Temporal and Periodic Variations of Sunspot Counts in Flaring and Non-flaring Active Regions

We analyzed temporal and periodic behavior of sunspot counts (SSCs) in flaring (C, M, or X class flares), and non-flaring active regions (ARs) for the almost two solar cycles (1996 through 2016). Our main findings are as follows: i) The temporal variation of monthly means of daily total SSCs in flaring and non-flaring ARs are different and these differences are also varying from cycle to cycle; temporal profile of non-flaring ARs are wider than the flaring ones during the solar cycle 23, while they are almost the same during the current cycle 24. The second peak (second maximum) of flaring ARs are strongly dominate during current cycle 24, while this difference is not such a remarkable during cycle 23. The amplitude of SSCs in the non-flaring ARs are comparable during the first and second peaks (maxima) of the current solar cycle, while the first peak is almost not existent in case of the flaring ARs. ii) Periodic variations observed in SSCs of flaring and non-flaring ARs are quite different in both MTM spectrum and wavelet scalograms and these variations are also different from one cycle to another; the largest detected period in the flaring ARs is 113 days, while there are much higher periodicities (327, 312, and 256 days) in non-flaring ARs. There are no meaningful periodicities in MTM spectrum of flaring ARs exceeding 45 days during solar cycle 24, while a 113 days periodicity detected from flaring ARs of solar cycle 23. For the non-flaring ARs the largest period is 72 days during solar cycle 24, while the largest period is 327 days during current cycle.Comment: Submitted to Solar Physics, 17 pages, 5 figure

Selecting Metrics to Evaluate Human Supervisory Control Applications

The goal of this research is to develop a methodology to select supervisory control metrics. This methodology is based on cost-benefit analyses and generic metric classes. In the context of this research, a metric class is defined as the set of metrics that quantify a certain aspect or component of a system. Generic metric classes are developed because metrics are mission-specific, but metric classes are generalizable across different missions. Cost-benefit analyses are utilized because each metric set has advantages, limitations, and costs, thus the added value of different sets for a given context can be calculated to select the set that maximizes value and minimizes costs. This report summarizes the findings of the first part of this research effort that has focused on developing a supervisory control metric taxonomy that defines generic metric classes and categorizes existing metrics. Future research will focus on applying cost benefit analysis methodologies to metric selection. Five main metric classes have been identified that apply to supervisory control teams composed of humans and autonomous platforms: mission effectiveness, autonomous platform behavior efficiency, human behavior efficiency, human behavior precursors, and collaborative metrics. Mission effectiveness measures how well the mission goals are achieved. Autonomous platform and human behavior efficiency measure the actions and decisions made by the humans and the automation that compose the team. Human behavior precursors measure human initial state, including certain attitudes and cognitive constructs that can be the cause of and drive a given behavior. Collaborative metrics address three different aspects of collaboration: collaboration between the human and the autonomous platform he is controlling, collaboration among humans that compose the team, and autonomous collaboration among platforms. These five metric classes have been populated with metrics and measuring techniques from the existing literature. Which specific metrics should be used to evaluate a system will depend on many factors, but as a rule-of-thumb, we propose that at a minimum, one metric from each class should be used to provide a multi-dimensional assessment of the human-automation team. To determine what the impact on our research has been by not following such a principled approach, we evaluated recent large-scale supervisory control experiments conducted in the MIT Humans and Automation Laboratory. The results show that prior to adapting this metric classification approach, we were fairly consistent in measuring mission effectiveness and human behavior through such metrics as reaction times and decision accuracies. However, despite our supervisory control focus, we were remiss in gathering attention allocation metrics and collaboration metrics, and we often gathered too many correlated metrics that were redundant and wasteful. This meta-analysis of our experimental shortcomings reflect those in the general research population in that we tended to gravitate to popular metrics that are relatively easy to gather, without a clear understanding of exactly what aspect of the systems we were measuring and how the various metrics informed an overall research question

Evaluation of biological activity of Turkish plants. Rapid screening for the antimicrobial, antioxidant, and acetylcholinesterase inhibitory potential by TLC bioautographic methods

Using thin-layer chromatography (TLC) bioautography, a total of 58 extracts from various organs (aerial parts, leaves, flowers, fruits, roots) of 16 Turkish plants were tested for their antibacterial, antifungal, acetylcholinesterase inhibitory, antioxidant, and radical scavenging activities. The hexane, CHCl3/CH2Cl2, water, and total MeOH extracts were used. No activity was observed against two Gram-negative bacteria (Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aureginosa) and the yeast Candida albicans. However, 23 plant extracts, mostly the CHCl3/CH2Cl2 and H2O-solubles, inhibited the growth of all five Gram-positive bacteria tested, Micrococcus luteus, Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus cereus, Staphylococcus aureus, and Staphylococcus epidermidis. Of the active extracts, the CHCl3-soluble of the roots of Putoria calabrica (L. fil) DC (Rubiaceae) displayed the highest antibacterial potential. The majority of the CHCl3/CH2Cl2 crude extracts also appeared to inhibit acetylcholinesterase on TLC plates at 100 µg/spot concentration. Particularly active samples were the middle polarity extracts (CHCl3/CH2Cl2) of the leaves of Rhododendron smirnovii Trautv., R. ponticum L., and R. ungernii Trautv. (Ericaceae). β-Carotene, β-carotene/linoleic acid mixture, and 2,2-diphenyl-l-pieryhydrazyl (DPPH) solutions sprayed onto TLC plates were used for detecting antioxidant and radical scavenging properties of the crude extracts. Antioxidant and radical scavenging activities were found to be predominant in highly polar extracts. The water-solubles of all Rhododendron (Ericaceae) and Phlomis (Lamiaceae) species presented the most significant activity

Attention Allocation Aid for Visual Search

This paper outlines the development and testing of a novel, feedback-enabled attention allocation aid (AAAD), which uses real-time physiological data to improve human performance in a realistic sequential visual search task. Indeed, by optimizing over search duration, the aid improves efficiency, while preserving decision accuracy, as the operator identifies and classifies targets within simulated aerial imagery. Specifically, using experimental eye-tracking data and measurements about target detectability across the human visual field, we develop functional models of detection accuracy as a function of search time, number of eye movements, scan path, and image clutter. These models are then used by the AAAD in conjunction with real time eye position data to make probabilistic estimations of attained search accuracy and to recommend that the observer either move on to the next image or continue exploring the present image. An experimental evaluation in a scenario motivated from human supervisory control in surveillance missions confirms the benefits of the AAAD.Comment: To be presented at the ACM CHI conference in Denver, Colorado in May 201

Analysis of the volatile components of five Turkish Rhododendron species by headspace solid-phase microextraction and GC-MS (HS-SPME-GC-MS)

Volatile constituents of various solvent extracts (n-hexane, CH2Cl2, H2O) of 15 different organs (leaves, flowers, fruits) of five Rhododendron species (Ericaceae) growing in Turkey were trapped with headspace solid-phase microextraction (HS-SPME) technique and analyzed by GC-MS. A total of 200 compounds were detected and identified from organic extracts, while the water extracts contained only traces of few volatiles. The CH2Cl2 extract of the R. luteum flowers was found to exhibit the most diverse composition: 34 compounds were identified, with benzyl alcohol (16.6%), limonene (14.6%) and p-cymene (8.4%) being the major compounds. The CH2Cl2-solubles of R. x sochadzeae leaves contained only phenyl ethyl alcohol. This study indicated appreciable intra-specific variations in volatile compositions within the genus. Different anatomical parts also showed altered volatile profiles. This is the first application of HS-SPME-GC-MS on the volatiles of Rhododendron species

Inhibiting activities of the secondary metabolites of Phlomis brunneogaleata against parasitic protozoa and plasmodial enoyl-ACP reductase, a crucial enzyme in fatty acid biosynthesis

Anti-plasmodial activity-guided fractionation of Phlomis brunneogaleata (Lamiaceae) led to the isolation of two new metabolites, the iridoid glycoside, brunneogaleatoside and a new pyrrolidinium derivative (2S,4R)-2-carboxy-4-(E)-p-coumaroyloxy-1,1-dimethylpyrrolidinium inner salt [(2S,4R)-1,1-dimethyl-4-(E)-p-coumaroyloxyproline inner salt]. Moreover, a known iridoid glycoside, ipolamiide, six known phenylethanoid glycosides, verbascoside, isoverbascoside, forsythoside B, echinacoside, glucopyranosyl-(1→Gi-6)-martynoside and integrifolioside B, two flavone glycosides, luteolin 7-O-β-D-glucopyranoside (10) and chrysoeriol 7-O-β-D-glucopyranoside (11), a lignan glycoside liriodendrin, an acetophenone glycoside 4-hydroxyacetophenone 4-O-(6′-O-β-D-apiofuranosyl)-β-D-glucopyranoside and three caffeic acid esters, chlorogenic acid, 3-O-caffeoylquinic acid methyl ester and 5-O-caffeoylshikimic acid were isolated. The structures of the pure compounds were elucidated by means of spectroscopic methods (UV, IR, MS, 1D and 2D NMR, [α]D) and X-ray crystallography. Compounds 10 and 11 were determined to be the major anti-malarial principles of the crude extract (IC50 values of 2.4 and 5.9 μg/mL, respectively). They also exhibited significant leishmanicidal activity (IC50 = 1.1 and 4.1 μg/mL, respectively). The inhibitory potential of the pure metabolites against plasmodial enoyl-ACP reductase (FabI), which is the key regulator of type II fatty acid synthases (FAS-II) in P. falciparum, was also assessed. Compound 10 showed promising FabI inhibiting effect (IC50 = 10 μg/mL) and appears to be the first anti-malarial natural product targeting FabI of P. falciparum

Secondary metabolites of Phlomis viscosa and their biological activities

Further phytochemical studies on the aerial parts of Phlomis viscosa (Lamiaceae) led to the isolation of 24 compounds: 3 iridoid glycosides, 10 phenylethanoid glycosides, a megastigmane glycoside and a hydroquinone glycoside, as well as 2 lignan glucosides and 7 neolignan glucosides, 1 of which is new (17b). Compound 17b was obtained as a minor component of an inseparable mixture (2:1) of 2 neolignan glucosides (17a/b), and characterized as 3',4-O-dimethylcedrusin 9-O-b -glucopyranoside. Full NMR data of the known 8-O-4' neolignan glucoside, erythro-1-(4-O-b-glucopyranosyl-3-methoxyphenyl)- 2-{2-methoxyl-4-[1-(E)-propene-3-ol]-phenoxyl}-propane-1,3-diol (18) are also reported. All isolated compounds were screened for cell growth inhibition versus 3 tumor cell lines (MCF7, NCI-H460, and SF-268) and several phenylethanoid glycosides were found to possess weak antitumoral activity. The phenylethanoid glycosides were also evaluated for their free radical (DPPH) scavenging, antibacterial and antifungal activities. The free radical (DPPH) scavenging activities of verbascoside (4), isoacteoside (5), forsythoside B (10), myricoside (13) and samioside (14) were found to be comparable to that of dl-a -tocopherol. Compounds 4, 5, 10 and 14 (MIC: 500 m g/mL) as well as Leucosceptoside A (8) and 13 (MIC:1000 m g/mL) showed very weak activity against Gram (+) bacteria

Optical and XPS evidence for the electrochemical generation of an N-heterocyclic carbene and its CS2 adduct from the ionic liquid [bmim][PF6]

Room temperature ionic liquids continue to be at the forefront of chemistry, covering a broad spectrum of research areas from electrochemistry and energy to catalysis and green chemistry. Therefore, it is of great value to fully understand the chemical and electrochemical reactivity and stability of ionic liquids utilized in these applications. In this context, we have investigated the electrochemical generation of an N-heterocyclic carbene and its CS2 adduct from the ionic liquid [bmim][PF6], and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) proved to be a highly effective spectroscopic tool to study such systems. Initially, the dithiocarboxylate adduct was chemically synthesized as a reference compound starting from both [bmim][PF6] and [bmim][OAc], and characterized by HRMS, and 1H- and 13C-NMR, FTIR, visible and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. While a simple mixture of [bmim][PF6] and CS2 revealed no evidence of adduct formation, the application of an electrochemical stimulus led to the formation of the dithiocarboxylate adduct as evidenced optically and through the newly formed S2p peak in the XP spectrum. Further evidence for the electrochemical reduction of [bmim][PF6] to the corresponding N-heterocyclic carbene came from the XPS analysis via the appearance of a new N1s peak in the XP spectrum. © 2017 The Royal Society of Chemistry and the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique