Possible hard X-ray shortages in bursts from KS 1731-260 and 4U 1705-44

Aims: A hard X-ray shortage, implying the cooling of the corona, was observed during bursts of IGR J17473-272, 4U 1636-536, Aql X-1, and GS 1826-238. Apart from these four sources, we investigate here an atoll sample, in which the number of bursts for each source is larger than 5, to explore the possible additional hard X-ray shortage during {\it Rossi X-ray timing explorer (RXTE)} era. Methods: According to the source catalog that shows type-I bursts, we analyzed all the available pointing observations of these sources carried out by the {\it RXTE} proportional counter array (PCA). We grouped and combined the bursts according to their outburst states and searched for the possible hard X-ray shortage while bursting. Results: We found that the island states of KS 1731-260 and 4U 1705-44 show a hard X-ray shortage at significant levels of 4.5 and 4.7 $\sigma$ and a systematic time lag of $0.9 \pm 2.1$ s and $2.5 \pm 2.0$ s with respect to the soft X-rays, respectively. While in their banana branches and other sources, we did not find any consistent shortage.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, accepted by A&A as a research not

Effect of electromagnetic stirring on solidification structure of austenitic stainless steel in horizontal continuous casting

An investigation on the influence of low frequency rotary electromagnetic stirring on solidification structure of austenitic stainless steel in horizontal continuous casting was experimentally conducted and carried out on an industrial trial basis. The results show that application of appropriate electromagnetic stirring parameters can obviously improve the macrostructure of austenitic stainless steel, in which both columnar and equiaxed grains can be greatly refined and shrinkage porosity or cavity zone along centerline can be remarkably decreased due to eliminating intracrystalline and enlarging equiaxed grains zone. The industrial trials verify that the electromagnetic stirring intensity of austenitic stainless steel should be higher than that of plain carbon steel. Electromagnetic stirring has somewhat affected the macrostructure of austenitic stainless steel even if the magnetic flux density of the electromagnetic stirring reaches 90 mT (amplitude reaches 141 mT) in average at frequency f=3-4Hz, which provides a reference for the optimization of design and process parameters when applying the rotary electromagnetic stirrer

Multi-Modal Knowledge Graph Transformer Framework for Multi-Modal Entity Alignment

Multi-Modal Entity Alignment (MMEA) is a critical task that aims to identify equivalent entity pairs across multi-modal knowledge graphs (MMKGs). However, this task faces challenges due to the presence of different types of information, including neighboring entities, multi-modal attributes, and entity types. Directly incorporating the above information (e.g., concatenation or attention) can lead to an unaligned information space. To address these challenges, we propose a novel MMEA transformer, called MoAlign, that hierarchically introduces neighbor features, multi-modal attributes, and entity types to enhance the alignment task. Taking advantage of the transformer's ability to better integrate multiple information, we design a hierarchical modifiable self-attention block in a transformer encoder to preserve the unique semantics of different information. Furthermore, we design two entity-type prefix injection methods to integrate entity-type information using type prefixes, which help to restrict the global information of entities not present in the MMKGs. Our extensive experiments on benchmark datasets demonstrate that our approach outperforms strong competitors and achieves excellent entity alignment performance

Detection of the freezing state and frozen section thickness of fine sand by ultrasonic testing

Determining the freezing state and frozen section thickness is fundamental to assessing the development of artificial frozen walls but is commonly difficult or inaccurate because of a limited number and fixed position of thermometer holes under complex field conditions. We report a novel experimental design that measures soil temperature, water content, and ultrasonic properties to monitor movement of the cryofront (0°C isotherm), water migration, and acoustic parameters during progressive upward freezing of fine sand under laboratory conditions. Ultrasonic testing during different stages of freezing revealed changes in three acoustic parameters (wave velocity, wave amplitude, and frequency spectrum). As the cryofront ascended through the sand at different water contents, wave velocity continually increased, whereas wave amplitude initially decreased and then increased. Wave velocity measurements revealed the cryofront position during freezing, but measurements of wave amplitude did not. The frequency components indicated the frequency of different evolving freezing regions during upward freezing and the freezing state of fine sand during later stages of freezing. The freezing state can be evaluated on the basis of single vs multiple peaks and the kurtosis of frequency spectrum change. An equation developed to predict the thickness of the frozen section and tested against measured values in the laboratory and field showed accuracies of 86.84–99.33%. The equation is used successfully to estimate frozen wall thickness in artificially frozen fine sand in Guangzhou, China

Retrospective analysis of the impact on the nursing compliance to rehabilitation in elderly patients with stroke dysphagia and their family members

目的  探讨脑卒中吞咽障碍患者及家属饮食护理的依从性对康复效果的影响。方法  对2014年1月14日—12月29日入院的老年脑卒中吞咽障碍患者43名，其中女性患者18名，脑出血8名，脑梗死10名；男性患着25名，脑出血11名，脑梗死14名进行SSA评分，根据误吸风险等级实施饮食分级护理，依据临床营养学知识为患者选择合理的饮食和进食方式进行针对性的饮食指导，强化安全意识，所有患者给予吞咽训练。比较患者住院期间饮食护理依从性与患者发生误吸、窒息、肺炎的关系，采用日常生活能力评估表评价对康复效果的影响。结果  2014年老年脑卒中吞咽障碍患者43例，依据SSA评定结果对吞咽障碍患者进行误吸风险分级，实施相应的个性化的饮食分级护理和吞咽指导8周，依从性好的患者中发生窒息1例，肺炎1例，误吸3例；依从性差的患者中发生窒息3例，肺炎5例，误吸8例，根据患者饮食护理依从性比较，误吸发生率比较有统计学意义(P<0.05)。结论  提高患者饮食护理的依从性，保障了病人的饮食安全和生命安全，完善了护理安全预警系统。Objective: To investigate the effects of diet nursing compliance to the rehabilitation in stroke patients with dysphagia. Methods: SSA scale was assessed for 43 cases of elderly stroke patients with dysphagia. The patients were admitted from January 14 to December 29, 2014, including 18 female patients (cerebral hemorrhage 8 cases, cerebral infarction 10 cases) and 25 men patients (cerebral hemorrhage 11 cases, cerebral infarction 14 cases). According to the level of risk of aspiration, diet grading nursing was done. A reasonable diet and eating pattern were selected, which was based on clinical nutrition knowledge. Swallowing training was given to the patients, with targeted dietary guidance to strengthen safety awareness. The relationship of the diet care compliance and the aspiration, asphyxia, and pneumonia was studied, and daily living assessment table was used to evaluate the effect of rehabilitation. Results: 43 cases of elderly stroke patients with dysphagia in 2014 were included. According to the SSA evaluation results, patients were graded by aspiration hazard. After the implementation of appropriate personalized diet grading nursing and swallowing guidance for eight weeks, patients with good compliance occurred: asphyxia 1 case, pneumonia 1 case, aspiration 3 cases, but patients with poor compliance occurs : asphyxia 3 cases, pneumonia 5 cases, aspiration 8 cases. Aspiration incidence based on patient care compliance was statistically significant (P<0.05). Conclusion: It is important to improve diet nursing compliance in patients. It can provide protection for food safety and life safety, and improve the care and safety warning systems.

An optical fibre dynamic instrumented palpation sensor for the characterisation of biological tissue

AbstractThe diagnosis of prostate cancer using invasive techniques (such as biopsy and blood tests for prostate-specific antigen) and non-invasive techniques (such as digital rectal examination and trans-rectal ultrasonography) may be enhanced by using an additional dynamic instrumented palpation approach to prostate tissue classification. A dynamically actuated membrane sensor/actuator has been developed that incorporates an optical fibre Fabry–Pérot interferometer to record the displacement of the membrane when it is pressed on to different tissue samples. The membrane sensor was tested on a silicon elastomer prostate model with enlarged and stiffer material on one side to simulate early stage prostate cancer. The interferometer measurement was found to have high dynamic range and accuracy, with a minimum displacement resolution of ±0.4μm over a 721μm measurement range. The dynamic response of the membrane sensor when applied to different tissue types changed depending on the stiffness of the tissue being measured. This demonstrates the feasibility of an optically tracked dynamic palpation technique for classifying tissue type based on the dynamic response of the sensor/actuator