Symbolic Ingredient Branding to Promote Premier Locally Produced Material in Global Consumer Market: A Case of American Wild Alligator Leather

Co-branding is one of the most commonly used strategies to promote new brands and maximize the market potential of established brands (Keller, 1993; Rooney, 1995). Ingredient branding (InBranding) is a popular co-branding strategy involving host and ingredient brands to develop an ingredient branding offering (IBO). Such co-branding is a win-win strategy for both host and ingredient brands working together to expand markets (Norris, 1992). This exploratory conceptual study focuses on the premier fashion component, American wild alligator leather

A novel alkali-activated cement from mineral admixture, superabsorbent polymers, and alkali-doped carboxylate glass

Acknowledgments We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of China National Key R&D Program (Grant No. 2018YFE0106300) and National Nature Science Foundation of China (No: 51925205). We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of “111” project (No. B18038). We gratefully acknowledge the Dr. Helle Rüsz Hansen for her contribution to the development of the slow release glasses used in this paper.Peer reviewe

Disturbance rejection for nonlinear uncertain systems with output measurement errors: Application to a helicopter model

As a virtual sensor, disturbance observer provides an alternative approach to reconstruct lumped disturbances (including external disturbances and system uncertainties) based upon system states/outputs measured by physical sensors. Not surprisingly, measurement errors bring adverse effects on the control performance and even the stability of the closed-loop system. Toward this end, this paper investigates the problem of disturbance observer based control for a class of disturbed uncertain nonlinear systems in the presence of unknown output measurement errors. Instead of inheriting from the estimation-error-driven structure of Luenberger type observer, the proposed disturbance observer only explicitly uses the control input. It has been proved that the proposed method endows the closed-loop system with strong robustness against output measurement errors and system uncertainties. With rigorous analysis under the semiglobal stability criterion, the guideline of gain choice based upon the proposed structure is provided. To better demonstrate feature and validity of the proposed method, numerical simulation and comparative experiments of a helicopter model are implemented

Trait Mindfulness Is Associated With the Self-Similarity of Heart Rate Variability

Previous studies have linked trait mindfulness with better self-regulation and adaptation. Heart rate variability (HRV) is a good physiological indicator of the capacity for self-regulation and adaptation. The present study explored the relationship between trait mindfulness and HRV from the viewpoint of crosstalking between different HRV parameter pairs, which would reflect the dynamic interactions between each pair of HRV parameters in different processes. We measured the trait mindfulness of seventy-four undergraduate students and recorded nine HRV parameters during the following four consecutive experimental phases: (1) calming phase, (2) mental arithmetic task phase, (3) recovery phase, and (4) mindfulness practice phase. The relationship between trait mindfulness and HRV was explored at the following three levels: (1) the absolute level, i.e., HRV parameters in four different states, (2) the difference-change level, i.e., differences in HRV parameters between different states, and (3) the crosstalking level, i.e., self-similarity of crosstalking HRV parameter pairs. The results supported the following hypothesis: trait mindfulness, as measured by the Mindful Attention Awareness Scale (MAAS), was significantly and positively correlated with the self-similarity of crosstalking HRV parameter pairs but was not significantly correlated with the HRV parameters at the difference-change and absolute levels. These findings indicate that as trait mindfulness increases, the ability to maintain ANS function homeostasis improves.HIGHLIGHTS-Trait mindfulness is associated with better self-regulation and adaptation.-Heart rate variability (HRV) is a good physiological indicator of the capacity for self-regulation and adaptation.-Trait mindfulness is significantly correlated with self-similarity of crosstalking HRV parameter pairs but not with the HRV parameters at the difference-change or absolute levels

Symbolic Ingredient Branding to Promote Premier Locally Produced Material in Global Consumer Market: A Case of American Wild Alligator Leather

Co-branding is one of the most commonly used strategies to promote new brands and maximize the market potential of established brands (Keller, 1993; Rooney, 1995). Ingredient branding (InBranding) is a popular co-branding strategy involving host and ingredient brands to develop an ingredient branding offering (IBO). Such co-branding is a win-win strategy for both host and ingredient brands working together to expand markets (Norris, 1992). This exploratory conceptual study focuses on the premier fashion component, American wild alligator leather.</p

Maximum Correntropy with Variable Center Unscented Kalman Filter for Robust Power System State Estimation

The robust Kalman filter with correntropy loss has received much attention in recent years for forecasting-aided state estimation in power systems, since it efficiently reduces the negative influence of various abnormal situations, such as non-Gaussian communication, changing environment, and instrument failures, and obviously improves the stability of power systems. However, the existing correntropy-based robust Kalman filters usually use the Gaussian function with a fixed center as the kernel function in correntropy, which may not be a suitable choice in practical applications of power system forecasting-aided state estimation (PSSE). To address this issue, a new and robust unscented Kalman filter, called the maximum correntropy with variable center unscented Kalman filter (MCVUKF), is proposed in this paper for PSSE. Specifically, MCVUKF adopts an extended version of correntropy, whose center can be located at any position, to replace the original correntropy in an unscented Kalman filter to improve the performance in PSSE. Moreover, by using an exponential function of the innovation vector to adjust a covariance matrix, an enhanced MCVUKF (En-MCVUKF) method is also developed for suppressing the influence of bad data to the innovation vector and further improving the accuracy of PSSE. Finally, extensive simulations have been conducted on IEEE 14-bus, 30-bus, and 57-bus test power systems, and the simulation results have shown the superiority of the proposed MCVUKF and En-MCVUKF methods compared with several related state-of-the-art Kalman filter methods

A green process for producing Na2S from waste Na2SO4 through hydrogen agglomerate fluidized bed reduction of BaSO4

A green process is proposed to produce Na2S from waste Na2SO4 through hydrogen agglomerate fluidized bed reduction of BaSO4. In the new process, BaSO4 acts as the circulating medium, and the synthesis of Na2S from waste Na2SO4 is performed via a two-step approach. First, BaSO4 is reduced to BaS by hydrogen at high temperatures. Then, the reduction product BaS is put into the Na2SO4 solution to prepare Na2S through the metathetical reaction. Simultaneously, insoluble BaSO4 is regenerated by filtration and drying, and it can be reused in the reduction reaction. Experimental results showed that the looping material BaSO4 could be reduced to a conversion rate above 80% at 900-950 degrees C in a conical fluidized bed by agglomerate fluidization. The introduction of Na2SO4 could greatly accelerate the reduction rate of BaSO4, and detailed analyses of the reduction kinetics indicated that the addition of Na2SO4 could strongly catalyze the reduction of BaSO4 by reducing the apparent reaction activation energy, which was realized through the synergistic effect of Na2SO4 and Na2S. The consumption of BaSO4 in the reduction reaction was nearly equal to that regenerated in the metathetical reaction, and the reactivity of BaSO4 remained almost the same as the original reactivity during multiple cycles, which indicated the strong recyclability of BaSO4 in the new process. After dehydration treatment of the Na2S solution by evaporation concentration, cooling crystallization, and vacuum drying, anhydrous Na2S of high purity was obtained eventually. Compared to traditional coal-based reduction approaches, the new process is more environmentally friendly, highly efficient, and low-cost

Spatiotemporal Joint Cleaning of Distribution Network Measurement Data Based on Correntropy Criterion with Variable Center Unscented Kalman Filter

Measurement data cleaning is a key step of edge computing in a distribution network; it is beneficial to improve the state perception and regional autonomy level of a distribution network. According to the temporal and spatial correlation of measurement data in the distribution network, a joint cleaning method of measurement data in a distribution network is proposed based on the correntropy criterion with variable center unscented Kalman filter (CC-VC-UKF). Initially, the mean square error (MSE) in the original unscented Kalman filter (UKF) is replaced by the correntropy criterion with variable center (CC-VC) to improve the accuracy of filtering the measurement data in the distribution network with a non-Gaussian non-zero mean measurement deviation. Then, the measured data of different measuring devices located on the same section of the line are filtered based on the CC-VC-UKF algorithm according to their respective reference time series to improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the measured data. Then, the filtered measured data are filtered and cleaned based on the CC-VC-UKF algorithm according to the space&ndash;time joint filtering and cleaning technology. Finally, the method is used to test the measurement data of the distribution network obtained by a power supply company in a city in north China to solve the problem of measurement deviation caused by the existence of space distance. Results show that this method can obtain FTU measurement data with higher precision from network topology based on the filtered TTU measurement data through the media of filtered spatial measurement deviation

A green process for producing Na2S from waste Na2SO4 through hydrogen agglomerate fluidized bed reduction of BaSO4

A green process is proposed to produce Na2S from waste Na2SO4 through hydrogen agglomerate fluidized bed reduction of BaSO4. In the new process, BaSO4 acts as the circulating medium, and the synthesis of Na2S from waste Na2SO4 is performed via a two-step approach. First, BaSO4 is reduced to BaS by hydrogen at high temperatures. Then, the reduction product BaS is put into the Na2SO4 solution to prepare Na2S through the metathetical reaction. Simultaneously, insoluble BaSO4 is regenerated by filtration and drying, and it can be reused in the reduction reaction. Experimental results showed that the looping material BaSO4 could be reduced to a conversion rate above 80% at 900-950 degrees C in a conical fluidized bed by agglomerate fluidization. The introduction of Na2SO4 could greatly accelerate the reduction rate of BaSO4, and detailed analyses of the reduction kinetics indicated that the addition of Na2SO4 could strongly catalyze the reduction of BaSO4 by reducing the apparent reaction activation energy, which was realized through the synergistic effect of Na2SO4 and Na2S. The consumption of BaSO4 in the reduction reaction was nearly equal to that regenerated in the metathetical reaction, and the reactivity of BaSO4 remained almost the same as the original reactivity during multiple cycles, which indicated the strong recyclability of BaSO4 in the new process. After dehydration treatment of the Na2S solution by evaporation concentration, cooling crystallization, and vacuum drying, anhydrous Na2S of high purity was obtained eventually. Compared to traditional coal-based reduction approaches, the new process is more environmentally friendly, highly efficient, and low-cost