Effects of Dynamic Properties of Rockfill Materials on Seismic Response of Concrete-Faced Rockfill Dams

In this paper, the equivalent-linear method is used for three-dimensional seismic response analyses of concrete-faced rockfill dams (CFRDs). Different combinations of various parameters such as small-strain shear modulus, strain-dependent patterns of modulus and hysteretic damping, are considered to systematically investigate the effects of dynamic properties of rockfill-type coarse-grained materials on seismic dynamic response of CFRDs. It is concluded that the nonlinearity of embankment material has a significant effect on both vibration characteristics and seismic response behavior of CFRDs. Numerical results presented are instructive to gain a better understanding on earthquake-resistant behavior of CFRDs and the effects of dynamic properties of rockfills

the case of Australia

Thesis(Master) --KDI School:Master of Public Policy,2011I examine earnings management around seasoned equity offerings in Australian Listed firms from 2002 to 2008. Seasoned equity issuers can raise reported earnings by altering discretionary accounting accruals. Consistent with prior studies (for example , Rangan, 1998 ; Lakshmanan, 2000; Yoon and Miller, 2002; Jo, Kim and Park, 2007; Guthrie and Sokolowsky, 2010; among many others ), I find that firms in Australia do manage their earnings in the year prior to seasoned equity offerings and the year of seasoned equity offerings, however, depending on different industries, some firms manage their earnings in the year prior to seasoned equity offering, for example, firms from industrials, consumer staples, health care and IT industry while other firms manage their earnings in the year of seasoned equity offering, for example, firms from the materials, industrials, consumer discretionary and consumer staples industry.Outstandingmasterpublishedby Xiao Xingzheng

On the Generation of Medical Question-Answer Pairs

Question answering (QA) has achieved promising progress recently. However, answering a question in real-world scenarios like the medical domain is still challenging, due to the requirement of external knowledge and the insufficient quantity of high-quality training data. In the light of these challenges, we study the task of generating medical QA pairs in this paper. With the insight that each medical question can be considered as a sample from the latent distribution of questions given answers, we propose an automated medical QA pair generation framework, consisting of an unsupervised key phrase detector that explores unstructured material for validity, and a generator that involves a multi-pass decoder to integrate structural knowledge for diversity. A series of experiments have been conducted on a real-world dataset collected from the National Medical Licensing Examination of China. Both automatic evaluation and human annotation demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. Further investigation shows that, by incorporating the generated QA pairs for training, significant improvement in terms of accuracy can be achieved for the examination QA system.Comment: AAAI 202

Functional features of a novel interferon-stimulated gene SHFL: a comprehensive review

Various interferon (IFN)-stimulated genes (ISGs), expressed via Janus kinase–signal transducer and activator of transcription (JAK-STAT) signaling pathway-stimulated IFNs to increase antiviral effects or regulate immune response, perform different roles in virus-infected cells. In recent years, a novel ISG, SHFL, which is located in the genomic region 19p13.2 and comprises two isoforms, has been studied as a virus-inhibiting agent. Studies have shown that SHFL suppressive effects on human immunodeficiency virus-1 (HIV), Zika virus (ZIKV), dengue virus (DENV), hepatitis C virus (HCV), Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV), porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV), Human enterovirus A71 (EV-A71) and Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpes virus (KSHV). SHFL interacts with various viral and host molecules to inhibit viral life circle and activities, such as replication, translation, and ribosomal frameshifting, or regulates host pathways to degrade viral proteins. In this review, we summarized the functional features of SHFL to provide insights to underlying mechanisms of the antiviral effects of SHFL and explored its potential function

Energy efficient cutting parameter optimization

Mechanical manufacturing industry consumes substantial energy with low energy efficiency. Increasing pressures from energy price and environmental directive force mechanical manufacturing industries to implement energy efficient technologies for reducing energy consumption and improving energy efficiency of their machining processes. In a practical machining process, cutting parameters are vital variables set by manufacturers in accordance with machining requirements of workpiece and machining condition. Proper selection of cutting parameters with energy consideration can effectively reduce energy consumption and improve energy efficiency of the machining process. Over the past 10 years, many researchers have been engaged in energy efficient cutting parameter optimization, and a large amount of literature have been published. This paper conducts a comprehensive literature review of current studies on energy efficient cutting parameter optimization to fully understand the recent advances in this research area. The energy consumption characteristics of machining process are analyzed by decomposing total energy consumption into electrical energy consumption of machine tool and embodied energy of cutting tool and cutting fluid. Current studies on energy efficient cutting parameter optimization by using experimental design method and energy models are reviewed in a comprehensive manner. Combined with the current status, future research directions of energy efficient cutting parameter optimization are presented

A framework for energy monitoring of machining workshops based on IoT

Machining workshop is a widely distributed manufacturing system that consumes massive energy in low efficiency. Due to the complicated and dynamic energy flow of the machining workshop, machinery manufacturers still lack an effective method to monitor and manage the energy efficiency. Hence, this paper proposes an energy efficiency monitoring system for machining workshop with the support of the newly emerging Internet of Things (IoT) technology. With the application of the proposed system, potential opportunities for energy efficiency improvement can be identified. Machinery manufacturers can easily reduce energy consumption and energy cost by managing the machining process