, Matan; Montanari, Andrea

2013-05-21

Let X(0) be an unknown M by N matrix. In matrix recovery, one takes n < MN linear measurements y(1),…,y(n) of X(0), where y(i) = Tr(A(T)iX(0)) and each A(i) is an M by N matrix. A popular approach for matrix recovery is nuclear norm minimization (NNM): solving the convex optimization problem min ||X||*subject to y(i) =Tr(A(T)(i)X) for all 1 ≤ i ≤ n, where || · ||* denotes the nuclear norm, namely, the sum of singular values. Empirical work reveals a phase transition curve, stated in terms of the undersampling fraction δ(n,M,N) = n/(MN), rank fraction ρ=rank(X0)/min {M,N}, and aspect ratio β=M/N. Specifically when the measurement matrices Ai have independent standard Gaussian random entries, a curve δ*(ρ) = δ*(ρ;β) exists such that, if δ > δ*(ρ), NNM typically succeeds for large M,N, whereas if δ < δ*(ρ), it typically fails. An apparently quite different problem is matrix denoising in Gaussian noise, in which an unknown M by N matrix X(0) is to be estimated based on direct noisy measurements Y =X(0) + Z, where the matrix Z has independent and identically distributed Gaussian entries. A popular matrix denoising scheme solves the unconstrained optimization problem min|| Y-X||(2)(F)/2+λ||X||*. When optimally tuned, this scheme achieves the asymptotic minimax mean-squared error M(ρ;β) = lim(M,N → ∞)inf(λ)sup(rank(X) ≤ ρ · M)MSE(X,X(λ)), where M/N → . We report extensive experiments showing that the phase transition δ*(ρ) in the first problem, matrix recovery from Gaussian measurements, coincides with the minimax risk curve M(ρ)=M(ρ;β) in the second problem, matrix denoising in Gaussian noise: δ*(ρ)=M(ρ), for any rank fraction 0 < ρ < 1 (at each common aspect ratio β). Our experiments considered matrices belonging to two constraint classes: real M by N matrices, of various ranks and aspect ratios, and real symmetric positive-semidefinite N by N matrices, of various ranks.

Using the Ridge Regression Procedures to Estimate the Multiple Linear Regression Coefficients

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gorgees, HazimMansoor; Mahdi, FatimahAssim

2018-05-01

This article concerns with comparing the performance of different types of ordinary ridge regression estimators that have been already proposed to estimate the regression parameters when the near exact linear relationships among the explanatory variables is presented. For this situations we employ the data obtained from tagi gas filling company during the period (2008-2010). The main result we reached is that the method based on the condition number performs better than other methods since it has smaller mean square error (MSE) than the other stated methods.

Practical implementation of the double linear damage rule and damage curve approach for treating cumulative fatigue damage

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Manson, S. S.; Halford, G. R.

1980-01-01

Simple procedures are presented for treating cumulative fatigue damage under complex loading history using either the damage curve concept or the double linear damage rule. A single equation is provided for use with the damage curve approach; each loading event providing a fraction of damage until failure is presumed to occur when the damage sum becomes unity. For the double linear damage rule, analytical expressions are provided for determining the two phases of life. The procedure involves two steps, each similar to the conventional application of the commonly used linear damage rule. When the sum of cycle ratios based on phase 1 lives reaches unity, phase 1 is presumed complete, and further loadings are summed as cycle ratios on phase 2 lives. When the phase 2 sum reaches unity, failure is presumed to occur. No other physical properties or material constants than those normally used in a conventional linear damage rule analysis are required for application of either of the two cumulative damage methods described. Illustrations and comparisons of both methods are discussed.

Practical implementation of the double linear damage rule and damage curve approach for treating cumulative fatigue damage

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Manson, S. S.; Halford, G. R.

1981-01-01

Simple procedures are given for treating cumulative fatigue damage under complex loading history using either the damage curve concept or the double linear damage rule. A single equation is given for use with the damage curve approach; each loading event providing a fraction of damage until failure is presumed to occur when the damage sum becomes unity. For the double linear damage rule, analytical expressions are given for determining the two phases of life. The procedure comprises two steps, each similar to the conventional application of the commonly used linear damage rule. Once the sum of cycle ratios based on Phase I lives reaches unity, Phase I is presumed complete, and further loadings are summed as cycle ratios based on Phase II lives. When the Phase II sum attains unity, failure is presumed to occur. It is noted that no physical properties or material constants other than those normally used in a conventional linear damage rule analysis are required for application of either of the two cumulative damage methods described. Illustrations and comparisons are discussed for both methods.

Near constant-time optimal piecewise LDR to HDR inverse tone mapping

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Qian; Su, Guan-Ming; Yin, Peng

2015-02-01

In a backward compatible HDR image/video compression, it is a general approach to reconstruct HDR from compressed LDR as a prediction to original HDR, which is referred to as inverse tone mapping. Experimental results show that 2- piecewise 2nd order polynomial has the best mapping accuracy than 1 piece high order or 2-piecewise linear, but it is also the most time-consuming method because to find the optimal pivot point to split LDR range to 2 pieces requires exhaustive search. In this paper, we propose a fast algorithm that completes optimal 2-piecewise 2nd order polynomial inverse tone mapping in near constant time without quality degradation. We observe that in least square solution, each entry in the intermediate matrix can be written as the sum of some basic terms, which can be pre-calculated into look-up tables. Since solving the matrix becomes looking up values in tables, computation time barely differs regardless of the number of points searched. Hence, we can carry out the most thorough pivot point search to find the optimal pivot that minimizes MSE in near constant time. Experiment shows that our proposed method achieves the same PSNR performance while saving 60 times computation time compared to the traditional exhaustive search in 2-piecewise 2nd order polynomial inverse tone mapping with continuous constraint.

An anthropometric model to estimate neonatal fat mass using air displacement plethysmography

PubMed Central

2012-01-01

Background Current validated neonatal body composition methods are limited/impractical for use outside of a clinical setting because they are labor intensive, time consuming, and require expensive equipment. The purpose of this study was to develop an anthropometric model to estimate neonatal fat mass (kg) using an air displacement plethysmography (PEA POD® Infant Body Composition System) as the criterion. Methods A total of 128 healthy term infants, 60 females and 68 males, from a multiethnic cohort were included in the analyses. Gender, race/ethnicity, gestational age, age (in days), anthropometric measurements of weight, length, abdominal circumference, skin-fold thicknesses (triceps, biceps, sub scapular, and thigh), and body composition by PEA POD® were collected within 1-3 days of birth. Backward stepwise linear regression was used to determine the model that best predicted neonatal fat mass. Results The statistical model that best predicted neonatal fat mass (kg) was: -0.012 -0.064*gender + 0.024*day of measurement post-delivery -0.150*weight (kg) + 0.055*weight (kg)2 + 0.046*ethnicity + 0.020*sum of three skin-fold thicknesses (triceps, sub scapular, and thigh); R2 = 0.81, MSE = 0.08 kg. Conclusions Our anthropometric model explained 81% of the variance in neonatal fat mass. Future studies with a greater variety of neonatal anthropometric measurements may provide equations that explain more of the variance. PMID:22436534

Serial heart rhythm complexity changes in patients with anterior wall ST segment elevation myocardial infarction

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chiu, Hung-Chih; Ma, Hsi-Pin; Lin, Chen; Lo, Men-Tzung; Lin, Lian-Yu; Wu, Cho-Kai; Chiang, Jiun-Yang; Lee, Jen-Kuang; Hung, Chi-Sheng; Wang, Tzung-Dau; Daisy Liu, Li-Yu; Ho, Yi-Lwun; Lin, Yen-Hung; Peng, Chung-Kang

2017-03-01

Heart rhythm complexity analysis has been shown to have good prognostic power in patients with cardiovascular disease. The aim of this study was to analyze serial changes in heart rhythm complexity from the acute to chronic phase of acute myocardial infarction (MI). We prospectively enrolled 27 patients with anterior wall ST segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) and 42 control subjects. In detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA), the patients had significantly lower DFAα2 in the acute stage (within 72 hours) and lower DFAα1 at 3 months and 12 months after MI. In multiscale entropy (MSE) analysis, the patients had a lower slope 5 in the acute stage, which then gradually increased during the follow-up period. The areas under the MSE curves for scale 1 to 5 (area 1-5) and 6 to 20 (area 6-20) were lower throughout the chronic stage. Area 6-20 had the greatest discriminatory power to differentiate the post-MI patients (at 1 year) from the controls. In both the net reclassification improvement and integrated discrimination improvement models, MSE parameters significantly improved the discriminatory power of the linear parameters to differentiate the post-MI patients from the controls. In conclusion, the patients with STEMI had serial changes in cardiac complexity.

Experimental demonstration of an OFDM based visible light communication system using inter-block precoding and superimposed pilots

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Junwei; Hong, Xuezhi; Liu, Jie; Guo, Changjian

2018-04-01

In this work, we investigate and experimentally demonstrate an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) based high speed wavelength-division multiplexed (WDM) visible light communication (VLC) system using an inter-block data precoding and superimposed pilots (DP-SP) based channel estimation (CE) scheme. The residual signal-to-pilot interference (SPI) can be eliminated by using inter-block data precoding, resulting in a significant improvement in estimated accuracy and the overall system performance compared with uncoded SP based CE scheme. We also study the power allocation/overhead problem of the training for DP-SP, uncoded SP and conventional preamble based CE schemes, from which we obtain the optimum signal-to-pilot power ratio (SPR)/overhead percentage for all above cases. Intra-symbol frequency-domain averaging (ISFA) is also adopted to further enhance the accuracy of CE. By using the DP-SP based CE scheme, aggregate data rates of 1.87-Gbit/s and 1.57-Gbit/s are experimentally demonstrated over 0.8-m and 2-m indoor free space transmission, respectively, using a commercially available red, green and blue (RGB) light emitting diode (LED) with WDM. Experimental results show that the DP-SP based CE scheme is comparable to the conventional preamble based CE scheme in term of received Q factor and data rate while entailing a much smaller overhead-size.

Accumulate repeat accumulate codes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Abbasfar, Aliazam; Divsalar, Dariush; Yao, Kung

2004-01-01

In this paper we propose an innovative channel coding scheme called 'Accumulate Repeat Accumulate codes' (ARA). This class of codes can be viewed as serial turbo-like codes, or as a subclass of Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes, thus belief propagation can be used for iterative decoding of ARA codes on a graph. The structure of encoder for this class can be viewed as precoded Repeat Accumulate (RA) code or as precoded Irregular Repeat Accumulate (IRA) code, where simply an accumulator is chosen as a precoder. Thus ARA codes have simple, and very fast encoder structure when they representing LDPC codes. Based on density evolution for LDPC codes through some examples for ARA codes, we show that for maximum variable node degree 5 a minimum bit SNR as low as 0.08 dB from channel capacity for rate 1/2 can be achieved as the block size goes to infinity. Thus based on fixed low maximum variable node degree, its threshold outperforms not only the RA and IRA codes but also the best known LDPC codes with the dame maximum node degree. Furthermore by puncturing the accumulators any desired high rate codes close to code rate 1 can be obtained with thresholds that stay close to the channel capacity thresholds uniformly. Iterative decoding simulation results are provided. The ARA codes also have projected graph or protograph representation that allows for high speed decoder implementation.

Image denoising in mixed Poisson-Gaussian noise.

PubMed

Luisier, Florian; Blu, Thierry; Unser, Michael

2011-03-01

We propose a general methodology (PURE-LET) to design and optimize a wide class of transform-domain thresholding algorithms for denoising images corrupted by mixed Poisson-Gaussian noise. We express the denoising process as a linear expansion of thresholds (LET) that we optimize by relying on a purely data-adaptive unbiased estimate of the mean-squared error (MSE), derived in a non-Bayesian framework (PURE: Poisson-Gaussian unbiased risk estimate). We provide a practical approximation of this theoretical MSE estimate for the tractable optimization of arbitrary transform-domain thresholding. We then propose a pointwise estimator for undecimated filterbank transforms, which consists of subband-adaptive thresholding functions with signal-dependent thresholds that are globally optimized in the image domain. We finally demonstrate the potential of the proposed approach through extensive comparisons with state-of-the-art techniques that are specifically tailored to the estimation of Poisson intensities. We also present denoising results obtained on real images of low-count fluorescence microscopy.

Redox-responsive mesoporous selenium delivery of doxorubicin targets MCF-7 cells and synergistically enhances its anti-tumor activity.

PubMed

Zhao, Shuang; Yu, Qianqian; Pan, Jiali; Zhou, Yanhui; Cao, Chengwen; Ouyang, Jian-Ming; Liu, Jie

2017-05-01

To reduce the side effects and enhance the anti-tumor activities of anticancer drugs in the clinic, the use of nano mesoporous materials, with mesoporous silica (MSN) being the best-studied, has become an effective method of drug delivery. In this study, we successfully synthesized mesoporous selenium (MSe) nanoparticles and first introduced them to the field of drug delivery. Loading MSe with doxorubicin (DOX) is mainly driven by the physical adsorption mechanism of the mesopores, and our results demonstrated that MSe could synergistically enhance the antitumor activity of DOX. Coating the surface of MSe@DOX with Human serum albumin (HSA) generated a unique redox-responsive nanoparticle (HSA-MSe@DOX) that demonstrated glutathione-dependent drug release, increased tumor-targeting effects and enhanced cellular uptake throug nanoparticle interact with SPARC in MCF-7 cells. In vitro, HSA-MSe@DOX prominently induced cancer cell toxicity by synergistically enhancing the effects of MSe and DOX. Moreover, HSA-MSe@DOX possessed tumor-targeting abilities in tumor-bearing nude mice and not only decreased the side effects associated with DOX, but also enhanced its antitumor activity. Therefore, HSA-MSe@DOX is a promising new drug that warrants further evaluation in the treatments of tumors. To reduce the side effects and enhance the anti-tumor activities of anticancer drugs, we successfully synthesized mesoporous selenium (MSe) nanoparticles and first introduced them to the field of drug delivery. Loading MSe with doxorubicin (DOX) is mainly driven by the physical adsorption mechanism of the mesopores. Coating the surface of MSe@DOX with Human serum albumin (HSA) generated a unique redox-responsive nanoparticle (HSA-MSe@DOX) that demonstrated glutathione-dependent drug release, increased tumor-targeting effects and enhanced cellular uptake throug nanoparticle interact with SPARC in MCF-7 cells. In vitro and in vivo, HSA-MSe@DOX possessed tumor-targeting abilities and not only decreased the side effects associated with DOX, but also enhanced its antitumor activity. Therefore, HSA-MSe@DOX is a promising new drug that warrants further evaluation in the treatments of tumors. Copyright © 2017 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Joint Transmitter and Receiver Power Allocation under Minimax MSE Criterion with Perfect and Imperfect CSI for MC-CDMA Transmissions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kotchasarn, Chirawat; Saengudomlert, Poompat

We investigate the problem of joint transmitter and receiver power allocation with the minimax mean square error (MSE) criterion for uplink transmissions in a multi-carrier code division multiple access (MC-CDMA) system. The objective of power allocation is to minimize the maximum MSE among all users each of which has limited transmit power. This problem is a nonlinear optimization problem. Using the Lagrange multiplier method, we derive the Karush-Kuhn-Tucker (KKT) conditions which are necessary for a power allocation to be optimal. Numerical results indicate that, compared to the minimum total MSE criterion, the minimax MSE criterion yields a higher total MSE but provides a fairer treatment across the users. The advantages of the minimax MSE criterion are more evident when we consider the bit error rate (BER) estimates. Numerical results show that the minimax MSE criterion yields a lower maximum BER and a lower average BER. We also observe that, with the minimax MSE criterion, some users do not transmit at full power. For comparison, with the minimum total MSE criterion, all users transmit at full power. In addition, we investigate robust joint transmitter and receiver power allocation where the channel state information (CSI) is not perfect. The CSI error is assumed to be unknown but bounded by a deterministic value. This problem is formulated as a semidefinite programming (SDP) problem with bilinear matrix inequality (BMI) constraints. Numerical results show that, with imperfect CSI, the minimax MSE criterion also outperforms the minimum total MSE criterion in terms of the maximum and average BERs.

Experimental demonstration of the transmission performance for LDPC-coded multiband OFDM ultra-wideband over fiber system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

He, Jing; Wen, Xuejie; Chen, Ming; Chen, Lin; Su, Jinshu

2015-01-01

To improve the transmission performance of multiband orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (MB-OFDM) ultra-wideband (UWB) over optical fiber, a pre-coding scheme based on low-density parity-check (LDPC) is adopted and experimentally demonstrated in the intensity-modulation and direct-detection MB-OFDM UWB over fiber system. Meanwhile, a symbol synchronization and pilot-aided channel estimation scheme is implemented on the receiver of the MB-OFDM UWB over fiber system. The experimental results show that the LDPC pre-coding scheme can work effectively in the MB-OFDM UWB over fiber system. After 70 km standard single-mode fiber (SSMF) transmission, at the bit error rate of 1 × 10-3, the receiver sensitivities are improved about 4 dB when the LDPC code rate is 75%.

New consensus multivariate models based on PLS and ANN studies of sigma-1 receptor antagonists.

PubMed

Oliveira, Aline A; Lipinski, Célio F; Pereira, Estevão B; Honorio, Kathia M; Oliveira, Patrícia R; Weber, Karen C; Romero, Roseli A F; de Sousa, Alexsandro G; da Silva, Albérico B F

2017-10-02

The treatment of neuropathic pain is very complex and there are few drugs approved for this purpose. Among the studied compounds in the literature, sigma-1 receptor antagonists have shown to be promising. In order to develop QSAR studies applied to the compounds of 1-arylpyrazole derivatives, multivariate analyses have been performed in this work using partial least square (PLS) and artificial neural network (ANN) methods. A PLS model has been obtained and validated with 45 compounds in the training set and 13 compounds in the test set (r 2 training = 0.761, q 2 = 0.656, r 2 test = 0.746, MSE test = 0.132 and MAE test = 0.258). Additionally, multi-layer perceptron ANNs (MLP-ANNs) were employed in order to propose non-linear models trained by gradient descent with momentum backpropagation function. Based on MSE test values, the best MLP-ANN models were combined in a MLP-ANN consensus model (MLP-ANN-CM; r 2 test = 0.824, MSE test = 0.088 and MAE test = 0.197). In the end, a general consensus model (GCM) has been obtained using PLS and MLP-ANN-CM models (r 2 test = 0.811, MSE test = 0.100 and MAE test = 0.218). Besides, the selected descriptors (GGI6, Mor23m, SRW06, H7m, MLOGP, and μ) revealed important features that should be considered when one is planning new compounds of the 1-arylpyrazole class. The multivariate models proposed in this work are definitely a powerful tool for the rational drug design of new compounds for neuropathic pain treatment. Graphical abstract Main scaffold of the 1-arylpyrazole derivatives and the selected descriptors.

High-resolution chromatography/time-of-flight MSE with in silico data mining is an information-rich approach to reactive metabolite screening.

PubMed

Barbara, Joanna E; Castro-Perez, Jose M

2011-10-30

Electrophilic reactive metabolite screening by liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) is commonly performed during drug discovery and early-stage drug development. Accurate mass spectrometry has excellent utility in this application, but sophisticated data processing strategies are essential to extract useful information. Herein, a unified approach to glutathione (GSH) trapped reactive metabolite screening with high-resolution LC/TOF MS(E) analysis and drug-conjugate-specific in silico data processing was applied to rapid analysis of test compounds without the need for stable- or radio-isotope-labeled trapping agents. Accurate mass defect filtering (MDF) with a C-heteroatom dealkylation algorithm dynamic with mass range was compared to linear MDF and shown to minimize false positive results. MS(E) data-filtering, time-alignment and data mining post-acquisition enabled detection of 53 GSH conjugates overall formed from 5 drugs. Automated comparison of sample and control data in conjunction with the mass defect filter enabled detection of several conjugates that were not evident with mass defect filtering alone. High- and low-energy MS(E) data were time-aligned to generate in silico product ion spectra which were successfully applied to structural elucidation of detected GSH conjugates. Pseudo neutral loss and precursor ion chromatograms derived post-acquisition demonstrated 50.9% potential coverage, at best, of the detected conjugates by any individual precursor or neutral loss scan type. In contrast with commonly applied neutral loss and precursor-based techniques, the unified method has the advantage of applicability across different classes of GSH conjugates. The unified method was also successfully applied to cyanide trapping analysis and has potential for application to alternate trapping agents. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

On the Brink of Shifting Paradigms, Molecular Systems Engineering Ethics Needs to Take a Proactive Approach.

PubMed

Heidari, Raheleh; Elger, Bernice S; Stutzki, Ralf

2016-01-01

Molecular Systems Engineering (MSE) is a paradigm shift in both engineering and life sciences. While the field is still in its infancy the perspectives of MSE in revolutionising technology is promising. MSE will offer a wide range of applications in clinical, biotechnological and engineering fields while simultaneously posing serious questions on the ethical and societal aspects of such technology. The moral and societal aspects of MSE need systematic investigation from scientific and social perspectives. In a democratic setting, the societal outcomes of MSE's cutting-edge technology need to be consulted and influenced by society itself. For this purpose MSE needs inclusive public engagement strategies that bring together the public, ethicists, scientists and policy makers for optimum flow of information that maximizes the impact of public engagement. In this report we present an MSE consortium and its ethics framework for establishing a proactive approach in the study of the ethics of MSE technology.

The modelling of lead removal from water by deep eutectic solvents functionalized CNTs: artificial neural network (ANN) approach.

PubMed

Fiyadh, Seef Saadi; AlSaadi, Mohammed Abdulhakim; AlOmar, Mohamed Khalid; Fayaed, Sabah Saadi; Hama, Ako R; Bee, Sharifah; El-Shafie, Ahmed

2017-11-01

The main challenge in the lead removal simulation is the behaviour of non-linearity relationships between the process parameters. The conventional modelling technique usually deals with this problem by a linear method. The substitute modelling technique is an artificial neural network (ANN) system, and it is selected to reflect the non-linearity in the interaction among the variables in the function. Herein, synthesized deep eutectic solvents were used as a functionalized agent with carbon nanotubes as adsorbents of Pb 2+ . Different parameters were used in the adsorption study including pH (2.7 to 7), adsorbent dosage (5 to 20 mg), contact time (3 to 900 min) and Pb 2+ initial concentration (3 to 60 mg/l). The number of experimental trials to feed and train the system was 158 runs conveyed in laboratory scale. Two ANN types were designed in this work, the feed-forward back-propagation and layer recurrent; both methods are compared based on their predictive proficiency in terms of the mean square error (MSE), root mean square error, relative root mean square error, mean absolute percentage error and determination coefficient (R 2 ) based on the testing dataset. The ANN model of lead removal was subjected to accuracy determination and the results showed R 2 of 0.9956 with MSE of 1.66 × 10 -4 . The maximum relative error is 14.93% for the feed-forward back-propagation neural network model.

Using Telephone and Informant Assessments to Estimate Missing Modified Mini-Mental State Exam Scores and Rates of Cognitive Decline

PubMed Central

Arnold, Alice M.; Newman, Anne B.; Dermond, Norma; Haan, Mary; Fitzpatrick, Annette

2009-01-01

Aim To estimate an equivalent to the Modified Mini-Mental State Exam (3MSE), and to compare changes in the 3MSE with and without the estimated scores. Methods Comparability study on a subset of 405 participants, aged ≥70 years, from the Cardiovascular Health Study (CHS), a longitudinal study in 4 United States communities. The 3MSE, the Telephone Interview for Cognitive Status (TICS) and the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (IQCODE) were administered within 30 days of one another. Regression models were developed to predict the 3MSE score from the TICS and/or IQCODE, and the predicted values were used to estimate missing 3MSE scores in longitudinal follow-up of 4,274 CHS participants. Results The TICS explained 67% of the variability in 3MSE scores, with a correlation of 0.82 between predicted and observed scores. The IQCODE alone was not a good estimate of 3MSE score, but improved the model fit when added to the TICS model. Using estimated 3MSE scores classified more participants with low cognition, and rates of decline were greater than when only the observed 3MSE scores were considered. Conclusions 3MSE scores can be reliably estimated from the TICS, with or without the IQCODE. Incorporating these estimates captured more cognitive decline in older adults. PMID:19407461

Empirical best linear unbiased prediction method for small areas with restricted maximum likelihood and bootstrap procedure to estimate the average of household expenditure per capita in Banjar Regency

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Aminah, Agustin Siti; Pawitan, Gandhi; Tantular, Bertho

2017-03-01

So far, most of the data published by Statistics Indonesia (BPS) as data providers for national statistics are still limited to the district level. Less sufficient sample size for smaller area levels to make the measurement of poverty indicators with direct estimation produced high standard error. Therefore, the analysis based on it is unreliable. To solve this problem, the estimation method which can provide a better accuracy by combining survey data and other auxiliary data is required. One method often used for the estimation is the Small Area Estimation (SAE). There are many methods used in SAE, one of them is Empirical Best Linear Unbiased Prediction (EBLUP). EBLUP method of maximum likelihood (ML) procedures does not consider the loss of degrees of freedom due to estimating β with β ^. This drawback motivates the use of the restricted maximum likelihood (REML) procedure. This paper proposed EBLUP with REML procedure for estimating poverty indicators by modeling the average of household expenditures per capita and implemented bootstrap procedure to calculate MSE (Mean Square Error) to compare the accuracy EBLUP method with the direct estimation method. Results show that EBLUP method reduced MSE in small area estimation.

Orthogonal Array Testing for Transmit Precoding based Codebooks in Space Shift Keying Systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Al-Ansi, Mohammed; Alwee Aljunid, Syed; Sourour, Essam; Mat Safar, Anuar; Rashidi, C. B. M.

2018-03-01

In Space Shift Keying (SSK) systems, transmit precoding based codebook approaches have been proposed to improve the performance in limited feedback channels. The receiver performs an exhaustive search in a predefined Full-Combination (FC) codebook to select the optimal codeword that maximizes the Minimum Euclidean Distance (MED) between the received constellations. This research aims to reduce the codebook size with the purpose of minimizing the selection time and the number of feedback bits. Therefore, we propose to construct the codebooks based on Orthogonal Array Testing (OAT) methods due to their powerful inherent properties. These methods allow to acquire a short codebook where the codewords are sufficient to cover almost all the possible effects included in the FC codebook. Numerical results show the effectiveness of the proposed OAT codebooks in terms of the system performance and complexity.

Performance Evaluation of Analog Beamforming with Hardware Impairments for mmW Massive MIMO Communication in an Urban Scenario.

PubMed

Gimenez, Sonia; Roger, Sandra; Baracca, Paolo; Martín-Sacristán, David; Monserrat, Jose F; Braun, Volker; Halbauer, Hardy

2016-09-22

The use of massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) techniques for communication at millimeter-Wave (mmW) frequency bands has become a key enabler to meet the data rate demands of the upcoming fifth generation (5G) cellular systems. In particular, analog and hybrid beamforming solutions are receiving increasing attention as less expensive and more power efficient alternatives to fully digital precoding schemes. Despite their proven good performance in simple setups, their suitability for realistic cellular systems with many interfering base stations and users is still unclear. Furthermore, the performance of massive MIMO beamforming and precoding methods are in practice also affected by practical limitations and hardware constraints. In this sense, this paper assesses the performance of digital precoding and analog beamforming in an urban cellular system with an accurate mmW channel model under both ideal and realistic assumptions. The results show that analog beamforming can reach the performance of fully digital maximum ratio transmission under line of sight conditions and with a sufficient number of parallel radio-frequency (RF) chains, especially when the practical limitations of outdated channel information and per antenna power constraints are considered. This work also shows the impact of the phase shifter errors and combiner losses introduced by real phase shifter and combiner implementations over analog beamforming, where the former ones have minor impact on the performance, while the latter ones determine the optimum number of RF chains to be used in practice.

On the estimation of brain signal entropy from sparse neuroimaging data

PubMed Central

Grandy, Thomas H.; Garrett, Douglas D.; Schmiedek, Florian; Werkle-Bergner, Markus

2016-01-01

Multi-scale entropy (MSE) has been recently established as a promising tool for the analysis of the moment-to-moment variability of neural signals. Appealingly, MSE provides a measure of the predictability of neural operations across the multiple time scales on which the brain operates. An important limitation in the application of the MSE to some classes of neural signals is MSE’s apparent reliance on long time series. However, this sparse-data limitation in MSE computation could potentially be overcome via MSE estimation across shorter time series that are not necessarily acquired continuously (e.g., in fMRI block-designs). In the present study, using simulated, EEG, and fMRI data, we examined the dependence of the accuracy and precision of MSE estimates on the number of data points per segment and the total number of data segments. As hypothesized, MSE estimation across discontinuous segments was comparably accurate and precise, despite segment length. A key advance of our approach is that it allows the calculation of MSE scales not previously accessible from the native segment lengths. Consequently, our results may permit a far broader range of applications of MSE when gauging moment-to-moment dynamics in sparse and/or discontinuous neurophysiological data typical of many modern cognitive neuroscience study designs. PMID:27020961

Study of the seismic performance of hybrid A-frame micropile/MSE (mechanically stabilized earth) wall

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Yumin; Zhang, Zhichao; Liu, Hanlong

2017-04-01

The Hybrid A-Frame Micropile/MSE (mechanically stabilized earth) Wall suitable for mountain roadways is put forward in this study: a pair of vertical and inclined micropiles goes through the backfill region of a highway MSE Wall from the road surface and are then anchored into the foundation. The pile cap and grade beam are placed on the pile tops, and then a road barrier is connected to the grade beam by connecting pieces. The MSE wall's global stability, local stability and impact resistance of the road barrier can be enhanced simultaneously by this design. In order to validate the serviceability of the hybrid A-frame micropile/MSE wall and the reliability of the numerical method, scale model tests and a corresponding numerical simulation were conducted. Then, the seismic performance of the MSE walls before and after reinforcement with micropiles was studied comparatively through numerical methods. The results indicate that the hybrid A-frame micropile/MSE wall can effectively control earthquake-induced deformation, differential settlement at the road surface, bearing pressure on the bottom and acceleration by means of a rigid-soft combination of micropiles and MSE. The accumulated displacement under earthquakes with amplitude of 0.1‒0.5 g is reduced by 36.3%‒46.5%, and the acceleration amplification factor on the top of the wall is reduced by 13.4%, 15.7% and 19.3% based on 0.1, 0.3 and 0.5 g input earthquake loading, respectively. In addition, the earthquake-induced failure mode of the MSE wall in steep terrain is the sliding of the MSE region along the backslope, while the micropiles effectively control the sliding trend. The maximum earthquake-induced pile bending moment is in the interface between MSE and slope foundation, so it is necessary to strengthen the reinforcement of the pile body in the interface. Hence, it is proven that the hybrid A-frame micropile/MSE wall system has good seismic performance.

Multiscale entropy analysis of biological signals: a fundamental bi-scaling law

PubMed Central

Gao, Jianbo; Hu, Jing; Liu, Feiyan; Cao, Yinhe

2015-01-01

Since introduced in early 2000, multiscale entropy (MSE) has found many applications in biosignal analysis, and been extended to multivariate MSE. So far, however, no analytic results for MSE or multivariate MSE have been reported. This has severely limited our basic understanding of MSE. For example, it has not been studied whether MSE estimated using default parameter values and short data set is meaningful or not. Nor is it known whether MSE has any relation with other complexity measures, such as the Hurst parameter, which characterizes the correlation structure of the data. To overcome this limitation, and more importantly, to guide more fruitful applications of MSE in various areas of life sciences, we derive a fundamental bi-scaling law for fractal time series, one for the scale in phase space, the other for the block size used for smoothing. We illustrate the usefulness of the approach by examining two types of physiological data. One is heart rate variability (HRV) data, for the purpose of distinguishing healthy subjects from patients with congestive heart failure, a life-threatening condition. The other is electroencephalogram (EEG) data, for the purpose of distinguishing epileptic seizure EEG from normal healthy EEG. PMID:26082711

Dual-tone optical vector millimeter wave signal generated by frequency-nonupling the radio frequency 16-star quadrature-amplitude-modulation signal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wu, Tonggen; Ma, Jianxin

2017-12-01

This paper proposes an original scheme to generate the photonic dual-tone optical millimeter wave (MMW) carrying the 16-star quadrature-amplitude-modulation (QAM) signal via an optical phase modulator (PM) and an interleaver with adaptive photonic frequency-nonupling without phase precoding. To enable the generated optical vector MMW signal to resist the power fading effect caused by the fiber chromatic dispersion, the modulated -5th- and +4th-order sidebands are selected from the output of the PM, which is driven by the precoding 16-star QAM signal. The modulation index of the PM is optimized to gain the maximum opto-electrical conversion efficiency. A radio over fiber link is built by simulation, and the simulated constellations and the bit error rate graph demonstrate that the frequency-nonupling 16-star QAM MMW signal has good transmission performance. The simulation results agree well with our theoretical results.

Interference-free SDMA for FBMC-OQAM

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Horlin, François; Fickers, Jessica; Deleu, Thibault; Louveaux, Jérome

2013-12-01

Filter-bank multi-carrier (FBMC) modulations have recently been considered for the emerging wireless communication systems as a means to improve the utilization of the physical resources and the robustness to channel time variations. FBMC divides the overall frequency channel in a set of subchannels of bandwidth proportionally decreasing with the number of subchannels. If the number of subchannels is high enough, the bandwidth of each subchannel is small enough to assume that it is approximately flat. On the other hand, space-division multiple access (SDMA) is a recognized technique to support multiple access in the downlink of a multi-user system. The user signals are precoded at the base station equipped with multiple antennas to separate the users in the spatial domain. The application of SDMA to FBMC is unfortunately difficult when the channel is too frequency selective (or when the number of subchannels to too small) to assume flat subchannels. In that case, the system suffers from inter-symbol and inter-subchannel interference, besides the multi-user interference inherent to SDMA. State-of-the art solutions simply neglect the inter-symbol/subchannel interference. This article proposes a new SDMA precoder for FBMC capable of mitigating the three sources of interference. It is constructed per subchannel in order to keep an acceptable complexity and has the structure of a filter applied on each subchannel and its neighbors at twice the symbol rate. Numerical results demonstrate that the precoder can get rid of all the interference present in the system and benefit therefore from the diversity and power gains achievable with multiple antenna systems.

Joint graph cut and relative fuzzy connectedness image segmentation algorithm.

PubMed

Ciesielski, Krzysztof Chris; Miranda, Paulo A V; Falcão, Alexandre X; Udupa, Jayaram K

2013-12-01

We introduce an image segmentation algorithm, called GC(sum)(max), which combines, in novel manner, the strengths of two popular algorithms: Relative Fuzzy Connectedness (RFC) and (standard) Graph Cut (GC). We show, both theoretically and experimentally, that GC(sum)(max) preserves robustness of RFC with respect to the seed choice (thus, avoiding "shrinking problem" of GC), while keeping GC's stronger control over the problem of "leaking though poorly defined boundary segments." The analysis of GC(sum)(max) is greatly facilitated by our recent theoretical results that RFC can be described within the framework of Generalized GC (GGC) segmentation algorithms. In our implementation of GC(sum)(max) we use, as a subroutine, a version of RFC algorithm (based on Image Forest Transform) that runs (provably) in linear time with respect to the image size. This results in GC(sum)(max) running in a time close to linear. Experimental comparison of GC(sum)(max) to GC, an iterative version of RFC (IRFC), and power watershed (PW), based on a variety medical and non-medical images, indicates superior accuracy performance of GC(sum)(max) over these other methods, resulting in a rank ordering of GC(sum)(max)>PW∼IRFC>GC. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Parametric and Nonparametric Statistical Methods for Genomic Selection of Traits with Additive and Epistatic Genetic Architectures

PubMed Central

Howard, Réka; Carriquiry, Alicia L.; Beavis, William D.

2014-01-01

Parametric and nonparametric methods have been developed for purposes of predicting phenotypes. These methods are based on retrospective analyses of empirical data consisting of genotypic and phenotypic scores. Recent reports have indicated that parametric methods are unable to predict phenotypes of traits with known epistatic genetic architectures. Herein, we review parametric methods including least squares regression, ridge regression, Bayesian ridge regression, least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO), Bayesian LASSO, best linear unbiased prediction (BLUP), Bayes A, Bayes B, Bayes C, and Bayes Cπ. We also review nonparametric methods including Nadaraya-Watson estimator, reproducing kernel Hilbert space, support vector machine regression, and neural networks. We assess the relative merits of these 14 methods in terms of accuracy and mean squared error (MSE) using simulated genetic architectures consisting of completely additive or two-way epistatic interactions in an F2 population derived from crosses of inbred lines. Each simulated genetic architecture explained either 30% or 70% of the phenotypic variability. The greatest impact on estimates of accuracy and MSE was due to genetic architecture. Parametric methods were unable to predict phenotypic values when the underlying genetic architecture was based entirely on epistasis. Parametric methods were slightly better than nonparametric methods for additive genetic architectures. Distinctions among parametric methods for additive genetic architectures were incremental. Heritability, i.e., proportion of phenotypic variability, had the second greatest impact on estimates of accuracy and MSE. PMID:24727289

Estimating right ventricular stroke work and the pulsatile work fraction in pulmonary hypertension.

PubMed

Chemla, Denis; Castelain, Vincent; Zhu, Kaixian; Papelier, Yves; Creuzé, Nicolas; Hoette, Susana; Parent, Florence; Simonneau, Gérald; Humbert, Marc; Herve, Philippe

2013-05-01

The mean pulmonary artery pressure (mPAP) replaces mean systolic ejection pressure (msePAP) in the classic formula of right ventricular stroke work (RVSW) = (mPAP - RAP) × stroke volume, where RAP is mean right atrial pressure. Only the steady work is thus taken into account, not the pulsatile work, whereas pulmonary circulation is highly pulsatile. Our retrospective, high-fidelity pressure study tested the hypothesis that msePAP was proportional to mPAP, and looked at the implications for RVSW. Eleven patients with severe, precapillary pulmonary hypertension (PH) (six patients with idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension and five with chronic thromboembolic PH; mPAP = 57 ± 10 mm Hg) were studied at rest and during mild to moderate exercise. Eight non-PH control subjects were also studied at rest (mPAP = 16 ± 2 mm Hg). The msePAP was averaged from end diastole to dicrotic notch. In the full data set (53 pressure-flow points), mPAP ranged from 14 to 99.5 mm Hg, cardiac output from 2.38 to 11.1 L/min, and heart rate from 53 to 163 beats/min. There was a linear relationship between msePAP and mPAP (r² = 0.99). The msePAP matched 1.25 mPAP (bias, -0.5 ± 2.6 mm Hg). Results were similar in the resting non-PH group and in resting and the exercising PH group. This implies that the classic formula markedly underestimates RVSW and that the pulsatile work may be a variable 20% to 55% fraction of RVSW, depending on RAP and mPAP. At rest, RVSW in patients with PH was twice as high as that of the non-PH group (P < .05), but pulsatile work fraction was similar between the two groups (26 ± 4% vs 24 ± 1%) because of the counterbalancing effects of high RAP (11 ± 5 mm Hg vs 4 ± 2 mm Hg), which increases the fraction, and high mPAP, which decreases the fraction. Our study favored the use of an improved formula that takes into account the variable pulsatile work fraction: RVSW = (1.25 mPAP - RAP) × stroke volume. Increased RAP and increased mPAP have opposite effects on the pulsatile work fraction.

Refined Composite Multiscale Dispersion Entropy and its Application to Biomedical Signals.

PubMed

Azami, Hamed; Rostaghi, Mostafa; Abasolo, Daniel; Escudero, Javier

2017-12-01

We propose a novel complexity measure to overcome the deficiencies of the widespread and powerful multiscale entropy (MSE), including, MSE values may be undefined for short signals, and MSE is slow for real-time applications. We introduce multiscale dispersion entropy (DisEn-MDE) as a very fast and powerful method to quantify the complexity of signals. MDE is based on our recently developed DisEn, which has a computation cost of O(N), compared with O(N 2 ) for sample entropy used in MSE. We also propose the refined composite MDE (RCMDE) to improve the stability of MDE. We evaluate MDE, RCMDE, and refined composite MSE (RCMSE) on synthetic signals and three biomedical datasets. The MDE, RCMDE, and RCMSE methods show similar results, although the MDE and RCMDE are faster, lead to more stable results, and discriminate different types of physiological signals better than MSE and RCMSE. For noisy short and long time series, MDE and RCMDE are noticeably more stable than MSE and RCMSE, respectively. For short signals, MDE and RCMDE, unlike MSE and RCMSE, do not lead to undefined values. The proposed MDE and RCMDE are significantly faster than MSE and RCMSE, especially for long signals, and lead to larger differences between physiological conditions known to alter the complexity of the physiological recordings. MDE and RCMDE are expected to be useful for the analysis of physiological signals thanks to their ability to distinguish different types of dynamics. The MATLAB codes used in this paper are freely available at http://dx.doi.org/10.7488/ds/1982.

Evaluation of corrosion of metallic reinforcements and connections in MSE retaining walls.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2008-05-01

Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE) retaining walls have become the dominant retained wall system on ODOT projects. The permanent MSE walls constructed on ODOT projects, in recent years, use metallic reinforcements and facing connections buried direc...

The motional Stark effect diagnostic for ITER using a line-shift approach.

PubMed

Foley, E L; Levinton, F M; Yuh, H Y; Zakharov, L E

2008-10-01

The United States has been tasked with the development and implementation of a motional Stark effect (MSE) system on ITER. In the harsh ITER environment, MSE is particularly susceptible to degradation, as it depends on polarimetry, and the polarization reflection properties of surfaces are highly sensitive to thin film effects due to plasma deposition and erosion of a first mirror. Here we present the results of a comprehensive study considering a new MSE-based approach to internal plasma magnetic field measurements for ITER. The proposed method uses the line shifts in the MSE spectrum (MSE-LS) to provide a radial profile of the magnetic field magnitude. To determine the utility of MSE-LS for equilibrium reconstruction, studies were performed using the ESC-ERV code system. A near-term opportunity to test the use of MSE-LS for equilibrium reconstruction is being pursued in the implementation of MSE with laser-induced fluorescence on NSTX. Though the field values and beam energies are very different from ITER, the use of a laser allows precision spectroscopy with a similar ratio of linewidth to line spacing on NSTX as would be achievable with a passive system on ITER. Simulation results for ITER and NSTX are presented, and the relative merits of the traditional line polarization approach and the new line-shift approach are discussed.

Regenerated Sciatic Nerve Axons Stimulated through a Chronically Implanted Macro-Sieve Electrode.

PubMed

MacEwan, Matthew R; Zellmer, Erik R; Wheeler, Jesse J; Burton, Harold; Moran, Daniel W

2016-01-01

Sieve electrodes provide a chronic interface for stimulating peripheral nerve axons. Yet, successful utilization requires robust axonal regeneration through the implanted electrode. The present study determined the effect of large transit zones in enhancing axonal regeneration and revealed an intimate neural interface with an implanted sieve electrode. Fabrication of the polyimide sieve electrodes employed sacrificial photolithography. The manufactured macro-sieve electrode (MSE) contained nine large transit zones with areas of ~0.285 mm 2 surrounded by eight Pt-Ir metallized electrode sites. Prior to implantation, saline, or glial derived neurotropic factor (GDNF) was injected into nerve guidance silicone-conduits with or without a MSE. The MSE assembly or a nerve guidance conduit was implanted between transected ends of the sciatic nerve in adult male Lewis rats. At 3 months post-operation, fiber counts were similar through both implant types. Likewise, stimulation of nerves regenerated through a MSE or an open silicone conduit evoked comparable muscle forces. These results showed that nerve regeneration was comparable through MSE transit zones and an open conduit. GDNF had a minimal positive effect on the quality and morphology of fibers regenerating through the MSE; thus, the MSE may reduce reliance on GDNF to augment axonal regeneration. Selective stimulation of several individual muscles was achieved through monopolar stimulation of individual electrodes sites suggesting that the MSE might be an optimal platform for functional neuromuscular stimulation.

Regenerated Sciatic Nerve Axons Stimulated through a Chronically Implanted Macro-Sieve Electrode

PubMed Central

MacEwan, Matthew R.; Zellmer, Erik R.; Wheeler, Jesse J.; Burton, Harold; Moran, Daniel W.

2016-01-01

Sieve electrodes provide a chronic interface for stimulating peripheral nerve axons. Yet, successful utilization requires robust axonal regeneration through the implanted electrode. The present study determined the effect of large transit zones in enhancing axonal regeneration and revealed an intimate neural interface with an implanted sieve electrode. Fabrication of the polyimide sieve electrodes employed sacrificial photolithography. The manufactured macro-sieve electrode (MSE) contained nine large transit zones with areas of ~0.285 mm2 surrounded by eight Pt-Ir metallized electrode sites. Prior to implantation, saline, or glial derived neurotropic factor (GDNF) was injected into nerve guidance silicone-conduits with or without a MSE. The MSE assembly or a nerve guidance conduit was implanted between transected ends of the sciatic nerve in adult male Lewis rats. At 3 months post-operation, fiber counts were similar through both implant types. Likewise, stimulation of nerves regenerated through a MSE or an open silicone conduit evoked comparable muscle forces. These results showed that nerve regeneration was comparable through MSE transit zones and an open conduit. GDNF had a minimal positive effect on the quality and morphology of fibers regenerating through the MSE; thus, the MSE may reduce reliance on GDNF to augment axonal regeneration. Selective stimulation of several individual muscles was achieved through monopolar stimulation of individual electrodes sites suggesting that the MSE might be an optimal platform for functional neuromuscular stimulation. PMID:28008303

Optimization of Operating Parameters for Minimum Mechanical Specific Energy in Drilling

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

Hamrick, Todd

2011-01-01

Efficiency in drilling is measured by Mechanical Specific Energy (MSE). MSE is the measure of the amount of energy input required to remove a unit volume of rock, expressed in units of energy input divided by volume removed. It can be expressed mathematically in terms of controllable parameters; Weight on Bit, Torque, Rate of Penetration, and RPM. It is well documented that minimizing MSE by optimizing controllable factors results in maximum Rate of Penetration. Current methods for computing MSE make it possible to minimize MSE in the field only through a trial-and-error process. This work makes it possible to computemore » the optimum drilling parameters that result in minimum MSE. The parameters that have been traditionally used to compute MSE are interdependent. Mathematical relationships between the parameters were established, and the conventional MSE equation was rewritten in terms of a single parameter, Weight on Bit, establishing a form that can be minimized mathematically. Once the optimum Weight on Bit was determined, the interdependent relationship that Weight on Bit has with Torque and Penetration per Revolution was used to determine optimum values for those parameters for a given drilling situation. The improved method was validated through laboratory experimentation and analysis of published data. Two rock types were subjected to four treatments each, and drilled in a controlled laboratory environment. The method was applied in each case, and the optimum parameters for minimum MSE were computed. The method demonstrated an accurate means to determine optimum drilling parameters of Weight on Bit, Torque, and Penetration per Revolution. A unique application of micro-cracking is also presented, which demonstrates that rock failure ahead of the bit is related to axial force more than to rotation speed.« less

A Comparison of Variable Selection Criteria for Multiple Linear Regression: A Second Simulation Study

DTIC Science & Technology

1993-03-01

statistical mathe- matics, began in the late 1800’s when Sir Francis Galton first attempted to use practical mathematical techniques to investigate the...randomly collected (sampled) many pairs of parent/child height mea- surements (data), Galton observed that for a given parent- height average, the...ty only Maximum Adjusted R2 will be discussed. However, Maximum Adjusted R’ and Minimum MSE test exactly the same 2.thing. Adjusted R is related to R

Gompertzian stochastic model with delay effect to cervical cancer growth

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

Mazlan, Mazma Syahidatul Ayuni binti; Rosli, Norhayati binti; Bahar, Arifah

2015-02-03

In this paper, a Gompertzian stochastic model with time delay is introduced to describe the cervical cancer growth. The parameters values of the mathematical model are estimated via Levenberg-Marquardt optimization method of non-linear least squares. We apply Milstein scheme for solving the stochastic model numerically. The efficiency of mathematical model is measured by comparing the simulated result and the clinical data of cervical cancer growth. Low values of Mean-Square Error (MSE) of Gompertzian stochastic model with delay effect indicate good fits.

Interaction between drilled shaft and mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) wall : project summary.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-08-31

Drilled shafts are being constructed within the reinforced zone of mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls (Figure 1). The drilled shafts may be subjected to horizontal loads and push against the front of the wall. Distress of MSE wall panels has b...

MSE wall void repair effect on corrosion of reinforcement - phase 2 : specialty fill materials, [summary].

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-06-01

Ramps leading, for example, to overpasses or bridges are usually constructed using : mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls, earthworks retained by concrete walls. Because : MSE walls are reinforced with steel embedded in the fill, their fill is c...

Modified Kramers-Kronig relations and sum rules for meromorphic total refractive index

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

Peiponen, Kai-Erik; Saarinen, Jarkko J.; Vartiainen, Erik M.

2003-08-01

Modified Kramers-Kronig relations and corresponding sum rules are shown to hold for the total refractive index that can be presented as a sum of complex linear and nonlinear refractive indices, respectively. It is suggested that a self-action process, involving the degenerate third-order nonlinear susceptibility, can yield a negative total refractive index at some spectral range.

Initial Operative Experience and Short-term Hearing Preservation Results With a Mid-scala Cochlear Implant Electrode Array.

PubMed

Svrakic, Maja; Roland, J Thomas; McMenomey, Sean O; Svirsky, Mario A

2016-12-01

To describe our initial operative experience and hearing preservation results with the Advanced Bionics (AB) Mid Scala Electrode (MSE). Retrospective review. Tertiary referral center. Sixty-three MSE implants in pediatric and adult patients were compared with age- and sex-matched 1j electrode implants from the same manufacturer. All patients were severe to profoundly deaf. Cochlear implantation with either the AB 1j electrode or the AB MSE. The MSE and 1j electrodes were compared in their angular depth of insertion and pre to postoperative change in hearing thresholds. Hearing preservation was analyzed as a function of angular depth of insertion. Secondary outcome measures included operative time, incidence of abnormal intraoperative impedance and telemetry values, and incidence of postsurgical complications. Depth of insertion was similar for both electrodes, but was more consistent for the MSE array and more variable for the 1j array. Patients with MSE electrodes had better hearing preservation. Thresholds shifts at four audiometric frequencies ranging from 250 to 2000 Hz were 10, 7, 2, and 6 dB smaller for the MSE electrode than for the 1j (p < 0.05). Hearing preservation at low frequencies was worse with deeper insertion, regardless of array. Secondary outcome measures were similar for both electrodes. The MSE electrode resulted in more consistent insertion depth and somewhat better hearing preservation than the 1j electrode. Differences in other surgical outcome measures were small or unlikely to have a meaningful effect.

Polynomials with Restricted Coefficients and Their Applications

DTIC Science & Technology

1987-01-01

sums of exponentials of quadratics, he reduced such ýzums to exponentials of linears (geometric sums!) by simplg multiplying by their conjugates...n, the same algebraic manipulations as before lead to rn V`-~ v ie ? --8-- el4V’ .fk ts with 𔄃 = a+(2r+l)t, A = a+(2r+2m+l)t. To estimate the right...coefficients. These random polynomials represent the deviation in frequency response of a linear , equispaced antenna array cauised by coefficient

MAI-free performance of PMU-OFDM transceiver in time-variant environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tadjpour, Layla; Tsai, Shang-Ho; Kuo, C.-C. J.

2005-06-01

An approximately multi-user OFDM transceiver was introduced to reduce the multi-access interference (MAI ) due to the carrier frequency offset (CFO) to a negligible amount via precoding by Tsai, Lin and Kuo. In this work, we investigate the performance of this precoded multi-user (PMU) OFDM system in a time-variant channel environment. We analyze and compare the MAI effect caused by time-variant channels in the PMU-OFDM and the OFDMA systems. Generally speaking, the MAI effect consists of two parts. The first part is due to the loss of orthogonality among subchannels for all users while the second part is due to the CFO effect caused by the Doppler shift. Simulation results show that, although OFDMA outperforms the PMU-OFDM transceiver in a fast time-variant environment without CFO, PMU-OFDM outperforms OFDMA in a slow time-variant channel via the use of M/2 symmetric or anti-symmetric codewords of M Hadamard-Walsh codes.

Short message service prompted mouth self-examination in oral cancer patients as an alternative to frequent hospital-based surveillance.

PubMed

Vaishampayan, Sagar; Malik, Akshat; Pawar, Prashant; Arya, Kavi; Chaturvedi, Pankaj

2017-01-01

Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) are amongst commonest cancer in the Indian sub-continent. After treatment, these patients require frequent followup to look for recurrences/second primary. Mouth Self Examination (MSE) has a great potential in all levels of prevention of oral cancer. However, the compliance to self-examination has been reported as poor. Mobile phone is a cheap and effective way to reach out to people. Short Message Service (SMS) is extremely popular can be a very effective motivational and interactive tool in health care setting. We aimed to identify in adequately treated OSCC patients, the influence of health provider initiated SMS on the compliance to the MSE and to establish the efficacy of MSE by comparing patients' MSE interpretation via replies to the SMS with that of the experts' opinion on clinical examination status during follow up. We conclude that MSE can be very useful in adequately treated OSCC patients for evaluating disease status. All treated OSCC patients must be adequately educated for MSE as an integral part of treatment & follow-up protocol by the health provider facility. Health provider generated SMS reminders do improve motivation and compliance towards MSE but don't seem to reduce dropouts in follow up for large and diverse population like that in India.

Mouth self-examination as a screening tool for oral cancer in a high-risk group of patients with Fanconi anemia.

PubMed

Furquim, Camila Pinheiro; Pivovar, Allana; Cavalcanti, Laura Grein; Araújo, Renata Fuentes; Sales Bonfim, Carmem Maria; Torres-Pereira, Cassius Carvalho

2014-10-01

Oral cancer usually occurs at accessible sites, enabling early detection by visual inspection. Fanconi anemia (FA) is a recessive disorder associated with a high risk of developing head and neck solid tumors. The aim of this study was to assess the ability to perform mouth self-examination (MSE) in these patients. A total of 44 patients with FA, aged ≥ 18 years, were given a self-reported questionnaire to collect sociodemographic data and information about health-related behaviors and oral cancer awareness. They were asked to perform MSE, which was evaluated using criteria for mucosal visualization and retracting ability. Subsequently, an oral medicine specialist clinically examined all participants, and these findings were considered to be the gold standard. The sensitivity and specificity values of MSE were 43% and 44%, respectively. The MSE accuracy was 43%. Most patients (73%) reported that MSE was easy or very easy, although 75% showed insufficient performance. The accuracy of MSE alone is not sufficient to indicate whether MSE should be recommended as a strategy to prevent oral cancer in patients with FA. Nevertheless, the present results indicate that this inexpensive technique could be used as a tool for early detection of cancer in these patients. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Plasma stability analysis using Consistent Automatic Kinetic Equilibrium reconstruction (CAKE)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Roelofs, Matthijs; Kolemen, Egemen; Eldon, David; Glasser, Alex; Meneghini, Orso; Smith, Sterling P.

2017-10-01

Presented here is the Consistent Automatic Kinetic Equilibrium (CAKE) code. CAKE is being developed to perform real-time kinetic equilibrium reconstruction, aiming to do a reconstruction in less than 100ms. This is achieved by taking, next to real-time Motional Stark Effect (MSE) and magnetics data, real-time Thomson Scattering (TS) and real-time Charge Exchange Recombination (CER, still in development) data in to account. Electron densities and temperature are determined by TS, while ion density and pressures are determined using CER. These form, together with the temperature and density of neutrals, the additional pressure constraints. Extra current constraints are imposed in the core by the MSE diagnostics. The pedestal current density is estimated using Sauters equation for the bootstrap current density. By comparing the behaviour of the ideal MHD perturbed potential energy (δW) and the linear stability index (Δ') of CAKE to magnetics-only reconstruction, it can be seen that the use of diagnostics to reconstruct the pedestal have a large effect on stability. Supported by U.S. DOE DE-SC0015878 and DE-FC02-04ER54698.

The Relationship between Teachers' and Principals' Decision-Making Power: Is It a Win-Win Situation or a Zero-Sum Game?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shen, Jianping; Xia, Jiangang

2012-01-01

Is the power relationship between public school teachers and principals a win-win situation or a zero-sum game? By applying hierarchical linear modeling to the 1999-2000 nationally representative Schools and Staffing Survey data, we found that both the win-win and zero-sum-game theories had empirical evidence. The decision-making areas…

Isothiocyanate-enriched moringa seed extract alleviates ulcerative colitis symptoms in mice

PubMed Central

Wu, Alex G.; Jaja-Chimedza, Asha; Graf, Brittany L.; Waterman, Carrie; Verzi, Michael P.; Raskin, Ilya

2017-01-01

Moringa (Moringa oleifera Lam.) seed extract (MSE) has anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activities. We investigated the effects of MSE enriched in moringa isothiocyanate-1 (MIC-1), its putative bioactive, on ulcerative colitis (UC) and its anti-inflammatory/antioxidant mechanism likely mediated through Nrf2-signaling pathway. Dextran sulfate sodium (DSS)-induced acute (n = 8/group; 3% DSS for 5 d) and chronic (n = 6/group; cyclic rotations of 2.5% DSS/water for 30 d) UC was induced in mice that were assigned to 4 experimental groups: healthy control (water/vehicle), disease control (DSS/vehicle), MSE treatment (DSS/MSE), or 5-aminosalicyic acid (5-ASA) treatment (positive control; DSS/5-ASA). Following UC induction, water (vehicle), 150 mg/kg MSE, or 50 mg/kg 5-ASA were orally administered for 1 or 2 wks. Disease activity index (DAI), spleen/colon sizes, and colonic histopathology were measured. From colon and/or fecal samples, pro-inflammatory biomarkers, tight-junction proteins, and Nrf2-mediated enzymes were analyzed at protein and/or gene expression levels. Compared to disease control, MSE decreased DAI scores, and showed an increase in colon lengths and decrease in colon weight/length ratios in both UC models. MSE also reduced colonic inflammation/damage and histopathological scores (modestly) in acute UC. MSE decreased colonic secretions of pro-inflammatory keratinocyte-derived cytokine (KC), tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α, nitric oxide (NO), and myeloperoxidase (MPO) in acute and chronic UC; reduced fecal lipocalin-2 in acute UC; downregulated gene expression of pro-inflammatory interleukin (IL)-1, IL-6, TNF-α, and inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) in acute UC; upregulated expression of claudin-1 and ZO-1 in acute and chronic UC; and upregulated GSTP1, an Nrf2-mediated phase II detoxifying enzyme, in chronic UC. MSE was effective in mitigating UC symptoms and reducing UC-induced colonic pathologies, likely by suppressing pro-inflammatory biomarkers and increasing tight-junction proteins. This effect is consistent with Nrf2-mediated anti-inflammatory/antioxidant signaling pathway documented for other isothiocyanates similar to MIC-1. Therefore, MSE, enriched with MIC-1, may be useful in prevention and treatment of UC. PMID:28922365

Isothiocyanate-enriched moringa seed extract alleviates ulcerative colitis symptoms in mice.

PubMed

Kim, Youjin; Wu, Alex G; Jaja-Chimedza, Asha; Graf, Brittany L; Waterman, Carrie; Verzi, Michael P; Raskin, Ilya

2017-01-01

Moringa (Moringa oleifera Lam.) seed extract (MSE) has anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activities. We investigated the effects of MSE enriched in moringa isothiocyanate-1 (MIC-1), its putative bioactive, on ulcerative colitis (UC) and its anti-inflammatory/antioxidant mechanism likely mediated through Nrf2-signaling pathway. Dextran sulfate sodium (DSS)-induced acute (n = 8/group; 3% DSS for 5 d) and chronic (n = 6/group; cyclic rotations of 2.5% DSS/water for 30 d) UC was induced in mice that were assigned to 4 experimental groups: healthy control (water/vehicle), disease control (DSS/vehicle), MSE treatment (DSS/MSE), or 5-aminosalicyic acid (5-ASA) treatment (positive control; DSS/5-ASA). Following UC induction, water (vehicle), 150 mg/kg MSE, or 50 mg/kg 5-ASA were orally administered for 1 or 2 wks. Disease activity index (DAI), spleen/colon sizes, and colonic histopathology were measured. From colon and/or fecal samples, pro-inflammatory biomarkers, tight-junction proteins, and Nrf2-mediated enzymes were analyzed at protein and/or gene expression levels. Compared to disease control, MSE decreased DAI scores, and showed an increase in colon lengths and decrease in colon weight/length ratios in both UC models. MSE also reduced colonic inflammation/damage and histopathological scores (modestly) in acute UC. MSE decreased colonic secretions of pro-inflammatory keratinocyte-derived cytokine (KC), tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α, nitric oxide (NO), and myeloperoxidase (MPO) in acute and chronic UC; reduced fecal lipocalin-2 in acute UC; downregulated gene expression of pro-inflammatory interleukin (IL)-1, IL-6, TNF-α, and inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) in acute UC; upregulated expression of claudin-1 and ZO-1 in acute and chronic UC; and upregulated GSTP1, an Nrf2-mediated phase II detoxifying enzyme, in chronic UC. MSE was effective in mitigating UC symptoms and reducing UC-induced colonic pathologies, likely by suppressing pro-inflammatory biomarkers and increasing tight-junction proteins. This effect is consistent with Nrf2-mediated anti-inflammatory/antioxidant signaling pathway documented for other isothiocyanates similar to MIC-1. Therefore, MSE, enriched with MIC-1, may be useful in prevention and treatment of UC.

Initial Operative Experience and Short Term Hearing Preservation Results with a Mid-Scala Cochlear Implant Electrode Array

PubMed Central

Svrakic, Maja; Roland, J. Thomas; McMenomey, Sean O.; Svirsky, Mario A.

2016-01-01

OBJECTIVE To describe our initial operative experience and hearing preservation results with the Advanced Bionics (AB) Mid Scala Electrode (MSE) STUDY DESIGN Retrospective review. SETTING Tertiary referral center. PATIENTS Sixty-three MSE implants in pediatric and adult patients were compared to age- and gender-matched 1j electrode implants from the same manufacturer. All patients were severe to profoundly deaf. INTERVENTION Cochlear implantation with either the AB 1j electrode or the AB MSE. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES The MSE and 1j electrode were compared in their angular depth of insertion (aDOI) and pre- to post-operative change in hearing thresholds. Hearing preservation was analyzed as a function of aDOI. Secondary outcome measures included operative time, incidence of abnormal intraoperative impedance and telemetry values, and incidence of postsurgical complications. RESULTS Depth of insertion was similar for both electrodes, but was more consistent for the MSE array and more variable for the 1j array. Patients with MSE electrodes had better hearing preservation. Thresholds shifts at four audiometric frequencies ranging from 250 to 2,000 Hz were 10 dB, 7 dB, 2 dB and 6 dB smaller for the MSE electrode than for the 1j (p<0.05). Hearing preservation at low frequencies was worse with deeper insertion, regardless of array. Secondary outcome measures were similar for both electrodes. CONCLUSIONS The MSE electrode resulted in more consistent insertion depth and somewhat better hearing preservation than the 1j electrode. Differences in other surgical outcome measures were small or unlikely to have a meaningful effect. PMID:27755356

Concurrent change in dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate and functional performance in the oldest old: results from the Cardiovascular Health Study All Stars study.

PubMed

Sanders, J L; Cappola, A R; Arnold, A M; Boudreau, R M; Chaves, P H; Robbins, J; Cushman, M; Newman, A B

2010-09-01

The correlation between dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEAS) decline and age led to the hypothesis that DHEAS might be a marker of primary aging, though conflicting data from observational studies of mortality do not support this. We evaluated concurrent DHEAS and functional decline in a very old cohort to test if DHEAS change tracks with functional change during aging. DHEAS and functional performance (gait speed, grip strength, Modified Mini-Mental State Examination [3MSE] score, and digit symbol substitution test [DSST] score) were measured in 1996-1997 and 2005-2006 in 989 participants in the Cardiovascular Health Study All Stars study (mean age 85.2 years in 2005-2006, 63.5% women and 16.5% African American). We used multivariable linear regression to test the association of DHEAS decline with functional decline. After adjustment, each standard deviation decrease in DHEAS was associated with greater declines in gait speed (0.12 m/s, p = .01), grip strength (0.09 kg, p = .03), 3MSE score (0.13 points, p < .001), and DSST score (0.14 points, p = .001) in women only. Additional adjustment for baseline DHEAS attenuated the association with grip strength but did not alter other estimates appreciably, and baseline DHEAS was unassociated with functional decline. In this cohort of very old individuals, DHEAS decline tracked with declines in gait speed, 3MSE score, and DSST score, but not grip strength, in women independent of baseline DHEAS level. DHEAS decline might be a marker for age-associated performance decline, but its relevance is specific to women.

Spatio-temporal alignment of pedobarographic image sequences.

PubMed

Oliveira, Francisco P M; Sousa, Andreia; Santos, Rubim; Tavares, João Manuel R S

2011-07-01

This article presents a methodology to align plantar pressure image sequences simultaneously in time and space. The spatial position and orientation of a foot in a sequence are changed to match the foot represented in a second sequence. Simultaneously with the spatial alignment, the temporal scale of the first sequence is transformed with the aim of synchronizing the two input footsteps. Consequently, the spatial correspondence of the foot regions along the sequences as well as the temporal synchronizing is automatically attained, making the study easier and more straightforward. In terms of spatial alignment, the methodology can use one of four possible geometric transformation models: rigid, similarity, affine, or projective. In the temporal alignment, a polynomial transformation up to the 4th degree can be adopted in order to model linear and curved time behaviors. Suitable geometric and temporal transformations are found by minimizing the mean squared error (MSE) between the input sequences. The methodology was tested on a set of real image sequences acquired from a common pedobarographic device. When used in experimental cases generated by applying geometric and temporal control transformations, the methodology revealed high accuracy. In addition, the intra-subject alignment tests from real plantar pressure image sequences showed that the curved temporal models produced better MSE results (P < 0.001) than the linear temporal model. This article represents an important step forward in the alignment of pedobarographic image data, since previous methods can only be applied on static images.

Improved diagonal queue medical image steganography using Chaos theory, LFSR, and Rabin cryptosystem.

PubMed

Jain, Mamta; Kumar, Anil; Choudhary, Rishabh Charan

2017-06-01

In this article, we have proposed an improved diagonal queue medical image steganography for patient secret medical data transmission using chaotic standard map, linear feedback shift register, and Rabin cryptosystem, for improvement of previous technique (Jain and Lenka in Springer Brain Inform 3:39-51, 2016). The proposed algorithm comprises four stages, generation of pseudo-random sequences (pseudo-random sequences are generated by linear feedback shift register and standard chaotic map), permutation and XORing using pseudo-random sequences, encryption using Rabin cryptosystem, and steganography using the improved diagonal queues. Security analysis has been carried out. Performance analysis is observed using MSE, PSNR, maximum embedding capacity, as well as by histogram analysis between various Brain disease stego and cover images.

Modeling error PDF optimization based wavelet neural network modeling of dynamic system and its application in blast furnace ironmaking

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

Zhou, Ping; Wang, Chenyu; Li, Mingjie

In general, the modeling errors of dynamic system model are a set of random variables. The traditional performance index of modeling such as means square error (MSE) and root means square error (RMSE) can not fully express the connotation of modeling errors with stochastic characteristics both in the dimension of time domain and space domain. Therefore, the probability density function (PDF) is introduced to completely describe the modeling errors in both time scales and space scales. Based on it, a novel wavelet neural network (WNN) modeling method is proposed by minimizing the two-dimensional (2D) PDF shaping of modeling errors. First,more » the modeling error PDF by the tradional WNN is estimated using data-driven kernel density estimation (KDE) technique. Then, the quadratic sum of 2D deviation between the modeling error PDF and the target PDF is utilized as performance index to optimize the WNN model parameters by gradient descent method. Since the WNN has strong nonlinear approximation and adaptive capability, and all the parameters are well optimized by the proposed method, the developed WNN model can make the modeling error PDF track the target PDF, eventually. Simulation example and application in a blast furnace ironmaking process show that the proposed method has a higher modeling precision and better generalization ability compared with the conventional WNN modeling based on MSE criteria. Furthermore, the proposed method has more desirable estimation for modeling error PDF that approximates to a Gaussian distribution whose shape is high and narrow.« less

Modeling error PDF optimization based wavelet neural network modeling of dynamic system and its application in blast furnace ironmaking

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

Zhou, Ping; Wang, Chenyu; Li, Mingjie

In general, the modeling errors of dynamic system model are a set of random variables. The traditional performance index of modeling such as means square error (MSE) and root means square error (RMSE) cannot fully express the connotation of modeling errors with stochastic characteristics both in the dimension of time domain and space domain. Therefore, the probability density function (PDF) is introduced to completely describe the modeling errors in both time scales and space scales. Based on it, a novel wavelet neural network (WNN) modeling method is proposed by minimizing the two-dimensional (2D) PDF shaping of modeling errors. First, themore » modeling error PDF by the traditional WNN is estimated using data-driven kernel density estimation (KDE) technique. Then, the quadratic sum of 2D deviation between the modeling error PDF and the target PDF is utilized as performance index to optimize the WNN model parameters by gradient descent method. Since the WNN has strong nonlinear approximation and adaptive capability, and all the parameters are well optimized by the proposed method, the developed WNN model can make the modeling error PDF track the target PDF, eventually. Simulation example and application in a blast furnace ironmaking process show that the proposed method has a higher modeling precision and better generalization ability compared with the conventional WNN modeling based on MSE criteria. However, the proposed method has more desirable estimation for modeling error PDF that approximates to a Gaussian distribution whose shape is high and narrow.« less

Modeling error PDF optimization based wavelet neural network modeling of dynamic system and its application in blast furnace ironmaking

DOE PAGES

Zhou, Ping; Wang, Chenyu; Li, Mingjie; ...

2018-01-31

In general, the modeling errors of dynamic system model are a set of random variables. The traditional performance index of modeling such as means square error (MSE) and root means square error (RMSE) cannot fully express the connotation of modeling errors with stochastic characteristics both in the dimension of time domain and space domain. Therefore, the probability density function (PDF) is introduced to completely describe the modeling errors in both time scales and space scales. Based on it, a novel wavelet neural network (WNN) modeling method is proposed by minimizing the two-dimensional (2D) PDF shaping of modeling errors. First, themore » modeling error PDF by the traditional WNN is estimated using data-driven kernel density estimation (KDE) technique. Then, the quadratic sum of 2D deviation between the modeling error PDF and the target PDF is utilized as performance index to optimize the WNN model parameters by gradient descent method. Since the WNN has strong nonlinear approximation and adaptive capability, and all the parameters are well optimized by the proposed method, the developed WNN model can make the modeling error PDF track the target PDF, eventually. Simulation example and application in a blast furnace ironmaking process show that the proposed method has a higher modeling precision and better generalization ability compared with the conventional WNN modeling based on MSE criteria. However, the proposed method has more desirable estimation for modeling error PDF that approximates to a Gaussian distribution whose shape is high and narrow.« less

Why the Disadvantaged Drop Out: The Administrators' View.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Morrison, James L.; Ferrante, Reynolds

A report focusing on the academically disadvantaged minority group students is presented. Perceptions of administrators in public two-year colleges as to the major reasons for attrition of this group are examined. A pre-coded questionnaire was developed to gather information concerning programs of compensatory education in two-year colleges. It…

Studying the dynamics of interbeat interval time series of healthy and congestive heart failure subjects using scale based symbolic entropy analysis

PubMed Central

Awan, Imtiaz; Aziz, Wajid; Habib, Nazneen; Alowibdi, Jalal S.; Saeed, Sharjil; Nadeem, Malik Sajjad Ahmed; Shah, Syed Ahsin Ali

2018-01-01

Considerable interest has been devoted for developing a deeper understanding of the dynamics of healthy biological systems and how these dynamics are affected due to aging and disease. Entropy based complexity measures have widely been used for quantifying the dynamics of physical and biological systems. These techniques have provided valuable information leading to a fuller understanding of the dynamics of these systems and underlying stimuli that are responsible for anomalous behavior. The single scale based traditional entropy measures yielded contradictory results about the dynamics of real world time series data of healthy and pathological subjects. Recently the multiscale entropy (MSE) algorithm was introduced for precise description of the complexity of biological signals, which was used in numerous fields since its inception. The original MSE quantified the complexity of coarse-grained time series using sample entropy. The original MSE may be unreliable for short signals because the length of the coarse-grained time series decreases with increasing scaling factor τ, however, MSE works well for long signals. To overcome the drawback of original MSE, various variants of this method have been proposed for evaluating complexity efficiently. In this study, we have proposed multiscale normalized corrected Shannon entropy (MNCSE), in which instead of using sample entropy, symbolic entropy measure NCSE has been used as an entropy estimate. The results of the study are compared with traditional MSE. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is demonstrated using noise signals as well as interbeat interval signals from healthy and pathological subjects. The preliminary results of the study indicate that MNCSE values are more stable and reliable than original MSE values. The results show that MNCSE based features lead to higher classification accuracies in comparison with the MSE based features. PMID:29771977

Studying the dynamics of interbeat interval time series of healthy and congestive heart failure subjects using scale based symbolic entropy analysis.

PubMed

Awan, Imtiaz; Aziz, Wajid; Shah, Imran Hussain; Habib, Nazneen; Alowibdi, Jalal S; Saeed, Sharjil; Nadeem, Malik Sajjad Ahmed; Shah, Syed Ahsin Ali

2018-01-01

Considerable interest has been devoted for developing a deeper understanding of the dynamics of healthy biological systems and how these dynamics are affected due to aging and disease. Entropy based complexity measures have widely been used for quantifying the dynamics of physical and biological systems. These techniques have provided valuable information leading to a fuller understanding of the dynamics of these systems and underlying stimuli that are responsible for anomalous behavior. The single scale based traditional entropy measures yielded contradictory results about the dynamics of real world time series data of healthy and pathological subjects. Recently the multiscale entropy (MSE) algorithm was introduced for precise description of the complexity of biological signals, which was used in numerous fields since its inception. The original MSE quantified the complexity of coarse-grained time series using sample entropy. The original MSE may be unreliable for short signals because the length of the coarse-grained time series decreases with increasing scaling factor τ, however, MSE works well for long signals. To overcome the drawback of original MSE, various variants of this method have been proposed for evaluating complexity efficiently. In this study, we have proposed multiscale normalized corrected Shannon entropy (MNCSE), in which instead of using sample entropy, symbolic entropy measure NCSE has been used as an entropy estimate. The results of the study are compared with traditional MSE. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is demonstrated using noise signals as well as interbeat interval signals from healthy and pathological subjects. The preliminary results of the study indicate that MNCSE values are more stable and reliable than original MSE values. The results show that MNCSE based features lead to higher classification accuracies in comparison with the MSE based features.

Greater Exposure to Sexual Content in Popular Movies Predicts Earlier Sexual Debut and Increased Sexual Risk Taking

PubMed Central

O’Hara, Ross E.; Gibbons, Frederick X.; Gerrard, Meg; Li, Zhigang; Sargent, James D.

2013-01-01

Early sexual debut is associated with risky sexual behavior and an increased risk of unplanned pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections later in life. The relations among early movie sexual exposure (MSE), sexual debut, and risky sexual behavior in adulthood (i.e., multiple sexual partners and inconsistent condom use) were examined in a longitudinal study of U.S. adolescents. MSE was measured using the Beach method, a comprehensive procedure for media content coding. Controlling for characteristics of adolescents and their families, analyses showed that MSE predicted age of sexual debut, both directly and indirectly through changes in sensation seeking. MSE also predicted engagement in risky sexual behaviors both directly and indirectly via early sexual debut. These results suggest that MSE may promote sexual risk taking both by modifying sexual behavior and by accelerating the normal rise in sensation seeking during adolescence. PMID:22810165

A linear programming approach to max-sum problem: a review.

PubMed

Werner, Tomás

2007-07-01

The max-sum labeling problem, defined as maximizing a sum of binary (i.e., pairwise) functions of discrete variables, is a general NP-hard optimization problem with many applications, such as computing the MAP configuration of a Markov random field. We review a not widely known approach to the problem, developed by Ukrainian researchers Schlesinger et al. in 1976, and show how it contributes to recent results, most importantly, those on the convex combination of trees and tree-reweighted max-product. In particular, we review Schlesinger et al.'s upper bound on the max-sum criterion, its minimization by equivalent transformations, its relation to the constraint satisfaction problem, the fact that this minimization is dual to a linear programming relaxation of the original problem, and the three kinds of consistency necessary for optimality of the upper bound. We revisit problems with Boolean variables and supermodular problems. We describe two algorithms for decreasing the upper bound. We present an example application for structural image analysis.

16QAM Blind Equalization via Maximum Entropy Density Approximation Technique and Nonlinear Lagrange Multipliers

PubMed Central

Mauda, R.; Pinchas, M.

2014-01-01

Recently a new blind equalization method was proposed for the 16QAM constellation input inspired by the maximum entropy density approximation technique with improved equalization performance compared to the maximum entropy approach, Godard's algorithm, and others. In addition, an approximated expression for the minimum mean square error (MSE) was obtained. The idea was to find those Lagrange multipliers that bring the approximated MSE to minimum. Since the derivation of the obtained MSE with respect to the Lagrange multipliers leads to a nonlinear equation for the Lagrange multipliers, the part in the MSE expression that caused the nonlinearity in the equation for the Lagrange multipliers was ignored. Thus, the obtained Lagrange multipliers were not those Lagrange multipliers that bring the approximated MSE to minimum. In this paper, we derive a new set of Lagrange multipliers based on the nonlinear expression for the Lagrange multipliers obtained from minimizing the approximated MSE with respect to the Lagrange multipliers. Simulation results indicate that for the high signal to noise ratio (SNR) case, a faster convergence rate is obtained for a channel causing a high initial intersymbol interference (ISI) while the same equalization performance is obtained for an easy channel (initial ISI low). PMID:24723813

A quantitative longitudinal study to explore factors which influence maternal self-efficacy among Chinese primiparous women during the initial postpartum period.

PubMed

Zheng, Xujuan; Morrell, Jane; Watts, Kim

2018-04-01

parenting during infancy is highly problematic for Chinese primiparous women. As an important determinant of good parenting, maternal self-efficacy (MSE) should be paid more attention by researchers. At present, the limitations of previous research about MSE during infancy are that the factors which influence MSE remained poorly explored, there were few studies with Chinese women, and the studies did not consider the effect of different cultures. to explore factors which influence MSE in primiparous women in China in the first three months postnatally. a quantitative longitudinal study using questionnaires was conducted. In total, 420 Chinese primiparous women were recruited in obstetric wards at three hospitals in Xiamen City, Fujian Province of China. Initial baseline questionnaires to measure socio-demographic and clinical characteristics were distributed to participants face-to-face by the researcher on the postnatal ward at three days postnatally. Follow-up questionnaires at six and 12 weeks postnatally were sent via e-mail by the researcher to participants, including the Self-efficacy in Infant Care Scale (SICS), the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) and the Postpartum Social Support Scale (PSSS) to measure MSE, postnatal depression symptoms and social support, respectively. These were returned by participants via e-mail. Quantitative data were analysed using SPSS. the variables: social support, women's satisfaction with 'Doing the month', postnatal depression, maternal education, baby health, and maternal occupation had an influence on MSE at six weeks postnatally (Adjusted R 2 = 0.510, F = 46.084, P<0.01); and the variables: postnatal depression, social support, baby health, women's satisfaction with 'Doing the month', and baby fussiness were the factors influencing MSE at 12 weeks postnatally (Adjusted R 2 = 0.485, F = 41.082, P<0.01). obstetric nurses and women's family members need to be aware of the significant contribution of social support, women's satisfaction with 'Doing the month' in positively influencing primiparous women's MSE, and the significant effect of postnatal depression symptoms in negatively impacting on first-time mothers' MSE; they should pay more attention to primiparous women with less education, unemployed mothers, women with unskilled occupations, women with an unhealthy baby, and women with a baby with a difficult temperament to improve their comparatively lower MSE levels during the initial postnatal period. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

The role of sympathetic and vagal cardiac control on complexity of heart rate dynamics.

PubMed

Silva, Luiz Eduardo Virgilio; Silva, Carlos Alberto Aguiar; Salgado, Helio Cesar; Fazan, Rubens

2017-03-01

Analysis of heart rate variability (HRV) by nonlinear approaches has been gaining interest due to their ability to extract additional information from heart rate (HR) dynamics that are not detectable by traditional approaches. Nevertheless, the physiological interpretation of nonlinear approaches remains unclear. Therefore, we propose long-term (60 min) protocols involving selective blockade of cardiac autonomic receptors to investigate the contribution of sympathetic and parasympathetic function upon nonlinear dynamics of HRV. Conscious male Wistar rats had their electrocardiogram (ECG) recorded under three distinct conditions: basal, selective (atenolol or atropine), or combined (atenolol plus atropine) pharmacological blockade of autonomic muscarinic or β 1 -adrenergic receptors. Time series of RR interval were assessed by multiscale entropy (MSE) and detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA). Entropy over short (1 to 5, MSE 1-5 ) and long (6 to 30, MSE 6-30 ) time scales was computed, as well as DFA scaling exponents at short (α short , 5 ≤ n ≤ 15), mid (α mid , 30 ≤ n ≤ 200), and long (α long , 200 ≤ n ≤ 1,700) window sizes. The results show that MSE 1-5 is reduced under atropine blockade and MSE 6-30 is reduced under atropine, atenolol, or combined blockade. In addition, while atropine expressed its maximal effect at scale six, the effect of atenolol on MSE increased with scale. For DFA, α short decreased during atenolol blockade, while the α mid increased under atropine blockade. Double blockade decreased α short and increased α long Results with surrogate data show that the dynamics during combined blockade is not random. In summary, sympathetic and vagal control differently affect entropy (MSE) and fractal properties (DFA) of HRV. These findings are important to guide future studies. NEW & NOTEWORTHY Although multiscale entropy (MSE) and detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) are recognizably useful prognostic/diagnostic methods, their physiological interpretation remains unclear. The present study clarifies the effect of the cardiac autonomic control on MSE and DFA, assessed during long periods (1 h). These findings are important to help the interpretation of future studies. Copyright © 2017 the American Physiological Society.

Effects of prior short multiple-sprint exercises with different intersprint recoveries on the slow component of oxygen uptake during high-intensity exercise.

PubMed

Lanzi, Stefano; Borrani, Fabio; Wolf, Martin; Gojanovic, Boris; Malatesta, Davide

2012-12-01

This study compares the effects of two short multiple-sprint exercise (MSE) (6 × 6 s) sessions with two different recovery durations (30 s or 180 s) on the slow component of oxygen uptake ([Formula: see text]O(2)) during subsequent high-intensity exercise. Ten male subjects performed a 6-min cycling test at 50% of the difference between the gas exchange threshold and [Formula: see text]O(2peak) (Δ50). Then, the subjects performed two MSEs of 6 × 6 s separated by two intersprint recoveries of 30 s (MSE(30)) and 180 s (MSE(180)), followed 10 min later by the Δ50 (Δ50(30) and Δ50(180), respectively). Electromyography (EMG) activities of the vastus medialis and lateralis were measured throughout each exercise bout. During MSE(30), muscle activity (root mean square) increased significantly (p ≤ 0.04), with a significant leftward-shifted median frequency of the power density spectrum (MDF; p ≤ 0.01), whereas MDF was significantly rightward-shifted during MSE(180) (p = 0.02). The mean [Formula: see text]O(2) value was significantly higher in MSE(30) than in MSE(180) (p < 0.001). During Δ50(30), [Formula: see text]O(2) and the deoxygenated hemoglobin ([HHb]) slow components were significantly reduced (-27%, p = 0.02, and -34%, p = 0.003, respectively) compared with Δ50. There were no significant modifications of the [Formula: see text]O(2) slow component in Δ50(180) compared with Δ50 (p = 0.32). The neuromuscular and metabolic adaptations during MSE(30) (preferential activation of type I muscle fibers evidenced by decreased MDF and a greater aerobic metabolism contribution to the required energy demands), but not during MSE(180), may lead to reduced [Formula: see text]O(2) and [HHb] slow components, suggesting an alteration in motor units recruitment profile (i.e., change in the type of muscle fibers recruited) and (or) an improved muscle O(2) delivery during subsequent exercise.

Neurologic, Functional and Cognitive Stroke Outcomes in Mexican Americans

PubMed Central

Lisabeth, Lynda D; Sánchez, Brisa N; Baek, Jonggyu; Skolarus, Lesli E; Smith, Melinda A; Garcia, Nelda; Brown, Devin L; Morgenstern, Lewis B

2014-01-01

Background and Purpose: Our objective was to compare neurologic, functional, and cognitive stroke outcomes in Mexican Americans (MAs) and non-Hispanic whites (NHWs) using data from a population-based study. Methods: Ischemic strokes (2008-2012) were identified from the Brain Attack Surveillance in Corpus Christi (BASIC) Project. Data were collected from patient or proxy interviews (conducted at baseline and 90 days post-stroke) and medical records. Ethnic differences in neurologic (National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS), range 0-44, higher scores worse), functional (activities of daily living (ADL)/instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) score, range 1-4, higher scores worse), and cognitive (Modified Mini-Mental State Examination (3MSE), range 0-100, lower scores worse) outcomes were assessed with Tobit or linear regression adjusted for demographics and clinical factors. Results: 513, 510, and 415 subjects had complete data for neurologic, functional and cognitive outcomes and covariates, respectively. Median age was 66 (IQR: 57-78); 64% were MA. In MAs, median NIHSS, ADL/IADL and 3MSE score were 3 (IQR: 1-6), 2.5 (IQR: 1.6-3.5) and 88 (IQR: 76-94), respectively. MAs scored 48% worse (95% CI: 23%-78%) on NIHSS, 0.36 points worse (95% CI: 0.16-0.57) on ADL/IADL score, and 3.39 points worse (95% CI: 0.35-6.43) on 3MSE than NHWs after multivariable adjustment. Conclusions: MAs scored worse than NHWs on all outcomes after adjustment for confounding factors; differences were only partially explained by ethnic differences in survival. These findings in combination with the increased stroke risk in MAs suggest that the public health burden of stroke in this growing population is substantial. PMID:24627112

Video Image Tracking Engine

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Howard, Richard T. (Inventor); Bryan, ThomasC. (Inventor); Book, Michael L. (Inventor)

2004-01-01

A method and system for processing an image including capturing an image and storing the image as image pixel data. Each image pixel datum is stored in a respective memory location having a corresponding address. Threshold pixel data is selected from the image pixel data and linear spot segments are identified from the threshold pixel data selected.. Ihe positions of only a first pixel and a last pixel for each linear segment are saved. Movement of one or more objects are tracked by comparing the positions of fust and last pixels of a linear segment present in the captured image with respective first and last pixel positions in subsequent captured images. Alternatively, additional data for each linear data segment is saved such as sum of pixels and the weighted sum of pixels i.e., each threshold pixel value is multiplied by that pixel's x-location).

Singular value decomposition based feature extraction technique for physiological signal analysis.

PubMed

Chang, Cheng-Ding; Wang, Chien-Chih; Jiang, Bernard C

2012-06-01

Multiscale entropy (MSE) is one of the popular techniques to calculate and describe the complexity of the physiological signal. Many studies use this approach to detect changes in the physiological conditions in the human body. However, MSE results are easily affected by noise and trends, leading to incorrect estimation of MSE values. In this paper, singular value decomposition (SVD) is adopted to replace MSE to extract the features of physiological signals, and adopt the support vector machine (SVM) to classify the different physiological states. A test data set based on the PhysioNet website was used, and the classification results showed that using SVD to extract features of the physiological signal could attain a classification accuracy rate of 89.157%, which is higher than that using the MSE value (71.084%). The results show the proposed analysis procedure is effective and appropriate for distinguishing different physiological states. This promising result could be used as a reference for doctors in diagnosis of congestive heart failure (CHF) disease.

Moringa oleifera Seed Extract Alleviates Scopolamine-Induced Learning and Memory Impairment in Mice.

PubMed

Zhou, Juan; Yang, Wu-Shuang; Suo, Da-Qin; Li, Ying; Peng, Lu; Xu, Lan-Xi; Zeng, Kai-Yue; Ren, Tong; Wang, Ying; Zhou, Yu; Zhao, Yun; Yang, Li-Chao; Jin, Xin

2018-01-01

The extract of Moringa oleifera seeds has been shown to possess various pharmacological properties. In the present study, we assessed the neuropharmacological effects of 70% ethanolic M. oleifera seed extract (MSE) on cognitive impairment caused by scopolamine injection in mice using the passive avoidance and Morris water maze (MWM) tests. MSE (250 or 500 mg/kg) was administered to mice by oral gavage for 7 or 14 days, and cognitive impairment was induced by intraperitoneal injection of scopolamine (4 mg/kg) for 1 or 6 days. Mice that received scopolamine alone showed impaired learning and memory retention and considerably decreased cholinergic system reactivity and neurogenesis in the hippocampus. MSE pretreatment significantly ameliorated scopolamine-induced cognitive impairment and enhanced cholinergic system reactivity and neurogenesis in the hippocampus. Additionally, the protein expressions of phosphorylated Akt, ERK1/2, and CREB in the hippocampus were significantly decreased by scopolamine, but these decreases were reversed by MSE treatment. These results suggest that MSE-induced ameliorative cognitive effects are mediated by enhancement of the cholinergic neurotransmission system and neurogenesis via activation of the Akt, ERK1/2, and CREB signaling pathways. These findings suggest that MSE could be a potent neuropharmacological drug against amnesia, and its mechanism might be modulation of cholinergic activity via the Akt, ERK1/2, and CREB signaling pathways.

A comparison of model-based imputation methods for handling missing predictor values in a linear regression model: A simulation study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hasan, Haliza; Ahmad, Sanizah; Osman, Balkish Mohd; Sapri, Shamsiah; Othman, Nadirah

2017-08-01

In regression analysis, missing covariate data has been a common problem. Many researchers use ad hoc methods to overcome this problem due to the ease of implementation. However, these methods require assumptions about the data that rarely hold in practice. Model-based methods such as Maximum Likelihood (ML) using the expectation maximization (EM) algorithm and Multiple Imputation (MI) are more promising when dealing with difficulties caused by missing data. Then again, inappropriate methods of missing value imputation can lead to serious bias that severely affects the parameter estimates. The main objective of this study is to provide a better understanding regarding missing data concept that can assist the researcher to select the appropriate missing data imputation methods. A simulation study was performed to assess the effects of different missing data techniques on the performance of a regression model. The covariate data were generated using an underlying multivariate normal distribution and the dependent variable was generated as a combination of explanatory variables. Missing values in covariate were simulated using a mechanism called missing at random (MAR). Four levels of missingness (10%, 20%, 30% and 40%) were imposed. ML and MI techniques available within SAS software were investigated. A linear regression analysis was fitted and the model performance measures; MSE, and R-Squared were obtained. Results of the analysis showed that MI is superior in handling missing data with highest R-Squared and lowest MSE when percent of missingness is less than 30%. Both methods are unable to handle larger than 30% level of missingness.

Influence of motion picture rating on adolescent response to movie smoking.

PubMed

Sargent, James D; Tanski, Susanne; Stoolmiller, Mike

2012-08-01

To examine the association between movie smoking exposure (MSE) and adolescent smoking according to rating category. A total of 6522 US adolescents were enrolled in a longitudinal survey conducted at 8-month intervals; 5503 subjects were followed up at 8 months, 5019 subjects at 16 months, and 4575 subjects at 24 months. MSE was estimated from 532 recent box-office hits, blocked into 3 Motion Picture Association of America rating categories: G/PG, PG-13, and R. A survival model evaluated time to smoking onset. Median MSE in PG-13-rated movies was ∼3 times higher than median MSE from R-rated movies, but their relation with smoking was essentially the same, with adjusted hazard ratios of 1.49 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.23-1.81) and 1.33 (95% CI: 1.23-1.81) for each additional 500 occurrences of MSE respectively. MSE from G/PG-rated movies was small and had no significant relationship with adolescent smoking. Attributable risk estimates showed that adolescent smoking would be reduced by 18% (95% CI: 14-21) if smoking in PG-13-rated movies was reduced to the fifth percentile. In comparison, making all parents maximally authoritative in their parenting would reduce adolescent smoking by 16% (95% CI: 12-19). The equivalent effect of PG-13-rated and R-rated MSE suggests it is the movie smoking that prompts adolescents to smoke, not other characteristics of R-rated movies or adolescents drawn to them. An R rating for movie smoking could substantially reduce adolescent smoking by eliminating smoking from PG-13 movies.

Sum-of-Squares-Based Region of Attraction Analysis for Gain-Scheduled Three-Loop Autopilot

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seo, Min-Won; Kwon, Hyuck-Hoon; Choi, Han-Lim

2018-04-01

A conventional method of designing a missile autopilot is to linearize the original nonlinear dynamics at several trim points, then to determine linear controllers for each linearized model, and finally implement gain-scheduling technique. The validation of such a controller is often based on linear system analysis for the linear closed-loop system at the trim conditions. Although this type of gain-scheduled linear autopilot works well in practice, validation based solely on linear analysis may not be sufficient to fully characterize the closed-loop system especially when the aerodynamic coefficients exhibit substantial nonlinearity with respect to the flight condition. The purpose of this paper is to present a methodology for analyzing the stability of a gain-scheduled controller in a setting close to the original nonlinear setting. The method is based on sum-of-squares (SOS) optimization that can be used to characterize the region of attraction of a polynomial system by solving convex optimization problems. The applicability of the proposed SOS-based methodology is verified on a short-period autopilot of a skid-to-turn missile.

Linear monogamy of entanglement in three-qubit systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Feng; Gao, Fei; Wen, Qiao-Yan

2015-11-01

For any three-qubit quantum systems ABC, Oliveira et al. numerically found that both the concurrence and the entanglement of formation (EoF) obey the linear monogamy relations in pure states. They also conjectured that the linear monogamy relations can be saturated when the focus qubit A is maximally entangled with the joint qubits BC. In this work, we prove analytically that both the concurrence and EoF obey linear monogamy relations in an arbitrary three-qubit state. Furthermore, we verify that all three-qubit pure states are maximally entangled in the bipartition A|BC when they saturate the linear monogamy relations. We also study the distribution of the concurrence and EoF. More specifically, when the amount of entanglement between A and B equals to that of A and C, we show that the sum of EoF itself saturates the linear monogamy relation, while the sum of the squared EoF is minimum. Different from EoF, the concurrence and the squared concurrence both saturate the linear monogamy relations when the entanglement between A and B equals to that of A and C.

Linear monogamy of entanglement in three-qubit systems.

PubMed

Liu, Feng; Gao, Fei; Wen, Qiao-Yan

2015-11-16

For any three-qubit quantum systems ABC, Oliveira et al. numerically found that both the concurrence and the entanglement of formation (EoF) obey the linear monogamy relations in pure states. They also conjectured that the linear monogamy relations can be saturated when the focus qubit A is maximally entangled with the joint qubits BC. In this work, we prove analytically that both the concurrence and EoF obey linear monogamy relations in an arbitrary three-qubit state. Furthermore, we verify that all three-qubit pure states are maximally entangled in the bipartition A|BC when they saturate the linear monogamy relations. We also study the distribution of the concurrence and EoF. More specifically, when the amount of entanglement between A and B equals to that of A and C, we show that the sum of EoF itself saturates the linear monogamy relation, while the sum of the squared EoF is minimum. Different from EoF, the concurrence and the squared concurrence both saturate the linear monogamy relations when the entanglement between A and B equals to that of A and C.

Linear monogamy of entanglement in three-qubit systems

PubMed Central

Liu, Feng; Gao, Fei; Wen, Qiao-Yan

2015-01-01

For any three-qubit quantum systems ABC, Oliveira et al. numerically found that both the concurrence and the entanglement of formation (EoF) obey the linear monogamy relations in pure states. They also conjectured that the linear monogamy relations can be saturated when the focus qubit A is maximally entangled with the joint qubits BC. In this work, we prove analytically that both the concurrence and EoF obey linear monogamy relations in an arbitrary three-qubit state. Furthermore, we verify that all three-qubit pure states are maximally entangled in the bipartition A|BC when they saturate the linear monogamy relations. We also study the distribution of the concurrence and EoF. More specifically, when the amount of entanglement between A and B equals to that of A and C, we show that the sum of EoF itself saturates the linear monogamy relation, while the sum of the squared EoF is minimum. Different from EoF, the concurrence and the squared concurrence both saturate the linear monogamy relations when the entanglement between A and B equals to that of A and C. PMID:26568265

Healing effects of Musa sapientum var. paradisiaca in diabetic rats with co-occurring gastric ulcer: cytokines and growth factor by PCR amplification.

PubMed

Kumar, Mohan; Gautam, Manish Kumar; Singh, Amit; Goel, Raj Kumar

2013-11-05

The present study evaluates the effects of extract of Musa sapientum fruit (MSE) on ulcer index, blood glucose level and gastric mucosal cytokines, TNF-α and IL-1β and growth factor, TGF-α (affected in diabetes and chronic ulcer) in acetic acid (AA)-induced gastric ulcer (GU) in diabetic (DR) rat. MSE (100 mg/kg, oral), omeprazole (OMZ, 2.0 mg/kg, oral), insulin (INS, 4 U/kg, sc) or pentoxyphylline (PTX, 10 mg/kg, oral) were given once daily for 10 days in 14 days post-streptozotocin (60 mg/kg, intraperitoneal)-induced diabetic rats while, the normal/diabetic rats received CMC for the same period after induction of GU with AA. Ulcer index was calculated based upon the product of length and width (mm2/rat) of ulcers while, TNF-α, IL-1β and TGF-α were estimated in the gastric mucosal homogenate from the intact/ulcer region. Phytochemical screening and HPTLC analysis of MSE was done following standard procedures. An increase in ulcer index, TNF-α and IL-1β were observed in normal (NR)-AA rat compared to NR-normal saline rat, which were further increased in DR-AA rat while, treatments of DR-AA rat with MSE, OMZ, INS and PTX reversed them, more so with MSE and PTX. Significant increase in TGF-α was found in NR-AA rat which did not increase further in DR-AA rat. MSE and PTX tended to increase while, OMZ and INS showed little or no effect on TGF-α in AA-DR rat. Phytochemical screening of MSE showed the presence of saponins, flavonoids, glycosides, steroids and alkaloids and HPTLC analysis indicated the presence of eight active compounds. MSE showed antidiabetic and better ulcer healing effects compared with OMZ (antiulcer) or INS (antidiabetic) in diabetic rat and could be more effective in diabetes with concurrent gastric ulcer.

What Caused the UK's Largest Common Dolphin (Delphinus delphis) Mass Stranding Event?

PubMed Central

Jepson, Paul D.; Deaville, Robert; Acevedo-Whitehouse, Karina; Barnett, James; Brownlow, Andrew; Brownell Jr., Robert L.; Clare, Frances C.; Davison, Nick; Law, Robin J.; Loveridge, Jan; Macgregor, Shaheed K.; Morris, Steven; Murphy, Sinéad; Penrose, Rod; Perkins, Matthew W.; Pinn, Eunice; Seibel, Henrike; Siebert, Ursula; Sierra, Eva; Simpson, Victor; Tasker, Mark L.; Tregenza, Nick; Cunningham, Andrew A.; Fernández, Antonio

2013-01-01

On 9 June 2008, the UK's largest mass stranding event (MSE) of short-beaked common dolphins (Delphinus delphis) occurred in Falmouth Bay, Cornwall. At least 26 dolphins died, and a similar number was refloated/herded back to sea. On necropsy, all dolphins were in good nutritive status with empty stomachs and no evidence of known infectious disease or acute physical injury. Auditory tissues were grossly normal (26/26) but had microscopic haemorrhages (5/5) and mild otitis media (1/5) in the freshest cases. Five lactating adult dolphins, one immature male, and one immature female tested were free of harmful algal toxins and had low chemical pollutant levels. Pathological evidence of mud/seawater inhalation (11/26), local tide cycle, and the relative lack of renal myoglobinuria (26/26) suggested MSE onset on a rising tide between 06∶30 and 08∶21 hrs (9 June). Potential causes excluded or considered highly unlikely included infectious disease, gas/fat embolism, boat strike, by-catch, predator attack, foraging unusually close to shore, chemical or algal toxin exposure, abnormal weather/climatic conditions, and high-intensity acoustic inputs from seismic airgun arrays or natural sources (e.g., earthquakes). International naval exercises did occur in close proximity to the MSE with the most intense part of the exercises (including mid-frequency sonars) occurring four days before the MSE and resuming with helicopter exercises on the morning of the MSE. The MSE may therefore have been a “two-stage process” where a group of normally pelagic dolphins entered Falmouth Bay and, after 3–4 days in/around the Bay, a second acoustic/disturbance event occurred causing them to strand en masse. This spatial and temporal association with the MSE, previous associations between naval activities and cetacean MSEs, and an absence of other identifiable factors known to cause cetacean MSEs, indicates naval activity to be the most probable cause of the Falmouth Bay MSE. PMID:23646103

Quantitative evaluations of ankle spasticity and stiffness in neurological disorders using manual spasticity evaluator.

PubMed

Peng, Qiyu; Park, Hyung-Soon; Shah, Parag; Wilson, Nicole; Ren, Yupeng; Wu, Yi-Ning; Liu, Jie; Gaebler-Spira, Deborah J; Zhang, Li-Qun

2011-01-01

Spasticity and contracture are major sources of disability in people with neurological impairments that have been evaluated using various instruments: the Modified Ashworth Scale, tendon reflex scale, pendulum test, mechanical perturbations, and passive joint range of motion (ROM). These measures generally are either convenient to use in clinics but not quantitative or they are quantitative but difficult to use conveniently in clinics. We have developed a manual spasticity evaluator (MSE) to evaluate spasticity/contracture quantitatively and conveniently, with ankle ROM and stiffness measured at a controlled low velocity and joint resistance and Tardieu catch angle measured at several higher velocities. We found that the Tardieu catch angle was linearly related to the velocity, indicating that increased resistance at higher velocities was felt at further stiffer positions and, thus, that the velocity dependence of spasticity may also be position-dependent. This finding indicates the need to control velocity in spasticity evaluation, which is achieved with the MSE. Quantitative measurements of spasticity, stiffness, and ROM can lead to more accurate characterizations of pathological conditions and outcome evaluations of interventions, potentially contributing to better healthcare services for patients with neurological disorders such as cerebral palsy, spinal cord injury, traumatic brain injury, and stroke.

Quantitative comparison of the spreading and invasion of radial growth phase and metastatic melanoma cells in a three-dimensional human skin equivalent model.

PubMed

Haridas, Parvathi; McGovern, Jacqui A; McElwain, Sean D L; Simpson, Matthew J

2017-01-01

Standard two-dimensional (2D) cell migration assays do not provide information about vertical invasion processes, which are critical for melanoma progression. We provide information about three-dimensional (3D) melanoma cell migration, proliferation and invasion in a 3D melanoma skin equivalent (MSE) model. In particular, we pay careful attention to compare the structure of the tissues in the MSE with similarly-prepared 3D human skin equivalent (HSE) models. The HSE model is identically prepared to the MSE model except that melanoma cells are omitted. Using the MSE model, we examine melanoma migration, proliferation and invasion from two different human melanoma cell lines. One cell line, WM35, is associated with the early phase of the disease where spreading is thought to be confined to the epidermis. The other cell line, SK-MEL-28, is associated with the later phase of the disease where spreading into the dermis is expected. 3D MSE and HSE models are constructed using human de-epidermised dermis (DED) prepared from skin tissue. Primary fibroblasts and primary keratinocytes are used in the MSE and HSE models to ensure the formation of a stratified epidermis, with a well-defined basement membrane. Radial spreading of cells across the surface of the HSE and MSE models is observed. Vertical invasion of melanoma cells downward through the skin is observed and measured using immunohistochemistry. All measurements of invasion are made at day 0, 9, 15 and 20, providing detailed time course data. Both HSE and MSE models are similar to native skin in vivo , with a well-defined stratification of the epidermis that is separated from the dermis by a basement membrane. In the HSE and MSE we find fibroblast cells confined to the dermis, and differentiated keratinocytes in the epidermis. In the MSE, melanoma cells form colonies in the epidermis during the early part of the experiment. In the later stage of the experiment, the melanoma cells in the MSE invade deeper into the tissues. Interestingly, both the WM35 and SK-MEL-28 melanoma cells lead to a breakdown of the basement membrane and eventually enter the dermis. However, these two cell lines invade at different rates, with the SK-MEL-28 melanoma cells invading faster than the WM35 cells. The MSE and HSE models are a reliable platform for studying melanoma invasion in a 3D tissue that is similar to native human skin. Interestingly, we find that the WM35 cell line, that is thought to be associated with radial spreading only, is able to invade into the dermis. The vertical invasion of melanoma cells into the dermal region appears to be associated with a localised disruption of the basement membrane. Presenting our results in terms of time course data, along with images and quantitative measurements of the depth of invasion extends previous 3D work that has often been reported without these details.

Quantitative comparison of the spreading and invasion of radial growth phase and metastatic melanoma cells in a three-dimensional human skin equivalent model

PubMed Central

Haridas, Parvathi; McGovern, Jacqui A.; McElwain, Sean D.L.

2017-01-01

Background Standard two-dimensional (2D) cell migration assays do not provide information about vertical invasion processes, which are critical for melanoma progression. We provide information about three-dimensional (3D) melanoma cell migration, proliferation and invasion in a 3D melanoma skin equivalent (MSE) model. In particular, we pay careful attention to compare the structure of the tissues in the MSE with similarly-prepared 3D human skin equivalent (HSE) models. The HSE model is identically prepared to the MSE model except that melanoma cells are omitted. Using the MSE model, we examine melanoma migration, proliferation and invasion from two different human melanoma cell lines. One cell line, WM35, is associated with the early phase of the disease where spreading is thought to be confined to the epidermis. The other cell line, SK-MEL-28, is associated with the later phase of the disease where spreading into the dermis is expected. Methods 3D MSE and HSE models are constructed using human de-epidermised dermis (DED) prepared from skin tissue. Primary fibroblasts and primary keratinocytes are used in the MSE and HSE models to ensure the formation of a stratified epidermis, with a well-defined basement membrane. Radial spreading of cells across the surface of the HSE and MSE models is observed. Vertical invasion of melanoma cells downward through the skin is observed and measured using immunohistochemistry. All measurements of invasion are made at day 0, 9, 15 and 20, providing detailed time course data. Results Both HSE and MSE models are similar to native skin in vivo, with a well-defined stratification of the epidermis that is separated from the dermis by a basement membrane. In the HSE and MSE we find fibroblast cells confined to the dermis, and differentiated keratinocytes in the epidermis. In the MSE, melanoma cells form colonies in the epidermis during the early part of the experiment. In the later stage of the experiment, the melanoma cells in the MSE invade deeper into the tissues. Interestingly, both the WM35 and SK-MEL-28 melanoma cells lead to a breakdown of the basement membrane and eventually enter the dermis. However, these two cell lines invade at different rates, with the SK-MEL-28 melanoma cells invading faster than the WM35 cells. Discussion The MSE and HSE models are a reliable platform for studying melanoma invasion in a 3D tissue that is similar to native human skin. Interestingly, we find that the WM35 cell line, that is thought to be associated with radial spreading only, is able to invade into the dermis. The vertical invasion of melanoma cells into the dermal region appears to be associated with a localised disruption of the basement membrane. Presenting our results in terms of time course data, along with images and quantitative measurements of the depth of invasion extends previous 3D work that has often been reported without these details. PMID:28890854

Antenna feed system for receiving circular polarization and transmitting linear polarization

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Seidel, B. L.; Bathker, D. A. (Inventor)

1979-01-01

An invention is described which provides for receiving a circularly polarized signal from an antenna feed connected to orthogonally spaced antenna elements. It also provides for transmitting a linearly polarized signal through the same feed without switches, and without suffering a 3 dB polarization mismatch loss, using an arrangement of hybrid junctions. The arrangement is comprised of two dividing hybrid junctions, each connected to a different pair of antenna elements and a summing hybrid junction. In one version, a receiver is connected to the summing hybrid junction directly. A diplexer is used to connect a transmitter to only one pair of antenna elements. In another version, designated left and right circularly polarized (LCP and RCP) transmitters are connected to the summing hybrid junction by separate diplexers, and separate LCP and RCP sensitive receivers are connected to the diplexers in order to transmit linearly polarized signals using all four antenna elements while receiving circularly polarized signals as before. An orthomode junction and horn antenna may replace the two dividing hybrid junctions and antenna feed.

Symmetries of the Space of Linear Symplectic Connections

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fox, Daniel J. F.

2017-01-01

There is constructed a family of Lie algebras that act in a Hamiltonian way on the symplectic affine space of linear symplectic connections on a symplectic manifold. The associated equivariant moment map is a formal sum of the Cahen-Gutt moment map, the Ricci tensor, and a translational term. The critical points of a functional constructed from it interpolate between the equations for preferred symplectic connections and the equations for critical symplectic connections. The commutative algebra of formal sums of symmetric tensors on a symplectic manifold carries a pair of compatible Poisson structures, one induced from the canonical Poisson bracket on the space of functions on the cotangent bundle polynomial in the fibers, and the other induced from the algebraic fiberwise Schouten bracket on the symmetric algebra of each fiber of the cotangent bundle. These structures are shown to be compatible, and the required Lie algebras are constructed as central extensions of their! linear combinations restricted to formal sums of symmetric tensors whose first order term is a multiple of the differential of its zeroth order term.

Sum of the m-th Powers of n Successive Terms of an Arithmetic Sequence: b[superscript m] + (a + b)[superscript m] + (2a + b)[superscript m] ... + ((n - 1)a + b)[superscript m

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gauthier, N.

2006-01-01

This note describes a method for evaluating the sums of the m -th powers of n consecutive terms of a general arithmetic sequence: { S[subscript m] = 0, 1, 2,...}. The method is based on the use of a differential operator that is repeatedly applied to a generating function. A known linear recurrence is then obtained and the m-th sum, S[subscript…

Forecasting of primary energy consumption data in the United States: A comparison between ARIMA and Holter-Winters models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rahman, A.; Ahmar, A. S.

2017-09-01

This research has a purpose to compare ARIMA Model and Holt-Winters Model based on MAE, RSS, MSE, and RMS criteria in predicting Primary Energy Consumption Total data in the US. The data from this research ranges from January 1973 to December 2016. This data will be processed by using R Software. Based on the results of data analysis that has been done, it is found that the model of Holt-Winters Additive type (MSE: 258350.1) is the most appropriate model in predicting Primary Energy Consumption Total data in the US. This model is more appropriate when compared with Holt-Winters Multiplicative type (MSE: 262260,4) and ARIMA Seasonal model (MSE: 723502,2).

Search for HRV-parameters that detect a sympathetic shift in heart failure patients on β-blocker treatment.

PubMed

Zhang, Yanru; de Peuter, Olav R; Kamphuisen, Pieter W; Karemaker, John M

2013-01-01

A sympathetic shift in heart rate variability (HRV) from high to lower frequencies may be an early signal of deterioration in a monitored patient. Most chronic heart failure (CHF) patients receive β-blockers. This tends to obscure HRV observation by increasing the fast variations. We tested which HRV parameters would still detect the change into a sympathetic state. β-blocker (Carvedilol®) treated CHF patients underwent a protocol of 10 min supine rest, followed by 10 min active standing. CHF patients (NYHA Class II-IV) n = 15, 10m/5f, mean age 58.4 years (47-72); healthy controls n = 29, 18m/11f, mean age 62.9 years (49-78). Interbeat intervals (IBI) were extracted from the finger blood pressure wave (Nexfin®). Both linear and non-linear HRV analyses were applied that (1) might be able to differentiate patients from healthy controls under resting conditions and (2) detect the change into a sympathetic state in the present short recordings. Linear: mean-IBI, SD-IBI, root mean square of successive differences (rMSSD), pIBI-50 (the proportion of intervals that differs by more than 50 ms from the previous), LF, HF, and LF/HF ratio. Non-linear: Sample entropy (SampEn), Multiscale entropy (MSE), and derived: Multiscale variance (MSV) and Multiscale rMSSD (MSD). In the supine resting situation patients differed from controls by having higher HF and, consequently, lower LF/HF. In addition their longer range (τ = 6-10) MSE was lower as well. The sympathetic shift was, in controls, detected by mean-IBI, rMSSD, pIBI-50, and LF/HF, all going down; in CHF by mean-IBI, rMSSD, pIBI-50, and MSD (τ = 6-10) going down. MSD6-10 introduced here works as a band-pass filter favoring frequencies from 0.02 to 0.1 Hz. In β-blocker treated CHF patients, traditional time domain analysis (mean-IBI, rMSSD, pIBI-50) and MSD6-10 provide the most useful information to detect a condition change.

Automatic classification of artifactual ICA-components for artifact removal in EEG signals.

PubMed

Winkler, Irene; Haufe, Stefan; Tangermann, Michael

2011-08-02

Artifacts contained in EEG recordings hamper both, the visual interpretation by experts as well as the algorithmic processing and analysis (e.g. for Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCI) or for Mental State Monitoring). While hand-optimized selection of source components derived from Independent Component Analysis (ICA) to clean EEG data is widespread, the field could greatly profit from automated solutions based on Machine Learning methods. Existing ICA-based removal strategies depend on explicit recordings of an individual's artifacts or have not been shown to reliably identify muscle artifacts. We propose an automatic method for the classification of general artifactual source components. They are estimated by TDSEP, an ICA method that takes temporal correlations into account. The linear classifier is based on an optimized feature subset determined by a Linear Programming Machine (LPM). The subset is composed of features from the frequency-, the spatial- and temporal domain. A subject independent classifier was trained on 640 TDSEP components (reaction time (RT) study, n = 12) that were hand labeled by experts as artifactual or brain sources and tested on 1080 new components of RT data of the same study. Generalization was tested on new data from two studies (auditory Event Related Potential (ERP) paradigm, n = 18; motor imagery BCI paradigm, n = 80) that used data with different channel setups and from new subjects. Based on six features only, the optimized linear classifier performed on level with the inter-expert disagreement (<10% Mean Squared Error (MSE)) on the RT data. On data of the auditory ERP study, the same pre-calculated classifier generalized well and achieved 15% MSE. On data of the motor imagery paradigm, we demonstrate that the discriminant information used for BCI is preserved when removing up to 60% of the most artifactual source components. We propose a universal and efficient classifier of ICA components for the subject independent removal of artifacts from EEG data. Based on linear methods, it is applicable for different electrode placements and supports the introspection of results. Trained on expert ratings of large data sets, it is not restricted to the detection of eye- and muscle artifacts. Its performance and generalization ability is demonstrated on data of different EEG studies.

Source of humidity in the terrestrial water cycle over the forested monsoon arid of Sahel; changes in the water recycle and atmospheric instability

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yosef, G.; Avissar, R.; Walko, R. L.; Yakir, D.

2017-12-01

Land-cover change from low-level shrubs to forest over semi-arid monsoon regions such as the Sahel, can significantly influence the surface energy budget and, in turn, the local atmospheric circulation. These regions, influenced at the summer by the monsoon rain following the migration of the tropical convergence zones (ITCZ). And low-level easterly jet that acts as a barrier to the penetration of the precipitation into the semi arid areas. In this study we follow-up first the results of large-scale afforestation numerical experiment in the Sahel that changes the local and regional atmospheric circulation and, consequently, increasing of precipitation. We aim for explicitly investigation of the change in the sources and pathways of humidity in the terrestrial water cycle over the Sahel as result afforestation. The GCM OLAM was used to performing simulations of afforestation scenarios in the Sahel. The area (Sahel 2.6 E6 km2) was afforested with a mature pine forest, using the extensive data form the long-term semi-arid Yatir forest in Israel as a reference forest for surface parameterization. The regional effect of the afforestation was analyzed using the following parameters; the index of water recycling (WR), which refers to the contribution of local ET fluxes to precipitation; the Moist Static Energy (MSE), is the sum of the potential, inertial and latent energy; and the vertical motion. The result shows increases of the WR in the south of the afforested area and north of the footprint, mainly as consequences of increasing in the vertical integrated moist flux convergence (MFC). Explaining this mechanism in terms of MSE shows that although the forest area become cooler and stabilizes the atmospheric column, its shift and weaken the African Easterly Jet enable the penetration of additional humidity to increase the MFC. On the other hand positive MSE observed over the northern footprint area mainly as a results of increasing the leant energy (e.g. humidity). Over all the result shows a self-sustainable system, where water is recharged to the atmosphere through ET, supported by the convergence process, as can be seen over the west part of the Sahel. As a consequence the forest system is not reliant on external water alone and also uses recycled water from its own ET to increase precipitation.

Delivering both sum and difference beam distributions to a planar monopulse antenna array

DOEpatents

Strassner, II, Bernd H.

2015-12-22

A planar monopulse radar apparatus includes a planar distribution matrix coupled to a planar antenna array having a linear configuration of antenna elements. The planar distribution matrix is responsive to first and second pluralities of weights applied thereto for providing both sum and difference beam distributions across the antenna array.

Levels of naturally occurring gamma radiation measured in British homes and their prediction in particular residences.

PubMed

Kendall, G M; Wakeford, R; Athanson, M; Vincent, T J; Carter, E J; McColl, N P; Little, M P

2016-03-01

Gamma radiation from natural sources (including directly ionising cosmic rays) is an important component of background radiation. In the present paper, indoor measurements of naturally occurring gamma rays that were undertaken as part of the UK Childhood Cancer Study are summarised, and it is shown that these are broadly compatible with an earlier UK National Survey. The distribution of indoor gamma-ray dose rates in Great Britain is approximately normal with mean 96 nGy/h and standard deviation 23 nGy/h. Directly ionising cosmic rays contribute about one-third of the total. The expanded dataset allows a more detailed description than previously of indoor gamma-ray exposures and in particular their geographical variation. Various strategies for predicting indoor natural background gamma-ray dose rates were explored. In the first of these, a geostatistical model was fitted, which assumes an underlying geologically determined spatial variation, superimposed on which is a Gaussian stochastic process with Matérn correlation structure that models the observed tendency of dose rates in neighbouring houses to correlate. In the second approach, a number of dose-rate interpolation measures were first derived, based on averages over geologically or administratively defined areas or using distance-weighted averages of measurements at nearest-neighbour points. Linear regression was then used to derive an optimal linear combination of these interpolation measures. The predictive performances of the two models were compared via cross-validation, using a randomly selected 70 % of the data to fit the models and the remaining 30 % to test them. The mean square error (MSE) of the linear-regression model was lower than that of the Gaussian-Matérn model (MSE 378 and 411, respectively). The predictive performance of the two candidate models was also evaluated via simulation; the OLS model performs significantly better than the Gaussian-Matérn model.

Decreased complexity of glucose dynamics in diabetes: evidence from multiscale entropy analysis of continuous glucose monitoring system data.

PubMed

Chen, Jin-Long; Chen, Pin-Fan; Wang, Hung-Ming

2014-07-15

Parameters of glucose dynamics recorded by the continuous glucose monitoring system (CGMS) could help in the control of glycemic fluctuations, which is important in diabetes management. Multiscale entropy (MSE) analysis has recently been developed to measure the complexity of physical and physiological time sequences. A reduced MSE complexity index indicates the increased repetition patterns of the time sequence, and, thus, a decreased complexity in this system. No study has investigated the MSE analysis of glucose dynamics in diabetes. This study was designed to compare the complexity of glucose dynamics between the diabetic patients (n = 17) and the control subjects (n = 13), who were matched for sex, age, and body mass index via MSE analysis using the CGMS data. Compared with the control subjects, the diabetic patients revealed a significant increase (P < 0.001) in the mean (diabetic patients 166.0 ± 10.4 vs. control subjects 93.3 ± 1.5 mg/dl), the standard deviation (51.7 ± 4.3 vs. 11.1 ± 0.5 mg/dl), and the mean amplitude of glycemic excursions (127.0 ± 9.2 vs. 27.7 ± 1.3 mg/dl) of the glucose levels; and a significant decrease (P < 0.001) in the MSE complexity index (5.09 ± 0.23 vs. 7.38 ± 0.28). In conclusion, the complexity of glucose dynamics is decreased in diabetes. This finding implies the reactivity of glucoregulation is impaired in the diabetic patients. Such impairment presenting as an increased regularity of glycemic fluctuating pattern could be detected by MSE analysis. Thus, the MSE complexity index could potentially be used as a biomarker in the monitoring of diabetes.

Multistage electrotherapy delivered through chronically-implanted leads terminates atrial fibrillation with lower energy than a single biphasic shock.

PubMed

Janardhan, Ajit H; Gutbrod, Sarah R; Li, Wenwen; Lang, Di; Schuessler, Richard B; Efimov, Igor R

The goal of this study was to develop a low-energy, implantable device-based multistage electrotherapy (MSE) to terminate atrial fibrillation (AF). Previous attempts to perform cardioversion of AF by using an implantable device were limited by the pain caused by use of a high-energy single biphasic shock (BPS). Transvenous leads were implanted into the right atrium (RA), coronary sinus, and left pulmonary artery of 14 dogs. Self-sustaining AF was induced by 6 ± 2 weeks of high-rate RA pacing. Atrial defibrillation thresholds of standard versus experimental electrotherapies were measured in vivo and studied by using optical imaging in vitro. The mean AF cycle length (CL) in vivo was 112 ± 21 ms (534 beats/min). The impedances of the RA-left pulmonary artery and RA-coronary sinus shock vectors were similar (121 ± 11 Ω vs. 126 ± 9 Ω; p = 0.27). BPS required 1.48 ± 0.91 J (165 ± 34 V) to terminate AF. In contrast, MSE terminated AF with significantly less energy (0.16 ± 0.16 J; p < 0.001) and significantly lower peak voltage (31.1 ± 19.3 V; p < 0.001). In vitro optical imaging studies found that AF was maintained by localized foci originating from pulmonary vein-left atrium interfaces. MSE Stage 1 shocks temporarily disrupted localized foci; MSE Stage 2 entrainment shocks continued to silence the localized foci driving AF; and MSE Stage 3 pacing stimuli enabled consistent RA-left atrium activation until sinus rhythm was restored. Low-energy MSE significantly reduced the atrial defibrillation thresholds compared with BPS in a canine model of AF. MSE may enable painless, device-based AF therapy. Copyright © 2014 American College of Cardiology Foundation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Multistage Electrotherapy Delivered Through Chronically-Implanted Leads Terminates Atrial Fibrillation With Lower Energy Than a Single Biphasic Shock

PubMed Central

Janardhan, Ajit H.; Gutbrod, Sarah R.; Li, Wenwen; Lang, Di; Schuessler, Richard B.; Efimov, Igor R.

2014-01-01

Objectives The goal of this study was to develop a low-energy, implantable device–based multistage electrotherapy (MSE) to terminate atrial fibrillation (AF). Background Previous attempts to perform cardioversion of AF by using an implantable device were limited by the pain caused by use of a high-energy single biphasic shock (BPS). Methods Transvenous leads were implanted into the right atrium (RA), coronary sinus, and left pulmonary artery of 14 dogs. Self-sustaining AF was induced by 6 ± 2 weeks of high-rate RA pacing. Atrial defibrillation thresholds of standard versus experimental electrotherapies were measured in vivo and studied by using optical imaging in vitro. Results The mean AF cycle length (CL) in vivo was 112 ± 21 ms (534 beats/min). The impedances of the RA–left pulmonary artery and RA–coronary sinus shock vectors were similar (121 ± 11 Ω vs. 126 ± 9 Ω; p = 0.27). BPS required 1.48 ± 0.91 J (165 ± 34 V) to terminate AF. In contrast, MSE terminated AF with significantly less energy (0.16 ± 0.16 J; p < 0.001) and significantly lower peak voltage (31.1 ± 19.3 V; p < 0.001). In vitro optical imaging studies found that AF was maintained by localized foci originating from pulmonary vein–left atrium interfaces. MSE Stage 1 shocks temporarily disrupted localized foci; MSE Stage 2 entrainment shocks continued to silence the localized foci driving AF; and MSE Stage 3 pacing stimuli enabled consistent RA–left atrium activation until sinus rhythm was restored. Conclusions Low-energy MSE significantly reduced the atrial defibrillation thresholds compared with BPS in a canine model of AF. MSE may enable painless, device-based AF therapy. PMID:24076284

Methylseleninic acid super-activates p53-senescence cancer progression barrier in prostate lesions of Pten-knockout mouse

PubMed Central

Wang, Lei; Guo, Xiaolan; Wang, Ji; Jiang, Cheng; Bosland, Maarten C.; Lü, Junxuan; Deng, Yibin

2015-01-01

Monomethylated selenium (MM-Se) forms that are precursors of methylselenol such as methylseleninic acid (MSeA) differ in metabolism and anti-cancer activities in preclinical cell and animal models from seleno-methionine that had failed to exert preventive efficacy against prostate cancer (PCa) in North American men. Given that human PCa arises from precancerous lesions such as high-grade prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia (HG-PIN) which frequently have lost PTEN tumor suppressor permitting AKT oncogenic signaling, we tested the efficacy of MSeA to inhibit HG-PIN progression in Pten prostate specific knockout (KO) mice and assessed the mechanistic involvement of p53-mediated cellular senescence and of the androgen receptor (AR). We observed that short-term (4 weeks) oral MSeA treatment significantly increased expression of P53 and P21Cip1 proteins and senescence-associated-β-galactosidase staining, and reduced Ki-67 cell proliferation index in Pten KO prostate epithelium. Long-term (25 weeks) MSeA administration significantly suppressed HG-PIN phenotype, tumor weight, and prevented emergence of invasive carcinoma in Pten KO mice. Mechanistically, the long-term MSeA treatment not only sustained P53-mediated senescence, but also markedly reduced AKT phosphorylation and AR abundance in the Pten KO prostate. Importantly, these cellular and molecular changes were not observed in the prostate of wild type littermates which were similarly treated with MSeA. Since p53 signaling is likely to be intact in HG-PIN compared to advanced PCa, the selective super-activation of p53-mediated senescence by MSeA suggests a new paradigm of cancer chemoprevention by strengthening a cancer progression barrier through induction of irreversible senescence with additional suppression of AR and AKT oncogenic signaling. PMID:26511486

Influence of Motion Picture Rating on Adolescent Response to Movie Smoking

PubMed Central

Tanski, Susanne; Stoolmiller, Mike

2012-01-01

OBJECTIVE: To examine the association between movie smoking exposure (MSE) and adolescent smoking according to rating category. METHODS: A total of 6522 US adolescents were enrolled in a longitudinal survey conducted at 8-month intervals; 5503 subjects were followed up at 8 months, 5019 subjects at 16 months, and 4575 subjects at 24 months. MSE was estimated from 532 recent box-office hits, blocked into 3 Motion Picture Association of America rating categories: G/PG, PG-13, and R. A survival model evaluated time to smoking onset. RESULTS: Median MSE in PG-13–rated movies was ∼3 times higher than median MSE from R-rated movies, but their relation with smoking was essentially the same, with adjusted hazard ratios of 1.49 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.23–1.81) and 1.33 (95% CI: 1.23–1.81) for each additional 500 occurrences of MSE respectively. MSE from G/PG-rated movies was small and had no significant relationship with adolescent smoking. Attributable risk estimates showed that adolescent smoking would be reduced by 18% (95% CI: 14–21) if smoking in PG-13–rated movies was reduced to the fifth percentile. In comparison, making all parents maximally authoritative in their parenting would reduce adolescent smoking by 16% (95% CI: 12–19). CONCLUSIONS: The equivalent effect of PG-13-rated and R-rated MSE suggests it is the movie smoking that prompts adolescents to smoke, not other characteristics of R-rated movies or adolescents drawn to them. An R rating for movie smoking could substantially reduce adolescent smoking by eliminating smoking from PG-13 movies. PMID:22778305

Comparison of Moist Static Energy and Budget between the GCM-Simulated Madden–Julian Oscillation and Observations over the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific

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

Wu, Xiaoqing; Deng, Liping

The moist static energy (MSE) anomalies and MSE budget associated with the Madden–Julian oscillation (MJO) simulated in the Iowa State University General Circulation Model (ISUGCM) over the Indian and Pacific Oceans are compared with observations. Different phase relationships between MJO 850-hPa zonal wind, precipitation, and surface latent heat flux are simulated over the Indian Ocean and western Pacific, which are greatly influenced by the convection closure, trigger conditions, and convective momentum transport (CMT). The moist static energy builds up from the lower troposphere 15–20 days before the peak of MJO precipitation, and reaches the maximum in the middle troposphere (500–600more » hPa) near the peak of MJO precipitation. The gradual lower-tropospheric heating and moistening and the upward transport of moist static energy are important aspects of MJO events, which are documented in observational studies but poorly simulated in most GCMs. The trigger conditions for deep convection, obtained from the year-long cloud resolving model (CRM) simulations, contribute to the striking difference between ISUGCM simulations with the original and modified convection schemes and play the major role in the improved MJO simulation in ISUGCM. Additionally, the budget analysis with the ISUGCM simulations shows the increase in MJO MSE is in phase with the horizontal advection of MSE over the western Pacific, while out of phase with the horizontal advection of MSE over the Indian Ocean. However, the NCEP analysis shows that the tendency of MJO MSE is in phase with the horizontal advection of MSE over both oceans.« less

Moringa oleifera Seed Extract Alleviates Scopolamine-Induced Learning and Memory Impairment in Mice

PubMed Central

Zhou, Juan; Yang, Wu-shuang; Suo, Da-qin; Li, Ying; Peng, Lu; Xu, Lan-xi; Zeng, Kai-yue; Ren, Tong; Wang, Ying; Zhou, Yu; Zhao, Yun; Yang, Li-chao; Jin, Xin

2018-01-01

The extract of Moringa oleifera seeds has been shown to possess various pharmacological properties. In the present study, we assessed the neuropharmacological effects of 70% ethanolic M. oleifera seed extract (MSE) on cognitive impairment caused by scopolamine injection in mice using the passive avoidance and Morris water maze (MWM) tests. MSE (250 or 500 mg/kg) was administered to mice by oral gavage for 7 or 14 days, and cognitive impairment was induced by intraperitoneal injection of scopolamine (4 mg/kg) for 1 or 6 days. Mice that received scopolamine alone showed impaired learning and memory retention and considerably decreased cholinergic system reactivity and neurogenesis in the hippocampus. MSE pretreatment significantly ameliorated scopolamine-induced cognitive impairment and enhanced cholinergic system reactivity and neurogenesis in the hippocampus. Additionally, the protein expressions of phosphorylated Akt, ERK1/2, and CREB in the hippocampus were significantly decreased by scopolamine, but these decreases were reversed by MSE treatment. These results suggest that MSE-induced ameliorative cognitive effects are mediated by enhancement of the cholinergic neurotransmission system and neurogenesis via activation of the Akt, ERK1/2, and CREB signaling pathways. These findings suggest that MSE could be a potent neuropharmacological drug against amnesia, and its mechanism might be modulation of cholinergic activity via the Akt, ERK1/2, and CREB signaling pathways. PMID:29740317

Eigenspace-based minimum variance adaptive beamformer combined with delay multiply and sum: experimental study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mozaffarzadeh, Moein; Mahloojifar, Ali; Nasiriavanaki, Mohammadreza; Orooji, Mahdi

2018-02-01

Delay and sum (DAS) is the most common beamforming algorithm in linear-array photoacoustic imaging (PAI) as a result of its simple implementation. However, it leads to a low resolution and high sidelobes. Delay multiply and sum (DMAS) was used to address the incapabilities of DAS, providing a higher image quality. However, the resolution improvement is not well enough compared to eigenspace-based minimum variance (EIBMV). In this paper, the EIBMV beamformer has been combined with DMAS algebra, called EIBMV-DMAS, using the expansion of DMAS algorithm. The proposed method is used as the reconstruction algorithm in linear-array PAI. EIBMV-DMAS is experimentally evaluated where the quantitative and qualitative results show that it outperforms DAS, DMAS and EIBMV. The proposed method degrades the sidelobes for about 365 %, 221 % and 40 %, compared to DAS, DMAS and EIBMV, respectively. Moreover, EIBMV-DMAS improves the SNR about 158 %, 63 % and 20 %, respectively.

MSE commissioning and other major diagnostic updates on KSTAR

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ko, Jinseok; Kstar Team

2015-11-01

The motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostic based on the photoelastic-modulator (PEM) approach has been commissioned for the Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR). The 25-channel MSE system with the polarization-preserving front optics and precise tilt-tuning narrow bandpass filters provides the spatial resolution less than 1 cm in most of the plasma cross section and about 10 millisecond of time resolution. The polarization response curves with the daily Faraday rotation correction provides reliable pitch angle profiles for the KSTAR discharges with the MSE-optimized energy combination in the three-ion-source neutral beam injection. Some major diagnostic advances such as the poloidal charge exchange spectroscopy, the improved Thomson-scatting system, and the divertor infrared TV are reported as well. Work supported by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning, Korea.

Vector quantizer designs for joint compression and terrain categorization of multispectral imagery

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gorman, John D.; Lyons, Daniel F.

1994-01-01

Two vector quantizer designs for compression of multispectral imagery and their impact on terrain categorization performance are evaluated. The mean-squared error (MSE) and classification performance of the two quantizers are compared, and it is shown that a simple two-stage design minimizing MSE subject to a constraint on classification performance has a significantly better classification performance than a standard MSE-based tree-structured vector quantizer followed by maximum likelihood classification. This improvement in classification performance is obtained with minimal loss in MSE performance. The results show that it is advantageous to tailor compression algorithm designs to the required data exploitation tasks. Applications of joint compression/classification include compression for the archival or transmission of Landsat imagery that is later used for land utility surveys and/or radiometric analysis.

Enhancing Security of Double Random Phase Encoding Based on Random S-Box

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Girija, R.; Singh, Hukum

2018-06-01

In this paper, we propose a novel asymmetric cryptosystem for double random phase encoding (DRPE) using random S-Box. While utilising S-Box separately is not reliable and DRPE does not support non-linearity, so, our system unites the effectiveness of S-Box with an asymmetric system of DRPE (through Fourier transform). The uniqueness of proposed cryptosystem lies on employing high sensitivity dynamic S-Box for our DRPE system. The randomness and scalability achieved due to applied technique is an additional feature of the proposed solution. The firmness of random S-Box is investigated in terms of performance parameters such as non-linearity, strict avalanche criterion, bit independence criterion, linear and differential approximation probabilities etc. S-Boxes convey nonlinearity to cryptosystems which is a significant parameter and very essential for DRPE. The strength of proposed cryptosystem has been analysed using various parameters such as MSE, PSNR, correlation coefficient analysis, noise analysis, SVD analysis, etc. Experimental results are conferred in detail to exhibit proposed cryptosystem is highly secure.

Truncated Linear Statistics Associated with the Eigenvalues of Random Matrices II. Partial Sums over Proper Time Delays for Chaotic Quantum Dots

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grabsch, Aurélien; Majumdar, Satya N.; Texier, Christophe

2017-06-01

Invariant ensembles of random matrices are characterized by the distribution of their eigenvalues \\{λ _1,\\ldots ,λ _N\\}. We study the distribution of truncated linear statistics of the form \\tilde{L}=\\sum _{i=1}^p f(λ _i) with p

Reliability of Summed Item Scores Using Structural Equation Modeling: An Alternative to Coefficient Alpha

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Green, Samuel B.; Yang, Yanyun

2009-01-01

A method is presented for estimating reliability using structural equation modeling (SEM) that allows for nonlinearity between factors and item scores. Assuming the focus is on consistency of summed item scores, this method for estimating reliability is preferred to those based on linear SEM models and to the most commonly reported estimate of…

On Viviani's Theorem and Its Extensions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Abboud, Elias

2010-01-01

Viviani's theorem states that the sum of distances from any point inside an equilateral triangle to its sides is constant. Here, in an extension of this result, we show, using linear programming, that any convex polygon can be divided into parallel line segments on which the sum of the distances to the sides of the polygon is constant. Let us say…

Healing effects of Musa sapientum var. paradisiaca in diabetic rats with co-occurring gastric ulcer: cytokines and growth factor by PCR amplification

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background The present study evaluates the effects of extract of Musa sapientum fruit (MSE) on ulcer index, blood glucose level and gastric mucosal cytokines, TNF-α and IL-1β and growth factor, TGF-α (affected in diabetes and chronic ulcer) in acetic acid (AA)-induced gastric ulcer (GU) in diabetic (DR) rat. Methods MSE (100 mg/kg, oral), omeprazole (OMZ, 2.0 mg/kg, oral), insulin (INS, 4 U/kg, sc) or pentoxyphylline (PTX, 10 mg/kg, oral) were given once daily for 10 days in 14 days post-streptozotocin (60 mg/kg, intraperitoneal)-induced diabetic rats while, the normal/diabetic rats received CMC for the same period after induction of GU with AA. Ulcer index was calculated based upon the product of length and width (mm2/rat) of ulcers while, TNF-α, IL-1β and TGF-α were estimated in the gastric mucosal homogenate from the intact/ulcer region. Phytochemical screening and HPTLC analysis of MSE was done following standard procedures. Results An increase in ulcer index, TNF-α and IL-1β were observed in normal (NR)-AA rat compared to NR-normal saline rat, which were further increased in DR-AA rat while, treatments of DR-AA rat with MSE, OMZ, INS and PTX reversed them, more so with MSE and PTX. Significant increase in TGF-α was found in NR-AA rat which did not increase further in DR-AA rat. MSE and PTX tended to increase while, OMZ and INS showed little or no effect on TGF-α in AA-DR rat. Phytochemical screening of MSE showed the presence of saponins, flavonoids, glycosides, steroids and alkaloids and HPTLC analysis indicated the presence of eight active compounds. Conclusion MSE showed antidiabetic and better ulcer healing effects compared with OMZ (antiulcer) or INS (antidiabetic) in diabetic rat and could be more effective in diabetes with concurrent gastric ulcer. PMID:24192345

The Pathways from a Behavior Change Communication Intervention to Infant and Young Child Feeding in Bangladesh Are Mediated and Potentiated by Maternal Self-Efficacy.

PubMed

Zongrone, Amanda A; Menon, Purnima; Pelto, Gretel H; Habicht, Jean-Pierre; Rasmussen, Kathleen M; Constas, Mark A; Vermeylen, Francoise; Khaled, Adiba; Saha, Kuntal K; Stoltzfus, Rebecca J

2018-02-01

Although self-efficacy is a potential determinant of feeding and care behaviors, there is limited empirical analysis of the role of maternal self-efficacy in low- and middle-income countries. In the context of behavior change interventions (BCIs) addressing complementary feeding (CF), it is possible that maternal self-efficacy can mediate or enhance intervention impacts. In the context of a BCI in Bangladesh, we studied the role of maternal self-efficacy for CF (MSE-CF) for 2 CF behaviors with the use of a theoretically grounded empirical model of determinants to illustrate the potential roles of MSE-CF. We developed and tested a locally relevant scale for MSE-CF and included it in a survey (n = 457 mothers of children aged 6-24 mo) conducted as part of a cluster-randomized evaluation. Qualitative research was used to inform the selection of 2 intervention-targeted behaviors: feeding green leafy vegetables in the last 24 h (GLV) and on-time introduction of egg (EGG) between 6 and 8 mo of age. We then examined direct, mediated, and potentiated paths of MSE-CF in relation to the impacts of the BCI on these behaviors with the use of regression and structural equation modeling. GLV and EGG were higher in the intensive group than in the nonintensive control group (16.0 percentage points for GLV; P < 0.001; 11.2 percentage points for EGG; P = 0.037). For GLV, MSE-CF mediated (β = 0.345, P = 0.010) and potentiated (β = 0.390, P = 0.038) the effect of the intensive group. In contrast, MSE-CF did not mediate or potentiate the effect of the intervention on EGG. MSE-CF was a significant mediator and potentiator for GLV but not for EGG. The divergent findings highlight the complex determinants of individual specific infant and young child feeding behaviors. The study shows the value of measuring behavioral determinants, such as MSE-CF, that affect a caregiver's capability to adopt intervention-targeted behaviors.

A class of stochastic optimization problems with one quadratic & several linear objective functions and extended portfolio selection model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xu, Jiuping; Li, Jun

2002-09-01

In this paper a class of stochastic multiple-objective programming problems with one quadratic, several linear objective functions and linear constraints has been introduced. The former model is transformed into a deterministic multiple-objective nonlinear programming model by means of the introduction of random variables' expectation. The reference direction approach is used to deal with linear objectives and results in a linear parametric optimization formula with a single linear objective function. This objective function is combined with the quadratic function using the weighted sums. The quadratic problem is transformed into a linear (parametric) complementary problem, the basic formula for the proposed approach. The sufficient and necessary conditions for (properly, weakly) efficient solutions and some construction characteristics of (weakly) efficient solution sets are obtained. An interactive algorithm is proposed based on reference direction and weighted sums. Varying the parameter vector on the right-hand side of the model, the DM can freely search the efficient frontier with the model. An extended portfolio selection model is formed when liquidity is considered as another objective to be optimized besides expectation and risk. The interactive approach is illustrated with a practical example.

Multiple summing operators on C(K) spaces

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pérez-García, David; Villanueva, Ignacio

2004-04-01

In this paper, we characterize, for 1≤ p<∞, the multiple ( p, 1)-summing multilinear operators on the product of C(K) spaces in terms of their representing polymeasures. As consequences, we obtain a new characterization of ( p, 1)-summing linear operators on C(K) in terms of their representing measures and a new multilinear characterization of L ∞ spaces. We also solve a problem stated by M.S. Ramanujan and E. Schock, improve a result of H. P. Rosenthal and S. J. Szarek, and give new results about polymeasures.

Usage-Centered Design Approach in Design of Malaysia Sexuality Education (MSE) Courseware

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chan, S. L.; Jaafar, A.

The problems amongst juveniles increased every year, especially rape case of minor. Therefore, the government of Malaysia has introduced the National Sexuality Education Guideline on 2005. An early study related to the perception of teachers and students toward the sexuality education curriculum taught in secondary schools currently was carried out in 2008. The study showed that there are big gaps between the perception of the teachers and the students towards several issues of Malaysia sexuality education today. The Malaysia Sexuality Education (MSE) courseware was designed based on few learning theories approach. Then MSE was executed through a comprehensive methodology which the model ADDIE integrated with Usage-Centered Design to achieve high usability courseware. In conclusion, the effort of developing the MSE is hopefully will be a solution to the current problem that happens in Malaysia sexuality education now.

MSE observatory: a revised and optimized astronomical facility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bauman, Steven E.; Angers, Mathieu; Benedict, Tom; Crampton, David; Flagey, Nicolas; Gedig, Mike; Green, Greg; Liu, Andy; Lo, David; Loewen, Nathan; McConnachie, Alan; Murowinski, Rick; Racine, René; Salmon, Derrick; Stiemer, Siegfried; Szeto, Kei; Wu, Di

2016-07-01

The Canada-France-Hawaii-Telescope Corporation (CFHT) plans to repurpose its observatory on the summit of Maunakea and operate a (60 segment) 11.25m aperture wide field spectroscopic survey telescope, the Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE). The prime focus telescope will be equipped with dedicated instrumentation to take advantage of one of the best sites in the northern hemisphere and offer its users the ability to perform large surveys. Central themes of the development plan are reusing and upgrading wherever possible. MSE will reuse the CFHT site and build upon the existing observatory infrastructure, using the same building and telescope pier as CFHT, while minimizing environmental impact on the summit. MSE will require structural support upgrades to the building to meet the latest building seismic code requirements and accommodate a new larger telescope and upgraded enclosure. It will be necessary to replace the current dome since a larger slit opening is needed for a larger telescope. MSE will use a thermal management system to remove heat generated by loads from the building, flush excess heat from lower levels, and maintain the observing environment temperature. This paper describes the design approach for redeveloping the CFHT facility for MSE. Once the project is completed the new facility will be almost indistinguishable on the outside from the current CFHT observatory. Past experience and lessons learned from CFHT staff and the astronomical community will be used to create a modern, optimized, and transformative scientific data collecting machine.

Robust Adaptive Dynamic Programming of Two-Player Zero-Sum Games for Continuous-Time Linear Systems.

PubMed

Fu, Yue; Fu, Jun; Chai, Tianyou

2015-12-01

In this brief, an online robust adaptive dynamic programming algorithm is proposed for two-player zero-sum games of continuous-time unknown linear systems with matched uncertainties, which are functions of system outputs and states of a completely unknown exosystem. The online algorithm is developed using the policy iteration (PI) scheme with only one iteration loop. A new analytical method is proposed for convergence proof of the PI scheme. The sufficient conditions are given to guarantee globally asymptotic stability and suboptimal property of the closed-loop system. Simulation studies are conducted to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

A miniature low-cost LWIR camera with a 160×120 microbolometer FPA

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tepegoz, Murat; Kucukkomurler, Alper; Tankut, Firat; Eminoglu, Selim; Akin, Tayfun

2014-06-01

This paper presents the development of a miniature LWIR thermal camera, MSE070D, which targets value performance infrared imaging applications, where a 160x120 CMOS-based microbolometer FPA is utilized. MSE070D features a universal USB interface that can communicate with computers and some particular mobile devices in the market. In addition, it offers high flexibility and mobility with the help of its USB powered nature, eliminating the need for any external power source, thanks to its low-power requirement option. MSE070D provides thermal imaging with its 1.65 inch3 volume with the use of a vacuum packaged CMOS-based microbolometer type thermal sensor MS1670A-VP, achieving moderate performance with a very low production cost. MSE070D allows 30 fps thermal video imaging with the 160x120 FPA size while resulting in an NETD lower than 350 mK with f/1 optics. It is possible to obtain test electronics and software, miniature camera cores, complete Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and relevant documentation with MSE070D, as MikroSens want to help its customers to evaluate its products and to ensure quick time-to-market for systems manufacturers.

The boundary layer moist static energy budget: Convection picks up moisture and leaves footprints in the marine boundary layer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

de Szoeke, S. P.

2017-12-01

Averaged over the tropical marine boundary layer (BL), 130 W m-2 turbulent surface moist static energy (MSE) flux, 120 W m-2 of which is evaporation, is balanced by upward MSE flux at the BL top due to 1) incorporation of cold air by downdrafts from deep convective clouds, and 2) turbulent entrainment of dry air into the BL. Cold saturated downdraft air, and warm clear air entrained into the BL have distinct thermodynamic properties. This work observationally quantifies their respective MSE fluxes in the central Indian Ocean in 2011, under different convective conditions of the intraseasonal (40-90 day) Madden Julian oscillation (MJO). Under convectively suppressed conditions, entrainment and downdraft fluxes export equal shares (60 W m-2) of MSE from the BL. Downdraft fluxes are more variable, increasing for stronger convection. In the convectively active phase of the MJO, downdrafts export 90 W m-2 from the BL, compared to 40 W m-2 by entrainment. These processes that control the internal, latent (condensation), and MSE of the tropical marine atmospheric BL determine the parcel buoyancy and strength of tropical deep convection.

Characterization of frictional interference in closely-spaced reinforcements in MSE walls.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-09-01

This research addresses one of several knowledge gaps in the understanding of tall MSE wall behavior: prediction of reinforcement loads impacted by frictional interference of closely-spaced reinforcements associated with tall walls.

Vector Sum Excited Linear Prediction (VSELP) speech coding at 4.8 kbps

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gerson, Ira A.; Jasiuk, Mark A.

1990-01-01

Code Excited Linear Prediction (CELP) speech coders exhibit good performance at data rates as low as 4800 bps. The major drawback to CELP type coders is their larger computational requirements. The Vector Sum Excited Linear Prediction (VSELP) speech coder utilizes a codebook with a structure which allows for a very efficient search procedure. Other advantages of the VSELP codebook structure is discussed and a detailed description of a 4.8 kbps VSELP coder is given. This coder is an improved version of the VSELP algorithm, which finished first in the NSA's evaluation of the 4.8 kbps speech coders. The coder uses a subsample resolution single tap long term predictor, a single VSELP excitation codebook, a novel gain quantizer which is robust to channel errors, and a new adaptive pre/postfilter arrangement.

A physician-led initiative to improve clinical documentation results in improved health care documentation, case mix index, and increased contribution margin.

PubMed

Aiello, Francesco A; Judelson, Dejah R; Durgin, Jonathan M; Doucet, Danielle R; Simons, Jessica P; Durocher, Dawn M; Flahive, Julie M; Schanzer, Andres

2018-05-04

Clinical documentation is the key determinant of inpatient acuity of illness and payer reimbursement. Every inpatient hospitalization is placed into a diagnosis related group with a relative value based on documented procedures, conditions, comorbidities and complications. The Case Mix Index (CMI) is an average of these diagnosis related groups and directly impacts physician profiling, medical center profiling, reimbursement, and quality reporting. We hypothesize that a focused, physician-led initiative to improve clinical documentation of vascular surgery inpatients results in increased CMI and contribution margin. A physician-led coding initiative to educate physicians on the documentation of comorbidities and conditions was initiated with concurrent chart review sessions with coding specialists for 3 months, and then as needed, after the creation of a vascular surgery documentation guide. Clinical documentation and billing for all carotid endarterectomy (CEA) and open infrainguinal procedures (OIPs) performed between January 2013 and July 2016 were stratified into precoding and postcoding initiative groups. Age, duration of stay, direct costs, actual reimbursements, contribution margin (CM), CMI, rate of complication or comorbidity, major complication or comorbidity, severity of illness, and risk of mortality assigned to each discharge were abstracted. Data were compared over time by standardizing Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) values for each diagnosis related group and using a CMS base rate reimbursement. Among 458 CEA admissions, postcoding initiative CEA patients (n = 253) had a significantly higher CMI (1.36 vs 1.25; P = .03), CM ($7859 vs $6650; P = .048), and CMS base rate reimbursement ($8955 vs $8258; P = .03) than precoding initiative CEA patients (n = 205). The proportion of admissions with a documented major complication or comorbidity and complication or comorbidity was significantly higher after the coding initiative (43% vs 27%; P < .01). Among 504 OIPs, postcoding initiative patients (n = 227) had a significantly higher CMI (2.23 vs 2.05; P < .01), actual reimbursement ($23,203 vs $19,909; P < .01), CM ($12,165 vs $8840; P < .01), and CMS base rate reimbursement ($14,649 vs $13,496; P < .01) than precoding initiative patients (n = 277). The proportion of admissions with a documented major complication or comorbidity and complication or comorbidity was significantly higher after the coding initiative (61% vs 43%; P < .01). For both CEA and OIPs, there were no differences in age, duration of stay, total direct costs, or primary insurance status between the precoding and postcoding patient groups. Accurate and detailed clinical documentation is required for key stakeholders to characterize the acuity of inpatient admissions and ensure appropriate reimbursement; it is also a key component of risk-adjustment methods for assessing quality of care. A physician-led documentation initiative significantly increased CMI and CM. Copyright © 2018 Society for Vascular Surgery. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Effects of Solar Geoengineering on Meridional Energy Transport and the ITCZ

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Russotto, R. D.; Ackerman, T. P.; Frierson, D. M.

2016-12-01

The polar amplification of warming and the ability of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) to shift to the north or south are two very important problems in climate science. Examining these behaviors in global climate models (GCMs) running solar geoengineering experiments is helpful not only for predicting the effects of solar geoengineering, but also for understanding how these processes work under increased CO2. Both polar amplification and ITCZ shifts are closely related to the meridional transport of moist static energy (MSE) by the atmosphere. In this study we examine changes in MSE transport in 10 fully coupled GCMs in Experiment G1 of the Geoengineering Model Intercomparison Project, in which the solar constant is reduced to compensate for abruptly quadrupled CO2 concentrations. In this experiment, poleward MSE transport decreases relative to preindustrial conditions in all models, in contrast to the CMIP5 abrupt4xCO2 experiment, in which poleward MSE transport increases. The increase in poleward MSE transport under increased CO2 is due to latent heat transport, as specific humidity increases faster in the tropics than at the poles; this mechanism is not present under G1 conditions, so the reduction in dry static energy transport due to a weakened equator-to-pole temperature gradient leads to weaker energy transport overall. Changes in cross-equatorial MSE transport in G1, meanwhile, are anticorrelated with shifts in the ITCZ. The northward ITCZ shift in G1 is 0.14 degrees in the multi-model mean and ranges from -0.33 to 0.89 degrees between the models. We examine the specific forcing and feedback terms responsible for changes in MSE transport in G1 by running experiments with a moist energy balance model. This work will help identify the largest sources of uncertainty regarding ITCZ shifts under solar geoengineering, and will help improve our understanding of the reasons for the residual polar amplification that occurs in the G1 experiment.

Gene expression of porcine blastocysts from gilts fed organic or inorganic selenium and pyridoxine.

PubMed

Dalto, B D; Tsoi, S; Audet, I; Dyck, M K; Foxcroft, G R; Matte, J J

2015-01-01

In this study, we determined how maternal dietary supplementation with pyridoxine combined with different sources of selenium (Se) affected global gene expression of porcine expanded blastocysts (PEB) during pregnancy. Eighteen gilts were randomly assigned to one of the three experimental diets (n=6 per treatment): i) basal diet without supplemental Se or pyridoxine (CONT); ii) CONT+0.3 mg/kg of Na-selenite and 10 mg/kg of HCl-pyridoxine (MSeB610); and iii) CONT+0.3 mg/kg of Se-enriched yeast and 10 mg/kg of HCl-pyridoxine (OSeB610). All gilts were inseminated at their fifth post-pubertal estrus and killed 5 days later for embryo harvesting. A porcine embryo-specific microarray was used to detect differentially gene expression between MSeB610 vs CONT, OSeB610 vs CONT, and OSeB610 vs MSeB610. CONT gilts had lower whole blood Se and erythrocyte pyridoxal-5-P concentrations than supplemented gilts (P<0.05). No treatment effect was observed on blood plasma Se-glutathione peroxidase activity (P=0.57). There were 10, 247, and 96 differentially expressed genes for MSeB610 vs CONT, OSeB610 vs CONT, and OSeB610 vs MSeB610 respectively. No specific biological process was associated with MSeB610 vs CONT. However, for OSeB610 vs CONT, upregulated genes were related with global protein synthesis but not to selenoproteins. The stimulation of some genes related with monooxygenase and thioredoxin families was confirmed by quantitative real-time RT-PCR. In conclusion, OSeB610 affects PEB metabolism more markedly than MSeB610. Neither Se sources with pyridoxine influenced the Se-glutathione peroxidase metabolic pathway in the PEB, but OSeB610 selectively stimulated genes involved with antioxidant defense. © 2015 Society for Reproduction and Fertility.

A multi-species exchange model for fully fluctuating polymer field theory simulations.

PubMed

Düchs, Dominik; Delaney, Kris T; Fredrickson, Glenn H

2014-11-07

Field-theoretic models have been used extensively to study the phase behavior of inhomogeneous polymer melts and solutions, both in self-consistent mean-field calculations and in numerical simulations of the full theory capturing composition fluctuations. The models commonly used can be grouped into two categories, namely, species models and exchange models. Species models involve integrations of functionals that explicitly depend on fields originating both from species density operators and their conjugate chemical potential fields. In contrast, exchange models retain only linear combinations of the chemical potential fields. In the two-component case, development of exchange models has been instrumental in enabling stable complex Langevin (CL) simulations of the full complex-valued theory. No comparable stable CL approach has yet been established for field theories of the species type. Here, we introduce an extension of the exchange model to an arbitrary number of components, namely, the multi-species exchange (MSE) model, which greatly expands the classes of soft material systems that can be accessed by the complex Langevin simulation technique. We demonstrate the stability and accuracy of the MSE-CL sampling approach using numerical simulations of triblock and tetrablock terpolymer melts, and tetrablock quaterpolymer melts. This method should enable studies of a wide range of fluctuation phenomena in multiblock/multi-species polymer blends and composites.

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

Düchs, Dominik; Delaney, Kris T., E-mail: kdelaney@mrl.ucsb.edu; Fredrickson, Glenn H., E-mail: ghf@mrl.ucsb.edu

Field-theoretic models have been used extensively to study the phase behavior of inhomogeneous polymer melts and solutions, both in self-consistent mean-field calculations and in numerical simulations of the full theory capturing composition fluctuations. The models commonly used can be grouped into two categories, namely, species models and exchange models. Species models involve integrations of functionals that explicitly depend on fields originating both from species density operators and their conjugate chemical potential fields. In contrast, exchange models retain only linear combinations of the chemical potential fields. In the two-component case, development of exchange models has been instrumental in enabling stable complexmore » Langevin (CL) simulations of the full complex-valued theory. No comparable stable CL approach has yet been established for field theories of the species type. Here, we introduce an extension of the exchange model to an arbitrary number of components, namely, the multi-species exchange (MSE) model, which greatly expands the classes of soft material systems that can be accessed by the complex Langevin simulation technique. We demonstrate the stability and accuracy of the MSE-CL sampling approach using numerical simulations of triblock and tetrablock terpolymer melts, and tetrablock quaterpolymer melts. This method should enable studies of a wide range of fluctuation phenomena in multiblock/multi-species polymer blends and composites.« less

Development of LRFD resistance factors for mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls : [technical summary].

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-12-01

Bridge approach embankments and many other : transportation-related applications make use of : reinforced earth retaining structures. Mechanically : Stabilized Earth (MSE) walls are designed under : the Load and Resistance Factor Design (LRFD) : meth...

Performance assessment of MSE abutment walls in Indiana : final report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-05-01

This report presents a numerical investigation of the behavior of steel strip-reinforced mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) direct bridge abutments under static loading. Finite element simulations were performed using an advanced two-surface boundin...

MYB transcription factor gene involved in sex determination in Asparagus officinalis.

PubMed

Murase, Kohji; Shigenobu, Shuji; Fujii, Sota; Ueda, Kazuki; Murata, Takanori; Sakamoto, Ai; Wada, Yuko; Yamaguchi, Katsushi; Osakabe, Yuriko; Osakabe, Keishi; Kanno, Akira; Ozaki, Yukio; Takayama, Seiji

2017-01-01

Dioecy is a plant mating system in which individuals of a species are either male or female. Although many flowering plants evolved independently from hermaphroditism to dioecy, the molecular mechanism underlying this transition remains largely unknown. Sex determination in the dioecious plant Asparagus officinalis is controlled by X and Y chromosomes; the male and female karyotypes are XY and XX, respectively. Transcriptome analysis of A. officinalis buds showed that a MYB-like gene, Male Specific Expression 1 (MSE1), is specifically expressed in males. MSE1 exhibits tight linkage with the Y chromosome, specific expression in early anther development and loss of function on the X chromosome. Knockout of the MSE1 orthologue in Arabidopsis induces male sterility. Thus, MSE1 acts in sex determination in A. officinalis. © 2016 Molecular Biology Society of Japan and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.

Capacity and optimal collusion attack channels for Gaussian fingerprinting games

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Ying; Moulin, Pierre

2007-02-01

In content fingerprinting, the same media covertext - image, video, audio, or text - is distributed to many users. A fingerprint, a mark unique to each user, is embedded into each copy of the distributed covertext. In a collusion attack, two or more users may combine their copies in an attempt to "remove" their fingerprints and forge a pirated copy. To trace the forgery back to members of the coalition, we need fingerprinting codes that can reliably identify the fingerprints of those members. Researchers have been focusing on designing or testing fingerprints for Gaussian host signals and the mean square error (MSE) distortion under some classes of collusion attacks, in terms of the detector's error probability in detecting collusion members. For example, under the assumptions of Gaussian fingerprints and Gaussian attacks (the fingerprinted signals are averaged and then the result is passed through a Gaussian test channel), Moulin and Briassouli1 derived optimal strategies in a game-theoretic framework that uses the detector's error probability as the performance measure for a binary decision problem (whether a user participates in the collusion attack or not); Stone2 and Zhao et al. 3 studied average and other non-linear collusion attacks for Gaussian-like fingerprints; Wang et al. 4 stated that the average collusion attack is the most efficient one for orthogonal fingerprints; Kiyavash and Moulin 5 derived a mathematical proof of the optimality of the average collusion attack under some assumptions. In this paper, we also consider Gaussian cover signals, the MSE distortion, and memoryless collusion attacks. We do not make any assumption about the fingerprinting codes used other than an embedding distortion constraint. Also, our only assumptions about the attack channel are an expected distortion constraint, a memoryless constraint, and a fairness constraint. That is, the colluders are allowed to use any arbitrary nonlinear strategy subject to the above constraints. Under those constraints on the fingerprint embedder and the colluders, fingerprinting capacity is obtained as the solution of a mutual-information game involving probability density functions (pdf's) designed by the embedder and the colluders. We show that the optimal fingerprinting strategy is a Gaussian test channel where the fingerprinted signal is the sum of an attenuated version of the cover signal plus a Gaussian information-bearing noise, and the optimal collusion strategy is to average fingerprinted signals possessed by all the colluders and pass the averaged copy through a Gaussian test channel. The capacity result and the optimal strategies are the same for both the private and public games. In the former scenario, the original covertext is available to the decoder, while in the latter setup, the original covertext is available to the encoder but not to the decoder.

Log-normal distribution from a process that is not multiplicative but is additive.

PubMed

Mouri, Hideaki

2013-10-01

The central limit theorem ensures that a sum of random variables tends to a Gaussian distribution as their total number tends to infinity. However, for a class of positive random variables, we find that the sum tends faster to a log-normal distribution. Although the sum tends eventually to a Gaussian distribution, the distribution of the sum is always close to a log-normal distribution rather than to any Gaussian distribution if the summands are numerous enough. This is in contrast to the current consensus that any log-normal distribution is due to a product of random variables, i.e., a multiplicative process, or equivalently to nonlinearity of the system. In fact, the log-normal distribution is also observable for a sum, i.e., an additive process that is typical of linear systems. We show conditions for such a sum, an analytical example, and an application to random scalar fields such as those of turbulence.

MSE wall void repair effect on corrosion of reinforcement - phase 2 : specialty fill materials.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-08-01

This project provided information and recommendations for material selection for best : corrosion control of reinforcement in mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls with void repairs. The : investigation consisted of small- and large-scale experim...

Modeling and analysis to quantify MSE wall behavior and performance.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-08-01

To better understand potential sources of adverse performance of mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls, a suite of analytical models was studied using the computer program FLAC, a numerical modeling computer program widely used in geotechnical en...

Assessing corrosion of MSE wall reinforcement.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2010-09-01

The primary objective of this study was to extract reinforcement coupons from select MSE walls and document the extent of corrosion. In doing this, a baseline has been established against which coupons extracted in the future can be compared. A secon...

Automated Engineering Design (AED); An approach to automated documentation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mcclure, C. W.

1970-01-01

The automated engineering design (AED) is reviewed, consisting of a high level systems programming language, a series of modular precoded subroutines, and a set of powerful software machine tools that effectively automate the production and design of new languages. AED is used primarily for development of problem and user-oriented languages. Software production phases are diagramed, and factors which inhibit effective documentation are evaluated.

ARA type protograph codes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Divsalar, Dariush (Inventor); Abbasfar, Aliazam (Inventor); Jones, Christopher R. (Inventor); Dolinar, Samuel J. (Inventor); Thorpe, Jeremy C. (Inventor); Andrews, Kenneth S. (Inventor); Yao, Kung (Inventor)

2008-01-01

An apparatus and method for encoding low-density parity check codes. Together with a repeater, an interleaver and an accumulator, the apparatus comprises a precoder, thus forming accumulate-repeat-accumulate (ARA codes). Protographs representing various types of ARA codes, including AR3A, AR4A and ARJA codes, are described. High performance is obtained when compared to the performance of current repeat-accumulate (RA) or irregular-repeat-accumulate (IRA) codes.

Secure Communications in CIoT Networks with a Wireless Energy Harvesting Untrusted Relay

PubMed Central

Hu, Hequn; Liao, Xuewen

2017-01-01

The Internet of Things (IoT) represents a bright prospect that a variety of common appliances can connect to one another, as well as with the rest of the Internet, to vastly improve our lives. Unique communication and security challenges have been brought out by the limited hardware, low-complexity, and severe energy constraints of IoT devices. In addition, a severe spectrum scarcity problem has also been stimulated by the use of a large number of IoT devices. In this paper, cognitive IoT (CIoT) is considered where an IoT network works as the secondary system using underlay spectrum sharing. A wireless energy harvesting (EH) node is used as a relay to improve the coverage of an IoT device. However, the relay could be a potential eavesdropper to intercept the IoT device’s messages. This paper considers the problem of secure communication between the IoT device (e.g., sensor) and a destination (e.g., controller) via the wireless EH untrusted relay. Since the destination can be equipped with adequate energy supply, secure schemes based on destination-aided jamming are proposed based on power splitting (PS) and time splitting (TS) policies, called intuitive secure schemes based on PS (Int-PS), precoded secure scheme based on PS (Pre-PS), intuitive secure scheme based on TS (Int-TS) and precoded secure scheme based on TS (Pre-TS), respectively. The secure performances of the proposed schemes are evaluated through the metric of probability of successfully secure transmission (PSST), which represents the probability that the interference constraint of the primary user is satisfied and the secrecy rate is positive. PSST is analyzed for the proposed secure schemes, and the closed form expressions of PSST for Pre-PS and Pre-TS are derived and validated through simulation results. Numerical results show that the precoded secure schemes have better PSST than the intuitive secure schemes under similar power consumption. When the secure schemes based on PS and TS polices have similar PSST, the average transmit power consumption of the secure scheme based on TS is lower. The influences of power splitting and time slitting ratios are also discussed through simulations. PMID:28869540

Discrete Applied Mathematics

DTIC Science & Technology

1993-05-31

program. In paper [28], we give a brief and elementary proof of a result of Hoffman [1952) about approximate solutions to systems, of linear inequalities...UCLA, Vestvood, CA, February 1993. " Linear Problems: Formulation and Solution," International Linear Algebra Society, Pensacola, FL, May 1993. Denise S...thresAold If there is a number h and a linear k-separator w assigning a real number to each vertex so that for any subset S of vertices, the sum of w

An Application of Interactive Computer Graphics to the Study of Inferential Statistics and the General Linear Model

DTIC Science & Technology

1991-09-01

matrix, the Regression Sum of Squares (SSR) and Error Sum of Squares (SSE) are also displayed as a percentage of the Total Sum of Squares ( SSTO ...vector when the student compares the SSR to the SSE. In addition to the plot, the actual values of SSR, SSE, and SSTO are also provided. Figure 3 gives the...Es ainSpace = E 3 Error- Eor Space =n t! L . Pro~cio q Yonto Pro~rct on of Y onto the simaton, pac ror Space SSR SSEL0.20 IV = 14,1 +IErrorI 2 SSTO

Large-Nc masses of light mesons from QCD sum rules for nonlinear radial Regge trajectories

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Afonin, S. S.; Solomko, T. D.

2018-04-01

The large-Nc masses of light vector, axial, scalar and pseudoscalar mesons are calculated from QCD spectral sum rules for a particular ansatz interpolating the radial Regge trajectories. The ansatz includes a linear part plus exponentially degreasing corrections to the meson masses and residues. The form of corrections was proposed some time ago for consistency with analytical structure of Operator Product Expansion of the two-point correlation functions. We revised that original analysis and found the second solution for the proposed sum rules. The given solution describes better the spectrum of vector and axial mesons.

A fuzzy controller with nonlinear control rules is the sum of a global nonlinear controller and a local nonlinear PI-like controller

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ying, Hao

1993-01-01

The fuzzy controllers studied in this paper are the ones that employ N trapezoidal-shaped members for input fuzzy sets, Zadeh fuzzy logic and a centroid defuzzification algorithm for output fuzzy set. The author analytically proves that the structure of the fuzzy controllers is the sum of a global nonlinear controller and a local nonlinear proportional-integral-like controller. If N approaches infinity, the global controller becomes a nonlinear controller while the local controller disappears. If linear control rules are used, the global controller becomes a global two-dimensional multilevel relay which approaches a global linear proportional-integral (PI) controller as N approaches infinity.

Method for extracting long-equivalent wavelength interferometric information

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hochberg, Eric B. (Inventor)

1991-01-01

A process for extracting long-equivalent wavelength interferometric information from a two-wavelength polychromatic or achromatic interferometer. The process comprises the steps of simultaneously recording a non-linear sum of two different frequency visible light interferograms on a high resolution film and then placing the developed film in an optical train for Fourier transformation, low pass spatial filtering and inverse transformation of the film image to produce low spatial frequency fringes corresponding to a long-equivalent wavelength interferogram. The recorded non-linear sum irradiance derived from the two-wavelength interferometer is obtained by controlling the exposure so that the average interferogram irradiance is set at either the noise level threshold or the saturation level threshold of the film.

Assessing multiscale complexity of short heart rate variability series through a model-based linear approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Porta, Alberto; Bari, Vlasta; Ranuzzi, Giovanni; De Maria, Beatrice; Baselli, Giuseppe

2017-09-01

We propose a multiscale complexity (MSC) method assessing irregularity in assigned frequency bands and being appropriate for analyzing the short time series. It is grounded on the identification of the coefficients of an autoregressive model, on the computation of the mean position of the poles generating the components of the power spectral density in an assigned frequency band, and on the assessment of its distance from the unit circle in the complex plane. The MSC method was tested on simulations and applied to the short heart period (HP) variability series recorded during graded head-up tilt in 17 subjects (age from 21 to 54 years, median = 28 years, 7 females) and during paced breathing protocols in 19 subjects (age from 27 to 35 years, median = 31 years, 11 females) to assess the contribution of time scales typical of the cardiac autonomic control, namely in low frequency (LF, from 0.04 to 0.15 Hz) and high frequency (HF, from 0.15 to 0.5 Hz) bands to the complexity of the cardiac regulation. The proposed MSC technique was compared to a traditional model-free multiscale method grounded on information theory, i.e., multiscale entropy (MSE). The approach suggests that the reduction of HP variability complexity observed during graded head-up tilt is due to a regularization of the HP fluctuations in LF band via a possible intervention of sympathetic control and the decrement of HP variability complexity observed during slow breathing is the result of the regularization of the HP variations in both LF and HF bands, thus implying the action of physiological mechanisms working at time scales even different from that of respiration. MSE did not distinguish experimental conditions at time scales larger than 1. Over a short time series MSC allows a more insightful association between cardiac control complexity and physiological mechanisms modulating cardiac rhythm compared to a more traditional tool such as MSE.

Development of LRFD resistance factors for mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-12-01

Over 100 centrifuge tests were conducted to assess Load and Resistance Factor : Design (LRFD) resistance factors for external stability of Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE) walls : founded on granular soils. In the case of sliding stability, the te...

Design parameters and methodology for mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-10-01

Since its appearance in 1970s, mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls have become a majority among all types of retaining walls due to their economics and satisfactory performance. The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) has primarily adopt...

Of Perspectives, Issues, and Politics in Materials Technology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Promisel, Nathan E.

1985-12-01

Recognizing the pervasive importance of materials science and engineering (MSE) to practically every facet of man’s life, this lecture takes a broad view of the origin and technical trends and achievements in MSE, briefly reviewing its history and relationship to society over many millennia, to the present day, with specific examples. Major emphasis, however, is placed on modern MSE as related to current national issues, using as illustrations of the latter natural resources, industry and the economy, research and development, education, and technology transfer. The discussion of these areas leads to consideration of the role of the Federal Government and the importance of and need for a coherent national policy to deal with critical issues, many of which are listed herein. Some important steps by the Government fostering high level coordination as well as cooperation among government, industry, and academe are cited. Having thus illustrated the pervasive and vital impact of MSE on society, and its current esteemed recognition and position of influence, the lecture concludes that in this period of global change — social, economic, and technological — there is a challenge to MSE to respond beneficially to societal needs more than ever before. The opportunity and mechanisms now exist. Greater participation in the public and political arenas, with mutual education, is indicated.

Safety factor profiles from spectral motional Stark effect for ITER applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ko, Jinseok; Chung, Jinil; Wi, Han Min

2017-10-01

Depositions on the first mirror and multiple reflections on the other mirrors in the labyrinth of the optical system in the motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostic for ITER are regarded as one of the main obstacles to overcome. One of the alternatives to the present-day conventional photoelastic-modulation-based MSE principles is the spectroscopic analyses on the motional Stark emissions where either the ratios among individual Stark multiplets or the amount of the Stark split are measured based on precise and accurate atomic data and models to ultimately provide the critical internal constraints in the magnetic equilibrium reconstruction. Equipped with the PEM-based conventional MSE hardware since 2015, the KSTAR MSE diagnostic system is capable of investigating the feasibility of the spectroscopic MSE approach particularly via comparative studies with the PEM approach. Available atomic data and models are used to analyze the beam emission spectra with a high-spectral-resolution spectrometer with a patent-pending dispersion calibration technology. Experimental validation on the atomic data and models is discussed in association with the effect of the existence of mirrors, the Faraday rotation in the relay optics media, and the background polarized light on the measured spectra. Work supported by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning, Korea.

Dietary arginine and linear growth: the Copenhagen School Child Intervention Study.

PubMed

van Vught, Anneke J A H; Dagnelie, Pieter C; Arts, Ilja C W; Froberg, Karsten; Andersen, Lars B; El-Naaman, Bianca; Bugge, Anna; Nielsen, Birgit M; Heitman, Berit L

2013-03-28

The amino acid arginine is a well-known growth hormone (GH) stimulator and GH is an important modulator of linear growth. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of dietary arginine on growth velocity in children between 7 and 13 years of age. Data from the Copenhagen School Child Intervention Study during 2001-2 (baseline), and at 3-year and 7-year follow-up, were used. Arginine intake was estimated via a 7 d precoded food diary at baseline and 3-year follow-up. Data were analysed in a multilevel structure in which children were embedded within schools. Random intercept and slopes were defined to estimate the association between arginine intake and growth velocity, including the following covariates: sex; age; baseline height; energy intake; puberty stage at 7-year follow-up and intervention/control group. The association between arginine intake and growth velocity was significant for the third and fourth quintile of arginine intake (2.5-2.8 and 2.8-3.2 g/d, respectively) compared with the first quintile ( < 2.2 g/d) (P for trend = 0.04). Protein intake (excluding arginine) was significantly associated with growth velocity; however, the association was weaker than the association between arginine intake and growth velocity (P for trend = 0.14). The results of the present study suggest a dose-dependent physiological role of habitual protein intake, and specifically arginine intake, on linear growth in normally growing children. However, since the study was designed in healthy children, we cannot firmly conclude whether arginine supplementation represents a relevant clinical strategy. Further research is needed to investigate whether dietary arginine may represent a nutritional strategy potentially advantageous for the prevention and treatment of short stature.

Non-linear analytic and coanalytic problems ( L_p-theory, Clifford analysis, examples)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dubinskii, Yu A.; Osipenko, A. S.

2000-02-01

Two kinds of new mathematical model of variational type are put forward: non-linear analytic and coanalytic problems. The formulation of these non-linear boundary-value problems is based on a decomposition of the complete scale of Sobolev spaces into the "orthogonal" sum of analytic and coanalytic subspaces. A similar decomposition is considered in the framework of Clifford analysis. Explicit examples are presented.

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

Dubrovsky, V. G.; Topovsky, A. V.

New exact solutions, nonstationary and stationary, of Veselov-Novikov (VN) equation in the forms of simple nonlinear and linear superpositions of arbitrary number N of exact special solutions u{sup (n)}, n= 1, Horizontal-Ellipsis , N are constructed via Zakharov and Manakov {partial_derivative}-dressing method. Simple nonlinear superpositions are represented up to a constant by the sums of solutions u{sup (n)} and calculated by {partial_derivative}-dressing on nonzero energy level of the first auxiliary linear problem, i.e., 2D stationary Schroedinger equation. It is remarkable that in the zero energy limit simple nonlinear superpositions convert to linear ones in the form of the sums ofmore » special solutions u{sup (n)}. It is shown that the sums u=u{sup (k{sub 1})}+...+u{sup (k{sub m})}, 1 Less-Than-Or-Slanted-Equal-To k{sub 1} < k{sub 2} < Horizontal-Ellipsis < k{sub m} Less-Than-Or-Slanted-Equal-To N of arbitrary subsets of these solutions are also exact solutions of VN equation. The presented exact solutions include as superpositions of special line solitons and also superpositions of plane wave type singular periodic solutions. By construction these exact solutions represent also new exact transparent potentials of 2D stationary Schroedinger equation and can serve as model potentials for electrons in planar structures of modern electronics.« less

Automatic Classification of Artifactual ICA-Components for Artifact Removal in EEG Signals

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background Artifacts contained in EEG recordings hamper both, the visual interpretation by experts as well as the algorithmic processing and analysis (e.g. for Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCI) or for Mental State Monitoring). While hand-optimized selection of source components derived from Independent Component Analysis (ICA) to clean EEG data is widespread, the field could greatly profit from automated solutions based on Machine Learning methods. Existing ICA-based removal strategies depend on explicit recordings of an individual's artifacts or have not been shown to reliably identify muscle artifacts. Methods We propose an automatic method for the classification of general artifactual source components. They are estimated by TDSEP, an ICA method that takes temporal correlations into account. The linear classifier is based on an optimized feature subset determined by a Linear Programming Machine (LPM). The subset is composed of features from the frequency-, the spatial- and temporal domain. A subject independent classifier was trained on 640 TDSEP components (reaction time (RT) study, n = 12) that were hand labeled by experts as artifactual or brain sources and tested on 1080 new components of RT data of the same study. Generalization was tested on new data from two studies (auditory Event Related Potential (ERP) paradigm, n = 18; motor imagery BCI paradigm, n = 80) that used data with different channel setups and from new subjects. Results Based on six features only, the optimized linear classifier performed on level with the inter-expert disagreement (<10% Mean Squared Error (MSE)) on the RT data. On data of the auditory ERP study, the same pre-calculated classifier generalized well and achieved 15% MSE. On data of the motor imagery paradigm, we demonstrate that the discriminant information used for BCI is preserved when removing up to 60% of the most artifactual source components. Conclusions We propose a universal and efficient classifier of ICA components for the subject independent removal of artifacts from EEG data. Based on linear methods, it is applicable for different electrode placements and supports the introspection of results. Trained on expert ratings of large data sets, it is not restricted to the detection of eye- and muscle artifacts. Its performance and generalization ability is demonstrated on data of different EEG studies. PMID:21810266

Interaction between drilled shaft and mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) wall : technical report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-04-01

Drilled shafts are being constructed within the reinforced zone of mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls especially in the case of overpass bridges where the drilled shafts carry the bridge deck or traffic signs. The interaction between the drill...

Pullout resistance of mechanically stabilized earth wall steel strip reinforcement in uniform aggregate.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-11-01

A wide range of reinforcement-backfill combinations have been used in mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls. Steel : strips are one type of reinforcement used to stabilize aggregate backfill through anchorage. In the current MSE wall design, pull...

0-6716 : design parameters and methodology for mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-08-01

Since their appearance in the 1970s, mechanically : stabilized earth (MSE) walls have become a majority : among all types of retaining walls due to their economics : and satisfactory performance. The Texas Department of : Transportation (TxDOT) has p...

Evaluation of geofabric in undercut on MSE wall stability.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-04-01

Compaction of granular base materials at sites with fine grained native soils often causes unwanted : material loss due to penetration at the base. In 2007, ODOT began placing geotextile fabrics in the : undercut of MSE walls at the interface of the ...

Ginkgo biloba for Preventing Cognitive Decline in Older Adults

PubMed Central

Snitz, Beth E.; O'Meara, Ellen S.; Carlson, Michelle C.; Arnold, Alice M.; Ives, Diane G.; Rapp, Stephen R.; Saxton, Judith; Lopez, Oscar L.; Dunn, Leslie O.; Sink, Kaycee M.; DeKosky, Steven T.

2010-01-01

Context The herbal product Ginkgo biloba is taken frequently with the intention of improving cognitive health in aging. However, evidence from adequately powered clinical trials is lacking regarding its effect on long-term cognitive functioning. Objective To determine whether G biloba slows the rates of global or domain-specific cognitive decline in older adults. Design, Setting, and Participants The Ginkgo Evaluation of Memory (GEM) study, a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial of 3069 community-dwelling participants aged 72 to 96 years, conducted in 6 academic medical centers in the United States between 2000 and 2008, with a median follow-up of 6.1 years. Intervention Twice-daily dose of 120-mg extract of G biloba (n=1545) or identical-appearing placebo (n=1524). Main Outcome Measures Rates of change over time in the Modified Mini-Mental State Examination (3MSE), in the cognitive subscale of the Alzheimer Disease Assessment Scale (ADAS-Cog), and in neuropsychological domains of memory, attention, visual-spatial construction, language, and executive functions, based on sums of z scores of individual tests. Results Annual rates of decline in z scores did not differ between G biloba and placebo groups in any domains, including memory (0.043; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.034-0.051 vs 0.041; 95% CI, 0.032-0.050), attention (0.043; 95% CI, 0.037-0.050 vs 0.048; 95% CI, 0.041-0.054), visuospatial abilities (0.107; 95% CI, 0.097-0.117 vs 0.118; 95% CI, 0.108-0.128), language (0.045; 95% CI, 0.037-0.054 vs 0.041; 95% CI, 0.033-0.048), and executive functions (0.092; 95% CI, 0.086-0.099 vs 0.089; 95% CI, 0.082-0.096). For the 3MSE and ADAS-Cog, rates of change varied by baseline cognitive status (mild cognitive impairment), but there were no differences in rates of change between treatment groups (for 3MSE, P=.71; for ADAS-Cog, P=.97). There was no significant effect modification of treatment on rate of decline by age, sex, race, education, APOE*E4 allele, or baseline mild cognitive impairment (P>.05). Conclusion Compared with placebo, the use of G biloba, 120 mg twice daily, did not result in less cognitive decline in older adults with normal cognition or with mild cognitive impairment. Trial Registration clinicaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT00010803 PMID:20040554

Explorative visual analytics on interval-based genomic data and their metadata.

PubMed

Jalili, Vahid; Matteucci, Matteo; Masseroli, Marco; Ceri, Stefano

2017-12-04

With the wide-spreading of public repositories of NGS processed data, the availability of user-friendly and effective tools for data exploration, analysis and visualization is becoming very relevant. These tools enable interactive analytics, an exploratory approach for the seamless "sense-making" of data through on-the-fly integration of analysis and visualization phases, suggested not only for evaluating processing results, but also for designing and adapting NGS data analysis pipelines. This paper presents abstractions for supporting the early analysis of NGS processed data and their implementation in an associated tool, named GenoMetric Space Explorer (GeMSE). This tool serves the needs of the GenoMetric Query Language, an innovative cloud-based system for computing complex queries over heterogeneous processed data. It can also be used starting from any text files in standard BED, BroadPeak, NarrowPeak, GTF, or general tab-delimited format, containing numerical features of genomic regions; metadata can be provided as text files in tab-delimited attribute-value format. GeMSE allows interactive analytics, consisting of on-the-fly cycling among steps of data exploration, analysis and visualization that help biologists and bioinformaticians in making sense of heterogeneous genomic datasets. By means of an explorative interaction support, users can trace past activities and quickly recover their results, seamlessly going backward and forward in the analysis steps and comparative visualizations of heatmaps. GeMSE effective application and practical usefulness is demonstrated through significant use cases of biological interest. GeMSE is available at http://www.bioinformatics.deib.polimi.it/GeMSE/ , and its source code is available at https://github.com/Genometric/GeMSE under GPLv3 open-source license.

Mechanical specific energy versus depth of cut in rock cutting and drilling

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

Zhou, Yaneng; Zhang, Wu; Gamwo, Isaac

The relationship between Mechanical Specific Energy (MSE) and the Rate of Penetration (ROP), or equivalently the depth of cut per revolution, provides an important measure for strategizing a drilling operation. This study explores how MSE evolves with depth of cut, and presents a concerted effort that encompasses analytical, computational and experimental approaches. A simple model for the relationship between MSE and cutting depth is first derived with consideration of the wear progression of a circular cutter. This is an extension of Detournay and Defourny's phenomenological cutting model. Wear is modeled as a flat contact area at the bottom of amore » cutter referred to as a wear flat, and that wear flat in the past is often considered to be fixed during cutting. But during a drilling operation by a full bit that consists of multiple circular cutters, the wear flat length may increase because of various wear mechanisms involved. The wear progression of cutters generally results in reduced efficiency with either increased MSE or decreased ROP. Also, an accurate estimate of removed rock volume is found important for the evaluation of MSE. The derived model is compared with experiment results from a single circular cutter, for cutting soft rock under ambient pressure with actual depth measured through a micrometer, and for cutting high strength rock under high pressure with actual cutting area measured by a confocal microscope. Lastly, the model is employed to interpret the evolution of MSE with depth of cut for a full drilling bit under confining pressure. The general form of equation of the developed model is found to describe well the experiment data and can be applied to interpret the drilling data for a full bit.« less

Mechanical specific energy versus depth of cut in rock cutting and drilling

DOE PAGES

Zhou, Yaneng; Zhang, Wu; Gamwo, Isaac; ...

2017-12-07

The relationship between Mechanical Specific Energy (MSE) and the Rate of Penetration (ROP), or equivalently the depth of cut per revolution, provides an important measure for strategizing a drilling operation. This study explores how MSE evolves with depth of cut, and presents a concerted effort that encompasses analytical, computational and experimental approaches. A simple model for the relationship between MSE and cutting depth is first derived with consideration of the wear progression of a circular cutter. This is an extension of Detournay and Defourny's phenomenological cutting model. Wear is modeled as a flat contact area at the bottom of amore » cutter referred to as a wear flat, and that wear flat in the past is often considered to be fixed during cutting. But during a drilling operation by a full bit that consists of multiple circular cutters, the wear flat length may increase because of various wear mechanisms involved. The wear progression of cutters generally results in reduced efficiency with either increased MSE or decreased ROP. Also, an accurate estimate of removed rock volume is found important for the evaluation of MSE. The derived model is compared with experiment results from a single circular cutter, for cutting soft rock under ambient pressure with actual depth measured through a micrometer, and for cutting high strength rock under high pressure with actual cutting area measured by a confocal microscope. Lastly, the model is employed to interpret the evolution of MSE with depth of cut for a full drilling bit under confining pressure. The general form of equation of the developed model is found to describe well the experiment data and can be applied to interpret the drilling data for a full bit.« less

Algebraic Riccati equations in zero-sum differential games

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johnson, T. L.; Chao, A.

1974-01-01

The procedure for finding the closed-loop Nash equilibrium solution of two-player zero-sum linear time-invariant differential games with quadratic performance criteria and classical information pattern may be reduced in most cases to the solution of an algebraic Riccati equation. Based on the results obtained by Willems, necessary and sufficient conditions for existence of solutions to these equations are derived, and explicit conditions for a scalar example are given.

Evaluation of geofabric in undercut on MSE wall stability : executive summary report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-05-01

Compaction of granular base materials at sites with fine grained native soils often causes unwanted material loss due to penetration. In 2007, ODOT began placing geofabrics in the undercut of MSE walls at the soil/ granular material interface to faci...

Nondestructive evaluation of mechanically stabilized earth walls with frequency-modulated continuous wave (FM-CW) radar.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-06-01

Effective techniques for a nondestructive evaluation of mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls during normal operation : or immediately after an earthquake event are yet to be developed. MSE walls often have a rough surface finishing for the : pur...

Lateral resistance of piles near vertical MSE abutment walls.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-03-01

Full scale lateral load tests were performed on eight piles located at various distances behind MSE walls. The objective of the testing was to determine the effect of spacing from the wall on the lateral resistance of the piles and on the force induc...

RESEARCH STUDIES AT THE GILT EDGE MINE SUPERFUND SITE

EPA Science Inventory

A collaborative effort is being implemented at the Gilt Edge Mine Superfund site near Lead, SD. The partnerships involves the Mine Waste Technology Program (MWTP) with the USEPA's NRMRL, Region VIII Superfund program, the DOE, MSE Technology Application, Inc (MSE) and CDM Federal...

Route 22 Over Liberty Avenue and Conrail Hillside Township, Union County, Monitoring of Tensar MSE Walls

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-12-01

This report discusses the application of Tensar geogrids as the reinforcement elements in the : construction of mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) walls on the Route 22 over Conrail and Liberty : Avenue bridge replacement project in Hillside, NJ. As...

Pullout resistance of mechanically stabilized earth wall steel strip reinforcement in uniform aggregate : [technical summary].

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-11-01

A wide range of reinforcement-backfill combinations have been used in mechanically : stabilized earth (MSE) walls. Steel strips are one type of reinforcement used to stabilize : aggregate backfill through anchorage. In the current MSE wall design, pu...

Optimal Bandwidth for Multitaper Spectrum Estimation

DOE PAGES

Haley, Charlotte L.; Anitescu, Mihai

2017-07-04

A systematic method for bandwidth parameter selection is desired for Thomson multitaper spectrum estimation. We give a method for determining the optimal bandwidth based on a mean squared error (MSE) criterion. When the true spectrum has a second-order Taylor series expansion, one can express quadratic local bias as a function of the curvature of the spectrum, which can be estimated by using a simple spline approximation. This is combined with a variance estimate, obtained by jackknifing over individual spectrum estimates, to produce an estimated MSE for the log spectrum estimate for each choice of time-bandwidth product. The bandwidth that minimizesmore » the estimated MSE then gives the desired spectrum estimate. Additionally, the bandwidth obtained using our method is also optimal for cepstrum estimates. We give an example of a damped oscillatory (Lorentzian) process in which the approximate optimal bandwidth can be written as a function of the damping parameter. Furthermore, the true optimal bandwidth agrees well with that given by minimizing estimated the MSE in these examples.« less

Intelligent fuzzy approach for fast fractal image compression

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nodehi, Ali; Sulong, Ghazali; Al-Rodhaan, Mznah; Al-Dhelaan, Abdullah; Rehman, Amjad; Saba, Tanzila

2014-12-01

Fractal image compression (FIC) is recognized as a NP-hard problem, and it suffers from a high number of mean square error (MSE) computations. In this paper, a two-phase algorithm was proposed to reduce the MSE computation of FIC. In the first phase, based on edge property, range and domains are arranged. In the second one, imperialist competitive algorithm (ICA) is used according to the classified blocks. For maintaining the quality of the retrieved image and accelerating algorithm operation, we divided the solutions into two groups: developed countries and undeveloped countries. Simulations were carried out to evaluate the performance of the developed approach. Promising results thus achieved exhibit performance better than genetic algorithm (GA)-based and Full-search algorithms in terms of decreasing the number of MSE computations. The number of MSE computations was reduced by the proposed algorithm for 463 times faster compared to the Full-search algorithm, although the retrieved image quality did not have a considerable change.

The motional stark effect with laser-induced fluorescence diagnostic

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Foley, E. L.; Levinton, F. M.

2010-05-01

The motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostic is the worldwide standard technique for internal magnetic field pitch angle measurements in magnetized plasmas. Traditionally, it is based on using polarimetry to measure the polarization direction of light emitted from a hydrogenic species in a neutral beam. As the beam passes through the magnetized plasma at a high velocity, in its rest frame it perceives a Lorentz electric field. This field causes the H-alpha emission to be split and polarized. A new technique under development adds laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) to a diagnostic neutral beam (DNB) for an MSE measurement that will enable radially resolved magnetic field magnitude as well as pitch angle measurements in even low-field (<1 T) experiments. An MSE-LIF system will be installed on the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. It will enable reconstructions of the plasma pressure, q-profile and current as well as, in conjunction with the existing MSE system, measurements of radial electric fields.

The multi-spectral line-polarization MSE system on Alcator C-Mod

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

Mumgaard, R. T., E-mail: mumgaard@psfc.mit.edu; Khoury, M.; Scott, S. D.

A multi-spectral line-polarization motional Stark effect (MSE-MSLP) diagnostic has been developed for the Alcator C-Mod tokamak wherein the Stokes vector is measured in multiple wavelength bands simultaneously on the same sightline to enable better polarized background subtraction. A ten-sightline, four wavelength MSE-MSLP detector system was designed, constructed, and qualified. This system consists of a high-throughput polychromator for each sightline designed to provide large étendue and precise spectral filtering in a cost-effective manner. Each polychromator utilizes four narrow bandpass interference filters and four custom large diameter avalanche photodiode detectors. Two filters collect light to the red and blue of the MSEmore » emission spectrum while the remaining two filters collect the beam pi and sigma emission generated at the same viewing volume. The filter wavelengths are temperature tuned using custom ovens in an automated manner. All system functions are remote controllable and the system can be easily retrofitted to existing single-wavelength line-polarization MSE systems.« less

The multi-spectral line-polarization MSE system on Alcator C-Mod

DOE PAGES

Mumgaard, R. T.; Scott, S. D.; Khoury, M.

2016-08-17

A multi-spectral line-polarization motional Stark effect (MSE-MSLP) diagnostic has been developed for the Alcator C-Mod tokamak wherein the Stokes vector is measured in multiple wavelength bands simultaneously on the same sightline to enable better polarized background subtraction. A ten-sightline, four wavelength MSE-MSLP detector system was designed, constructed, and qualified. This system consists of a high-throughput polychromator for each sightline designed to provide large étendue and precise spectral filtering in a cost-effective manner. Each polychromator utilizes four narrow bandpass interference filters and four custom large diameter avalanche photodiode detectors. Two filters collect light to the red and blue of the MSEmore » emission spectrum while the remaining two filters collect the beam pi and sigma emission generated at the same viewing volume. The filter wavelengths are temperature tuned using custom ovens in an automated manner. Furthermore, all system functions are remote controllable and the system can be easily retrofitted to existing single-wavelength line-polarization MSE systems.« less

A happiness degree predictor using the conceptual data structure for deep learning architectures.

PubMed

Pérez-Benito, Francisco Javier; Villacampa-Fernández, Patricia; Conejero, J Alberto; García-Gómez, Juan M; Navarro-Pardo, Esperanza

2017-11-13

Happiness is a universal fundamental human goal. Since the emergence of Positive Psychology, a major focus in psychological research has been to study the role of certain factors in the prediction of happiness. The conventional methodologies are based on linear relationships, such as the commonly used Multivariate Linear Regression (MLR), which may suffer from the lack of representative capacity to the varied psychological features. Using Deep Neural Networks (DNN), we define a Happiness Degree Predictor (H-DP) based on the answers to five psychometric standardized questionnaires. A Data-Structure driven architecture for DNNs (D-SDNN) is proposed for defining a HDP in which the network architecture enables the conceptual interpretation of psychological factors associated to happiness. Four different neural network configurations have been tested, varying the number of neurons and the presence or absence of bias in the hidden layers. Two metrics for evaluating the influence of conceptual dimensions have been defined and computed: one quantifies the influence weight of the conceptual dimension in absolute terms and the other one pinpoints the direction (positive or negative) of the influence. A cross-sectional survey targeting non-institutionalized adult population residing in Spain was completed by 823 cases. The total of 111 elements of the survey are grouped by socio-demographic data and by five psychometric scales (Brief COPE Inventory, EPQR-A, GHQ-28, MOS-SSS and SDHS) measuring several psychological factors acting one as the outcome (SDHS) and the four others as predictors. Our D-SDNN approach provided a better outcome (MSE: 1.46·10 -2 ) than MLR (MSE: 2.30·10 -2 ), hence improving by 37% the predictive accuracy, and allowing to simulate the conceptual structure. We observe a better performance of Deep Neural Networks (DNN) with respect to traditional methodologies. This demonstrates its capability to capture the conceptual structure for predicting happiness degree through psychological variables assessed by standardized questionnaires. It also permits to estimate the influence of each factor on the outcome without assuming a linear relationship. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Effect of plantain banana on gastric ulceration in NIDDM rats: role of gastric mucosal glycoproteins, cell proliferation, antioxidants and free radicals.

PubMed

Mohan Kumar, M; Joshi, M C; Prabha, T; Dorababu, M; Goel, R K

2006-04-01

Methanolic extract of Musa sapientum var. Paradisiaca (MSE, 100 mg/kg) was studied for its antiulcer and mucosal defensive factors in normal and non-insulin dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) rats. NIDDM was induced by administering streptozotocin (STZ, 70 mg/kg, ip) to 5 days old rat pups. The animals showing blood glucose level >140mg/dL after 12 weeks of STZ administration were considered as NIDDM positive. Effects of MSE were compared with known ulcer protective drug, sucralfate (SFT, 500 mg/kg) and anti-diabetic drug glibenclamide (GLC, 0.6 mg/kg) when administered orally, once daily for 6 days against gastric ulcers (GU) induced by cold-restraint stress (CRS) and ethanol and subsequent changes in gastric mucosal glycoproteins, cell proliferation, free radicals (lipid peroxidation and nitric oxide) and anti-oxidants enzymes (super oxide dismutase and catalase) and glutathione (GSH) levels. MSE showed better ulcer protective effect in NIDDM rats compared with SFT and GLC in CRS-induced GU. NIDDM caused a significant decrease in gastric mucosal glycoprotein level without having any effect on cell proliferation. However, all the test drugs reversed the decrease in glycoprotein level in NIDDM rats, but cell proliferation was enhanced in case of MSE alone. Both CRS or NIDDM as such enhanced gastric mucosal LPO, NO and SOD, but decreased CAT levels while CRS plus NIDDM rats caused further increase in LPO and NO level without causing any further changes in SOD and CAT level. MSE pretreatment showed reversal in the levels of all the above parameters better than GLC. Ethanol caused a decrease in glutathione level which was further reduced in NIDDM-ethanol rats. MSE reversed the above changes significantly in both normal as well as in NIDDM rats, while GLC reversed it only in NIDDM rats. However, SFT was ineffective in reversing the changes induced by CRS or ethanol or when given in NIDDM-CRS or NIDDM-ethanol rats. The results indicated that the ulcer protective effect of MSE could be due to its predominant effect on mucosal glycoprotein, cell proliferation, free radicals and antioxidant systems.

The modulation of EEG variability between internally- and externally-driven cognitive states varies with maturation and task performance

PubMed Central

Willatt, Stephanie E.; Cortese, Filomeno; Protzner, Andrea B.

2017-01-01

Increasing evidence suggests that brain signal variability is an important measure of brain function reflecting information processing capacity and functional integrity. In this study, we examined how maturation from childhood to adulthood affects the magnitude and spatial extent of state-to-state transitions in brain signal variability, and how this relates to cognitive performance. We looked at variability changes between resting-state and task (a symbol-matching task with three levels of difficulty), and within trial (fixation, post-stimulus, and post-response). We calculated variability with multiscale entropy (MSE), and additionally examined spectral power density (SPD) from electroencephalography (EEG) in children aged 8–14, and in adults aged 18–33. Our results suggest that maturation is characterized by increased local information processing (higher MSE at fine temporal scales) and decreased long-range interactions with other neural populations (lower MSE at coarse temporal scales). Children show MSE changes that are similar in magnitude, but greater in spatial extent when transitioning between internally- and externally-driven brain states. Additionally, we found that in children, greater changes in task difficulty were associated with greater magnitude of modulation in MSE. Our results suggest that the interplay between maturational and state-to-state changes in brain signal variability manifest across different spatial and temporal scales, and influence information processing capacity in the brain. PMID:28750035

Orthogonal Regression: A Teaching Perspective

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Carr, James R.

2012-01-01

A well-known approach to linear least squares regression is that which involves minimizing the sum of squared orthogonal projections of data points onto the best fit line. This form of regression is known as orthogonal regression, and the linear model that it yields is known as the major axis. A similar method, reduced major axis regression, is…

On the null distribution of Bayes factors in linear regression

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

We show that under the null, the 2 log (Bayes factor) is asymptotically distributed as a weighted sum of chi-squared random variables with a shifted mean. This claim holds for Bayesian multi-linear regression with a family of conjugate priors, namely, the normal-inverse-gamma prior, the g-prior, and...

Is social interaction associated with alcohol consumption in Uganda?

PubMed

Tumwesigye, Nazarius Mbona; Kasirye, Rogers; Nansubuga, Elizabeth

2009-07-01

Little is documented about the association of alcohol consumption and social interaction in Uganda, a country with one of the highest per capita alcohol consumptions in the world. This paper describes the pattern of social interaction by sex and establishes the relationship between social interaction and alcohol consumption with and without the consideration of confounders. The data used had 1479 records and were collected in a survey in 2003. The study was part of a multinational study on Gender, Alcohol, and Culture International Study (GENACIS). Each question on social interaction had been pre-coded in a way that quantified the extent of social interaction. The sum of responses on interaction questions gave a summative score which was used to compute summary indices on social interaction. Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to identify the best combination of variables for a social interaction index. The index was computed by a prediction using a PCA model developed from the selected variables. The index was categorised into quintiles and used in bivariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis of alcohol consumption and social interaction. The stronger the social interaction the more the likelihood of taking alcohol frequently (chi(trend)(2)=4.72, p<0.001). The strength of the association remains significant even after controlling for sex, age group and education level (p=0.008). The strength of relationship between social interaction and heavy consumption of alcohol gets weak in multivariate analysis. Communication messages meant to improve health, well-being and public order need to incorporate dangers of negative influence of social interaction.

Improving Marine Corps Assignment of SDAP Levels

DTIC Science & Technology

2013-03-01

Nettles , Colonel, USMC, M&RA (MPO). 15 Information Paper SDAP. 17 for a job or being able to fill the position at all, in addition to the potential to...Total 7850672.93 60132 130.557323 Root MSE = 6.2241... Root MSE = .26638 Adj R-squared = 0.0097 Residual 4577.29534 64507 .070958118

Sparse Regression as a Sparse Eigenvalue Problem

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Moghaddam, Baback; Gruber, Amit; Weiss, Yair; Avidan, Shai

2008-01-01

We extend the l0-norm "subspectral" algorithms for sparse-LDA [5] and sparse-PCA [6] to general quadratic costs such as MSE in linear (kernel) regression. The resulting "Sparse Least Squares" (SLS) problem is also NP-hard, by way of its equivalence to a rank-1 sparse eigenvalue problem (e.g., binary sparse-LDA [7]). Specifically, for a general quadratic cost we use a highly-efficient technique for direct eigenvalue computation using partitioned matrix inverses which leads to dramatic x103 speed-ups over standard eigenvalue decomposition. This increased efficiency mitigates the O(n4) scaling behaviour that up to now has limited the previous algorithms' utility for high-dimensional learning problems. Moreover, the new computation prioritizes the role of the less-myopic backward elimination stage which becomes more efficient than forward selection. Similarly, branch-and-bound search for Exact Sparse Least Squares (ESLS) also benefits from partitioned matrix inverse techniques. Our Greedy Sparse Least Squares (GSLS) generalizes Natarajan's algorithm [9] also known as Order-Recursive Matching Pursuit (ORMP). Specifically, the forward half of GSLS is exactly equivalent to ORMP but more efficient. By including the backward pass, which only doubles the computation, we can achieve lower MSE than ORMP. Experimental comparisons to the state-of-the-art LARS algorithm [3] show forward-GSLS is faster, more accurate and more flexible in terms of choice of regularization

Self-Encoded Spread Spectrum Modulation for Robust Anti-Jamming Communication

DTIC Science & Technology

2009-06-30

experience in both theoretical and experimental aspects of RF and optical communications, multi-user CDMA systems, transmitter precoding and code...the performance of DS - and FH-SESS modulation in the presence of worst-case jamming, develop innovative SESS schemes that further exploit time and...Determine BER and AJ performance of the feedback and iterative detectors in DS -SESS under pulsed-noise and multi-tone jamming • Task 2: Develop a scheme

Complexity analysis of brain activity in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: A multiscale entropy analysis.

PubMed

Chenxi, Li; Chen, Yanni; Li, Youjun; Wang, Jue; Liu, Tian

2016-06-01

The multiscale entropy (MSE) is a novel method for quantifying the intrinsic dynamical complexity of physiological systems over several scales. To evaluate this method as a promising way to explore the neural mechanisms in ADHD, we calculated the MSE in EEG activity during the designed task. EEG data were collected from 13 outpatient boys with a confirmed diagnosis of ADHD and 13 age- and gender-matched normal control children during their doing multi-source interference task (MSIT). We estimated the MSE by calculating the sample entropy values of delta, theta, alpha and beta frequency bands over twenty time scales using coarse-grained procedure. The results showed increased complexity of EEG data in delta and theta frequency bands and decreased complexity in alpha frequency bands in ADHD children. The findings of this study revealed aberrant neural connectivity of kids with ADHD during interference task. The results showed that MSE method may be a new index to identify and understand the neural mechanism of ADHD. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Venn, Kim; Starkenburg, Else; Martin, Nicolas; Kielty, Collin; Youakim, Kris; Arnetsen, Anke

2018-06-01

The Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) is an ambitious project to transform the Canada-France-Hawaii 3.6-metre telescope into an 11.25-metre facility dedicated to wide field multi-object spectroscopy. Following a successful conceptual design review of ten subsystems and the systems-level review in January 2018, MSE is preparing to move into the Preliminary Design Phase. MSE will simultaneously deploy over 3000 fibers that feed low/medium resolution spectrometers and 1000 fibers that feed high-resolution (R~40,000) spectrometers. This design is expected to revolutionize astrophysical studies requiring large spectroscopic datasets: i.e., reconstructing the Milky Way's formation history through the chemical tagging of stars, searches for the effects of dark matter on stellar streams, determination of environmental influences on galaxy formation since cosmic noon, measuring black hole masses through repeat spectroscopy of quasars, follow-up of large samples identified in other surveys (Gaia, LSST, SKA, etc.), and more. MSE will reuse a large fraction of CFHT’s existing facilities while tripling the diameter of the telescope’s primary mirror and increasing the height of the enclosure by only 10%. I will discuss the progress to date and opportunities for partnerships.

Influence of non-local thermodynamic equilibrium and Zeeman effects on magnetic equilibrium reconstruction using spectral motional Stark effect diagnostic

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Reimer, R.; Marchuk, O.; Geiger, B.; Mc Carthy, P. J.; Dunne, M.; Hobirk, J.; Wolf, R.; ASDEX Upgrade Team

2017-08-01

The Motional Stark Effect (MSE) diagnostic is a well established technique to infer the local internal magnetic field in fusion plasmas. In this paper, the existing forward model which describes the MSE data is extended by the Zeeman effect, fine-structure, and relativistic corrections in the interpretation of the MSE spectra for different experimental conditions at the tokamak ASDEX Upgrade. The contribution of the non-Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium (non-LTE) populations among the magnetic sub-levels and the Zeeman effect on the derived plasma parameters is different. The obtained pitch angle is changed by 3 ° … 4 ° and by 0 . 5 ° … 1 ° including the non-LTE and the Zeeman effects into the standard statistical MSE model. The total correction is about 4°. Moreover, the variation of the magnetic field strength is significantly changed by 2.2% due to the Zeeman effect only. While the data on the derived pitch angle still could not be tested against the other diagnostics, the results from an equilibrium reconstruction solver confirm the obtained values for magnetic field strength.

Exploitation of high resolution beam spectroscopy diagnostics on MAST

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Michael, Clive; Debock, Maarten; Conway, Neil; Akers, Rob; Appel, Lynton; Field, Anthony; Walsh, Mike; Wisse, Marco

2009-11-01

Recent developments in beam spectroscopy on MAST, including CXRS, MSE and a pilot FIDA system have revealed new information about phenomena such as ITBs, MHD instabilities, transport and fast particle physics. For example, ITBs in the ion temperature and toroidal rotation have been observed with the 64ch CXRS system, while reverse-shear q profiles have been observed with the recently commissioned 35ch MSE system. Thus, the synergy of these diagnostics helps us to understand, among other things, the role of magnetic and rotational shear on ITBs. MSE measurements have also helped to understand MHD phenomena such as locked modes (characterized by changes in toroidal momentum, revealed by CXRS), sawteeth, and internal reconnection events. Finally, the temporal/spatial resolution and SNR of the MSE system have been exploited. Interesting results include the detection of low frequency (˜2kHz) magnetic field fluctuations, characterization of the radial structure of higher frequency (<100kHz) broadband and coherent density (BES) fluctuations, and the identification of short scale length features (˜1.8cm) in the current profile near the edge pedestal.

Hyperstaticity and loops in frictional granular packings

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tordesillas, Antoinette; Lam, Edward; Metzger, Philip T.

2009-06-01

The hyperstatic nature of granular packings of perfectly rigid disks is analyzed algebraically and through numerical simulation. The elementary loops of grains emerge as a fundamental element in addressing hyperstaticity. Loops consisting of an odd number of grains behave differently than those with an even number. For odd loops, the latent stresses are exterior and are characterized by the sum of frictional forces around each loop. For even loops, the latent stresses are interior and are characterized by the alternating sum of frictional forces around each loop. The statistics of these two types of loop sums are found to be Gibbsian with a "temperature" that is linear with the friction coefficient μ when μ<1.

Sum rules for the uniform-background model of an atomic-sharp metal corner

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Streitenberger, P.

1994-04-01

Analytical results are derived for the electrostatic potential of an atomic-sharp 90° metal corner in the uniform-background model. The electrostatic potential at a free jellium edge and the jellium corner, respectively, is determined exactly in terms of the energy per electron of the uniform electron gas integrated over the background density. The surface energy, the edge formation energy and the derivative of the corner formation energy with respect to the background density are given as integrals over the electrostatic potential. The present approach represents a novel approach to such sum rules, inclusive of the Budd-Vannimenus sum rules for a free jellium surface, based on general properties of linear response functions.

PAnalyzer: a software tool for protein inference in shotgun proteomics.

PubMed

Prieto, Gorka; Aloria, Kerman; Osinalde, Nerea; Fullaondo, Asier; Arizmendi, Jesus M; Matthiesen, Rune

2012-11-05

Protein inference from peptide identifications in shotgun proteomics must deal with ambiguities that arise due to the presence of peptides shared between different proteins, which is common in higher eukaryotes. Recently data independent acquisition (DIA) approaches have emerged as an alternative to the traditional data dependent acquisition (DDA) in shotgun proteomics experiments. MSE is the term used to name one of the DIA approaches used in QTOF instruments. MSE data require specialized software to process acquired spectra and to perform peptide and protein identifications. However the software available at the moment does not group the identified proteins in a transparent way by taking into account peptide evidence categories. Furthermore the inspection, comparison and report of the obtained results require tedious manual intervention. Here we report a software tool to address these limitations for MSE data. In this paper we present PAnalyzer, a software tool focused on the protein inference process of shotgun proteomics. Our approach considers all the identified proteins and groups them when necessary indicating their confidence using different evidence categories. PAnalyzer can read protein identification files in the XML output format of the ProteinLynx Global Server (PLGS) software provided by Waters Corporation for their MSE data, and also in the mzIdentML format recently standardized by HUPO-PSI. Multiple files can also be read simultaneously and are considered as technical replicates. Results are saved to CSV, HTML and mzIdentML (in the case of a single mzIdentML input file) files. An MSE analysis of a real sample is presented to compare the results of PAnalyzer and ProteinLynx Global Server. We present a software tool to deal with the ambiguities that arise in the protein inference process. Key contributions are support for MSE data analysis by ProteinLynx Global Server and technical replicates integration. PAnalyzer is an easy to use multiplatform and free software tool.

PAnalyzer: A software tool for protein inference in shotgun proteomics

PubMed Central

2012-01-01

Background Protein inference from peptide identifications in shotgun proteomics must deal with ambiguities that arise due to the presence of peptides shared between different proteins, which is common in higher eukaryotes. Recently data independent acquisition (DIA) approaches have emerged as an alternative to the traditional data dependent acquisition (DDA) in shotgun proteomics experiments. MSE is the term used to name one of the DIA approaches used in QTOF instruments. MSE data require specialized software to process acquired spectra and to perform peptide and protein identifications. However the software available at the moment does not group the identified proteins in a transparent way by taking into account peptide evidence categories. Furthermore the inspection, comparison and report of the obtained results require tedious manual intervention. Here we report a software tool to address these limitations for MSE data. Results In this paper we present PAnalyzer, a software tool focused on the protein inference process of shotgun proteomics. Our approach considers all the identified proteins and groups them when necessary indicating their confidence using different evidence categories. PAnalyzer can read protein identification files in the XML output format of the ProteinLynx Global Server (PLGS) software provided by Waters Corporation for their MSE data, and also in the mzIdentML format recently standardized by HUPO-PSI. Multiple files can also be read simultaneously and are considered as technical replicates. Results are saved to CSV, HTML and mzIdentML (in the case of a single mzIdentML input file) files. An MSE analysis of a real sample is presented to compare the results of PAnalyzer and ProteinLynx Global Server. Conclusions We present a software tool to deal with the ambiguities that arise in the protein inference process. Key contributions are support for MSE data analysis by ProteinLynx Global Server and technical replicates integration. PAnalyzer is an easy to use multiplatform and free software tool. PMID:23126499

Electrical resisitivity of mechancially stablized earth wall backfill

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Snapp, Michael; Tucker-Kulesza, Stacey; Koehn, Weston

2017-06-01

Mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) retaining walls utilized in transportation projects are typically backfilled with coarse aggregate. One of the current testing procedures to select backfill material for construction of MSE walls is the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials standard T 288: ;Standard Method of Test for Determining Minimum Laboratory Soil Resistivity.; T 288 is designed to test a soil sample's electrical resistivity which correlates to its corrosive potential. The test is run on soil material passing the No. 10 sieve and believed to be inappropriate for coarse aggregate. Therefore, researchers have proposed new methods to measure the electrical resistivity of coarse aggregate samples in the laboratory. There is a need to verify that the proposed methods yield results representative of the in situ conditions; however, no in situ measurement of the electrical resistivity of MSE wall backfill is established. Electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) provides a two-dimensional (2D) profile of the bulk resistivity of backfill material in situ. The objective of this study was to characterize bulk resistivity of in-place MSE wall backfill aggregate using ERT. Five MSE walls were tested via ERT to determine the bulk resistivity of the backfill. Three of the walls were reinforced with polymeric geogrid, one wall was reinforced with metallic strips, and one wall was a gravity retaining wall with no reinforcement. Variability of the measured resistivity distribution within the backfill may be a result of non-uniform particle sizes, thoroughness of compaction, and the presence of water. A quantitative post processing algorithm was developed to calculate mean bulk resistivity of in-situ backfill. Recommendations of the study were that the ERT data be used to verify proposed testing methods for coarse aggregate that are designed to yield data representative of in situ conditions. A preliminary analysis suggests that ERT may be utilized as construction quality assurance for thoroughness of compaction in MSE construction; however more data are needed at this time.

Biochemical characterization and anti-inflammatory properties of an isothiocyanate-enriched moringa (Moringa oleifera) seed extract.

PubMed

Jaja-Chimedza, Asha; Graf, Brittany L; Simmler, Charlotte; Kim, Youjin; Kuhn, Peter; Pauli, Guido F; Raskin, Ilya

2017-01-01

Moringa oleifera Lam. is a tropical plant, used for centuries as food and traditional medicine. The aim of this study was to develop, validate and biochemically characterize an isothiocyanate-enriched moringa seed extract (MSE), and to compare the anti-inflammatory effects of MSE-containing moringa isothiocyanate-1 (MIC-1) with a curcuminoid-enriched turmeric extract (CTE), and a material further enriched in its primary phytochemical, curcumin (curcumin-enriched material; CEM). MSE was prepared by incubating ground moringa seeds with water to allow myrosinase-catalyzed enzymatic formation of bioactive MIC-1, the predominant isothiocyanate in moringa seeds. Optimization of the extraction process yielded an extract of 38.9% MIC-1. Phytochemical analysis of MSE revealed the presence of acetylated isothiocyanates, phenolic glycosides unique to moringa, flavonoids, fats and fatty acids, proteins and carbohydrates. MSE showed a reduction in the carrageenan-induced rat paw edema (33% at 500 mg/kg MIC-1) comparable to aspirin (27% at 300 mg/kg), whereas CTE did not have any significant effect. In vitro, MIC-1 at 1 μM significantly reduced the production of nitric oxide (NO) and at 5 μM, the gene expression of LPS-inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) and interleukins 1β and 6 (IL-1β and IL-6), whereas CEM did not show any significant activity at all concentrations tested. MIC-1 (10μM) was also more effective at upregulating the nuclear factor (erythroid-derived 2)-like 2 (Nrf2) target genes NAD(P)H:quinone oxidoreductase 1 (NQO1), glutathione S-transferase pi 1 (GSTP1), and heme oxygenase 1 (HO1) than the CEM. Thus, in contrast to CTE and CEM, MSE and its major isothiocyanate MIC-1 displayed strong anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties in vivo and in vitro, making them promising botanical leads for the mitigation of inflammatory-mediated chronic disorders.

Biochemical characterization and anti-inflammatory properties of an isothiocyanate-enriched moringa (Moringa oleifera) seed extract

PubMed Central

Simmler, Charlotte; Kim, Youjin; Kuhn, Peter; Pauli, Guido F.; Raskin, Ilya

2017-01-01

Moringa oleifera Lam. is a tropical plant, used for centuries as food and traditional medicine. The aim of this study was to develop, validate and biochemically characterize an isothiocyanate-enriched moringa seed extract (MSE), and to compare the anti-inflammatory effects of MSE-containing moringa isothiocyanate-1 (MIC-1) with a curcuminoid-enriched turmeric extract (CTE), and a material further enriched in its primary phytochemical, curcumin (curcumin-enriched material; CEM). MSE was prepared by incubating ground moringa seeds with water to allow myrosinase-catalyzed enzymatic formation of bioactive MIC-1, the predominant isothiocyanate in moringa seeds. Optimization of the extraction process yielded an extract of 38.9% MIC-1. Phytochemical analysis of MSE revealed the presence of acetylated isothiocyanates, phenolic glycosides unique to moringa, flavonoids, fats and fatty acids, proteins and carbohydrates. MSE showed a reduction in the carrageenan-induced rat paw edema (33% at 500 mg/kg MIC-1) comparable to aspirin (27% at 300 mg/kg), whereas CTE did not have any significant effect. In vitro, MIC-1 at 1 μM significantly reduced the production of nitric oxide (NO) and at 5 μM, the gene expression of LPS-inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) and interleukins 1β and 6 (IL-1β and IL-6), whereas CEM did not show any significant activity at all concentrations tested. MIC-1 (10μM) was also more effective at upregulating the nuclear factor (erythroid-derived 2)-like 2 (Nrf2) target genes NAD(P)H:quinone oxidoreductase 1 (NQO1), glutathione S-transferase pi 1 (GSTP1), and heme oxygenase 1 (HO1) than the CEM. Thus, in contrast to CTE and CEM, MSE and its major isothiocyanate MIC-1 displayed strong anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties in vivo and in vitro, making them promising botanical leads for the mitigation of inflammatory-mediated chronic disorders. PMID:28792522

Aircraft measurement over the Gulf of Tonkin capturing aloft transport of biomass burning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, Xiaoyang; Xu, Jun; Bi, Fang; Zhang, Zhongzhi; Chen, Yunbo; He, Youjiang; Han, Feng; Zhi, Guorui; Liu, Shijie; Meng, Fan

2018-06-01

A suite of aircraft measurements was conducted over the Gulf of Tonkin, located downwind to the east of Mainland Southeast Asia (MSE), between March 23rd and April 6th, 2015. To the best of our knowledge, this campaign of 11 flights (totaling 34.4 h) was the first in-flight measurement over the region. Measurements of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, ozone, carbon monoxide, black carbon and the particulate scattering coefficient were recorded at approximately 1 500 m (low level) and 3 000 m (high level). Significantly higher measurements of black carbon, carbon monoxide and ozone in the high level on March 23rd and April 5th and 6th were directly related to biomass burning in the MSE and were comparable to severe pollution events at the surface. Similarly, relatively low pollutant concentrations were observed at both altitudes between March 23rd and April 5th. A combined analysis of the measurements with meteorology and satellite data verified that the plumes captured at 3 000 m were attributed to transport in the high altitude originating from biomass burning in northern MSE. Furthermore, each plume captured by the measurements in the high level corresponded to heavy regional air pollution caused by biomass burning in northern MSE. In addition, relatively low levels of the measured pollutants corresponded to relatively light pollution levels in MSE and its adjacent areas. Taken together, these results indicated that aircraft measurements were accurate in characterizing the variation in transport and pollutant levels. During the most active season of biomass burning in MSE, pollutant emissions and their regional impact could vary on an episodic basis. Nonetheless, such concentrated emissions from biomass burning is likely to lead to particularly high atmospheric-loading of pollutants at a regional level and, depending on weather conditions, has the potential of being transported over considerably longer distances. Further investigation of the short-term impacts of such concentrations therefore appears prudent.

Changes in maternal self-efficacy, postnatal depression symptoms and social support among Chinese primiparous women during the initial postpartum period: A longitudinal study.

PubMed

Zheng, Xujuan; Morrell, Jane; Watts, Kim

2018-07-01

There are many parenting problems during infancy for Chinese primiparous women. As an important determinant of good parenting, maternal self-efficacy (MSE) should be paid more attention by researchers. At present, the limitations of previous research examining MSE during infancy are that most studies were conducted with a homogeneous sample and there were few studies with Chinese women. Secondly, the trajectory of change in MSE, postnatal depression symptoms and social support for Chinese primiparous women was not clear during the initial postpartum period in earlier studies. This study aimed to describe changes in MSE, postnatal depression symptoms and social support among Chinese primiparous women in the first three months postnatally. A quantitative longitudinal study using questionnaires was conducted. Obstetric wards at three hospitals in Xiamen City, South-East China. In total, 420 Chinese primiparous women were recruited. Initial baseline questionnaires to measure socio-demographic and clinical characteristics at three days postnatally were distributed to participants face-to-face by the researcher on the postnatal ward. Follow-up questionnaires at six and 12 weeks postnatally were sent via e-mail by the researcher to participants, including the Self-efficacy in Infant Care Scale (SICS), the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) and the Postpartum Social Support Scale (PSSS) to measure MSE, postnatal depression symptoms and social support, respectively. These were returned by participants via e-mail. Quantitative data were analysed using SPSS. The mean MSE score at six weeks postnatally was 74.92 (SD = 11.05), and increased to 77.78 (SD = 11.13) at 12 weeks postnatally. The mean social support scores at six and 12 weeks postnatally were 40.99 (SD = 9.31) and 43.00 (SD = 9.55). The mean EPDS scores decreased from 9.09 (SD = 4.33) at six weeks postnatally to 8.63 (SD = 4.40) at 12 weeks postnatally; the proportion of women with an EPDS score of ten or more and 13 or more at the two time points declined from 47.4% to 38.3%, and from 21.4% to 18.2%, respectively. In this study, Chinese primiparous women had a moderate level of MSE and received a moderate level of social support at six and 12 weeks postnatally, and a higher proportion of Chinese women had postnatal depression symptoms than did women in Western countries. From six to 12 weeks postnatally, the mean MSE scores and social support scores had a statistically significant increase; the mean EPDS scores had a statistically significant decrease. Copyright © 2018 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

Secure Communications in CIoT Networks with a Wireless Energy Harvesting Untrusted Relay.

PubMed

Hu, Hequn; Gao, Zhenzhen; Liao, Xuewen; Leung, Victor C M

2017-09-04

The Internet of Things (IoT) represents a bright prospect that a variety of common appliances can connect to one another, as well as with the rest of the Internet, to vastly improve our lives. Unique communication and security challenges have been brought out by the limited hardware, low-complexity, and severe energy constraints of IoT devices. In addition, a severe spectrum scarcity problem has also been stimulated by the use of a large number of IoT devices. In this paper, cognitive IoT (CIoT) is considered where an IoT network works as the secondary system using underlay spectrum sharing. A wireless energy harvesting (EH) node is used as a relay to improve the coverage of an IoT device. However, the relay could be a potential eavesdropper to intercept the IoT device's messages. This paper considers the problem of secure communication between the IoT device (e.g., sensor) and a destination (e.g., controller) via the wireless EH untrusted relay. Since the destination can be equipped with adequate energy supply, secure schemes based on destination-aided jamming are proposed based on power splitting (PS) and time splitting (TS) policies, called intuitive secure schemes based on PS (Int-PS), precoded secure scheme based on PS (Pre-PS), intuitive secure scheme based on TS (Int-TS) and precoded secure scheme based on TS (Pre-TS), respectively. The secure performances of the proposed schemes are evaluated through the metric of probability of successfully secure transmission ( P S S T ), which represents the probability that the interference constraint of the primary user is satisfied and the secrecy rate is positive. P S S T is analyzed for the proposed secure schemes, and the closed form expressions of P S S T for Pre-PS and Pre-TS are derived and validated through simulation results. Numerical results show that the precoded secure schemes have better P S S T than the intuitive secure schemes under similar power consumption. When the secure schemes based on PS and TS polices have similar P S S T , the average transmit power consumption of the secure scheme based on TS is lower. The influences of power splitting and time slitting ratios are also discussed through simulations.

Gaussian Process Regression for Predictive But Interpretable Machine Learning Models: An Example of Predicting Mental Workload across Tasks

PubMed Central

Caywood, Matthew S.; Roberts, Daniel M.; Colombe, Jeffrey B.; Greenwald, Hal S.; Weiland, Monica Z.

2017-01-01

There is increasing interest in real-time brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) for the passive monitoring of human cognitive state, including cognitive workload. Too often, however, effective BCIs based on machine learning techniques may function as “black boxes” that are difficult to analyze or interpret. In an effort toward more interpretable BCIs, we studied a family of N-back working memory tasks using a machine learning model, Gaussian Process Regression (GPR), which was both powerful and amenable to analysis. Participants performed the N-back task with three stimulus variants, auditory-verbal, visual-spatial, and visual-numeric, each at three working memory loads. GPR models were trained and tested on EEG data from all three task variants combined, in an effort to identify a model that could be predictive of mental workload demand regardless of stimulus modality. To provide a comparison for GPR performance, a model was additionally trained using multiple linear regression (MLR). The GPR model was effective when trained on individual participant EEG data, resulting in an average standardized mean squared error (sMSE) between true and predicted N-back levels of 0.44. In comparison, the MLR model using the same data resulted in an average sMSE of 0.55. We additionally demonstrate how GPR can be used to identify which EEG features are relevant for prediction of cognitive workload in an individual participant. A fraction of EEG features accounted for the majority of the model’s predictive power; using only the top 25% of features performed nearly as well as using 100% of features. Subsets of features identified by linear models (ANOVA) were not as efficient as subsets identified by GPR. This raises the possibility of BCIs that require fewer model features while capturing all of the information needed to achieve high predictive accuracy. PMID:28123359

WE-AB-207A-02: John’s Equation Based Consistency Condition and Incomplete Projection Restoration Upon Circular Orbit CBCT

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

Ma, J; Qi, H; Wu, S

Purpose: In transmitted X-ray tomography imaging, projections are sometimes incomplete due to a variety of reasons, such as geometry inaccuracy, defective detector cells, etc. To address this issue, we have derived a direct consistency condition based on John’s Equation, and proposed a method to effectively restore incomplete projections based on this consistency condition. Methods: Through parameter substitutions, we have derived a direct consistency condition equation from John’s equation, in which the left side is only projection derivative of view and the right side is projection derivative of other geometrical parameters. Based on this consistency condition, a projection restoration method ismore » proposed, which includes five steps: 1) Forward projecting reconstructed image and using linear interpolation to estimate the incomplete projections as the initial result; 2) Performing Fourier transform on the projections; 3) Restoring the incomplete frequency data using the consistency condition equation; 4) Performing inverse Fourier transform; 5) Repeat step 2)∼4) until our criteria is met to terminate the iteration. Results: A beam-blocking-based scatter correction case and a bad-pixel correction case were used to demonstrate the efficacy and robustness of our restoration method. The mean absolute error (MAE), signal noise ratio (SNR) and mean square error (MSE) were employed as our evaluation metrics of the reconstructed images. For the scatter correction case, the MAE is reduced from 63.3% to 71.7% with 4 iterations. Compared with the existing Patch’s method, the MAE of our method is further reduced by 8.72%. For the bad-pixel case, the SNR of the reconstructed image by our method is increased from 13.49% to 21.48%, with the MSE being decreased by 45.95%, compared with linear interpolation method. Conclusion: Our studies have demonstrated that our restoration method based on the new consistency condition could effectively restore the incomplete projections, especially for their high frequency component.« less

Adaptively combined FIR and functional link artificial neural network equalizer for nonlinear communication channel.

PubMed

Zhao, Haiquan; Zhang, Jiashu

2009-04-01

This paper proposes a novel computational efficient adaptive nonlinear equalizer based on combination of finite impulse response (FIR) filter and functional link artificial neural network (CFFLANN) to compensate linear and nonlinear distortions in nonlinear communication channel. This convex nonlinear combination results in improving the speed while retaining the lower steady-state error. In addition, since the CFFLANN needs not the hidden layers, which exist in conventional neural-network-based equalizers, it exhibits a simpler structure than the traditional neural networks (NNs) and can require less computational burden during the training mode. Moreover, appropriate adaptation algorithm for the proposed equalizer is derived by the modified least mean square (MLMS). Results obtained from the simulations clearly show that the proposed equalizer using the MLMS algorithm can availably eliminate various intensity linear and nonlinear distortions, and be provided with better anti-jamming performance. Furthermore, comparisons of the mean squared error (MSE), the bit error rate (BER), and the effect of eigenvalue ratio (EVR) of input correlation matrix are presented.

On the covariant gauge {alpha} of the linearized gravity in de Sitter spacetime

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

Cheong, Lee Yen

2012-09-26

In previous work, we studied the linearized gravity with covariant gauge {beta}= 2/3 and {alpha}= 5/3. It was found that the sum of the source and initial contributions reproduces the correct field configuration over the whole de Sitter spacetime. In this paper, we extend this work to generalizing the linearized gravitational field in an arbitrary value of the gauge parameter {alpha} but the gauge parameter {beta} remains the same.

Least square regularized regression in sum space.

PubMed

Xu, Yong-Li; Chen, Di-Rong; Li, Han-Xiong; Liu, Lu

2013-04-01

This paper proposes a least square regularized regression algorithm in sum space of reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces (RKHSs) for nonflat function approximation, and obtains the solution of the algorithm by solving a system of linear equations. This algorithm can approximate the low- and high-frequency component of the target function with large and small scale kernels, respectively. The convergence and learning rate are analyzed. We measure the complexity of the sum space by its covering number and demonstrate that the covering number can be bounded by the product of the covering numbers of basic RKHSs. For sum space of RKHSs with Gaussian kernels, by choosing appropriate parameters, we tradeoff the sample error and regularization error, and obtain a polynomial learning rate, which is better than that in any single RKHS. The utility of this method is illustrated with two simulated data sets and five real-life databases.

Some Results on Mean Square Error for Factor Score Prediction

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Krijnen, Wim P.

2006-01-01

For the confirmatory factor model a series of inequalities is given with respect to the mean square error (MSE) of three main factor score predictors. The eigenvalues of these MSE matrices are a monotonic function of the eigenvalues of the matrix gamma[subscript rho] = theta[superscript 1/2] lambda[subscript rho] 'psi[subscript rho] [superscript…

Center for Cement Composite Materials

DTIC Science & Technology

1990-01-31

metal-oxygen structures G. Kordas MSE-Ceramics Electron paramagnetic resonance W. M. Kriven MSE-Ceramics Electron microscopy Microstructural...SPONSORING iSb. OFFICE SYMBOL 9. PROWIREMENT INSTRUMENT IDENTIFICATION NUMBER ORGANIZATION (If applicable) C S(2is _ _ _- r_,__’ Contract F49620-87-C...novel in-situ technique involving nuclear magnetic resonance . Fiber- matrix interactions in MDF laminates were also studied. Characterization of DSP

Dietary supplementation with methylseleninic acid inhibits mammary tumorigenesis and metastasis in male MMTV-PyMT mice

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

Male breast cancer, which makes up approximately 1% of all breast cancer, is an aggressive disease with poor prognosis. We investigated the effects of dietary supplementation with selenium in the form of methylseleninic acid (MSeA, 4.0 mg MSeA/kg) on mammary tumorigenesis in male MMTV-PyMT mice. ...

Measurements with magnetic field in the National Spherical Torus Experiment using the motional Stark effect with laser induced fluorescence diagnostic

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Foley, E. L.; Levinton, F. M.

2013-04-01

The motional Stark effect with laser-induced fluorescence diagnostic (MSE-LIF) has been installed and tested on the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) at the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab. The MSE-LIF diagnostic will be capable of measuring radially resolved profiles of magnetic field magnitude or pitch angle in NSTX plasmas. The system includes a diagnostic neutral hydrogen beam and a laser which excites the n = 2 to n = 3 transition. A viewing system has been implemented which will support up to 38 channels from the plasma edge to past the magnetic axis. First measurements of MSE-LIF signals in the presence of small applied magnetic fields in neutral gas are reported.

Real-Time Distributed Implementation of Interference Alignment with Analog Feedback

DTIC Science & Technology

2013-01-01

manner as in Figure 5(a). As such, six OFDM symbols are transmitted for our three user 2 × 2 MIMO system. The training does not experience precoding nor...pp. 159170, August 2009. [12] O. E. Ayach, S.W. Peters, and R.W. Heath Jr., ”The feasibility of interference alignment over measured MIMO - OFDM ...A Space-Time Receiver with Joint Synchronization and Interference Cancellation in Asynchronous MIMO - OFDM Systems,” IEEE Transactions on Vehicular

MEMS For Rolling-Element Bearings

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-01-01

Layers Illustration (not to scale) 17 - 4PH Stainless Steel Cross-section from A-A’ Top view from B-B’ Au flash ~ 500 Å Ni ~ 25 µm B...B’ A A’ 17 - 4PH Stainless Steel Pre-metallization region Pre-metallization of steel substrate for bonding of MEMS strain sensor Figure RB6: Pre...Code: RES-04 Canton, OH 44706 - REPORT DOCUMENTATION PAGE b. ABSTRACT UU c. THIS PAGE UU 2. REPORT TYPE Final Report 17 . LIMITATION OF ABSTRACT UU

Accumulate-Repeat-Accumulate-Accumulate-Codes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Divsalar, Dariush; Dolinar, Sam; Thorpe, Jeremy

2004-01-01

Inspired by recently proposed Accumulate-Repeat-Accumulate (ARA) codes [15], in this paper we propose a channel coding scheme called Accumulate-Repeat-Accumulate-Accumulate (ARAA) codes. These codes can be seen as serial turbo-like codes or as a subclass of Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) codes, and they have a projected graph or protograph representation; this allows for a high-speed iterative decoder implementation using belief propagation. An ARAA code can be viewed as a precoded Repeat-and-Accumulate (RA) code with puncturing in concatenation with another accumulator, where simply an accumulator is chosen as the precoder; thus ARAA codes have a very fast encoder structure. Using density evolution on their associated protographs, we find examples of rate-lJ2 ARAA codes with maximum variable node degree 4 for which a minimum bit-SNR as low as 0.21 dB from the channel capacity limit can be achieved as the block size goes to infinity. Such a low threshold cannot be achieved by RA or Irregular RA (IRA) or unstructured irregular LDPC codes with the same constraint on the maximum variable node degree. Furthermore by puncturing the accumulators we can construct families of higher rate ARAA codes with thresholds that stay close to their respective channel capacity thresholds uniformly. Iterative decoding simulation results show comparable performance with the best-known LDPC codes but with very low error floor even at moderate block sizes.

On 2- and 3-person games on polyhedral sets

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

Belenky, A.S.

1994-12-31

Special classes of 3 person games are considered where the sets of players` allowable strategies are polyhedral and the payoff functions are defined as maxima, on a polyhedral set, of certain kind of sums of linear and bilinear functions. Necessary and sufficient conditions, which are easy to verify, for a Nash point in these games are established, and a finite method, based on these conditions, for calculating Nash points is proposed. It is shown that the game serves as a generalization of a model for a problem of waste products evacuation from a territory. The method makes it possible tomore » reduce calculation of a Nash point to solving some linear and quadratic programming problems formulated on the basis of the original 3-person game. A class of 2-person games on connected polyhedral sets is considered, with the payoff function being a sum of two linear functions and one bilinear function. Necessary and sufficient conditions are established for the min-max, the max-min, and for a certain equilibrium. It is shown that the corresponding points can be calculated from auxiliary linear programming problems formulated on the basis of the master game.« less

On the linear programming bound for linear Lee codes.

PubMed

Astola, Helena; Tabus, Ioan

2016-01-01

Based on an invariance-type property of the Lee-compositions of a linear Lee code, additional equality constraints can be introduced to the linear programming problem of linear Lee codes. In this paper, we formulate this property in terms of an action of the multiplicative group of the field [Formula: see text] on the set of Lee-compositions. We show some useful properties of certain sums of Lee-numbers, which are the eigenvalues of the Lee association scheme, appearing in the linear programming problem of linear Lee codes. Using the additional equality constraints, we formulate the linear programming problem of linear Lee codes in a very compact form, leading to a fast execution, which allows to efficiently compute the bounds for large parameter values of the linear codes.

Specificity of early movie effects on adolescent sexual behavior and alcohol use.

PubMed

O'Hara, Ross E; Gibbons, Frederick X; Li, Zhigang; Gerrard, Meg; Sargent, James D

2013-11-01

Adolescents' movie sex exposure (MSE) and movie alcohol exposure (MAE) have been shown to influence later sexual behavior and drinking, respectively. No study to date, however, has tested whether these effects generalize across behaviors. This study examined the concurrent influences of early (i.e., before age 16) MSE and MAE on subsequent risky sex and alcohol use among a national sample of 1228 U.S. adolescents. Participants reported their health behaviors and movie viewing up to six times between 2003 and 2009 in telephone interviews. The Beach method was used to create a population-based estimate of each participant's MSE and MAE, which were then entered into a structural equation model (SEM) to predict lifetime risky sex and past month alcohol use at ages 18-21. For both men and women, MAE predicted alcohol use, mediated by age of initiation of heavy episodic drinking (HED) and age of sexual debut; MAE also predicted risky sex via age of sexual debut. Among men only, MSE indirectly predicted risky sex and alcohol use. Findings indicated that early exposure to risk content from movies had both specific and general effects on later risk-taking, but gender differences were evident: for men, MSE was a stronger predictor than MAE, but for women, only MAE predicted later risk behavior. These results have implications for future media research, prevention programs for adolescent sex and alcohol use, and movie ratings that can guide parents' decisions as to which movies are appropriate for their children. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Specificity of Early Movie Effects on Adolescent Sexual Behavior and Alcohol Use

PubMed Central

O’Hara, Ross E.; Gibbons, Frederick X.; Li, Zhigang; Gerrard, Meg; Sargent, James D.

2013-01-01

Adolescents’ movie sex exposure (MSE) and movie alcohol exposure (MAE) have been shown to influence later sexual behavior and drinking, respectively. No study to date, however, has tested whether these effects generalize across behaviors. This study examined the concurrent influences of early (i.e., before age 16) MSE and MAE on subsequent risky sex and alcohol use among a national sample of 1,228 U.S. adolescents. Participants reported their health behaviors and movie viewing up to six times between 2003 and 2009 in telephone interviews. The Beach method was used to create a population-based estimate of each participant’s MSE and MAE, which were then entered into a structural equation model (SEM) to predict lifetime risky sex and past month alcohol use at ages 18–21. For both men and women, MAE predicted alcohol use, mediated by age of initiation of heavy episodic drinking (HED) and age of sexual debut; MAE also predicted risky sex via age of sexual debut. Among men only, MSE indirectly predicted risky sex and alcohol use. Findings indicated that early exposure to risk content from movies had both specific and general effects on later risk-taking, but gender differences were evident: for men, MSE was a stronger predictor than MAE, but for women, only MAE predicted later risk behavior. These results have implications for future media research, prevention programs for adolescent sex and alcohol use, and movie ratings that can guide parents’ decisions as to which movies are appropriate for their children. PMID:24034968

Neutralizing properties of Musa paradisiaca L. (Musaceae) juice on phospholipase A2, myotoxic, hemorrhagic and lethal activities of crotalidae venoms.

PubMed

Borges, M H; Alves, D L F; Raslan, D S; Piló-Veloso, D; Rodrigues, V M; Homsi-Brandeburgo, M I; de Lima, M E

2005-04-08

The use of plants as medicine has been referred to since ancient peoples, perhaps as early as Neanderthal man. Plants are a source of many biologically active products and nowadays they are of great interest to the pharmaceutical industry. The study of how people of different culture use plants in particular ways has led to the discovery of important new medicines. In this work, we verify the possible activity of Musa paradisiaca L. (Musaceae) against the toxicity of snake venoms. Musa paradisiaca, an important source of food in the world, has also been reported to be popularly used as an anti-venom. Interaction of Musa paradisiaca extract (MsE) with snake venom proteins has been examined in this study. Phospholipase A2 (PLA2), myotoxic and hemorrhagic activities, including lethality in mice, induced by crotalidae venoms were significantly inhibited when different amounts of MsE were mixed with these venoms before assays. On the other hand, mice that received MsE and venoms without previous mixture or by separated routes were not protected against venom toxicity. Partial chemical characterization of MsE showed the presence of polyphenols and tannins and they are known to non-specifically inactivate proteins. We suggest that these compounds can be responsible for the in vitro inhibition of the toxic effects of snake venoms. In conclusion, according to our results, using mice as experimental model, MsE does not show protection against the toxic effects of snake venoms in vivo, but if was very effective when the experiments were done in vitro.

Nonlinear model for offline correction of pulmonary waveform generators.

PubMed

Reynolds, Jeffrey S; Stemple, Kimberly J; Petsko, Raymond A; Ebeling, Thomas R; Frazer, David G

2002-12-01

Pulmonary waveform generators consisting of motor-driven piston pumps are frequently used to test respiratory-function equipment such as spirometers and peak expiratory flow (PEF) meters. Gas compression within these generators can produce significant distortion of the output flow-time profile. A nonlinear model of the generator was developed along with a method to compensate for gas compression when testing pulmonary function equipment. The model and correction procedure were tested on an Assess Full Range PEF meter and a Micro DiaryCard PEF meter. The tests were performed using the 26 American Thoracic Society standard flow-time waveforms as the target flow profiles. Without correction, the pump loaded with the higher resistance Assess meter resulted in ten waveforms having a mean square error (MSE) higher than 0.001 L2/s2. Correction of the pump for these ten waveforms resulted in a mean decrease in MSE of 87.0%. When loaded with the Micro DiaryCard meter, the uncorrected pump outputs included six waveforms with MSE higher than 0.001 L2/s2. Pump corrections for these six waveforms resulted in a mean decrease in MSE of 58.4%.

Comparing Postural Stability Entropy Analyses to Differentiate Fallers and Non-Fallers

PubMed Central

Fino, Peter C.; Mojdehi, Ahmad R.; Adjerid, Khaled; Habibi, Mohammad; Lockhart, Thurmon E.; Ross, Shane D.

2015-01-01

The health and financial cost of falls has spurred research to differentiate the characteristics of fallers and non-fallers. Postural stability has received much of the attention with recent studies exploring various measures of entropy. This study compared the discriminatory ability of several entropy methods at differentiating two paradigms in the center-of-pressure (COP) of elderly individuals: 1.) eyes open (EO) versus eyes closed (EC) and 2.) fallers (F) versus non-fallers (NF). Methods were compared using the area under the curve (AUC) of the receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curves developed from logistic regression models. Overall, multiscale entropy (MSE) and composite multiscale entropy (CompMSE) performed the best with AUCs of 0.71 for EO/EC and 0.77 for F/NF. When methods were combined together to maximize the AUC, the entropy classifier had an AUC of for 0.91 the F/NF comparison. These results suggest researchers and clinicians attempting to create clinical tests to identify fallers should consider a combination of every entropy method when creating a classifying test. Additionally, MSE and CompMSE classifiers using polar coordinate data outperformed rectangular coordinate data, encouraging more research into the most appropriate time series for postural stability entropy analysis. PMID:26464267

Reversible heart rhythm complexity impairment in patients with primary aldosteronism

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lin, Yen-Hung; Wu, Vin-Cent; Lo, Men-Tzung; Wu, Xue-Ming; Hung, Chi-Sheng; Wu, Kwan-Dun; Lin, Chen; Ho, Yi-Lwun; Stowasser, Michael; Peng, Chung-Kang

2015-08-01

Excess aldosterone secretion in patients with primary aldosteronism (PA) impairs their cardiovascular system. Heart rhythm complexity analysis, derived from heart rate variability (HRV), is a powerful tool to quantify the complex regulatory dynamics of human physiology. We prospectively analyzed 20 patients with aldosterone producing adenoma (APA) that underwent adrenalectomy and 25 patients with essential hypertension (EH). The heart rate data were analyzed by conventional HRV and heart rhythm complexity analysis including detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) and multiscale entropy (MSE). We found APA patients had significantly decreased DFAα2 on DFA analysis and decreased area 1-5, area 6-15, and area 6-20 on MSE analysis (all p < 0.05). Area 1-5, area 6-15, area 6-20 in the MSE study correlated significantly with log-transformed renin activity and log-transformed aldosterone-renin ratio (all p < = 0.01). The conventional HRV parameters were comparable between PA and EH patients. After adrenalectomy, all the altered DFA and MSE parameters improved significantly (all p < 0.05). The conventional HRV parameters did not change. Our result suggested that heart rhythm complexity is impaired in APA patients and this is at least partially reversed by adrenalectomy.

UPLC-MSE Profiling of Phytoplankton Metabolites: Application to the Identification of Pigments and Structural Analysis of Metabolites in Porphyridium purpureum

PubMed Central

Juin, Camille; Bonnet, Antoine; Nicolau, Elodie; Bérard, Jean-Baptiste; Devillers, Romain; Thiéry, Valérie; Cadoret, Jean-Paul; Picot, Laurent

2015-01-01

A fast and high-resolution UPLC-MSE analysis was used to identify phytoplankton pigments in an ethanol extract of Porphyridium purpureum (Pp) devoid of phycobiliproteins. In a first step, 22 standard pigments were analyzed by UPLC-MSE to build a database including retention time and accurate masses of parent and fragment ions. Using this database, seven pigments or derivatives previously reported in Pp were unequivocally identified: β,β-carotene, chlorophyll a, zeaxanthin, chlorophyllide a, pheophorbide a, pheophytin a, and cryptoxanthin. Minor amounts of Divinyl chlorophyll a, a chemotaxonomic pigment marker for prochlorophytes, were also unequivocally identified using the database. Additional analysis of ionization and fragmentation patterns indicated the presence of ions that could correspond to hydroxylated derivatives of chlorophyll a and pheophytin a, produced during the ethanolic extraction, as well as previously described galactosyldiacylglycerols, the thylakoid coenzyme plastoquinone, and gracilamide B, a molecule previously reported in the red seaweed Gracillaria asiatica. These data point to UPLC-MSE as an efficient technique to identify phytoplankton pigments for which standards are available, and demonstrate its major interest as a complementary method for the structural elucidation of ionizable marine molecules. PMID:25913708

Comparing Postural Stability Entropy Analyses to Differentiate Fallers and Non-fallers.

PubMed

Fino, Peter C; Mojdehi, Ahmad R; Adjerid, Khaled; Habibi, Mohammad; Lockhart, Thurmon E; Ross, Shane D

2016-05-01

The health and financial cost of falls has spurred research to differentiate the characteristics of fallers and non-fallers. Postural stability has received much of the attention with recent studies exploring various measures of entropy. This study compared the discriminatory ability of several entropy methods at differentiating two paradigms in the center-of-pressure of elderly individuals: (1) eyes open (EO) vs. eyes closed (EC) and (2) fallers (F) vs. non-fallers (NF). Methods were compared using the area under the curve (AUC) of the receiver-operating characteristic curves developed from logistic regression models. Overall, multiscale entropy (MSE) and composite multiscale entropy (CompMSE) performed the best with AUCs of 0.71 for EO/EC and 0.77 for F/NF. When methods were combined together to maximize the AUC, the entropy classifier had an AUC of for 0.91 the F/NF comparison. These results suggest researchers and clinicians attempting to create clinical tests to identify fallers should consider a combination of every entropy method when creating a classifying test. Additionally, MSE and CompMSE classifiers using polar coordinate data outperformed rectangular coordinate data, encouraging more research into the most appropriate time series for postural stability entropy analysis.

Neurophysiological basis of creativity in healthy elderly people: a multiscale entropy approach.

PubMed

Ueno, Kanji; Takahashi, Tetsuya; Takahashi, Koichi; Mizukami, Kimiko; Tanaka, Yuji; Wada, Yuji

2015-03-01

Creativity, which presumably involves various connections within and across different neural networks, reportedly underpins the mental well-being of older adults. Multiscale entropy (MSE) can characterize the complexity inherent in EEG dynamics with multiple temporal scales. It can therefore provide useful insight into neural networks. Given that background, we sought to clarify the neurophysiological bases of creativity in healthy elderly subjects by assessing EEG complexity with MSE, with emphasis on assessment of neural networks. We recorded resting state EEG of 20 healthy elderly subjects. MSE was calculated for each subject for continuous 20-s epochs. Their relevance to individual creativity was examined concurrently with intellectual function. Higher individual creativity was linked closely to increased EEG complexity across higher temporal scales, but no significant relation was found with intellectual function (IQ score). Considering the general "loss of complexity" theory of aging, our finding of increased EEG complexity in elderly people with heightened creativity supports the idea that creativity is associated with activated neural networks. Results reported here underscore the potential usefulness of MSE analysis for characterizing the neurophysiological bases of elderly people with heightened creativity. Copyright © 2014 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Multi-source apportionment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons using simultaneous linear equations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Marinaite, Irina; Semenov, Mikhail

2014-05-01

A new approach to identify multiple sources of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and to evaluate the source contributions to atmospheric deposition of particulate PAHs is proposed. The approach is based on differences in concentrations of sums of PAHs with the same molecular weight among the sources. The data on PAHs accumulation in snow as well as the source profiles were used for calculations. Contributions of aluminum production plant, oil-fired central heating boilers, and residential wood and coal combustion were calculated using the linear mixing models. The concentrations of PAH pairs such as Benzo[b]fluorantene + Benzo[k]fluorantene and Benzo[g,h,i]perylene + Indeno[1,2,3-c,d]pyrene normalized to Benzo[a]antracene + Chrysene were used as tracers in mixing equations. The results obtained using ratios of sums of PAHs were compared with those obtained using molecular diagnostic ratios such as Benzo[a]antracene/Chrysene and Benzo[g,h,i]perylene/Indeno[1,2,3-c,d]pyrene. It was shown that the results obtained using diagnostic ratios as tracers are less reliable than results obtained using ratios of sums of PAHs. Funding was provided by Siberian Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences grant No. 8 (2012-2014).

Weighted-MSE based on saliency map for assessing video quality of H.264 video streams

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boujut, H.; Benois-Pineau, J.; Hadar, O.; Ahmed, T.; Bonnet, P.

2011-01-01

Human vision system is very complex and has been studied for many years specifically for purposes of efficient encoding of visual, e.g. video content from digital TV. There have been physiological and psychological evidences which indicate that viewers do not pay equal attention to all exposed visual information, but only focus on certain areas known as focus of attention (FOA) or saliency regions. In this work, we propose a novel based objective quality assessment metric, for assessing the perceptual quality of decoded video sequences affected by transmission errors and packed loses. The proposed method weights the Mean Square Error (MSE), Weighted-MSE (WMSE), according to the calculated saliency map at each pixel. Our method was validated trough subjective quality experiments.

Signaling threat: how situational cues affect women in math, science, and engineering settings.

PubMed

Murphy, Mary C; Steele, Claude M; Gross, James J

2007-10-01

This study examined the cues hypothesis, which holds that situational cues, such as a setting's features and organization, can make potential targets vulnerable to social identity threat. Objective and subjective measures of identity threat were collected from male and female math, science, and engineering (MSE) majors who watched an MSE conference video depicting either an unbalanced ratio of men to women or a balanced ratio. Women who viewed the unbalanced video exhibited more cognitive and physiological vigilance, and reported a lower sense of belonging and less desire to participate in the conference, than did women who viewed the gender-balanced video. Men were unaffected by this situational cue. The implications for understanding vulnerability to social identity threat, particularly among women in MSE settings, are discussed.

Tensor products of U{sub q}{sup Prime }sl-caret(2)-modules and the big q{sup 2}-Jacobi function transform

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

Gade, R. M.

2013-01-15

Four tensor products of evaluation modules of the quantum affine algebra U{sub q}{sup Prime }sl-caret(2) obtained from the negative and positive series, the complementary and the strange series representations are investigated. Linear operators R(z) satisfying the intertwining property on finite linear combinations of the canonical basis elements of the tensor products are described in terms of two sets of infinite sums {l_brace}{tau}{sup (r,t)}{r_brace}{sub r,t Element-Of Z{sub {>=}{sub 0}}} and {l_brace}{tau}{sup (r,t)}{r_brace}{sub r,t Element-Of Z{sub {>=}{sub 0}}} involving big q{sup 2}-Jacobi functions or related nonterminating basic hypergeometric series. Inhomogeneous recurrence relations can be derived for both sets. Evaluations of the simplestmore » sums provide the corresponding initial conditions. For the first set of sums the relations entail a big q{sup 2}-Jacobi function transform pair. An integral decomposition is obtained for the sum {tau}{sup (r,t)}. A partial description of the relation between the decompositions of the tensor products with respect to U{sub q}sl(2) or with respect to its complement in U{sub q}{sup Prime }sl-caret(2) can be formulated in terms of Askey-Wilson function transforms. For a particular combination of two tensor products, the occurrence of proper U{sub q}{sup Prime }sl-caret(2)-submodules is discussed.« less

Combined solvent- and non-uniform temperature-programmed gradient liquid chromatography. I - A theoretical investigation.

PubMed

Gritti, Fabrice

2016-11-18

An new class of gradient liquid chromatography (GLC) is proposed and its performance is analyzed from a theoretical viewpoint. During the course of such gradients, both the solvent strength and the column temperature are simultaneously changed in time and space. The solvent and temperature gradients propagate along the chromatographic column at their own and independent linear velocity. This class of gradient is called combined solvent- and temperature-programmed gradient liquid chromatography (CST-GLC). The general expressions of the retention time, retention factor, and of the temporal peak width of the analytes at elution in CST-GLC are derived for linear solvent strength (LSS) retention models, modified van't Hoff retention behavior, linear and non-distorted solvent gradients, and for linear temperature gradients. In these conditions, the theory predicts that CST-GLC is equivalent to a unique and apparent dynamic solvent gradient. The apparent solvent gradient steepness is the sum of the solvent and temperature steepness. The apparent solvent linear velocity is the reciprocal of the steepness-averaged sum of the reciprocal of the actual solvent and temperature linear velocities. The advantage of CST-GLC over conventional GLC is demonstrated for the resolution of protein digests (peptide mapping) when applying smooth, retained, and linear acetonitrile gradients in combination with a linear temperature gradient (from 20°C to 90°C) using 300μm×150mm capillary columns packed with sub-2 μm particles. The benefit of CST-GLC is demonstrated when the temperature gradient propagates at the same velocity as the chromatographic speed. The experimental proof-of-concept for the realization of temperature ramps propagating at a finite and constant linear velocity is also briefly described. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Data-Independent MS/MS Quantification of Neuropeptides for Determination of Putative Feeding-Related Neurohormones in Microdialysate

PubMed Central

2015-01-01

Food consumption is an important behavior that is regulated by an intricate array of neuropeptides (NPs). Although many feeding-related NPs have been identified in mammals, precise mechanisms are unclear and difficult to study in mammals, as current methods are not highly multiplexed and require extensive a priori knowledge about analytes. New advances in data-independent acquisition (DIA) MS/MS and the open-source quantification software Skyline have opened up the possibility to identify hundreds of compounds and quantify them from a single DIA MS/MS run. An untargeted DIA MSE quantification method using Skyline software for multiplexed, discovery-driven quantification was developed and found to produce linear calibration curves for peptides at physiologically relevant concentrations using a protein digest as internal standard. By using this method, preliminary relative quantification of the crab Cancer borealis neuropeptidome (<2 kDa, 137 peptides from 18 families) was possible in microdialysates from 8 replicate feeding experiments. Of these NPs, 55 were detected with an average mass error below 10 ppm. The time-resolved profiles of relative concentration changes for 6 are shown, and there is great potential for the use of this method in future experiments to aid in correlation of NP changes with behavior. This work presents an unbiased approach to winnowing candidate NPs related to a behavior of interest in a functionally relevant manner, and demonstrates the success of such a UPLC-MSE quantification method using the open source software Skyline. PMID:25552291

Sialic Acid Metabolic Engineering: A Potential Strategy for the Neuroblastoma Therapy

PubMed Central

Gnanapragassam, Vinayaga S.; Bork, Kaya; Galuska, Christina E.; Galuska, Sebastian P.; Glanz, Dagobert; Nagasundaram, Manimozhi; Bache, Matthias; Vordermark, Dirk; Kohla, Guido; Kannicht, Christoph; Schauer, Roland; Horstkorte, Rüdiger

2014-01-01

Background Sialic acids (Sia) represent negative-charged terminal sugars on most glycoproteins and glycolipids on the cell surface of vertebrates. Aberrant expression of tumor associated sialylated carbohydrate epitopes significantly increases during onset of cancer. Since Sia contribute towards cell migration ( =  metastasis) and to chemo- and radiation resistance. Modulation of cellular Sia concentration and composition poses a challenge especially for neuroblastoma therapy, due to the high heterogeneity and therapeutic resistance of these cells. Here we propose that Metabolic Sia Engineering (MSE) is an effective strategy to reduce neuroblastoma progression and metastasis. Methods Human neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y cells were treated with synthetic Sia precursors N-propanoyl mannosamine (ManNProp) or N-pentanoyl mannosamine (ManNPent). Total and Polysialic acids (PolySia) were investigated by high performance liquid chromatography. Cell surface polySia were examined by flow-cytometry. Sia precursors treated cells were examined for the migration, invasion and sensitivity towards anticancer drugs and radiation treatment. Results Treatment of SH-SY5Y cells with ManNProp or ManNPent (referred as MSE) reduced their cell surface sialylation significantly. We found complete absence of polysialylation after treatment of SH-SY5Y cells with ManNPent. Loss of polysialylation results in a reduction of migration and invasion ability of these cells. Furthermore, radiation of Sia-engineered cells completely abolished their migration. In addition, MSE increases the cytotoxicity of anti-cancer drugs, such as 5-fluorouracil or cisplatin. Conclusions Metabolic Sia Engineering (MSE) of neuroblastoma cells using modified Sia precursors reduces their sialylation, metastatic potential and increases their sensitivity towards radiation or chemotherapeutics. Therefore, MSE may serve as an effective method to treat neuroblastoma. PMID:25148252

The Cross-Sectional Relationship Between Body Mass Index, Waist-Hip Ratio and Cognitive Performance in Postmenopausal Women Enrolled in the Women's Health Initiative (WHI)

PubMed Central

Kerwin, Diana R.; Zhang, Yinghua; Kotchen, Jane Morley; Espeland, Mark A.; Van Horn, Linda; McTigue, Kathleen M.; Robinson, Jennifer G.; Powell, Lynda; Kooperberg, Charles; Coker, Laura H.; Hoffmann, Raymond

2010-01-01

OBJECTIVES To determine if body weight (BMI) is independently associated with cognitive function in postmenopausal women and the relationship between body fat distribution as estimated by waist-hip-ratio (WHR) and cognitive function. DESIGN Cross-sectional data analysis SETTING Baseline data from the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) hormone trials. PARTICIPANTS 8745 postmenopausal women aged 65–79 years, free of clinical evidence of dementia and completed baseline evaluation in the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) hormone trials. MEASUREMENTS Participants completed a Modified Mini-Mental State Examination (3MSE), health and lifestyle questionnaires, and standardized measurements of height, weight, body circumferences and blood pressure. Statistical analysis of associations between 3MSE scores, BMI and WHR after controlling for known confounders. RESULTS With the exception of smoking and exercise, vascular disease risk factors, including hypertension, waist measurement, heart disease and diabetes, were significantly associated with 3MSE score and were included as co-variables in subsequent analyses. BMI was inversely related to 3MSE scores, for every 1 unit increase in BMI, 3MSE decrease 0.988 (p=.0001) after adjusting for age, education and vascular disease risk factors. BMI had the most pronounced association with poorer cognitive functioning scores among women with smaller waist measurements. Among women with the highest WHR, cognitive scores increased with BMI. CONCLUSION Increasing BMI is associated with poorer cognitive function in women with smaller WHR. Higher WHR, estimating central fat mass, is associated with higher cognitive function in this cross-sectional study. Further research is needed to clarify the mechanism for this association. PMID:20646100

The cross-sectional relationship between body mass index, waist-hip ratio, and cognitive performance in postmenopausal women enrolled in the Women's Health Initiative.

PubMed

Kerwin, Diana R; Zhang, Yinghua; Kotchen, Jane Morley; Espeland, Mark A; Van Horn, Linda; McTigue, Kathleen M; Robinson, Jennifer G; Powell, Lynda; Kooperberg, Charles; Coker, Laura H; Hoffmann, Raymond

2010-08-01

To determine whether body mass index (BMI) is independently associated with cognitive function in postmenopausal women and the relationship between body fat distribution as estimated by waist-hip ratio (WHR). Cross-sectional data analysis. Baseline data from the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) hormone trials. Eight thousand seven hundred forty-five postmenopausal women aged 65 to 79 free of clinical evidence of dementia who completed the baseline evaluation in the WHI hormone trials. Participants completed a Modified Mini-Mental State Examination (3MSE), health and lifestyle questionnaires, and standardized measurements of height, weight, body circumference, and blood pressure. Statistical analysis was performed of associations between 3MSE score, BMI, and WHR after controlling for known confounders. With the exception of smoking and exercise, vascular disease risk factors, including hypertension, waist measurement, heart disease, and diabetes mellitus, were significantly associated with 3MSE score and were included as covariables in subsequent analyses. BMI was inversely related to 3MSE score; for every 1-unit increase in BMI, 3MSE score decreased 0.988 points (P<.001) after adjusting for age, education, and vascular disease risk factors. BMI had the most pronounced association with poorer cognitive functioning scores in women with smaller waist measurements. In women with the highest WHR, cognitive scores increased with BMI. Higher BMI was associated with poorer cognitive function in women with smaller WHR. Higher WHR, estimating central fat mass, was associated with higher cognitive function in this cross-sectional study. Further research is needed to clarify the mechanism for this association. © 2010, Copyright the Authors. Journal compilation © 2010, No claim to original US government works.

MEG-based detection and localization of perilesional dysfunction in chronic stroke.

PubMed

Chu, Ron K O; Braun, Allen R; Meltzer, Jed A

2015-01-01

Post-stroke impairment is associated not only with structural lesions, but also with dysfunction in surviving perilesional tissue. Previous studies using equivalent current dipole source localization of MEG/EEG signals have demonstrated a preponderance of slow-wave activity localized to perilesional areas. Recent studies have also demonstrated the utility of nonlinear analyses such as multiscale entropy (MSE) for quantifying neuronal dysfunction in a wide range of pathologies. The current study utilized beamformer-based reconstruction of signals in source space to compare spectral and nonlinear measures of electrical activity in perilesional and healthy cortices. Data were collected from chronic stroke patients and healthy controls, both young and elderly. We assessed relative power in the delta (1-4 Hz), theta (4-7 Hz), alpha (8-12 Hz) and beta (15-30 Hz) frequency bands, and also measured the nonlinear complexity of electrical activity using MSE. Perilesional tissue exhibited a general slowing of the power spectrum (increased delta/theta, decreased beta) as well as a reduction in MSE. All measures tested were similarly sensitive to changes in the posterior perilesional regions, but anterior perilesional dysfunction was detected better by MSE and beta power. The findings also suggest that MSE is specifically sensitive to electrophysiological dysfunction in perilesional tissue, while spectral measures were additionally affected by an increase in rolandic beta power with advanced age. Furthermore, perilesional electrophysiological abnormalities in the left hemisphere were correlated with the degree of language task-induced activation in the right hemisphere. Finally, we demonstrate that single subject spectral and nonlinear analyses can identify dysfunctional perilesional regions within individual patients that may be ideal targets for interventions with noninvasive brain stimulation.

Photon wave function formalism for analysis of Mach–Zehnder interferometer and sum-frequency generation

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

Ritboon, Atirach, E-mail: atirach.3.14@gmail.com; Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, Prince of Songkla University, Hat Yai 90112; Daengngam, Chalongrat, E-mail: chalongrat.d@psu.ac.th

2016-08-15

Biakynicki-Birula introduced a photon wave function similar to the matter wave function that satisfies the Schrödinger equation. Its second quantization form can be applied to investigate nonlinear optics at nearly full quantum level. In this paper, we applied the photon wave function formalism to analyze both linear optical processes in the well-known Mach–Zehnder interferometer and nonlinear optical processes for sum-frequency generation in dispersive and lossless medium. Results by photon wave function formalism agree with the well-established Maxwell treatments and existing experimental verifications.

Singular Differential Game Numerical Technique and Closed Loop Guidance and Control Strategies,

DTIC Science & Technology

1982-03-01

zero sum games one player tries to minimize and the other player tries to maxwm e payoff functions. In such games a saddle point solu- tion is sought...period- ically in a a-all time interval At tK - ti, i - O,,. e . Whe the game starts running, the pursuer takes a measurement at t 1 t 0 + At and...Loop Solutions to Non-Linear-Zero-Sum Differential Games ," Int. J. Syst., Vol. 7 (5), 1976. 41 . Johnson, D. E ., Convergence Properties of the Method

Construction of high frame rate images with Fourier transform

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Peng, Hu; Lu, Jian-Yu

2002-05-01

Traditionally, images are constructed with a delay-and-sum method that adjusts the phases of received signals (echoes) scattered from the same point in space so that they are summed in phase. Recently, the relationship between the delay-and-sum method and the Fourier transform is investigated [Jian-yu Lu, Anjun Liu, and Hu Peng, ``High frame rate and delay-and-sum imaging methods,'' IEEE Trans. Ultrason. Ferroelectr. Freq. Control (submitted)]. In this study, a generic Fourier transform method is developed. Two-dimensional (2-D) or three-dimensional (3-D) high frame rate images can be constructed using the Fourier transform with a single transmission of an ultrasound pulse from an array as long as the transmission field of the array is known. To verify our theory, computer simulations have been performed with a linear array, a 2-D array, a convex curved array, and a spherical 2-D array. The simulation results are consistent with our theory. [Work supported in part by Grant 5RO1 HL60301 from NIH.

Spin structure of the neutron ({sup 3}He) and the Bjoerken sum rule

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

Meziani, Z.E.

1994-12-01

A first measurement of the longitudinal asymmetry of deep-inelastic scattering of polarized electrons from a polarized {sup 3}He target at energies ranging from 19 to 26 GeV has been performed at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC). The spin-structure function of the neutron g{sub 1}{sup n} has been extracted from the measured asymmetries. The Quark Parton Model (QPM) interpretation of the nucleon spin-structure function is examined in light of the new results. A test of the Ellis-Jaffe sum rule (E-J) on the neutron is performed at high momentum transfer and found to be satisfied. Furthermore, combining the proton results ofmore » the European Muon Collaboration (EMC) and the neutron results of E-142, the Bjoerken sum rule test is carried at high Q{sup 2} where higher order Perturbative Quantum Chromodynamics (PQCD) corrections and higher-twist corrections are smaller. The sum rule is saturated to within one standard deviation.« less

Image contrast enhancement with brightness preservation using an optimal gamma correction and weighted sum approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jiang, G.; Wong, C. Y.; Lin, S. C. F.; Rahman, M. A.; Ren, T. R.; Kwok, Ngaiming; Shi, Haiyan; Yu, Ying-Hao; Wu, Tonghai

2015-04-01

The enhancement of image contrast and preservation of image brightness are two important but conflicting objectives in image restoration. Previous attempts based on linear histogram equalization had achieved contrast enhancement, but exact preservation of brightness was not accomplished. A new perspective is taken here to provide balanced performance of contrast enhancement and brightness preservation simultaneously by casting the quest of such solution to an optimization problem. Specifically, the non-linear gamma correction method is adopted to enhance the contrast, while a weighted sum approach is employed for brightness preservation. In addition, the efficient golden search algorithm is exploited to determine the required optimal parameters to produce the enhanced images. Experiments are conducted on natural colour images captured under various indoor, outdoor and illumination conditions. Results have shown that the proposed method outperforms currently available methods in contrast to enhancement and brightness preservation.

A novel active disturbance rejection based tracking design for laser system with quadrant photodetector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Manojlović, Stojadin M.; Barbarić, Žarko P.; Mitrović, Srđan T.

2015-06-01

A new tracking design for laser systems with different arrangements of a quadrant photodetector, based on the principle of active disturbance rejection control is suggested. The detailed models of quadrant photodetector with standard add-subtract, difference-over-sum and diagonal-difference-over-sum algorithms for displacement signals are included in the control loop. Target moving, non-linearity of a photodetector, parameter perturbations and exterior disturbances are treated as a total disturbance. Active disturbance rejection controllers with linear extended state observers for total disturbance estimation and rejection are designed. Proposed methods are analysed in frequency domain to quantify their stability characteristics and disturbance rejection performances. It is shown through simulations, that tracking errors are effectively compensated, providing the laser spot positioning in the area near the centre of quadrant photodetector where the mentioned algorithms have the highest sensitivity, which provides tracking of the manoeuvring targets with high accuracy.

Evaluation of two methods for using MR information in PET reconstruction

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Caldeira, L.; Scheins, J.; Almeida, P.; Herzog, H.

2013-02-01

Using magnetic resonance (MR) information in maximum a posteriori (MAP) algorithms for positron emission tomography (PET) image reconstruction has been investigated in the last years. Recently, three methods to introduce this information have been evaluated and the Bowsher prior was considered the best. Its main advantage is that it does not require image segmentation. Another method that has been widely used for incorporating MR information is using boundaries obtained by segmentation. This method has also shown improvements in image quality. In this paper, two methods for incorporating MR information in PET reconstruction are compared. After a Bayes parameter optimization, the reconstructed images were compared using the mean squared error (MSE) and the coefficient of variation (CV). MSE values are 3% lower in Bowsher than using boundaries. CV values are 10% lower in Bowsher than using boundaries. Both methods performed better than using no prior, that is, maximum likelihood expectation maximization (MLEM) or MAP without anatomic information in terms of MSE and CV. Concluding, incorporating MR information using the Bowsher prior gives better results in terms of MSE and CV than boundaries. MAP algorithms showed again to be effective in noise reduction and convergence, specially when MR information is incorporated. The robustness of the priors in respect to noise and inhomogeneities in the MR image has however still to be performed.

Multiscale entropy analysis of electroencephalography during sleep in patients with Parkinson disease.

PubMed

Chung, Chen-Chih; Kang, Jiunn-Horng; Yuan, Rey-Yue; Wu, Dean; Chen, Chih-Chung; Chi, Nai-Fang; Chen, Po-Chih; Hu, Chaur-Jong

2013-07-01

Sleep disorders are frequently seen in patients with Parkinson disease (PD), including rapid eye movement (REM) behavior disorder and periodic limb movement disorder. However, knowledge about changes in non-REM sleep in patients with PD is limited. This study explored the characteristics of electroencephalography (EEG) during sleep in patients with PD and non-PD controls. We further conducted multiscale entropy (MSE) analysis to evaluate and compare the complexity of sleep EEG for the 2 groups. There were 9 patients with PD (Hoehn-Yahr stage 1 or 2) and 11 non-PD controls. All participants underwent standard whole-night polysomnography (PSG), which included 23 channels, 6 of which were for EEG. The raw data of the EEG were extracted and subjected to MSE analysis. Patients with PD had a longer sleep onset time and a higher spontaneous EEG arousal index. Sleep stage-specific increased MSE was observed in patients with PD during non-REM sleep. The difference was more marked and significant at higher time scale factors (TSFs). In conclusion, increased biosignal complexity, as revealed by MSE analysis, was found in patients with PD during non-REM sleep at high TSFs. This finding might reflect a compensatory mechanism for early defects in neuronal network control machinery in PD.

Performance of spectral MSE diagnostic on C-Mod and ITER

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liao, Ken; Rowan, William; Mumgaard, Robert; Granetz, Robert; Scott, Steve; Marchuk, Oleksandr; Ralchenko, Yuri; Alcator C-Mod Team

2015-11-01

Magnetic field was measured on Alcator C-mod by applying spectral Motional Stark Effect techniques based on line shift (MSE-LS) and line ratio (MSE-LR) to the H-alpha emission spectrum of the diagnostic neutral beam atoms. The high field of Alcator C-mod allows measurements to be made at close to ITER values of Stark splitting (~ Bv⊥) with similar background levels to those expected for ITER. Accurate modeling of the spectrum requires a non-statistical, collisional-radiative analysis of the excited beam population and quadratic and Zeeman corrections to the Stark shift. A detailed synthetic diagnostic was developed and used to estimate the performance of the diagnostic at C-Mod and ITER parameters. Our analysis includes the sensitivity to view and beam geometry, aperture and divergence broadening, magnetic field, pixel size, background noise, and signal levels. Analysis of preliminary experiments agree with Kinetic+(polarization)MSE EFIT within ~2° in pitch angle and simulations predict uncertainties of 20 mT in | B | and <2° in pitch angle. This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, Office of Fusion Energy Sciences under Award Number DE-FG03-96ER-54373 and DE-FC02-99ER54512.

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

Gu, M F; Holcomb, C; Jayakuma, J

We present detailed atomic physics models for motional Stark effects (MSE) diagnostic on magnetic fusion devices. Excitation and ionization cross sections of the hydrogen or deuterium beam traveling in a magnetic field in collisions with electrons, ions, and neutral gas are calculated in the first Born approximation. The density matrices and polarization states of individual Stark-Zeeman components of the Balmer {alpha} line are obtained for both beam into plasma and beam into gas models. A detailed comparison of the model calculations and the MSE polarimetry and spectral intensity measurements obtained at the DIII-D tokamak is carried out. Although our beammore » into gas models provide a qualitative explanation for the larger {pi}/{sigma} intensity ratios and represent significant improvements over the statistical population models, empirical adjustment factors ranging from 1.0-2.0 must still be applied to individual line intensities to bring the calculations into full agreement with the observations. Nevertheless, we demonstrate that beam into gas measurements can be used successfully as calibration procedures for measuring the magnetic pitch angle through {pi}/{sigma} intensity ratios. The analyses of the filter-scan polarization spectra from the DIII-D MSE polarimetry system indicate unknown channel and time dependent light contaminations in the beam into gas measurements. Such contaminations may be the main reason for the failure of beam into gas calibration on MSE polarimetry systems.« less

Novel Behavioral and Neural Evidences for Age-Related changes in Force complexity.

PubMed

Chen, Yi-Ching; Lin, Linda L; Hwang, Ing-Shiou

2018-02-17

This study investigated age-related changes in behavioral and neural complexity for a polyrhythmic movement, which appeared to be an exception to the loss of complexity hypothesis. Young (n = 15; age = 24.2 years) and older (15; 68.1 years) adults performed low-level force-tracking with isometric index abduction to couple a compound sinusoidal target. Multi-scale entropy (MSE) of tracking force and inter-spike interval (ISI) of motor unit (MU) in the first dorsal interosseus muscle were assessed. The MSE area of tracking force at shorter time scales of older adults was greater (more complex) than that of young adults, whereas an opposite trend (less complex for the elders) was noted at longer time scales. The MSE area of force fluctuations (the stochastic component of the tracking force) were generally smaller (less complex) for older adults. Along with greater mean and coefficient of ISI, the MSE area of the cumulative discharge rate of elders tended to be lower (less complex) than that of young adults. In conclusion, age-related complexity changes in polyrhythmic force-tracking depended on the time scale. The adaptive behavioral consequences could be multi-factorial origins of the age-related impairment in rate coding, increased discharge noises, and lower discharge complexity of pooled MUs.

Age-related variation in EEG complexity to photic stimulation: A multiscale entropy analysis

PubMed Central

Takahashi, Tetsuya; Cho, Raymond Y.; Murata, Tetsuhito; Mizuno, Tomoyuki; Kikuchi, Mitsuru; Mizukami, Kimiko; Kosaka, Hirotaka; Takahashi, Koichi; Wada, Yuji

2010-01-01

Objective This study was intended to examine variations in electroencephalographic (EEG) complexity in response to photic stimulation (PS) during aging to test the hypothesis that the aging process reduces physiologic complexity and functional responsiveness. Methods Multiscale entropy (MSE), an estimate of time-series signal complexity associated with long-range temporal correlation, is used as a recently proposed method for quantifying EEG complexity with multiple coarse-grained sequences. We recorded EEG in 13 healthy elderly subjects and 12 healthy young subjects during pre-PS and post-PS conditions and estimated their respective MSE values. Results For the pre-PS condition, no significant complexity difference was found between the groups. However, a significant MSE change (complexity increase) was found post-PS only in young subjects, thereby revealing a power-law scaling property, which means long-range temporal correlation. Conclusions Enhancement of long-range temporal correlation in young subjects after PS might reflect a cortical response to stimuli, which was absent in elderly subjects. These results are consistent with the general “loss of complexity/diminished functional response to stimuli” theory of aging. Significance Our findings demonstrate that application of MSE analysis to EEG is a powerful approach for studying age-related changes in brain function. PMID:19231279

A simple smoothness indicator for the WENO scheme with adaptive order

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Cong; Chen, Li Li

2018-01-01

The fifth order WENO scheme with adaptive order is competent for solving hyperbolic conservation laws, its reconstruction is a convex combination of a fifth order linear reconstruction and three third order linear reconstructions. Note that, on uniform mesh, the computational cost of smoothness indicator for fifth order linear reconstruction is comparable with the sum of ones for three third order linear reconstructions, thus it is too heavy; on non-uniform mesh, the explicit form of smoothness indicator for fifth order linear reconstruction is difficult to be obtained, and its computational cost is much heavier than the one on uniform mesh. In order to overcome these problems, a simple smoothness indicator for fifth order linear reconstruction is proposed in this paper.

Advanced Instrumentation for Aero Engine Components: Conference Proceedings of the Propulsion and Energetics Panel Symposium (67th) Held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on 19-23 May 1986.

DTIC Science & Technology

1986-11-01

optical wave-mixing am., interact via the third order non linear susceptibility of the medium to produce a coherent laser-like signal beam at the higher...is the third order non- linear susceptibility of the medium and determines the shape of the CARS spectrum. It is the sum of a resonant contribution and...simultaneously using an appropriate spectrograph/optical multichannel detector; intensified linear diode array detectors are now used in most systems. The two

Apparatus and method for detecting and measuring changes in linear relationships between a number of high frequency signals

DOEpatents

Bittner, J.W.; Biscardi, R.W.

1991-03-19

An electronic measurement circuit is disclosed for high speed comparison of the relative amplitudes of a predetermined number of electrical input signals independent of variations in the magnitude of the sum of the signals. The circuit includes a high speed electronic switch that is operably connected to receive on its respective input terminals one of said electrical input signals and to have its common terminal serve as an input for a variable-gain amplifier-detector circuit that is operably connected to feed its output to a common terminal of a second high speed electronic switch. The respective terminals of the second high speed electronic switch are operably connected to a plurality of integrating sample and hold circuits, which in turn have their outputs connected to a summing logic circuit that is operable to develop first, second and third output voltages, the first output voltage being proportional to a predetermined ratio of sums and differences between the compared input signals, the second output voltage being proportional to a second summed ratio of predetermined sums and differences between said input signals, and the third output voltage being proportional to the sum of signals to the summing logic circuit. A servo system that is operably connected to receive said third output signal and compare it with a reference voltage to develop a slowly varying feedback voltage to control the variable-gain amplifier in said common amplifier-detector circuit in order to make said first and second output signals independent of variations in the magnitude of the sum of said input signals. 2 figures.

Apparatus and method for detecting and measuring changes in linear relationships between a number of high frequency signals

DOEpatents

Bittner, John W.; Biscardi, Richard W.

1991-01-01

An electronic measurement circuit for high speed comparison of the relative amplitudes of a predetermined number of electrical input signals independent of variations in the magnitude of the sum of the signals. The circuit includes a high speed electronic switch that is operably connected to receive on its respective input terminals one of said electrical input signals and to have its common terminal serve as an input for a variable-gain amplifier-detector circuit that is operably connected to feed its output to a common terminal of a second high speed electronic switch. The respective terminals of the second high speed electronic switch are operably connected to a plurality of integrating sample and hold circuits, which in turn have their outputs connected to a summing logic circuit that is operable to develop first, second and third output voltages, the first output voltage being proportional to a predetermined ratio of sums and differences between the compared input signals, the second output voltage being proportional to a second summed ratio of predetermined sums and differences between said input signals, and the third output voltage being proportional to the sum of signals to the summing logic circuit. A servo system that is operably connected to receive said third output signal and compare it with a reference voltage to develop a slowly varying feedback voltage to control the variable-gain amplifier in said common amplifier-detector circuit in order to make said first and second output signals independent of variations in the magnitude of the sum of said input signals.

Normalization of cell responses in cat striate cortex

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Heeger, D. J.

1992-01-01

Simple cells in the striate cortex have been depicted as half-wave-rectified linear operators. Complex cells have been depicted as energy mechanisms, constructed from the squared sum of the outputs of quadrature pairs of linear operators. However, the linear/energy model falls short of a complete explanation of striate cell responses. In this paper, a modified version of the linear/energy model is presented in which striate cells mutually inhibit one another, effectively normalizing their responses with respect to stimulus contrast. This paper reviews experimental measurements of striate cell responses, and shows that the new model explains a significantly larger body of physiological data.

Smisc - A collection of miscellaneous functions

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

Landon Sego, PNNL

2015-08-31

A collection of functions for statistical computing and data manipulation. These include routines for rapidly aggregating heterogeneous matrices, manipulating file names, loading R objects, sourcing multiple R files, formatting datetimes, multi-core parallel computing, stream editing, specialized plotting, etc. Smisc-package A collection of miscellaneous functions allMissing Identifies missing rows or columns in a data frame or matrix as.numericSilent Silent wrapper for coercing a vector to numeric comboList Produces all possible combinations of a set of linear model predictors cumMax Computes the maximum of the vector up to the current index cumsumNA Computes the cummulative sum of a vector without propogating NAsmore » d2binom Probability functions for the sum of two independent binomials dataIn A flexible way to import data into R. dbb The Beta-Binomial Distribution df2list Row-wise conversion of a data frame to a list dfplapply Parallelized single row processing of a data frame dframeEquiv Examines the equivalence of two dataframes or matrices dkbinom Probability functions for the sum of k independent binomials factor2character Converts all factor variables in a dataframe to character variables findDepMat Identify linearly dependent rows or columns in a matrix formatDT Converts date or datetime strings into alternate formats getExtension Filename manipulations: remove the extension or path, extract the extension or path getPath Filename manipulations: remove the extension or path, extract the extension or path grabLast Filename manipulations: remove the extension or path, extract the extension or path ifelse1 Non-vectorized version of ifelse integ Simple numerical integration routine interactionPlot Two-way Interaction Plot with Error Bar linearMap Linear mapping of a numerical vector or scalar list2df Convert a list to a data frame loadObject Loads and returns the object(s) in an ".Rdata" file more Display the contents of a file to the R terminal movAvg2 Calculate the moving average using a 2-sided window openDevice Opens a graphics device based on the filename extension p2binom Probability functions for the sum of two independent binomials padZero Pad a vector of numbers with zeros parseJob Parses a collection of elements into (almost) equal sized groups pbb The Beta-Binomial Distribution pcbinom A continuous version of the binomial cdf pkbinom Probability functions for the sum of k independent binomials plapply Simple parallelization of lapply plotFun Plot one or more functions on a single plot PowerData An example of power data pvar Prints the name and value of one or more objects qbb The Beta-Binomial Distribution rbb And numerous others (space limits reporting).« less

Reconceptualizing Efficacy in Substance Use Prevention Research: Refusal Response Efficacy and Drug Resistance Self-Efficacy in Adolescent Substance Use

PubMed Central

Choi, Hye Jeong; Krieger, Janice L.; Hecht, Michael L.

2014-01-01

The purpose of this study is to utilize the Extended Parallel Process Model (EPPM) to expand the construct of efficacy in the adolescent substance use context. Using survey data collected from 2,129 seventh-grade students in 39 rural schools, we examined the construct of drug refusal efficacy and demonstrated relationships among response efficacy (RE), self-efficacy (SE), and adolescent drug use. Consistent with the hypotheses, confirmatory factor analyses of a 12-item scale yielded a three-factor solution: refusal RE, alcohol-resistance self-efficacy (ASE), and marijuana-resistance self-efficacy (MSE). Refusal RE and ASE/MSE were negatively related to alcohol use and marijuana use, whereas MSE was positively associated with alcohol use. These data demonstrate that efficacy is a broader construct than typically considered in drug prevention. Prevention programs should reinforce both refusal RE and substance-specific resistance SE. PMID:23330857

Multi-modulus algorithm based on global artificial fish swarm intelligent optimization of DNA encoding sequences.

PubMed

Guo, Y C; Wang, H; Wu, H P; Zhang, M Q

2015-12-21

Aimed to address the defects of the large mean square error (MSE), and the slow convergence speed in equalizing the multi-modulus signals of the constant modulus algorithm (CMA), a multi-modulus algorithm (MMA) based on global artificial fish swarm (GAFS) intelligent optimization of DNA encoding sequences (GAFS-DNA-MMA) was proposed. To improve the convergence rate and reduce the MSE, this proposed algorithm adopted an encoding method based on DNA nucleotide chains to provide a possible solution to the problem. Furthermore, the GAFS algorithm, with its fast convergence and global search ability, was used to find the best sequence. The real and imaginary parts of the initial optimal weight vector of MMA were obtained through DNA coding of the best sequence. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm has a faster convergence speed and smaller MSE in comparison with the CMA, the MMA, and the AFS-DNA-MMA.

Does the modified Stroop effect exist in PTSD? Evidence from dissertation abstracts and the peer reviewed literature.

PubMed

Kimble, Matthew O; Frueh, B Christopher; Marks, Libby

2009-06-01

The modified Stroop effect (MSE), in which participants show delayed colour naming to trauma-specific words, is one of the most widely cited findings in the literature pertaining to cognitive bias in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The current study used a novel approach (Dissertation Abstract Review; DAR) to review the presence of the MSE in dissertation abstracts. A review of dissertations that used the modified Stroop task in a PTSD sample revealed that only 8% of the studies found delayed reaction times to trauma-specific words in participants with PTSD. The most common finding (75%) was for no PTSD-specific effects in colour naming trauma-relevant words. This ratio is significantly lower than ratios found in the peer reviewed literature, but even in the peer reviewed literature only 44% of controlled studies found the modified Stroop effect. These data suggest that a reevaluation of the MSE in PTSD is warranted.

Computational materials science and engineering education: A survey of trends and needs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Thornton, K.; Nola, Samanthule; Edwin Garcia, R.; Asta, Mark; Olson, G. B.

2009-10-01

Results from a recent reassessment of the state of computational materials science and engineering (CMSE) education are reported. Surveys were distributed to the chairs and heads of materials programs, faculty members engaged in computational research, and employers of materials scientists and engineers, mainly in the United States. The data was compiled to assess current course offerings related to CMSE, the general climate for introducing computational methods in MSE curricula, and the requirements from the employers’ viewpoint. Furthermore, the available educational resources and their utilization by the community are examined. The surveys show a general support for integrating computational content into MSE education. However, they also reflect remaining issues with implementation, as well as a gap between the tools being taught in courses and those that are used by employers. Overall, the results suggest the necessity for a comprehensively developed vision and plans to further the integration of computational methods into MSE curricula.

Effects of multisensory environments on stereotyped behaviours assessed as maintained by automatic reinforcement.

PubMed

Hill, Lindsay; Trusler, Karen; Furniss, Frederick; Lancioni, Giulio

2012-11-01

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effects of the sensory equipment provided in a multi-sensory environment (MSE) and the level of social contact provided on levels of stereotyped behaviours assessed as being maintained by automatic reinforcement. Stereotyped and engaged behaviours of two young people with severe intellectual disabilities were observed while the participants were either in a living room or in a MSE and receiving either high or low levels of interaction from carers. For both participants, levels of stereotyped behaviour were lower in the MSE irrespective of the level of carer attention received, while levels of engagement were higher under conditions of high carer attention in both environments. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that reductions in stereotyped behaviour observed in MSEs are due to the increased levels of specific sensory stimulation provided by such environments. © 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

The science enabled by the Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Martin, N. F.; Babusiaux, C.

2017-12-01

With its unique wide-field, multi-object, and dedicated spectroscopic capabilities, the Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) is a powerful facility to shed light on the faint Universe. Built around an upgrade of the Canada-France Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) to a 11.25-meter telescope with a dedicated ˜1.5 deg^2, 4,000-fiber wide-field spectrograph that covers the optical and near-infrared wavelengths at resolutions between 2,500 and 40,000, the MSE is the essential follow-up complement to the current and next generations of multi-wavelength imaging surveys, such as the LSST, Gaia, Euclid, eROSITA, SKA, and WFIRST, and is an ideal feeder facility for the extremely large telescopes that are currently being built (E-ELT, GMT, and TMT). The science enabled by the MSE is vast and would have an impact on almost all aspects of astronomy research.

VLSI implementation of a new LMS-based algorithm for noise removal in ECG signal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Satheeskumaran, S.; Sabrigiriraj, M.

2016-06-01

Least mean square (LMS)-based adaptive filters are widely deployed for removing artefacts in electrocardiogram (ECG) due to less number of computations. But they posses high mean square error (MSE) under noisy environment. The transform domain variable step-size LMS algorithm reduces the MSE at the cost of computational complexity. In this paper, a variable step-size delayed LMS adaptive filter is used to remove the artefacts from the ECG signal for improved feature extraction. The dedicated digital Signal processors provide fast processing, but they are not flexible. By using field programmable gate arrays, the pipelined architectures can be used to enhance the system performance. The pipelined architecture can enhance the operation efficiency of the adaptive filter and save the power consumption. This technique provides high signal-to-noise ratio and low MSE with reduced computational complexity; hence, it is a useful method for monitoring patients with heart-related problem.

Physiologic variability at the verge of systemic inflammation: multiscale entropy of heart rate variability is affected by very low doses of endotoxin.

PubMed

Herlitz, Georg N; Arlow, Renee L; Cheung, Nora H; Coyle, Susette M; Griffel, Benjamin; Macor, Marie A; Lowry, Stephen F; Calvano, Steve E; Gale, Stephen C

2015-02-01

Human injury or infection induces systemic inflammation with characteristic neuroendocrine responses. Fluctuations in autonomic function during inflammation are reflected by beat-to-beat variation in heart rate, termed heart rate variability (HRV). In the present study, we determine threshold doses of endotoxin needed to induce observable changes in markers of systemic inflammation, investigate whether metrics of HRV exhibit a differing threshold dose from other inflammatory markers, and investigate the size of data sets required for meaningful use of multiscale entropy (MSE) analysis of HRV. Healthy human volunteers (n = 25) were randomized to receive placebo (normal saline) or endotoxin/lipopolysaccharide (LPS): 0.1, 0.25, 0.5, 1.0, or 2.0 ng/kg administered intravenously. Vital signs were recorded every 30 min for 6 h and then at 9, 12, and 24 h after LPS. Blood samples were drawn at specific time points for cytokine measurements. Heart rate variability analysis was performed using electrocardiogram epochs of 5 min. Multiscale entropy for HRV was calculated for all dose groups to scale factor 40. The lowest significant threshold dose was noted in core temperature at 0.25 ng/kg. Endogenous tumor necrosis factor α and interleukin 6 were significantly responsive at the next dosage level (0.5 ng/kg) along with elevations in circulating leukocytes and heart rate. Responses were exaggerated at higher doses (1 and 2 ng/kg). Time domain and frequency domain HRV metrics similarly suggested a threshold dose, differing from placebo at 1.0 and 2.0 ng/kg, below which no clear pattern in response was evident. By applying repeated-measures analysis of variance across scale factors, a significant decrease in MSE was seen at 1.0 and 2.0 ng/kg by 2 h after exposure to LPS. Although not statistically significant below 1.0 ng/kg, MSE unexpectedly decreased across all groups in an orderly dose-response pattern not seen in the other outcomes. By using repeated-measures analysis of variance across scale factors, MSE can detect autonomic change after LPS challenge in a group of 25 subjects using electrocardiogram epochs of only 5 min and entropy analysis to scale factor of only 40, potentially facilitating MSE's wider use as a research tool or bedside monitor. Traditional markers of inflammation generally exhibit threshold dose behavior. In contrast, MSE's apparent continuous dose-response pattern, although not statistically verifiable in this study, suggests a potential subclinical harbinger of infectious or other insult. The possible derangement of autonomic complexity prior to or independent of the cytokine surge cannot be ruled out. Future investigation should focus on confirmation of overt inflammation following observed decreases in MSE in a clinical setting.

Audio visual speech source separation via improved context dependent association model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kazemi, Alireza; Boostani, Reza; Sobhanmanesh, Fariborz

2014-12-01

In this paper, we exploit the non-linear relation between a speech source and its associated lip video as a source of extra information to propose an improved audio-visual speech source separation (AVSS) algorithm. The audio-visual association is modeled using a neural associator which estimates the visual lip parameters from a temporal context of acoustic observation frames. We define an objective function based on mean square error (MSE) measure between estimated and target visual parameters. This function is minimized for estimation of the de-mixing vector/filters to separate the relevant source from linear instantaneous or time-domain convolutive mixtures. We have also proposed a hybrid criterion which uses AV coherency together with kurtosis as a non-Gaussianity measure. Experimental results are presented and compared in terms of visually relevant speech detection accuracy and output signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) of source separation. The suggested audio-visual model significantly improves relevant speech classification accuracy compared to existing GMM-based model and the proposed AVSS algorithm improves the speech separation quality compared to reference ICA- and AVSS-based methods.

Reversed magnetic shear suppression of electron-scale turbulence on NSTX

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yuh, Howard Y.; Levinton, F. M.; Bell, R. E.; Hosea, J. C.; Kaye, S. M.; Leblanc, B. P.; Mazzucato, E.; Smith, D. R.; Domier, C. W.; Luhmann, N. C.; Park, H. K.

2009-11-01

Electron thermal internal transport barriers (e-ITBs) are observed in reversed (negative) magnetic shear NSTX discharges^1. These e-ITBs can be created with either neutral beam heating or High Harmonic Fast Wave (HHFW) RF heating. The e-ITB location occurs at the location of minimum magnetic shear determined by Motional Stark Effect (MSE) constrained equilibria. Statistical studies show a threshold condition in magnetic shear for e-ITB formation. High-k fluctuation measurements at electron turbulence wavenumbers^3 have been made under several different transport regimes, including a bursty regime that limits temperature gradients at intermediate magnetic shear. The growth rate of fluctuations has been calculated immediately following a change in the local magnetic shear, resulting in electron temperature gradient relaxation. Linear gyrokinetic simulation results for NSTX show that while measured electron temperature gradients exceed critical linear thresholds for ETG instability, growth rates can remain low under reversed shear conditions up to high electron temperatures gradients. ^1H. Yuh, et. al., PoP 16, 056120 ^2D.R. Smith, E. Mazzucato et al., RSI 75, 3840 ^3E. Mazzucato, D.R. Smith et al., PRL 101, 075001

Grid-based lattice summation of electrostatic potentials by assembled rank-structured tensor approximation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Khoromskaia, Venera; Khoromskij, Boris N.

2014-12-01

Our recent method for low-rank tensor representation of sums of the arbitrarily positioned electrostatic potentials discretized on a 3D Cartesian grid reduces the 3D tensor summation to operations involving only 1D vectors however retaining the linear complexity scaling in the number of potentials. Here, we introduce and study a novel tensor approach for fast and accurate assembled summation of a large number of lattice-allocated potentials represented on 3D N × N × N grid with the computational requirements only weakly dependent on the number of summed potentials. It is based on the assembled low-rank canonical tensor representations of the collected potentials using pointwise sums of shifted canonical vectors representing the single generating function, say the Newton kernel. For a sum of electrostatic potentials over L × L × L lattice embedded in a box the required storage scales linearly in the 1D grid-size, O(N) , while the numerical cost is estimated by O(NL) . For periodic boundary conditions, the storage demand remains proportional to the 1D grid-size of a unit cell, n = N / L, while the numerical cost reduces to O(N) , that outperforms the FFT-based Ewald-type summation algorithms of complexity O(N3 log N) . The complexity in the grid parameter N can be reduced even to the logarithmic scale O(log N) by using data-sparse representation of canonical N-vectors via the quantics tensor approximation. For justification, we prove an upper bound on the quantics ranks for the canonical vectors in the overall lattice sum. The presented approach is beneficial in applications which require further functional calculus with the lattice potential, say, scalar product with a function, integration or differentiation, which can be performed easily in tensor arithmetics on large 3D grids with 1D cost. Numerical tests illustrate the performance of the tensor summation method and confirm the estimated bounds on the tensor ranks.

Comparison of various error functions in predicting the optimum isotherm by linear and non-linear regression analysis for the sorption of basic red 9 by activated carbon.

PubMed

Kumar, K Vasanth; Porkodi, K; Rocha, F

2008-01-15

A comparison of linear and non-linear regression method in selecting the optimum isotherm was made to the experimental equilibrium data of basic red 9 sorption by activated carbon. The r(2) was used to select the best fit linear theoretical isotherm. In the case of non-linear regression method, six error functions namely coefficient of determination (r(2)), hybrid fractional error function (HYBRID), Marquardt's percent standard deviation (MPSD), the average relative error (ARE), sum of the errors squared (ERRSQ) and sum of the absolute errors (EABS) were used to predict the parameters involved in the two and three parameter isotherms and also to predict the optimum isotherm. Non-linear regression was found to be a better way to obtain the parameters involved in the isotherms and also the optimum isotherm. For two parameter isotherm, MPSD was found to be the best error function in minimizing the error distribution between the experimental equilibrium data and predicted isotherms. In the case of three parameter isotherm, r(2) was found to be the best error function to minimize the error distribution structure between experimental equilibrium data and theoretical isotherms. The present study showed that the size of the error function alone is not a deciding factor to choose the optimum isotherm. In addition to the size of error function, the theory behind the predicted isotherm should be verified with the help of experimental data while selecting the optimum isotherm. A coefficient of non-determination, K(2) was explained and was found to be very useful in identifying the best error function while selecting the optimum isotherm.

Longitudinal Cognitive Trajectories of Women Veterans from the Women’s Health Initiative Memory Study

PubMed Central

Padula, Claudia B.; Weitlauf, Julie C.; Rosen, Allyson C.; Reiber, Gayle; Cochrane, Barbara B.; Naughton, Michelle J.; Li, Wenjun; Rissling, Michelle; Yaffe, Kristine; Hunt, Julie R.; Stefanick, Marcia L.; Goldstein, Mary K.; Espeland, Mark A.

2016-01-01

Purpose of the Study: A comparison of longitudinal global cognitive functioning in women Veteran and non-Veteran participants in the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI). Design and Methods: We studied 7,330 women aged 65–79 at baseline who participated in the WHI Hormone Therapy Trial and its ancillary Memory Study (WHIMS). Global cognitive functioning (Modified Mini-Mental State Examination [3MSE]) in Veterans (n = 279) and non-Veterans (n = 7,051) was compared at baseline and annually for 8 years using generalized linear modeling methods. Results: Compared with non-Veterans, Veteran women were older, more likely to be Caucasian, unmarried, and had higher rates of educational and occupational attainment. Results of unadjusted baseline analyses suggest 3MSE scores were similar between groups. Longitudinal analyses, adjusted for age, education, ethnicity, and WHI trial assignment revealed differences in the rate of cognitive decline between groups over time, such that scores decreased more in Veterans relative to non-Veterans. This relative difference was more pronounced among Veterans who were older, had higher educational/occupational attainment and greater baseline prevalence of cardiovascular risk factors (e.g., smoking) and cardiovascular disease (e.g., angina, stroke). Implications: Veteran status was associated with higher prevalence of protective factors that may have helped initially preserve cognitive functioning. However, findings ultimately revealed more pronounced cognitive decline among Veteran relative to non-Veteran participants, likely suggesting the presence of risks that may impact neuropathology and the effects of which were initially masked by Veterans’ greater cognitive reserve. PMID:26615021

Artificial neural network modelling for organic and total nitrogen removal of aerobic granulation under steady-state condition.

PubMed

Gong, H; Pishgar, R; Tay, J H

2018-04-27

Aerobic granulation is a recent technology with high level of complexity and sensitivity to environmental and operational conditions. Artificial neural networks (ANNs), computational tools capable of describing complex non-linear systems, are the best fit to simulate aerobic granular bioreactors. In this study, two feedforward backpropagation ANN models were developed to predict chemical oxygen demand (Model I) and total nitrogen removal efficiencies (Model II) of aerobic granulation technology under steady-state condition. Fundamentals of ANN models and the steps to create them were briefly reviewed. The models were respectively fed with 205 and 136 data points collected from laboratory-, pilot-, and full-scale studies on aerobic granulation technology reported in the literature. Initially, 60%, 20%, and 20%, and 80%, 10%, and 10% of the points in the corresponding datasets were randomly chosen and used for training, testing, and validation of Model I, and Model II, respectively. Overall coefficient of determination (R 2 ) value and mean squared error (MSE) of the two models were initially 0.49 and 15.5, and 0.37 and 408, respectively. To improve the model performance, two data division methods were used. While one method is generic and potentially applicable to other fields, the other can only be applied to modelling the performance of aerobic granular reactors. R 2 value and MSE were improved to 0.90 and 2.54, and 0.81 and 121.56, respectively, after applying the new data division methods. The results demonstrated that ANN-based models were capable simulation approach to predict a complicated process like aerobic granulation.

Mauna Kea Spectrographic Explorer (MSE): a conceptual design for multi-object high resolution spectrograph

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Kai; Zhu, Yongtian; Hu, Zhongwen

2016-08-01

The Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) project will transform the CFHT 3.6m optical telescope into a 10m class dedicated multi-object spectroscopic facility, with an ability to simultaneously measure thousands of objects with a spectral resolution range spanning 2,000 to 40,000. MSE will develop two spectrographic facilities to meet the science requirements. These are respectively, the Low/Medium Resolution spectrographs (LMRS) and High Resolution spectrographs (HRS). Multi-object high resolution spectrographs with total of 1,156 fibers is a big challenge, one that has never been attempted for a 10m class telescope. To date, most spectral survey facilities work in single order low/medium resolution mode, and only a few Wide Field Spectrographs (WFS) provide a cross-dispersion high resolution mode with a limited number of orders. Nanjing Institute of Astronomical Optics and Technology (NIAOT) propose a conceptual design with the use of novel image slicer arrays and single order immersed Volume Phase Holographic (VPH) grating for the MSE multi-object high resolution spectrographs. The conceptual scheme contains six identical fiber-link spectrographs, each of which simultaneously covers three restricted bands (λ/30, λ/30, λ/15) in the optical regime, with spectral resolution of 40,000 in Blue/Visible bands (400nm / 490nm) and 20,000 in Red band (650nm). The details of the design is presented in this paper.

An experimental study of interstitial lung tissue classification in HRCT images using ANN and role of cost functions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dash, Jatindra K.; Kale, Mandar; Mukhopadhyay, Sudipta; Khandelwal, Niranjan; Prabhakar, Nidhi; Garg, Mandeep; Kalra, Naveen

2017-03-01

In this paper, we investigate the effect of the error criteria used during a training phase of the artificial neural network (ANN) on the accuracy of the classifier for classification of lung tissues affected with Interstitial Lung Diseases (ILD). Mean square error (MSE) and the cross-entropy (CE) criteria are chosen being most popular choice in state-of-the-art implementations. The classification experiment performed on the six interstitial lung disease (ILD) patterns viz. Consolidation, Emphysema, Ground Glass Opacity, Micronodules, Fibrosis and Healthy from MedGIFT database. The texture features from an arbitrary region of interest (AROI) are extracted using Gabor filter. Two different neural networks are trained with the scaled conjugate gradient back propagation algorithm with MSE and CE error criteria function respectively for weight updation. Performance is evaluated in terms of average accuracy of these classifiers using 4 fold cross-validation. Each network is trained for five times for each fold with randomly initialized weight vectors and accuracies are computed. Significant improvement in classification accuracy is observed when ANN is trained by using CE (67.27%) as error function compared to MSE (63.60%). Moreover, standard deviation of the classification accuracy for the network trained with CE (6.69) error criteria is found less as compared to network trained with MSE (10.32) criteria.

Decomposition of the Mean Squared Error and NSE Performance Criteria: Implications for Improving Hydrological Modelling

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gupta, Hoshin V.; Kling, Harald; Yilmaz, Koray K.; Martinez-Baquero, Guillermo F.

2009-01-01

The mean squared error (MSE) and the related normalization, the Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE), are the two criteria most widely used for calibration and evaluation of hydrological models with observed data. Here, we present a diagnostically interesting decomposition of NSE (and hence MSE), which facilitates analysis of the relative importance of its different components in the context of hydrological modelling, and show how model calibration problems can arise due to interactions among these components. The analysis is illustrated by calibrating a simple conceptual precipitation-runoff model to daily data for a number of Austrian basins having a broad range of hydro-meteorological characteristics. Evaluation of the results clearly demonstrates the problems that can be associated with any calibration based on the NSE (or MSE) criterion. While we propose and test an alternative criterion that can help to reduce model calibration problems, the primary purpose of this study is not to present an improved measure of model performance. Instead, we seek to show that there are systematic problems inherent with any optimization based on formulations related to the MSE. The analysis and results have implications to the manner in which we calibrate and evaluate environmental models; we discuss these and suggest possible ways forward that may move us towards an improved and diagnostically meaningful approach to model performance evaluation and identification.

Generalized concurrence in boson sampling.

PubMed

Chin, Seungbeom; Huh, Joonsuk

2018-04-17

A fundamental question in linear optical quantum computing is to understand the origin of the quantum supremacy in the physical system. It is found that the multimode linear optical transition amplitudes are calculated through the permanents of transition operator matrices, which is a hard problem for classical simulations (boson sampling problem). We can understand this problem by considering a quantum measure that directly determines the runtime for computing the transition amplitudes. In this paper, we suggest a quantum measure named "Fock state concurrence sum" C S , which is the summation over all the members of "the generalized Fock state concurrence" (a measure analogous to the generalized concurrences of entanglement and coherence). By introducing generalized algorithms for computing the transition amplitudes of the Fock state boson sampling with an arbitrary number of photons per mode, we show that the minimal classical runtime for all the known algorithms directly depends on C S . Therefore, we can state that the Fock state concurrence sum C S behaves as a collective measure that controls the computational complexity of Fock state BS. We expect that our observation on the role of the Fock state concurrence in the generalized algorithm for permanents would provide a unified viewpoint to interpret the quantum computing power of linear optics.

Linearly Additive Shape and Color Signals in Monkey Inferotemporal Cortex

PubMed Central

McMahon, David B. T.; Olson, Carl R.

2009-01-01

How does the brain represent a red circle? One possibility is that there is a specialized and possibly time-consuming process whereby the attributes of shape and color, carried by separate populations of neurons in low-order visual cortex, are bound together into a unitary neural representation. Another possibility is that neurons in high-order visual cortex are selective, by virtue of their bottom-up input from low-order visual areas, for particular conjunctions of shape and color. A third possibility is that they simply sum shape and color signals linearly. We tested these ideas by measuring the responses of inferotemporal cortex neurons to sets of stimuli in which two attributes—shape and color—varied independently. We find that a few neurons exhibit conjunction selectivity but that in most neurons the influences of shape and color sum linearly. Contrary to the idea of conjunction coding, few neurons respond selectively to a particular combination of shape and color. Contrary to the idea that binding requires time, conjunction signals, when present, occur as early as feature signals. We argue that neither conjunction selectivity nor a specialized feature binding process is necessary for the effective representation of shape–color combinations. PMID:19144745

Linearly additive shape and color signals in monkey inferotemporal cortex.

PubMed

McMahon, David B T; Olson, Carl R

2009-04-01

How does the brain represent a red circle? One possibility is that there is a specialized and possibly time-consuming process whereby the attributes of shape and color, carried by separate populations of neurons in low-order visual cortex, are bound together into a unitary neural representation. Another possibility is that neurons in high-order visual cortex are selective, by virtue of their bottom-up input from low-order visual areas, for particular conjunctions of shape and color. A third possibility is that they simply sum shape and color signals linearly. We tested these ideas by measuring the responses of inferotemporal cortex neurons to sets of stimuli in which two attributes-shape and color-varied independently. We find that a few neurons exhibit conjunction selectivity but that in most neurons the influences of shape and color sum linearly. Contrary to the idea of conjunction coding, few neurons respond selectively to a particular combination of shape and color. Contrary to the idea that binding requires time, conjunction signals, when present, occur as early as feature signals. We argue that neither conjunction selectivity nor a specialized feature binding process is necessary for the effective representation of shape-color combinations.

Relationships between depression, anxiety, and pain in a group of university music students.

PubMed

Wristen, Brenda W; Fountain, Sarah E

2013-09-01

There is emerging interest in studying the incidence of music-related injuries and problems among students. The current study drew on a data set collected from 287 music majors and minors at a large US midwestern university school of music in order to determine if correlations existed between anxiety and/or depression and the reported presence of physical pain, and to understand the nature of any such relationships. Physical pain symptoms were scored on a scale of 0 (none) to 10 (excruciating) and summed across 21 body regions. Depression and anxiety symptoms were scored as none (0), mild (1), moderate (2), or severe (3), and each summed across either 13 symptoms for depression or 8 symptoms for anxiety. The potential linear relationship among these variables was evaluated using F-tests (as part of ANOVAs) and linear regression parameter estimation techniques. The explanatory value of these relationships was evaluated using R² values. Results indicate a clear positive linear relationship between both depression and pain, and anxiety and pain. However, the presence of depression and/or anxiety symptoms was insufficient to explain variability in pain scores of these participants.

Parameter estimation of Monod model by the Least-Squares method for microalgae Botryococcus Braunii sp

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

See, J. J.; Jamaian, S. S.; Salleh, R. M.; Nor, M. E.; Aman, F.

2018-04-01

This research aims to estimate the parameters of Monod model of microalgae Botryococcus Braunii sp growth by the Least-Squares method. Monod equation is a non-linear equation which can be transformed into a linear equation form and it is solved by implementing the Least-Squares linear regression method. Meanwhile, Gauss-Newton method is an alternative method to solve the non-linear Least-Squares problem with the aim to obtain the parameters value of Monod model by minimizing the sum of square error ( SSE). As the result, the parameters of the Monod model for microalgae Botryococcus Braunii sp can be estimated by the Least-Squares method. However, the estimated parameters value obtained by the non-linear Least-Squares method are more accurate compared to the linear Least-Squares method since the SSE of the non-linear Least-Squares method is less than the linear Least-Squares method.

160-Gb/s all-optical phase-transparent wavelength conversion through cascaded SFG-DFG in a broadband linear-chirped PPLN waveguide.

PubMed

Lu, Guo-Wei; Shinada, Satoshi; Furukawa, Hideaki; Wada, Naoya; Miyazaki, Tetsuya; Ito, Hiromasa

2010-03-15

We experimentally demonstrated ultra-fast phase-transparent wavelength conversion using cascaded sum- and difference-frequency generation (cSFG-DFG) in linear-chirped periodically poled lithium niobate (PPLN). Error-free wavelength conversion of a 160-Gb/s return-to-zero differential phase-shift keying (RZ-DPSK) signal was successfully achieved. Thanks to the enhanced conversion bandwidth in the PPLN with linear-chirped periods, no optical equalizer was required to compensate the spectrum distortion after conversion, unlike a previous demonstration of 160-Gb/s RZ on-off keying (OOK) using fixed-period PPLN.

Design of nonlinear PID controller and nonlinear model predictive controller for a continuous stirred tank reactor.

PubMed

Prakash, J; Srinivasan, K

2009-07-01

In this paper, the authors have represented the nonlinear system as a family of local linear state space models, local PID controllers have been designed on the basis of linear models, and the weighted sum of the output from the local PID controllers (Nonlinear PID controller) has been used to control the nonlinear process. Further, Nonlinear Model Predictive Controller using the family of local linear state space models (F-NMPC) has been developed. The effectiveness of the proposed control schemes has been demonstrated on a CSTR process, which exhibits dynamic nonlinearity.

Approximating Smooth Step Functions Using Partial Fourier Series Sums

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-09-01

interp1(xt(ii), smoothstepbez( t(ii), min(t(ii)), max(t(ii)), ’y’), t(ii), ’linear’, ’ extrap ’); ii = find( abs(t - tau/2) <= epi ); iii = t(ii...interp1( xt(ii), smoothstepbez( rt, min(rt), max(rt), ’y’), t(ii), ’linear’, ’ extrap ’ ); % stepm(ii) = 1 - interp1(xt(ii), smoothstepbez( t(ii...min(t(ii)), max(t(ii)), ’y’), t(ii), ’linear’, ’ extrap ’); In this case, because x is also defined as a function of the independent parameter

Parameter estimation method and updating of regional prediction equations for ungaged sites in the desert region of California

USGS Publications Warehouse

Barth, Nancy A.; Veilleux, Andrea G.

2012-01-01

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is currently updating at-site flood frequency estimates for USGS streamflow-gaging stations in the desert region of California. The at-site flood-frequency analysis is complicated by short record lengths (less than 20 years is common) and numerous zero flows/low outliers at many sites. Estimates of the three parameters (mean, standard deviation, and skew) required for fitting the log Pearson Type 3 (LP3) distribution are likely to be highly unreliable based on the limited and heavily censored at-site data. In a generalization of the recommendations in Bulletin 17B, a regional analysis was used to develop regional estimates of all three parameters (mean, standard deviation, and skew) of the LP3 distribution. A regional skew value of zero from a previously published report was used with a new estimated mean squared error (MSE) of 0.20. A weighted least squares (WLS) regression method was used to develop both a regional standard deviation and a mean model based on annual peak-discharge data for 33 USGS stations throughout California’s desert region. At-site standard deviation and mean values were determined by using an expected moments algorithm (EMA) method for fitting the LP3 distribution to the logarithms of annual peak-discharge data. Additionally, a multiple Grubbs-Beck (MGB) test, a generalization of the test recommended in Bulletin 17B, was used for detecting multiple potentially influential low outliers in a flood series. The WLS regression found that no basin characteristics could explain the variability of standard deviation. Consequently, a constant regional standard deviation model was selected, resulting in a log-space value of 0.91 with a MSE of 0.03 log units. Yet drainage area was found to be statistically significant at explaining the site-to-site variability in mean. The linear WLS regional mean model based on drainage area had a Pseudo- 2 R of 51 percent and a MSE of 0.32 log units. The regional parameter estimates were then used to develop a set of equations for estimating flows with 50-, 20-, 10-, 4-, 2-, 1-, 0.5-, and 0.2-percent annual exceedance probabilities for ungaged basins. The final equations are functions of drainage area.Average standard errors of prediction for these regression equations range from 214.2 to 856.2 percent.

Nonlinear dynamical systems effects of homeopathic remedies on multiscale entropy and correlation dimension of slow wave sleep EEG in young adults with histories of coffee-induced insomnia.

PubMed

Bell, Iris R; Howerter, Amy; Jackson, Nicholas; Aickin, Mikel; Bootzin, Richard R; Brooks, Audrey J

2012-07-01

Investigators of homeopathy have proposed that nonlinear dynamical systems (NDS) and complex systems science offer conceptual and analytic tools for evaluating homeopathic remedy effects. Previous animal studies demonstrate that homeopathic medicines alter delta electroencephalographic (EEG) slow wave sleep. The present study extended findings of remedy-related sleep stage alterations in human subjects by testing the feasibility of using two different NDS analytic approaches to assess remedy effects on human slow wave sleep EEG. Subjects (N=54) were young adult male and female college students with a history of coffee-related insomnia who participated in a larger 4-week study of the polysomnographic effects of homeopathic medicines on home-based all-night sleep recordings. Subjects took one bedtime dose of a homeopathic remedy (Coffea cruda or Nux vomica 30c). We computed multiscale entropy (MSE) and the correlation dimension (Mekler-D2) for stages 3 and 4 slow wave sleep EEG sampled in artifact-free 2-min segments during the first two rapid-eye-movement (REM) cycles for remedy and post-remedy nights, controlling for placebo and post-placebo night effects. MSE results indicate significant, remedy-specific directional effects, especially later in the night (REM cycle 2) (CC: remedy night increases and post-remedy night decreases in MSE at multiple sites for both stages 3 and 4 in both REM cycles; NV: remedy night decreases and post-remedy night increases, mainly in stage 3 REM cycle 2 MSE). D2 analyses yielded more sporadic and inconsistent findings. Homeopathic medicines Coffea cruda and Nux vomica in 30c potencies alter short-term nonlinear dynamic parameters of slow wave sleep EEG in healthy young adults. MSE may provide a more sensitive NDS analytic method than D2 for evaluating homeopathic remedy effects on human sleep EEG patterns. Copyright © 2012 The Faculty of Homeopathy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Nonlinear Dynamical Systems Effects of Homeopathic Remedies on Multiscale Entropy and Correlation Dimension of Slow Wave Sleep EEG in Young Adults with Histories of Coffee-Induced Insomnia

PubMed Central

Bell, Iris R.; Howerter, Amy; Jackson, Nicholas; Aickin, Mikel; Bootzin, Richard R.; Brooks, Audrey J.

2012-01-01

Background Investigators of homeopathy have proposed that nonlinear dynamical systems (NDS) and complex systems science offer conceptual and analytic tools for evaluating homeopathic remedy effects. Previous animal studies demonstrate that homeopathic medicines alter delta electroencephalographic (EEG) slow wave sleep. The present study extended findings of remedy-related sleep stage alterations in human subjects by testing the feasibility of using two different NDS analytic approaches to assess remedy effects on human slow wave sleep EEG. Methods Subjects (N=54) were young adult male and female college students with a history of coffee-related insomnia who participated in a larger 4-week study of the polysomnographic effects of homeopathic medicines on home-based all-night sleep recordings. Subjects took one bedtime dose of a homeopathic remedy (Coffea cruda or Nux vomica 30c). We computed multiscale entropy (MSE) and the correlation dimension (Mekler-D2) for stage 3 and 4 slow wave sleep EEG sampled in artifact-free 2-minute segments during the first two rapid-eye-movement (REM) cycles for remedy and post-remedy nights, controlling for placebo and post-placebo night effects. Results MSE results indicate significant, remedy-specific directional effects, especially later in the night (REM cycle 2) (CC: remedy night increases and post-remedy night decreases in MSE at multiple sites for both stages 3 and 4 in both REM cycles; NV: remedy night decreases and post-remedy night increases, mainly in stage 3 REM cycle 2 MSE). D2 analyses yielded more sporadic and inconsistent findings. Conclusions Homeopathic medicines Coffea cruda and Nux vomica in 30c potencies alter short-term nonlinear dynamic parameters of slow wave sleep EEG in healthy young adults. MSE may provide a more sensitive NDS analytic method than D2 for evaluating homeopathic remedy effects on human sleep EEG patterns. PMID:22818237

Direct surface magnetometry with photoemission magnetic x-ray dichroism

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

Tobin, J.G.; Goodman, K.W.; Schumann, F.O.

1997-04-01

Element specific surface magnetometry remains a central goal of synchrotron radiation based studies of nanomagnetic structures. One appealing possibility is the combination of x-ray absorption dichroism measurements and the theoretical framework provided by the {open_quotes}sum rules.{close_quotes} Unfortunately, sum rule analysis are hampered by several limitations including delocalization of the final state, multi-electronic phenomena and the presence of surface dipoles. An alternative experiment, Magnetic X-Ray Dichroism in Photoelectron Spectroscopy, holds out promise based upon its elemental specificity, surface sensitivity and high resolution. Computational simulations by Tamura et al. demonstrated the relationship between exchange and spin orbit splittings and experimental data ofmore » linear and circular dichroisms. Now the authors have developed an analytical framework which allows for the direct extraction of core level exchange splittings from circular and linear dichroic photoemission data. By extending a model initially proposed by Venus, it is possible to show a linear relation between normalized dichroism peaks in the experimental data and the underlying exchange splitting. Since it is reasonable to expect that exchange splittings and magnetic moments track together, this measurement thus becomes a powerful new tool for direct surface magnetometry, without recourse to time consuming and difficult spectral simulations. The theoretical derivation will be supported by high resolution linear and circular dichroism data collected at the Spectromicroscopy Facility of the Advanced Light Source.« less

Complex-energy approach to sum rules within nuclear density functional theory

DOE PAGES

Hinohara, Nobuo; Kortelainen, Markus; Nazarewicz, Witold; ...

2015-04-27

The linear response of the nucleus to an external field contains unique information about the effective interaction, correlations governing the behavior of the many-body system, and properties of its excited states. To characterize the response, it is useful to use its energy-weighted moments, or sum rules. By comparing computed sum rules with experimental values, the information content of the response can be utilized in the optimization process of the nuclear Hamiltonian or nuclear energy density functional (EDF). But the additional information comes at a price: compared to the ground state, computation of excited states is more demanding. To establish anmore » efficient framework to compute energy-weighted sum rules of the response that is adaptable to the optimization of the nuclear EDF and large-scale surveys of collective strength, we have developed a new technique within the complex-energy finite-amplitude method (FAM) based on the quasiparticle random- phase approximation. The proposed sum-rule technique based on the complex-energy FAM is a tool of choice when optimizing effective interactions or energy functionals. The method is very efficient and well-adaptable to parallel computing. As a result, the FAM formulation is especially useful when standard theorems based on commutation relations involving the nuclear Hamiltonian and external field cannot be used.« less

Quantification of crystalline cellulose in lignocellulosic biomass using sum frequency generation (SFG) vibration spectroscopy and comparison with other analytical methods.

PubMed

Barnette, Anna L; Lee, Christopher; Bradley, Laura C; Schreiner, Edward P; Park, Yong Bum; Shin, Heenae; Cosgrove, Daniel J; Park, Sunkyu; Kim, Seong H

2012-07-01

The non-centrosymmetry requirement of sum frequency generation (SFG) vibration spectroscopy allows the detection and quantification of crystalline cellulose in lignocellulose biomass without spectral interferences from hemicelluloses and lignin. This paper shows a correlation between the amount of crystalline cellulose in biomass and the SFG signal intensity. Model biomass samples were prepared by mixing commercially available cellulose, xylan, and lignin to defined concentrations. The SFG signal intensity was found sensitive to a wide range of crystallinity, but varied non-linearly with the mass fraction of cellulose in the samples. This might be due to the matrix effects such as light scattering and absorption by xylan and lignin, as well as the non-linear density dependence of the SFG process itself. Comparison with other techniques such as XRD, FT-Raman, FT-IR and NMR demonstrate that SFG can be a complementary and sensitive tool to assess crystalline cellulose in biomass. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A fast-initializing digital equalizer with on-line tracking for data communications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Houts, R. C.; Barksdale, W. J.

1974-01-01

A theory is developed for a digital equalizer for use in reducing intersymbol interference (ISI) on high speed data communications channels. The equalizer is initialized with a single isolated transmitter pulse, provided the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is not unusually low, then switches to a decision directed, on-line mode of operation that allows tracking of channel variations. Conditions for optimal tap-gain settings are obtained first for a transversal equalizer structure by using a mean squared error (MSE) criterion, a first order gradient algorithm to determine the adjustable equalizer tap-gains, and a sequence of isolated initializing pulses. Since the rate of tap-gain convergence depends on the eigenvalues of a channel output correlation matrix, convergence can be improved by making a linear transformation on to obtain a new correlation matrix.

Adaptive Window Zero-Crossing-Based Instantaneous Frequency Estimation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sekhar, S. Chandra; Sreenivas, TV

2004-12-01

We address the problem of estimating instantaneous frequency (IF) of a real-valued constant amplitude time-varying sinusoid. Estimation of polynomial IF is formulated using the zero-crossings of the signal. We propose an algorithm to estimate nonpolynomial IF by local approximation using a low-order polynomial, over a short segment of the signal. This involves the choice of window length to minimize the mean square error (MSE). The optimal window length found by directly minimizing the MSE is a function of the higher-order derivatives of the IF which are not available a priori. However, an optimum solution is formulated using an adaptive window technique based on the concept of intersection of confidence intervals. The adaptive algorithm enables minimum MSE-IF (MMSE-IF) estimation without requiring a priori information about the IF. Simulation results show that the adaptive window zero-crossing-based IF estimation method is superior to fixed window methods and is also better than adaptive spectrogram and adaptive Wigner-Ville distribution (WVD)-based IF estimators for different signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).

An empirical model of water quality for use in rapid management strategy evaluation in Southeast Queensland, Australia.

PubMed

de la Mare, William; Ellis, Nick; Pascual, Ricardo; Tickell, Sharon

2012-04-01

Simulation models have been widely adopted in fisheries for management strategy evaluation (MSE). However, in catchment management of water quality, MSE is hampered by the complexity of both decision space and the hydrological process models. Empirical models based on monitoring data provide a feasible alternative to process models; they run much faster and, by conditioning on data, they can simulate realistic responses to management actions. Using 10 years of water quality indicators from Queensland, Australia, we built an empirical model suitable for rapid MSE that reproduces the water quality variables' mean and covariance structure, adjusts the expected indicators through local management effects, and propagates effects downstream by capturing inter-site regression relationships. Empirical models enable managers to search the space of possible strategies using rapid assessment. They provide not only realistic responses in water quality indicators but also variability in those indicators, allowing managers to assess strategies in an uncertain world. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Comparison of sum-of-hourly and daily time step standardized ASCE Penman-Monteith reference evapotranspiration

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Djaman, Koffi; Irmak, Suat; Sall, Mamadou; Sow, Abdoulaye; Kabenge, Isa

2017-10-01

The objective of this study was to quantify differences associated with using 24-h time step reference evapotranspiration (ETo), as compared with the sum of hourly ETo computations with the standardized ASCE Penman-Monteith (ASCE-PM) model for semi-arid dry conditions at Fanaye and Ndiaye (Senegal) and semiarid humid conditions at Sapu (The Gambia) and Kankan (Guinea). The results showed that there was good agreement between the sum of hourly ETo and daily time step ETo at all four locations. The daily time step overestimated the daily ETo relative to the sum of hourly ETo by 1.3 to 8% for the whole study periods. However, there is location and monthly dependence of the magnitude of ETo values and the ratio of the ETo values estimated by both methods. Sum of hourly ETo tends to give higher ETo during winter time at Fanaye and Sapu, while the daily ETo was higher from March to November at the same weather stations. At Ndiaye and Kankan, daily time step estimates of ETo were high during the year. The simple linear regression slopes between the sum of 24-h ETo and the daily time step ETo at all weather stations varied from 1.02 to 1.08 with high coefficient of determination (R 2 ≥ 0.87). Application of the hourly ETo estimation method might help on accurate ETo estimation to meet irrigation requirement under precision agriculture.

SU-G-BRB-14: Uncertainty of Radiochromic Film Based Relative Dose Measurements

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

Devic, S; Tomic, N; DeBlois, F

2016-06-15

Purpose: Due to inherently non-linear dose response, measurement of relative dose distribution with radiochromic film requires measurement of absolute dose using a calibration curve following previously established reference dosimetry protocol. On the other hand, a functional form that converts the inherently non-linear dose response curve of the radiochromic film dosimetry system into linear one has been proposed recently [Devic et al, Med. Phys. 39 4850–4857 (2012)]. However, there is a question what would be the uncertainty of such measured relative dose. Methods: If the relative dose distribution is determined going through the reference dosimetry system (conversion of the response bymore » using calibration curve into absolute dose) the total uncertainty of such determined relative dose will be calculated by summing in quadrature total uncertainties of doses measured at a given and at the reference point. On the other hand, if the relative dose is determined using linearization method, the new response variable is calculated as ζ=a(netOD)n/ln(netOD). In this case, the total uncertainty in relative dose will be calculated by summing in quadrature uncertainties for a new response function (σζ) for a given and the reference point. Results: Except at very low doses, where the measurement uncertainty dominates, the total relative dose uncertainty is less than 1% for the linear response method as compared to almost 2% uncertainty level for the reference dosimetry method. The result is not surprising having in mind that the total uncertainty of the reference dose method is dominated by the fitting uncertainty, which is mitigated in the case of linearization method. Conclusion: Linearization of the radiochromic film dose response provides a convenient and a more precise method for relative dose measurements as it does not require reference dosimetry and creation of calibration curve. However, the linearity of the newly introduced function must be verified. Dave Lewis is inventor and runs a consulting company for radiochromic films.« less

What side effects are problematic for patients prescribed antipsychotic medication? The Maudsley Side Effects (MSE) measure for antipsychotic medication.

PubMed

Wykes, T; Evans, J; Paton, C; Barnes, T R E; Taylor, D; Bentall, R; Dalton, B; Ruffell, T; Rose, D; Vitoratou, S

2017-10-01

Capturing service users' perspectives can highlight additional and different concerns to those of clinicians, but there are no up to date, self-report psychometrically sound measures of side effects of antipsychotic medications. Aim To develop a psychometrically sound measure to identify antipsychotic side effects important to service users, the Maudsley Side Effects (MSE) measure. An initial item bank was subjected to a Delphi exercise (n = 9) with psychiatrists and pharmacists, followed by service user focus groups and expert panels (n = 15) to determine item relevance and language. Feasibility and comprehensive psychometric properties were established in two samples (N43 and N50). We investigated whether we could predict the three most important side effects for individuals from their frequency, severity and life impact. MSE is a 53-item measure with good reliability and validity. Poorer mental and physical health, but not psychotic symptoms, was related to side-effect burden. Seventy-nine percent of items were chosen as one of the three most important effects. Severity, impact and distress only predicted 'putting on weight' which was more distressing, more severe and had more life impact in those for whom it was most important. MSE is a self-report questionnaire that identifies reliably the side-effect burden as experienced by patients. Identifying key side effects important to patients can act as a starting point for joint decision making on the type and the dose of medication.

The Multisensory Environment (MSE) in Dementia Care: Examining Its Role and Quality From a User Perspective.

PubMed

Collier, Lesley; Jakob, Anke

2017-10-01

Multisensory environments (MSEs) for people with dementia have been available over 20 years but are used in an ad hoc manner using an eclectic range of equipment. Care homes have endeavored to utilize this approach but have struggled to find a design and approach that works for this setting. Study aims were to appraise the evolving concept of MSEs from a user perspective, to study the aesthetic and functional qualities, to identify barriers to staff engagement with a sensory environment approach, and to identify design criteria to improve the potential of MSE for people with dementia. Data were collected from 16 care homes with experience of MSE using ethnographic methods, incorporating semi-structured interviews, and observations of MSE design. Analysis was undertaken using descriptive statistics and thematic analysis. Observations revealed equipment that predominantly stimulated vision and touch. Thematic analysis of the semi-structured interviews revealed six themes: not knowing what to do in the room, good for people in the later stages of the disease, reduces anxiety, it's a good activity, design and setting up of the space, and including relatives and care staff. Few MSEs in care homes are designed to meet needs of people with dementia, and staff receive little training in how to facilitate sessions. As such, MSEs are often underused despite perceived benefits. Results of this study have been used to identify the design principles that have been reviewed by relevant stakeholders.

Science-based requirements and operations development for the Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McConnachie, Alan W.; Flagey, Nicolas; Murowinski, Rick; Szeto, Kei; Salmon, Derrick; Withington, Kanoa; Mignot, Shan

2016-07-01

MSE is a wide field telescope (1.5 square degree field of view) with an aperture of 11.25m. It is dedicated to multi-object spectroscopy at several different spectral resolutions in the range R 2500 - 40000 over a broad wavelength range (0:36 - 1:8μm). MSE enables transformational science in areas as diverse as exoplanetary host characterization; stellar monitoring campaigns; tomographic mapping of the interstellar and intergalactic media; the in-situ chemical tagging of the distant Galaxy; connecting galaxies to the large scale structure of the Universe; measuring the mass functions of cold dark matter sub-halos in galaxy and cluster-scale hosts; reverberation mapping of supermassive black holes in quasars. Here, we summarize the Observatory and describe the development of the top level science requirements and operational concepts. Specifically, we describe the definition of the Science Requirements to be the set of capabilities that allow certain high impact science programs to be conducted. We cross reference these science cases to the science requirements to illustrate the traceability of this approach. We further discuss the operations model for MSE and describe the development of the Operations Concept Document, one of the foundational documents for the project. We also discuss the next stage in the science based development of MSE, specifically the development of the initial Legacy Survey that will occupy a majority of time on the telescope over the first few years of operation.

Analysis of surface EMG baseline for detection of hidden muscle activity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Xu; Zhou, Ping

2014-02-01

Objective. This study explored the feasibility of detecting hidden muscle activity in surface electromyogram (EMG) baseline. Approach. Power spectral density (PSD) analysis and multi-scale entropy (MSE) analysis were used. Both analyses were applied to computer simulations of surface EMG baseline with the presence (representing activity data) or absence (representing reference data) of hidden muscle activity, as well as surface electrode array EMG baseline recordings of healthy control and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) subjects. Main results. Although the simulated reference data and the activity data yielded no distinguishable difference in the time domain, they demonstrated a significant difference in the frequency and signal complexity domains with the PSD and MSE analyses. For a comparison using pooled data, such a difference was also observed when the PSD and MSE analyses were applied to surface electrode array EMG baseline recordings of healthy control and ALS subjects, which demonstrated no distinguishable difference in the time domain. Compared with the PSD analysis, the MSE analysis appeared to be more sensitive for detecting the difference in surface EMG baselines between the two groups. Significance. The findings implied the presence of a hidden muscle activity in surface EMG baseline recordings from the ALS subjects. To promote the presented analysis as a useful diagnostic or investigatory tool, future studies are necessary to assess the pathophysiological nature or origins of the hidden muscle activity, as well as the baseline difference at the individual subject level.

Analysis of Surface EMG Baseline for Detection of Hidden Muscle Activity

PubMed Central

Zhang, Xu; Zhou, Ping

2014-01-01

Objective This study explored the feasibility of detecting hidden muscle activity in surface electromyogram (EMG) baseline. Approach Power spectral density (PSD) analysis and multi-scale entropy (MSE) analysis were used respectively. Both analyses were applied to computer simulations of surface EMG baseline with presence (representing activity data) or absence (representing reference data) of hidden muscle activity, as well as surface electrode array EMG baseline recordings of healthy control and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) subjects. Main results Although the simulated reference data and the activity data yielded no distinguishable difference in the time domain, they demonstrated a significant difference in the frequency and signal complexity domains with the PSD and MSE analyses. For a comparison using pooled data, such a difference was also observed when the PSD and MSE analyses were applied to surface electrode array EMG baseline recordings of healthy control and ALS subjects, which demonstrated no distinguishable difference in the time domain. Compared with the PSD analysis, the MSE analysis appeared to be more sensitive for detecting the difference in surface EMG baselines between the two groups. Significance The findings implied presence of hidden muscle activity in surface EMG baseline recordings from the ALS subjects. To promote the presented analysis as a useful diagnostic or investigatory tool, future studies are necessary to assess the pathophysiological nature or origins of the hidden muscle activity, as well as the baseline difference at the individual subject level. PMID:24445526

Some Theoretical Aspects of Nonzero Sum Differential Games and Applications to Combat Problems

DTIC Science & Technology

1971-06-01

the Equilibrium Solution . 7 Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman Partial Differential Equations ............. .............. 9 Influence Function Differential...Linearly .......... ............ 18 Problem Statement .......... ............ 18 Formulation of LJB Equations, Influence Function Equations and the TPBVP...19 Control Lawe . . .. ...... ........... 21 Conditions for Influence Function Continuity along Singular Surfaces

Investigating Absolute Value: A Real World Application

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kidd, Margaret; Pagni, David

2009-01-01

Making connections between various representations is important in mathematics. In this article, the authors discuss the numeric, algebraic, and graphical representations of sums of absolute values of linear functions. The initial explanations are accessible to all students who have experience graphing and who understand that absolute value simply…

Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) in a small, herbivorous, arctic marine zooplankton (Calanus hyperboreus): trends from April to July and the influence of lipids and trophic transfer.

PubMed

Fisk, A T; Stern, G A; Hobson, K A; Strachan, W J; Loewen, M D; Norstrom, R J

2001-01-01

Samples of Calanus hyperboreus, a herbivorous copepod, were collected (n = 20) between April and July 1998, and water samples (n = 6) were collected in May 1998, in the Northwater Polynya (NOW) to examine persistent organic pollutants (POPs) in a high Arctic marine zooplankton. Lipid content (dry weight) doubled, water content (r2 = 0.88) and delta15N (r2 = 0.54) significantly decreased, and delta13C significantly increased (r2 = 0.30) in the C. hyperboreus over the collection period allowing an examination of the role of these variables in POP dynamics in this small pelagic zooplankton. The rank and concentrations of POP groups in C. hyperboreus over the entire sampling was sum of PCB (30.1 +/- 4.03 ng/g, dry weight) > sum of HCH (11.8 +/- 3.23) > sum of DDT (4.74 +/- 0.74), sum of CHLOR (4.44 +/- 1.0) > sum of CIBz (2.42 +/- 0.18), although these rankings varied considerably over the summer. The alpha- and gamma-HCH and lower chlorinated PCB congeners were the most common POPs in C. hyperboreus. The relationship between bioconcentration factor (BCF) and octanol-water partition coefficient (Kow) observed for the C. hyperboreus was linear and near 1:1 (slope = 0.72) for POPs with a log Kow between 3 and 6 but curvilinear when hydrophobic POPs (log Kow > 6) were included. Concentrations of sum of HCH. Sum of CHLOR and sum of CIBz increased over the sampling period, but no change in sum of PCB or sum of DDT was observed. After removing the effects of time, the variables lipid content, water content, delta15N and delta13C did not describe POP concentrations in C. hyperboreus. These results suggest that hydrophobic POP (log Kow = 3.86.0) concentrations in zooplankton are likely to reflect water concentrations and that POPs do not biomagnify in C. hyperboreus or likely in other small, herbivorous zooplankton.

Single-machine common/slack due window assignment problems with linear decreasing processing times

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Xingong; Lin, Win-Chin; Wu, Wen-Hsiang; Wu, Chin-Chia

2017-08-01

This paper studies linear non-increasing processing times and the common/slack due window assignment problems on a single machine, where the actual processing time of a job is a linear non-increasing function of its starting time. The aim is to minimize the sum of the earliness cost, tardiness cost, due window location and due window size. Some optimality results are discussed for the common/slack due window assignment problems and two O(n log n) time algorithms are presented to solve the two problems. Finally, two examples are provided to illustrate the correctness of the corresponding algorithms.

A new adaptively central-upwind sixth-order WENO scheme

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Cong; Chen, Li Li

2018-03-01

In this paper, we propose a new sixth-order WENO scheme for solving one dimensional hyperbolic conservation laws. The new WENO reconstruction has three properties: (1) it is central in smooth region for low dissipation, and is upwind near discontinuities for numerical stability; (2) it is a convex combination of four linear reconstructions, in which one linear reconstruction is sixth order, and the others are third order; (3) its linear weights can be any positive numbers with requirement that their sum equals one. Furthermore, we propose a simple smoothness indicator for the sixth-order linear reconstruction, this smooth indicator not only can distinguish the smooth region and discontinuities exactly, but also can reduce the computational cost, thus it is more efficient than the classical one.

Final Report - Energy Reduction and Advanced Water Removal via Membrane Solvent Extraction Technology

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

Reed, John; Fanselow, Dan; Abbas, Charles

2014-08-06

3M and Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) collaborated with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop and demonstrate a novel membrane solvent extraction (MSE) process that can substantially reduce energy and water consumption in ethanol production, and accelerate the fermentation process. A cross-flow membrane module was developed, using porous membrane manufactured by 3M. A pilot process was developed that integrates fermentation, MSE and vacuum distillation. Extended experiments of 48-72 hours each were conducted to develop the process, verify its performance and begin establishing commercial viability.

Modeling of second order space charge driven coherent sum and difference instabilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yuan, Yao-Shuo; Boine-Frankenheim, Oliver; Hofmann, Ingo

2017-10-01

Second order coherent oscillation modes in intense particle beams play an important role for beam stability in linear or circular accelerators. In addition to the well-known second order even envelope modes and their instability, coupled even envelope modes and odd (skew) modes have recently been shown in [Phys. Plasmas 23, 090705 (2016), 10.1063/1.4963851] to lead to parametric instabilities in periodic focusing lattices with sufficiently different tunes. While this work was partly using the usual envelope equations, partly also particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation, we revisit these modes here and show that the complete set of second order even and odd mode phenomena can be obtained in a unifying approach by using a single set of linearized rms moment equations based on "Chernin's equations." This has the advantage that accurate information on growth rates can be obtained and gathered in a "tune diagram." In periodic focusing we retrieve the parametric sum instabilities of coupled even and of odd modes. The stop bands obtained from these equations are compared with results from PIC simulations for waterbag beams and found to show very good agreement. The "tilting instability" obtained in constant focusing confirms the equivalence of this method with the linearized Vlasov-Poisson system evaluated in second order.

Comparison of two weighted integration models for the cueing task: linear and likelihood

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Shimozaki, Steven S.; Eckstein, Miguel P.; Abbey, Craig K.

2003-01-01

In a task in which the observer must detect a signal at two locations, presenting a precue that predicts the location of a signal leads to improved performance with a valid cue (signal location matches the cue), compared to an invalid cue (signal location does not match the cue). The cue validity effect has often been explained with a limited capacity attentional mechanism improving the perceptual quality at the cued location. Alternatively, the cueing effect can also be explained by unlimited capacity models that assume a weighted combination of noisy responses across the two locations. We compare two weighted integration models, a linear model and a sum of weighted likelihoods model based on a Bayesian observer. While qualitatively these models are similar, quantitatively they predict different cue validity effects as the signal-to-noise ratios (SNR) increase. To test these models, 3 observers performed in a cued discrimination task of Gaussian targets with an 80% valid precue across a broad range of SNR's. Analysis of a limited capacity attentional switching model was also included and rejected. The sum of weighted likelihoods model best described the psychophysical results, suggesting that human observers approximate a weighted combination of likelihoods, and not a weighted linear combination.

Existential and Phenomenological Foundations of Currere: Self-Report in Curriculum Inquiry.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Grumet, Madeleine R.

Traditional models for curriculum theory describe human development as a sum of its parts, organized in a hierarchy leading to operational competencies. The reconceptualist Currere model, originated by William Penar, develops horizontally with energy and learning moving outward and inward rather than upward in a linear trajectory. Educational…

Longitudinal Cognitive Trajectories of Women Veterans from the Women's Health Initiative Memory Study.

PubMed

Padula, Claudia B; Weitlauf, Julie C; Rosen, Allyson C; Reiber, Gayle; Cochrane, Barbara B; Naughton, Michelle J; Li, Wenjun; Rissling, Michelle; Yaffe, Kristine; Hunt, Julie R; Stefanick, Marcia L; Goldstein, Mary K; Espeland, Mark A

2016-02-01

A comparison of longitudinal global cognitive functioning in women Veteran and non-Veteran participants in the Women's Health Initiative (WHI). We studied 7,330 women aged 65-79 at baseline who participated in the WHI Hormone Therapy Trial and its ancillary Memory Study (WHIMS). Global cognitive functioning (Modified Mini-Mental State Examination [3MSE]) in Veterans (n = 279) and non-Veterans (n = 7,051) was compared at baseline and annually for 8 years using generalized linear modeling methods. Compared with non-Veterans, Veteran women were older, more likely to be Caucasian, unmarried, and had higher rates of educational and occupational attainment. Results of unadjusted baseline analyses suggest 3MSE scores were similar between groups. Longitudinal analyses, adjusted for age, education, ethnicity, and WHI trial assignment revealed differences in the rate of cognitive decline between groups over time, such that scores decreased more in Veterans relative to non-Veterans. This relative difference was more pronounced among Veterans who were older, had higher educational/occupational attainment and greater baseline prevalence of cardiovascular risk factors (e.g., smoking) and cardiovascular disease (e.g., angina, stroke). Veteran status was associated with higher prevalence of protective factors that may have helped initially preserve cognitive functioning. However, findings ultimately revealed more pronounced cognitive decline among Veteran relative to non-Veteran participants, likely suggesting the presence of risks that may impact neuropathology and the effects of which were initially masked by Veterans' greater cognitive reserve. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Predicted arterial oxygenation at commercial aircraft cabin altitudes.

PubMed

Muhm, J Michael

2004-10-01

The degree of hypoxia manifested by airline passengers during flight is not well characterized. Statistical models to predict age-specific levels of Pao2 manifest at altitudes between sea level and 8000 ft (Pao2alt) are described. The relationship between age and Pao2 at sea level (Pao2sl) and the relationship between Pao2alt, and Pao2sl, Pco2 at sea level (Pco2sl), and pulmonary health status were investigated using linear regression techniques to analyze previously published data. In persons with normal pulmonary health, the relationship between Pao2sl (mmHg) and age (yr) was Pao2sl = 105.9 - 0.44 * age (R2 = 0.582, MSE = 25.314); Pco2sl (38.1 +/- 2.8 mmHg) was not related to age over the range 18-75 yr. In persons with chronic obstructive lung disease (COPD), neither Pao2sl (78.2 +/- 11.3 mmHg) nor Pco2sl (40.5 +/- 5.7 mmHg) were related to age (77.0 +/- 9.0 yrs).The relationship between PaO2alt and Pao2sl, Pco2sl and altitude (ft) was: Pao2alt = 1.59 + 0.98 * Pao2sl + 0.0031 * Alt - 0.000061 * Pao2sl * Alt - 0.000065 * PCO(2)sl [corrected] * Alt + 0.000000092 * Alt2 (R2 = 0.932, MSE = 22.774). Pao2sl declines with age in persons with normal pulmonary health; Pco2sl remains constant. Neither vary with age in persons with COPD. Pao2alt can be estimated with acceptable precision from knowledge of Pao2sl, Pco2sl, and altitude. These models predict a substantial proportion of older passengers will manifest a Pao2alt at 8000 ft below the threshold at which supplemental oxygen is recommended.

Prediction of dissolved oxygen concentration in hypoxic river systems using support vector machine: a case study of Wen-Rui Tang River, China.

PubMed

Ji, Xiaoliang; Shang, Xu; Dahlgren, Randy A; Zhang, Minghua

2017-07-01

Accurate quantification of dissolved oxygen (DO) is critically important for managing water resources and controlling pollution. Artificial intelligence (AI) models have been successfully applied for modeling DO content in aquatic ecosystems with limited data. However, the efficacy of these AI models in predicting DO levels in the hypoxic river systems having multiple pollution sources and complicated pollutants behaviors is unclear. Given this dilemma, we developed a promising AI model, known as support vector machine (SVM), to predict the DO concentration in a hypoxic river in southeastern China. Four different calibration models, specifically, multiple linear regression, back propagation neural network, general regression neural network, and SVM, were established, and their prediction accuracy was systemically investigated and compared. A total of 11 hydro-chemical variables were used as model inputs. These variables were measured bimonthly at eight sampling sites along the rural-suburban-urban portion of Wen-Rui Tang River from 2004 to 2008. The performances of the established models were assessed through the mean square error (MSE), determination coefficient (R 2 ), and Nash-Sutcliffe (NS) model efficiency. The results indicated that the SVM model was superior to other models in predicting DO concentration in Wen-Rui Tang River. For SVM, the MSE, R 2 , and NS values for the testing subset were 0.9416 mg/L, 0.8646, and 0.8763, respectively. Sensitivity analysis showed that ammonium-nitrogen was the most significant input variable of the proposal SVM model. Overall, these results demonstrated that the proposed SVM model can efficiently predict water quality, especially for highly impaired and hypoxic river systems.

Modeling additive and non-additive effects in a hybrid population using genome-wide genotyping: prediction accuracy implications

PubMed Central

Bouvet, J-M; Makouanzi, G; Cros, D; Vigneron, Ph

2016-01-01

Hybrids are broadly used in plant breeding and accurate estimation of variance components is crucial for optimizing genetic gain. Genome-wide information may be used to explore models designed to assess the extent of additive and non-additive variance and test their prediction accuracy for the genomic selection. Ten linear mixed models, involving pedigree- and marker-based relationship matrices among parents, were developed to estimate additive (A), dominance (D) and epistatic (AA, AD and DD) effects. Five complementary models, involving the gametic phase to estimate marker-based relationships among hybrid progenies, were developed to assess the same effects. The models were compared using tree height and 3303 single-nucleotide polymorphism markers from 1130 cloned individuals obtained via controlled crosses of 13 Eucalyptus urophylla females with 9 Eucalyptus grandis males. Akaike information criterion (AIC), variance ratios, asymptotic correlation matrices of estimates, goodness-of-fit, prediction accuracy and mean square error (MSE) were used for the comparisons. The variance components and variance ratios differed according to the model. Models with a parent marker-based relationship matrix performed better than those that were pedigree-based, that is, an absence of singularities, lower AIC, higher goodness-of-fit and accuracy and smaller MSE. However, AD and DD variances were estimated with high s.es. Using the same criteria, progeny gametic phase-based models performed better in fitting the observations and predicting genetic values. However, DD variance could not be separated from the dominance variance and null estimates were obtained for AA and AD effects. This study highlighted the advantages of progeny models using genome-wide information. PMID:26328760

PAH determination based on a rapid and novel gas purge-microsyringe extraction (GP-MSE) technique in road dust of Shanghai, China: Characterization, source apportionment, and health risk assessment.

PubMed

Zheng, Xin; Yang, Yi; Liu, Min; Yu, Yingpeng; Zhou, John L; Li, Donghao

2016-07-01

A novel cleanup technique termed as gas purge-microsyringe extraction (GP-MSE) was evaluated and applied for polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) determination in road dust samples. A total of 68 road dust samples covering almost the entire Shanghai area were analyzed for 16 priority PAHs using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. The results indicate that the total PAH concentrations over the investigated sites ranged from 1.04μg/g to 134.02μg/g dw with an average of 13.84μg/g. High-molecular-weight compounds (4-6 rings PAHs) were significantly dominant in the total mass of PAHs, and accounted for 77.85% to 93.62%. Diagnostic ratio analysis showed that the road dust PAHs were mainly from the mixture of petroleum and biomass/coal combustions. Principal component analysis in conjunction with multiple linear regression indicated that the two major origins of road dust PAHs were vehicular emissions and biomass/fossil fuel combustions, which contributed 66.7% and 18.8% to the total road dust PAH burden, respectively. The concentration of benzo[a]pyrene equivalent (BaPeq) varied from 0.16μg/g to 24.47μg/g. The six highly carcinogenic PAH species (benz(a)anthracene, benzo(a)pyrene, benzo(b)fluoranthene, benzo(k)fluoranthene, dibenz(a,h)anthracene, and indeno(1,2,3-cd)pyrene) accounted for 98.57% of the total BaPeq concentration. Thus, the toxicity of PAHs in road dust was highly associated with high-molecular-weight compounds. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Mapping CHU9D Utility Scores from the PedsQLTM 4.0 SF-15.

PubMed

Mpundu-Kaambwa, Christine; Chen, Gang; Russo, Remo; Stevens, Katherine; Petersen, Karin Dam; Ratcliffe, Julie

2017-04-01

The Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory™ 4.0 Short Form 15 Generic Core Scales (hereafter the PedsQL) and the Child Health Utility-9 Dimensions (CHU9D) are two generic instruments designed to measure health-related quality of life in children and adolescents in the general population and paediatric patient groups living with specific health conditions. Although the PedsQL is widely used among paediatric patient populations, presently it is not possible to directly use the scores from the instrument to calculate quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) for application in economic evaluation because it produces summary scores which are not preference-based. This paper examines different econometric mapping techniques for estimating CHU9D utility scores from the PedsQL for the purpose of calculating QALYs for cost-utility analysis. The PedsQL and the CHU9D were completed by a community sample of 755 Australian adolescents aged 15-17 years. Seven regression models were estimated: ordinary least squares estimator, generalised linear model, robust MM estimator, multivariate factorial polynomial estimator, beta-binomial estimator, finite mixture model and multinomial logistic model. The mean absolute error (MAE) and the mean squared error (MSE) were used to assess predictive ability of the models. The MM estimator with stepwise-selected PedsQL dimension scores as explanatory variables had the best predictive accuracy using MAE and the equivalent beta-binomial model had the best predictive accuracy using MSE. Our mapping algorithm facilitates the estimation of health-state utilities for use within economic evaluations where only PedsQL data is available and is suitable for use in community-based adolescents aged 15-17 years. Applicability of the algorithm in younger populations should be assessed in further research.

A m-ary linear feedback shift register with binary logic

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Perlman, M. (Inventor)

1973-01-01

A family of m-ary linear feedback shift registers with binary logic is disclosed. Each m-ary linear feedback shift register with binary logic generates a binary representation of a nonbinary recurring sequence, producible with a m-ary linear feedback shift register without binary logic in which m is greater than 2. The state table of a m-ary linear feedback shift register without binary logic, utilizing sum modulo m feedback, is first tubulated for a given initial state. The entries in the state table are coded in binary and the binary entries are used to set the initial states of the stages of a plurality of binary shift registers. A single feedback logic unit is employed which provides a separate feedback binary digit to each binary register as a function of the states of corresponding stages of the binary registers.

Mouth self-examination to improve oral cancer awareness and early detection in a high-risk population.

PubMed

Elango, Kalavathy Jayapal; Anandkrishnan, Nitin; Suresh, Amritha; Iyer, Subramania K; Ramaiyer, Sundaram Karimassery; Kuriakose, Moni Abraham

2011-07-01

Oral cancer is a potentially preventable disease due to its association with well-known risk factors and easy detectability. There is a significant deficiency in the awareness of oral cancer and its risk factors among the public. Raising public awareness could effectively contribute to achieving a significant reduction in the incidence of oral cancer. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of mouth self-examination (MSE) in improving the awareness of oral cancer and its risk factors as well as test its feasibility as an oral cancer-screening tool. The study was carried out in a high-risk population of 57,704 from India, of which, 34,766 individuals who have met the eligibility criteria formed the study population. MSE brochures and trained health workers were employed for the purpose of health education and cancer screening. The present study compared their efficacy to detect oral lesions. Subjects with suspicious lesions were referred to the trained oral cancer specialist for confirmation. A questionnaire to assess the awareness of oral cancer and its risk factors was developed and validated. SPSS (v.11.0) was used for data analysis. The program identified 216 cases of potentially malignant lesions as well as three cases of oral cancer. The findings of MSE and health workers showed 72% concordance, while that of health workers and oral cancer specialist showed 100% concordance. MSE had a low sensitivity of 18%, while the specificity was 99.9%. Though the technique identified high-risk lesions such as red patches (66.7%) and non-healing ulcers (42.9%), the detection rate of white patches was low (12.7%). Overall awareness of oral cancer and its risk factors after introduction of MSE program was over 80%; but the compliance to seek treatment was poor (32%). Mouth self-examination may be used as an effective tool to improve the awareness of oral cancer and for the early detection of lesions. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Effects of an empowerment-based education program for public health nurses in Taiwan.

PubMed

Chang, Li-Chun; Liu, Chieh-Hsing; Yen, Edwin Han-Wen

2008-10-01

The aim of this study was to examine the effects of an empowerment-based education program (EBEP) on employee empowerment, job satisfaction, job productivity and innovative behaviours for public health nurses (PHN) in Taiwan. Empowerment is an important consideration among nurses trying to function in ever-changing health care and education settings. Several studies focused on the trend of public health nursing revealed that PHN have experienced a severe feeling of powerlessness. Developing empowerment strategies through organisations may be a means of helping employees recognise powerlessness in difficult situations and take appropriate action. Quasi-experimental design. PHN in two health bureaus in Taiwan were assigned into an empowerment group (n = 29) and a control group (n = 32). Twenty-four hours of the EBEP lasted four weeks included four empowerment classes and four group workshops following each curriculum for PHN to apply principles of empowerment in their work environment. Data were collected at baseline and four weeks after the intervention. Analysis of covariance (ancova) was used to examine the intervention effect. The experimental group reported significantly higher psychological empowerment [F (1,47) = 5.09, MSE = 3.25, p = 0.001, eta(2) = 0.18] and competence [F (1,47) = 3.96, MSE = 28.78, p = 0.05, eta(2) = 0.22] and impact [F (1,47) = 4.98, MSE = 44.79, p = 0.002, eta(2) = 0.20] subscales, job productivity [F (1,47) = 4.88, MSE = 5.18, p = 0.002, eta(2) = 0.19] and innovative behaviours [F (1,47) = 5.09, MSE = 3.25, p = 0.001, eta(2) = 0.24] than the control group after the EBEP. The EBEP had significant effect on psychological empowerment and subscales of competence and impact, innovative behaviour and job productivity but no effect on organisational empowerment and job satisfaction for PHN. Our findings suggest public health administration could design empowerment-based education to improve employee empowerment and job productivity for PHN. Furthermore, using multiple components to design empowerment education should be considered in further studies.

Life beyond MSE and R2 — improving validation of predictive models with observations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Papritz, Andreas; Nussbaum, Madlene

2017-04-01

Machine learning and statistical predictive methods are evaluated by the closeness of predictions to observations of a test dataset. Common criteria for rating predictive methods are bias and mean square error (MSE), characterizing systematic and random prediction errors. Many studies also report R2-values, but their meaning is not always clear (correlation between observations and predictions or MSE skill score; Wilks, 2011). The same criteria are also used for choosing tuning parameters of predictive procedures by cross-validation and bagging (e.g. Hastie et al., 2009). For evident reasons, atmospheric sciences have developed a rich box of tools for forecast verification. Specific criteria have been proposed for evaluating deterministic and probabilistic predictions of binary, multinomial, ordinal and continuous responses (see reviews by Wilks, 2011, Jollie and Stephenson, 2012 and Gneiting et al., 2007). It appears that these techniques are not very well-known in the geosciences community interested in machine learning. In our presentation we review techniques that offer more insight into proximity of data and predictions than bias, MSE and R2 alone. We mention here only examples: (i) Graphing observations vs. predictions is usually more appropriate than the reverse (Piñeiro et al., 2008). (ii) The decomposition of the Brier score score (= MSE for probabilistic predictions of binary yes/no data) into reliability and resolution reveals (conditional) bias and capability of discriminating yes/no observations by the predictions. We illustrate the approaches by applications from digital soil mapping studies. Gneiting, T., Balabdaoui, F., and Raftery, A. E. (2007). Probabilistic forecasts, calibration and sharpness. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B, 69, 243-268. Hastie, T., Tibshirani, R., and Friedman, J. (2009). The Elements of Statistical Learning; Data Mining, Inference and Prediction. Springer, New York, second edition. Jolliffe, I. T. and Stephenson, D. B., editors (2012). Forecast Verification: A Practitioner's Guide in Atmospheric Science. Wiley-Blackwell, second edition. Piñeiro, G., Perelman, S., Guerschman, J., and Paruelo, J. (2008). How to evaluate models: Observed vs. predicted or predicted vs. observed? Ecological Modelling, 216, 316-322. Wilks, D. S. (2011). Statistical Methods in the Atmospheric Sciences. Academic Press, third edition.

Research perspectives in the field of ground penetrating radars in Armenia

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Baghdasaryan, Hovik; Knyazyan, Tamara; Hovhannisyan, Tamara

2014-05-01

Armenia is a country located in a very complicated region from geophysical point of view. It is situated on a cross of several tectonic plates and a lot of dormant volcanoes. The main danger is earthquakes and the last big disaster was in 1988 in the northwest part of contemporary Armenia. As a consequence, the main direction of geophysical research is directed towards monitoring and data analysis of seismic activity. National Academy of Sciences of Armenia is conducting these activities in the Institute of Geological Sciences and in the Institute of Geophysics and Engineering Seismology. Research in the field of ground penetrating radars is considered in Armenia as an advanced and perspective complement to the already exploiting research tools. The previous achievements of Armenia in the fields of radiophysics, antenna measurements, laser physics and existing relevant research would permit to initiate new promising area of research in the direction of theory and experiments of ground penetrating radars. One of the key problems in the operation of ground penetrating radars is correct analysis of peculiarities of electromagnetic wave interaction with different layers of the earth. For this, the well-known methods of electromagnetic boundary problem solutions are applied. In addition to the existing methods our research group of Fiber Optics Communication Laboratory at the State Engineering University of Armenia declares its interest in exploring the possibilities of new non-traditional method of boundary problems solution for electromagnetic wave interaction with the ground. This new method for solving boundary problems of electrodynamics is called the method of single expression (MSE) [1-3]. The distinctive feature of this method is denial from the presentation of wave equation's solution in the form of counter-propagating waves, i.e. denial from the superposition principal application. This permits to solve linear and nonlinear (field intensity-dependent) problems with the same exactness, without any approximations. It is favourable also since in solution of boundary problems in the MSE there is no necessity in applying absorbing boundary conditions at the model edges by terminating the computational domain. In the MSE the computational process starts from the rear side of any multilayer structure that ensures the uniqueness of problem solution without application of any artificial absorbing boundary conditions. Previous success of the MSE application in optical domain gives us confidence in successful extension of this method's use for solution of different problems related to electromagnetic wave interaction with the layers of the earth and buried objects in the ground. This work benefited from networking activities carried out within the EU funded COST Action TU1208 "Civil Engineering Applications of Ground Penetrating Radar." 1. H.V. Baghdasaryan, T.M. Knyazyan, 'Problem of Plane EM Wave Self-action in Multilayer Structure: an Exact Solution', Optical and Quantum Electronics, vol. 31, 1999, pp.1059-1072. 2. H.V. Baghdasaryan, T.M. Knyazyan, 'Modelling of strongly nonlinear sinusoidal Bragg gratings by the Method of Single Expression', Optical and Quantum Electronics, vol. 32, 2000, pp. 869-883. 3. H.V. Baghdasaryan, 'Basics of the Method of Single Expression: New Approach for Solving Boundary Problems in Classical Electrodynamics', Yerevan, Chartaraget, 2013.

Validation of the urinary sensation scale (USS).

PubMed

Coyne, Karin S; Margolis, Mary Kay; Hsieh, Ray; Vats, Vasudha; Chapple, Christopher R

2011-03-01

The purpose of this study was to assess the validity of the Urinary Sensation Scale (USS) in men with overactive bladder and voiding symptoms (OAB-LUTS) and women with overactive bladder (OAB). Data from two OAB clinical trials of tolterodine were used. The USS, a 5-point scale, assesses the amount of urinary urgency associated with each urination. Three methods to calculate the USS are: mean urgency (Mean USS); mode urgency (Mode USS); and sum urgency (sum USS). The validity and responsiveness of the scoring methods was assessed using Spearman's correlations, general linear models, and effect sizes. Data from 650 men (Study 1) and 413 women (Study 2) were analyzed. Mean age was 65.2 (men) and 47.8 (women); 70% were Caucasian in both studies. Correlations of USS scores with bladder diary variables were small to moderate and higher among Sum USS than Mean USS (r=0.02-0.64). Correlations among the USS and patient-reported outcomes (PROs) were again small to moderate and higher with Sum USS (r=0.05-0.41). Both the Mean USS and Sum USS significantly discriminated (all P<0.001) among all bladder diary variables (except nocturia and UUI in men) when grouped as improved/not improved as well as by the PROs. Effect sizes for men and women, respectively, were -0.52 and -1.09 for Mean USS and -0.72 and -1.36 for Sum USS. The USS is a valid and highly responsive measure of urinary urgency in men with OAB-LUTS and women with OAB. Copyright © 2011 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Probing α-relaxation with nuclear magnetic resonance echo decay and relaxation: a study on nitrile butadiene rubber.

PubMed

Sturniolo, Simone; Pieruccini, Marco; Corti, Maurizio; Rigamonti, Attilio

2013-01-01

One dimensional (1)H NMR measurements have been performed to probe slow molecular motions in nitrile butadiene rubber (NBR) around its calorimetric glass transition temperature Tg. The purpose is to show how software aided data analysis can extract meaningful dynamical data from these measurements. Spin-lattice relaxation time, free induction decay (FID) and magic sandwich echo (MSE) measurements have been carried out at different values of the static field, as a function of temperature. It has been evidenced how the efficiency of the MSE signal in reconstructing the original FID exhibits a sudden minimum at a given temperature, with a slight dependence from the measuring frequency. Computer simulations performed with the software SPINEVOLUTION have shown that the minimum in the efficiency reconstruction of the MSE signal corresponds to the average motional frequency taking a value around the inter-proton coupling. The FID signals have been fitted with a truncated form of a newly derived exact correlation function for the transverse magnetization of a dipolar interacting spin pair, which allows one to avoid the restriction of the stationary and Gaussian approximations. A direct estimate of the conformational dynamics on approaching the Tg is obtained, and the results are in agreement with the analysis performed via the MSE reconstruction efficiency. The occurrence of a wide distribution of correlation frequencies for the chains motion, with a Vogel-Fulcher type temperature dependence, is addressed. A route for a fruitful study of the dynamics accompanying the glass transition by a variety of NMR measurements is thus proposed. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Comparing the cohort design and the nested case–control design in the presence of both time-invariant and time-dependent treatment and competing risks: bias and precision

PubMed Central

Austin, Peter C; Anderson, Geoffrey M; Cigsar, Candemir; Gruneir, Andrea

2012-01-01

Purpose Observational studies using electronic administrative healthcare databases are often used to estimate the effects of treatments and exposures. Traditionally, a cohort design has been used to estimate these effects, but increasingly, studies are using a nested case–control (NCC) design. The relative statistical efficiency of these two designs has not been examined in detail. Methods We used Monte Carlo simulations to compare these two designs in terms of the bias and precision of effect estimates. We examined three different settings: (A) treatment occurred at baseline, and there was a single outcome of interest; (B) treatment was time varying, and there was a single outcome; and C treatment occurred at baseline, and there was a secondary event that competed with the primary event of interest. Comparisons were made of percentage bias, length of 95% confidence interval, and mean squared error (MSE) as a combined measure of bias and precision. Results In Setting A, bias was similar between designs, but the cohort design was more precise and had a lower MSE in all scenarios. In Settings B and C, the cohort design was more precise and had a lower MSE in all scenarios. In both Settings B and C, the NCC design tended to result in estimates with greater bias compared with the cohort design. Conclusions We conclude that in a range of settings and scenarios, the cohort design is superior in terms of precision and MSE. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. PMID:22653805

A 14-day repeated-dose oral toxicological evaluation of an isothiocyanate-enriched hydro-alcoholic extract from Moringa oleifera Lam. seeds in rats.

PubMed

Kim, Youjin; Jaja-Chimedza, Asha; Merrill, Daniel; Mendes, Odete; Raskin, Ilya

2018-01-01

A 14-d short-term oral toxicity study in rats evaluated the safety of moringa isothiocyanate-1 (MIC-1)-enriched hydro-alcoholic moringa seeds extract (MSE). Rats (5 males/5 females per group) were gavaged daily for 14 d with the vehicle control or MSE, at 78 (low), 257 (mid-low), 772 (mid-high), or 2571 (high) mg/kg bw/d, standardized to MIC-1 (30, 100, 300, or 1000 mg/kg bw/d, respectively). Toxicological endpoints included body weight and weight gain, food consumption and feed efficiency, clinical observations, hematology, gross necropsy and histopathology, and relative organ weights. Mortality was only observed in the high dose group animals, both male and female, representing decreases in body weight/weight gain and food consumption/feed efficiency. Irregular respiratory patterns and piloerection were major clinical observations found primarily in the mid-high and high dose group animals. In the high dose group, gastrointestinal distention and stomach discoloration were observed in non-surviving males and females, and degeneration and necrosis of the testicular germinal cells and epididymal cells were also observed in a non-surviving male. Increased liver weights were found in females in the mid-high and high dose groups. Animals in the low and mid-low groups did not exhibit adverse effects of MSE (100 mg/kg bw/d MIC-1). A no observed adverse effect level (NOAEL) of the standardized MSE was determined as 257 mg/kg bw/d providing 100 mg/kg bw/d MIC-1.

Combat casualties undergoing lifesaving interventions have decreased heart-rate complexity at multiple time scales

PubMed Central

Cancio, Leopoldo C.; Batchinsky, Andriy I.; Baker, William L.; Necsoiu, Corina; Salinas, José; Goldberger, Ary L.; Costa, Madalena D.

2013-01-01

Purpose We found that heart-rate (HR) complexity metrics, such as sample entropy (SampEn), identified trauma patients receiving lifesaving interventions (LSIs). We now aimed: 1) to test a new multiscale entropy (MSE) index; 2) to compare it to single-scale measures including SampEn; and 3) to assess different parameter values for calculation of SampEn and MSE. Methods This was a study of combat casualties in an Emergency Department (ED) in Iraq. ECGs of 70 acutely injured adults were recorded. Twelve underwent LSIs and 58 did not. LSIs included endotracheal intubation (9); tube thoracostomy (9); and emergency transfusion (4). From each ECG, a segment of 800 consecutive beats was selected. Off-line, R waves were detected and R-to-R (RR) interval time series were generated. SampEn, MSE, and time-domain measures of HR variability (mean HR, standard deviation, pNN20, pNN50, rMSSD) were computed. Results Differences in mean HR (LSI=111±33, NonLSI=90±17) were not significant. Systolic arterial pressure was statistically but not clinically different (LSI=123±19, NonLSI=135±19). SampEn (LSI=0.90±0.42, NonLSI=1.19±0.35, p<0.05) and MSE index (LSI = 2.58±2.55, NonLSI=5.67±2.48, p<0.001) differed significantly. Conclusions Complexity of HR dynamics over a range of time scales was lower in high-risk than in low-risk combat casualties and outperformed traditional vital signs. PMID:24140167

How are memory complaints in functional memory disorder related to measures of affect, metamemory and cognition?

PubMed

Metternich, Birgitta; Schmidtke, Klaus; Hüll, Michael

2009-05-01

Memory complaints are a common finding in outpatients, especially in psychosomatic and neurological practice. In a substantial group of patients persistent memory complaints are found in the absence of abnormal neuropsychology. Different labels such as "functional memory complaint" have been suggested for this phenomenon. We characterise a group of patients with such memory complaints, which we termed functional memory disorder (FMD). The aim of the present study is to describe patients with FMD. Thirty-nine patients with FMD were compared to 38 control subjects. Data were collected on the German version of the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning test and the Zahlenverbindungstest (cognitive speed), subscales of the Metamemory in Adulthood questionnaire (MIA), the Perceived Stress Questionnaire (PSQ), the Global Severity Index (GSI) of the Symptom Checklist, the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), and other psychological questionnaire measures. We found significant group differences on all psychological questionnaire measures, with more pathological scores in the patient group. GSI and PSQ were the best predictors of memory self-efficacy. MIA-Memory Self-Efficacy (MSE), MIA-Achievement, and BDI were the best predictors of group membership (FMD vs. control group). When MSE was excluded, MIA-Achievement and BDI or GSI were the only predictors of group membership. Neuropsychological measures predicted neither MSE nor group membership. Pathological scores on measures of metamemory, stress, and depression are typical of FMD. Low MSE and a high memory-related achievement motivation seem to be key features of FMD. Other important features are increased perceived stress, general psychosomatic complaint, and elevated depression scores. Neuropsychological test performance is not associated with FMD symptoms.

Measurement of type-I edge localized mode pulse propagation in scrape-off layer using optical system of motional Stark effect diagnostics in JT-60U

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

Suzuki, T.; Oyama, N.; Asakura, N.

2010-04-15

Propagation of plasma ejected by type-I edge localized mode (ELM) has been measured in scrape-off layer (SOL) of the JT-60U tokamak, using optical system of motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostics as beam emission spectroscopy (BES) diagnostics through a new technique developed. This MSE/BES system measures D{alpha} emission from heating neutral beam excited by collisions with the ejected plasma, as well as background light (e.g., bremsstrahlung). While spatio-temporal change in the beam emission gives information on propagation of the ejected plasma, the background light that is observed simultaneously in all spatial channels veils the information. In order to separate the beammore » emission and the background light, a two-wavelength detector is newly introduced into the MSE/BES system. The detector observes simultaneously at the same spatial point in two distinct wavelengths using two photomultiplier tubes through two interference filters. One of the filters is adjusted to the central wavelength of the beam emission for the MSE diagnostics, and the other is outside the beam emission spectrum. Eliminating the background light, temporal change in the net beam emission in the SOL has been evaluated. Comparing conditionally averaged beam emission with respect to 594 ELMs in a discharge at five spatial channels (0.02-0.3 m outside the main plasma near equatorial plane), radial velocity of the ELM pulse propagation in SOL is evaluated to be 0.8-1.8 km/s ({approx}1.4 km/s for least-mean-squared fitting).« less

Monthly ENSO Forecast Skill and Lagged Ensemble Size

PubMed Central

DelSole, T.; Tippett, M.K.; Pegion, K.

2018-01-01

Abstract The mean square error (MSE) of a lagged ensemble of monthly forecasts of the Niño 3.4 index from the Climate Forecast System (CFSv2) is examined with respect to ensemble size and configuration. Although the real‐time forecast is initialized 4 times per day, it is possible to infer the MSE for arbitrary initialization frequency and for burst ensembles by fitting error covariances to a parametric model and then extrapolating to arbitrary ensemble size and initialization frequency. Applying this method to real‐time forecasts, we find that the MSE consistently reaches a minimum for a lagged ensemble size between one and eight days, when four initializations per day are included. This ensemble size is consistent with the 8–10 day lagged ensemble configuration used operationally. Interestingly, the skill of both ensemble configurations is close to the estimated skill of the infinite ensemble. The skill of the weighted, lagged, and burst ensembles are found to be comparable. Certain unphysical features of the estimated error growth were tracked down to problems with the climatology and data discontinuities. PMID:29937973

Oil recovery from petroleum sludge through ultrasonic assisted solvent extraction.

PubMed

Hu, Guangji; Li, Jianbing; Huang, Shuhui; Li, Yubao

2016-09-18

The effect of ultrasonic assisted extraction (UAE) process on oil recovery from refinery oily sludge was examined in this study. Two types of UAE treatment including UAE probe (UAEP) system and UAE bath (UAEB) system were investigated. Their oil recovery efficiencies were compared to that of mechanical shaking extraction (MSE). Three solvents including cyclohexane (CHX), ethyl acetate (EA), and methyl ethyl ketone (MEK) were examined as the extraction solvents. The influence of experimental factors on oil and solvent recovery was investigated using an orthogonal experimental design. Results indicated that solvent type, solvent-to-sludge (S/S) ratio, and treatment duration could have significant effects on oil recovery in UAE treatment. Under the optimum conditions, UAEP treatment can obtain an oil recovery of 68.8% within 20 s, which was higher than that (i.e., 62.0%) by MSE treatment after 60 min' extraction. UAEB treatment can also obtain a promising oil recovery within shorter extraction duration (i.e., 15 min) than MSE. UAE was thus illustrated as an effective and improved approach for oily sludge recycling.

Prototype of haptic device for sole of foot using magnetic field sensitive elastomer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kikuchi, T.; Masuda, Y.; Sugiyama, M.; Mitsumata, T.; Ohori, S.

2013-02-01

Walking is one of the most popular activities and a healthy aerobic exercise for the elderly. However, if they have physical and / or cognitive disabilities, sometimes it is challenging to go somewhere they don't know well. The final goal of this study is to develop a virtual reality walking system that allows users to walk in virtual worlds fabricated with computer graphics. We focus on a haptic device that can perform various plantar pressures on users' soles of feet as an additional sense in the virtual reality walking. In this study, we discuss a use of a magnetic field sensitive elastomer (MSE) as a working material for the haptic interface on the sole. The first prototype with MSE was developed and evaluated in this work. According to the measurement of planter pressures, it was found that this device can perform different pressures on the sole of a light-weight user by applying magnetic field on the MSE. The result also implied necessities of the improvement of the magnetic circuit and the basic structure of the mechanism of the device.

Optimized satellite image compression and reconstruction via evolution strategies

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Babb, Brendan; Moore, Frank; Peterson, Michael

2009-05-01

This paper describes the automatic discovery, via an Evolution Strategy with Covariance Matrix Adaptation (CMA-ES), of vectors of real-valued coefficients representing matched forward and inverse transforms that outperform the 9/7 Cohen-Daubechies-Feauveau (CDF) discrete wavelet transform (DWT) for satellite image compression and reconstruction under conditions subject to quantization error. The best transform evolved during this study reduces the mean squared error (MSE) present in reconstructed satellite images by an average of 33.78% (1.79 dB), while maintaining the average information entropy (IE) of compressed images at 99.57% in comparison to the wavelet. In addition, this evolved transform achieves 49.88% (3.00 dB) average MSE reduction when tested on 80 images from the FBI fingerprint test set, and 42.35% (2.39 dB) average MSE reduction when tested on a set of 18 digital photographs, while achieving average IE of 104.36% and 100.08%, respectively. These results indicate that our evolved transform greatly improves the quality of reconstructed images without substantial loss of compression capability over a broad range of image classes.

Evolution of the central safety factor during stabilized sawtooth instabilities at KSTAR

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Messmer, M. C. C.; Ko, J.; Chung, J.; Woo, M. H.; Lee, K.-D.; Jaspers, R. J. E.

2018-01-01

A motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostic has recently been installed in the KSTAR tokamak. A difficulty faced at KSTAR and common to other MSE diagnostics is calibration of the system for absolute measurements. In this report we present our novel calibration routine and discuss first results, evaluating the evolution of the the central safety factor during sawtooth instabilities. The calibration scheme ensures that the bandpass filters typically used in MSE systems are aligned correctly and identifies and removes systematic offsets present in the measurement. This is verified by comparing the reconstructed safety factor profile against various discharges where the locations of rational q surfaces have been obtained from MHD markers. The calibration is applied to analyse the evolution of q 0 in a shot where the sawteeth are stabilized by neutral beam injection. Within the analysed sawtooth periods q 0 drops below unity during the quiescent phase and relaxes close to or slightly above unity at the sawtooth crash. This finding is in line with the classical Kadomtsev model of full magnetic reconnection and earlier findings at JET.

Monthly ENSO Forecast Skill and Lagged Ensemble Size

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Trenary, L.; DelSole, T.; Tippett, M. K.; Pegion, K.

2018-04-01

The mean square error (MSE) of a lagged ensemble of monthly forecasts of the Niño 3.4 index from the Climate Forecast System (CFSv2) is examined with respect to ensemble size and configuration. Although the real-time forecast is initialized 4 times per day, it is possible to infer the MSE for arbitrary initialization frequency and for burst ensembles by fitting error covariances to a parametric model and then extrapolating to arbitrary ensemble size and initialization frequency. Applying this method to real-time forecasts, we find that the MSE consistently reaches a minimum for a lagged ensemble size between one and eight days, when four initializations per day are included. This ensemble size is consistent with the 8-10 day lagged ensemble configuration used operationally. Interestingly, the skill of both ensemble configurations is close to the estimated skill of the infinite ensemble. The skill of the weighted, lagged, and burst ensembles are found to be comparable. Certain unphysical features of the estimated error growth were tracked down to problems with the climatology and data discontinuities.

Science capabilities of the Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Devost, Daniel; McConnachie, Alan; Flagey, Nicolas; Cote, Patrick; Balogh, Michael; Driver, Simon P.; Venn, Kim

2017-01-01

The Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE) project will transform the CFHT 3.6m optical telescope into a 10m class dedicated multiobject spectroscopic facility, with an ability to simultaneously measure thousands of objects with a spectral resolution range spanning 2,000 to 20,000. The project is currently in design phase, with full science operations nominally starting in 2025. MSE will enable transformational science in areas as diverse as exoplanetary host characterization; stellar monitoring campaigns; tomographic mapping of the interstellar and intergalactic media; the in-situ chemical tagging of the distant Galaxy; connecting galaxies to the large scale structure of the Universe; measuring the mass functions of cold dark matter sub-halos in galaxy and cluster-scale hosts; reverberation mapping of supermassive black holes in quasars. MSE is an essential follow-up facility to current and next generations of multi-wavelength imaging surveys, including LSST, Gaia, Euclid, eROSITA, SKA, and WFIRST, and is an ideal feeder facility for E-ELT, TMT and GMT. I will give an update on the status of the project and review some of the most exciting scientific capabilities of the observatory.

Acoustic Biometric System Based on Preprocessing Techniques and Linear Support Vector Machines

PubMed Central

del Val, Lara; Izquierdo-Fuente, Alberto; Villacorta, Juan J.; Raboso, Mariano

2015-01-01

Drawing on the results of an acoustic biometric system based on a MSE classifier, a new biometric system has been implemented. This new system preprocesses acoustic images, extracts several parameters and finally classifies them, based on Support Vector Machine (SVM). The preprocessing techniques used are spatial filtering, segmentation—based on a Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) to separate the person from the background, masking—to reduce the dimensions of images—and binarization—to reduce the size of each image. An analysis of classification error and a study of the sensitivity of the error versus the computational burden of each implemented algorithm are presented. This allows the selection of the most relevant algorithms, according to the benefits required by the system. A significant improvement of the biometric system has been achieved by reducing the classification error, the computational burden and the storage requirements. PMID:26091392

Acoustic Biometric System Based on Preprocessing Techniques and Linear Support Vector Machines.

PubMed

del Val, Lara; Izquierdo-Fuente, Alberto; Villacorta, Juan J; Raboso, Mariano

2015-06-17

Drawing on the results of an acoustic biometric system based on a MSE classifier, a new biometric system has been implemented. This new system preprocesses acoustic images, extracts several parameters and finally classifies them, based on Support Vector Machine (SVM). The preprocessing techniques used are spatial filtering, segmentation-based on a Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) to separate the person from the background, masking-to reduce the dimensions of images-and binarization-to reduce the size of each image. An analysis of classification error and a study of the sensitivity of the error versus the computational burden of each implemented algorithm are presented. This allows the selection of the most relevant algorithms, according to the benefits required by the system. A significant improvement of the biometric system has been achieved by reducing the classification error, the computational burden and the storage requirements.

Validation of a pre-coded food diary used among 60-80 year old men: comparison of self-reported energy intake with objectively recorded energy expenditure.

PubMed

Stea, Tonje H; Andersen, Lene F; Paulsen, Gøran; Hetlelid, Ken J; Lohne-Seiler, Hilde; Adnanes, Svanhild; Bjørnsen, Thomas; Salvesen, Svein; Berntsen, Sveinung

2014-01-01

To validate energy intake (EI) estimated from a pre-coded food diary (PFD) against energy expenditure (EE) measured with a valid physical activity monitor (SenseWear Pro3 Armband) and to evaluate whether misreporting was associated with overweight/obesity in a group of elderly men. Forty-seven healthy Norwegian men, 60-80 years old, completed the study. As this study was part of a larger intervention study, cross-sectional data were collected at both baseline and post-test. Participants recorded their food intake for four consecutive days using food diaries and wore SenseWear Pro3 Armband (SWA) during the same period. Only participants with complete data sets at both baseline and post-test were included in the study. The group average EI was 17% lower at baseline and 18% lower at post-test compared to measured EE. Mean difference from Bland-Altman plot for EI and EE was -1.5 MJ/day (±1.96 SD: -7.0, 4.0 MJ/day) at baseline and -1.6 MJ/day (-6.6, 3.4 MJ/day) at post-test. The intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was 0.30 (95% CI: 0.02, 0.54, p = 0.018) at baseline and 0.34 (0.06, 0.57, p = 0.009) at post-test. Higher values of underreporting was shown among overweight/obese compared to normal weight participants at both baseline and post-test (p≤ 0.001), respectively. The results indicate that the PFD could be a useful tool for estimating energy intake in normal weight elderly men. On the other hand, the PFD seems to be less suitable for estimating energy intake in overweight/obese elderly men.

Self-assembled organic and fullerene monolayers characterisation by two-colour SFG spectroscopy: a pathway to meet doubly resonant SFG process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Humbert, C.; Caudano, Y.; Dreesen, L.; Sartenaer, Y.; Mani, A. A.; Silien, C.; Lemaire, J.-J.; Thiry, P. A.; Peremans, A.

2004-10-01

Two-colour sum-frequency generation (two-colour SFG) spectroscopy was used to probe both vibrational and electronic properties of 1-dodecanethiol/Ag(1 1 1), Au(1 1 1), and Pt(1 1 1), of 5-[ p-(6-mercaptohexoxy)-phenyl]-10,15,20-triphenylporphin/Pt(1 1 1), and of C 60/Ag(1 1 1). The role of the various physical parameters determining the sum-frequency generation (SFG) intensity equation is highlighted. The enhancement of the non-linear second order susceptibility in the aforementioned interfaces is explained in terms of metal interband transition, molecular electronic transition and of electron-phonon coupling, respectively.

Transmit Designs for the MIMO Broadcast Channel With Statistical CSI

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wu, Yongpeng; Jin, Shi; Gao, Xiqi; McKay, Matthew R.; Xiao, Chengshan

2014-09-01

We investigate the multiple-input multiple-output broadcast channel with statistical channel state information available at the transmitter. The so-called linear assignment operation is employed, and necessary conditions are derived for the optimal transmit design under general fading conditions. Based on this, we introduce an iterative algorithm to maximize the linear assignment weighted sum-rate by applying a gradient descent method. To reduce complexity, we derive an upper bound of the linear assignment achievable rate of each receiver, from which a simplified closed-form expression for a near-optimal linear assignment matrix is derived. This reveals an interesting construction analogous to that of dirty-paper coding. In light of this, a low complexity transmission scheme is provided. Numerical examples illustrate the significant performance of the proposed low complexity scheme.

Non-linear wave-particle interactions and fast ion loss induced by multiple Alfvén eigenmodes in the DIII-D tokamak

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

Chen, Xi; Kramer, Gerrit J.; Heidbrink, William W.

2014-05-21

A new non-linear feature has been observed in fast-ion loss from tokamak plasmas in the form of oscillations at the sum, difference and second harmonic frequencies of two independent Alfvén eigenmodes (AEs). Full orbit calculations and analytic theory indicate this non-linearity is due to coupling of fast-ion orbital response as it passes through each AE — a change in wave-particle phase k • r by one mode alters the force exerted by the next. Furthermore, the loss measurement is of barely confined, non-resonant particles, while similar non-linear interactions can occur between well-confined particles and multiple AEs leading to enhanced fast-ionmore » transport.« less

Body fat assessed from body density and estimated from skinfold thickness in normal children and children with cystic fibrosis.

PubMed

Johnston, J L; Leong, M S; Checkland, E G; Zuberbuhler, P C; Conger, P R; Quinney, H A

1988-12-01

Body density and skinfold thickness at four sites were measured in 140 normal boys, 168 normal girls, and 6 boys and 7 girls with cystic fibrosis, all aged 8-14 y. Prediction equations for the normal boys and girls for the estimation of body-fat content from skinfold measurements were derived from linear regression of body density vs the log of the sum of the skinfold thickness. The relationship between body density and the log of the sum of the skinfold measurements differed from normal for the boys and girls with cystic fibrosis because of their high body density even though their large residual volume was corrected for. However the sum of skinfold measurements in the children with cystic fibrosis did not differ from normal. Thus body fat percent of these children with cystic fibrosis was underestimated when calculated from body density and invalid when calculated from skinfold thickness.

Model-Free CUSUM Methods for Person Fit

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Armstrong, Ronald D.; Shi, Min

2009-01-01

This article demonstrates the use of a new class of model-free cumulative sum (CUSUM) statistics to detect person fit given the responses to a linear test. The fundamental statistic being accumulated is the likelihood ratio of two probabilities. The detection performance of this CUSUM scheme is compared to other model-free person-fit statistics…

The Formalization of Fairness: Issues in Testing for Measurement Invariance Using Subtest Scores

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Molenaar, Dylan; Borsboom, Denny

2013-01-01

Measurement invariance is an important prerequisite for the adequate comparison of group differences in test scores. In psychology, measurement invariance is typically investigated by means of linear factor analyses of subtest scores. These subtest scores typically result from summing the item scores. In this paper, we discuss 4 possible problems…

Boulder Dislodgement by Tsunamis and Storms: Version 2.0

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Weiss, Robert

2016-04-01

In the past, boulder dislodgement by tsunami and storm waves has been approached with a simple threshold approach in which a boulder was moved if the sum of the acting forces on the boulder is larger than zero. The impulse theory taught us, however, that this criterion is not enough to explain particle dislodgement. We employ an adapted version of the Newton's Second Law of Motion (NSLM) in order to consider the essence of the impulse theory which is that the sum of the forces has to exceed a certain threshold for a certain period of time. Furthermore, a classical assumption is to consider linear waves. However, when waves travel toward the shore, they alter due to non-linear processes. We employ the TRIADS model to quantify that change and how it impacts boulder dislodgement. We present our results of the coupled model (adapted NSLM and TRIADS model). The results project a more complex picture of boulder transport by storms and tsunami. The following question arises: What information do we actually invert, and what does it tell us about the causative event?

Self-duality in higher dimensions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bilge, A. H.; Dereli, T.; Kocak, S.

2017-01-01

Let ω be a 2-form on a 2n dimensional manifold. In previous work, we called ω “strong self-dual, if the eigenvalues of its matrix with respect to an orthonormal frame are equal in absolute value. In a series of papers, we showed that strong self-duality agrees with previous definitions; in particular if ω is strong self-dual, then, in 2n dimensions, ωn is proportional to its Hodge dual ω and in 4n dimensions, ωn is Hodge self-dual. We also obtained a local expression of the Bonan 4-form on 8 manifolds with Spin 7 holonomy, as the sum of the squares of any orthonormal basis of a maximal linear subspace of strong self-dual 2-forms. In the present work we generalize the notion of strong self-duality to odd dimensional manifolds and we express the dual of the Fundamental 3-form 7 manifolds with G 2 holonomy, as a sum of the squares of an orthonormal basis of a maximal linear subspace of strong self-dual 2-forms.

Field-free orientation of diatomic molecule via the linearly polarized resonant pulses

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Li, Su-Yu; Guo, Fu-Ming; Wang, Jun; Yang, Yu-Jun; Jin, Ming-Xing

2015-10-01

We propose a scheme to coherently control the field-free orientation of NO molecule whose rotational temperature is above 0 K. It is found that the maximum molecular orientation is affected by two factors: one is the sum of the population of M = 0 rotational states and the other is their distribution, however, their distribution plays a much more significant role in molecular orientation than the sum of their population. By adopting a series of linearly polarized pulses resonant with the rotational states, the distribution of M = 0 rotational states is well rearranged. Though the number of pulses used is small, a relatively high orientation degree can be obtained. This scheme provides a promising approach to the achievement of a good orientation effect. Project supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (Grant No. 2013CB922200), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 11034003, 11474129, 11274141, and 11304116), the Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education of China (Grant No. 20130061110021), and the Graduate Innovation Fund of Jilin University (Grant No. 2015091).

Predicting the nonlinear optical response in the resonant region from the linear characterization: a self-consistent theory for the first-, second-, and third-order (non)linear optical response

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pérez-Moreno, Javier; Clays, Koen; Kuzyk, Mark G.

2010-08-01

We introduce a self-consistent theory for the description of the optical linear and nonlinear response of molecules that is based strictly on the results of the experimental characterization. We show how the Thomas-Kuhn sum-rules can be used to eliminate the dependence of the nonlinear response on parameters that are not directly measurable. Our approach leads to the successful modeling of the dispersion of the nonlinear response of complex molecular structures with different geometries (dipolar and octupolar), and can be used as a guide towards the modeling in terms of fundamental physical parameters.

Emerald oil field on production in North Sea

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

Not Available

1992-08-31

This paper reports that Midland and Scottish Energy Ltd. (MSE) has placed Emerald oil field on stream in the U.K. North Sea with a floating production unit. Initial production, from two satellite wells, will be used to commission facilities. Three water injection wells have been unplugged and are ready for start-up. MSE will place a central cluster of wells-five producers and one water injector-on stream during the next few weeks. Production will build to an expected 25,000 b/d from 35 million bbl of reserves. Field development has undergone an unusually large number of setbacks and changes.

Ethnic Diversity in Materials Science and Engineering. A report on the workshop on ethnic diversity in materials science and engineering.

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

Schwartz, Justin

The immediate goal of the workshop was to elevate and identify issues and challenges that have impeded participation of diverse individuals in MSE. The longerterm goals are to continue forward by gathering and disseminating data, launching and tracking initiatives to mitigate the impediments, and increase the number of diverse individuals pursuing degrees and careers in MSE. The larger goal, however, is to create over time an ever-increasing number of role models in science fields who will, in turn, draw others in to contribute to the workforce of the future.

Observatory software for the Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vermeulen, Tom; Isani, Sidik; Withington, Kanoa; Ho, Kevin; Szeto, Kei; Murowinski, Rick

2016-07-01

The Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope is currently in the conceptual design phase to redevelop its facility into the new Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer (MSE). MSE is designed to be the largest non-ELT optical/NIR astronomical telescope, and will be a fully dedicated facility for multi-object spectroscopy over a broad range of spectral resolutions. This paper outlines the software and control architecture envisioned for the new facility. The architecture will be designed around much of the existing software infrastructure currently used at CFHT as well as the latest proven opensource software. CFHT plans to minimize risk and development time by leveraging existing technology.

Poor health kills small business: illness and microenterprises in South Africa.

PubMed

Chao, Li-Wei; Pauly, Mark; Szrek, Helena; Pereira, Nuno Sousa; Bundred, Frances; Cross, Catherine; Gow, Jeff

2007-01-01

Small businesses contribute almost 50 percent of total employment and 30 percent of gross domestic product in South Africa, but the impact of poor health and AIDS on these businesses is poorly documented. Using three waves of longitudinal data from predominantly African neighborhoods in peri-urban Durban, South Africa, this project investigates the connections between the health of the owner of a micro- and small enterprise (MSE) and the MSE's growth, survival, or exit. The results show that poor baseline health and declines in health over time are both significantly associated with subsequent business closure.

Physiologic variability at the verge of systemic inflammation: multi-scale entropy of heart rate variability is affected by very low doses of endotoxin

PubMed Central

Herlitz, Georg N.; Sanders, Renee L.; Cheung, Nora H.; Coyle, Susette M.; Griffel, Benjamin; Macor, Marie A.; Lowry, Stephen F.; Calvano, Steve E.; Gale, Stephen C.

2014-01-01

Introduction Human injury or infection induces systemic inflammation with characteristic neuro-endocrine responses. Fluctuations in autonomic function during inflammation are reflected by beat-to-beat variation in heart rate, termed heart rate variability (HRV). In the present study, we determine threshold doses of endotoxin needed to induce observable changes in markers of systemic inflammation, we investigate whether metrics of HRV exhibit a differing threshold dose from other inflammatory markers, and we investigate the size of data sets required for meaningful use of multi-scale entropy (MSE) analysis of HRV. Methods Healthy human volunteers (n=25) were randomized to receive placebo (normal saline) or endotoxin/lipopolysaccharide (LPS): 0.1, 0.25, 0.5, 1.0, or 2.0 ng/kg administered intravenously. Vital signs were recorded every 30 minutes for 6 hours and then at 9, 12, and 24 hours after LPS. Blood samples were drawn at specific time points for cytokine measurements. HRV analysis was performed using EKG epochs of 5 minutes. MSE for HRV was calculated for all dose groups to scale factor 40. Results The lowest significant threshold dose was noted in core temperature at 0.25ng/kg. Endogenous TNF-α and IL-6 were significantly responsive at the next dosage level (0.5ng/kg) along with elevations in circulating leukocytes and heart rate. Responses were exaggerated at higher doses (1 and 2 ng/kg). Time domain and frequency domain HRV metrics similarly suggested a threshold dose, differing from placebo at 1.0 and 2.0 ng/kg, below which no clear pattern in response was evident. By applying repeated-measures ANOVA across scale factors, a significant decrease in MSE was seen at 1.0 and 2.0 ng/kg by 2 hours post exposure to LPS. While not statistically significant below 1.0 ng/kg, MSE unexpectedly decreased across all groups in an orderly dose-response pattern not seen in the other outcomes. Conclusions By usingrANOVA across scale factors, MSE can detect autonomic change after LPS challenge in a group of 25 subjects using EKG epochs of only 5 minutes and entropy analysis to scale factor of only 40, potentially facilitating MSE’s wider use as a research tool or bedside monitor. Traditional markers of inflammation generally exhibit threshold dose behavior. In contrast, MSE’s apparent continuous dose-response pattern, while not statistically verifiable in this study, suggests a potential subclinical harbinger of infectious or other insult. The possible derangement of autonomic complexity prior to or independent of the cytokine surge cannot be ruled out. Future investigation should focus on confirmation of overt inflammation following observed decreases in MSE in a clinical setting. PMID:25526373

Re-entry vehicle shape for enhanced performance

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brown, James L. (Inventor); Garcia, Joseph A. (Inventor); Prabhu, Dinesh K. (Inventor)

2008-01-01

A convex shell structure for enhanced aerodynamic performance and/or reduced heat transfer requirements for a space vehicle that re-enters an atmosphere. The structure has a fore-body, an aft-body, a longitudinal axis and a transverse cross sectional shape, projected on a plane containing the longitudinal axis, that includes: first and second linear segments, smoothly joined at a first end of each the first and second linear segments to an end of a third linear segment by respective first and second curvilinear segments; and a fourth linear segment, joined to a second end of each of the first and second segments by curvilinear segments, including first and second ellipses having unequal ellipse parameters. The cross sectional shape is non-symmetric about the longitudinal axis. The fourth linear segment can be replaced by a sum of one or more polynomials, trigonometric functions or other functions satisfying certain constraints.

Heart rate complexity in sinoaortic-denervated mice.

PubMed

Silva, Luiz Eduardo V; Rodrigues, Fernanda Luciano; de Oliveira, Mauro; Salgado, Hélio Cesar; Fazan, Rubens

2015-02-01

What is the central question of this study? New measurements for cardiovascular complexity, such as detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) and multiscale entropy (MSE), have been shown to predict cardiovascular outcomes. Given that cardiovascular diseases are accompanied by autonomic imbalance and decreased baroreflex sensitivity, the central question is: do baroreceptors contribute to cardiovascular complexity? What is the main finding and its importance? Sinoaortic denervation altered both DFA scaling exponents and MSE, indicating that both short- and long-term mechanisms of complexity are altered in sinoaortic denervated mice, resulting in a loss of physiological complexity. These results suggest that the baroreflex is a key element in the complex structures involved in heart rate variability regulation. Recently, heart rate (HR) oscillations have been recognized as complex behaviours derived from non-linear processes. Physiological complexity theory is based on the idea that healthy systems present high complexity, i.e. non-linear, fractal variability at multiple scales, with long-range correlations. The loss of complexity in heart rate variability (HRV) has been shown to predict adverse cardiovascular outcomes. Based on the idea that most cardiovascular diseases are accompanied by autonomic imbalance and a decrease in baroreflex sensitivity, we hypothesize that the baroreflex plays an important role in complex cardiovascular behaviour. Mice that had been subjected to sinoaortic denervation (SAD) were implanted with catheters in the femoral artery and jugular vein 5 days prior to the experiment. After recording the baseline arterial pressure (AP), pulse interval time series were generated from the intervals between consecutive values of diastolic pressure. The complexity of the HRV was determined using detrended fluctuation analysis and multiscale entropy. The detrended fluctuation analysis α1 scaling exponent (a short-term index) was remarkably decreased in the SAD mice (0.79 ± 0.06 versus 1.13 ± 0.04 for the control mice), whereas SAD slightly increased the α2 scaling exponent (a long-term index; 1.12 ± 0.03 versus 1.04 ± 0.02 for control mice). In the SAD mice, the total multiscale entropy was decreased (13.2 ± 1.3) compared with the control mice (18.9 ± 1.4). In conclusion, fractal and regularity structures of HRV are altered in SAD mice, affecting both short- and long-term mechanisms of complexity, suggesting that the baroreceptors play a considerable role in the complex structure of HRV. © 2014 The Authors. Experimental Physiology © 2014 The Physiological Society.

Zadoff-Chu sequence-based hitless ranging scheme for OFDMA-PON configured 5G fronthaul uplinks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Reza, Ahmed Galib; Rhee, June-Koo Kevin

2017-05-01

A Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence-based low-complexity hitless upstream time synchronization scheme is proposed for an orthogonal frequency division multiple access passive optical network configured cloud radio access network fronthaul. The algorithm is based on gradual loading of the ZC sequences, where the phase discontinuity due to the cyclic prefix is alleviated by a frequency domain phase precoder, eliminating the requirements of guard bands to mitigate intersymbol interference and inter-carrier interference. Simulation results for uncontrolled-wavelength asynchronous transmissions from four concurrent transmitting optical network units are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.

Robust logistic regression to narrow down the winner's curse for rare and recessive susceptibility variants.

PubMed

Kesselmeier, Miriam; Lorenzo Bermejo, Justo

2017-11-01

Logistic regression is the most common technique used for genetic case-control association studies. A disadvantage of standard maximum likelihood estimators of the genotype relative risk (GRR) is their strong dependence on outlier subjects, for example, patients diagnosed at unusually young age. Robust methods are available to constrain outlier influence, but they are scarcely used in genetic studies. This article provides a non-intimidating introduction to robust logistic regression, and investigates its benefits and limitations in genetic association studies. We applied the bounded Huber and extended the R package 'robustbase' with the re-descending Hampel functions to down-weight outlier influence. Computer simulations were carried out to assess the type I error rate, mean squared error (MSE) and statistical power according to major characteristics of the genetic study and investigated markers. Simulations were complemented with the analysis of real data. Both standard and robust estimation controlled type I error rates. Standard logistic regression showed the highest power but standard GRR estimates also showed the largest bias and MSE, in particular for associated rare and recessive variants. For illustration, a recessive variant with a true GRR=6.32 and a minor allele frequency=0.05 investigated in a 1000 case/1000 control study by standard logistic regression resulted in power=0.60 and MSE=16.5. The corresponding figures for Huber-based estimation were power=0.51 and MSE=0.53. Overall, Hampel- and Huber-based GRR estimates did not differ much. Robust logistic regression may represent a valuable alternative to standard maximum likelihood estimation when the focus lies on risk prediction rather than identification of susceptibility variants. © The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Moisture dynamics of the northward and eastward propagating boreal summer intraseasonal oscillations: possible role of tropical Indo-west Pacific SST and circulation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pillai, Prasanth A.; Sahai, A. K.

2016-08-01

Boreal summer intraseasonal oscillation (BSISO) has complex spatial structure due to the co-existence of equatorial eastward and off-equatorial northward propagation in the equatorial Indian Ocean. As a result, equatorial Indian Ocean convection has simultaneous northward and eastward (NE), northward only (N-only) and eastward only (E-only) propagations. It is well established that the convection propagates in the direction of increasing moist static energy (MSE). The moisture and MSE budget analysis reveals that the horizontal advection of anomalous MSE contributes to positive MSE tendency, which is in agreement with the horizontal advection of column integrated moisture anomaly. Northward movement of warm SST and the anomalous moisture advected by zonal wind are the major initiative for the northward propagation of convection from the equatorial Indian Ocean in both NE and N-only category. At the same time warm SST anomaly in the equatorial west Pacific along with moisture advection caused by anomalous meridional wind is important for the equatorial eastward branch of NE propagation. As these anomalies in the west Pacific moves northward, equatorial Indian Ocean convection establishes over the equatorial west Pacific. The absence of these processes confines the BSISO in northward direction for N-only category. In the case of E-only movement, warm SST anomaly and moisture advection by zonal component of wind causes the eastward propagation of convection. Boundary layer moisture convergence always remains east of convection center in E-only propagation, while it coincides with convection centre in other two categories. Thus the present study concludes that the difference in underlying SST and atmospheric circulation in tropical Indo-west Pacific oceanic regions encourage the differential propagation of BSISO convection through moisture dynamics.

Method for correction of measured polarization angles from motional Stark effect spectroscopy for the effects of electric fields

DOE PAGES

Luce, T. C.; Petty, C. C.; Meyer, W. H.; ...

2016-11-02

An approximate method to correct the motional Stark effect (MSE) spectroscopy for the effects of intrinsic plasma electric fields has been developed. The motivation for using an approximate method is to incorporate electric field effects for between-pulse or real-time analysis of the current density or safety factor profile. The toroidal velocity term in the momentum balance equation is normally the dominant contribution to the electric field orthogonal to the flux surface over most of the plasma. When this approximation is valid, the correction to the MSE data can be included in a form like that used when electric field effectsmore » are neglected. This allows measurements of the toroidal velocity to be integrated into the interpretation of the MSE polarization angles without changing how the data is treated in existing codes. In some cases, such as the DIII-D system, the correction is especially simple, due to the details of the neutral beam and MSE viewing geometry. The correction method is compared using DIII-D data in a variety of plasma conditions to analysis that assumes no radial electric field is present and to analysis that uses the standard correction method, which involves significant human intervention for profile fitting. The comparison shows that the new correction method is close to the standard one, and in all cases appears to offer a better result than use of the uncorrected data. Lastly, the method has been integrated into the standard DIII-D equilibrium reconstruction code in use for analysis between plasma pulses and is sufficiently fast that it will be implemented in real-time equilibrium analysis for control applications.« less

K(2)MM'(3)Se(6) (M = Cu, Ag; M' = Ga, In), A new series of metal chalcogenides with chain-sublayer-chain slabs: (infinity)(1)[M'Se(4)]-(infinity)(2)[(MSe(4))(M'Se(4))]-(infinity)(1)[M'Se(4)].

PubMed

Ma, Hong-Wei; Guo, Guo-Cong; Wang, Ming-Sheng; Zhou, Guo-Wei; Lin, Shan-Hou; Dong, Zhen-Chao; Huang, Jin-Shun

2003-02-24

A new series of novel isostructural metal chalcogenides, K(2)CuIn(3)Se(6) (1), K(2)CuGa(3)Se(6) (2), and K(2)AgIn(3)Se(6) (3), were obtained by a reactive flux technique and structurally characterized. Compounds 1, 2, and 3 crystallize in the space group C2/c of the monoclinic system with eight formula units in a cell: a = 11.445(2) A, b = 11.495(2) A, c = 21.263(4) A, beta = 97.68(3) degrees, V = 2772(1) A(3), R1/wR2 = 0.0676/0.1652 for 1; a = 11.031(2) A, b = 11.050(4) A, c = 20.808(7) A, beta = 97.71(2) degrees, V = 2513(1) A(3), R1/wR2 = 0.0301/0.0511 for 2; and a = 11.633(1) A, b = 11.587(1) A, c = 21.355(1) A, beta = 98.010(8) degrees, V = 2850.4(4) A(3), R1/wR2 = 0.0471/0.0732 for 3. These isostructural compounds are characterized by a chain-sublayer-chain slab structure. The sublayer, composed of alternative corner-sharing mixed-metal tetrahedra, is sandwiched by parallel corner-sharing tetrahedral chains. Optical absorption spectra of compounds 1, 2, and 3 reveal the presence of a sharp optical gap of 1.68, 1.72, and 1.64 eV, respectively, suggesting that these materials are semiconductors and suitable for efficient absorption of solar radiation in solar cell applications. IR spectra show no obvious absorption in the range 800-4000 cm(-)(1).

Near Infrared Spectrometry of Clinically Significant Fatty Acids Using Multicomponent Regression

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kalinin, A. V.; Krasheninnikov, V. N.; Sviridov, A. P.; Titov, V. N.

2016-11-01

We have developed methods for determining the content of clinically important fatty acids (FAs), primarily saturated palmitic acid, monounsaturated oleic acid, and the sum of polyenoic fatty acids (eicosapentaenoic + docosahexaenoic), in oily media (food products and supplements, fish oils) using different types of near infrared (NIR) spectrometers: Fourier-transform, linear photodiode array, and Raman. Based on a calibration method (regression) by means of projections to latent structures, using standard samples of oil and fat mixtures, we have confirmed the feasibility of reliable and selective quantitative analysis of the above-indicated fatty acids. As a result of comparing the calibration models for Fourier-transform spectrometers in different parts of the NIR range (based on different overtones and combinations of fatty acid absorption), we have provided a basis for selection of the spectral range for a portable linear InGaAs-photodiode array spectrometer. In testing the calibrations of a linear InGaAs-photodiode array spectrometer which is a prototype for a portable instrument, for palmitic and oleic acids and also the sum of the polyenoic fatty acids we have achieved a multiple correlation coefficient of 0.89, 0.85, and 0.96 and a standard error of 0.53%, 1.43%, and 0.39% respectively. We have confirmed the feasibility of using Raman spectra to determine the content of the above-indicated fatty acids in media where water is present.

Time trends of persistent organic pollutants in Sweden during 1993-2007 and relation to age, gender, body mass index, breast-feeding and parity.

PubMed

Hardell, Elin; Carlberg, Michael; Nordström, Marie; van Bavel, Bert

2010-09-15

Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) are lipophilic chemicals that bioaccumulate. Most of them were resticted or banned in the 1970s and 1980s to protect human health and the environment. The main source for humans is dietary intake of dairy products, meat and fish. Little data exist on changes of the concentration of POPs in the Swedish population over time. To study if the concentrations of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), DDE, hexachlorobenzene (HCB) and chlordanes have changed in the Swedish population during 1993-2007, and certain factors that may influence the concentrations. During 1993-2007 samples from 537 controls in different human cancer studies were collected and analysed. Background information such as body mass index, breast-feeding and parity was assessed by questionaires. Wilcoxon rank-sum test was used to analyse the explanatory factors specimen (blood or adipose tissue), gender, BMI, total breast-feeding and parity in relation to POPs. Time trends for POPs were analysed using linear regression analysis, adjusted for specimen, gender, BMI and age. The concentration decreased for all POPs during 1993-2007. The annual change was statistically significant for the sum of PCBs -7.2%, HCB -8.8%, DDE -13.5% and the sum of chlordanes -10.3%. BMI and age were determinants of the concentrations. Cumulative breast-feeding >8 months gave statistically significantly lower concentrations for the sum of PCBs, DDE and the sum of chlordanes. Parity with >2 children yielded statistically significantly lower sum of PCBs. All the studied POPs decreased during the time period, probably due to restrictions of their use. Copyright 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Magnetic heading reference

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Garner, H. D. (Inventor)

1983-01-01

Devices are disclosed for vectorially summing two signals. In a first embodiment, the vectorial summation is implemented by a mechanical sin/cos mechanism in which a crank drives two linear potentiometers out of phase. In a second embodiment, a polarized light resolver generates the sin and cos functions. In a third embodiment, a printed circuit resolver generates the sin and cos functions.

Within-Subject Comparison of Changes in a Pretest-Posttest Design

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hennig, Christian; Mullensiefen, Daniel; Bargmann, Jens

2010-01-01

The authors propose a method to compare the influence of a treatment on different properties within subjects. The properties are measured by several Likert-type-scaled items. The results show that many existing approaches, such as repeated measurement analysis of variance on sum and mean scores, a linear partial credit model, and a graded response…

Precision digital pulse phase generator

DOEpatents

McEwan, T.E.

1996-10-08

A timing generator comprises a crystal oscillator connected to provide an output reference pulse. A resistor-capacitor combination is connected to provide a variable-delay output pulse from an input connected to the crystal oscillator. A phase monitor is connected to provide duty-cycle representations of the reference and variable-delay output pulse phase. An operational amplifier drives a control voltage to the resistor-capacitor combination according to currents integrated from the phase monitor and injected into summing junctions. A digital-to-analog converter injects a control current into the summing junctions according to an input digital control code. A servo equilibrium results that provides a phase delay of the variable-delay output pulse to the output reference pulse that linearly depends on the input digital control code. 2 figs.

Precision digital pulse phase generator

DOEpatents

McEwan, Thomas E.

1996-01-01

A timing generator comprises a crystal oscillator connected to provide an output reference pulse. A resistor-capacitor combination is connected to provide a variable-delay output pulse from an input connected to the crystal oscillator. A phase monitor is connected to provide duty-cycle representations of the reference and variable-delay output pulse phase. An operational amplifier drives a control voltage to the resistor-capacitor combination according to currents integrated from the phase monitor and injected into summing junctions. A digital-to-analog converter injects a control current into the summing junctions according to an input digital control code. A servo equilibrium results that provides a phase delay of the variable-delay output pulse to the output reference pulse that linearly depends on the input digital control code.

Predicting Madura cattle growth curve using non-linear model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Widyas, N.; Prastowo, S.; Widi, T. S. M.; Baliarti, E.

2018-03-01

Madura cattle is Indonesian native. It is a composite breed that has undergone hundreds of years of selection and domestication to reach nowadays remarkable uniformity. Crossbreeding has reached the isle of Madura and the Madrasin, a cross between Madura cows and Limousine semen emerged. This paper aimed to compare the growth curve between Madrasin and one type of pure Madura cows, the common Madura cattle (Madura) using non-linear models. Madura cattles are kept traditionally thus reliable records are hardly available. Data were collected from small holder farmers in Madura. Cows from different age classes (<6 months, 6-12 months, 1-2years, 2-3years, 3-5years and >5years) were observed, and body measurements (chest girth, body length and wither height) were taken. In total 63 Madura and 120 Madrasin records obtained. Linear model was built with cattle sub-populations and age as explanatory variables. Body weights were estimated based on the chest girth. Growth curves were built using logistic regression. Results showed that within the same age, Madrasin has significantly larger body compared to Madura (p<0.05). The logistic models fit better for Madura and Madrasin cattle data; with the estimated MSE for these models were 39.09 and 759.28 with prediction accuracy of 99 and 92% for Madura and Madrasin, respectively. Prediction of growth curve using logistic regression model performed well in both types of Madura cattle. However, attempts to administer accurate data on Madura cattle are necessary to better characterize and study these cattle.

Sampling for mercury at subnanogram per litre concentrations for load estimation in rivers

USGS Publications Warehouse

Colman, J.A.; Breault, R.F.

2000-01-01

Estimation of constituent loads in streams requires collection of stream samples that are representative of constituent concentrations, that is, composites of isokinetic multiple verticals collected along a stream transect. An all-Teflon isokinetic sampler (DH-81) cleaned in 75??C, 4 N HCl was tested using blank, split, and replicate samples to assess systematic and random sample contamination by mercury species. Mean mercury concentrations in field-equipment blanks were low: 0.135 ng??L-1 for total mercury (??Hg) and 0.0086 ng??L-1 for monomethyl mercury (MeHg). Mean square errors (MSE) for ??Hg and MeHg duplicate samples collected at eight sampling stations were not statistically different from MSE of samples split in the laboratory, which represent the analytical and splitting error. Low fieldblank concentrations and statistically equal duplicate- and split-sample MSE values indicate that no measurable contamination was occurring during sampling. Standard deviations associated with example mercury load estimations were four to five times larger, on a relative basis, than standard deviations calculated from duplicate samples, indicating that error of the load determination was primarily a function of the loading model used, not of sampling or analytical methods.

Effect of dietary ethanol extracts of mango (Mangifera indica L.) on lipid oxidation and the color of chicken meat during frozen storage.

PubMed

Freitas, Ednardo Rodrigues; da Silva Borges, Ângela; Pereira, Ana Lúcia Fernandes; Abreu, Virgínia Kelly Gonçalves; Trevisan, Maria Teresa Salles; Watanabe, Pedro Henrique

2015-12-01

The aim of this study was to evaluate the dietary effect of mango extracts on lipid stability and the coloring of broiler chicken breast meat during frozen storage. The treatments consisted of broiler chicken diet without antioxidants (control) and diets containing antioxidants: 200 ppm of butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT), 200 ppm of mango peel extract (MPE), 400 ppm of MPE, 200 ppm of mango seed extract (MSE), and 400 ppm of MSE. The broiler breasts were stored for 90 days and analysis of lipid oxidation and color was performed every 30 days. The thiobarbituric acid reactive substances values increased during storage and at 90 days, but the 400 ppm MSE treatment yielded lower values, indicating greater antioxidant activity. During storage, the lightness values decreased and the redness increased. Additions of 200 ppm BHT and 400 ppm MPE increased yellowness at 60 days of storage. Thus, mango peel and seed extracts added to broiler chicken diets reduce lipid oxidation and maintain color in breast meat during frozen storage, with mango seed extract at 400 ppm being the most effective. © 2015 Poultry Science Association Inc.

Antioxidant and antibacterial activities of selected varieties of thai mango seed extract.

PubMed

Khammuang, Saranyu; Sarnthima, Rakrudee

2011-01-01

This study reports the antioxidant and antibacterial activities of four fresh mango seed extracts from Thai varieties. Total phenol contents determined by the Folin-ciocalteu method revealed the highest values to be in MKE, Chok-a-nan variety (399.8 mgGAE/g extract) and MSE of Nam-dok-mai variety (377.2 mgGAE/g extract). Both extracts showed potent ABTS˙+ radical and DPPH˙ radical scavenging activities with the lower half inhibition concentration (IC50) values than those of the reference compounds; vitamin C, trolox and BHA, respectively. Their antioxidant property of MSE and MKE is strongly correlated with the total phenol contents (r=0.98 and 0.98, respectively). When combined the MSE and MKE of the Fah-lun variety showed the strongest antioxidant activity. All mango seed extracts showed interesting antibacterial activity against both gram positive and gram negative bacteria as determined by disc diffusion method. The most sensitive pathogenic strain inhibited by all extracts (especially Kaew variety) was Pseudomonas aeruginosa ATCC 27853. This work suggests potential applications for practical uses of mango seed extracts from Thai varieties, as sources of antioxidant and antibacterial agents.

A digital clock recovery algorithm based on chromatic dispersion and polarization mode dispersion feedback dual phase detection for coherent optical transmission systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Bo; Xin, Xiangjun; Zhang, Lijia; Wang, Fu; Zhang, Qi

2018-02-01

A new feedback symbol timing recovery technique using timing estimation joint equalization is proposed for digital receivers with two samples/symbol or higher sampling rate. Different from traditional methods, the clock recovery algorithm in this paper adopts another algorithm distinguishing the phases of adjacent symbols, so as to accurately estimate the timing offset based on the adjacent signals with the same phase. The addition of the module for eliminating phase modulation interference before timing estimation further reduce the variance, thus resulting in a smoothed timing estimate. The Mean Square Error (MSE) and Bit Error Rate (BER) of the resulting timing estimate are simulated to allow a satisfactory estimation performance. The obtained clock tone performance is satisfactory for MQAM modulation formats and the Roll-off Factor (ROF) close to 0. In the back-to-back system, when ROF= 0, the maximum of MSE obtained with the proposed approach reaches 0 . 0125. After 100-km fiber transmission, BER decreases to 10-3 with ROF= 0 and OSNR = 11 dB. With the increase in ROF, the performances of MSE and BER become better.

A randomised controlled trial on evaluation of the clinical efficacy of massage therapy in a multisensory environment for residents with severe and profound intellectual disabilities: a pilot study.

PubMed

Chan, J S L; Chien, W T

2017-06-01

Recent literature has suggested that relaxation activities can reduce the challenging behaviours of people with intellectual disabilities, particularly in severe and profound grades, due to the counteractive effect of muscle relaxation on emotional frustration or psychological distress. Despite having inconclusive evidence, multisensory environment (MSE) and massage therapy (MT) are the commonly used approaches to relaxation among these people. However, these two approaches have not yet practised or tested in combination for reducing these people's challenging behaviours. A preliminary clinical efficacy trial was conducted to evaluate the effects of MT, MSE and their combined use for residents with intellectual disabilities in a long-term care facility on reducing their challenging behaviours. Eligible residents were recruited and randomly assigned to one of the four study groups (n = 11-12 per group), that is, MT in MSE, MSE alone, MT alone or usual care, for a 10-week intervention after a 1-month washout period. Outcome measures, including the Behaviour Problem Inventory, pulse and respiration rates, Behaviour Checklist and Alertness Observation Checklist, were assessed at recruitment and immediately following the interventions. A total of 42 participants (17 men and 25 women) completed the study. There were no significant differences in frequency and severity of challenging behaviours and most of the outcome measures between the four groups at post-test. Nevertheless, there were statistical significant differences on the active and inactive state (Alertness Observation Checklist) between the three treatment and control groups. Many participants in the three treatment groups changed from an active to inactive state (i.e. reduced activity levels) throughout the interventions, especially the MT in MSE. Such inactivity might suggest the participants' brief exhaustion followed by a period of alertness during the treatment activities. But their attention span and social contact to the immediate environment could still be maintained. Participants of MT in multisensory environment acquired more inactive state than the other study groups. This inactive state indicates a state of 'passive alertness', which is more likely in a relaxing manner. © 2017 MENCAP and International Association of the Scientific Study of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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

Asplund, Curtis T., E-mail: ca2621@columbia.edu; Berenstein, David, E-mail: dberens@physics.ucsb.edu

We consider oscillators evolving subject to a periodic driving force that dynamically entangles them, and argue that this gives the linearized evolution around periodic orbits in a general chaotic Hamiltonian dynamical system. We show that the entanglement entropy, after tracing over half of the oscillators, generically asymptotes to linear growth at a rate given by the sum of the positive Lyapunov exponents of the system. These exponents give a classical entropy growth rate, in the sense of Kolmogorov, Sinai and Pesin. We also calculate the dependence of this entropy on linear mixtures of the oscillator Hilbert-space factors, to investigate themore » dependence of the entanglement entropy on the choice of coarse graining. We find that for almost all choices the asymptotic growth rate is the same.« less

Retrieval of all effective susceptibilities in nonlinear metamaterials

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Larouche, Stéphane; Radisic, Vesna

2018-04-01

Electromagnetic metamaterials offer a great avenue to engineer and amplify the nonlinear response of materials. Their electric, magnetic, and magnetoelectric linear and nonlinear response are related to their structure, providing unprecedented liberty to control those properties. Both the linear and the nonlinear properties of metamaterials are typically anisotropic. While the methods to retrieve the effective linear properties are well established, existing nonlinear retrieval methods have serious limitations. In this work, we generalize a nonlinear transfer matrix approach to account for all nonlinear susceptibility terms and show how to use this approach to retrieve all effective nonlinear susceptibilities of metamaterial elements. The approach is demonstrated using sum frequency generation, but can be applied to other second-order or higher-order processes.

Generation of multifocal irradiance patterns by using complex Fresnel holograms.

PubMed

Mendoza-Yero, Omel; Carbonell-Leal, Miguel; Mínguez-Vega, Gladys; Lancis, Jesús

2018-03-01

We experimentally demonstrate Fresnel holograms able to produce multifocal irradiance patterns with micrometric spatial resolution. These holograms are assessed from the coherent sum of multiple Fresnel lenses. The utilized encoded technique guarantees full control over the reconstructed irradiance patterns due to an optimal codification of the amplitude and phase information of the resulting complex field. From a practical point of view, a phase-only spatial light modulator is used in a couple of experiments addressed to obtain two- and three-dimensional distributions of focal points to excite both linear and non-linear optical phenomena.

Some New Properties of Quantum Correlations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Feng; Li, Fei; Wei, Yunxia

2017-02-01

Quantum coherence measures the correlation between different measurement results in a single-system, while entanglement and quantum discord measure the correlation among different subsystems in a multipartite system. In this paper, we focus on the relative entropy form of them, and obtain three new properties of them as follows: 1) General forms of maximally coherent states for the relative entropy coherence, 2) Linear monogamy of the relative entropy entanglement, and 3) Subadditivity of quantum discord. Here, the linear monogamy is defined as there is a small constant as the upper bound on the sum of the relative entropy entanglement in subsystems.

Estimating and testing interactions when explanatory variables are subject to non-classical measurement error.

PubMed

Murad, Havi; Kipnis, Victor; Freedman, Laurence S

2016-10-01

Assessing interactions in linear regression models when covariates have measurement error (ME) is complex.We previously described regression calibration (RC) methods that yield consistent estimators and standard errors for interaction coefficients of normally distributed covariates having classical ME. Here we extend normal based RC (NBRC) and linear RC (LRC) methods to a non-classical ME model, and describe more efficient versions that combine estimates from the main study and internal sub-study. We apply these methods to data from the Observing Protein and Energy Nutrition (OPEN) study. Using simulations we show that (i) for normally distributed covariates efficient NBRC and LRC were nearly unbiased and performed well with sub-study size ≥200; (ii) efficient NBRC had lower MSE than efficient LRC; (iii) the naïve test for a single interaction had type I error probability close to the nominal significance level, whereas efficient NBRC and LRC were slightly anti-conservative but more powerful; (iv) for markedly non-normal covariates, efficient LRC yielded less biased estimators with smaller variance than efficient NBRC. Our simulations suggest that it is preferable to use: (i) efficient NBRC for estimating and testing interaction effects of normally distributed covariates and (ii) efficient LRC for estimating and testing interactions for markedly non-normal covariates. © The Author(s) 2013.

Suppression of turbulent transport in NSTX internal transport barriers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yuh, Howard

2008-11-01

Electron transport will be important for ITER where fusion alphas and high-energy beam ions will primarily heat electrons. In the NSTX, internal transport barriers (ITBs) are observed in reversed (negative) shear discharges where diffusivities for electron and ion thermal channels and momentum are reduced. While neutral beam heating can produce ITBs in both electron and ion channels, High Harmonic Fast Wave (HHFW) heating can produce electron thermal ITBs under reversed magnetic shear conditions without momentum input. Interestingly, the location of the electron ITB does not necessarily match that of the ion ITB: the electron ITB correlates well with the minimum in the magnetic shear determined by Motional Stark Effect (MSE) [1] constrained equilibria, whereas the ion ITB better correlates with the maximum ExB shearing rate. Measured electron temperature gradients can exceed critical linear thresholds for ETG instability calculated by linear gyrokinetic codes in the ITB confinement region. The high-k microwave scattering diagnostic [2] shows reduced local density fluctuations at wavenumbers characteristic of electron turbulence for discharges with strongly negative magnetic shear versus weakly negative or positive magnetic shear. Fluctuation reductions are found to be spatially and temporally correlated with the local magnetic shear. These results are consistent with non-linear gyrokinetic simulations predictions showing the reduction of electron transport in negative magnetic shear conditions despite being linearly unstable [3]. Electron transport improvement via negative magnetic shear rather than ExB shear highlights the importance of current profile control in ITER and future devices. [1] F.M. Levinton, H. Yuh et al., PoP 14, 056119 [2] D.R. Smith, E. Mazzucato et al., RSI 75, 3840 [3] Jenko, F. and Dorland, W., PRL 89 225001

Coupled Groups of g-Modes in a Sun with Mixed Core

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wolff, Charles L.; ODonovan, Adam

2007-01-01

Groups of linear g-modes can sum to create long-lived nonlinear oscillations in small "hot volumes" very deep in the Sun that help drive the modes. In these volumes (dimensions -10 Mm), the time average rate of He-3 burning doubles as temperature fluctuations exceed 10% and rises by an order of magnitude for fluctuations of 25%. To be consistent with locally large motions, we impose a mixed shell on an otherwise standard solar model before computing g-mode solutions. Mixing in the assumed shell r = (0.10+/-0.03) R(sub sun) is rapid (<<10(exp 6) yr) with slower mixing somewhat beyond. If l is the principal spherical harmonic index, a set of g-modes for any single l less than or equal to 15 with five consecutive radial harmonics can be excited with nearly linear thermal amplitudes, A(sub T) less than or equal to 0.053, throughout the star and a fractional temperature fluctuation in its hot volume of (Delta)T/T less than or equal to 0.18. These thresholds for excitation will become smaller when sets for several values of l are computed simultaneously. There is some evidence for the rotation of g-mode sets in the long solar activity record and g-mode upward wave flux has been suggested to explain the 1.3 yr reversing flows tentatively detected below the Sun's convective envelope (CE). The large local amplitudes needed for excitation implies that g-modes may transport a non-negligible fraction of the solar luminosity, yet their near linear amplitudes outside the hot volume suggests amplitudes over most of the solar surface that would be barely detectable for l > 3. A formalism is presented for summing the g-modes and estimating growth rates under the approximation that modes are strictly linear except in a hot volume which holds only a few percent of mode kinetic energy. Finally over the range 2 less than or equal to l less than or equal to 30, we summed all zonal harmonics, m, for a given l and computed the relative angular orientations that would release the most nuclear energy. This should be close to the physically preferred angular state of such a family and a few examples were displayed.

Linear indices of the "molecular pseudograph's atom adjacency matrix": definition, significance-interpretation, and application to QSAR analysis of flavone derivatives as HIV-1 integrase inhibitors.

PubMed

Marrero-Ponce, Yovani

2004-01-01

This report describes a new set of molecular descriptors of relevance to QSAR/QSPR studies and drug design, atom linear indices fk(xi). These atomic level chemical descriptors are based on the calculation of linear maps on Rn[fk(xi): Rn--> Rn] in canonical basis. In this context, the kth power of the molecular pseudograph's atom adjacency matrix [Mk(G)] denotes the matrix of fk(xi) with respect to the canonical basis. In addition, a local-fragment (atom-type) formalism was developed. The kth atom-type linear indices are calculated by summing the kth atom linear indices of all atoms of the same atom type in the molecules. Moreover, total (whole-molecule) linear indices are also proposed. This descriptor is a linear functional (linear form) on Rn. That is, the kth total linear indices is a linear map from Rn to the scalar R[ fk(x): Rn --> R]. Thus, the kth total linear indices are calculated by summing the atom linear indices of all atoms in the molecule. The features of the kth total and local linear indices are illustrated by examples of various types of molecular structures, including chain-lengthening, branching, heteroatoms-content, and multiple bonds. Additionally, the linear independence of the local linear indices to other 0D, 1D, 2D, and 3D molecular descriptors is demonstrated by using principal component analysis for 42 very heterogeneous molecules. Much redundancy and overlapping was found among total linear indices and most of the other structural indices presently in use in the QSPR/QSAR practice. On the contrary, the information carried by atom-type linear indices was strikingly different from that codified in most of the 229 0D-3D molecular descriptors used in this study. It is concluded that the local linear indices are an independent indices containing important structural information to be used in QSPR/QSAR and drug design studies. In this sense, atom, atom-type, and total linear indices were used for the prediction of pIC50 values for the cleavage process of a set of flavone derivatives inhibitors of HIV-1 integrase. Quantitative models found are significant from a statistical point of view (R of 0.965, 0.902, and 0.927, respectively) and permit a clear interpretation of the studied properties in terms of the structural features of molecules. A LOO cross-validation procedure revealed that the regression models had a fairly good predictability (q2 of 0.679, 0.543, and 0.721, respectively). The comparison with other approaches reveals good behavior of the method proposed. The approach described in this paper appears to be an excellent alternative or guides for discovery and optimization of new lead compounds.

Complete convergence of randomly weighted END sequences and its application.

PubMed

Li, Penghua; Li, Xiaoqin; Wu, Kehan

2017-01-01

We investigate the complete convergence of partial sums of randomly weighted extended negatively dependent (END) random variables. Some results of complete moment convergence, complete convergence and the strong law of large numbers for this dependent structure are obtained. As an application, we study the convergence of the state observers of linear-time-invariant systems. Our results extend the corresponding earlier ones.

Bohnenblust-Hille inequalities: analytical and computational aspects.

PubMed

Cavalcante, Wasthenny V; Pellegrino, Daniel M

2018-02-01

The Bohnenblust-Hille polynomial and multilinear inequalities were proved in 1931 and the determination of exact values of their constants is still an open and challenging problem, pursued by various authors. The present paper briefly surveys recent attempts to attack/solve this problem; it also presents new results, like connections with classical results of the linear theory of absolutely summing operators, and new perspectives.

Two heads are better than one, but how much? Evidence that people's use of causal integration rules does not always conform to normative standards.

PubMed

Vadillo, Miguel A; Ortega-Castro, Nerea; Barberia, Itxaso; Baker, A G

2014-01-01

Many theories of causal learning and causal induction differ in their assumptions about how people combine the causal impact of several causes presented in compound. Some theories propose that when several causes are present, their joint causal impact is equal to the linear sum of the individual impact of each cause. However, some recent theories propose that the causal impact of several causes needs to be combined by means of a noisy-OR integration rule. In other words, the probability of the effect given several causes would be equal to the sum of the probability of the effect given each cause in isolation minus the overlap between those probabilities. In the present series of experiments, participants were given information about the causal impact of several causes and then they were asked what compounds of those causes they would prefer to use if they wanted to produce the effect. The results of these experiments suggest that participants actually use a variety of strategies, including not only the linear and the noisy-OR integration rules, but also averaging the impact of several causes.

Model Checking Techniques for Assessing Functional Form Specifications in Censored Linear Regression Models.

PubMed

León, Larry F; Cai, Tianxi

2012-04-01

In this paper we develop model checking techniques for assessing functional form specifications of covariates in censored linear regression models. These procedures are based on a censored data analog to taking cumulative sums of "robust" residuals over the space of the covariate under investigation. These cumulative sums are formed by integrating certain Kaplan-Meier estimators and may be viewed as "robust" censored data analogs to the processes considered by Lin, Wei & Ying (2002). The null distributions of these stochastic processes can be approximated by the distributions of certain zero-mean Gaussian processes whose realizations can be generated by computer simulation. Each observed process can then be graphically compared with a few realizations from the Gaussian process. We also develop formal test statistics for numerical comparison. Such comparisons enable one to assess objectively whether an apparent trend seen in a residual plot reects model misspecification or natural variation. We illustrate the methods with a well known dataset. In addition, we examine the finite sample performance of the proposed test statistics in simulation experiments. In our simulation experiments, the proposed test statistics have good power of detecting misspecification while at the same time controlling the size of the test.

On squares of representations of compact Lie algebras

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

Zeier, Robert, E-mail: robert.zeier@ch.tum.de; Zimborás, Zoltán, E-mail: zimboras@gmail.com

We study how tensor products of representations decompose when restricted from a compact Lie algebra to one of its subalgebras. In particular, we are interested in tensor squares which are tensor products of a representation with itself. We show in a classification-free manner that the sum of multiplicities and the sum of squares of multiplicities in the corresponding decomposition of a tensor square into irreducible representations has to strictly grow when restricted from a compact semisimple Lie algebra to a proper subalgebra. For this purpose, relevant details on tensor products of representations are compiled from the literature. Since the summore » of squares of multiplicities is equal to the dimension of the commutant of the tensor-square representation, it can be determined by linear-algebra computations in a scenario where an a priori unknown Lie algebra is given by a set of generators which might not be a linear basis. Hence, our results offer a test to decide if a subalgebra of a compact semisimple Lie algebra is a proper one without calculating the relevant Lie closures, which can be naturally applied in the field of controlled quantum systems.« less

Mixed Integer Linear Programming based machine learning approach identifies regulators of telomerase in yeast.

PubMed

Poos, Alexandra M; Maicher, André; Dieckmann, Anna K; Oswald, Marcus; Eils, Roland; Kupiec, Martin; Luke, Brian; König, Rainer

2016-06-02

Understanding telomere length maintenance mechanisms is central in cancer biology as their dysregulation is one of the hallmarks for immortalization of cancer cells. Important for this well-balanced control is the transcriptional regulation of the telomerase genes. We integrated Mixed Integer Linear Programming models into a comparative machine learning based approach to identify regulatory interactions that best explain the discrepancy of telomerase transcript levels in yeast mutants with deleted regulators showing aberrant telomere length, when compared to mutants with normal telomere length. We uncover novel regulators of telomerase expression, several of which affect histone levels or modifications. In particular, our results point to the transcription factors Sum1, Hst1 and Srb2 as being important for the regulation of EST1 transcription, and we validated the effect of Sum1 experimentally. We compiled our machine learning method leading to a user friendly package for R which can straightforwardly be applied to similar problems integrating gene regulator binding information and expression profiles of samples of e.g. different phenotypes, diseases or treatments. © The Author(s) 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

Spatial summation revealed in the earliest visual evoked component C1 and the effect of attention on its linearity.

PubMed

Chen, Juan; Yu, Qing; Zhu, Ziyun; Peng, Yujia; Fang, Fang

2016-01-01

In natural scenes, multiple objects are usually presented simultaneously. How do specific areas of the brain respond to multiple objects based on their responses to each individual object? Previous functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies have shown that the activity induced by a multiobject stimulus in the primary visual cortex (V1) can be predicted by the linear or nonlinear sum of the activities induced by its component objects. However, there has been little evidence from electroencephelogram (EEG) studies so far. Here we explored how V1 responded to multiple objects by comparing the EEG signals evoked by a three-grating stimulus with those evoked by its two components (the central grating and 2 flanking gratings). We focused on the earliest visual component C1 (onset latency of ∼50 ms) because it has been shown to reflect the feedforward responses of neurons in V1. We found that when the stimulus was unattended, the amplitude of the C1 evoked by the three-grating stimulus roughly equaled the sum of the amplitudes of the C1s evoked by its two components, regardless of the distances between these gratings. When the stimulus was attended, this linear spatial summation existed only when the three gratings were far apart from each other. When the three gratings were close to each other, the spatial summation became compressed. These results suggest that the earliest visual responses in V1 follow a linear summation rule when attention is not involved and that attention can affect the earliest interactions between multiple objects. Copyright © 2016 the American Physiological Society.

Experimental evidence for an effect of early-diagenetic interaction between labile and refractory marine sedimentary organic matter on nitrogen dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Turnewitsch, Robert; Domeyer, Bettina; Graf, Gerhard

2007-05-01

In most natural sedimentary systems labile and refractory organic material (OM) occur concomitantly. Little, however, is known on how different kinds of OM interact and how such interactions affect early diagenesis in sediments. In a simple sediment experiment, we investigated how interactions of OM substrates of different degradability affect benthic nitrogen (N) dynamics. Temporal evolution of a set of selected biogeochemical parameters was monitored in sandy sediment over 116 days in three experimental set-ups spiked with labile OM (tissue of Mytilus edulis), refractory OM (mostly aged Zostera marina and macroalgae), and a 1:1 mixture of labile and refractory OM. The initial amounts of particulate organic carbon (POC) were identical in the three set-ups. To check for non-linear interactions between labile and refractory OM, the evolution of the mixture system was compared with the evolution of the simple sum of the labile and refractory systems, divided by two. The sum system is the experimental control where labile and refractory OM are virtually combined but not allowed to interact. During the first 30 days there was evidence for net dissolved-inorganic-nitrogen (DIN) production followed by net DIN consumption. (Here 'DIN' is the sum of ammonium, nitrite and nitrate.) After ˜ 30 days a quasi steady state was reached. Non-linear interactions between the two types of OM were reflected by three main differences between the early-diagenetic evolutions of nitrogen dynamics of the mixture and sum (control) systems: (1) In the mixture system the phases of net DIN production and consumption commenced more rapidly and were more intense. (2) The mixture system was shifted towards a more oxidised state of DIN products [as indicated by increased (nitrite + nitrate)/(ammonium) ratios]. (3) There was some evidence that more OM, POC and particulate nitrogen were preserved in the mixture system. That is, in the mixture system more particulate OM was preserved while a higher proportion of the decomposed particulate N was converted into inorganic N. It can be concluded that during the first days and weeks of early diagenesis the magnitude and composition of the flux of decompositional dissolved N-compounds from sediments into the overlying water was influenced by non-linear interactions of OM substrates of different degradability. Given these experimental results it is likely that the relative spatial distributions of OM of differing degradability in sediments control the magnitude and composition of the return flux of dissolved N-bearing compounds from sediments into the overlying water column.

The nonlinearity of passive extraocular muscles

PubMed Central

Quaia, Christian; Ying, Howard S.; Optican, Lance M.

2011-01-01

Passive extraocular muscles (EOMs), like most biological tissues, are hyper-elastic, i.e., their stiffness increases as they are stretched. It has always been assumed, and in a few occasions argued, that this is their only nonlinearity and that it can be ignored in central gaze. However, using novel measurement techniques in anesthetized paralyzed monkeys, we have recently demonstrated that EOMs are characterized by another prominent nonlinearity: the forces induced by sequences of stretches do not sum. Thus, superposition, a central tenet of linear and quasi-linear models, does not hold in passive EOMs. Here, we outline the implications of this finding, especially in light of the common assumption that it is easier for the brain to control a linear than a nonlinear plant. We argue against this common belief: the specific nonlinearity of passive EOMs may actually make it easier for the brain to control the plant than if muscles were linear. PMID:21950971

Dual-range linearized transimpedance amplifier system

DOEpatents

Wessendorf, Kurt O.

2010-11-02

A transimpedance amplifier system is disclosed which simultaneously generates a low-gain output signal and a high-gain output signal from an input current signal using a single transimpedance amplifier having two different feedback loops with different amplification factors to generate two different output voltage signals. One of the feedback loops includes a resistor, and the other feedback loop includes another resistor in series with one or more diodes. The transimpedance amplifier system includes a signal linearizer to linearize one or both of the low- and high-gain output signals by scaling and adding the two output voltage signals from the transimpedance amplifier. The signal linearizer can be formed either as an analog device using one or two summing amplifiers, or alternately can be formed as a digital device using two analog-to-digital converters and a digital signal processor (e.g. a microprocessor or a computer).

A Galerkin discretisation-based identification for parameters in nonlinear mechanical systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Zuolin; Xu, Jian

2018-04-01

In the paper, a new parameter identification method is proposed for mechanical systems. Based on the idea of Galerkin finite-element method, the displacement over time history is approximated by piecewise linear functions, and the second-order terms in model equation are eliminated by integrating by parts. In this way, the lost function of integration form is derived. Being different with the existing methods, the lost function actually is a quadratic sum of integration over the whole time history. Then for linear or nonlinear systems, the optimisation of the lost function can be applied with traditional least-squares algorithm or the iterative one, respectively. Such method could be used to effectively identify parameters in linear and arbitrary nonlinear mechanical systems. Simulation results show that even under the condition of sparse data or low sampling frequency, this method could still guarantee high accuracy in identifying linear and nonlinear parameters.

Global optimization algorithm for heat exchanger networks

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

Quesada, I.; Grossmann, I.E.

This paper deals with the global optimization of heat exchanger networks with fixed topology. It is shown that if linear area cost functions are assumed, as well as arithmetic mean driving force temperature differences in networks with isothermal mixing, the corresponding nonlinear programming (NLP) optimization problem involves linear constraints and a sum of linear fractional functions in the objective which are nonconvex. A rigorous algorithm is proposed that is based on a convex NLP underestimator that involves linear and nonlinear estimators for fractional and bilinear terms which provide a tight lower bound to the global optimum. This NLP problem ismore » used within a spatial branch and bound method for which branching rules are given. Basic properties of the proposed method are presented, and its application is illustrated with several example problems. The results show that the proposed method only requires few nodes in the branch and bound search.« less

IR visible sum-frequency vibrational spectroscopy of Biphenyl-3 methylene thiol monolayer on gold and silver: effect of the visible wavelength on the SFG spectrum

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Humbert, C.; Dreesen, L.; Mani, A. A.; Caudano, Y.; Lemaire, J.-J.; Thiry, P. A.; Peremans, A.

2002-04-01

We measured IR-visible sum-frequency generation spectra of CH 3-(C 6H 4) 2-(CH 2) 3-S-H (Biphenyl-3) self-assembled monolayers on a silver and a gold substrate. For the latter substrate, we observed different interference patterns between the resonant signal of the CH vibration and the non-resonant contribution of the substrate as a function of the visible beam wavelength. The non-linear response of the gold substrate is enhanced around 480 nm corresponding to the s-d interband transition. Such effect is not observed for the silver substrate the interband transition of which is located out of the investigated visible spectral range of 450-700 nm.

Two-point motional Stark effect diagnostic for Madison Symmetric Torus

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

Ko, J.; Den Hartog, D. J.; Caspary, K. J.

2010-10-15

A high-precision spectral motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostic provides internal magnetic field measurements for Madison Symmetric Torus (MST) plasmas. Currently, MST uses two spatial views - on the magnetic axis and on the midminor (off-axis) radius, the latter added recently. A new analysis scheme has been developed to infer both the pitch angle and the magnitude of the magnetic field from MSE spectra. Systematic errors are reduced by using atomic data from atomic data and analysis structure in the fit. Reconstructed current density and safety factor profiles are more strongly and globally constrained with the addition of the off-axis radiusmore » measurement than with the on-axis one only.« less

Non-linearities in Theory-of-Mind Development.

PubMed

Blijd-Hoogewys, Els M A; van Geert, Paul L C

2016-01-01

Research on Theory-of-Mind (ToM) has mainly focused on ages of core ToM development. This article follows a quantitative approach focusing on the level of ToM understanding on a measurement scale, the ToM Storybooks, in 324 typically developing children between 3 and 11 years of age. It deals with the eventual occurrence of developmental non-linearities in ToM functioning, using smoothing techniques, dynamic growth model building and additional indicators, namely moving skewness, moving growth rate changes and moving variability. The ToM sum-scores showed an overall developmental trend that leveled off toward the age of 10 years. Within this overall trend two non-linearities in the group-based change pattern were found: a plateau at the age of around 56 months and a dip at the age of 72-78 months. These temporary regressions in ToM sum-score were accompanied by a decrease in growth rate and variability, and a change in skewness of the ToM data, all suggesting a developmental shift in ToM understanding. The temporary decreases also occurred in the different ToM sub-scores and most clearly so in the core ToM component of beliefs. It was also found that girls had an earlier growth spurt than boys and that the underlying developmental path was more salient in girls than in boys. The consequences of these findings are discussed from various theoretical points of view, with an emphasis on a dynamic systems interpretation of the underlying developmental paths.

Non-linearities in Theory-of-Mind Development

PubMed Central

Blijd-Hoogewys, Els M. A.; van Geert, Paul L. C.

2017-01-01

Research on Theory-of-Mind (ToM) has mainly focused on ages of core ToM development. This article follows a quantitative approach focusing on the level of ToM understanding on a measurement scale, the ToM Storybooks, in 324 typically developing children between 3 and 11 years of age. It deals with the eventual occurrence of developmental non-linearities in ToM functioning, using smoothing techniques, dynamic growth model building and additional indicators, namely moving skewness, moving growth rate changes and moving variability. The ToM sum-scores showed an overall developmental trend that leveled off toward the age of 10 years. Within this overall trend two non-linearities in the group-based change pattern were found: a plateau at the age of around 56 months and a dip at the age of 72–78 months. These temporary regressions in ToM sum-score were accompanied by a decrease in growth rate and variability, and a change in skewness of the ToM data, all suggesting a developmental shift in ToM understanding. The temporary decreases also occurred in the different ToM sub-scores and most clearly so in the core ToM component of beliefs. It was also found that girls had an earlier growth spurt than boys and that the underlying developmental path was more salient in girls than in boys. The consequences of these findings are discussed from various theoretical points of view, with an emphasis on a dynamic systems interpretation of the underlying developmental paths. PMID:28101065

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

Carpenter, Daniel; Westover, Tyler; Howe, Daniel

Here, we report here on an experimental study to produce refinery-ready fuel blendstocks via catalytic hydrodeoxygenation (upgrading) of pyrolysis oil using several biomass feedstocks and various blends. Blends were tested along with the pure materials to determine the effect of blending on product yields and qualities. Within experimental error, oil yields from fast pyrolysis and upgrading are shown to be linear functions of the blend components. Switchgrass exhibited lower fast pyrolysis and upgrading yields than the woody samples, which included clean pine, oriented strand board (OSB), and a mix of pinon and juniper (PJ). The notable exception was PJ, formore » which the poor upgrading yield of 18% was likely associated with the very high viscosity of the PJ fast pyrolysis oil (947 cp). The highest fast pyrolysis yield (54% dry basis) was obtained from clean pine, while the highest upgrading yield (50%) was obtained from a blend of 80% clean pine and 20% OSB (CP 8OSB 2). For switchgrass, reducing the fast pyrolysis temperature to 450 degrees C resulted in a significant increase to the pyrolysis oil yield and reduced hydrogen consumption during hydrotreating, but did not directly affect the hydrotreating oil yield. The water content of fast pyrolysis oils was also observed to increase linearly with the summed content of potassium and sodium, ranging from 21% for clean pine to 37% for switchgrass. Multiple linear regression models demonstrate that fast pyrolysis is strongly dependent upon the contents lignin and volatile matter as well as the sum of potassium and sodium.« less

Nonlinear (time domain) and linearized (time and frequency domain) solutions to the compressible Euler equations in conservation law form

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sreenivas, Kidambi; Whitfield, David L.

1995-01-01

Two linearized solvers (time and frequency domain) based on a high resolution numerical scheme are presented. The basic approach is to linearize the flux vector by expressing it as a sum of a mean and a perturbation. This allows the governing equations to be maintained in conservation law form. A key difference between the time and frequency domain computations is that the frequency domain computations require only one grid block irrespective of the interblade phase angle for which the flow is being computed. As a result of this and due to the fact that the governing equations for this case are steady, frequency domain computations are substantially faster than the corresponding time domain computations. The linearized equations are used to compute flows in turbomachinery blade rows (cascades) arising due to blade vibrations. Numerical solutions are compared to linear theory (where available) and to numerical solutions of the nonlinear Euler equations.

Estimated breeding values for canine hip dysplasia radiographic traits in a cohort of Australian German Shepherd dogs.

PubMed

Wilson, Bethany J; Nicholas, Frank W; James, John W; Wade, Claire M; Thomson, Peter C

2013-01-01

Canine hip dysplasia (CHD) is a serious and common musculoskeletal disease of pedigree dogs and therefore represents both an important welfare concern and an imperative breeding priority. The typical heritability estimates for radiographic CHD traits suggest that the accuracy of breeding dog selection could be substantially improved by the use of estimated breeding values (EBVs) in place of selection based on phenotypes of individuals. The British Veterinary Association/Kennel Club scoring method is a complex measure composed of nine bilateral ordinal traits, intended to evaluate both early and late dysplastic changes. However, the ordinal nature of the traits may represent a technical challenge for calculation of EBVs using linear methods. The purpose of the current study was to calculate EBVs of British Veterinary Association/Kennel Club traits in the Australian population of German Shepherd Dogs, using linear (both as individual traits and a summed phenotype), binary and ordinal methods to determine the optimal method for EBV calculation. Ordinal EBVs correlated well with linear EBVs (r = 0.90-0.99) and somewhat well with EBVs for the sum of the individual traits (r = 0.58-0.92). Correlation of ordinal and binary EBVs varied widely (r = 0.24-0.99) depending on the trait and cut-point considered. The ordinal EBVs have increased accuracy (0.48-0.69) of selection compared with accuracies from individual phenotype-based selection (0.40-0.52). Despite the high correlations between linear and ordinal EBVs, the underlying relationship between EBVs calculated by the two methods was not always linear, leading us to suggest that ordinal models should be used wherever possible. As the population of German Shepherd Dogs which was studied was purportedly under selection for the traits studied, we examined the EBVs for evidence of a genetic trend in these traits and found substantial genetic improvement over time. This study suggests the use of ordinal EBVs could increase the rate of genetic improvement in this population.

Effects of Preseason Training on the Sleep Characteristics of Professional Rugby League Players.

PubMed

Thornton, Heidi R; Delaney, Jace A; Duthie, Grant M; Dascombe, Ben J

2018-02-01

To investigate the influence of daily and exponentially weighted moving training loads on subsequent nighttime sleep. Sleep of 14 professional rugby league athletes competing in the National Rugby League was recorded using wristwatch actigraphy. Physical demands were quantified using GPS technology, including total distance, high-speed distance, acceleration/deceleration load (SumAccDec; AU), and session rating of perceived exertion (AU). Linear mixed models determined effects of acute (daily) and subacute (3- and 7-d) exponentially weighted moving averages (EWMA) on sleep. Higher daily SumAccDec was associated with increased sleep efficiency (effect-size correlation; ES = 0.15; ±0.09) and sleep duration (ES = 0.12; ±0.09). Greater 3-d EWMA SumAccDec was associated with increased sleep efficiency (ES = 0.14; ±0.09) and an earlier bedtime (ES = 0.14; ±0.09). An increase in 7-d EWMA SumAccDec was associated with heightened sleep efficiency (ES = 0.15; ±0.09) and earlier bedtimes (ES = 0.15; ±0.09). The direction of the associations between training loads and sleep varied, but the strongest relationships showed that higher training loads increased various measures of sleep. Practitioners should be aware of the increased requirement for sleep during intensified training periods, using this information in the planning and implementation of training and individualized recovery modalities.

On Spectral Invariance of Single Scattering Albedo for Weakly Absorbing Wavelengths

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Marshak, Alexander; Knyazikhin, Yuri; Chiu, J. Christine; Wiscombe, Warren J.

2011-01-01

This note shows that for water droplets at weakly absorbing wavelengths, the ratio omega(sub O lambda(r))/omega(sub O lambda(r(sub O)) of two single scattering albedo spectra, omega(sub O lambda(r) and omega(sub O lambda(r (sub O)), is a linear function of omega(sub O lambda(r). The slope and intercept of the linear function are wavelength independent and sum to unity. This relationship allows for a representation of any single scattering albedo omega(sub O lambda(r) via one known spectrum omega(sub O lambda(r(sub O)). The note provides a simple physical explanation of the discovered relationship. In addition to water droplets, similar linear relationships were found for the single scattering albedo of non-spherical ice crystals.

Enrollment Management: Institutional Applications.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hossler, Don

1987-01-01

The principles and common practices of enrollment management efforts in colleges and universities are outlined, and institutional conditions favoring effective enrollment management are discussed. (MSE)

Central obesity, leptin and cognitive decline: the Sacramento Area Latino Study on Aging.

PubMed

Zeki Al Hazzouri, Adina; Haan, Mary N; Whitmer, Rachel A; Yaffe, Kristine; Neuhaus, John

2012-01-01

Central obesity is a risk factor for cognitive decline. Leptin is secreted by adipose tissue and has been associated with better cognitive function. Aging Mexican Americans have higher levels of obesity than non-Hispanic Whites, but no investigations examined the relationship between leptin and cognitive decline among them or the role of central obesity in this association. We analyzed 1,480 dementia-free older Mexican Americans who were followed over 10 years. Cognitive function was assessed every 12-15 months with the Modified Mini Mental State Exam (3MSE) and the Spanish and English Verbal Learning Test (SEVLT). For females with a small waist circumference (≤35 inches), an interquartile range difference in leptin was associated with 35% less 3MSE errors and 22% less decline in the SEVLT score over 10 years. For males with a small waist circumference (≤40 inches), an interquartile range difference in leptin was associated with 44% less 3MSE errors and 30% less decline in the SEVLT score over 10 years. There was no association between leptin and cognitive decline among females or males with a large waist circumference. Leptin interacts with central obesity in shaping cognitive decline. Our findings provide valuable information about the effects of metabolic risk factors on cognitive function. Copyright © 2012 S. Karger AG, Basel.

Measurements of the internal magnetic field using the B-Stark motional Stark effect diagnostic on DIII-D (inivited).

PubMed

Pablant, N A; Burrell, K H; Groebner, R J; Holcomb, C T; Kaplan, D H

2010-10-01

Results are presented from the B-Stark diagnostic installed on the DIII-D tokamak. This diagnostic provides measurements of the magnitude and direction of the internal magnetic field. The B-Stark system is a version of a motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostic based on the relative line intensities and spacing of the Stark split D(α) emission from injected neutral beams. This technique may have advantages over MSE polarimetry based diagnostics in future devices, such as the ITER. The B-Stark diagnostic technique and calibration procedures are discussed. The system is shown to provide accurate measurements of B(θ)/B(T) and ∣B∣ over a range of plasma conditions. Measurements have been made with toroidal fields in the range of 1.2-2.1 T, plasma currents in the range 0.5-2.0 MA, densities between 1.7 and 9.0×10(19) m(-3), and neutral beam voltages between 50 and 81 keV. The viewing direction and polarization dependent transmission properties of the collection optics are found using an in situ beam into gas calibration. These results are compared to values found from plasma equilibrium reconstructions and the MSE polarimetry system on DIII-D.

Measurements of the internal magnetic field on DIII-D using intensity and spacing of the motional Stark multiplet.

PubMed

Pablant, N A; Burrell, K H; Groebner, R J; Kaplan, D H; Holcomb, C T

2008-10-01

We describe a version of a motional Stark effect (MSE) diagnostic based on the relative line intensities and spacing of Stark split D(alpha) emission from the neutral beams. This system, named B-Stark, has been recently installed on the DIII-D tokamak. To find the magnetic pitch angle, we use the ratio of the intensities of the pi(3) and sigma(1) lines. These lines originate from the same upper level and so are not dependent on the level populations. In future devices, such as ITER, this technique may have advantages over diagnostics based on MSE polarimetry. We have done an optimization of the viewing direction for the available ports on DIII-D to choose the installation location. With this placement, we have a near optimal viewing angle of 59.6 degrees from the vertical direction. All hardware has been installed for one chord, and we have been routinely taking data since January 2007. We fit the spectra using a simple Stark model in which the upper level populations of the D(alpha) transition are treated as free variables. The magnitude and direction of the magnetic field obtained using this diagnostic technique compare well with measurements from MSE polarimetry and EFIT.

Resistance Training Exercise Program for Intervention to Enhance Gait Function in Elderly Chronically Ill Patients: Multivariate Multiscale Entropy for Center of Pressure Signal Analysis

PubMed Central

Jiang, Bernard C.

2014-01-01

Falls are unpredictable accidents, and the resulting injuries can be serious in the elderly, particularly those with chronic diseases. Regular exercise is recommended to prevent and treat hypertension and other chronic diseases by reducing clinical blood pressure. The “complexity index” (CI), based on multiscale entropy (MSE) algorithm, has been applied in recent studies to show a person's adaptability to intrinsic and external perturbations and widely used measure of postural sway or stability. The multivariate multiscale entropy (MMSE) was advanced algorithm used to calculate the complexity index (CI) values of the center of pressure (COP) data. In this study, we applied the MSE & MMSE to analyze gait function of 24 elderly, chronically ill patients (44% female; 56% male; mean age, 67.56 ± 10.70 years) with either cardiovascular disease, diabetes mellitus, or osteoporosis. After a 12-week training program, postural stability measurements showed significant improvements. Our results showed beneficial effects of resistance training, which can be used to improve postural stability in the elderly and indicated that MMSE algorithms to calculate CI of the COP data were superior to the multiscale entropy (MSE) algorithm to identify the sense of balance in the elderly. PMID:25295070

[Rapid analysis on phenolic compounds in Rheum palmatum based on UPLC-Q-TOF/MSE combined with diagnostic ions filter].

PubMed

Wang, Qing; Lu, Zhi-Wei; Liu, Yue-Hong; Wang, Ming-Ling; Fu, Shuang; Zhang, Qing-Qing; Zhao, Hui-Zhen; Zhang, Zhi-Xin; Xie, Zi-Ye; Huang, Zheng-Hai; Yu, Hong-Hong; Zhou, Wen-Juan; Gao, Xiao-Yan

2017-05-01

Diagnostic ions filter method was used to rapidly detect and identify the phenolic compounds in Rheum palmatum based on ultra performance liquid chromatography coupled with quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-Q-TOF/MSE). The representative authentic standards of phenolic compounds, including gallic acid, (+)-catechin, (－)-epicatechin, (－)-epicatechin-3-O-gallate and procyanidin B2, were subjected to analysis by UPLC-Q-TOF/MSE system with negative ion mode. Fragmentation patterns of each standard were summarized based on assigned fragment ions. The prominent product ions were selected as diagnostic ions. Subsequently, diagnostic ions filter was employed to rapidly recognize analogous skeletons. Combined with retention time, accurate mass, characteristic fragments and previous literature data, the structures of the filtered compounds were identified or tentatively characterized. A total 63 phenolic compounds (36 phenolic acid derivatives, 8 flavonoid derivatives and 19 tennis derivatives) in R. palmatum were identified, including 6 potential new compounds. The method of diagnostic ions filter could rapidly detect and identify phenolic compounds in R. palmatum This study provides a method for rapid detection of phenolic compounds in R. palmatum and is expected to complete the material basis of rhubarb. Copyright© by the Chinese Pharmaceutical Association.

Assessment of Gamma-Ray-Spectra Analysis Method Utilizing the Fireworks Algorithm for Various Error Measures

DOE PAGES

Alamaniotis, Miltiadis; Tsoukalas, Lefteri H.

2018-01-01

The analysis of measured data plays a significant role in enhancing nuclear nonproliferation mainly by inferring the presence of patterns associated with special nuclear materials. Among various types of measurements, gamma-ray spectra is the widest utilized type of data in nonproliferation applications. In this paper, a method that employs the fireworks algorithm (FWA) for analyzing gamma-ray spectra aiming at detecting gamma signatures is presented. In particular, FWA is utilized to fit a set of known signatures to a measured spectrum by optimizing an objective function, where non-zero coefficients express the detected signatures. FWA is tested on a set of experimentallymore » obtained measurements optimizing various objective functions—MSE, RMSE, Theil-2, MAE, MAPE, MAP—with results exhibiting its potential in providing highly accurate and precise signature detection. Finally and furthermore, FWA is benchmarked against genetic algorithms and multiple linear regression, showing its superiority over those algorithms regarding precision with respect to MAE, MAPE, and MAP measures.« less

[Morphology determination of multi-needle bipolar corona discharge by OES].

PubMed

Chen, Hai-Feng; Su, Peng-Hao; Zhu, Yi-Min

2009-01-01

Using the method of OES (optical emission spectrum) for measuring N2 emission spectrum, the spacial distribution of energetic electrons in multi-needle bipolar corona discharge at atmospheric pressure was investigated. According to the distribution of N2 second positive band's intensity ISPB, the outline of ionisation region was drawn accurately. The relationship between ISPB and discharge current I was obtained through the sum of ISPB. There are two ionisation regions in the multi-needle bipolar corona discharge. One is near the HV electrode and the other is near the grounded electrode. The ionisation region exists around the needlepoint within 2-3 mm. The volume of ionisation region becomes big with the applied voltage U increasing. The ionisation region of negative corona is bigger than that of positive corona. Near the HV discharge electrode, the outline of electron avalanche is similar to the configuration of electric field lines in the ionisation region, so the electron avalanche along the axis direction of needle develops farther than that along the radial direction. The electric field in the migration area is weak, and the distribution of space charges is large along the radial direction. The sum of ISPB in each ionisation region is second order linear with I, but the quadratic coefficient is very small. So the sum of ISPB is nearly linear with I, the distribution of ISPB is corresponding to the density distribution of energetic electrons. So the charged particles forming the discharge current in ionisation region are electrons. No emission spectrum of N2 can be measured in migration area, so there is no energetic electron. The energetic electrons only exist in ionisation region and the charged particles in migration area are ions.

Type 2 diabetes in Vietnam: a cross-sectional, prevalence-based cost-of-illness study.

PubMed

Le, Nguyen Tu Dang; Dinh Pham, Luyen; Quang Vo, Trung

2017-01-01

According to the International Diabetes Federation, total global health care expenditures for diabetes tripled between 2003 and 2013 because of increases in the number of people with diabetes as well as in the average expenditures per patient. This study aims to provide accurate and timely information about the economic impacts of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) in Vietnam. The cost-of-illness estimates followed a prospective, prevalence-based approach from the societal perspective of T2DM with 392 selected diabetic patients who received treatment from a public hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, during the 2016 fiscal year. In this study, the annual cost per patient estimate was US $246.10 (95% CI 228.3, 267.2) for 392 patients, which accounted for about 12% (95% CI 11, 13) of the gross domestic product per capita in 2017. That includes US $127.30, US $34.40 and US $84.40 for direct medical costs, direct nonmedical expenditures, and indirect costs, respectively. The cost of pharmaceuticals accounted for the bulk of total expenditures in our study (27.5% of total costs and 53.2% of direct medical costs). A bootstrap analysis showed that female patients had a higher cost of treatment than men at US $48.90 (95% CI 3.1, 95.0); those who received insulin and oral antidiabetics (OAD) also had a statistically significant higher cost of treatment compared to those receiving OAD, US $445.90 (95% CI 181.2, 690.6). The Gradient Boosting Regression (Ensemble method) and Lasso Regression (Generalized Linear Models) were determined to be the best models to predict the cost of T2DM ( R 2 =65.3, mean square error [MSE]=0.94; and R 2 =64.75, MSE=0.96, respectively). The findings of this study serve as a reference for policy decision making in diabetes management as well as adjustment of costs for patients in order to reduce the economic impact of the disease.

Non-Asymptotic Oracle Inequalities for the High-Dimensional Cox Regression via Lasso.

PubMed

Kong, Shengchun; Nan, Bin

2014-01-01

We consider finite sample properties of the regularized high-dimensional Cox regression via lasso. Existing literature focuses on linear models or generalized linear models with Lipschitz loss functions, where the empirical risk functions are the summations of independent and identically distributed (iid) losses. The summands in the negative log partial likelihood function for censored survival data, however, are neither iid nor Lipschitz.We first approximate the negative log partial likelihood function by a sum of iid non-Lipschitz terms, then derive the non-asymptotic oracle inequalities for the lasso penalized Cox regression using pointwise arguments to tackle the difficulties caused by lacking iid Lipschitz losses.

Non-Asymptotic Oracle Inequalities for the High-Dimensional Cox Regression via Lasso

PubMed Central

Kong, Shengchun; Nan, Bin

2013-01-01

We consider finite sample properties of the regularized high-dimensional Cox regression via lasso. Existing literature focuses on linear models or generalized linear models with Lipschitz loss functions, where the empirical risk functions are the summations of independent and identically distributed (iid) losses. The summands in the negative log partial likelihood function for censored survival data, however, are neither iid nor Lipschitz.We first approximate the negative log partial likelihood function by a sum of iid non-Lipschitz terms, then derive the non-asymptotic oracle inequalities for the lasso penalized Cox regression using pointwise arguments to tackle the difficulties caused by lacking iid Lipschitz losses. PMID:24516328

Robustness of speckle imaging techniques applied to horizontal imaging scenarios

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bos, Jeremy P.

Atmospheric turbulence near the ground severely limits the quality of imagery acquired over long horizontal paths. In defense, surveillance, and border security applications, there is interest in deploying man-portable, embedded systems incorporating image reconstruction to improve the quality of imagery available to operators. To be effective, these systems must operate over significant variations in turbulence conditions while also subject to other variations due to operation by novice users. Systems that meet these requirements and are otherwise designed to be immune to the factors that cause variation in performance are considered robust. In addition to robustness in design, the portable nature of these systems implies a preference for systems with a minimum level of computational complexity. Speckle imaging methods are one of a variety of methods recently been proposed for use in man-portable horizontal imagers. In this work, the robustness of speckle imaging methods is established by identifying a subset of design parameters that provide immunity to the expected variations in operating conditions while minimizing the computation time necessary for image recovery. This performance evaluation is made possible using a novel technique for simulating anisoplanatic image formation. I find that incorporate as few as 15 image frames and 4 estimates of the object phase per reconstructed frame provide an average reduction of 45% reduction in Mean Squared Error (MSE) and 68% reduction in deviation in MSE. In addition, the Knox-Thompson phase recovery method is demonstrated to produce images in half the time required by the bispectrum. Finally, it is shown that certain blind image quality metrics can be used in place of the MSE to evaluate reconstruction quality in field scenarios. Using blind metrics rather depending on user estimates allows for reconstruction quality that differs from the minimum MSE by as little as 1%, significantly reducing the deviation in performance due to user action.

Energy transport, polar amplification, and ITCZ shifts in the GeoMIP G1 ensemble

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Russotto, Rick D.; Ackerman, Thomas P.

2018-02-01

The polar amplification of warming and the ability of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) to shift to the north or south are two very important problems in climate science. Examining these behaviors in global climate models (GCMs) running solar geoengineering experiments is helpful not only for predicting the effects of solar geoengineering but also for understanding how these processes work under increased carbon dioxide (CO2). Both polar amplification and ITCZ shifts are closely related to the meridional transport of moist static energy (MSE) by the atmosphere. This study examines changes in MSE transport in 10 fully coupled GCMs in experiment G1 of the Geoengineering Model Intercomparison Project (GeoMIP), in which the solar constant is reduced to compensate for the radiative forcing from abruptly quadrupled CO2 concentrations. In G1, poleward MSE transport decreases relative to preindustrial conditions in all models, in contrast to the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5 (CMIP5) abrupt4xCO2 experiment, in which poleward MSE transport increases. We show that since poleward energy transport decreases rather than increases, and local feedbacks cannot change the sign of an initial temperature change, the residual polar amplification in the G1 experiment must be due to the net positive forcing in the polar regions and net negative forcing in the tropics, which arise from the different spatial patterns of the simultaneously imposed solar and CO2 forcings. However, the reduction in poleward energy transport likely plays a role in limiting the polar warming in G1. An attribution study with a moist energy balance model shows that cloud feedbacks are the largest source of uncertainty regarding changes in poleward energy transport in midlatitudes in G1, as well as for changes in cross-equatorial energy transport, which are anticorrelated with ITCZ shifts.

The microcomputer scientific software series 3: general linear model--analysis of variance.

Treesearch

Harold M. Rauscher

1985-01-01

A BASIC language set of programs, designed for use on microcomputers, is presented. This set of programs will perform the analysis of variance for any statistical model describing either balanced or unbalanced designs. The program computes and displays the degrees of freedom, Type I sum of squares, and the mean square for the overall model, the error, and each factor...

Periodic solutions of the Hamilton-Jacobi equation with a periodic non-homogeneous term and Aubry-Mather theory

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

Sobolevskii, A N

It is proved that the one-dimensional Hamilton-Jacobi equation with a periodic non-homogeneous term admits a family of generalized solutions, each of which can be represented as the sum of a linear and a periodic function; a condition for the uniqueness of such a solution is given in terms of Aubry-Mather theory.

Towards a unifying theory for the first-, second-, and third-order molecular (non)linear optical response

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pérez-Moreno, Javier; Clays, Koen; Kuzyk, Mark G.

2010-05-01

We present a procedure for the modeling of the dispersion of the nonlinear optical response of complex molecular structures that is based strictly on the results from experimental characterization. We show how under some general conditions, the use of the Thomas-Kuhn sum-rules leads to a successful modeling of the nonlinear response of complex molecular structures.

Reservoir Computing Properties of Neural Dynamics in Prefrontal Cortex

PubMed Central

Procyk, Emmanuel; Dominey, Peter Ford

2016-01-01

Primates display a remarkable ability to adapt to novel situations. Determining what is most pertinent in these situations is not always possible based only on the current sensory inputs, and often also depends on recent inputs and behavioral outputs that contribute to internal states. Thus, one can ask how cortical dynamics generate representations of these complex situations. It has been observed that mixed selectivity in cortical neurons contributes to represent diverse situations defined by a combination of the current stimuli, and that mixed selectivity is readily obtained in randomly connected recurrent networks. In this context, these reservoir networks reproduce the highly recurrent nature of local cortical connectivity. Recombining present and past inputs, random recurrent networks from the reservoir computing framework generate mixed selectivity which provides pre-coded representations of an essentially universal set of contexts. These representations can then be selectively amplified through learning to solve the task at hand. We thus explored their representational power and dynamical properties after training a reservoir to perform a complex cognitive task initially developed for monkeys. The reservoir model inherently displayed a dynamic form of mixed selectivity, key to the representation of the behavioral context over time. The pre-coded representation of context was amplified by training a feedback neuron to explicitly represent this context, thereby reproducing the effect of learning and allowing the model to perform more robustly. This second version of the model demonstrates how a hybrid dynamical regime combining spatio-temporal processing of reservoirs, and input driven attracting dynamics generated by the feedback neuron, can be used to solve a complex cognitive task. We compared reservoir activity to neural activity of dorsal anterior cingulate cortex of monkeys which revealed similar network dynamics. We argue that reservoir computing is a pertinent framework to model local cortical dynamics and their contribution to higher cognitive function. PMID:27286251

A Pilot Study of Determinants of Ongoing Participation in EnhanceFitness: A Community-Based Group Exercise Program for Older Adults.

PubMed

Gillette, David B; Petrescu-Prahova, Miruna; Herting, Jerald R; Belza, Basia

2015-01-01

Physical activity has many benefits for older adults, but adherence is often low. The purposes of this study were to (1) identify motivators and barriers for participation in EnhanceFitness (EF), a group-based exercise program; and (2) quantitatively examine the association between motivators, barriers and individual characteristics, and ongoing participation in the program. This was a prospective, cross-sectional study. We mailed a pilot, investigator-developed survey to assess motivators and barriers to exercising to 340 adults who started a new EF class, regardless of their attendance rate. We precoded surveys on the basis of class attendance, with former participants defined as having no attendance a month or more before a 4-month fitness check. Of the 241 respondents (71% response rate), 61 (25%) were precoded as former participants and 180 (75%) as current participants. The mean age of respondents was 71 years and they were predominately female (89%). More than half of respondents were whites (58%), and almost half were married (46%). Former participants reported lower total motivation scores than current participants (P < .01) and had a significantly higher mean total barrier score (P < .001). The effects of 5 barriers ("Class was too hard," "Class was too easy," "I don't like to exercise," "Personal illness," and "Exercise caused pain") and 2 motivators ("I want to exercise" and "I plan exercise as part of my day") were significantly different between current and former participants. Discrete event history models show that dropout was related positively to ethnicity (whites were more likely to drop out) and health-related barriers. In newly formed EF classes, participants who drop out report more program, psychosocial, and health barriers, and fewer program and psychosocial motivators. Total barrier score and health barriers significantly predict a participant's dropping out, and white ethnicity is associated with a higher likelihood of dropping out. Employing strategies that address health barriers to participation could improve attendance rates for group-based exercise programs.

ILAMO: Partner in Optometric Education.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dablemont, Maria

1984-01-01

The history, organization, function, holdings, regulations, and services of the International Library, Museum and Archives of Optometry, a section of the American Optometric Association, are outlined. (MSE)

Optimal design of multichannel equalizers for the structural similarity index.

PubMed

Chai, Li; Sheng, Yuxia

2014-12-01

The optimization of multichannel equalizers is studied for the structural similarity (SSIM) criteria. The closed-form formula is provided for the optimal equalizer when the mean of the source is zero. The formula shows that the equalizer with maximal SSIM index is equal to the one with minimal mean square error (MSE) multiplied by a positive real number, which is shown to be equal to the inverse of the achieved SSIM index. The relation of the maximal SSIM index to the minimal MSE is also established for given blurring filters and fixed length equalizers. An algorithm is also presented to compute the suboptimal equalizer for the general sources. Various numerical examples are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the results.

'Finding the person the disease has'--the case for multisensory environments.

PubMed

Hope, K W; Easby, R; Waterman, H

2004-10-01

Education about, and exposure to, the utilization of a multisensory environment (MSE) was provided to clinical staff as a response to findings from the problem identification stage of an action research study. Feedback was obtained about their experience and perceptions of its use. Through the auspices of focus groups and one-to-one interviews, respondents commented on the impact that using the MSE had on their perception of their clients and on subsequent care. The case is made that MSEs afford an opportunity to impact on care through their mediating influence on formal carers' perceptions of their clients and, as such represent a significant but as yet unrealized potential for improving the quality of care of older people with dementia.

Performance Analysis of Blind Subspace-Based Signature Estimation Algorithms for DS-CDMA Systems with Unknown Correlated Noise

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zarifi, Keyvan; Gershman, Alex B.

2006-12-01

We analyze the performance of two popular blind subspace-based signature waveform estimation techniques proposed by Wang and Poor and Buzzi and Poor for direct-sequence code division multiple-access (DS-CDMA) systems with unknown correlated noise. Using the first-order perturbation theory, analytical expressions for the mean-square error (MSE) of these algorithms are derived. We also obtain simple high SNR approximations of the MSE expressions which explicitly clarify how the performance of these techniques depends on the environmental parameters and how it is related to that of the conventional techniques that are based on the standard white noise assumption. Numerical examples further verify the consistency of the obtained analytical results with simulation results.

Dynamic whole body PET parametric imaging: II. Task-oriented statistical estimation

PubMed Central

Karakatsanis, Nicolas A.; Lodge, Martin A.; Zhou, Y.; Wahl, Richard L.; Rahmim, Arman

2013-01-01

In the context of oncology, dynamic PET imaging coupled with standard graphical linear analysis has been previously employed to enable quantitative estimation of tracer kinetic parameters of physiological interest at the voxel level, thus, enabling quantitative PET parametric imaging. However, dynamic PET acquisition protocols have been confined to the limited axial field-of-view (~15–20cm) of a single bed position and have not been translated to the whole-body clinical imaging domain. On the contrary, standardized uptake value (SUV) PET imaging, considered as the routine approach in clinical oncology, commonly involves multi-bed acquisitions, but is performed statically, thus not allowing for dynamic tracking of the tracer distribution. Here, we pursue a transition to dynamic whole body PET parametric imaging, by presenting, within a unified framework, clinically feasible multi-bed dynamic PET acquisition protocols and parametric imaging methods. In a companion study, we presented a novel clinically feasible dynamic (4D) multi-bed PET acquisition protocol as well as the concept of whole body PET parametric imaging employing Patlak ordinary least squares (OLS) regression to estimate the quantitative parameters of tracer uptake rate Ki and total blood distribution volume V. In the present study, we propose an advanced hybrid linear regression framework, driven by Patlak kinetic voxel correlations, to achieve superior trade-off between contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) and mean squared error (MSE) than provided by OLS for the final Ki parametric images, enabling task-based performance optimization. Overall, whether the observer's task is to detect a tumor or quantitatively assess treatment response, the proposed statistical estimation framework can be adapted to satisfy the specific task performance criteria, by adjusting the Patlak correlation-coefficient (WR) reference value. The multi-bed dynamic acquisition protocol, as optimized in the preceding companion study, was employed along with extensive Monte Carlo simulations and an initial clinical FDG patient dataset to validate and demonstrate the potential of the proposed statistical estimation methods. Both simulated and clinical results suggest that hybrid regression in the context of whole-body Patlak Ki imaging considerably reduces MSE without compromising high CNR. Alternatively, for a given CNR, hybrid regression enables larger reductions than OLS in the number of dynamic frames per bed, allowing for even shorter acquisitions of ~30min, thus further contributing to the clinical adoption of the proposed framework. Compared to the SUV approach, whole body parametric imaging can provide better tumor quantification, and can act as a complement to SUV, for the task of tumor detection. PMID:24080994

Dynamic whole-body PET parametric imaging: II. Task-oriented statistical estimation.

PubMed

Karakatsanis, Nicolas A; Lodge, Martin A; Zhou, Y; Wahl, Richard L; Rahmim, Arman

2013-10-21

In the context of oncology, dynamic PET imaging coupled with standard graphical linear analysis has been previously employed to enable quantitative estimation of tracer kinetic parameters of physiological interest at the voxel level, thus, enabling quantitative PET parametric imaging. However, dynamic PET acquisition protocols have been confined to the limited axial field-of-view (~15-20 cm) of a single-bed position and have not been translated to the whole-body clinical imaging domain. On the contrary, standardized uptake value (SUV) PET imaging, considered as the routine approach in clinical oncology, commonly involves multi-bed acquisitions, but is performed statically, thus not allowing for dynamic tracking of the tracer distribution. Here, we pursue a transition to dynamic whole-body PET parametric imaging, by presenting, within a unified framework, clinically feasible multi-bed dynamic PET acquisition protocols and parametric imaging methods. In a companion study, we presented a novel clinically feasible dynamic (4D) multi-bed PET acquisition protocol as well as the concept of whole-body PET parametric imaging employing Patlak ordinary least squares (OLS) regression to estimate the quantitative parameters of tracer uptake rate Ki and total blood distribution volume V. In the present study, we propose an advanced hybrid linear regression framework, driven by Patlak kinetic voxel correlations, to achieve superior trade-off between contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) and mean squared error (MSE) than provided by OLS for the final Ki parametric images, enabling task-based performance optimization. Overall, whether the observer's task is to detect a tumor or quantitatively assess treatment response, the proposed statistical estimation framework can be adapted to satisfy the specific task performance criteria, by adjusting the Patlak correlation-coefficient (WR) reference value. The multi-bed dynamic acquisition protocol, as optimized in the preceding companion study, was employed along with extensive Monte Carlo simulations and an initial clinical (18)F-deoxyglucose patient dataset to validate and demonstrate the potential of the proposed statistical estimation methods. Both simulated and clinical results suggest that hybrid regression in the context of whole-body Patlak Ki imaging considerably reduces MSE without compromising high CNR. Alternatively, for a given CNR, hybrid regression enables larger reductions than OLS in the number of dynamic frames per bed, allowing for even shorter acquisitions of ~30 min, thus further contributing to the clinical adoption of the proposed framework. Compared to the SUV approach, whole-body parametric imaging can provide better tumor quantification, and can act as a complement to SUV, for the task of tumor detection.

Sequential CFAR detectors using a dead-zone limiter

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tantaratana, Sawasd

1990-09-01

The performances of some proposed sequential constant-false-alarm-rate (CFAR) detectors are evaluated. The observations are passed through a dead-zone limiter, the output of which is -1, 0, or +1, depending on whether the input is less than -c, between -c and c, or greater than c, where c is a constant. The test statistic is the sum of the outputs. The test is performed on a reduced set of data (those with absolute value larger than c), with the test statistic being the sum of the signs of the reduced set of data. Both constant and linear boundaries are considered. Numerical results show a significant reduction of the average number of observations needed to achieve the same false alarm and detection probabilities as a fixed-sample-size CFAR detector using the same kind of test statistic.

Oceanographic and meteorological research based on the data products of SEASAT

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pierson, W. J., Jr.

1985-01-01

Reservations were expressed concerning the sum of squares wind recovery algorithm and the power law model function. The SAS sum of squares (SOS) method for recovering winds from backscatter data leads to inconsistent results when V pol and H pol winds are compared. A model function that does not use a power law and that accounts for sea surface temperature is needed and is under study both theoretically and by means of the SASS mode 4 data. Aspects of the determination of winds by means of scatterometry and of the utilization of vector wind data for meteorological forecasts are elaborated. The operational aspect of an intermittent assimilation scheme currently utilized for the specification of the initial value field is considered with focus on quantifying the absolute 12-hour linear displacement error of the movement of low centers.

Ward identities and combinatorics of rainbow tensor models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Itoyama, H.; Mironov, A.; Morozov, A.

2017-06-01

We discuss the notion of renormalization group (RG) completion of non-Gaussian Lagrangians and its treatment within the framework of Bogoliubov-Zimmermann theory in application to the matrix and tensor models. With the example of the simplest non-trivial RGB tensor theory (Aristotelian rainbow), we introduce a few methods, which allow one to connect calculations in the tensor models to those in the matrix models. As a byproduct, we obtain some new factorization formulas and sum rules for the Gaussian correlators in the Hermitian and complex matrix theories, square and rectangular. These sum rules describe correlators as solutions to finite linear systems, which are much simpler than the bilinear Hirota equations and the infinite Virasoro recursion. Search for such relations can be a way to solving the tensor models, where an explicit integrability is still obscure.

The light-front gauge-invariant energy-momentum tensor

DOE PAGES

Lorce, Cedric

2015-08-11

In this study, we provide for the first time a complete parametrization for the matrix elements of the generic asymmetric, non-local and gauge-invariant canonical energy-momentum tensor, generalizing therefore former works on the symmetric, local and gauge-invariant kinetic energy-momentum tensor also known as the Belinfante-Rosenfeld energy-momentum tensor. We discuss in detail the various constraints imposed by non-locality, linear and angular momentum conservation. We also derive the relations with two-parton generalized and transverse-momentum dependent distributions, clarifying what can be learned from the latter. In particular, we show explicitly that two-parton transverse-momentum dependent distributions cannot provide any model-independent information about the parton orbitalmore » angular momentum. On the way, we recover the Burkardt sum rule and obtain similar new sum rules for higher-twist distributions.« less

Integrational Linguistics and the Structuralist Legacy.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Harris, Roy

1999-01-01

Examines attempts to extend Ferdinand de Saussure's structuralist linguistic theory, particularly those by integrational linguists. Discusses the place of integrational linguistics with regard to Saussurean work. (MSE)

The effect of the cosmological constant on a quadrupole signal in the linearized approximation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Somlai, László Ábel; Vasúth, Mátyás

In this study the effects of a nonzero cosmological constant Λ on a quadrupole gravitational wave (GW) signal are analyzed. The linearized approximation of general relativity was used, so the perturbed metric can be written as the sum of hGW GWs and hΛ background term, originated from Λ. The ΛhGW term was also included in this study. To derive physically relevant consequences of Λ≠0 comoving coordinates are used. In these coordinates, the equations of motion (EoMs) are not self-consistent so the result of the linearized theory has to be transformed to the FRW frame. The luminosity distance and the same order of the magnitude of frequency in accordance with the detected GWs were used to demonstrate the effects of the cosmological constant.

Correlation between isotopic and meteorological parameters in Italian wines: a local-scale approach.

PubMed

Aghemo, Costanza; Albertino, Andrea; Gobetto, Roberto; Spanna, Federico

2011-08-30

Since the beginning of the 1980s deuterium nuclear magnetic resonance and carbon-13 mass spectrometry have proved to be reliable techniques for detecting adulteration and for classifying natural products by their geographic origin. Scientific literature has so far mainly focused on data acquired at regional level where isotopic parameters are correlated to climatic mean data relative to large territories. Nebbiolo and Barbera wine samples of various vintages and from different areas within the Piedmont region (northern Italy) were analysed using SNIF-NMR and GC-C-IRMS and a large set of meteorological parameters were recorded by means of weather stations placed in fields where the grapes were grown. Correlations between isotopic ((2)H and (13)C) data and several climatic parameters at a local level (mean temperature, total rainfall, mean humidity and thermal sums) were attempted and some linear correlations were found. Mean temperature and total rainfall were found to be correlated to isotopic ((2)H and (13)C) abundance in linear direct and inverse proportions respectively. Lower or no correlations between deuterium and carbon-13 abundances and other meteorological parameters such as mean humidity and thermal sums were found. Moreover, wines produced from different grape varieties in the same grape field showed significantly different isotopic values. Copyright © 2011 Society of Chemical Industry.

Single photon counting linear mode avalanche photodiode technologies

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Williams, George M.; Huntington, Andrew S.

2011-10-01

The false count rate of a single-photon-sensitive photoreceiver consisting of a high-gain, low-excess-noise linear-mode InGaAs avalanche photodiode (APD) and a high-bandwidth transimpedance amplifier (TIA) is fit to a statistical model. The peak height distribution of the APD's multiplied dark current is approximated by the weighted sum of McIntyre distributions, each characterizing dark current generated at a different location within the APD's junction. The peak height distribution approximated in this way is convolved with a Gaussian distribution representing the input-referred noise of the TIA to generate the statistical distribution of the uncorrelated sum. The cumulative distribution function (CDF) representing count probability as a function of detection threshold is computed, and the CDF model fit to empirical false count data. It is found that only k=0 McIntyre distributions fit the empirically measured CDF at high detection threshold, and that false count rate drops faster than photon count rate as detection threshold is raised. Once fit to empirical false count data, the model predicts the improvement of the false count rate to be expected from reductions in TIA noise and APD dark current. Improvement by at least three orders of magnitude is thought feasible with further manufacturing development and a capacitive-feedback TIA (CTIA).

Enhanced linear-array photoacoustic beamforming using modified coherence factor.

PubMed

Mozaffarzadeh, Moein; Yan, Yan; Mehrmohammadi, Mohammad; Makkiabadi, Bahador

2018-02-01

Photoacoustic imaging (PAI) is a promising medical imaging modality providing the spatial resolution of ultrasound imaging and the contrast of optical imaging. For linear-array PAI, a beamformer can be used as the reconstruction algorithm. Delay-and-sum (DAS) is the most prevalent beamforming algorithm in PAI. However, using DAS beamformer leads to low-resolution images as well as high sidelobes due to nondesired contribution of off-axis signals. Coherence factor (CF) is a weighting method in which each pixel of the reconstructed image is weighted, based on the spatial spectrum of the aperture, to mainly improve the contrast. We demonstrate that the numerator of the formula of CF contains a DAS algebra and propose the use of a delay-multiply-and-sum beamformer instead of the available DAS on the numerator. The proposed weighting technique, modified CF (MCF), has been evaluated numerically and experimentally compared to CF. It was shown that MCF leads to lower sidelobes and better detectable targets. The quantitative results of the experiment (using wire targets) show that MCF leads to for about 45% and 40% improvement, in comparison with CF, in the terms of signal-to-noise ratio and full-width-half-maximum, respectively. (2018) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE).

Characterization of a photoacoustic system through neural networks to determine multicomponent samples

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zajarevich, N. M.; Peuriot, A. L.; Slezak, V. B.

2016-07-01

Photoacoustic spectroscopy for trace gases detection, based on a CO2 laser, can be used in a wide range of applications. The tunability of this laser in the mid-infrared (9.4-10.6 μm) allows the quantitative determination of different substances in multicomponent samples. In general, at traces level, the total photoacoustic amplitude at a certain wavelength may be approximated by a linear superposition of the amplitudes given by each of the species absorbing at that wavelength. However, in some cases, the sum of the individual signals is no longer valid. In particular, it is known the presence of CO2 delays the acoustic signal in relation to the laser excitation due to the exchange of vibrational energy between CO2 and N2. This phenomenon generates a slow V-T energy relaxation from a metastable N2 vibrational level and the sum of individual contributions may no longer be valid. Moreover, the resolution of a linear equation system has limitations, so the possibility to determine concentrations in photoacoustics based on neural network is proposed in this work. This procedure is tried in a particular case of a volatile organic compound, such as C2H4, and CO2 in air. The results are compared with the ones obtained with a model based on rate equations.

Use of a genetic algorithm for the analysis of eye movements from the linear vestibulo-ocular reflex

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Shelhamer, M.

2001-01-01

It is common in vestibular and oculomotor testing to use a single-frequency (sine) or combination of frequencies [sum-of-sines (SOS)] stimulus for head or target motion. The resulting eye movements typically contain a smooth tracking component, which follows the stimulus, in which are interspersed rapid eye movements (saccades or fast phases). The parameters of the smooth tracking--the amplitude and phase of each component frequency--are of interest; many methods have been devised that attempt to identify and remove the fast eye movements from the smooth. We describe a new approach to this problem, tailored to both single-frequency and sum-of-sines stimulation of the human linear vestibulo-ocular reflex. An approximate derivative is used to identify fast movements, which are then omitted from further analysis. The remaining points form a series of smooth tracking segments. A genetic algorithm is used to fit these segments together to form a smooth (but disconnected) wave form, by iteratively removing biases due to the missing fast phases. A genetic algorithm is an iterative optimization procedure; it provides a basis for extending this approach to more complex stimulus-response situations. In the SOS case, the genetic algorithm estimates the amplitude and phase values of the component frequencies as well as removing biases.

Evaluation of a speaker identification system with and without fusion using three databases in the presence of noise and handset effects

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

S. Al-Kaltakchi, Musab T.; Woo, Wai L.; Dlay, Satnam; Chambers, Jonathon A.

2017-12-01

In this study, a speaker identification system is considered consisting of a feature extraction stage which utilizes both power normalized cepstral coefficients (PNCCs) and Mel frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCC). Normalization is applied by employing cepstral mean and variance normalization (CMVN) and feature warping (FW), together with acoustic modeling using a Gaussian mixture model-universal background model (GMM-UBM). The main contributions are comprehensive evaluations of the effect of both additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) and non-stationary noise (NSN) (with and without a G.712 type handset) upon identification performance. In particular, three NSN types with varying signal to noise ratios (SNRs) were tested corresponding to street traffic, a bus interior, and a crowded talking environment. The performance evaluation also considered the effect of late fusion techniques based on score fusion, namely, mean, maximum, and linear weighted sum fusion. The databases employed were TIMIT, SITW, and NIST 2008; and 120 speakers were selected from each database to yield 3600 speech utterances. As recommendations from the study, mean fusion is found to yield overall best performance in terms of speaker identification accuracy (SIA) with noisy speech, whereas linear weighted sum fusion is overall best for original database recordings.

Save Energy $.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hirsch, Thomas E., III; Shapiro, Robert F.

1986-01-01

Large institutional energy users can reduce energy costs by constructing and operating steam and electricity cogeneration facilities and purchasing their own gas at lower prices rather than relying on local distributors. (MSE)

Coping with the Insurance Crisis.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hindman, R. Eugene, Jr.

1986-01-01

Ten suggestions are given for administering an institutional insurance program and coping with recent changes in the insurance market due to increasing premiums and more limited coverage options. (MSE)

Rule Changes Passed at the NCAA Convention.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chronicle of Higher Education, 1987

1987-01-01

Recent changes in National Collegiate Athletic Association rules concerning academics, recruiting, amateurism, membership and classification, championships, playing and practice seasons, general policies, and eligibility are summarized. (MSE)

A View from the Professional Schools: Public Health.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gemmell, Michael K.

1987-01-01

Issues and trends affecting professional education for public health careers are examined, including specialization shortages, physician faculty shortages, declining federal support, and changing student demographics. (MSE)

Catalytic hydroprocessing of fast pyrolysis oils: Impact of biomass feedstock on process efficiency

DOE PAGES

Carpenter, Daniel; Westover, Tyler; Howe, Daniel; ...

2016-12-01

Here, we report here on an experimental study to produce refinery-ready fuel blendstocks via catalytic hydrodeoxygenation (upgrading) of pyrolysis oil using several biomass feedstocks and various blends. Blends were tested along with the pure materials to determine the effect of blending on product yields and qualities. Within experimental error, oil yields from fast pyrolysis and upgrading are shown to be linear functions of the blend components. Switchgrass exhibited lower fast pyrolysis and upgrading yields than the woody samples, which included clean pine, oriented strand board (OSB), and a mix of pinon and juniper (PJ). The notable exception was PJ, formore » which the poor upgrading yield of 18% was likely associated with the very high viscosity of the PJ fast pyrolysis oil (947 cp). The highest fast pyrolysis yield (54% dry basis) was obtained from clean pine, while the highest upgrading yield (50%) was obtained from a blend of 80% clean pine and 20% OSB (CP 8OSB 2). For switchgrass, reducing the fast pyrolysis temperature to 450 degrees C resulted in a significant increase to the pyrolysis oil yield and reduced hydrogen consumption during hydrotreating, but did not directly affect the hydrotreating oil yield. The water content of fast pyrolysis oils was also observed to increase linearly with the summed content of potassium and sodium, ranging from 21% for clean pine to 37% for switchgrass. Multiple linear regression models demonstrate that fast pyrolysis is strongly dependent upon the contents lignin and volatile matter as well as the sum of potassium and sodium.« less

An Application of Robust Method in Multiple Linear Regression Model toward Credit Card Debt

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Amira Azmi, Nur; Saifullah Rusiman, Mohd; Khalid, Kamil; Roslan, Rozaini; Sufahani, Suliadi; Mohamad, Mahathir; Salleh, Rohayu Mohd; Hamzah, Nur Shamsidah Amir

2018-04-01

Credit card is a convenient alternative replaced cash or cheque, and it is essential component for electronic and internet commerce. In this study, the researchers attempt to determine the relationship and significance variables between credit card debt and demographic variables such as age, household income, education level, years with current employer, years at current address, debt to income ratio and other debt. The provided data covers 850 customers information. There are three methods that applied to the credit card debt data which are multiple linear regression (MLR) models, MLR models with least quartile difference (LQD) method and MLR models with mean absolute deviation method. After comparing among three methods, it is found that MLR model with LQD method became the best model with the lowest value of mean square error (MSE). According to the final model, it shows that the years with current employer, years at current address, household income in thousands and debt to income ratio are positively associated with the amount of credit debt. Meanwhile variables for age, level of education and other debt are negatively associated with amount of credit debt. This study may serve as a reference for the bank company by using robust methods, so that they could better understand their options and choice that is best aligned with their goals for inference regarding to the credit card debt.

Influence of age on adaptability of human mastication.

PubMed

Peyron, Marie-Agnès; Blanc, Olivier; Lund, James P; Woda, Alain

2004-08-01

The objective of this work was to study the influence of age on the ability of subjects to adapt mastication to changes in the hardness of foods. The study was carried out on 67 volunteers aged from 25 to 75 yr (29 males, 38 females) who had complete healthy dentitions. Surface electromyograms of the left and right masseter and temporalis muscles were recorded simultaneously with jaw movements using an electromagnetic transducer. Each volunteer was asked to chew and swallow four visco-elastic model foods of different hardness, each presented three times in random order. The number of masticatory cycles, their frequency, and the sum of all electromyographic (EMG) activity in all four muscles were calculated for each masticatory sequence. Multiple linear regression analyses were used to assess the effects of hardness, age, and gender. Hardness was associated to an increase in the mean number of cycles and mean summed EMG activity per sequence. It also increased mean vertical amplitude. Mean vertical amplitude and mean summed EMG activity per sequence were higher in males. These adaptations were present at all ages. Age was associated with an increase of 0.3 cycles per sequence per year of life and with a progressive increase in mean summed EMG activity per sequence. Cycle and opening duration early in the sequence also fell with age. We concluded that although the number of cycles needed to chew a standard piece of food increases progressively with age, the capacity to adapt to changes in the hardness of food is maintained.