Gait parameter estimation from a miniaturized ear-worn sensor using singular spectrum analysis and longest common subsequence

This paper presents a new approach to gait analysis and parameter estimation from a single miniaturised earworn sensor embedded with a triaxial accelerometer. Singular spectrum analysis (SSA) combined with the longest common subsequence (LCSS) algorithm has been used as a basis for gait parameter estimation. It incorporates information from all axes of the accelerometer to estimate parameters including swing, stance and stride times. Rather than only using local features of the raw signals, the periodicity of the signals is also taken into account. The hypotheses tested by this study include: 1) how accurate is the ear-worn sensor in terms of gait parameter extraction compared to the use of an instrumented treadmill; 2) does the ear-worn sensor provide a feasible option for assessment and quantification of gait pattern changes. Key gait events for normal subjects such as heel contact and toe off are validated with a high-speed camera, as well as a force-plate instrumented treadmill. Ten healthy adults walked for 20 minutes on a treadmill with an increasing incline of 2% every 2 minutes. The upper and lower limits of the absolute errors using 95% confidence intervals for swing, stance and stride times were obtained as 35.5±3.99ms, 36.9 ± 3.84ms, and 17.9 ± 2.29ms, respectively

Structure and transcriptional regulation of the major intrinsic protein gene family in grapevine

Background The major intrinsic protein (MIP) family is a family of proteins, including aquaporins, which facilitate water and small molecule transport across plasma membranes. In plants, MIPs function in a huge variety of processes including water transport, growth, stress response, and fruit development. In this study, we characterize the structure and transcriptional regulation of the MIP family in grapevine, describing the putative genome duplication events leading to the family structure and characterizing the family’s tissue and developmental specific expression patterns across numerous preexisting microarray and RNAseq datasets. Gene co-expression network (GCN) analyses were carried out across these datasets and the promoters of each family member were analyzed for cis-regulatory element structure in order to provide insight into their transcriptional regulation. Results A total of 29 Vitis vinifera MIP family members (excluding putative pseudogenes) were identified of which all but two were mapped onto Vitis vinifera chromosomes. In this study, segmental duplication events were identified for five plasma membrane intrinsic protein (PIP) and four tonoplast intrinsic protein (TIP) genes, contributing to the expansion of PIPs and TIPs in grapevine. Grapevine MIP family members have distinct tissue and developmental expression patterns and hierarchical clustering revealed two primary groups regardless of the datasets analyzed. Composite microarray and RNA-seq gene co-expression networks (GCNs) highlighted the relationships between MIP genes and functional categories involved in cell wall modification and transport, as well as with other MIPs revealing a strong co-regulation within the family itself. Some duplicated MIP family members have undergone sub-functionalization and exhibit distinct expression patterns and GCNs. Cis-regulatory element (CRE) analyses of the MIP promoters and their associated GCN members revealed enrichment for numerous CREs including AP2/ERFs and NACs. Conclusions Combining phylogenetic analyses, gene expression profiling, gene co-expression network analyses, and cis-regulatory element enrichment, this study provides a comprehensive overview of the structure and transcriptional regulation of the grapevine MIP family. The study highlights the duplication and sub-functionalization of the family, its strong coordinated expression with genes involved in growth and transport, and the putative classes of TFs responsible for its regulation.This study has been carried out with financial support from the University of Bordeaux’s Initiative of Excellence (IdEx) program, doctoral school of life and health sciences, and Cluster of Excellence COTE (ANR-10-LABX-45, within the Water Stress project), as well as the Canada Research Chairs Program, Genome British Columbia (10R21188), and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (10R23082)

Multibeam Maser Survey of methanol and excited OH in the Magellanic clouds: new detections and maser abundance estimates

‘The definitive version is available at www.blackwell-synergy.com.’ Copyright Blackwell Publishing DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2966.2008.12888.xPeer reviewe

New exact solution of Dirac-Coulomb equation with exact boundary condition

It usually writes the boundary condition of the wave equation in the Coulomb field as a rough form without considering the size of the atomic nucleus. The rough expression brings on that the solutions of the Klein-Gordon equation and the Dirac equation with the Coulomb potential are divergent at the origin of the coordinates, also the virtual energies, when the nuclear charges number Z > 137, meaning the original solutions do not satisfy the conditions for determining solution. Any divergences of the wave functions also imply that the probability density of the meson or the electron would rapidly increase when they are closing to the atomic nucleus. What it predicts is not a truth that the atom in ground state would rapidly collapse to the neutron-like. We consider that the atomic nucleus has definite radius and write the exact boundary condition for the hydrogen and hydrogen-like atom, then newly solve the radial Dirac-Coulomb equation and obtain a new exact solution without any mathematical and physical difficulties. Unexpectedly, the K value constructed by Dirac is naturally written in the barrier width or the equivalent radius of the atomic nucleus in solving the Dirac equation with the exact boundary condition, and it is independent of the quantum energy. Without any divergent wave function and the virtual energies, we obtain a new formula of the energy levels that is different from the Dirac formula of the energy levels in the Coulomb field.Comment: 12 pages,no figure

Momentum and Energy Distributions of Nucleons in Finite Nuclei due to Short-Range Correlations

The influence of short-range correlations on the momentum and energy distribution of nucleons in nuclei is evaluated assuming a realistic meson-exchange potential for the nucleon-nucleon interaction. Using the Green-function approach the calculations are performed directly for the finite nucleus $^{16}$O avoiding the local density approximation and its reference to studies of infinite nuclear matter. The nucleon-nucleon correlations induced by the short-range and tensor components of the interaction yield an enhancement of the momentum distribution at high momenta as compared to the Hartree-Fock description. These high-momentum components should be observed mainly in nucleon knockout reactions like $(e,e'p)$ leaving the final nucleus in a state of high excitation energy. Our analysis also demonstrates that non-negligible contributions to the momentum distribution should be found in partial waves which are unoccupied in the simple shell-model. The treatment of correlations beyond the Brueckner-Hartree-Fock approximation also yields an improvement for the calculated ground-state properties.Comment: 12 pages RevTeX, 7 figures postscript files appende

Electronic structure of fluorides: general trends for ground and excited state properties

The electronic structure of fluorite crystals are studied by means of density functional theory within the local density approximation for the exchange correlation energy. The ground-state electronic properties, which have been calculated for the cubic structures $CaF_{2}$,$SrF_{2}$, $BaF_{2}$, $CdF_{2}$, $HgF_{2}$, $\beta$-$PbF_{2}$, using a plane waves expansion of the wave functions, show good comparison with existing experimental data and previous theoretical results. The electronic density of states at the gap region for all the compounds and their energy-band structure have been calculated and compared with the existing data in the literature. General trends for the ground-state parameters, the electronic energy-bands and transition energies for all the fluorides considered are given and discussed in details. Moreover, for the first time results for $HgF_{2}$ have been presented

The Muonium Atom as a Probe of Physics beyond the Standard Model

The observed interactions between particles are not fully explained in the successful theoretical description of the standard model to date. Due to the close confinement of the bound state muonium ($M = \mu^+ e^-$) can be used as an ideal probe of quantum electrodynamics and weak interaction and also for a search for additional interactions between leptons. Of special interest is the lepton number violating process of sponteanous conversion of muonium to antimuonium.Comment: 15 pages,6 figure

Stress corrosion cracking in Al-Zn-Mg-Cu aluminum alloys in saline environments

Copyright 2013 ASM International. This paper was published in Metallurgical and Materials Transactions A, 44A(3), 1230 - 1253, and is made available as an electronic reprint with the permission of ASM International. One print or electronic copy may be made for personal use only. Systematic or multiple reproduction, distribution to multiple locations via electronic or other means, duplications of any material in this paper for a fee or for commercial purposes, or modification of the content of this paper are prohibited.Stress corrosion cracking of Al-Zn-Mg-Cu (AA7xxx) aluminum alloys exposed to saline environments at temperatures ranging from 293 K to 353 K (20 °C to 80 °C) has been reviewed with particular attention to the influences of alloy composition and temper, and bulk and local environmental conditions. Stress corrosion crack (SCC) growth rates at room temperature for peak- and over-aged tempers in saline environments are minimized for Al-Zn-Mg-Cu alloys containing less than ~8 wt pct Zn when Zn/Mg ratios are ranging from 2 to 3, excess magnesium levels are less than 1 wt pct, and copper content is either less than ~0.2 wt pct or ranging from 1.3 to 2 wt pct. A minimum chloride ion concentration of ~0.01 M is required for crack growth rates to exceed those in distilled water, which insures that the local solution pH in crack-tip regions can be maintained at less than 4. Crack growth rates in saline solution without other additions gradually increase with bulk chloride ion concentrations up to around 0.6 M NaCl, whereas in solutions with sufficiently low dichromate (or chromate), inhibitor additions are insensitive to the bulk chloride concentration and are typically at least double those observed without the additions. DCB specimens, fatigue pre-cracked in air before immersion in a saline environment, show an initial period with no detectible crack growth, followed by crack growth at the distilled water rate, and then transition to a higher crack growth rate typical of region 2 crack growth in the saline environment. Time spent in each stage depends on the type of pre-crack (“pop-in” vs fatigue), applied stress intensity factor, alloy chemistry, bulk environment, and, if applied, the external polarization. Apparent activation energies (E a) for SCC growth in Al-Zn-Mg-Cu alloys exposed to 0.6 M NaCl over the temperatures ranging from 293 K to 353 K (20 °C to 80 °C) for under-, peak-, and over-aged low-copper-containing alloys (~0.8 wt pct), they are typically ranging from 20 to 40 kJ/mol for under- and peak-aged alloys, and based on limited data, around 85 kJ/mol for over-aged tempers. This means that crack propagation in saline environments is most likely to occur by a hydrogen-related process for low-copper-containing Al-Zn-Mg-Cu alloys in under-, peak- and over-aged tempers, and for high-copper alloys in under- and peak-aged tempers. For over-aged high-copper-containing alloys, cracking is most probably under anodic dissolution control. Future stress corrosion studies should focus on understanding the factors that control crack initiation, and insuring that the next generation of higher performance Al-Zn-Mg-Cu alloys has similar longer crack initiation times and crack propagation rates to those of the incumbent alloys in an over-aged condition where crack rates are less than 1 mm/month at a high stress intensity factor

Modelling J/psi production and absorption in a microscopic nonequilibrium approach

Charmonium production and absorption in heavy ion collisions is studied with the Ultrarelativisitic Quantum Molecular Dynamics model. We compare the scenario of universal and time independent color-octet dissociation cross sections with one of distinct color-singlet J/psi, psi' and chi_c states, evolving from small, color transparent configurations to their asymptotic sizes. The measured J/psi production cross sections in pA and AB collisions at SPS energies are consistent with both - purely hadronic - scenarios. The predicted rapidity dependence of J/psi suppression can be used to discriminate between the two experimentally. The importance of interactions with secondary hadrons and the applicability of thermal reaction kinetics to J/psi absorption are investigated. We discuss the effect of nuclear stopping and the role of leading hadrons. The dependence of the psi' to J/psi ratio on the model assumptions and the possible influence of refeeding processes is also studied.Comment: 35 pages, 16 figure