pinecone/core-2020-05-10-deduplication huggingface dataset:
Microcrystalline silicon: Strain gauge and sensor arrays on flexible substrate for the measurement of high deformations

International audienceThis paper presents strain sensor arrays on flexible substrates able to measure local deformation induced by radii of curvature of few millimeters. Sensors use n-type doped microcrystalline silicon (μc-Si) as piezoresistive material, directly deposited on polyimide sheets at 165 °C. Sensitivity of individual sensors was investigated under tensile and compressive bending at various radii of curvature, down to 5 mm. A Transmission Line Method was used to extract the resistivity for each radius. The devices exhibited longitudinal gauge factors of −31 and longitudinal piezoresistive coefficients of −4.10−10 Pa−1. Reliability was demonstrated with almost unchanged resistances after cycles of bending (standard deviation of 1.7%). Strain gauge arrays, composed of 800 resistors on a 2 cm2 area, were fabricated with a spatial resolution of 500 × 500 μm2. Strain mapping showed the possibility to detect local deformation on a single resistor or to detect larger objects. These strain sensor arrays can find applications when high sensitivity and high spatial resolution is required. This paper also showed that μc-Si can be a relevant semi-conductor candidate for flexible electronic
Combination of 3D Scanning, Modeling and Analyzing Methods around the Castle of Coatfrec Reconstitution

International audienceThe castle of Coatfrec is a medieval castle in Brittany constituting merely a few remaining ruins currently in the process of restoration. Beyond its great archeological interest, it has become, over the course of the last few years, the subject of experimentation in digital archeology. Methods of 3D scanning were implored in order to gauge comparisons between the remaining structures and their absent hypothetical ones, resulting in the first quantitative results of its kind. This paper seeks to introduce the methods which carried out said research, as well as to present the subsequent results obtained using these new digital tools
Characterizations of Lojasiewicz inequalities: Subgradient flows, talweg, convexity

International audienceThe classical Lojasiewicz inequality and its extensions for partial differential equation problems (Simon) and to o-minimal structures (Kurdyka) have a considerable impact on the analysis of gradient-like methods and related problems: minimization methods, complexity theory, asymptotic analysis of dissipative partial differential equations, tame geometry. This paper provides alternative characterizations of this type of inequalities for nonsmooth lower semicontinuous functions defined on a metric or a real Hilbert space. In a metric context, we show that a generalized form of the Lojasiewicz inequality (hereby called the Kurdyka-Lojasiewicz inequality) relates to metric regularity and to the Lipschitz continuity of the sublevel mapping, yielding applications to discrete methods (strong convergence of the proximal algorithm). In a Hilbert setting we further establish that asymptotic properties of the semiflow generated by $-\partial f$ are strongly linked to this inequality. This is done by introducing the notion of a piecewise subgradient curve: such curves have uniformly bounded lengths if and only if the Kurdyka-Lojasiewicz inequality is satisfied. Further characterizations in terms of talweg lines -a concept linked to the location of the less steepest points at the level sets of $f$- and integrability conditions are given. In the convex case these results are significantly reinforced, allowing in particular to establish the asymptotic equivalence of discrete gradient methods and continuous gradient curves. On the other hand, a counterexample of a convex C^2 function in in the plane is constructed to illustrate the fact that, contrary to our intuition, and unless a specific growth condition is satisfied, convex functions may fail to fulfill the Kurdyka-Lojasiewicz inequality
Marked improvements in electrical and optical properties for MOVPE InN annealed at a low temperature (300 °C) in O2 atmosphere

We have found that the material quality of MOVPE InN can be markedly improved after the annealing in the air at around 300 °C. By the annealing in the air, carrier concentration is reduced by about one order of magnitude. In accordance with the carrier reduction, PL intensity is increased and PL peak energy is shifted to the lower energy side by about 0.06 eV for the film annealed for 3 h. The reduction of carrier concentration is also conformed by the shift of LO phonon-plasmon coupled mode in the Raman spectrum. The FWHM of the E_2 (high) mode is decreased, indicating that the crystalline quality is slightly improved by the annealing. Since the FWHM of X-ray rocking curve is not changed after the annealing, the improvement by the annealing is concluded not to be in macroscopic scale but microscopic scale. No improvements are found for the samples annealed in the N_2 flow. No data that show the chemical oxidation of InN are also found
Comprehensive compositional study of torrefied wood and herbaceous materials by chemical analysis and thermoanalytical methods

In this work the torrefaction of three biomass materials: black locust wood, wheat and rape straw was studied at various temperatures: 200, 225, 250, 275 and 300 °C. The thermal stability and the formation of the decomposition products of the untreated and treated samples were measured by TG/MS method. The degree of hemicellulose and cellulose decomposition during torrefaction at different temperatures were characterized by compositional analysis of the torrefied and untreated samples. The cellulose, hemicellulose and Klason-lignin contents of the raw and torrefied biomass samples were determined by acidic hydrolysis and subsequent HPLC analysis. The inorganic ion contents of the untreated samples were measured by ICP-OES method. The joint evaluation of the results obtained by various analytical methods revealed that the acidic side groups of hemicellulose were partially split off, while the main mass of hemicellulose did not degrade at 225 °C torrefaction temperature. About 40% of hemicellulose degrades at 250 °C torrefaction temperature and the remainder decomposes at higher temperature. Although hemicellulose has different chemical structure in the hardwood and the straws, no significant differences were observed in the thermal stability of hemicelluloses in the three studied samples. Taking into consideration the significantly higher alkali ion content of the straw samples it was concluded that the alkali ion content of the samples did not modify the thermal stability of hemicellulose. Statistical analysis (PCA) have been used to present correlations between the torrefaction temperature, chemical composition and thermal parameters of the samples. The PCA calculations revealed substantial changes in the chemical composition and thermal properties of biomass materials as a result of torrefaction at 275-300°C temperatures
Pixel-level APS Sensor Integration and Sensitivity Scaling for Vision Based Speed Measurement

A dual-pixel APS sensor architecture is proposed in this paper, for vision based speed measurement applications, based on a novel double exposure method. The sensor integrates two type of imaging elements on pixel level, and is designed to generate two spatially and temporally coherent images. The primary sensor generates a good quality image for vehicle identification, while the output of the secondary sensor is used to calculate speed estimates, based on the intra-frame displacement of the vehicle's headlight. A scaling process has also been developed for the sensitivity of the secondary sensor, based on photodiode parasitic capacitor discharge time
Old habits die hard? Lingering son preference in an era of normalizing sex ratios at birth in South Korea

South Korea was among the first countries to report both an abnormally high sex ratio at birth (SRB) and its subsequent normalization. We examine the role of son preference in driving fertility intentions during a period of declining SRB and consider the contribution of individual characteristics and broader social context to explaining changes in intentions. We employ data from the National Survey on Fertility, Family Health and Welfare that span 1991–2012. We find that reported son preference declined to a great extent but remained substantial by the end of the observation period, and that the intention to have a third child still differed by sex of existing children. Change in individual-level factors does not explain the decline in son preference, suggesting that broad social changes were also important. This study provides a better understanding of how son preference evolves in the post-transitional context of very low fertility
Evaluating the impact of teacher professional development: an evidence-based framework

Does teacher professional development make a difference? How do we know? While researchers and policy makers acknowledge that teacher professional development (PD) needs to be assessed and evaluated there is often little clarity as to how this can be achieved. Evaluation of teacher PD has been described as the weak link in the PD chain despite it being linked with improved PD experiences and pupil outcomes. This may be due to a lack of skills and tools to carry out such evaluations or indeed it may be linked to how PD is conceptualised. This article explores extant literature and models of evaluation, revealing gaps in existing evaluation frameworks resulting in the development of a provisional PD evaluation framework for use in a study which set out to formally evaluate the impact of a PD initiative on teachers’ professional learning in five urban primary disadvantaged schools in the Republic of Ireland. Following application within this study the framework was critiqued and revised resulting in a new PD Impact Evaluation Framework which has subsequently been further tested to add to its robustness and may support teachers, researchers and policy makers to carry out systematic and focused evaluations of teacher PD
Characteristics of Staphylococcus Hyicus strains isolated from pig carcasses in two different slaughterhouses

In a previous study, we showed that coagulase positive staphylococci (CPS), which are often used as indicators for S. aureus, are frequently found on pig carcasses at slaughter. Further characterization of the CPS identified only a minor part as S. aureus. Selected non-S. aureus strains were all identified as S. hyicus, However, two studies have described also in this species strains that produce staphylococcal enterotoxins. The aim of the present study was therefore to further characterize such coagulase positive S. hyicus strains isolated from pig carcasses and to assess the results also in view of their food safety relevance. A total of 189 S. hyicus strains from abattoirs A (n=36) and B (n=153) were characterized. Phenotypically, 98.9% showed non-pigmented colonies, 99.5% no haemolysis and 67.7% were egg yolk-positive. DNase activity was found in all but one isolate. Only five of the 189 strains were resistant to the antimicrobials tested. One strain harboured the mecA gene. Exfoliative toxin genes were detected in 31 (16.4%) strains. Six strains harboured the exhA and 25 strains the exhD gene. S. aureus Enterotoxin (SE) genes were detected in none of the strains. \ud
The PFGE genotyping results show only a limited number of clusters. Cluster I included more than 50% of the strains. The fact that similar or closely related PFGE patterns of S. hyicus can be found on carcasses after bleeding in both abattoirs indicates the occurrence of widespread strains in the Swiss pig population. Moreover, the genotyping results revealed a remarkable homogeneity in S. hyicus strains isolated from different slaughter process stages in abattoir B, which could indicate a recontamination problem with persisting strains
A new manifold representation for visual speech recognition

In this paper, we propose a new manifold representation capable of being applied for visual speech recognition. In this regard, the real time input video data is compressed using Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and the low-dimensional points calculated for each frame define the manifolds. Since the number of frames that from the video sequence is dependent on the word complexity, in order to use these manifolds for visual speech classification it is required to re-sample them into a fixed number of keypoints that are used as input for classification. In this paper two classification schemes, namely the k Nearest Neighbour (kNN) algorithm that is used in conjunction with the two-stage PCA and Hidden-Markov-Model (HMM) classifier are evaluated. The classification results for a group of English words indicate that the proposed approach is able to produce accurate classification results
Some Results Using Different Approaches to Merge Visual and Text-Based Features in CLEF’08 Photo Collection

This paper describes the participation of the MIRACLE team at the ImageCLEF Photographic Retrieval task of CLEF 2008. We succeeded in submitting 41 runs. Obtained results from text-based retrieval are better than content-based as previous experiments in the MIRACLE team campaigns [5, 6] using different software. Our main aim was to experiment with several merging approaches to fuse text-based retrieval and content-based retrieval results, and it happened that we improve the text-based baseline when applying one of the three merging algorithms, although visual results are lower than textual ones
Fire models and methods to map fuel types: The role of remote sensing.

Understanding fire is essential to improving forest management strategies. More specifically, an accurate knowledge of the spatial distribution of fuels is critical when analyzing, modelling and predicting fire behaviour. First, we review the main concepts and terminology associated with forest fuels and a number of fuel type classifications. Second, we summarize the main techniques employed to map fuel types starting with the most traditional approaches, such as field work, aerial photo interpretation or ecological modelling. We pay special attention to more contemporary techniques, which involve the use of remote sensing systems. In general, remote sensing systems are low-priced, can be regularly updated and are less time-consuming than traditional methods, but they are still facing important limitations. Recent work has shown that the integration of different sources of information andmethods in a complementary way helps to overcome most of these limitations. Further research is encouraged to develop novel and enhanced remote sensing techniques
Laminar heat transfer enhancement downstream of a backward facing step by using a pulsating flow

This study is motivated by the need to devise means to enhance heat transfer in configurations, like the back step, that appear in certain types of MEMS that involve fluid flow and that are not very efficient from the thermal transfer point of view. In particular, the work described in this paper studies the effect that a prescribed flow pulsation (defined by two control parameters: velocity pulsation frequency and pressure gradient amplitude at the inlet section) has on the heat transfer rate behind a backward facing step in the unsteady laminar 2-D regime. The working fluid that we have considered is water with temperature dependent viscosity and thermal conductivity. We have found that, for inlet pressure gradients that avoid flow reversal at both the upstream and downstream boundary conditions, the timeaveraged Nusselt number behind the step depends on the two above mentioned control parameters and is always larger than in the steady-state case. At Reynolds 100 and pulsating at the resonance frequency, the maximum time-averaged Nusselt number in the horizontal wall region located behind the step whose length is four times the step height is 55% larger than in the steady-case. Away from the resonant pulsation frequency, the time-averaged Nusselt number smoothly decreases and approaches its steady-state value
The role of iron on the degradation and mineralization or organic compounds using conventional Fenton and photo-Fenton processes

The role of iron on the degradation of different organic compounds, differing in their structure (aliphatic versus aromatic) and iron complex formation capacity, by conventional and photo-Fenton processes was investigated. Results show that these chemical characteristics can affect the degree of treatment in terms of COD and TOC removals. While aromatics exhibited a fast and great reduction in the COD by the conventional Fenton process, aliphatic compounds, apart from acetic acid, required the presence of UV light to enhance treatment results. EDTA and oxalic acid responded very positively to UV irradiation in both COD removal and mineralization, reaching the highest values showed by aromatics; and results depended on the intensity of the UV light applied. Phenol and 4-nitrophenol responded favourably to UV irradiation in terms of mineralization and slightly in COD removal. Reductions in the COD were almost total (95.99%), while only an 80% of reduction in the TOC was achieved, for the best photo-Fenton treatment of oxalic acid, phenol and nitrophenol. 60% COD and 40% TOC removals were achieved correspondingly in the case of EDTA. Acetic acid showed almost no mineralization and low COD removal (≈20%) when treated by a conventional Fenton process; and did not enhanced results when assisting the treatment with UV light. Photo-regeneration of ferrous ion and photo-decarboxylation of iron carboxylates are assessed in the framework of these results
Artificial Pheromone for Path Selection by a Foraging Swarm of Robots

Foraging robots involved in a search and retrieval task may create paths to navigate faster in their environment. In this context, a swarm of robots that has found several resources and created different paths may benefit strongly from path selection. Path selection enhances the foraging behavior by allowing the swarm to focus on the most profitable resource with the possibility for unused robots to stop participating in the path maintenance and to switch to another task. In order to achieve path selection, we implement virtual ants that lay artificial pheromone inside a network of robots. Virtual ants are local messages transmitted by robots; they travel along chains of robots and deposit artificial pheromone on the robots that are literally forming the chain and indicating the path. The concentration of artificial pheromone on the robots allows them to decide whether they are part of a selected path. We parameterize the mechanism with a mathematical model and provide an experimental validation using a swarm of 20 real robots. We show that our mechanism favors the selection of the closest resource is able to select a new path if a selected resource becomes unavailable and selects a newly detected and better resource when possible. As robots use very simple messages and behaviors, the system would be particularly well suited for swarms of microrobots with minimal abilitie
The impossibility of effective enforcement mechanisms in collateralized credit markets

We analyze the possibility of the simultaneous presence
of three key features in price-taking credit markets: infinity horizon, collateralized credit operations and effective additional enforcement mechanisms, i.e. those implying payments besides the value of the collateral guarantees.

We show that these additional mechanisms, instead of
strengthening, actually weaken the restrictions that collateral places on borrowing. In fact, when collateral requirements are not large enough in relation to
the effectiveness of the additional mechanisms, lenders anticipate total payments exceeding the value of the collateral requirements. Thus, by non-arbitrage, they lend more than the value of these guarantees. In turn, in the absence of other market frictions such as borrowing constraints, agents may indefinitely postpone
their debts, implying the collapse of the agent's maximization problem and of such credit markets.
Differences in the effect of social capital on health status between workers and non-workers

This paper explores the relationship of social capital to self-rated health status in Japan, and how this is affected by the labor market. Data of 3075 adult participants in the 2000 Social Policy and Social Consciousness (SPSC) survey were used. Controlling for endogenous bias, the main finding is that social capital has a significant positive influence on health status for people without a job but not for those with. This empirical study provides evidence that people without a job can afford to allocate time to accumulate social capital and thereby improve their health status.
On the relation between the mean and variance of delay in dynamic queues with random capacity and demand

This paper investigates the distribution of delays during a repeatedly occurring demand peak in a congested facility with random capacity and demand, such as an airport or an urban road. Congestion is described in the form of a dynamic queue using the Vickrey bottleneck model and assuming Nash equilibrium in arrival times. The paper shows that the expected delay and the variance of delay vary differently over time during the peak and must hence be considered separately. The paper gives some characterization of how the expected delay and the variance of delay are related, which explain the looping phenomenon that has now been observed a number of times. Empirical illustration is provided.
Dynamic Bayesian network-based anomaly detection for in-process visual inspection of laser surface heat treatment

We present the application of a cyber-physical system for inprocess\ud
quality control based on the visual inspection of a laser surface\ud
heat treatment process. To do this, we propose a classification framework\ud
that detects anomalies in recorded video sequences that have been preprocessed\ud
using a clustering-based method for feature subset selection.\ud
One peculiarity of the classification task is that there are no examples\ud
with errors, since major irregularities seldom occur in efficient industrial\ud
processes. Additionally, the parts to be processed are expensive so the\ud
sample size is small. The proposed framework uses anomaly detection,\ud
cross-validation and sampling techniques to deal with these issues. Regarding\ud
anomaly detection, dynamic Bayesian networks (DBNs) are used\ud
to represent the temporal characteristics of the normal process. Experiments\ud
are conducted with two diferent types of DBN structure learning\ud
algorithms, and classification performance is assessed on both anomalyfree\ud
examples and sequences with anomalies simulated by experts
Regulation of AMPA Receptors by Phosphorylation

The AMPA receptors for glutamate are oligomeric structures that mediate fast excitatory responses in the central nervous system. Phosphorylation of AMPA receptors is an important mechanism for short-term modulation of their function, and is thought to play an important role in synaptic plasticity in different brain regions. Recent studies have shown that phosphorylation of AMPA receptors by cAMP-dependent protein kinase (PKA) and Ca2+ - and calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II (CaMKII) potentiates their activity, but phosphorylation of the receptor subunits may also affect their interaction with intracellular proteins, and their expression at the plasma membrane. Phosphorylation of AMPA receptor subunits has also been investigated in relation to processes of synaptic plasticity. This review focuses on recent advances in understanding the molecular mechanisms of regulation of AMPA receptors, and their implications in synaptic plasticity.http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/A:100764412888