StageInteractor: Query-based Object Detector with Cross-stage Interaction

Previous object detectors make predictions based on dense grid points or numerous preset anchors. Most of these detectors are trained with one-to-many label assignment strategies. On the contrary, recent query-based object detectors depend on a sparse set of learnable queries and a series of decoder layers. The one-to-one label assignment is independently applied on each layer for the deep supervision during training. Despite the great success of query-based object detection, however, this one-to-one label assignment strategy demands the detectors to have strong fine-grained discrimination and modeling capacity. To solve the above problems, in this paper, we propose a new query-based object detector with cross-stage interaction, coined as StageInteractor. During the forward propagation, we come up with an efficient way to improve this modeling ability by reusing dynamic operators with lightweight adapters. As for the label assignment, a cross-stage label assigner is applied subsequent to the one-to-one label assignment. With this assigner, the training target class labels are gathered across stages and then reallocated to proper predictions at each decoder layer. On MS COCO benchmark, our model improves the baseline by 2.2 AP, and achieves 44.8 AP with ResNet-50 as backbone, 100 queries and 12 training epochs. With longer training time and 300 queries, StageInteractor achieves 51.1 AP and 52.2 AP with ResNeXt-101-DCN and Swin-S, respectively

Evaluating the influence of specimen preparation on saturated hydraulic conductivity using nuclear magnetic resonance technology

© 2019 The Author(s). A series of laboratory tests were performed to investigate the influences of specimen preparation on pore size distribution of soil and saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ks). Nuclear magnetic resonance technology was used to measure the pore size distribution of the saturated samples of silty soil, which were prepared by three different kinds of methods: Proctor compaction, static compaction, and the consolidation method. The Ks of the samples was measured by the falling head permeability test. The results show that the difference in Ks caused by different specimen preparations can be large as one order of magnitude, as the measured Ks varied from 3.09 ´ 10−3 to 3.36 ´ 10−4 cm s−1. The consolidated specimen tended to have the greatest Ks value, followed by those prepared by Proctor compaction and static compaction. The observed difference highlights the importance of pore structure in determining Ks. This study also presents a pore-information-based theoretical approach for predicting Ks. A comparison of measured data shows that the proposed model performs better than the traditional void-ratio-based models

Anti-inflammatory and anti-apoptotic effect of Rhodiola crenulata extract on spinal cord injury in rats

Purpose: To investigate the effects of Rhodiola crenulata on injured spinal cord tissue recovery due to the presence of neuroprotective constituents such as salidroside, tyrosol, rosavins, and crenulatanoside.Methods: Effect of R. crenulata extract (RCE) at doses of 10, 20 and 50 mg kg-1 was investigated for spinal cord injury (SCI) recovery in rat. The anti-inflammatory activity was estimated by haematoxylineosin (H&E) staining and myeloperoxidase activity assay, while the anti-apoptotic effect was investigated by terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick-end labelling (TUNEL) and caspase-3 activity assays in SCI tissue.Results: RCE (10 mg mL-1) treatment resulted in a Basso, Beattie and Bresnahan (BBB) score of 14.50 ± 1.22, while negative control showed a BBB score of 6.17 ± 1.60. H&E staining in test groups treated with 20 and 50 mg kg-1 RCE showed statistically different (p < 0.05) histological scores (2.0 ± 0.37 and 1.83 ± 0.31, respectively) which are higher than those of SCI (S)-induced group. The estimates of apoptosis in SCI tissue) revealed significant differences from the normalised levels in RCE-treated groups.Conclusion: The plant extract produced good recovery of injured spinal tissue,  suggesting that further clinical trials and chemical constituent studies are  warranted.Keywords: Rhodiola crenulata, Haematoxylin-eosin, Caspase-3, Anti-inflammatory, Anti-apoptoti

Effects of n-Decenylsuccinic Acid (n-DSA) and It's Monomethyl Ester (m-MDSA) on Water and Ion Flux in Isolated Roots

The purpose of this study was (1) to measure the changes in water flux in isolated roots exposed to n-DSA and its mono-methly ester (m-MDSA) using a photometric technique in the absence of an externally applied suction and (2) to measure the flux of Na and K in similarly treated roots using a flame photometric method

Cathodoluminescence and Cross-sectional Transmission Electron Microscopy Studies for Deformation Behaviors of GaN Thin Films Under Berkovich Nanoindentation

In this study, details of Berkovich nanoindentation-induced mechanical deformation mechanisms of metal-organic chemical-vapor deposition-derived GaN thin films have been systematic investigated with the aid of the cathodoluminescence (CL) and the cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy (XTEM) techniques. The multiple “pop-in” events were observed in the load-displacement (P–h) curve and appeared to occur randomly by increasing the indentation load. These instabilities are attributed to the dislocation nucleation and propagation. The CL images of nanoindentation show very well-defined rosette structures with the hexagonal system and, clearly display the distribution of deformation-induced extended defects/dislocations which affect CL emission. By using focused ion beam milling to accurately position the cross-section of an indented area, XTEM results demonstrate that the major plastic deformation is taking place through the propagation of dislocations. The present observations are in support to the massive dislocations activities occurring underneath the indenter during the loading cycle. No evidence of either phase transformation or formation of micro-cracking was observed by means of scanning electron microscopy and XTEM observations. We also discuss how these features correlate with Berkovich nanoindentation produced defects/dislocations structures