Network coding for wireless communication networks

This special issue includes a collection of 19 outstanding research papers which cover a diversity of topics on the application of network coding in wireless communication networks.published_or_final_versio

Groundwater storage changes in the Tibetan Plateau and adjacent areas revealed from GRACE satellite gravity data

Understanding groundwater storage (GWS) changes is vital to the utilization and control of water resources in the Tibetan Plateau. However, well level observations are rare in this big area, and reliable hydrology models including GWS are not available. We use hydro-geodesy to quantitate GWS changes in the Tibetan Plateau and surroundings from 2003 to 2009 using a combined analysis of satellite gravity and satellite altimetry data, hydrology models as well as a model of glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA). Release-5 GRACE gravity data are jointly used in a mascon fitting method to estimate the terrestrial water storage (TWS) changes during the period, from which the hydrology contributions and the GIA effects are effectively deducted to give the estimates of GWS changes for 12 selected regions of interest. The hydrology contributions are carefully calculated from glaciers and lakes by ICESat-1 satellite altimetry data, permafrost degradation by an Active-Layer Depth (ALD) model, soil moisture and snow water equivalent by multiple hydrology models, and the GIA effects are calculated with the new ICE-6G_C (VM5a) model. Taking into account the measurement errors and the variability of the models, the uncertainties are rigorously estimated for the TWS changes, the hydrology contributions (including GWS changes) and the GIA effect. For the first time, we show explicitly separated GWS changes in the Tibetan Plateau and adjacent areas except for those to the south of the Himalayas. We find increasing trend rates for eight basins: +2.46 ±2.24Gt/yrfor the Jinsha River basin, +1.77 ±2.09Gt/yrfor the Nujiang-Lancangjiang Rivers Source Region, +1.86 ±1.69Gt/yrfor the Yangtze River Source Region, +1.14 ±1.39Gt/yrfor the Yellow River Source Region, +1.52 ±0.95Gt/yrfor the Qaidam basin, +1.66 ±1.52Gt/yrfor the central Qiangtang Nature Reserve, +5.37 ±2.17Gt/yrfor the Upper Indus basin and +2.77 ±0.99Gt/yrfor the Aksu River basin. All these increasing trends are most likely caused by increased runoff recharges from melt water and/or precipitation in the surroundings. We also find that the administrative actions such as the Chinese Ecological Protection and Construction Project help to store more groundwater in the Three Rivers Source Region, and suggest that seepages from the Endorheic basin to the west of it are a possible source for GWS increase in this region. In addition, our estimates for GWS changes basically confirm previous results along Afghanistan, Pakistan, north India and Bangladesh, and clearly reflect the excessive use of groundwater. Our results will benefit the water resource management in the study area, and are of particular significance for the ecological restoration in the Tibetan Plateau.published_or_final_versio

Influences of crustal thickening in the Tibetan Plateau on loading modeling and inversion associated with water storage variation

We use the average crustal structure of the CRUST1.0 model for the Tibetan Plateau to establish a realistic earth model termed as TC1P, and data from the Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS) hydrology model and Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) data, to generate the hydrology signals assumed in this study. Modeling of surface radial displacements and gravity variation is performed using both TC1P and the global Preliminary Reference Earth Model (PREM). Furthermore, inversions of the hydrology signals based on simulated Global Positioning System (GPS) and GRACE data are performed using PREM. Results show that crust in TC1P is harder and softer than that in PREM above and below a depth of 15 km, respectively, causing larger differences in the computed load Love numbers and loading Green's functions. When annual hydrology signals are assumed, the differences of the radial displacements are found to be as large as approximately 0.6 mm for the truncated degree of 180; while for hydrology-trend signals the differences are very small. When annual hydrology signals and the trends are assumed, the differences in the surface gravity variation are very small. It is considered that TC1P can be used to efficiently remove the hydrological effects on the monitoring of crustal movement. It was also found that when PREM is used inappropriately, the inversion of the hydrology signals from simulated annual GPS signals can only recover approximately 88.0% of the annual hydrology signals for the truncated degree of 180, and the inversion of hydrology signals from the simulated trend GPS signals can recover approximately 92.5% for the truncated degree of 90. However, when using the simulated GRACE data, it is possible to recover almost 100%. Therefore, in future, the TC1P model can be used in the inversions of hydrology signals based on GPS network data. PREM is also valid for use with inversions of hydrology signals from GRACE data at resolutions of approximately 220 km and larger.published_or_final_versio

Water storage changes in North America retrieved from GRACE gravity and GPS data

published_or_final_versio

Efficient simulation of the spatial transmission dynamics of influenza

Early data from the 2009 H1N1 pandemic (H1N1pdm) suggest that previous studies over-estimated the within-country rate of spatial spread of pandemic influenza. As large spatially resolved data sets are constructed, the need for efficient simulation code with which to investigate the spatial patterns of the pandemic becomes clear. Here, we present a significant improvement to the efficiency of an individual based stochastic disease simulation framework commonly used in multiple previous studies. We quantify the efficiency of the revised algorithm and present an alternative parameterization of the model in terms of the basic reproductive number. We apply the model to the population of Taiwan and demonstrate how the location of the initial seed can influence spatial incidence profiles and the overall spread of the epidemic. Differences in incidence are driven by the relative connectivity of alternate seed locations. The ability to perform efficient simulation allows us to run a batch of simulations and take account of their average in real time. The averaged data are stable and can be used to differentiate spreading patterns that are not readily seen by only conducting a few runs. © 2010 Tsai et al.published_or_final_versio

Do unsaturated fatty acids have beneficial effect on reduction of stroke risk in hypertensive population?

Abstracts for Chaired Posters: no. CP10BACKGROUND: It has been suggested that monospecific unsaturated fatty acids have potential effect on protection against stroke. Studies on the effect of different categories of fatty acids are lacking. The stroke incidence is high in hypertensive patients. Therefore, we studied the relationship between serum level of 6 categories of fatty acids and stroke incidence in ...postprin

Strain Softening Induced by High Pressure Torsion in Copper Alloys

Three kinds of Cu-Al alloys and a pure Cu sample with different stacking fault energies (SFEs) are deformed using room temperature rolling (RR) and high pressure torsion (HPT), respectively. The microstructure is analysed by means of transaction electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction. It is found that HIPT is more feasible to obtain nanocrystals and profuse twins. Tailoring the SFE can promote sample strength without sacrificing the ductility of the Cu alloys. The tensile properties of samples processed by HPT and RR are compared. It is discovered that the HPT process leads to the strain softening phenomenon in samples with relatively high SFE. The excellent mechanical properties can be obtained in samples deformed by HPT with a SFE of 6 mJ/m(2), in which strain softening was restrained and strain hardening played a dominant role in the deformation process. The relationship between tensile properties and microstructures of the deformed metals is also investigated.110Ysciescopu

P-wave Quarkonium Decays to Meson Pairs

The processes of P-wave Quarkonium exclusive decays to two mesons are investigated, in which the final state vector mesons with various polarizations are considered separately. In the calculation, the initial heavy quarkonia are treated in the framework of non-relativistic quantum chromodynamics, whereas for light mesons, the light cone distribution amplitudes up to twist-3 are employed. It turns out that the higher twist contribution is significant and provides a possible explanation for the observation of the hadron helicity selection rule violated processes $\chi_{c1}\rightarrow \phi\phi,\omega\omega$ by the BESIII collaboration in recently. We also evaluate the $\chi_{b1}\to J/\psi J/\psi$ process and find that its branching ratio is big enough to be measured at the B-factories.Comment: more results and discussions adde

Genetic Incorporation of Unnatural Amino Acids into Proteins in Mycobacterium tuberculosis

New tools are needed to study the intracellular pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), the causative agent of tuberculosis (TB), to facilitate new drug discovery and vaccine development. We have developed methodology to genetically incorporate unnatural amino acids into proteins in Mycobacterium smegmatis, BCG and Mtb, grown both extracellularly in culture and inside host cells. Orthogonal mutant tRNATyr/tyrosyl-tRNA synthetase pairs derived from Methanococcus jannaschii and evolved in Escherichia coli incorporate a variety of unnatural amino acids (including photocrosslinking, chemically reactive, heavy atom containing, and immunogenic amino acids) into proteins in response to the amber nonsense codon. By taking advantage of the fidelity and suppression efficiency of the MjtRNA/pIpaRS pair in mycobacteria, we are also able to use p-iodophenylalanine to induce the expression of proteins in mycobacteria both extracellularly in culture and inside of mammalian host cells. This provides a new approach to regulate the expression of reporter genes or mycobacteria endogenous genes of interest. The establishment of the unnatural amino acid expression system in Mtb, an intracellular pathogen, should facilitate studies of TB biology and vaccine development