bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Preliminary study on hydrogen storage for fuel of fuel cell using Fe3Al metal hydride system
Authors: Rohendi D , Rachmat A , Syarif N , Said M , Amelia I
Published: December 2019

Fe3Âl alloy for hydrogen storage was successfully synthesized from Fe (70 wt%) and Al (30 wt%) through ball-mill method in 5 hours milling and Ball to Powder Ratio (BPR) 10:1 to produced mechanical alloy. The results was confirmed by XRD diffraction pattern at 2¸ = 44.791° (10) which is characteristic peak of Fe3Al. The material was applied on hydrogen storage to form metal hydride in which at various temperature and pressure. The Fe3Al alloy performance for hydrogen storage for fuel cell application was indicated from the capacity of hydrogen adsorption and the ability to supply hydrogen for fuel cell. Characterization by using SEM-EDX on adsorption used alloy showed that Fe3Al Alloy has homogeneous surface and no cracks revealed. XRD pattern of alloy after being used to adsorb hydrogen showed a typical pattern at 2¸ = 44.667° (11). Based on the results it can be concluded that hydrogen storage capacity increases with increasing temperature and pressure, and the average adsorption capacity were 58%. Hydrogen storage by the metal hydride method has met the storage criteria established by the US Department of Energy (DOE) as clean and efficient urban energy for the future.
The Production of Hydrogen from Aluminum Waste by Aluminum-Water Methods at Various Conditions
Authors: Rohendi D , Rachmat A , Syarif N , Said M , Rihsansah I
Published: December 2019

The production of hydrogen gas from aluminum waste by Aluminum-water methods at various condition has been successfully performed. The hydrogen production is a very important for support the fuel cell application Hydrogen was produced both in the acidic and base conditions at various temperature and using lithium as the activator. The urgencies in this research were effective and cheaper methods. The highest hydrogen production from reaction 0.3 g aluminum with 30 mL hydrochloric acid 2 M at 50 °C in 10 minutes was 348 mL. Meanwhile, the best condition for aluminum water methods for 0.3 g of Aluminum as reactants, were 3 mL water, 5% w/w lithium content and 100 mesh aluminum particle size. Furthermore, using KOH as a catalyst, gave hydrogen product 670 mL with the rate at 67 mL/min.
Land Use Change Along Lebih Coastal Line, Entailing Its Designation as A Zone for Tourist Development
Authors: Suartika G A M , Ledysianty I A S O , Saputra K E
Published: December 2019

The coastal area is a physically productive area, but is easily degraded which may be due to the lack of planning or even natural factors. The coastal area in Gianyar has experienced a drastic physical development, especially after it is declared as Lebih Tourist Zone or Lebih Tourist Zone (LTZ) and the construction of the arterial road between Tohpati and Kusamba. The study documented in this paper discusses: (i) the form in which the coastal area in Gianyar are utilized post the recognition as the LTZ; (ii) the factors that influence the changes in land utilization in this region; and (iii) how does this condition affect the sustainability of the LTZ. Fundamentally, this study applies the conception of sustainable development and the descriptive qualitative research method. The data were collected through field surveys and in-depth interviews with the land owners, land users, and the authority. The research results showed that the LTZ has experienced a significant change, both physically and non-physically. The factors that influence this change in function is the physical condition of the land, economy, institutional factors, and accessibility. This change has implications for the environment, economy and social culture. This study concludes to develop the sustainability of the LTZ some fundamental actions must be made, namely: evaluate the usage of land, establish clear and restricting zoning law to anticipate any land use violation; consistency in the layout plan; the active participation in the control of land use by the government, the people and private sectors; providing incentives and disincentives in utilizing the space.
Smart Kampung: Characterisation of Surabaya Urban Coastal Settlements through Smart City Measurement
Authors: Nariratih K P , Rahmawati D
Published: December 2019

Surabaya is a metropolitan city in Indonesia, with the 4 million population. Therefore, it takes the smart city system to help The Government to optimize their service for citizen needs, and increasing its life quality, by putting interaction in the community based on ICT. Surabaya as a coastal city located on north coast of East Java Province make this city has several district in coastal area, one of them is Bulak District which is known as the fishing settlement integrated with tourism. Their character, totally different with midtown settlement. So do the given policy, there will be a difference treatments between coastal and midtown settlement. Therefore, it is necessary to explore the characteristic of coastal settlements that will support Surabaya as a smart city. This study aims to determine the criteria of urban settlements development in Surabaya based on smart city concept, focused on coastal urban settlement. To achieve this goal, it will use qualitative and quantitative approach (mixed method) which focuses on field conditions and community preferences in the location of settlement in the study area and must be through the 3 stage analysis. The first stage is identifying the smart potentials of coastal settlement using qualitative descriptive analysis. The second is identifying influential variables with using Confirmatory Factor Analysis feature on SmartPLS Application. The third was a determination of smart coastal settlement criteria using Pairwise comparison-triangulation. The result is there are 13 criteria of smart coastal settlement, spreaded on 6 major dimension. These criteria became a basic of dynamic measurement for smartkampung prototype which has so far resulted for identification and intelligence character on Bulak coastal settlement, included an entrepreneurship activities with local resources and uses ICT in its development; good accesibility which supported by the community’s ability to follow transportation technology; ICT-based environmental management activities and community participation; creative community, open-technology-minded and able to preserve local coastal culture; sea tidal disaster free area that is equipped with mitigation facilities; developing an ICT-based tourist attraction area, and also achieving positive impact from the online Government’s service.
Towards Collaborative Batik Waste Management Model in Kampong Batik Semarang
Authors: Wungo G L , Dewi S P , Susanto H , Desiriani R , Karamah E F
Published: December 2019

Kampong Batik is one of thematic urban kampongs located in Semarang inner-city with batik production and sales as the main activities. One of the important issues related to this kampong is batik waste management; there is not installation wastewater treatment plan. It caused by several reasons such as land availability, fund, government and community commitment. Therefore, this paper intended to analyses the batik waste management model through collaborative planning strategy. It used qualitative research method through interview and observation techniques. Likewise, secondary data has also used as the data collection method. The research objectives was break downed into several activities; first, identification of existing waste management. Second, analyze waste management gap that compare between the existing situations with the expected performance. Then, it can be structured the collaborative waste management model as the third objective. This study output is a collaborative model in batik waste management that emphasized on the managerial aspect rather than the physical aspect.
The Analysis of Barriers for Implementation of Sustainable Construction in Indonesia
Authors: Susanti B , Filestre S F H , Juliantina I
Published: December 2019

The sustainable development requires the provision of adequate infrastructure, but the construction activities on infrastructure development itself still have been considered as a sector that has a negative impact to the environment. The implementation of the sustainable construction becomes a necessity, but the implementation of the sustainable construction in developing countries is still very limited, since there are still many factors that inhibit the implementation of this concept. This study aims to analyse the barriers in the implementation of sustainable construction in the infrastructure development projects in Palembang, Indonesia. The barriers are identified based on the results of literature studies. The survey using a questionnaire was conducted to state-owned and private companies that were carrying out infrastructure development projects in Palembang and its surrounding areas. The survey confirms the various barriers that may occur based on the perceptions of respondents representing state-owned and private companies. The mean item score was used to determine the ranking of each barrier. This study indicate that the following factors are the main barriers to the implementation of sustainable construction, namely factors related to the limited number of trained and/or certified workers and lack of communication between parties involved in the project.
Community Perception of Cheese-Making Wastes Utilization and its Sustainability
Authors: Utama G L , Dinika I , Balia R L
Published: December 2019

Cheese-making wastes utilization has been done in KPBS (The Dairy Farmer Cooperatives of South Bandung) and affect the surrounding communities. The research aimed to determine the perception of the community towards the utilization of cheese-making wastes that has been done. Cluster random sampling was taken on three groups of respondents, namely KPBS employees, KPBS member farmers and the affected communities around KPBS. Randomized numerical tables used to determine the respondent which resulted 24 respondents of KPBS employees, 41 respondents of KPBS member farmers and 28 respondents of affected communities around KPBS, with the total of 93 respondents. Questionnaires used to obtain the community perceptions of cheese-making wastes utilization and its sustainability that covered social, economic, environmental and technological dimension with five levels Likert scale to express the respondent’s preference. Results showed that the communities perception of cheese-making wastes utilization on social, economic and ecological dimension shown neutral to positives perception with average Likert score of 3.61, 3.82 and 3.35 respectively, while technological knowledge dimension shown neutral to negative perception (2.99) which could be a threat towards cheese-making sustainability.
Performance characteristics of non-edible Jatropha oil with adjustable compression ratios
Authors: Singh R , Kumar J , Shukla A , Soota T
Published: December 2019

Non-edible biodiesel extracted from jatropha oil is broadly studied to solve the twin problem of reduction of fossil fuels and environmental degradation. The present study is conducted on unmodified variable compression ratio (VCR) diesel engine for exploring the effect of biodiesel blends. The performance characteristics of Jatropha oil are compared with diesel fuel at two compression ratios 17 and 18. The viscosity and density are 23% and 3.9% higher with respect to diesel for pure jatropha methyl ester and calorific value is lower for J100, 6.8% with respect to diesel. Performance and emission have been observed better when compression ratio increases from 17 to 18 and also notice that the hydrocarbon (HC) and carban monoxide (CO) emission reduced but corban dioxide CO2 and NOX emission increases.
Optimization of the operating parameters to minimize gear tooth wear rate and surface temperature of glass fiber filled HDPE based homogeneous and FGM gears
Authors: Yadav Sanjay , Kumar Singh Akant , Siddhartha
Published: December 2019

This study emphasis on the optimization of the operating parameters viz. gear fabrication technique, rotational speed and applied torque on fabricated gears to improve their performance. Polymer gears are injection molded using conventional and horizontal centrifugal casting technique known as homogeneous and FGM gears, respectively. Material used to fabricate the gear is High Density Polyethylene (HDPE). Taguchi technique is used to optimize the performance output of homogeneous and FGM gears with respect to input parameters such as torque and rotational speeds. Three different rotational speeds of 400, 700 and 1000 rpm along with three different torque levels of 1, 2 and 3 Nm are selected for this investigation. Number of cycles of 1.5×105 was fixed for the experimentation. The influence of input control parameters on performance output is analysed by ANOVA analysis. The results finding show that the thermal behavior of gear is very much affected by torque whereas the specific wear rate (WR) is utmost pointedly influenced by the gear fabrication technique i.e. FGM gear has small tooth wear in the compression of homogeneous and neat HDPE gears.
An adaptive multipopulation genetic algorithm for the optimization of active magnetic bearings
Authors: Reddy Anand S. , Kumar Agarwal Praveen , Chand Satish
Published: December 2019

Active magnetic bearings (AMBs)are mechatronic systems to support the rotors without any physical contact. Compact AMBs are required for better performance. Present work aims at optimization of AMB for achieving the compact size. Genetic algorithms (GAs) are mostly used for the optimization of such nonlinear design problems. However, GAs with fixed parameters may result in convergence to local optimal solutions and sluggish convergence speed.To remove these deficiencies, the adaptive multipopulation genetic algorithm (AMPGA) is used for the optimization of AMB in the present work. In this algorithm, crossover and mutation probabilities and migration rateare regulated based onpopulation diversity. In addition, real-encoded chromosomes are used. Performance of the designed AMPGA is studied in terms of the convergence speed and optimal solution. It is found that AMPGA converges at a faster rate and gives a better optimal solution than both multipopulation genetic algorithm (MPGA) and simple genetic algorithm (SGA). The optimal value of the AMB size obtained by AMPGA is found to be smaller than that obtained by MPGA and SGA.
Development and Fabrication of an Autonomous Seed Sowing Robot
Authors: Dutta Sweety , Shanker Udit , Katiyar Sulekha , Singh Venktesh , Nayab Zafar Mohd. , Mohanta J. C.
Published: December 2019

Automisation of agricultural processes provides the benefits of increased efficiency, productivity, healthy crops, efficient use of resources & material and labour cost savings. In this paper, an autonomous seed-sowing robot is designed to cope up the above goals. The robot divides the field into a grid with intersection points as places where the seeds are sown. The depth of the hole, the distance between points where the seeds are sown is calculated according to government data and is fed to the logic board of the robot. The robot goes to the starting points and makes a hole using a toothed wheel with teeth of increasing height. The delivery system makes sure that only one seed is dispensed per hole and the back plate mechanism fills the hole after sowing is done. Sensors are used for obstacle detection and robot changes its path accordingly. There are several robots available in the market and research has been done on many more, that perform the above functions separately but no one has integrated all the above functions in one system. The proposed robot does this and provides a better solution for low productivity nations.
Review on Biodiesel Production and Emission Characteristic of Non-Edible Vegetable Oil
Authors: Dyundi S , Matolia S , Singla A , Kumar D , Singh Y , Sharma A , Bhurat S , Upadhyay A K
Published: December 2019

Bio-diesel has become more popular in recent timesas of its low after emissions and due to its extraction from renewable resources. Transesterification process is used to extract the bio-diesel from oil either by edible oil or by non-edible oil. The use of biodiesel has created a constructive effect in solving issues of decrement in petroleum stocks. Biodiesel can be extracted with the use of edible &non-edible vegetable oils. However, use of edible oils can threaten the food storage, so non-edible oil, which is also acknowledged as second-generation feedstock, can be used as another option in extraction of biodiesel from oil. This paper has explained in detailed some of the categories of non-edible vegetables oils have higher quality of biodiesel. In this review, an endeavor has done on bio-diesel production of various non-edible oil and its influence on internal combustion engines performance and emissions characteristics.
Experimental investigation of an air conditioner unit by varying different air flow rates using air and evaporatively cooled condenser
Authors: Hussain Taliv
Published: December 2019

An air conditioning system consumes enormous amount of energy particularly in the areas having hot and humid weather conditions. Thus, improvement in the performance of an air conditioner for such climatic conditions can be obtained by incorporating evaporative cooling instead of conventional air cooling. In this paper, effectiveness of an air conditioner unit using air cooled condenser and evaporatively cooled condenser is performed experimentally by varying three different air flow rates i.e (4.5, 6.0 and 7.5 m/s). Experimental results indicate that utilization of evaporatively cooled conditioning unit has a remarkable effect on the COP (Coefficient of performance) and rate of improvement is also better than conventional air cooled conditioning unit.
A Review on Performance and Emission of CI Engine using Exhaust gas recirculation (EGR)
Authors: Dubey Aseem , Ahmad Ansari Naushad , Kumar Girish , Arora Akhilesh , Sharma Abhishek
Published: December 2019

The diesel engine has the advantage over gasoline engine due to its low fuel consumption, higher combustion efficiency, durability and low hydrocarbons (HC), particulate, carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO) and NOXemission as a major source. Due to abovesaid problems, diesel is now blended with Biofuels and play a significant role to meet its energy and environmental challenges. Exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) is an eco-friendly alternativeto lower NOX and particulates emission. The use of EGR in compression ignition engines, lowers the concentration of oxygen mixture and flame temperature. However, it has been observed that advantages of EGR is fuel specific. In present paper a performance review of compression ignitionengine using EGR with blended fuelshas been carried out. The effect on break power, break specific fuel consumption, thermal efficiency has been reported. Further aspects of response surface methodology on optimization of NOx emission, smoke opacity and BSFChasbeen carriedout using blended fuel, EGR rate, injection timing etc.
Numerical investigation of temperature distribution in blast furnace hearth
Authors: Ubale Divyesh , Ubale Prafulla
Published: December 2019

Erosion of the Blast Furnace hearth affects the life of the Blast Furnace. High temperature across the molten iron and hearth makes it difficult to measure temperature in real life. Temperature prediction inside the hearth is a complex process as it involves conjugate heat transfer. A CFD model is developed for analysing the temperature distribution across slag, molten iron and hearth. It is essential for estimating the life of Blast Furnace and the wear rate of hearth. Three different cases are analysed and the temperature profiles are plotted. The CFD results are validated with the published experimental results in the literature. Only temperature effects are considered and natural convection effect is neglected for the analysis of hearth.
Materiality analysis of SCM issues for Competitive Advantage: Study of an Indian FMEG Organization
Authors: Mathur Sandeep , Kumar Ravinder
Published: December 2019

Fast Moving Electrical Goods (FMEG) products represent the basic needs of its consumers in the modern society, influencing their life style in every way from living room to drawing room, from kitchen to the bedroom. Globalization has resulted in fierce competition among the players of this fast growing sector. The only way therefore to sustain a profitable growth is to stay competitive in local and global market. However, given the legacies of past practices and old mindsets of Indian FMEG players, it is not easy for any organization to stay competitive unless it applies a systematic and scientific approach of supply chain management (SCM).This work attempts to analyse the issues of supply chain for competitive advantage of an Indian FMEG organization. The company under study has adopted a unique approach of materiality analysis that complemented seamlessly with the SWOT analysis to evolve its supply chain strategies and priorities. The process thus built around them has been evaluated against the performance in line with customer expectations. The case study offers an excellent framework to follow for any FMEG organization seeking competitive advantage in the face of current global challenges.
Cycle-by-cycle variations in a spark ignition engine fueled with gasoline and natural gas
Authors: Kumar Singotia Pawan , Saraswati Samir
Published: December 2019

A comparative study of cycle-by-cycle variations (CCV) in a spark ignition (SI) engine fueled with gasoline and natural gas was conducted. The average peak cylinder pressure (PP), indicated mean effective pressure (IMEP) and maximum rate of pressure rise ((dp/dθ)max)are found to be low for engine fueled with natural gas in comparison to that of gasoline. However, the CCV of these parameters increases as engine operation is switched from gasoline to natural gas. The coefficient of variation (COV) of PP, IMEP and (dp/dθ)max significantly increases at very low load condition for both the fuels due to high residual gases. Natural gas engine shows more misfiring cycles in comparison to gasoline engine. Further, CCV increases with the increase of engine speed for both the fuels because of an increase in turbulence and instable combustion at high engine speed. As engine speed increases and engine load decreases the combustion based parameters become more independent of crank angle due to high CCV in these conditions.
Investigation of Automatic Solar Irrigation Model
Authors: Verma Aditya , Jha Shubham kr. , Chandra Verma Ramesh , Kumar Naresh , Ranjan Rajiv , Tiwari Sumit
Published: December 2019

India is an agriculture prominent country. Scientist and researchers are continuously working for betterment of agriculture processes. From the research, it was found that there is a loss of power and resources in irrigation process. Present manuscript consist of proposed model which utilizes renewable energy (solar energy) to operate irrigation process which results in better handling within limited resources. Proposed system consist of moisture sensing device in the field that provide convenience to farmer by supporting them in automation at very minute energy. This proposed design uses polycrystalline photovoltaic solar panel to charge the battery and this battery provide power supply to operate the model.
Metal matrix composites- a review on synthesis and characterization
Authors: Kumar Srivastava Ashish , Gupta Yash , Patel Saurabh , Kumar Tiwari Sachin , Pandey Shubham
Published: December 2019

The manufacturing industries continuously demanded the new class of engineering materials for various applications. It results in improvement of metal matrix composites. Development of newer materials like MMCs are one of the keen area of research now a day’s. In this regard various literatures are available in open literature on development, characterization and application of MMCs. In this work an attempt is made to discuss the available literatures in terms of their output findings. The work also focuses on the area where the more attention is required to carry out the research work.
Experimental Lumped Analysis of Different Solid Geometries
Authors: Mishra Mukesh , Kumar Pradeep
Published: December 2019

Present work describes the experimental analysis of unsteady state heat transfer of different solid geometries. Heat transfer process in considered as a function of time only i.e. solid body behave as ‘Lumped’ means there is uniform temperature with in the body and having negligible internal thermal conduction resistance. The lumped analysis is done with cylindrical, conical and mixed geometry of cylinder and cone of two different materials. Specimens are heated in water ant cooled in air to estimate the heat transfer response of geometries in same ambient conditions MATLAB programming is done for calculation to obtain good and accurate results and to estimate heat transfer response of different geometries used in many engineering application.
Modelling of Risk Analysis in Production System
Authors: Shakya Rishabh , Chauhan Prashant
Published: December 2019

Production system may be defined as “The procedure, methods or arrangement which includes all functions required to gather the inputs, process or reprocess the inputs, and deliver the finished output”. Industries are also faced with different challenges due to the increasing complexity of their own production processes. Owing to the complex nature of production system because of its interface between organizations, technologies and tacit knowledge of employees, it is very difficult to analyse the inter-relationship among the various risks. Interpretive structural modelling (ISM) is a well-established methodology for identifying relationships among specific items, which define a problem or an issue. In this study, inter relationships among various risks like coordination risk, disruption risk quality risk etc. are established and categorized eight risks in four categories to focus on most influential risks among them.
Performance of Solar Photovoltaic panel using Forced convection of water-based CuO nanofluid: An Understanding
Authors: Nandan Gopal
Published: December 2019

Most of the conventional Solar Photovoltaic module consists of a Silicon cell that converts sunlight into electric energy. The process of conversion into electricity is exothermic and all photons are not able to produce electricity due to insufficient energy. Depending upon efficiency to convert it into electricity only the small amount of radiations are used and rest all are involved in increasing the temperature of the module. Study shows that 80% of incident solar radiation are absorbed by a solar photovoltaic cell. This increases the temperature of the module, reduces its electrical efficiency. This increase in temperature affects the power output and lifespan of the PV module. So to maintain the temperature of the module various cooling methods such as air cooling, hydraulic cooling, heat pipe cooling, cooling with phase change materials and cooling with nanofluids have been reported in the literature. The use of suitable nanofluids is one of the effective methods to increase thermal capacitance and control the temperature rise of the PV module. To increase the performance of the system thermal properties of working fluid must be improved which is achieved by using suitable additives with the base fluid which are referred to as nanofluids. Using Copper oxide/water as a working fluid analysis was performed. It was concluded that performance can be improved significantly if we integrate the system with a good heat exchanger. In this paper, the effect of CuO based nanofluids as a cooling medium for a PV module has been reported.
Exergy analysis and performance optimization of bagasse fired boiler
Authors: Parvez Yusuf , Hasan M M
Published: December 2019

In the present scenario, the energy crisis and its demand have become the global problems that restrict the sustainable development. To overcome this problem, one needs to develop an advanced technological system which not only improves the system performance but also reduces the environmental effects. Several technologies have been established among which cogeneration appeared to be the most lucrative option. India, one of the leading producers of sugarcane, has enough cogeneration capacity in sugar mills. From the previous research articles, energy analysis explores several components which account for the significant loss of energy in a cogeneration power plant but the analysis based on the second law depicts that maximum exergy destruction occurred in a boiler. Hence, to enhance the overall performance of the plant, we need to improve boiler performance. In the present study, the energy and exergy analyses of a sugarcane bagasse boiler are carried out, and it has been seen that the energy efficiency of the boiler is high enough (81.78%). However, the second law efficiency is 25.08%, the irreversibility rate associated with the combustion chamber is 50.06 MW is a significant value which shows that 45.56% of the input fuel exergy is destroyed in the combustion chamber only. The irreversibilities associated with the heat exchangers are also significant which has been investigated as 17.23% of the input exergy of the fuel. This shows that the combustion chamber and heat exchangers both have enough scope of improvement.
A review on Snake-like Continuum Robots for Medical Surgeries
Authors: Jha Manika , Ram Chauhan Nathi
Published: December 2019

This paper describes the various applications of Continuum robots in the field of medical science. These robots are biologically inspired by trunks and snakes. They possess the ability to transverse into small and restricted spaces, to manipulate objects in difficult environments and move in curved path. Due to this ability they can be extensively used in medical science as precision is very important in this field. Recently, increasing efforts have been made towards different surgical areas. In this paper recent state if structure, modeling and actuation in snake like robot is provided. Recently, increasing efforts have been made in various surgical interventions. In this paper, current state of structure, modelling and actuation in snake like robot is provided.
On solvability of the first Hochschild cohomology of a finite-dimensional algebra
Authors: Eisele Florian , Raedschelders Theo
Published: December 2019

For an arbitrary finite-dimensional algebra

A
A

, we introduce a general approach to determining when its first Hochschild cohomology

H
H

1

(
A
)

\mathrm {HH}^1(A)

, considered as a Lie algebra, is solvable. If

A
A

is, moreover, of tame or finite representation type, we are able to describe

H
H

1

(
A
)

\mathrm {HH}^1(A)

as the direct sum of a solvable Lie algebra and a sum of copies of

s
l

2

\mathfrak {sl}_2

. We proceed to determine the exact number of such copies, and give an explicit formula for this number in terms of certain chains of Kronecker subquivers of the quiver of

A
A

. As a corollary, we obtain a precise answer to a question posed by Chaparro, Schroll, and Solotar.
Electron tomography reveals aspects of spindle structure important for mechanical stability at metaphase
Authors: O’Toole Eileen , Morphew Mary , McIntosh J. Richard
Published: December 2019

Electron tomography of mitotic spindles reveals connections that link kinetochore-associated microtubules with other microtubules that cross the spindle midplane, providing support for the tension that acts on metaphase chromosomes.
Gαq-mediated calcium dynamics and membrane tension modulate neurite plasticity
Authors: Pearce Katherine M. , Bell Miriam , Linthicum Will H. , Wen Qi , Srinivasan Jagan , Rangamani Padmini , Scarlata Suzanne
Published: December 2019

Membrane tension induced by physical forces in the environment, such as osmotic pressure, or by biochemical forces that result from the addition of neurotransmitters to generate cellular calcium signal acts as a unifying force to direct the growth or retraction of neurite protrusions.
Sufficient dimension reduction for compositional data
Authors: Tomassi Diego , Forzani Liliana , Duarte Sabrina , Pfeiffer Ruth M
Published: December 2019

Recent efforts to characterize the human microbiome and its relation to chronic diseases have led to a surge in statistical development for compositional data. We develop likelihood-based sufficient dimension reduction methods (SDR) to find linear combinations that contain all the information in the compositional data on an outcome variable, i.e., are sufficient for modeling and prediction of the outcome. We consider several models for the inverse regression of the compositional vector or transformations of it, as a function of outcome. They include normal, multinomial, and Poisson graphical models that allow for complex dependencies among observed counts. These methods yield efficient estimators of the reduction and can be applied to continuous or categorical outcomes. We incorporate variable selection into the estimation via penalties and address important invariance issues arising from the compositional nature of the data. We illustrate and compare our methods and some established methods for analyzing microbiome data in simulations and using data from the Human Microbiome Project. Displaying the data in the coordinate system of the SDR linear combinations allows visual inspection and facilitates comparisons across studies.
Phenotype–genotype network construction and characterization: a case study of cardiovascular diseases and associated non-coding RNAs
Authors: Wu Rongrong , Lin Yuxin , Liu Xingyun , Zhan Chaoying , He Hongxin , Shi Manhong , Jiang Zhi , Shen Bairong
Published: December 2019

The phenotype–genotype relationship is a key for personalized and precision medicine for complex diseases. To unravel the complexity of the clinical phenotype–genotype network, we used cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) and associated non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) (i.e. miRNAs, long ncRNAs, etc.) as the case for the study of CVDs at a systems or network level. We first integrated a database of CVDs and ncRNAs (CVDncR, http://sysbio.org.cn/cvdncr/) to construct CVD–ncRNA networks and annotate their clinical associations. To characterize the networks, we then separated the miRNAs into two groups, i.e. universal miRNAs associated with at least two types of CVDs and specific miRNAs related only to one type of CVD. Our analyses indicated two interesting patterns in these CVD–ncRNA networks. First, scale-free features were present within both CVD–miRNA and CVD–lncRNA networks; second, universal miRNAs were more likely to be CVDs biomarkers. These results were confirmed by computational functional analyses. The findings offer theoretical guidance for decoding CVD–ncRNA associations and will facilitate the screening of CVD ncRNA biomarkers.

Database URL: http://sysbio.org.cn/cvdncr/
The Association Between Deaf Identity and Emotional Distress Among Adolescents
Authors: Lambez Tal , Nagar Maayan , Shoshani Anat , Nakash Ora
Published: December 2019

The sociocultural approach regards being deaf as a cultural characteristic in the identity of a deaf/hard-of-hearing (D/HH) person. The degree to which one integrates the hearing and Deaf cultures (“acculturation”) is an important factor for the well-being of deaf adolescents. We examined the relationship between acculturation patterns and emotional distress among D/HH (n = 69) compared to hearing (n = 60) adolescents in Israel. We used culturally and linguistically accessible measures. Our findings showed no significant differences in emotional distress between D/HH and their hearing counterparts. Acculturation played an important role predicting emotional distress. Identification with both the Deaf and hearing cultures was associated with reduced somatization. Exposure to discrimination and social support was also associated with emotional distress in predictable ways. Findings are interpreted within the specific context of Israeli society and highlight the importance of using adaptive linguistic and cultural assessment tools with D/HH populations.
Populist Governments and International Law: A Reply to Heike Krieger
Authors: Blokker Paul
Published: December 2019

The article by Heike Krieger, published in this issue, is an important contribution to the debate on populism and the law, not least because of its emphasis on a distinctive populist approach to the law. Krieger’s account lacks however in providing sufficient attention to three dimensions: popular sovereignty, constituent power and a shifting imaginary of the law. The relation of populism with popular sovereignty (and populism as a reaction to unresponsive institutions) is little discussed, and, hence, the explicit democratic claim of populists is downplayed. Constituent power is equally little touched upon, meaning that the populist understanding of the law as an obstacle but equally as a means to institutionalize a different democratic order is overlooked. The most important argument in the paper, which remains however too implicit, is that of a potentially shifting imaginary of the law. Krieger’s argument points in the right direction, but it could be developed further by stressing the essentially and historically contested nature of the progressive international system and its weak spots in terms of legitimacy and accountability.
Why the neglect? Social rights and French Revolutionary historiography
Authors: Walton Charles
Published: December 2019

Despite the rise of ‘human rights’ histories in recent decades, the subset of social rights has been largely neglected. To the degree that social rights—to subsistence, work and education—are acknowledged, they tend to be treated as ‘second-generation rights’—as mid-twentieth-century additions to the corpus of civil and political rights stretching back to the eighteenth century. This article shows that debates over social rights also stretch back to that period. The author discusses why historians of the French Revolution have largely neglected social rights. One reason has to do with post-Cold War conceptions of human rights, which stress their liberal rather than socio-economic content. Another has to do with the recent tendency to subsume the ‘social’ within late eighteenth-century liberal political economy. In their effort to recast revolutionaries as ‘social liberals’—as espousing free markets and social welfare—historians have obscured deep tensions over social rights and the obligation, or ‘duty’, to finance them.
Filial Descent: The African Roots of Postcolonial Literature in Italy
Authors: Lombardi-Diop Cristina
Published: December 2019

The essay concentrates on two seminal postcolonial novels by authors of African descent: Cristina Ubax Ali Farah’s Madre piccola (2007) (Little Mother: A Novel) and Gabriella Ghermandi’s Regina di fiori e di perle (2007) (Queen of Flowers and Pearls). It argues that these works give expression to an African diasporic urban generation that is changing the literary legacy of the Horn of Africa. The co-presence of multiple genres, with orality appearing as a strong influence on their written narrative forms, places these novels within the larger formation of a black African literary tradition. By looking at these two novels from an Africanist perspective, the essay takes into consideration their plurilingual interventions, the use of glossaries and linguistic borrowings, alongside the presence of Somali and Amharic cultural references. It highlights the authorial perspective as a ‘filial descent’ that addresses the complexity of a postcolonial generational shift in contemporary African literature. By placing these works within an African literary tradition and showing their critical de-centring of this tradition, the essay reconfigures a possible space of cultural autonomy for African postcolonial writing, away from the Italocentric space of discourse that has so far dominated its critical reception in Italy.
Outlier-insensitive Bayesian inference for linear inverse problems (OutIBI) with applications to space geodetic data
Authors: Hang Yu , Barbot Sylvain , Dauwels Justin , Wang Teng , Nanjundiah Priyamvada , Qiu Qiang
Published: December 2019

Inverse problems play a central role in data analysis across the fields of science. Many techniques and algorithms provide parameter estimation including the best-fitting model and the parameters statistics. Here, we concern ourselves with the robustness of parameter estimation under constraints, with the focus on assimilation of noisy data with potential outliers, a situation all too familiar in Earth science, particularly in analysis of remote-sensing data. We assume a linear, or linearized, forward model relating the model parameters to multiple data sets with a priori unknown uncertainties that are left to be characterized. This is relevant for global navigation satellite system and synthetic aperture radar data that involve intricate processing for which uncertainty estimation is not available. The model is constrained by additional equalities and inequalities resulting from the physics of the problem, but the weights of equalities are unknown. We formulate the problem from a Bayesian perspective with non-informative priors. The posterior distribution of the model parameters, weights and outliers conditioned on the observations are then inferred via Gibbs sampling. We demonstrate the practical utility of the method based on a set of challenging inverse problems with both synthetic and real space-geodetic data associated with earthquakes and nuclear explosions. We provide the associated computer codes and expect the approach to be of practical interest for a wide range of applications.
Strong error analysis for stochastic gradient descent optimization algorithms
Authors: Jentzen Arnulf , Kuckuck Benno , Neufeld Ariel , von Wurstemberger Philippe
Published: December 2019

Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) optimization algorithms are key ingredients in a series of machine learning applications. In this article we perform a rigorous strong error analysis for SGD optimization algorithms. In particular, we prove for every arbitrarily small $\varepsilon \in (0,\infty )$ and every arbitrarily large $p{\,\in\,} (0,\infty )$ that the considered SGD optimization algorithm converges in the strong $L^p$-sense with order $1/2-\varepsilon $ to the global minimum of the objective function of the considered stochastic optimization problem under standard convexity-type assumptions on the objective function and relaxed assumptions on the moments of the stochastic errors appearing in the employed SGD optimization algorithm. The key ideas in our convergence proof are, first, to employ techniques from the theory of Lyapunov-type functions for dynamical systems to develop a general convergence machinery for SGD optimization algorithms based on such functions, then, to apply this general machinery to concrete Lyapunov-type functions with polynomial structures and, thereafter, to perform an induction argument along the powers appearing in the Lyapunov-type functions in order to achieve for every arbitrarily large $ p \in (0,\infty ) $ strong $ L^p $-convergence rates.
Bridging the hybrid high-order and virtual element methods
Authors: Lemaire Simon
Published: December 2019

We present a unifying viewpoint on hybrid high-order and virtual element methods on general polytopal meshes in dimension $2$ or $3$, in terms of both formulation and analysis. We focus on a model Poisson problem. To build our bridge (i) we transcribe the (conforming) virtual element method into the hybrid high-order framework and (ii) we prove $H^m$ approximation properties for the local polynomial projector in terms of which the local virtual element discrete bilinear form is defined. This allows us to perform a unified analysis of virtual element/hybrid high-order methods, that differs from standard virtual element analyses by the fact that the approximation properties of the underlying virtual space are not explicitly used. As a complement to our unified analysis we also study interpolation in local virtual spaces, shedding light on the differences between the conforming and nonconforming cases.
A novel multiresistance gene cluster located on a plasmid-borne transposon in Listeria monocytogenes
Authors: Yan He , Yu Runhao , Li Dexi , Shi Lei , Schwarz Stefan , Yao Hong , Li Xin-Sheng , Du Xiang-Dang
Published: December 2019

Objectives

To identify the genetic context and the transferability of the multiresistance gene lsa(E) in Listeria monocytogenes.

Methods

MICs were determined by broth microdilution. Transferability of lsa(E) was investigated by conjugation, electrotransformation and natural transformation. The lsa(E)-carrying plasmid was sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq and PacBio RSII platforms. The presence of translocatable units (TUs) was examined by PCR.

Results

The 85 555 bp non-conjugative multiresistance plasmid pNH1 from L. monocytogenes harboured nine antimicrobial resistance genes including a multiresistance gene cluster, consisting of the genes aphA3, erm(B), aadE, spw, lsa(E) and lnu(B), and in addition the genes dfrG, tet(S) and catA8 were also located on plasmid pNH1 The multiresistance gene cluster, and each of the genes tet(S), catA8 and cadA were flanked by IS1216 elements. PCR identified four types of TUs, consisting of either the multiresistance gene cluster and one copy of IS1216, the catA8 gene and one copy of IS1216, or both, but also the tet(S) gene and one copy of IS1216, respectively. Natural transformation into Streptococcus mutans UA159 yielded transformants that harboured a novel 13 208 bp transposon, designated Tn6659. This transposon consisted of the multiresistance gene cluster bounded by IS1216 copies. All transformants displayed elevated MICs of the respective antimicrobial agents. At the integration site in the transformants, 8 bp direct target duplications (5′-ATTCAAAC-3′) were found immediately up- and downstream of Tn6659.

Conclusions

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of this novel multiresistance gene cluster and the gene catA8, flanked by IS1216 elements located on a plasmid of L. monocytogenes. Moreover, a novel functionally active multiresistance transposon was identified.
Local habitat specialization as an evolutionary response to interspecific competition between two sympatric shrews
Authors: Biedma Luis , Calzada Javier , Godoy José A , Román Jacinto
Published: December 2019

Interspecific competition affects population dynamics, distributional ranges, and evolution of competing species. The competitive exclusion principle states that ecologically similar species cannot coexist unless they exhibit niche segregation. Herein, we assess whether niche segregation allows the coexistence of Crocidura russula and C. suaveolens in southwestern Iberia and whether segregation is the result of current (ecological effect) or past (evolutionary effect) competition. We performed an annual live-trapping cycle in the two main habitats of the Odiel Marshes Natural Reserve (OMNR), the tidal marsh and the Mediterranean forest, both in syntopic (i.e., where both species co-occur) and allotopic (where only one of the two species occurs) sites within this Reserve. We modeled the presence–absence of each species in both habitats and sites by generalized linear mixed models. The coexistence of both species was favored by spatial and temporal niche segregation. Crocidura suaveolens was restricted to tidal marsh and did not occupy Mediterranean forest, even when C. russula was absent. We interpret this to be the result of competition in the past triggering an evolutionary response in C. suaveolens towards its specialization in tidal marsh. Moreover, the specialist C. suaveolens currently is outcompeting C. russula in tidal marshes, reversing the dominance pattern observed elsewhere. The degree of co-occurrence between both species in syntopic sites was low, as they showed inverse dynamics of seasonal abundances. Interspecific competition leading to habitat specialization favors the coexistence of these ecologically similar species.