Grain Residuals and Time Requirements for Combine Cleaning

Emerging identity-preserved grain markets depend on avoidance of commingling grain at harvest. Knowledge of where grain resides in a combine, cleaning labor requirements, and resulting purity levels would assist producers. Measurements were made of grain and other material residing in different areas of rotary- and cylinder-type combines in replicated clean-outs during corn and soybean harvest and also in preliminary clean-outs during oat harvest. Concentration of the prior (i.e., commingled) grain was measured in the first grain harvested of the subsequent crop

Strategies for Peripheral Nerve Repair

PURPPOSE AND REVIEW: This review focuses on biomechanical and cellular considerations required for development of biomaterials and engineered tissues suitable for implantation following PNI, as well as translational requirements relating to outcome measurements for testing success in patients. RECENT FINDINGS: Therapies that incorporate multiple aspects of the regenerative environment are likely to be key to improving therapies for nerve regeneration. This represents a complex challenge when considering the diversity of biological, chemical and mechanical factors involved. In addition, clinical outcome measures following peripheral nerve repair which are sensitive and responsive to changes in the tissue microenvironment following neural injury and regeneration are required. SUMMARY: Effective new therapies for the treatment of PNI are likely to include engineered tissues and biomaterials able to evoke a tissue microenvironment that incorporates both biochemical and mechanical features supportive to regeneration. Translational development of these technologies towards clinical use in humans drives a concomitant need for improved clinical measures to quantify nerve regeneration

A discrete slug population model determined by egg production

Slugs are significant pests in agriculture (as well as a nuisance to gardeners), and it is therefore important to understand their population dynamics for the construction of efficient and effective control measures. Differential equation models of slug populations require the inclusion of large (variable) temporal delays, and strong seasonal forcing results in a non-autonomous system. This renders such models open to only a limited amount of rigorous analysis. In this paper, we derive a novel batch model based purely upon the quantity of eggs produced at different times of the year. This model is open to considerable reduction; from the resulting two variable discrete-time system it is possible to reconstruct the dynamics of the full population across the year and give conditions for extinction or global stability and persistence. Furthermore, the steady state temporal population distribution displays qualitatively different behavior with only small changes in the survival probability of slugs. The model demonstrates how small variations in the favorability of different years may result in widely different slug population fluctuations between consecutive years, and is in good agreement with field data

Fiber optic temperature sensor

An inexpensive, lightweight fiber optic micro-sensor that is suitable for applications which may require remote temperature sensing. The disclosed temperature sensor includes a phosphor material that, after receiving incident light stimulation, is adapted to emit phosphorescent radiation output signals, the amplitude decay rate and wavelength of which are functions of the sensed temperature