32 research outputs found
Detector do batimento cardíaco fetal
Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro Tecnológico. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Engenharia Elétrica
Implementação de um codificador de voz padronizado em DSP
Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro Tecnológico.Neste trabalho, é proposta uma implementação de um codificador de voz padronizado em DSP. Foi escolhido como padrão de codificação o da recomendação G.723.1 do ITU-T. Esse padrão opera com duas taxa de compressão (5.3 e 6.3 kbits/s) e foi desenvolvido para utilização principalmente em aplicações para Internet. A família de DSPs adotada foi a ADSP-21XX da Analog Devices, que tem como principal característica operação em ponto fixo com precisão de 16 bits e baixo custo. Dentre as principais características da implementação proposta, pode-se destacar a flexibilidade, robustez, eficiência, baixo custo e capacidade de instanciação. Esta solução possui um alto grau de competitividade com outras soluções semelhantes disponíveis no mercado
Stochastic analysis of the Elo rating algorithm in round-robin tournaments
The Elo algorithm, renowned for its simplicity, is widely used for rating in
sports tournaments and other applications. However, despite its widespread use,
a detailed understanding of the convergence characteristics of the Elo
algorithm is still lacking. Aiming to fill this gap, this paper presents a
comprehensive (stochastic) analysis of the Elo algorithm, considering
round-robin tournaments. Specifically, analytical expressions are derived
describing the evolution of the skills and performance metrics. Then, taking
into account the relationship between the behavior of the algorithm and the
step-size value, which is a hyperparameter that can be controlled, design
guidelines and discussions about the performance of the algorithm are provided.
Experimental results are shown confirming the accuracy of the analysis and
illustrating the applicability of the theoretical findings using real-world
data obtained from SuperLega, the Italian volleyball league
Hormigón reciclado con árido grueso reciclado. Una visión general y análisis
[Abstract:] The construction field has contributed to environmental degradation, producing a high amount of construction and demolition waste (C&D waste) and consuming large volumes of natural resources. In this context, recycled concrete (RC) has been recognised as a means to preserve natural resources and reduce space for waste storage. During the last decades, many researchers have developed works studying different recycled concrete properties. This review focuses on structural RC made with coarse recycled aggregate from concrete waste. The main objective is to provide a state of the art report on RC’s properties and an analysis on how to predict them taking into account relevant research works. Moreover, the study tries to collect and update RC findings, proposing equations to define RC’s performance, in terms of mechanical strength, modulus of elasticity, stress-strain, creep and shrinkage.[Resumen:] El campo de la construcción ha contribuido a la degradación del medio ambiente, produciendo gran cantidad de residuos de construcción y demolición y consumiendo grandes volúmenes de recursos naturales. En este contexto, el hormigón reciclado se ha presentado como una opción para preservar los recursos naturales y reducir el espacio destinado a vertedero. Así, durante las últimas décadas, muchos investigadores han desarrollado trabajos para estudiar las propiedades del hormigón reciclado. Este artículo se centra en el hormigón estructural fabricado con árido reciclado grueso procedente de residuos de hormigón. El principal objetivo es desarrollar un estado del arte que recoja las principales propiedades del hormigón reciclado y un análisis de cómo calcularlas teniendo en cuenta un gran número de trabajos relevantes en este ámbito. Adicionalmente, el estudio recopila y actualiza el conocimiento sobre estos hormigones, proponiendo ecuaciones que permitan definir sus resistencias mecánicas, módulo de elasticidad, tensión-deformación, fluencia y retracción
Evaluation of biotechnological processing through solid-state fermentation of oilseed cakes on extracts bioactive potential
Oilseed cakes (OC) are natural sources of lignocellulosic biomass, produced every year in large amounts. In addition to their main applications as animal feed, plant or soil fertilizer, and compost, they present enormous potential for being used in biotechnological processes for the obtainment and extraction of valuable bioactive compounds. This work evaluated the effect of solid-state fermentation on the bioactive properties of extracts obtained from the bioprocessing of OC and evaluated the effect of solvents on the recovery of compounds with higher bioactive potential. A general decrease of EC50 values was observed for fermented extracts obtained using a mixture of water/methanol (1:1) as extraction solvent. A decrease in the minimum inhibitory concentration was observed for fermented water extracts compared to non-fermented. Additionally, growth inhibition of Listeria monocytogenes was observed when using aqueous methanolic fermented extracts. These extracts also exhibited a higher percentage of growth reduction against phytopathogenic fungi, and some extracts exhibited increased protection against genotoxic agents such as camptothecin and bisphenol A. It was demonstrated that bioprocessing of OC through SSF is an effective approach to obtaining valuable compounds with bioactive properties for use in the food, pharmaceutical or cosmetic industries.Open access funding provided by FCT|FCCN (b-on). The authors thank the Portuguese Foundation for Sci ence and Technology (FCT) under the scope of the strategic funding of UIDB/BIO/04469/2020 and UIDB/04033/2020
units. Daniel Sousa acknowledges the fnancial support pro vided by national funds through FCT(PD/BD/135328/2017), under the Doctoral Program “Agricultural Production Chains – from fork to farm” (PD/00122/2012) and from the European Social Funds and the Regional Operational Programme Norte
2020.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Callous-unemotional traits moderate anticipated guilt and wrongness judgments to everyday moral transgressions in adolescents
The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2021.625328/full#supplementary-materialCallous-unemotional (CU) traits observed during childhood and adolescence are thought to be precursors of psychopathic traits in adulthood. Adults with high levels of psychopathic traits typically present antisocial behavior. Such behavior can be indicative of atypical moral processing. Evidence suggests that moral dysfunction in these individuals may stem from a disruption of affective components of moral processing rather than from an inability to compute moral judgments per se. No study to date has tested if the dissociation between affective and cognitive dimensions of moral processing linked to psychopathic traits in adulthood is also linked to CU traits during development. Here, 47 typically developing adolescents with varying levels of CU traits completed a novel, animated cartoon task depicting everyday moral transgressions and indicated how they would feel in such situations and how morally wrong the situations were. Adolescents with higher CU traits reported reduced anticipated guilt and wrongness appraisals of the transgressions. However, our key finding was a significant interaction between CU traits and anticipated guilt in predicting wrongness judgments. The strength of the association between anticipated guilt and wrongness judgement was significantly weaker for those with higher levels of CU traits. This evidence extends our knowledge on the cognitive-affective processing deficits that may underlie moral dysfunction in youth who are at heightened risk for antisocial behavior and psychopathy in adulthood. Future longitudinal research is required to elucidate whether there is an increased dissociation between different components of moral processing from adolescence to adulthood for those with high psychopathic traits.This study was supported by the Portuguese Foundation for
Science and Technology (FCT) research grant awarded to AS-C
(PTDC/MHC-PCN/2296/2014), co-financed by FEDER through
COMPETE2020 under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement
(POCI-01-0145-FEDER-016747). The study was conducted
at the Psychology Research Center (PSI/01662), School of
Psychology, University of Minho, supported by FCT through the
Portuguese State Budget (Ref.: UIDB/PSI/01662/2020)
Solid-state fermentation as green technology to improve the use of plant feedstuffs as ingredients in diets for european sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) juveniles
This study aimed to evaluate the utilization by juvenile European sea bass of a SSFed PF mixture with Aspergillus niger CECT 2088. A 22-day digestibility and a 50-day growth trial were performed testing four diets, including 20 or 40% of an unfermented or SSFed PF mixture (rapeseed, soybean, rice bran, and sunflower seed meals, 25% each). SSF of the PF added cellulase and β-glucosidase activity to the diets. Mycotoxin contamination was not detected in any of the experimental diets except for residual levels of zearalenone and deoxynivalenol (100 and 600 times lower than that established by the European Commission Recommendation-2006/576/EC). In diets including 20% PF, SSF did not affect growth but increased apparent digestibility coefficients of protein and energy, feed efficiency, and protein efficiency ratio. On the contrary, in diets including 40% PF, SSF decreased growth performance, feed intake, feed and protein efficiency, and diet digestibility. SSF decreased the intestinal amylase activity in the 40% SSFed diet, while total alkaline proteases decreased in the 20% and 40% SSFed diets. Hepatic amino acid catabolic enzyme activity was not modulated by SSF, and plasma total protein, cholesterol, and triglyceride levels were similar among dietary treatments. In conclusion, dietary inclusion of moderate levels of the SSFed PF, up to 20%, improves the overall feed utilization efficiency without negatively impacting European sea bass growth performance. The replacement of PF with the SSFed PF mixture may contribute to reducing the environmental footprint of aquaculture production.Simple Summary: The rapid growth of the world’s population has increased the demand for seafood, leading to the expansion of aquaculture to fulfill these needs and reduce the pressure on wild fish stocks. Plant feedstuffs (PFs) are often used as the main protein source in aquafeeds due to their wide availability and low cost. However, PFs usually contain high levels of non-starch polysaccharides that limit their utilization in aquafeeds, mainly for carnivorous fish. Solid-state fermentation (SSF) is a cost-effective technological process that may reduce anti-nutritional factor levels while improving nutrient digestibility and the production of several bioactive compounds, enhancing feedstuffs’ nutritional value in aquafeeds. Hence, this study evaluated the effects of using a PF mixture (rapeseed, soybean, rice bran, and sunflower seed meals, 25% each) solid-state fermented (SSFed) with Aspergillus niger CECT 2088 at two inclusion levels (20% and 40%) on European sea bass juveniles’ growth performance, feed digestibility, digestive and catabolic enzyme activity, and plasma metabolites. Overall, the SSFed PF mixture improved the overall feed digestibility, and utilization efficiency, when included at balanced level (20%) without negatively impacting fish growth performance, but not at the higher level (40%).Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia | Ref. UIDB/04423/2020Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia | Ref. UIDP/04423/2020Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia | Ref. 2020.05525.BDFundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia | Ref. SFRH/BD/115870/2016Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia | Ref. SFRH/BD/137919/2018Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia | Ref. SFRH/BD/143614/201
An Adaptive Approach for the Joint Antenna Selection and Beamforming Optimization
Adaptive beamforming techniques are widely known for their capability of leveraging the performance of antenna arrays. The effectiveness of such techniques typically increases as the number of antennas grows. In contrast, computational and hardware costs very often limit the deployment of beamforming in large-scale arrays. To circumvent this problem, antenna selection strategies have been developed aiming to maintain much of the performance gain obtained by using a large array while keeping computational and hardware costs at acceptable levels. In this context, the present paper is dedicated to the development of two new adaptive algorithms for solving the problem of joint antenna selection and beamforming for uplink reception in mobile communication systems. Both algorithms are based on an alternating optimization strategy and are designed to operate with a limited number of radio-frequency chains. The main difference between the proposed algorithms is that the first is formulated by considering the minimum mean-square error (MMSE) criterion, while the second is based on the minimum-variance distortionless-response (MVDR) approach. The numerical simulation results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms