No-Service Rail Surface Defect Segmentation via Normalized Attention and Dual-scale Interaction

No-service rail surface defect (NRSD) segmentation is an essential way for perceiving the quality of no-service rails. However, due to the complex and diverse outlines and low-contrast textures of no-service rails, existing natural image segmentation methods cannot achieve promising performance in NRSD images, especially in some unique and challenging NRSD scenes. To this end, in this paper, we propose a novel segmentation network for NRSDs based on Normalized Attention and Dual-scale Interaction, named NaDiNet. Specifically, NaDiNet follows the enhancement-interaction paradigm. The Normalized Channel-wise Self-Attention Module (NAM) and the Dual-scale Interaction Block (DIB) are two key components of NaDiNet. NAM is a specific extension of the channel-wise self-attention mechanism (CAM) to enhance features extracted from low-contrast NRSD images. The softmax layer in CAM will produce very small correlation coefficients which are not conducive to low-contrast feature enhancement. Instead, in NAM, we directly calculate the normalized correlation coefficient between channels to enlarge the feature differentiation. DIB is specifically designed for the feature interaction of the enhanced features. It has two interaction branches with dual scales, one for fine-grained clues and the other for coarse-grained clues. With both branches working together, DIB can perceive defect regions of different granularities. With these modules working together, our NaDiNet can generate accurate segmentation map. Extensive experiments on the public NRSD-MN dataset with man-made and natural NRSDs demonstrate that our proposed NaDiNet with various backbones (i.e., VGG, ResNet, and DenseNet) consistently outperforms 10 state-of-the-art methods. The code and results of our method are available at https://github.com/monxxcn/NaDiNet.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures, Accepted by IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement 202

Aplicación en carne de cerdo de un bioconservante en polvo obtenido a partir de Pediococcus acidilactici

[ES] La bioconservación es definida como la extensión de la vida y seguridad de un alimento a través del uso de microbiota natural o controlada y/o sus compuestos antimicrobianos. el objetivo del presente trabajo consistió en aumentar la vida útil de la carne picada de cerdo mediante el empleo de un bioconservante en polvo obtenido a partir del caldo de fermentación (subproducto) resultante tras el proceso de fermentación de Pediococcus acidilactici en un medio de cultivo de grado alimentario y la posterior separación de los microrganismos. Inicialmente se procedió a la fermentación de Pediococcus acidilactici en un medio de cultivo de grado alimentario. Posteriormente, se separaron los microoganismos mediante filtración y el subproducto conformado por el caldo de fermentación. Este último se liofilizó obteniéndose así el bioconservante en polvo libre de células para su aplicación en la carne picada de cerdo. Posteriormente, se testaron diferentes concentraciones (30, 40 y 50 g/kg) de bioconservante en polvo en carne picada de cerdo, junto con un control (0 g/Kg). Las muestras fueron mantenidas en refrigeración durante 9 días. Durante el almacenamiento se analizó la evolución de los siguientes parámetros: crecimiento microbiano, pH, pérdida de agua por goteo y color. Los resultados obtenidos indicaron actividad antimicrobiana cuando la dosis utilizada fue de 50g/kg y frente a Pseudomonas spp., Brochothrix thermosphacta, enterobacterias y aerobios mesofilos. Dosis de 30 y 40 g/kg de bioconservante no presentaron efecto antimicrobiano claro. La incorporación de bioconservante apenas modificó el valor del pH de la carne, solo se observó un ligero descenso lo que contrasta con el elevado incremento de este en las muestras control. La capacidad de retención de agua no se modificó como consecuencia de adicionar los aditivos. La adición de estas concentraciones de aditivo no produjo un efecto significativo sobre el color de la carne, puesto que no se observaron diferencias relevantes en las coordenadas L*, a* y b*. En el caso de la concentración más alta (50 g/Kg), si se observaron diferencias evidentes con respecto a la muestra control.[EN] Bioconservation is defined as the extension of the life and safety of food through the use of natural or controlled microbiota and / or its antimicrobial compounds. The objective of this work was to increase the useful life of minced pork using a bio-preservative powder obtained from the fermentation broth (by-product) resulting from the fermentation process of Pediococcus acidilactici in a culture medium of food-grade and the subsequent separation of microorganisms. Initially, the fermentation of Pediococcus acidilactici was carried out in a food-grade culture medium. Subsequently, the microorganisms were separated by filtration and the by-product formed by the fermentation broth. The latter was lyophilized thus obtaining the cell-free powder bioconservative for application in minced pork. Subsequently, different concentrations (30, 40 and 50 g / kg) of bioconservative powder were tested in minced pork, together with control (0 g / Kg). The samples were kept in refrigeration for 9 days. During storage, the evolution of the following parameters were analyzed: microbial growth, pH, loss of water by dripping and colour. The results obtained indicated antimicrobial activity when the dose used was 50g / kg and against Pseudomonas spp., Brochothrix thermosphacta, enterobacteriaceae and mesophilic aerobes. Doses of 30 and 40 g / kg of bioconservative had no clear antimicrobial effect. The incorporation of bioconservative hardly changed the pH value of the meat, only a slight decrease was observed, which contrasts with the high increase of this in the control samples. The water retention capacity was not modified as a consequence of adding the additives. The addition of these additive concentrations did not produce a significant effect on the colour of the meat since no relevant differences were observed in the L *, a * and b * coordinates. In the case of the highest concentration (50 g / Kg), if evident differences were observed concerning the control sample.Han, C. (2020). Aplicación en carne de cerdo de un bioconservante en polvo obtenido a partir de Pediococcus acidilactici. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/151190TFG

Characterization of the response of IHEP-IME LGAD with shallow carbon to Gamma Irradiation

Low Gain Avalanche Detectors (LGAD), as part of High-Granularity Timing Detector (HGTD), is crucial to reducing pileup in the upgrading to HL-LHC. Many studies have been done on the bulk damages of the LGAD. However, there's no study about the surface radiation hardness of the LGAD sensors with carbon implanted. The IHEP-IME LGAD version 3 with the shallow carbon and different interpad separations were irradiated up to 2 MGy by gamma irradiation. The performance of the IHEP-IME LGAD version 3 before and after irradiation had been tested, such as the leakage current, break-down voltage, capacitance, V$_{gl}$, and inter-pad resistance. The results showed that apart from minor fluctuations in some samples, no significant changes concerning inter-pad separation were observed before and after irradiation. Leakage current and break-down voltage increase after irradiation, which is considered due to surface passivation; the overall inter-pad resistance are larger than $10^9\ \Omega$before and after irradiation; capacitance is found to be less than 4.5 pF with a slight drop in V$_{gl}$ after irradiation. All parameters meet the requirements of HGTD, and the results indicated that IHEP-IME LGAD v3 has excellent anti-irradiation performance

Leakage current simulations of Low Gain Avalanche Diode with improved Radiation Damage Modeling

We report precise TCAD simulations of IHEP-IME-v1 Low Gain Avalanche Diode (LGAD) calibrated by secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS). Our setup allows us to evaluate the leakage current, capacitance, and breakdown voltage of LGAD, which agree with measurements' results before irradiation. And we propose an improved LGAD Radiation Damage Model (LRDM) which combines local acceptor removal with global deep energy levels. The LRDM is applied to the IHEP-IME-v1 LGAD and able to predict the leakage current well at -30 $^{\circ}$C after an irradiation fluence of $\Phi_{eq}=2.5 \times 10^{15} ~n_{eq}/cm^{2}$. The charge collection efficiency (CCE) is under development

Extinction and Ergodic Property of Stochastic SIS Epidemic Model with Nonlinear Incidence Rate

We investigate a stochastic SIS model with nonlinear incidence rate. We show that there exists a unique nonnegative solution to the system, and condition for the infectious individuals I(t) to be extinct is given. Moreover, we prove that the system has ergodic property. Finally, computer simulations are carried out to verify our results

Characterization of cellulose II nanoparticles regenerated from 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride

Regenerated cellulose nanoparticles (RCNs) including both elongated fiber and spherical structures were prepared from microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) and cotton using 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride followed by high-pressure homogenization. The crystalline structure of RCNs was cellulose II in contrast to the cellulose I form of the starting materials. Also, the RCNs have decreased crystallinity and crystallite size. The elongated RCNs produced from cotton and MCC had average lengths of 123 ± 34 and 112 ± 42 nm, and mean widths of 12 ± 5 and 12 ± 3 nm, respectively. The average diameter of spherical RCNs from MCC was 118 ± 32nm. The dimensions of the various RCNs were all well fitted with an asymmetrical log-normal distribution function. The RCN has a two-step pyrolysis, different from raw MCC and cotton that have a one-step process

Characterization of cellulose II nanoparticles regenerated from 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride

Regenerated cellulose nanoparticles (RCNs) including both elongated fiber and spherical structures were prepared from microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) and cotton using 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride followed by high-pressure homogenization. The crystalline structure of RCNs was cellulose II in contrast to the cellulose I form of the starting materials. Also, the RCNs have decreased crystallinity and crystallite size. The elongated RCNs produced from cotton and MCC had average lengths of 123 ± 34 and 112 ± 42 nm, and mean widths of 12 ± 5 and 12 ± 3 nm, respectively. The average diameter of spherical RCNs from MCC was 118 ± 32nm. The dimensions of the various RCNs were all well fitted with an asymmetrical log-normal distribution function. The RCN has a two-step pyrolysis, different from raw MCC and cotton that have a one-step process