In-plane Crushing Analysis of Cellular Materials Using Vector Form Intrinsic Finite Element

The crushing of cellular materials is a highly nonlinear problem, for which geometrical, material, and contact/impact must be treated in one analysis. In order to develop a framework able to solve it efficiently and accurately, in this paper procedures for in-plane crushing analysis of cellular materials using vector form intrinsic finite element (VFIFE) is performed. A beam element of VFIFE is employed to handle large rotation and large deflection in the cell walls. An elastic-plastic material model with mixed hardening rule is adopted to account for material nonlinearity. In addition, an efficient contact/impact algorithm is designed to treat the complex contact/impact encountered in crushed cellular materials. Numerical results performed reveals that the procedures proposed in this paper are sound and reliable to simulate crushing of diverse cellular materials

The Application of RFID in Emergency Medicine

Recently natural disasters and man-made calamities happened very frequently in Taiwan, some of which caused hundreds of inhabitants died and injured. The most important thing that makes the emergency medical treatment system work effectively during these catastrophes is dependent on the accuracy and immediacy of the information among ambulances, hospitals, fire bureaus, public health bureaus or offices, and emergency executive centers. With this information, the medical system can arrange the resources efficiently. Radio frequency identification (RFID) is a kind of wireless technology that it uses radio frequency (RF) to identify target objects. The characteristics of RFID are its identification and orientation. Through tracing electronic signals, RFID is able to identify, orientate and trace patients or medical materials directly and continuously. Thus, RFID can help managers of medical institutions to promote emergency medical treatment quality, reduce medical mistakes effectively, and increase efficiency and effectiveness in hospitals. A series of emergency medical delivery applications that use 915MHz RFID rings is developed in this paper. Through the help of RFID, the paper integrates the information of the whole emergency medical supply chain, and establishes a new model of emergency medical activities to solve the problems of information blocking among different medical rescue units. By solving these problems, the new model can enhance the rescue quality, reduce the damage of the disaster and strengthen the patient-oriented emergency care system

(2,2 '-Bipyridine)(2-{1- 2-(dimethylamino)ethylimino ethyl}-4-methoxyphenolat o)copper(II) perchlorate

The Cu atom of the title complex, [Cu(C(13)H(19)N(2)O(2))(C(10)H(8)N(2))]ClO(4), has a distorted square-pyramidal geometry with all three of the donor atoms from the N, N', O-tridentate Schiff base ligand in the equatorial positions and the bipyridine N atoms in an equatorial-axial binding mode. The Cu atom is 0.1801 (11) angstrom above the N(3)O mean basal plane

Analysis and Development of Emergency Management Information System for Railway Systems in Taiwan

Railway is one of the most efficient, convenient, and comfortable ways with maximum mobility to meet people. Railway accidents or disasters often cause delays and service interruptions, resulting in operational and other loss. Despite many railway systems in Taiwan having a variety of monitoring systems for natural disasters, they still need an efficient platform for the emergency management of disasters and accidents since time and efficiency are the keys to emergency management. This study aims to fill in this gap by developing an emergency management information system for Railway Systems in Taiwan, i.e. “Railway Emergency Management Information System”, to support railway emergency management center and its sub-divisions in resource management, communication, messaging, and information sharing among different groups. The system includes many features that will improve communications between emergency management center and the mobile emergency management center to facilitate the progress of the disaster control units and dispatching at the disaster site. The study’s information system has been designated by local railway administration as the core system and starts trial since February 2012. Information requirement analysis, framework and design of the aforementioned information system will be discussed in this paper. It is hoped that the present study's information system research will help improve the emergency response of railway administration and provide safer rail transport service for the passengers.conference pape

Making things happen : a model of proactive motivation

Being proactive is about making things happen, anticipating and preventing problems, and seizing opportunities. It involves self-initiated efforts to bring about change in the work environment and/or oneself to achieve a different future. The authors develop existing perspectives on this topic by identifying proactivity as a goal-driven process involving both the setting of a proactive goal (proactive goal generation) and striving to achieve that proactive goal (proactive goal striving). The authors identify a range of proactive goals that individuals can pursue in organizations. These vary on two dimensions: the future they aim to bring about (achieving a better personal fit within one’s work environment, improving the organization’s internal functioning, or enhancing the organization’s strategic fit with its environment) and whether the self or situation is being changed. The authors then identify “can do,” “reason to,” and “energized to” motivational states that prompt proactive goal generation and sustain goal striving. Can do motivation arises from perceptions of self-efficacy, control, and (low) cost. Reason to motivation relates to why someone is proactive, including reasons flowing from intrinsic, integrated, and identified motivation. Energized to motivation refers to activated positive affective states that prompt proactive goal processes. The authors suggest more distal antecedents, including individual differences (e.g., personality, values, knowledge and ability) as well as contextual variations in leadership, work design, and interpersonal climate, that influence the proactive motivational states and thereby boost or inhibit proactive goal processes. Finally, the authors summarize priorities for future researc

Estrogen receptor alpha polymorphism is associated with pelvic organ prolapse risk

Estrogen and estrogen receptors are known to play important roles in the pathophysiology of pelvic organ prolapse (POP). We investigated whether estrogen receptor alpha (ER alpha) gene polymorphisms were associated with POP risk by conducting a case-control association study in 88 women with POP and 153 women without POP. Genotypes of the ER alpha (ESR1) gene polymorphisms (rs17847075, rs2207647, rs2234693, rs3798577, and rs2228480) were determined by polymerase chain reaction, followed by restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis. There was significant difference between women with and those without POP in the distribution of the ESR1 rs2228480 genotypes evaluated. By using multivariable logistic regression, age and ESR1 rs2228480 genotype GA were significantly associated with POP risk. Although the sample size of women with POP studied is small, the present study shows that ER alpha genotype may be associated with POP risk

Cost-effectiveness of Clinical Pathway in Coronary Artery Bypass Surgery

Few studies have been devoted to the exploration of the effect of clinical pathways on coronary artery diseases treated with coronary artery bypass (CAB) surgery. This study was aimed to investigate the cost and effectiveness of the clinical pathway on CAB surgery in a medical center. With a retrospective dataset in 2003-2007, 212 CAB surgery patients were included. Data of the costs and postoperative complication occurrence and length of stays were the focus and patient demographics, surgical risk indicator EuroSCORE, surgical conditions were collected. It revealed that there was differentiation across specified cost items in beating heart CAB surgery patients, but not for heart arrest CAB surgery patients with and without clinical pathways enrolled. In addition, there was no difference in postoperative complication occurrence in CAB surgery patients enrolled into clinical pathways. However, robotic beating heart CAB surgery patients enrolled clinical pathways were shown to have less postoperative ordinary ward stay than those not enrolled clinical pathways. CAB surgery patients' age and surgical risks were related to their postoperative lengths of stay to some extent

Measurement of the Bottom-Strange Meson Mixing Phase in the Full CDF Data Set

We report a measurement of the bottom-strange meson mixing phase \beta_s using the time evolution of B0_s -> J/\psi (->\mu+\mu-) \phi (-> K+ K-) decays in which the quark-flavor content of the bottom-strange meson is identified at production. This measurement uses the full data set of proton-antiproton collisions at sqrt(s)= 1.96 TeV collected by the Collider Detector experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron, corresponding to 9.6 fb-1 of integrated luminosity. We report confidence regions in the two-dimensional space of \beta_s and the B0_s decay-width difference \Delta\Gamma_s, and measure \beta_s in [-\pi/2, -1.51] U [-0.06, 0.30] U [1.26, \pi/2] at the 68% confidence level, in agreement with the standard model expectation. Assuming the standard model value of \beta_s, we also determine \Delta\Gamma_s = 0.068 +- 0.026 (stat) +- 0.009 (syst) ps-1 and the mean B0_s lifetime, \tau_s = 1.528 +- 0.019 (stat) +- 0.009 (syst) ps, which are consistent and competitive with determinations by other experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, Phys. Rev. Lett 109, 171802 (2012

Customer emotions in service failure and recovery encounters

Emotions play a significant role in the workplace, and considerable attention has been given to the study of employee emotions. Customers also play a central function in organizations, but much less is known about customer emotions. This chapter reviews the growing literature on customer emotions in employee–customer interfaces with a focus on service failure and recovery encounters, where emotions are heightened. It highlights emerging themes and key findings, addresses the measurement, modeling, and management of customer emotions, and identifies future research streams. Attention is given to emotional contagion, relationships between affective and cognitive processes, customer anger, customer rage, and individual differences