Fluidized-bed combustion (FBC) is an established means of burning high-sulfur coal and various other difficult-to-burn feedstocks in an efficient, cost-effective, and environmentally acceptable manner, notwithstanding...
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Morphological reconstructions have become a routine and valuable tool for neuroscientists. The accuracy of reconstructions is a matter of considerable interest given that they are widely used in computational studies ...
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Morphological reconstructions have become a routine and valuable tool for neuroscientists. The accuracy of reconstructions is a matter of considerable interest given that they are widely used in computational studies of neural function. Despite their wide usage, comparisons of reconstructions obtained using various methodologies are lacking. We reviewed reconstructions of hippocampal CA1 pyramidal cells from five published studies and found marked differences in some of the most basic measurements. For four of the five studies means of total cell length clustered in the 11,479-13,417-mu m range. The remaining study had a significantly larger value for this index at 16,992 +/- 5,788 mu m. Surface area means varied more than 4-fold from 16,074 to 67,102 mu m(2). Volume means varied more than 8-fold from 3,828 to 30,384 mu m(3). Simulated passive input resistance means varied from 38.0 to 172.1 M Omega, reflecting the variability in cell dimensions. Estimates of the electrotonic length varied from 1.26 to 1.56. In two reconstructions used in previously published studies, simulated somatic excitatory postsynaptic potentials (EPSPs) varied 2-4-fold in amplitude, time to peak and half-width, for synaptic inputs at similar locations. Substantial jitter on the z-axis was identified as one likely source of the discrepancy in total cell length, while substantial differences in diameter measurements across studies, and sometimes within the same study, accounted for the variability in surface area and volume. While some part of the observed variability is surely due to the diversity of CA1 pyramidal cells, our analysis suggests that a substantial portion stemmed from methodological inconsistencies and from technological limitations. Suggestions are made for improving the quality and usefulness of morphological reconstructions. We conclude that reconstructions across studies have substantial variability in measures that are very relevant to neuronal function. Consequently, model
The objective of this study was to investigate the normal distribution of cartilage thickness in the major joints of the lower limb in elderly individuals. A 12.5 MHz ultrasound transducer was used to measure the cart...
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The objective of this study was to investigate the normal distribution of cartilage thickness in the major joints of the lower limb in elderly individuals. A 12.5 MHz ultrasound transducer was used to measure the cartilage thickness in the right and left hip, knee and ankle joint of 10 individuals aged between 62 and 99 y. Distribution patterns of cartilage thickness were derived by b-spline interpolation and the average distribution computed in each surface. The maximum cartilage thickness in the hip joint was 2.6 (+/-0.36) mm and the mean thickness 1.3 (+/-0.17) mm. The CV% (a measure of thickness inhomogeneity within the joint surface) was 32 %. In the knee, the maximal and mean values were 3.8 (+/-0.46) mm and 1.9 mm (+/-0.24) mm, respectively (CV % =34 %), and in the ankle 1.7 (+/-0.25) mm and 1.0 (+/-0.16) mm (CV % =32 %). Systematic differences existed between both sides in the knee, the distal femur showing a significantly greater thickness on the right. While the mean and maximal thicknesses were systematically higher in the knee than in the hip, and in the hip higher than in the ankle (P < 0.05), there were no systematic differences in the thickness inhomogeneity of;the 3 joints. Only the malleolus showed a somewhat more uniform thickness than the other joint surfaces. The variablity between individuals was similar for all joints for mean thickness, but the interindividual variability of the maximal thickness values was highest in the knee and lowest in the ankle. Whereas the cartilage thickness distributions in the joints of the lower limb have been suggested to reflect the pressure distribution within the articular surface, the absolute thickness is proposed to be a function of dynamic loading (range of motion) during gait, rather than being a reflection of the static articular pressure.
A method for inducing a desired rank correlation matrix on multivariate input vectors for simulation studies has recently been developed by Iman and Conover (1982). The primary intention of this procedure is to produc...
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The utilisation of nighttime highway construction has increased in recent years in order to minimise daytime construction-related service disruptions and traffic congestion. In this type of nighttime construction, lig...
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The utilisation of nighttime highway construction has increased in recent years in order to minimise daytime construction-related service disruptions and traffic congestion. In this type of nighttime construction, lighting arrangements need to be properly designed and implemented in order to enhance safety and productivity on site, and ensure full compliance with the required lighting specifications. A number of field experiments were conducted to evaluate the performance of various lighting arrangements in three typical highway construction zones, namely: activity area, transition and termination areas and flagger stations. In each of these zones, a number of practical lighting arrangements were found to be capable of satisfying all the lighting design criteria required by various Departments of Transportation. The experimental results also confirm that the set-up of lighting equipment on site has a significant impact on lighting performance, and therefore lighting arrangements should be carefully designed and executed on nighttime highway construction projects.
New research on affective computing aiming to develop computer systems that recognize and respond to affective states can also contribute to the issues raised by Coan. Research on how humans interact with computers, a...
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New research on affective computing aiming to develop computer systems that recognize and respond to affective states can also contribute to the issues raised by Coan. Research on how humans interact with computers, and computer models that automatically recognize affective states from features in our physiology, behaviour, and language, may provide insights on how emotions that are experienced and expressed come to be. For example, there is empirical evidence that affect recognition techniques using several modalities are more accurate than those using a single modality, but it is not clear if these improvements are caused by superadditivity (i.e., emergence) or redundancy.
In many scientific disciplines complex computer models are used to understand the behaviour of large scale physical systems. An uncertainty analysis of such a computer model known as Galform is presented. Galform mode...
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In many scientific disciplines complex computer models are used to understand the behaviour of large scale physical systems. An uncertainty analysis of such a computer model known as Galform is presented. Galform models the creation an devolution of approximately one million galaxies from the beginning of the Universe until the current day, an disregarded as a state-of-the-art model within the cosmology community. It requires the specification of many input parameters in order to run the simulation, takes significant time to run, and provides various outputs that can be compared with real world data. A Bayes Linear approach is presented in order to identify the subset of the input space that could give rise to acceptable matches between model output and measured data. This approach takes account of the major sources of uncertainty in a consistent and unified manner, including input parameter uncertainty, function uncertainty, observational error, forcing function uncertainty and structural uncertainty. The approach is known as History Matching, and involves the use of an iterative succession of emulators (stochastic belief specifications detailing beliefs about the Galform function), which are used to cut down the input parameter space. The analysis was successful inproducing a large collection of model evaluations that exhibit good fits to the observed data.
Data from experiments on animals and humans have supported the development of computer models that predict human response to various combinations of the three main heat stress factors work, clothing, and environment. ...
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Data from experiments on animals and humans have supported the development of computer models that predict human response to various combinations of the three main heat stress factors work, clothing, and environment. However, recent application of such models shows that the validity of their output is limited in part by the need to represent more faithfully the interactions among the primary heat stress factors and certain physiological variables. Examples of such interactions include the weight and stiffness of protective outfits increasing the metabolic cost of a task, profuse sweating that wets clothing and alters its heat transfer characteristics, task-related movements altering air exchange rates through clothing, individual aerobic capacity affecting thermoregulatory response to a given metabolic load, and sweat retention in clothing raising skin wettedness and possibly inducing sweat suppression. This paper reviews recent research in these areas and identifies certain areas where further data are needed.
The purpose of this study was mathematical modeling of the heart rate (HR) response to isoproterenol (Iso) infusion. We developed a computerized system for the controlled increase of HR by Iso, based on a modified pro...
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The purpose of this study was mathematical modeling of the heart rate (HR) response to isoproterenol (Iso) infusion. We developed a computerized system for the controlled increase of HR by Iso, based on a modified proportional-integral controller. HR was measured in conscious, freely moving rats. We found that the steady-state HR can be described as a hyperbolic power function of the steady-state Iso flow rate. This dependence was coupled with a first-order difference equation to form a pharmacodynamic model that reliably describes the relationship between HR and Iso flow for any arbitrary form of Iso flow function. In simulation studies, we showed that the model continued to follow the HR curve from real-time experiments far beyond the initial "learning interval" from which its parameters were calculated. Our results suggest that the predictive ability and the simplicity of calculating the parameters render this pharmacodynamic model appropriate for use within future advanced, model-based, adaptive control systems and as a part of larger cardiovascular models.
The molecular mechanisms that control the binding of odorant to olfactory receptors and transduce this signal into membrane depolarization are reviewed. They are compared in vertebrates and insects for interspecific (...
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The molecular mechanisms that control the binding of odorant to olfactory receptors and transduce this signal into membrane depolarization are reviewed. They are compared in vertebrates and insects for interspecific (allelochemicals) and intraspecific (pheromones) olfactory signals. Attempts to develop quantitative models of these multistage signalling networks are presented. Computational analysis of olfactory transduction is still in its infancy and appears as a promising area for future developments.
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