Influence of skew and cross-coupling on flux-weakening performance of permanent-magnet brushless AC machines

A method is proposed for predicting the flux-weakening performance of permanent-magnet (PM) brushless ac machines accounting for skew and d-q axis cross-coupling. The method is based on a d-q-axis flux-linkage model, a hybrid 2-D finite-element (FE)-analytical method being used to predict the d- and q-axis inductances. However, it only requires 2-D FE analysis of the magnetic field distribution over a cross section of the machine. The developed method is used to predict the torque-speed characteristic of an interior PM brushless ac machine with one stator slot-pitch skew. This is compared with predictions from a direct FE analysis of the machine and validated by measurements

Site-specific identification and quantitation of endogenous SUMO modifications under native conditions.

Small ubiquitin-like modifier (SUMO) modification regulates numerous cellular processes. Unlike ubiquitin, detection of endogenous SUMOylated proteins is limited by the lack of naturally occurring protease sites in the C-terminal tail of SUMO proteins. Proteome-wide detection of SUMOylation sites on target proteins typically requires ectopic expression of mutant SUMOs with introduced tryptic sites. Here, we report a method for proteome-wide, site-level detection of endogenous SUMOylation that uses α-lytic protease, WaLP. WaLP digestion of SUMOylated proteins generates peptides containing SUMO-remnant diglycyl-lysine (KGG) at the site of SUMO modification. Using previously developed immuno-affinity isolation of KGG-containing peptides followed by mass spectrometry, we identified 1209 unique endogenous SUMO modification sites. We also demonstrate the impact of proteasome inhibition on ubiquitin and SUMO-modified proteomes using parallel quantitation of ubiquitylated and SUMOylated peptides. This methodological advancement enables determination of endogenous SUMOylated proteins under completely native conditions

Quest for organic plasmonics

Many photonic metamaterials and plasmonic devices, in spite of their unparalleled responses to light waves and nearly fantastic applications, suffer from absorption loss in constituent metallic components. Unfortunately, none of the known techniques aimed to conquer the absorption loss has led to a revolutionary technological breakthrough, prompting a continuing quest for efficient solutions to the loss problem. In this letter, we study optical properties of non-metallic organic plasmonic and epsilon-near-zero materials and demonstrate propagation of a surface plasmon polariton at the interface between solid organic dye and air. (C) 2013 AIP Publishing LLC

Combining NMR and LC/MS Using Backward Variable Elimination: Metabolomics Analysis of Colorectal Cancer, Polyps, and Healthy Controls

Both nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and mass spectrometry (MS) play important roles in metabolomics. The complementary features of NMR and MS make their combination very attractive; however, currently the vast majority of metabolomics studies use either NMR or MS separately, and variable selection that combines NMR and MS for biomarker identification and statistical modeling is still not well developed. In this study focused on methodology, we developed a backward variable elimination partial least-squares discriminant analysis algorithm embedded with Monte Carlo cross validation (MCCV-BVE-PLSDA), to combine NMR and targeted liquid chromatography (LC)/MS data. Using the metabolomics analysis of serum for the detection of colorectal cancer (CRC) and polyps as an example, we demonstrate that variable selection is vitally important in combining NMR and MS data. The combined approach was better than using NMR or LC/MS data alone in providing significantly improved predictive accuracy in all the pairwise comparisons among CRC, polyps, and healthy controls. Using this approach, we selected a subset of metabolites responsible for the improved separation for each pairwise comparison, and we achieved a comprehensive profile of altered metabolite levels, including those in glycolysis, the TCA cycle, amino acid metabolism, and other pathways that were related to CRC and polyps. MCCV-BVE-PLSDA is straightforward, easy to implement, and highly useful for studying the contribution of each individual variable to multivariate statistical models. On the basis of these results, we recommend using an appropriate variable selection step, such as MCCV-BVE-PLSDA, when analyzing data from multiple analytical platforms to obtain improved statistical performance and a more accurate biological interpretation, especially for biomarker discovery. Importantly, the approach described here is relatively universal and can be easily expanded for combination with other analytical technologies

The Properties of H{\alpha} Emission-Line Galaxies at z = 2.24

Using deep narrow-band $H_2S1$ and $K_{s}$-band imaging data obtained with CFHT/WIRCam, we identify a sample of 56 H$\alpha$ emission-line galaxies (ELGs) at $z=2.24$ with the 5$\sigma$ depths of $H_2S1=22.8$ and $K_{s}=24.8$ (AB) over 383 arcmin$^{2}$ area in the ECDFS. A detailed analysis is carried out with existing multi-wavelength data in this field. Three of the 56 H$\alpha$ ELGs are detected in Chandra 4 Ms X-ray observation and two of them are classified as AGNs. The rest-frame UV and optical morphologies revealed by HST/ACS and WFC3 deep images show that nearly half of the H$\alpha$ ELGs are either merging systems or with a close companion, indicating that the merging/interacting processes play a key role in regulating star formation at cosmic epoch z=2-3; About 14% are too faint to be resolved in the rest-frame UV morphology due to high dust extinction. We estimate dust extinction from SEDs. We find that dust extinction is generally correlated with H$\alpha$ luminosity and stellar mass (SM). Our results suggest that H$\alpha$ ELGs are representative of star-forming galaxies (SFGs). Applying extinction correction for individual objects, we examine the intrinsic H$\alpha$ luminosity function (LF) at $z=2.24$, obtaining a best-fit Schechter function characterized by a faint-end slope of $\alpha=-1.3$. This is shallower than the typical slope of $\alpha \sim -1.6$ in previous works based on constant extinction correction. We demonstrate that this difference is mainly due to the different extinction corrections. The proper extinction correction is thus key to recovering the intrinsic LF as the extinction globally increases with H$\alpha$ luminosity. Moreover, we find that our H$\alpha$ LF mirrors the SM function of SFGs at the same cosmic epoch. This finding indeed reflects the tight correlation between SFR and SM for the SFGs, i.e., the so-called main sequence.Comment: 15 pages, 12 figures, 2 tables, Received 2013 October 11; accepted 2014 February 13; published 2014 March 18 by Ap