1,039 research outputs found
A Dynamic Approach to Rhythm in Language: Toward a Temporal Phonology
It is proposed that the theory of dynamical systems offers appropriate tools
to model many phonological aspects of both speech production and perception. A
dynamic account of speech rhythm is shown to be useful for description of both
Japanese mora timing and English timing in a phrase repetition task. This
orientation contrasts fundamentally with the more familiar symbolic approach to
phonology, in which time is modeled only with sequentially arrayed symbols. It
is proposed that an adaptive oscillator offers a useful model for perceptual
entrainment (or `locking in') to the temporal patterns of speech production.
This helps to explain why speech is often perceived to be more regular than
experimental measurements seem to justify. Because dynamic models deal with
real time, they also help us understand how languages can differ in their
temporal detail---contributing to foreign accents, for example. The fact that
languages differ greatly in their temporal detail suggests that these effects
are not mere motor universals, but that dynamical models are intrinsic
components of the phonological characterization of language.Comment: 31 pages; compressed, uuencoded Postscrip
Exploring the molecular basis of host specific dynamic adaptation in <i>Phytophthora capsici</i>
Feed intake pattern, behaviour, rumen characteristics and blood metabolites of finishing beef steers offered total mixed rations constituted at feeding or ensiling
peer-reviewedTwo experiments were undertaken. In Experiment 1, behaviour, intake pattern and
blood metabolites, were recorded for steers offered total mixed rations (TMR) based
on grass silage and concentrates, and constituted either at ensiling (E-TMR) or feedout
(F-TMR). Fourteen continental crossbred steers (mean starting weight 505 (s.d.
41.5) kg) were assigned to each of the following eight treatments: grass silage offered
ad libitum (SO), E-TMR diets constituted in approximate dry matter (DM) ratios of
grass:concentrates of 75:25 (EL), 50:50 (EM) and 25:75 (EH), F-TMR diets constituted
in approximate DM ratios of grass silage:concentrates of 75:25 (FL), 50:50 (FM)
and 25:75 (FH), and finally concentrates ad libitum (AL). Total DM intake increased
linearly (P < 0.001) and the time spent eating and ruminating decreased linearly
(P < 0.001) with increasing concentrate proportion. Animals on the F-TMR diets had
higher total DM intakes (P < 0.05) and plasma glucose (P < 0.05) and urea (P < 0.001)
concentrations than animals on the corresponding E-TMR diets. No effect of method
of feed preparation on intake pattern or behaviour was recorded. In Experiment 2,
four ruminally cannulated Holstein-Friesian steers of mean initial live weight 630 (s.d.
23.2) kg were used to evaluate rumen characteristics for four of the above diets (FL,
EL, FH and EH) in a 4 × 4 latin square design. Higher concentrate diets resulted in
lower rumen pH (P < 0.05), higher lactic acid (P < 0.001) and ammonia (P < 0.05)
concentrations and lower acetate:propionate (P < 0.05). F-TMR was associated with
a higher (P < 0.05) rumen volatile fatty acid concentration but no difference in other
rumen fermentation characteristics compared to E-TMR. Concentrate proportion and method of feed preparation had no effect (P > 0.05) on rumen pool sizes but animals
consuming the high concentrate diet had a faster (P < 0.05) rumen passage rate of
NDF than animals on the low concentrate diet.B. Cummins was in receipt of a Teagasc Walsh Fellowship
Conservation characteristics of grass and dry sugar beet pulp co-ensiled after different degrees of mixing
peer-reviewedThe objective of this experiment was to quantify the effects of the degree of mixing of dry molassed sugar beet pulp (BP) with grass on silage conservation characteristics.
Herbage from a timothy (Phleum pratense) sward was precision chopped and treated with a formic acid based additive (3 l/t grass). Units of 50 kg grass, without or with 2.5kg BP were randomly allocated among four replicates on each of seven treatments. The treatments were (1) no BP (NONE), (2) BP evenly mixed through the grass (EVEN),
(3) BP evenly mixed through the lower 25 kg grass (LOWH), (4) BP evenly mixed through the lower 12.5 kg grass (LOWQ), (5) 0.625 kg BP mixed through the top 25 kg grass and 1.875 kg SBP mixed through the lower 25 kg grass (25/75), (6) BP placed in 0.5 kg layers beneath each 10 kg grass (LAYR), and (7) BP placed in a single layer under all of the grass (BOTM). Laboratory silos were filled and sealed, and stored at 15 °C for 163 days. Effluent was collected and weighed from each silo throughout the ensilage period.
At opening, silage composition and aerobic stability measurements were made. Total outflow of effluent was reduced (P<0.001) by the addition of BP; LAYR had a greater effect (P<0.001) than any of the other treatments. Effluent dry matter (DM) concentration was highest (P<0.05) for BOTM and lowest (P<0.01) for NONE. All treatments underwent similar lactic-acid dominant fermentations. Incorporation of BP with grass increased silage DM concentration (P<0.001), in vitro DM digestibility (P<0.05) and water soluble carbohydrate (P<0.001) concentration and reduced acid detergent fibre (P<0.001) concentration. Aerobic stability was similar across treatments and aerobic deterioration at 192 h was higher (P<0.05) for LOWQ, 25/75, LAYR and BOTM than for NONE. In conclusion, the incorporation of BP increased silage DM digestibility but had relatively little effect on fermentation or aerobic stability. Placing BP in layers gave the largest and most sustained restriction in effluent output.B. Cummins acknowledges receipt of a Walsh Fellowship provided by Teagasc
auDeep: Unsupervised Learning of Representations from Audio with Deep Recurrent Neural Networks
auDeep is a Python toolkit for deep unsupervised representation learning from
acoustic data. It is based on a recurrent sequence to sequence autoencoder
approach which can learn representations of time series data by taking into
account their temporal dynamics. We provide an extensive command line interface
in addition to a Python API for users and developers, both of which are
comprehensively documented and publicly available at
https://github.com/auDeep/auDeep. Experimental results indicate that auDeep
features are competitive with state-of-the art audio classification
Effects of breed type, silage harvest date and pattern of offering concentrates on intake, performance and carcass traits of finishing steers
peer-reviewedThe objective of this experiment was to investigate the effects and interactions of breed type, silage harvest date and pattern of offering concentrates on intake, performance and carcass traits of finishing steers. Seventy-two steers (36 Friesian and 36 beef cross) were blocked on weight within breed type and assigned to a pre-experimental slaughter group or to one of 4 dietary treatments in a 2 (breed type) 2 (early- or late- cut silage) 2 (flat rate or varied pattern of offering concentrates) factorial arrangement of treatments. The flat-rate feeding pattern was silage ad libitum plus 5 kg concentrates per head daily to slaughter. The varied feeding pattern was silage only for 79 days followed by concentrates ad libitum to slaughter. All animals were slaughtered together after 164 days when the groups on the two feeding patterns had consumed the same total quantity of concentrates. Friesians had a higher (P < 0.001) silage dry matter (DM) intake and a higher (P < 0.01) total DM intake than the beef crosses. Live-weight gain was similar for both breed types but the beef-cross animals had a higher (P < 0.001) kill-out proportion, higher (P < 0.01) carcass gain, and better (P < 0.001) carcass conformation than the Friesians. The beef-cross type also had a higher (P < 0.001) proportion of muscle and a lower (P < 0.001) proportion of bone in the carcass. Silage harvest date had no effect on silage or total DM intakes but the early-cut silage did result in higher (P < 0.01) carcass gain. Animals on the varied feeding pattern consumed less (P < 0.01) silage DM and less (P < 0.001) total DM than those on the flat rate feeding pattern. Live-weight gain and carcass gain were similar for the two feeding patterns. It is concluded that Friesians had a higher intake, but had lower carcass gain than the beef-cross type. Animals on the early-cut silage had higher carcass gain than those on the late-cut silage. The varied feeding pattern resulted in lower DM intake but efficiency of feed energy utilisation was similar for both feeding patterns. Interactions were generally not statistically significant
Effector-Decoy Pairs:Another Countermeasure Emerging during Host-Microbe Co-evolutionary Arms Races?
Acrylamide formation in potato products
End of Project ReportAcrylamide, a substance classified as a potential carcinogen, occurs in heated
starchy foods at concentrations many times in excess of levels permitted in
drinking water. Early surveys indicated that levels of acrylamide in potato
products such as French fries and potato crisps were the highest of the
foodstuffs investigated. The present project addressed this issue by
determining levels of acrylamide precursors (asparagine and reducing sugars)
in raw potatoes and levels of acrylamide in (i) potato products from different
storage regimes, (ii) spot-sampled potatoes purchased from a local
supermarket, (iii) samples that received pre-treatments and were fried at
different temperatures and (iv) French fries reheated in different ovens.A risk
assessment of the estimated acrylamide intake from potato products for
various cohorts of the Irish population was also conducted
Oil Market Modelling: A Comparative Analysis of Fundamental and Latent Factor Approaches
International audienceWe formally compare fundamental factor and latent factor approaches to oil price modelling. Fundamental modelling has a long history in seeking to understand oil price movements, while latent factor modelling has a more recent and limited history, but has gained popularity in other financial markets. The two approaches, though competing, have not formally been compared as to effectiveness. For a range of short-medium-and long-dated WTI oil futures we test a recently proposed five-factor fundamental model and a Principal Component Analysis latent factor model. Our findings demonstrate that there is no discernible difference between the two techniques in a dynamic setting. We conclude that this infers some advantages in adopting the latent factor approach due to the difficulty in determining a well specified fundamental model
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