Comparison of hybrid-excitation fault-tolerant in-wheel motor drives for electric vehicles

Paper no. DS2-23Hybrid-excitation in-wheel motor drive receives the attractive merit for its fault-tolerant operation. This paper gives the performance comparison of three types of hybrid-excitation in-wheel motor drives in electric vehicles (EVs) for their fault-tolerant operations. By using finite-time element analysis, the torque output is utilized as the fault indicator to investigate the performances of each motor drive under normal, faulty, and remedial operations.published_or_final_versio

Wealth Effects on Consumption in Taiwan: An Application of the Multivariate Markov Regime-Switching Model

“The buffer stock theory” derived from the intertemporal utility maximization predicts that an increase in wealth will dampen the motive for precautionary savings and therefore reduce consumption’s over-sensitivity with respect to income changes. Since over the last forty years Taiwan has more than once experienced sharp rises in the values of stock market and real estate, the goal of this paper is to examine whether the prediction of the buffer stock theory holds in Taiwan. The empirical model we propose is a trivariate two-state Markov regime-switching model that is originated from Euler equation for consumption growth. The three macro variables we consider are the real non-durable good consumption growth, the real GDP growth, and the real growth in stock market total value. It is assumed that these three variables are subject to the same Markov regime-switching variable in determining their two states. Our empirical results using Taiwan’s quarterly data suggest a high growth state and a low growth one: the former includes 1973Q3, 1973Q4, 1978Q3, 1987Q2 – 1990Q1, 1991Q2, and 1991Q3. The main finding of this paper is as follows: It is indeed the precautionary savings motive that causes the aggregate consumption in Taiwan to be overly sensitive to income changes, just as the buffer stock theory has predicted. When wealth in Taiwan, symbolized by the values of stock market, increased substantially under the high growth state, consumers’ precautionary savings motive weakened and the over-sensitivity phenomenon to a large extent disappeared.消費過度敏感現象, 預防性儲蓄動機, 財富效果, 三變量結構轉換模型

On the Influencing Factors of Dictionary App Interface Design for the Elders

AbstractEnglish learning is becoming one of the popular movements towards the Globalization. In recent years especially, more people use smartphones to learn English. However, it was found in the current market that most dictionary apps were designed for the younger generation and neglected the needs of the elderly. The issue of memory over-load turned out to be the critical problem of the usability for the elderly, due to the complex menu structures. Thus this study is meant to explore a suitable menu structure for the senior user, and provide suggestions for the relative researches.The study results are:1.Gender: There is no significant between male and female in the operating performance.2.Menu structure: the performance of the hybrid structure is superior to the linear structure.3.Display mode: There is no significant between the horizontal and vertical display modes in operating performance.4.Task Complexity: A positive ratio between task complexity and menu topological structure was revealed, the harder the task complexity, the better performance of mixed structure can be expected

Sequence features involved in the mechanism of 3' splice junction wobbling

Background Alternative splicing is an important mechanism mediating the diversified functions of genes in multicellular organisms, and such event occurs in around 40-60% of human genes. Recently, a new splice-junction wobbling mechanism was proposed that subtle modifications exist in mRNA maturation by alternatively choosing at 5'- GTNGT and 3'- NAGNAG, which created single amino acid insertion and deletion isoforms. Results By browsing the Alternative Splicing Database information, we observed that most 3' alternative splice site choices occur within six nucleotides of the dominant splice site and the incidence significantly decreases further away from the dominant acceptor site. Although a lower frequency of alternative splicing occurs within the intronic region (alternative splicing at the proximal AG) than in the exonic region (alternative splicing at the distal AG), alternative AG sites located within the intronic region show stronger potential as the acceptor. These observations revealed that the choice of 3' splice sites during 3' splicing junction wobbling could depend on the distance between the duplicated AG and the branch point site (BPS). Further mutagenesis experiments demonstrated that the distance of AG-to-AG and BPS-to-AG can greatly influence 3' splice site selection. Knocking down a known alternative splicing regulator, hSlu7, failed to affect wobble splicing choices. Conclusion Our results implied that nucleotide distance between proximal and distal AG sites has an important regulatory function. In this study, we showed that occurrence of 3' wobble splicing occurs in a distance-dependent manner and that most of this wobble splicing is probably caused by steric hindrance from a factor bound at the neighboring tandem motif sequence

Three-dimensional structure and cytokine distribution of platelet-rich fibrin

OBJECTIVES: Previous reports have revealed that several cytokines (including platelet-derived growth factor-BB, transforming growth factors-β1 and insulin-like growth factor-1) can enhance the rate of bone formation and synthesis of extracellular matrix in orthopaedics or periodontology. This study aimed to determine the concentration of cytokines within platelet-rich fibrin microstructures and investigate whether there are differences in the different portions of platelet-rich fibrin, which has implications for proper clinical use of platelet-rich fibrin gel. METHODS: Whole blood was obtained from six New Zealand rabbits (male, 7 to 39 weeks old, weight 2.7-4 kg); it was then centrifuged for preparation of platelet-rich fibrin gels and harvest of plasma. The resultant platelet-rich fibrin gels were used for cytokine determination, histological analyses and scanning electron microscopy. All plasmas obtained were subject to the same cytokine determination assays for the purpose of comparison. RESULTS: Cytokines platelet-derived growth factor-BB and transforming growth factor-β1 formed concentration gradients from high at the red blood cell end of the platelet-rich fibrin gel (p=1.88×10-5) to low at the plasma end (p=0.19). Insulin-like growth factor-1 concentrations were similar at the red blood cell and plasma ends. The porosities of the platelet-rich fibrin samples taken in sequence from the red blood cell end to the plasma end were 6.5% ± 4.9%, 24.8% ± 7.5%, 30.3% ± 8.5%, 41.4% ± 12.3%, and 40.3% ± 11.7%, respectively, showing a gradual decrease in the compactness of the platelet-rich fibrin network. CONCLUSION: Cytokine concentrations are positively associated with platelet-rich fibrin microstructure and portion in a rabbit model. As platelet-rich fibrin is the main entity currently used in regenerative medicine, assessing cytokine concentration and the most valuable portion of PRF gels is essential and recommended to all physicians

Dose pre-hospital laryngeal mask airway use has a survival benefit in non-shockable cardiac arrest?

Background. Whether pre-hospital laryngeal mask airway (LMA) use poses a survival benefit and should be approved as routine airway management in non-shockable cardiac arrest is of major concern. The present study examined the effectiveness of LMA, in comparison to other pre-hospital airway management on individuals who have experienced non-shockable cardiac arrest. Methods. Adult patients who experienced non-shockable cardiac arrest with activation of the emergency medical service (EMS) made up our study cohort in Taoyuan, Taiwan. The data were abstracted from EMS records and cardiac arrest registration protocols. Results. Among the 1912 enrolled patients, most received LMA insertion (72.4%), 108 (5.6%) bag-valve-mask (BVM) ventilation, 376 (19.7%) high-flow oxygen non-rebreather facemask, and only 44 (2.3%) received endotracheal tube intubation (ETI). With regard to survival to discharge, no significant differences in prevalence were evident among the groups: 2.8% of oxygen facial mask, 1.1% of BVM, 2.1% of LMA, and 4.5% of the ETI group survived to discharge (p = 0.314). In comparison to oxygen facial mask use, different types of airway management remained unassociated with survival to discharge after adjusting for variables by logistic regression analysis (BVM: 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.079 – 1.639 [p = 0.186]; LMA: 95% CI, 0.220–2.487 [p = 0.627]; ETI: 95% CI, 0.325–17.820 [p = 0.390]). The results of Hosmer-Lemeshow goodness-of-fit test of logistic regression model revealed good calibration. Conclusions. Pre-hospital LMA use was not associated with additional survival to discharge compared with facial oxygen mask, BVM, or ETI following non-shockable cardiac arrest