Low Cost Earth Sensor Based on Oxygen Airglow (AIRES)

This project has demonstrated the feasibility of a low-cost Earth sensor based on imaging oxygen airglow, allowing 0.4° accuracy from GEO under any illumination condition. Available Earth Sensor (ES) are based on the measurement of the earth’s infrared radiation to determine the vector to the Earth’s centre. These designs provide excellent accuracies over a large field of view, but are often heavy, large, require cooling or temperature stabilization and are power hungry. In addition, the sensor concept for a LEO or GEO application ES differs significantly. We have developed a novel ES concept for applications where milli-degree accuracy is not required, but where low-cost is essential and lower (about 1 – 5°) accuracy is acceptable. Such a sensor could be used in new scenarios and to improve spacecraft reliability by providing a low-cost back-up sensor. Our Earth Sensor concept is based on imaging atmospheric oxygen emission at 762 nm using highly sensitive detectors. In both night-time and daytime there is continuous emission at 762 nm due to oxygen recombination. Low-noise active pixel sensors (APS) or low-light detector based on arrays of single photon avalanche diodes (SPAD) enables the ES to operate at night and day, over a wide temperature range, with a very compact optical system (aperture of 8 mm, focal length of 11 mm) and no scanning elements. A modular design allows designing similar instruments using the same wavelength band, the same detector technology, the same optics, the same power and data interfaces and similar algorithms for GEO and LEO applications, thus reducing the development cost. We have developed an Earth appearance model at 762 nm, which was used as input for the mechanical, optical and electric design of the Earth Sensor (conceptual design). In order to achieve a low-cost solution, simplicity and reduction of part count was a driving factor in the design trade-offs. Total mass for the GEO design is 845 g with a mean power consumption of 4 W. Algorithms were developed to determine the vector to the Earth from the images. A breadboard was built to display a simulated picture of the Earth under varying conditions, image those pictures at different temperatures with a radiation tolerant APS (LCMS), and verify the correct operation of the algorithms. In addition to the conceptual design and breadboard level demonstration of key technologies, a novel detector chip was designed and fabricated: a radiation-tolerant array of single photon avalanche photodiodes (SPAD) build using conventional 0.35 μm CMOS technology. The chip was tested under proton and gamma irradiation, and operated with only minor changes in dark current after 30 krad TID. Having shown the feasibility of such an Earth Sensor, this work concluded with a development plan to lead to a flight model

A consecutive series of 235 epigastric hernias

Abstract Background Epigastric herniation is a common, though not always symptomatic condition. It is likely, that in accordance to the tension-free principles for other hernias, epigastric hernia repair should be mesh based. Methods Patients from two large hospitals were investigated retrospectively if they were operated on an epigastric hernia for the past 6 years. Follow-up was completed with a postal questionnaire. Results A total of 235 patients (50 % male) were operated. Sixty-eight patients were operated with mesh and 167 patients with suture repair. Forty-six patients were loss-to follow-up (19.6 %). In the mesh operated patients the recurrence rate was 10.9 % (n = 6) compared to 14.9 % (n = 20) in the suture repair group. Cox-regression analysis showed an increased risk for recurrence in the suture repair group (odds ratio 1.43; 95 % CI 0.56-3.57; p = 0.44). Operation time for mesh repair (47 min) was significantly longer compared to suture repair (29 min) (p \ 0.0001). Thirty-seven patients had previous or other anterior wall hernias. A total of 51 patients smoked and 14 patients had diabetes mellitus. Fourteen patients used steroids and 22 patients suffered from a chronic lung disease. Subgroup analysis showed a significant difference for pain in patients in which re-operation for a recurrence occurred (p = 0.004). Conclusions This is one of the largest reported series on solely epigastric hernias. A recurrence occurred more often after sutured repair compared to mesh repair. No differences in chronic pain was seen between mesh and suture repaired patients. Male:female ratio of 1:1, which is different from the 3:1 ratio found in previous older smaller studies, could be more reliable

Compact solid-state CMOS single-photon detector array for in vivo NIR fluorescence lifetime oncology measurements

In near infrared fluorescence-guided surgical oncology, it is challenging to distinguish healthy from cancerous tissue. One promising research avenue consists in the analysis of the exogenous fluorophores’ lifetime, which are however in the (sub-)nanosecond range. We have integrated a single-photon pixel array, based on standard CMOS SPADs (single-photon avalanche diodes), in a compact, time-gated measurement system, named FluoCam. In vivo measurements were carried out with indocyanine green (ICG)-modified derivatives targeting the avb3 integrin, initially on a genetically engineered mouse model of melanoma injected with ICG conjugated with tetrameric cyclic pentapeptide (ICG􀀀E[c(RGDfK)4]), then on mice carrying tumour xenografts of U87-MG (a human primary glioblastoma cell line) injected with monomeric ICG􀀀c(RGDfK). Measurements on tumor, muscle and tail locations allowed us to demonstrate the feasibility of in vivo lifetime measurements with the FluoCam, to determine the characteristic lifetimes (around 500 ps) and subtle lifetime differences between bound and unbound ICG-modified fluorophores (10% level), as well as to estimate the available photon fluxes under realistic conditions

Some Consequences of Thermosolutal Convection: The Grain Structure of Castings

The essential principles of thermosolutal convection are outlined, and how convection provides a transport mechanism between the mushy region of a casting and the open bulk liquid is illustrated. The convective flow patterns which develop assist in heat exchange and macroscopic solute segregation during solidification; they also provide a mechanism for the transport of dendritic fragments from the mushy region into the bulk liquid. Surviving fragments become nuclei for equiaxed grains and so lead to blocking of the parental columnar, dendritic growth front from which they originated. The physical steps in such a sequence are considered and some experimental data are provided to support the argument

Decrease in antibiotic resistance among invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) isolates in France from 2003 to 2007; On-going survey of the French Pneumococcus network (ORP)

Date du colloque&nbsp;: 10/2008</p