Motivation for sport spectating among the Taiwanese people

The purpose of this research was to examine the motivation for sport spectatorship among Taiwanese people. Seven sport spectating motivation factors that have been found in U.S. studies to be involved in sport spectatorship (self-esteem, entertainment, eustress, aesthetic, escape, group-affiliation, and family-togetherness) were examined. In addition, this study looked at the differences in spectating motivation between Taiwanese males and females. Surveys were administrated to 188 Taiwanese people. ANOVA and MANOVA analyses were conducted to examine spectator motivations and differences between males and females. The results indicated that some factors were more descriptive of the sport spectating motivation of Taiwanese people than others, and that there were differences between males and females

A new algorithm for fast generalized DFTs

We give an new arithmetic algorithm to compute the generalized Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) over finite groups $G$. The new algorithm uses $O(|G|^{\omega/2 + o(1)})$ operations to compute the generalized DFT over finite groups of Lie type, including the linear, orthogonal, and symplectic families and their variants, as well as all finite simple groups of Lie type. Here $\omega$ is the exponent of matrix multiplication, so the exponent $\omega/2$ is optimal if $\omega = 2$. Previously, "exponent one" algorithms were known for supersolvable groups and the symmetric and alternating groups. No exponent one algorithms were known (even under the assumption $\omega = 2$) for families of linear groups of fixed dimension, and indeed the previous best-known algorithm for $SL_2(F_q)$ had exponent $4/3$ despite being the focus of significant effort. We unconditionally achieve exponent at most $1.19$ for this group, and exponent one if $\omega = 2$. Our algorithm also yields an improved exponent for computing the generalized DFT over general finite groups $G$, which beats the longstanding previous best upper bound, for any $\omega$. In particular, assuming $\omega = 2$, we achieve exponent $\sqrt{2}$, while the previous best was $3/2$

Deterministic Dense Coding and Faithful Teleportation with Multipartite Graph States

We proposed novel schemes to perform the deterministic dense coding and faithful teleportation with multipartite graph states. We also find the sufficient and necessary condition of a viable graph state for the proposed scheme. That is, for the associated graph, the reduced adjacency matrix of the Tanner-type subgraph between senders and receivers should be invertible.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure;v2. discussions improve

Evaluation of antioxidant properties of some commercially available culinary and medicinal mushrooms from Taiwan

PhD ThesisA selection of commercially available mushrooms was obtained from Taiwan and screened for phenolic contents and antioxidant activity in aqueous extracts using various chemical measurements, namely scavenging of 2,2´-azinobis-(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonate) radical cation (TEAC), Ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP), scavenging of 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl radical (DPPH) and Folin-Ciocalteu reaction. According to the antioxidant activity perceived, Cordyceps militaris, Pleurotus citrinopileatus, Trametes versicolor, Hericium erinaceus, Ganoderma lucidum and Auricularia auricula-judae were selected for in vitro digestion and cellular antioxidant assay. After the in vitro digestion steps, the antioxidant activity in the extracts of C. militaris had significantly decreased, (in TEAC 22% and 27 % decrease, in hot- and cold-water extracts, respectively, in FRAP 42% and 21% decrease, in hot- and cold-water extracts, respectively and in DPPH 78% and 21% decrease in hot- and cold-water extracts, respectively). The hot-water extract of A. auricula-judae and cold-water extracts of H. erinaceus showed no significant increase in TEAC assay after enzymatic digestion. There was a significant increase in antioxidant activity in the other mushroom extracts after in vitro enzymatic digestion. P. citrinopileatus exhibited the most potent antioxidant activity in the TEAC (from 24 to 2 times higher and 10 to 1.5 times higher than other mushrooms in hot- and cold-water extracts, respectively) and DPPH assays (from 6.4 to 1.2 times higher and from 27 to 1.6 times higher than the other five mushrooms in hot- and cold-water extracts, respectively) after digestion steps. T. versicolor showed the most potent ferric reducing power after digestion steps (from 29 to 5 times higher and 14 to 1.1 times higher than the other five mushrooms in hot- and cold-water extracts, respectively). These results indicate that most of the potential antioxidant compounds within the mushroom extracts could be released after digestion steps, whereas the potential antioxidant compounds of C. militaris might be degraded after digestion steps. The results suggest that determination of antioxidant activity in selected mushroom extracts may underestimate the real antioxidant activity that may be in close contact with the intestinal lumen. Chemical estimates of potential antioxidant compounds within the mushroom extracts may not accurately indicate the complex nature of the antioxidant activity of mushroom extracts within cells. In this study, human hepatoma cell lines (Huh 7) were used to measure cellular antioxidant activity using 2´, 7´- dichlorodihydrofluorescein diacetate as a fluorescent probe. In artificially induced peroxyl radicals, among the selected mushroom extracts tested, C. militaris and T. versicolor had the highest cellular antioxidant activity, whereas H. erinaceus had the lowest. In addition, in chemical assays (TEAC and DPPH), the antioxidant activity of T. versicolor was less than that of P. citrinopileatus (64% and 67 % less in TEAC in hot-and cold- water extracts, respectively and 70% and 82% less in DPPH in hot- and cold-water extracts respectively). Even though the antioxidant activity of C. militaris was decreased after digestion steps, C. militaris exhibited far stronger cellular antioxidant activity than the other five mushrooms (p < 0.001). Based on the different antioxidant assay methods, the antioxidant activity of each antioxidant assay gave different antioxidant trends and antioxidant activity value depending on the type of extract method (hot- and cold-water extracts). Using cellular antioxidant assays may produce bioactivity results of the antioxidant activity of mushroom extracts within cells. These findings could suggest that the aqueous extracts from C. militaris and T. versicolor associated with health benefits and other traditional remedies, at least in part, might be their potent antioxidant activity

Neural Correlates of Causal Inferences and Semantic Priming in People with Williams Syndrome: An fMRI Study

This study aimed at examining the ability of causal inferences and semantic priming of people with Williams syndrome (WS). Previous studies pointed out that people with WS showed deviant sentence comprehension, given advantageous lexical semantics. This study investigated the impairment in connecting words in the semantic network by using neuroimaging techniques to reveal neurological deficits in the contextual integration of people with Williams syndrome. Four types of word pairs were presented: causal, categorical, associative, and functional. Behavioural results revealed that causal word pairs required heavier cognitive processing than functional word pairs. Distinct neural correlates of semantic priming confirmed atypical semantic linkage and possible cause of impairment of contextual integration in people with WS. The findings of normal behaviours and atypical neural correlates in people with WS provide evidence of atypical development resulted from early gene mutations

Factors Influencing Irregular Compaction Curves

The important influences of temperature on the compaction curves has been given little consideration, A.W. Johnson and J. K. Jallberg summarized primarily from a search of the literature that increasing the temperature leads to increase the maximum dry density 0£ the single peak curve. They explained that the water in the soil is more viscous at the lower temperature, reducing the workability of the soil, which induces a lower dry density. Some investigations which were not involved· in the compaction tests, have shown the temperature effect on some soil properties. From the results of confined and undrained compression test, M. A. Sherif and C. M. Burrous concluded that an increase in the temperature causes a decrease in the compressive strength of the soil. They reasoned that the absorbed water around the soil particles has a less rigid state as the temperature increases, thereby increasing the pore pressure and decreasing the effective stress. This conclusion, therefore, is in agreement with most investigation. although not all indicate exactly the same results. R. L. Plum and M. I. Esrig also postulate that the expansion of the electric double layer of soil particles will occur with the increase of temperature, thereby increasing the repulsive forces and decreasing the effective stress and shearing strength. Johnson and Jallberg also indicated in their summary that increasing the compaction effort by the modified compaction test for a single peak curve not only increases maximum dry unit weight and decreases optimum moisture content, but also decreases the percentage of air voids. In addition, they pointed out that very heavy clay soils may result in irregular compaction curves when tested under the standard compaction method and that increasing the compaction effort tends to decrease irregularity. However, this brief statement is based merely on limited data, and a systematic investigation is necessary. J. L. McRae and P. C. Rutledge observed that the optimum water contents at the same maximum dry densities for the kneading compaction on a single peak curve are about 1 percent higher than the standard impact-type compaction. It has been suspected that there is a difference on moisture-density curves between values obtained by reusing the same portion of soil over and over and values obtained by using a new batch of soil for each point on the compaction curve. It is noted that most of the prior investigations on1 examined the single peak compaction curve. To investigate the characteristics of irregularly shaped compaction curve is therefore necessary. This investigation, which was carried out at South Dakota State University, sponsored by the National Science Foundation, is the third stage of a series of investigations to examine the characteristics of irregularly shaped compaction curves. Because the change of temperature is an important factor in influencing the engineering properties of soil, the main objective of this research was to examine carefully the effect of temperature on the irregularly shaped compaction curve. The additional purposes were to investigate the influence of different compaction methods and the influence of soil sample preparation