Tradeoffs among Free-flow Speed, Capacity, Cost, and Environmental Footprint in Highway Design

This paper investigates differentiated design standards as a source of capacity additions that are more affordable and have smaller aesthetic and environmental impacts than expressways. We consider several tradeoffs, including narrow versus wide lanes and shoulders on an expressway of a given total width, and high-speed expressway versus lower-speed arterial. We quantify the situations in which off-peak traffic is sufficiently great to make it worthwhile to spend more on construction, or to give up some capacity, in order to provide very high off-peak speeds even if peak speeds are limited by congestion. We also consider the implications of differing accident rates. The results support expanding the range of highway designs that are considered when adding capacity to ameliorate urban road congestion.Highway design; Capacity; Free-flow speed; Parkway

Bis(μ-3-nitro­phthalato-κ2 O 1:O 2)bis­[aqua­(2,2′-bipyridine-κ2 N,N′)copper(II)] dihydrate

Two 3-nitro­phthalate dianions bridge two water-coordinated 2,2′-bipyridine-chelated CuII atoms about a center of inversion to generate the title dinuclear compound, [Cu2(C8H3NO6)2(C10H8N2)2(H2O)2]·2H2O. The geometry of the CuII atom is a distorted square pyramid. Adjacent mol­ecules are linked through the coordinated and solvent water mol­ecules to form a linear ribbon running along the a axis of the monoclinic unit cell

Linear MIMO Precoders Design for Finite Alphabet Inputs via Model-Free Training

This paper investigates a novel method for designing linear precoders with finite alphabet inputs based on autoencoders (AE) without the knowledge of the channel model. By model-free training of the autoencoder in a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system, the proposed method can effectively solve the optimization problem to design the precoders that maximize the mutual information between the channel inputs and outputs, when only the input-output information of the channel can be observed. Specifically, the proposed method regards the receiver and the precoder as two independent parameterized functions in the AE and alternately trains them using the exact and approximated gradient, respectively. Compared with previous precoders design methods, it alleviates the limitation of requiring the explicit channel model to be known. Simulation results show that the proposed method works as well as those methods under known channel models in terms of maximizing the mutual information and reducing the bit error rate.Comment: Accepted by GLOBECOM 202

Joint Beamforming and Antenna Movement Design for Moveable Antenna Systems Based on Statistical CSI

This paper studies a novel movable antenna (MA)-enhanced multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system to leverage the corresponding spatial degrees of freedom (DoFs) for improving the performance of wireless communications. We aim to maximize the achievable rate by jointly optimizing the MA positions and the transmit covariance matrix based on statistical channel state information (CSI). To solve the resulting design problem, we develop a constrained stochastic successive convex approximation (CSSCA) algorithm applicable for the general movement mode. Furthermore, we propose two simplified antenna movement modes, namely the linear movement mode and the planar movement mode, to facilitate efficient antenna movement and reduce the computational complexity of the CSSCA algorithm. Numerical results show that the considered MA-enhanced system can significantly improve the achievable rate compared to conventional MIMO systems employing uniform planar arrays (UPAs) and that the proposed planar movement mode performs closely to the performance upper bound achieved by the general movement mode

Modeling and model calibration for model predictive occupants comfort control in buildings

Mathematical models are essential in Model-Predictive Control (MPC) for building automation and control (BAC) application, which must be precise and computationally efficient for realtime optimization and control. However, building models are of high complexity because of the nonlinearities of heat and mass transfer processes in buildings and their air-conditioning and mechanical ventilation (ACMV) systems. This paper proposes a method to develop an integrated linear model for indoor air temperature, humidity and Predicted Mean Vote (PMV) index suitable for fast real-time multiple objectives optimization. A linear dynamic model is developed using SIMSCAPE language based on the BCA SkyLab test bed facility in Singapore as a case study. Experimental data is used to calibrate the model using trust-region-reflective least squares optimization method. The results show that the mean absolute percentage errors (MAPE) of predicted room temperature and humidity ratio are 1.25% and 4.98%, compared to measurement, respectively

Duration of untreated bipolar disorder: A multicenter study

Little is known about the demographic and clinical differences between short and long duration of untreated bipolar disorder (DUB) in Chinese patients. This study examined the demographic and clinical features of short (≤2 years) and long DUB (\u3e2 years) in China. A consecutively recruited sample of 555 patients with bipolar disorder (BD) was examined in 7 psychiatric hospitals and general hospital psychiatric units across China. Patients’ demographic and clinical characteristics were collected using a standardized protocol and data collection procedure. The mean DUB was 3.2 ± 6.0 years; long DUB accounted for 31.0% of the sample. Multivariate analyses revealed that longer duration of illness, diagnosis of BD type II, and earlier misdiagnosis of BD for major depressive disorder or schizophrenia were independently associated with long DUB. The mean DUB in Chinese BD patients was shorter than the reported figures from Western countries. The long-term impact of DUB on the outcome of BD is warranted

A Biophysical Model for Analysis of Transcription Factor Interaction and Binding Site Arrangement from Genome-Wide Binding Data

BACKGROUND:How transcription factors (TFs) interact with cis-regulatory sequences and interact with each other is a fundamental, but not well understood, aspect of gene regulation. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS:We present a computational method to address this question, relying on the established biophysical principles. This method, STAP (sequence to affinity prediction), takes into account all combinations and configurations of strong and weak binding sites to analyze large scale transcription factor (TF)-DNA binding data to discover cooperative interactions among TFs, infer sequence rules of interaction and predict TF target genes in new conditions with no TF-DNA binding data. The distinctions between STAP and other statistical approaches for analyzing cis-regulatory sequences include the utility of physical principles and the treatment of the DNA binding data as quantitative representation of binding strengths. Applying this method to the ChIP-seq data of 12 TFs in mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells, we found that the strength of TF-DNA binding could be significantly modulated by cooperative interactions among TFs with adjacent binding sites. However, further analysis on five putatively interacting TF pairs suggests that such interactions may be relatively insensitive to the distance and orientation of binding sites. Testing a set of putative Nanog motifs, STAP showed that a novel Nanog motif could better explain the ChIP-seq data than previously published ones. We then experimentally tested and verified the new Nanog motif. A series of comparisons showed that STAP has more predictive power than several state-of-the-art methods for cis-regulatory sequence analysis. We took advantage of this power to study the evolution of TF-target relationship in Drosophila. By learning the TF-DNA interaction models from the ChIP-chip data of D. melanogaster (Mel) and applying them to the genome of D. pseudoobscura (Pse), we found that only about half of the sequences strongly bound by TFs in Mel have high binding affinities in Pse. We show that prediction of functional TF targets from ChIP-chip data can be improved by using the conservation of STAP predicted affinities as an additional filter. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE:STAP is an effective method to analyze binding site arrangements, TF cooperativity, and TF target genes from genome-wide TF-DNA binding data

Protective effect of Dendrobium officinale polysaccharides on experimental Sjogren's syndrome

Sjogren's syndrome (SS), usually described as a chronic inflammation which results in xerostomia (dry mouth) and xerophthalmia (dry eyes). According to the theory of traditional Chinese medicine, body fluid impairment causes the dryness, inducing water secretion deficiency. Discovery of a family of water-specific membrane channel proteins, the aquaporins, provides an interesting molecular mechanism of water permeability and transportation which were found abnormal in tissues of SS patients. Thus, this dryness may lead to the dysfunction in organs as various systematic manifestations. We established an autoallergic mouse model in vivo, and human salivary gland cell line A-253 in vitro. Polysaccharides of Dendrobium officinale (DP) were administrated as treatment, which was described to nourish yin and promote the body fluid. Results showed that immunization with SG autoantigen induced decrease of body weight and increased water intake, decreased AQP5 expression in a series of organs related to body fluid. Sera from model mice induced apoptosis of A-253 cells with activation of caspase-3. Administration of DP could reverse these pathological changes in both the animal and cell model. Thus, DP may be a promising candidate for the treatment of SS by up-regulating the expression of AQP-5 and protecting cells from apoptosis. © 2010 The Berkeley Electronic Press. All rights reserved.published_or_final_versio

Protective effect of Dendrobium officinale polysaccharides on experimental Sjogren's syndrome

Sjogren's syndrome (SS), usually described as a chronic inflammation which results in xerostomia (dry mouth) and xerophthalmia (dry eyes). According to the theory of traditional Chinese medicine, body fluid impairment causes the dryness, inducing water secretion deficiency. Discovery of a family of water-specific membrane channel proteins, the aquaporins, provides an interesting molecular mechanism of water permeability and transportation which were found abnormal in tissues of SS patients. Thus, this dryness may lead to the dysfunction in organs as various systematic manifestations. We established an autoallergic mouse model in vivo, and human salivary gland cell line A-253 in vitro. Polysaccharides of Dendrobium officinale (DP) were administrated as treatment, which was described to nourish yin and promote the body fluid. Results showed that immunization with SG autoantigen induced decrease of body weight and increased water intake, decreased AQP5 expression in a series of organs related to body fluid. Sera from model mice induced apoptosis of A-253 cells with activation of caspase-3. Administration of DP could reverse these pathological changes in both the animal and cell model. Thus, DP may be a promising candidate for the treatment of SS by up-regulating the expression of AQP-5 and protecting cells from apoptosis. © 2010 The Berkeley Electronic Press. All rights reserved.published_or_final_versio