Evaluating extreme rainfall changes over Taiwan using a standardized index

The annual daily maximum precipitation (rx1day) is widely used to represent extreme events and is an important parameter in climate change studies. However, the climate variability in rx1day is sensitive to outliers and has difficulty representing the characteristics of large areas. We propose to use the probability index (PI), based on the cumulative density function (CDF) of a generalized extreme value (GEV) distribution to fit and standardize the rx1day to represent extreme event records in this study. A good correlation between the area-averaged PIs of the observed stations and those of the gridded dataset can be found over Taiwan. From the past PI records, there is no distinct trend in western Taiwan before the end of the 20th century, but a climate regime change happened during 2002 - 2003. The dual change effects from both the variance and linear trend of extreme events are identified over the northeastern and southern parts of Taiwan, along with the island's central and southern regions, showing different abrupt changing trends and intensity. The PI can also be calculated using climate projection data to represent the characteristics of future extreme changes. The climate variability of PIs on the present (ALL) and future (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) scenarios were evaluated using the 16 Couple Model Intercomparison Projects Phase-5 models (CMIP5). The simulated present fluctuations in PIs are smaller than those of actual observations. In the 21st century, the RCP8.5 scenario shows that the PI significantly increases by 10% during the first half of the century, and 14% by the end of the century.1112Ysciescopu

Production of polyploids from cultured shoot tips of Eucalyptus globulus Labill by treatment with colchicine

Polyploids from cultured shoot tips of Eucalyptus globulus were produced by treatment with colchicine. Results showed that the combination of 0.5% colchicine and treating multiple shoot clumps for 4 days was the most appropriate conditions for E. globulus polyploidy induction and the effect of the use of multiple shoot clumps for colchicine polyploidy-induced was better than single buds. By comparing the polyploidy plants with normal diploid ones in morphology, leaves of polyploid plants were thicker, larger, and darker green. The chromosome number of polyploidy plants that had been identified in morphology was 2n = 4x = 44, while that of diploids was 2n = 2x = 22

Continuum removal in H\alpha\ extragalactic measurements

We point out an important source of error in measurements of extragalactic H-alpha emission and suggest ways to reduce it. The H-alpha line, used for estimating star formation rates, is commonly measured by imaging in a narrow band and a wide band, both which include the line. The image analysis relies on the accurate removal of the underlying continuum. We discuss in detail the derivation of the emission line's equivalent width and flux for extragalactic extended sources, and the required photometric calibrations. We describe commonly used continuum-subtraction procedures, and discuss the uncertainties that they introduce. Specifically, we analyse errors introduced by colour effects. We show that the errors in the measured H-alpha equivalent width induced by colour effects can lead to underestimates as large as 40% and overestimates as large as 10%, depending on the underlying galaxy's stellar population and the continuum-subtraction procedure used. We also show that these errors may lead to biases in results of surveys, and to the underestimation of the cosmic star formation rate at low redshifts (the low z points in the Madau plot). We suggest a method to significantly reduce these errors using a single colour measurement.Comment: 8 pages, 3 figures, MNRAS in pres

Prediction of the functional class of metal-binding proteins from sequence derived physicochemical properties by support vector machine approach

Metal-binding proteins play important roles in structural stability, signaling, regulation, transport, immune response, metabolism control, and metal homeostasis. Because of their functional and sequence diversity, it is desirable to explore additional methods for predicting metal-binding proteins irrespective of sequence similarity. This work explores support vector machines (SVM) as such a method. SVM prediction systems were developed by using 53,333 metal-binding and 147,347 non-metal-binding proteins, and evaluated by an independent set of 31,448 metal-binding and 79,051 non-metal-binding proteins. The computed prediction accuracy is 86.3%, 81.6%, 83.5%, 94.0%, 81.2%, 85.4%, 77.6%, 90.4%, 90.9%, 74.9% and 78.1% for calcium-binding, cobalt-binding, copper-binding, iron-binding, magnesium-binding, manganese-binding, nickel-binding, potassium-binding, sodium-binding, zinc-binding, and all metal-binding proteins respectively. The accuracy for the non-member proteins of each class is 88.2%, 99.9%, 98.1%, 91.4%, 87.9%, 94.5%, 99.2%, 99.9%, 99.9%, 98.0%, and 88.0% respectively. Comparable accuracies were obtained by using a different SVM kernel function. Our method predicts 67% of the 87 metal-binding proteins non-homologous to any protein in the Swissprot database and 85.3% of the 333 proteins of known metal-binding domains as metal-binding. These suggest the usefulness of SVM for facilitating the prediction of metal-binding proteins. Our software can be accessed at the SVMProt server

Semi-automatic tool to identify heterogeneity zones in lge-cmr and incorporate the result into a 3d model of the left ventricle

Fatal scar-related arrhythmias are caused by an abnormal electrical wave propagation around non conductive scarred tissue and through viable channels of reduced conductivity. Late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) is the gold-standard procedure used to differentiate the scarred tissue from the healthy, highlighting the dead cells. The border regions responsible for creating the feeble channels are visible as gray zones. Identifying and monitoring (as they may evolve) these areas may predict the risk of arrhythmias that may lead to cardiac arrest. The main goal of this project is the development of a system able to aid the user in the extraction of geometrical and physiological information from LGE images and the replication of myocardial heterogeneities onto a three-dimensional (3D) structure, built by the methods described by our team in another publication, able to undergo electro-physiologic simulations. The system components were developed in MATLAB R2019b the first is a semi-automatic tool, to identify and segment the myocardial scars and gray zones in every two-dimensional (2D) slice of a LGE CMR dataset. The second component takes these results and assembles different sections while setting different conductivity values for each. At this point, the resulting parts are incorporated into the functional 3D model of the left ventricle, and therefore the chosen values and regions can be validated and redefined until a satisfactory result is obtained. As preliminary results we present the first steps of building one functional Left ventricle (LV) model with scarred zones.authorsversionpublishe

Creation and suppression of point defects through a kick-out substitution process of Fe in InP

Indium antisite defect In P-related photoluminescence has been observed in Fe-diffused semi-insulating (SI) InP. Compared to annealed undoped or Fe-predoped SI InP, there are fewer defects in SI InP obtained by long-duration, high-temperature Fe diffusion. The suppression of the formation of point defects in Fe-diffused SI InP can be explained in terms of the complete occupation by Fe at indium vacancy. The In P defect is enhanced by the indium interstitial that is caused by the kick out of In and the substitution at the indium site of Fe in the diffusion process. Through these Fe-diffusion results, the nature of the defects in annealed undoped SI InP is better understood. © 2002 American Institute of Physics.published_or_final_versio