5,418 research outputs found

    Pressure effect in the X-ray intrinsic position resolution in noble gases and mixtures

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    A study of the gas pressure effect in the position resolution of an interacting X- or gamma-ray photon in a gas medium is performed. The intrinsic position resolution for pure noble gases (Argon and Xenon) and their mixtures with CO2 and CH4 were calculated for several gas pressures (1-10bar) and for photon energies between 5.4 and 60.0 keV, being possible to establish a linear match between the intrinsic position resolution and the inverse of the gas pressure in that energy range. In order to evaluate the quality of the method here described, a comparison between the available experimental data and the calculated one in this work, is done and discussed. In the majority of the cases, a strong agreement is observed

    Can the Visits of Dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) Influence the Mental Health (Anxiety and Depression) of Male Aging Patients Institutionalized with Dementia in Health Care Units? A Pilot Study of Madeira Island, Portugal

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    Despite the fact that in the last decades, several mental health studies have shown that companion animals contribute to psychological and social well-being in humans (e.g., posi tive impacts have been observed in the elderly medicated for chronic diseases such as anxiety, dementia, and depression), bonds between humans and other animals continue to be under estimated. The aim of this study is to assess the impact of an animal’s visits (twice a week, N = 30) in depression and anxiety levels of an institutionalized male population diagnosed with de mentia. While some of these patients are being partially medicated with antidepressants and/or anxiolytics, others are not subject to any medication (control group). The GAI and GDS measur ing instruments were used and there were differences in anxiety and depression levels between the first and last dog visit, statistically significant in depression levels of nonmedicated patients. Such findings allow us to conclude that the effects of the visits of an animal near nonmedicated patients are greater than near medicated ones. The complementary role of animals in mental health institutions where patients are being treated for psychiatric disorders (in the particular case of dementia) should be considered.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

    Can the Visits of Dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) Influence the Mental Health (Anxiety and Depression) of Male Aging Patients Institutionalized with Dementia in Health Care Units? A Pilot Study of Madeira Island, Portugal

    Get PDF
    Despite the fact that in the last decades, several mental health studies have shown that companion animals contribute to psychological and social well- being in humans (e.g., positive impacts have been observed in the elderly medicated for chronic diseases such as anxiety, dementia, and depression), bonds between humans and other animals continue to be under-estimated. The aim of this study is to assess the impact of an animal’s visits (twice a week, N = 30) in depression and anxiety levels of an institutionalized male population diagnosed with dementia. While some of these patients are being partially medicated with antidepressants and/or anxiolytics, others are not subject to any medication (control group). The GAI and GDS measuring instruments were used and there were differences in anxiety and depression levels between the first and last dog visit, statistically significant in depression levels of nonmedicated patients. Such findings allow us to conclude that the effects of the visits of an animal near nonmedicated patients are greater than near medicated ones. The complementary role of animals in mental health institutions where patients are being treated for psychiatric disorders (in the particular case of dementia) should be considered

    Tuning of observer-based estimators: theory and application to the on-line estimation of kinetic parameters

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    This paper deals with the tuning of observer-based estimators. Initially, these algorithms were designed for estimating on-line kinetic parameters, like specific growth rates, in bioprocesses, and have proved to be very successful in practical applications. Here a systematic tuning approach that allows a decoupled estimation of each parameter and the assignment of the estimator dynamics independently of the process dynamics is proposed. The presented approach is illustrated on an animal cell culture example in numerical simulation and with real-life data

    The Resistive-Plate WELL with Argon mixtures - a robust gaseous radiation detector

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    A thin single-element THGEM-based, Resistive-Plate WELL (RPWELL) detector was operated with 150 GeV/c muon and pion beams in Ne/(5%CH4_4), Ar/(5%CH4_4) and Ar/(7%CO2_2); signals were recorded with 1 cm2^2 square pads and SRS/APV25 electronics. Detection efficiency values greater than 98% were reached in all the gas mixtures, at average pad multiplicity of 1.2. The use of the 109^9{\Omega}cm resistive plate resulted in a completely discharge-free operation also in intense pion beams. The efficiency remained essentially constant at 98-99% up to fluxes of \sim104^4Hz/cm2^2, dropping by a few % when approaching 105^5 Hz/cm2^2. These results pave the way towards cost-effective, robust, efficient, large-scale detectors for a variety of applications in future particle, astro-particle and applied fields. A potential target application is digital hadron calorimetry.Comment: presented at the 2016 VIenna Conf. On instrumentation. Submitted to the Conference proceeding
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