Behavior of axially loaded circular stainless steel tube confined concrete stub columns

A stainless steel tube confined concrete (SSTCC) stub column is a new form of steel-concrete composite column in which the stainless steel tube without bearing the axial load directly is used to confine the core concrete. It could take the advantages of both the stainless steel tube and the confined concrete columns. This paper presents the experimental investigation of circular SSTCC stub columns subjected to axial load. Meanwhile, comparative tests of the circular concrete-filled stainless steel tubes and circular hollow stainless steel tubes were also conducted. The experimental phenomena of specimens are introduced in detail and the experimental results are analyzed. Through the investigation of axial stress and circumference stress on the stainless steel tube, the interaction behavior between stainless steel tube and core concrete is studied. The experimental results showed that the stainless steel tube provides better confinement to the concrete core, thus results the compressive capacity increased obviously comparing with unconfined concrete. The load-carrying capacity of SSTCC stub columns is higher than that of concrete-filled stainless steel tubes. An equation to calculate the load-carrying capacity of SSTCC stub columns was proposed, the results based on calculation are close to the experimental results

Dressing the electromagnetic nucleon current

A field-theory-based approach to pion photoproduction off the nucleon is used to derive a microscopically consistent formulation of the fully dressed electromagnetic nucleon current in an effective Lagrangian formalism. It is shown how the rigorous implementation of local gauge invariance at all levels of the reaction dynamics provides equations that lend themselves to practically manageable truncations of the underlying nonlinearities of the problem. The requirement of consistency also suggests a novel way of treating the pion photoproduction problem. Guided by a phenomenological implementation of gauge invariance for the truncated equations that has proved successful for pion photoproduction, an expression for the fully dressed nucleon current is given that satisfies the Ward-Takahashi identity for a fully dressed nucleon propagator as a matter of course. Possible applications include meson photo- and electroproduction processes, bremsstrahlung, Compton scattering, and $ee'$ processes off nucleons.Comment: 10 pages, 9 figure

Multivariate adaptive regression splines for estimating riverine constituent concentrations

Regression-based methods are commonly used for riverine constituent concentration/flux estimation, which is essential for guiding water quality protection practices and environmental decision making. This paper developed a multivariate adaptive regression splines model for estimating riverine constituent concentrations (MARS-EC). The process, interpretability and flexibility of the MARS-EC modelling approach, was demonstrated for total nitrogen in the Patuxent River, a major river input to Chesapeake Bay. Model accuracy and uncertainty of the MARS-EC approach was further analysed using nitrate plus nitrite datasets from eight tributary rivers to Chesapeake Bay. Results showed that the MARS-EC approach integrated the advantages of both parametric and nonparametric regression methods, and model accuracy was demonstrated to be superior to the traditionally used ESTIMATOR model. MARS-EC is flexible and allows consideration of auxiliary variables; the variables and interactions can be selected automatically. MARS-EC does not constrain concentration-predictor curves to be constant but rather is able to identify shifts in these curves from mathematical expressions and visual graphics. The MARS-EC approach provides an effective and complementary tool along with existing approaches for estimating riverine constituent concentrations

In vitro Culture of Several Rice Cultivars

Tissue culture methods have been established to regenerate certain rice (Oryza sativa L) cultivars, but regeneration of the rice cultivars widely grown in Arkansas has not been reported. This study has established an in vitroculture for the rice cultivars \u27Nortai\u27, \u27Starbonnet\u27, \u27Mars\u27, Tebonnet\u27, \u27Newbonnet\u27, and \u27Lemont\u27. Callus was induced in the dark at either 20 or 28 C from dehusked seeds cultured on Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium (Murashige and Skoog, 1962) containing 40 g L^-1 sucrose, 10 g L^1 agar, 0.5, 1.0, or 2.0 mg L^-1 1 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D) and adjusted to pH 5.7. After four weeks the calli were weighed, transferred onto MS medium containing no 2,4-D, and maintained in a 1 2-h photoperiod (65 uE m^-2 s^-1) at 25 ± 2 C to induce plant regeneration. Callus production was best when cultured on a medium containing 1.0 mg L^-1 2,4-D and incubated at 28 C. Plant regeneration was observed two to four weeks later. The percentage of calli regenerating platlets varied with the cultivar and the callus induction treatment. Callus induction at 20 C on a medium with a 2,4-D level less than 2.0 mg L^-1 enhanced the regenerability of most cultivars. Regenerates were transplanted to soil and grow normally to maturity. This system can be helpful in improving rice cultivars with tissue culture techniques such as somaclonal variant selection and somatic hybridization

A Palette of Deepened Emotions: Exploring Emotional Challenge in Virtual Reality Games

Recent work introduced the notion of ‘emotional challenge’promising for understanding more unique and diverse player experiences (PX). Although emotional challenge has immediately attracted HCI researchers’ attention, the concept has not been experimentally explored, especially in virtual reality (VR), one of the latest gaming environments. We conducted two experiments to investigate how emotional challenge affects PX when separately from or jointly with conventional challenge in VR and PC conditions. We found that relatively exclusive emotional challenge induced a wider range of different emotions in both conditions, while the adding of emotional challenge broadened emotional responses only in VR. In both experiments, VR significantly enhanced the measured PX of emotional responses, appreciation, immersion and presence. Our findings indicate that VR may be an ideal medium to present emotional challenge and also extend the understanding of emotional (and conventional) challenge in video games