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Sample records for unit objective specific

  1. Specification of Concurrent Objects

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sørensen, Morten U.

    relation over two objects and an event. In the model, objects can be composed by parallel composition, encapsulation, and hiding of operations. Refinement between objects is defined as fair trace inclusion.A specification language is presented where objects can be specified operationally by abstract...

  2. The Reviewing of Object Files: Object-Specific Integration of Information.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kahneman, Daniel; And Others

    1992-01-01

    Seven experiments involving a total of 203 college students explored a form of object-specific priming and established a robust object-specific benefit that indicates that a new stimulus will be named faster if it physically matches a previous stimulus seen as part of the same perceptual object. (SLD)

  3. General object recognition is specific: Evidence from novel and familiar objects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Richler, Jennifer J; Wilmer, Jeremy B; Gauthier, Isabel

    2017-09-01

    In tests of object recognition, individual differences typically correlate modestly but nontrivially across familiar categories (e.g. cars, faces, shoes, birds, mushrooms). In theory, these correlations could reflect either global, non-specific mechanisms, such as general intelligence (IQ), or more specific mechanisms. Here, we introduce two separate methods for effectively capturing category-general performance variation, one that uses novel objects and one that uses familiar objects. In each case, we show that category-general performance variance is unrelated to IQ, thereby implicating more specific mechanisms. The first approach examines three newly developed novel object memory tests (NOMTs). We predicted that NOMTs would exhibit more shared, category-general variance than familiar object memory tests (FOMTs) because novel objects, unlike familiar objects, lack category-specific environmental influences (e.g. exposure to car magazines or botany classes). This prediction held, and remarkably, virtually none of the substantial shared variance among NOMTs was explained by IQ. Also, while NOMTs correlated nontrivially with two FOMTs (faces, cars), these correlations were smaller than among NOMTs and no larger than between the face and car tests themselves, suggesting that the category-general variance captured by NOMTs is specific not only relative to IQ, but also, to some degree, relative to both face and car recognition. The second approach averaged performance across multiple FOMTs, which we predicted would increase category-general variance by averaging out category-specific factors. This prediction held, and as with NOMTs, virtually none of the shared variance among FOMTs was explained by IQ. Overall, these results support the existence of object recognition mechanisms that, though category-general, are specific relative to IQ and substantially separable from face and car recognition. They also add sensitive, well-normed NOMTs to the tools available to study

  4. Parallel object-oriented specification language

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Florescu, O.; Voeten, J.P.M.; Theelen, B.D.; Geilen, M.C.W.; Corporaal, H.; Burns, Alan

    2008-01-01

    The Parallel Object-Oriented Specification Language (POOSL) is an expressive modelling language for hardware/software systems [10]. It was originally defined in [7] as an object-oriented extension of process algebra CCS [6], supporting (conditional) synchronous message passing between

  5. Supporting an Object-Oriented Approach to Unit Generator Development: The Csound Plugin Opcode Framework

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Victor Lazzarini

    2017-09-01

    Full Text Available This article presents a new framework for unit generator development for Csound, supporting a full object-oriented programming approach. It introduces the concept of unit generators and opcodes, and its centrality with regards to music programming languages in general, and Csound in specific. The layout of an opcode from the perspective of the Csound C-language API is presented, with some outline code examples. This is followed by a discussion which places the unit generator within the object-oriented paradigm and the motivation for a full C++ programming support, which is provided by the Csound Plugin Opcode Framework (CPOF. The design of CPOF is then explored in detail, supported by several opcode examples. The article concludes by discussing two key applications of object-orientation and their respective instances in the Csound code base.

  6. Multi-objective Optimization of a Solar Humidification Dehumidification Desalination Unit

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rafigh, M.; Mirzaeian, M.; Najafi, B.; Rinaldi, F.; Marchesi, R.

    2017-11-01

    In the present paper, a humidification-dehumidification desalination unit integrated with solar system is considered. In the first step mathematical model of the whole plant is represented. Next, taking into account the logical constraints, the performance of the system is optimized. On one hand it is desired to have higher energetic efficiency, while on the other hand, higher efficiency results in an increment in the required area for each subsystem which consequently leads to an increase in the total cost of the plant. In the present work, the optimum solution is achieved when the specific energy of the solar heater and also the areas of humidifier and dehumidifier are minimized. Due to the fact that considered objective functions are in conflict, conventional optimization methods are not applicable. Hence, multi objective optimization using genetic algorithm which is an efficient tool for dealing with problems with conflicting objectives has been utilized and a set of optimal solutions called Pareto front each of which is a tradeoff between the mentioned objectives is generated.

  7. Object-Based Attention on Social Units: Visual Selection of Hands Performing a Social Interaction.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yin, Jun; Xu, Haokui; Duan, Jipeng; Shen, Mowei

    2018-05-01

    Traditionally, objects of attention are characterized either as full-fledged entities or either as elements grouped by Gestalt principles. Because humans appear to use social groups as units to explain social activities, we proposed that a socially defined group, according to social interaction information, would also be a possible object of attentional selection. This hypothesis was examined using displays with and without handshaking interactions. Results demonstrated that object-based attention, which was measured by an object-specific attentional advantage (i.e., shorter response times to targets on a single object), was extended to two hands performing a handshake but not to hands that did not perform meaningful social interactions, even when they did perform handshake-like actions. This finding cannot be attributed to the familiarity of the frequent co-occurrence of two handshaking hands. Hence, object-based attention can select a grouped object whose parts are connected within a meaningful social interaction. This finding implies that object-based attention is constrained by top-down information.

  8. Object marking in Swahili: Definiteness, specificity, or both ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    This article examines the role of object marking in relation to definiteness and specificity in Swahili. Object marking in general has attracted the attention of many scholars in the field of Bantu linguistics due to the complex nature of object markers (OMs) and varying functions they fulfil in Bantu. Opinions differ on the role of ...

  9. Assessment of Psychophysiological Response and Specific Fine Motor Skills in Combat Units.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sánchez-Molina, Joaquín; Robles-Pérez, José J; Clemente-Suárez, Vicente J

    2018-03-02

    Soldiers´ training and experience can influence the outcome of the missions, as well as their own physical integrity. The objective of this research was to analyze the psycho-physiological response and specific motor skills in an urban combat simulation with two units of infantry with different training and experience. psychophysiological parameters -Heart Rate, blood oxygen saturation, glucose and blood lactate, cortical activation, anxiety and heart rate variability-, as well as fine motor skills were analyzed in 31 male soldiers of the Spanish Army, 19 belonging to the Light Infantry Brigade, and 12 to the Heavy Forces Infantry Brigade, before and after an urban combat simulation. A combat simulation provokes an alteration of the psycho-physiological basal state in soldiers and a great unbalance in the sympathetic-vagal interaction. The specific training of Light Infantry unit involves lower metabolic, cardiovascular, and anxiogenic response not only previous, but mainly after a combat maneuver, than Heavy Infantry unit's. No differences were found in relation with fine motor skills, improving in both cases after the maneuver. This fact should be taken into account for betterment units´ deployment preparation in current theaters of operations.

  10. Visual object recognition and category-specificity

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerlach, Christian

    This thesis is based on seven published papers. The majority of the papers address two topics in visual object recognition: (i) category-effects at pre-semantic stages, and (ii) the integration of visual elements into elaborate shape descriptions corresponding to whole objects or large object parts...... (shape configuration). In the early writings these two topics were examined more or less independently. In later works, findings concerning category-effects and shape configuration merge into an integrated model, termed RACE, advanced to explain category-effects arising at pre-semantic stages in visual...... in visual long-term memory. In the thesis it is described how this simple model can account for a wide range of findings on category-specificity in both patients with brain damage and normal subjects. Finally, two hypotheses regarding the neural substrates of the model's components - and how activation...

  11. Object specific reconstruction using compressively sensed data

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mahalanobis, Abhijit

    2008-01-01

    Compressed sensing holds the promise for radically novel sensors that can perfectly reconstruct images using considerably less samples of data than required by the otherwise general Shannon sampling theorem. In surveillance systems however, it is also desirable to cue regions of the image where objects of interest may exist. Thus in this paper, we are interested in imaging interesting objects in a scene, without necessarily seeking perfect reconstruction of the whole image. We show that our goals are achieved by minimizing a modified L2-norm criterion with good results when the reconstruction of only specific objects is of interest. The method yields a simple closed form analytical solution that does not require iterative processing. Objects can be meaningfully sensed in considerable detail while heavily compressing the scene elsewhere. Essentially, this embeds the object detection and clutter discrimination function in the sensing and imaging process.

  12. Testing object Interactions

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Grüner, Andreas

    2010-01-01

    In this thesis we provide a unit testing approach for multi-purposes object-oriented programming languages in the style of Java and C#. Our approach includes the definition of a test specification language which results from extending the programming language with new designated specification

  13. Advantages of Task-Specific Multi-Objective Optimisation in Evolutionary Robotics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Trianni, Vito; López-Ibáñez, Manuel

    2015-01-01

    The application of multi-objective optimisation to evolutionary robotics is receiving increasing attention. A survey of the literature reveals the different possibilities it offers to improve the automatic design of efficient and adaptive robotic systems, and points to the successful demonstrations available for both task-specific and task-agnostic approaches (i.e., with or without reference to the specific design problem to be tackled). However, the advantages of multi-objective approaches over single-objective ones have not been clearly spelled out and experimentally demonstrated. This paper fills this gap for task-specific approaches: starting from well-known results in multi-objective optimisation, we discuss how to tackle commonly recognised problems in evolutionary robotics. In particular, we show that multi-objective optimisation (i) allows evolving a more varied set of behaviours by exploring multiple trade-offs of the objectives to optimise, (ii) supports the evolution of the desired behaviour through the introduction of objectives as proxies, (iii) avoids the premature convergence to local optima possibly introduced by multi-component fitness functions, and (iv) solves the bootstrap problem exploiting ancillary objectives to guide evolution in the early phases. We present an experimental demonstration of these benefits in three different case studies: maze navigation in a single robot domain, flocking in a swarm robotics context, and a strictly collaborative task in collective robotics.

  14. Advantages of Task-Specific Multi-Objective Optimisation in Evolutionary Robotics.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vito Trianni

    Full Text Available The application of multi-objective optimisation to evolutionary robotics is receiving increasing attention. A survey of the literature reveals the different possibilities it offers to improve the automatic design of efficient and adaptive robotic systems, and points to the successful demonstrations available for both task-specific and task-agnostic approaches (i.e., with or without reference to the specific design problem to be tackled. However, the advantages of multi-objective approaches over single-objective ones have not been clearly spelled out and experimentally demonstrated. This paper fills this gap for task-specific approaches: starting from well-known results in multi-objective optimisation, we discuss how to tackle commonly recognised problems in evolutionary robotics. In particular, we show that multi-objective optimisation (i allows evolving a more varied set of behaviours by exploring multiple trade-offs of the objectives to optimise, (ii supports the evolution of the desired behaviour through the introduction of objectives as proxies, (iii avoids the premature convergence to local optima possibly introduced by multi-component fitness functions, and (iv solves the bootstrap problem exploiting ancillary objectives to guide evolution in the early phases. We present an experimental demonstration of these benefits in three different case studies: maze navigation in a single robot domain, flocking in a swarm robotics context, and a strictly collaborative task in collective robotics.

  15. Cockpit management and Specific Behavioral Objectives (SBOs)

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mudge, R. W.

    1987-01-01

    One of the primary tools used to accomplish the task of effective training is the specific behavioral objective (SBO). An SBO is simply a statement which specifically identifies a small segment of the final behavior sought, and a little more. The key word is specific. The company pinpoints exactly what it is it wants the pilot to do after completing training, and what it should evaluate from the point of view of both the program and the pilot. It tells the junior crewmember exactly, specifically, what he should monitor and support insofar as the management function is concerned. It gives greater meaning to the term second in command. And finally, it tells the supervisory pilot exactly what he should observe, evaluate, and instruct, insofar as the management function is concerned.

  16. Deformation-specific and deformation-invariant visual object recognition: pose vs identity recognition of people and deforming objects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tristan J Webb

    2014-04-01

    Full Text Available When we see a human sitting down, standing up, or walking, we can recognise one of these poses independently of the individual, or we can recognise the individual person, independently of the pose. The same issues arise for deforming objects. For example, if we see a flag deformed by the wind, either blowing out or hanging languidly, we can usually recognise the flag, independently of its deformation; or we can recognise the deformation independently of the identity of the flag. We hypothesize that these types of recognition can be implemented by the primate visual system using temporo-spatial continuity as objects transform as a learning principle. In particular, we hypothesize that pose or deformation can be learned under conditions in which large numbers of different people are successively seen in the same pose, or objects in the same deformation. We also hypothesize that person-specific representations that are independent of pose, and object-specific representations that are independent of deformation and view, could be built, when individual people or objects are observed successively transforming from one pose or deformation and view to another. These hypotheses were tested in a simulation of the ventral visual system, VisNet, that uses temporal continuity, implemented in a synaptic learning rule with a short-term memory trace of previous neuronal activity, to learn invariant representations. It was found that depending on the statistics of the visual input, either pose-specific or deformation-specific representations could be built that were invariant with respect to individual and view; or that identity-specific representations could be built that were invariant with respect to pose or deformation and view. We propose that this is how pose-specific and pose-invariant, and deformation-specific and deformation-invariant, perceptual representations are built in the brain.

  17. Objective Versus Subjective Military Pilot Selection Methods in the United States of America

    Science.gov (United States)

    2015-12-14

    a computerized test designed to assess pilot skills by measuring spatial orientation and psychomotor skills and multitasking . The second is the...AFRL-SA-WP-SR-2015-0028 Objective Versus Subjective Military Pilot Selection Methods in the United States of America Joe...September 2014 4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE Objective Versus Subjective Military Pilot Selection Methods in the United States of America 5a. CONTRACT

  18. Linking actions and objects: Context-specific learning of novel weight priors.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Trewartha, Kevin M; Flanagan, J Randall

    2017-06-01

    Distinct explicit and implicit memory processes support weight predictions used when lifting objects and making perceptual judgments about weight, respectively. The first time that an object is encountered weight is predicted on the basis of learned associations, or priors, linking size and material to weight. A fundamental question is whether the brain maintains a single, global representation of priors, or multiple representations that can be updated in a context specific way. A second key question is whether the updating of priors, or the ability to scale lifting forces when repeatedly lifting unusually weighted objects requires focused attention. To investigate these questions we compared the adaptability of weight predictions used when lifting objects and judging their weights in different groups of participants who experienced size-weight inverted objects passively (with the objects placed on the hands) or actively (where participants lift the objects) under full or divided attention. To assess weight judgments we measured the size-weight illusion after every 20 trials of experience with the inverted objects both passively and actively. The attenuation of the illusion that arises when lifting inverted object was found to be context-specific such that the attenuation was larger when the mode of interaction with the inverted objects matched the method of assessment of the illusion. Dividing attention during interaction with the inverted objects had no effect on attenuation of the illusion, but did slow the rate at which lifting forces were scaled to the weight inverted objects. These findings suggest that the brain stores multiple representations of priors that are context specific, and that focused attention is important for scaling lifting forces, but not for updating weight predictions used when judging object weight. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  19. Do overarching mitigation objectives dominate transport-specific targets in the EU?

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ghersi, Frédéric; McDonnell, Simon; Sassi, Olivier

    2013-01-01

    This research investigates if the stringent 2020 and 2050 overarching CO 2 mitigation objectives set out by the European Union dominate its 2010 to 2020 targets specific to the transportation arena, specifically its biofuel penetration objectives and gram CO 2 per kilometre emission caps. Using a dynamic recursive general equilibrium model, IMACLIM-R, we demonstrate that these overarching targets do not dominate the interim transportation targets when the carbon policy triggering compliance with the mitigation objectives boils down to the theoretical least-cost option of uniform carbon pricing. Ground transportation is confirmed as quite insensitive to high carbon prices, even when such prices are applied over a long term. It is tempting to conclude that pursuing the mitigation objectives specific to transportation will impose unnecessary costs. However, because of the second best conditions prevailing in actual economies, and of the risk of lock-in in carbon intensive trajectories, we conclude with the urgent need for some ambitious transport-specific policy design research agenda. - Highlights: ► We review the European Union’s climate and transportation policy. ► We describe the IMACLIM-R model and how it represents transport. ► We develop an EU carbon pricing scenario that meets its aggregate CO 2 targets. ► This does not require meeting biofuel nor g/km 2010 to 2020 objectives. ► We conclude on the policy implications of this apparent inefficiency

  20. Do overarching mitigation objectives dominate transport-specific targets in the EU?

    OpenAIRE

    GHERSI , Frédéric; Mcdonnell , Simon; Sassi , Olivier

    2013-01-01

    International audience; This research investigates if the stringent 2020 and 2050 overarching CO2 mitigation objectives set out by the European Union dominate its 2010 to 2020 targets specific to the transportation arena, specifically its biofuel penetration objectives and gram CO2 per kilometre emission caps. Using a dynamic recursive general equilibrium model, IMACLIM-R, we demonstrate that these overarching targets do not dominate the interim transportation targets when the carbon policy t...

  1. Delineation of site-specific management units in a saline region at the Venice Lagoon margin, Italy, using soil reflectance and apparent electrical conductivity

    Science.gov (United States)

    Site-specific crop management utilizes site-specific management units (SSMUs) to apply inputs when, where, and in the amount needed to increase food productivity, optimize resource utilization, increase profitability, and reduce detrimental environmental impacts. It is the objective of this study to...

  2. Search and Retrieval of Foreign Objects for the Steam Generator of Wolsung NPP Unit 1

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jeong, Woo-Tae; Lee, Kyung-Ho [KHNP CRI, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    2016-10-15

    We developed a foreign object search and retrieval (FOSAR) system for Wolsung NPP unit 1 steam generators. The steam generators of Wolsung NPP unit 1 have one 2.5 inch hand hole and two 4 inch hand holes. The FOSAR system was designed to be installed through 4 inch hand holes. Using permanent magnet, the FOSAR system was firmly attached to the vertical annulus wall of the steam generator. We successfully developed the FOSAR system for Wolsung NPP unit 1. Using the developed FOSAR system, technicians successfully found and removed various foreign objects. Most of the foreign objects, we found, were made of carbon steel sheet, therefore magnet tool was the most useful to remove it. Alligator tool was sometimes used. Based on the experience during the FOSAR activities, we are developing a lancing system for Wolsung NPP unit 1. It will be designed and manufactured until November 2016.

  3. Search and Retrieval of Foreign Objects for the Steam Generator of Wolsung NPP Unit 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jeong, Woo-Tae; Lee, Kyung-Ho

    2016-01-01

    We developed a foreign object search and retrieval (FOSAR) system for Wolsung NPP unit 1 steam generators. The steam generators of Wolsung NPP unit 1 have one 2.5 inch hand hole and two 4 inch hand holes. The FOSAR system was designed to be installed through 4 inch hand holes. Using permanent magnet, the FOSAR system was firmly attached to the vertical annulus wall of the steam generator. We successfully developed the FOSAR system for Wolsung NPP unit 1. Using the developed FOSAR system, technicians successfully found and removed various foreign objects. Most of the foreign objects, we found, were made of carbon steel sheet, therefore magnet tool was the most useful to remove it. Alligator tool was sometimes used. Based on the experience during the FOSAR activities, we are developing a lancing system for Wolsung NPP unit 1. It will be designed and manufactured until November 2016

  4. 49 CFR 179.301 - Individual specification requirements for multi-unit tank car tanks.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ...-unit tank car tanks. 179.301 Section 179.301 Transportation Other Regulations Relating to... MATERIALS REGULATIONS SPECIFICATIONS FOR TANK CARS Specifications for Multi-Unit Tank Car Tanks (Classes DOT-106A and 110AW) § 179.301 Individual specification requirements for multi-unit tank car tanks. (a) In...

  5. Near-Earth Objects. Chapter 27

    Science.gov (United States)

    Harris, Alan W.; Drube, Line; McFadden, Lucy A.; Binzel, Richard P.

    2014-01-01

    A near-Earth object (NEO) is an asteroid or comet orbiting the Sun with a perihelion distance of less than 1.3 Astronomical Units (AU) (1 AU, an astronomical unit, is the mean distance between the Earth and the Sun, around 150 million kilometers). If the orbit of an NEO can bring it to within 0.05 AU of the Earth's orbit, and it is larger than about 120 meters, it is termed a potentially hazardous object (PHO); an object of this size is likely to survive passage through the atmosphere and cause extensive damage on impact. (The acronyms NEA and PHO are used when referring specifically to asteroids.)

  6. What Is the Unit of Visual Attention? Object for Selection, but Boolean Map for Access

    Science.gov (United States)

    Huang, Liqiang

    2010-01-01

    In the past 20 years, numerous theories and findings have suggested that the unit of visual attention is the object. In this study, I first clarify 2 different meanings of unit of visual attention, namely the unit of access in the sense of measurement and the unit of selection in the sense of division. In accordance with this distinction, I argue…

  7. Category Specificity in Normal Episodic Learning: Applications to Object Recognition and Category-Specific Agnosia

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bukach, Cindy M.; Bub, Daniel N.; Masson, Michael E. J.; Lindsay, D. Stephen

    2004-01-01

    Studies of patients with category-specific agnosia (CSA) have given rise to multiple theories of object recognition, most of which assume the existence of a stable, abstract semantic memory system. We applied an episodic view of memory to questions raised by CSA in a series of studies examining normal observers' recall of newly learned attributes…

  8. Control system design specification of advanced spent fuel management process units

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Ahn, S. H.; Kim, S. H.; Yoon, J. S

    2003-06-01

    In this study, the design specifications of instrumentation and control system for advanced spent fuel management process units are presented. The advanced spent fuel management process consists of several process units such as slitting device, dry pulverizing/mixing device, metallizer, etc. In this study, the control and operation characteristics of the advanced spent fuel management mockup process devices and the process devices developed in 2001 and 2002 are analysed. Also, a integral processing system of the unit process control signals is proposed, which the operation efficiency is improved. And a redundant PLC control system is constructed which the reliability is improved. A control scheme is proposed for the time delayed systems compensating the control performance degradation caused by time delay. The control system design specification is presented for the advanced spent fuel management process units. This design specifications can be effectively used for the detail design of the advanced spent fuel management process.

  9. Multi-Objective Optimization of Start-up Strategy for Pumped Storage Units

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jinjiao Hou

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available This paper proposes a multi-objective optimization method for the start-up strategy of pumped storage units (PSU for the first time. In the multi-objective optimization method, the speed rise time and the overshoot during the process of the start-up are taken as the objectives. A precise simulation platform is built for simulating the transient process of start-up, and for calculating the objectives based on the process. The Multi-objective Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm (MOPSO is adopted to optimize the widely applied start-up strategies based on one-stage direct guide vane control (DGVC, and two-stage DGVC. Based on the Pareto Front obtained, a multi-objective decision-making method based on the relative objective proximity is used to sort the solutions in the Pareto Front. Start-up strategy optimization for a PSU of a pumped storage power station in Jiangxi Province in China is conducted in experiments. The results show that: (1 compared with the single objective optimization, the proposed multi-objective optimization of start-up strategy not only greatly shortens the speed rise time and the speed overshoot, but also makes the speed curve quickly stabilize; (2 multi-objective optimization of strategy based on two-stage DGVC achieves better solution for a quick and smooth start-up of PSU than that of the strategy based on one-stage DGVC.

  10. Patterns of muscle activity underlying object-specific grasp by the macaque monkey.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brochier, T; Spinks, R L; Umilta, M A; Lemon, R N

    2004-09-01

    During object grasp, a coordinated activation of distal muscles is required to shape the hand in relation to the physical properties of the object. Despite the fundamental importance of the grasping action, little is known of the muscular activation patterns that allow objects of different sizes and shapes to be grasped. In a study of two adult macaque monkeys, we investigated whether we could distinguish between EMG activation patterns associated with grasp of 12 differently shaped objects, chosen to evoke a wide range of grasping postures. Each object was mounted on a horizontal shuttle held by a weak spring (load force 1-2 N). Objects were located in separate sectors of a "carousel," and inter-trial rotation of the carousel allowed sequential presentation of the objects in pseudorandom order. EMG activity from 10 to 12 digit, hand, and arm muscles was recorded using chronically implanted electrodes. We show that the grasp of different objects was characterized by complex but distinctive patterns of EMG activation. Cluster analysis shows that these object-related EMG patterns were specific and consistent enough to identify the object unequivocally from the EMG recordings alone. EMG-based object identification required a minimum of six EMGs from simultaneously recorded muscles. EMG patterns were consistent across recording sessions in a given monkey but showed some differences between animals. These results identify the specific patterns of activity required to achieve distinct hand postures for grasping, and they open the way to our understanding of how these patterns are generated by the central motor network.

  11. Object-Oriented Approach to Modeling Units of Pneumatic Systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yu. V. Kyurdzhiev

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available The article shows the relevance of the approaches to the object-oriented programming when modeling the pneumatic units (PU.Based on the analysis of the calculation schemes of aggregates pneumatic systems two basic objects, namely a cavity flow and a material point were highlighted.Basic interactions of objects are defined. Cavity-cavity interaction: ex-change of matter and energy with the flows of mass. Cavity-point interaction: force interaction, exchange of energy in the form of operation. Point-point in-teraction: force interaction, elastic interaction, inelastic interaction, and inter-vals of displacement.The authors have developed mathematical models of basic objects and interactions. Models and interaction of elements are implemented in the object-oriented programming.Mathematical models of elements of PU design scheme are implemented in derived from the base class. These classes implement the models of flow cavity, piston, diaphragm, short channel, diaphragm to be open by a given law, spring, bellows, elastic collision, inelastic collision, friction, PU stages with a limited movement, etc.A numerical integration of differential equations for the mathematical models of PU design scheme elements is based on the Runge-Kutta method of the fourth order. On request each class performs a tact of integration i.e. calcu-lation of the coefficient method.The paper presents an integration algorithm of the system of differential equations. All objects of the PU design scheme are placed in a unidirectional class list. Iterator loop cycle initiates the integration tact of all the objects in the list. One in four iteration makes a transition to the next step of integration. Calculation process stops when any object shows a shutdowns flag.The proposed approach was tested in the calculation of a number of PU designs. With regard to traditional approaches to modeling, the authors-proposed method features in easy enhancement, code reuse, high reliability

  12. Collective Training and Fielding Opportunities for the Objective Force Maneuver Systems at the Unit of Action Level in a Unit Manning/Unit Replacement Personnel System

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    Courts, Michael

    2003-01-01

    The introduction of Objective Force formations, beginning with the first Unit of Action, will fundamentally change existing organizational structures, training requirements and operational constructs for the U.S. Army...

  13. Multi-objective unit commitment with wind penetration and emission concerns under stochastic and fuzzy uncertainties

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wang, Bo; Wang, Shuming; Zhou, Xianzhong; Watada, Junzo

    2016-01-01

    Recent years have witnessed the ever increasing renewable penetration in power generation systems, which entails modern unit commitment problems with modelling and computation burdens. This study aims to simulate the impacts of manifold uncertainties on system operation with emission concerns. First, probability theory and fuzzy set theory are applied to jointly represent the uncertainties such as wind generation, load fluctuation and unit outage that interleaved in unit commitment problems. Second, a Value-at-Risk-based multi-objective approach is developed as a bridge of existing stochastic and robust unit commitment optimizations, which not only captures the inherent conflict between operation cost and supply reliability, but also provides easy-to-adjust robustness against worst-case scenarios. Third, a multi-objective algorithm that integrates fuzzy simulation and particle swarm optimization is developed to achieve approximate Pareto-optimal solutions. The research effectiveness is exemplified by two case studies: The comparison between test systems with and without generation uncertainty demonstrates that this study is practicable and can suggest operational insights of generation mix systems. The sensitivity analysis on Value-at-Risk proves that our method can achieve adequate tradeoff between performance optimality and robustness, thus help system operators in making informed decisions. Finally, the model and algorithm comparisons also justify the superiority of this research. - Highlights: • Probability theory and fuzzy set theory are used to describe different uncertainties. • A Value-at-Risk-based multi-objective unit commitment model is proposed. • An improved multi-objective particle swarm optimization algorithm is developed. • The model achieves adequate trade-off between performance optimality and robustness. • The algorithm can obtain convergent and diversified Pareto fronts.

  14. What are the underlying units of perceived animacy? Chasing detection is intrinsically object-based.

    Science.gov (United States)

    van Buren, Benjamin; Gao, Tao; Scholl, Brian J

    2017-10-01

    One of the most foundational questions that can be asked about any visual process is the nature of the underlying 'units' over which it operates (e.g., features, objects, or spatial regions). Here we address this question-for the first time, to our knowledge-in the context of the perception of animacy. Even simple geometric shapes appear animate when they move in certain ways. Do such percepts arise whenever any visual feature moves appropriately, or do they require that the relevant features first be individuated as discrete objects? Observers viewed displays in which one disc (the "wolf") chased another (the "sheep") among several moving distractor discs. Critically, two pairs of discs were also connected by visible lines. In the Unconnected condition, both lines connected pairs of distractors; but in the Connected condition, one connected the wolf to a distractor, and the other connected the sheep to a different distractor. Observers in the Connected condition were much less likely to describe such displays using mental state terms. Furthermore, signal detection analyses were used to explore the objective ability to discriminate chasing displays from inanimate control displays in which the wolf moved toward the sheep's mirror-image. Chasing detection was severely impaired on Connected trials: observers could readily detect an object chasing another object, but not a line-end chasing another line-end, a line-end chasing an object, or an object chasing a line-end. We conclude that the underlying units of perceived animacy are discrete visual objects.

  15. Specifications for Supplementary Classroom Units, Stressed Skin Panel.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Waring, Robert B.; And Others

    Complete outline specifications are given for the construction of supplementary classroom units using stressed skin panels. Sections included are--(1) concrete and related work, (2) masonry, (3) structural and miscellaneous metal, (4) curtain walls and metal windows, (5) carpentry and related work, (6) roofing, sheet metal, and related work, (7)…

  16. Common input to motor units of intrinsic and extrinsic hand muscles during two-digit object hold.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Winges, Sara A; Kornatz, Kurt W; Santello, Marco

    2008-03-01

    Anatomical and physiological evidence suggests that common input to motor neurons of hand muscles is an important neural mechanism for hand control. To gain insight into the synaptic input underlying the coordination of hand muscles, significant effort has been devoted to describing the distribution of common input across motor units of extrinsic muscles. Much less is known, however, about the distribution of common input to motor units belonging to different intrinsic muscles and to intrinsic-extrinsic muscle pairs. To address this void in the literature, we quantified the incidence and strength of near-simultaneous discharges of motor units residing in either the same or different intrinsic hand muscles (m. first dorsal, FDI, and m. first palmar interosseus, FPI) during two-digit object hold. To extend the characterization of common input to pairs of extrinsic muscles (previous work) and pairs of intrinsic muscles (present work), we also recorded electromyographic (EMG) activity from an extrinsic thumb muscle (m. flexor pollicis longus, FPL). Motor-unit synchrony across FDI and FPI was weak (common input strength, CIS, mean +/- SE: 0.17 +/- 0.02). Similarly, motor units from extrinsic-intrinsic muscle pairs were characterized by weak synchrony (FPL-FDI: 0.25 +/- 0.02; FPL-FPI: 0.29 +/- 0.03) although stronger than FDI-FPI. Last, CIS from within FDI and FPI was more than three times stronger (0.70 +/- 0.06 and 0.66 +/- 0.06, respectively) than across these muscles. We discuss present and previous findings within the framework of muscle-pair specific distribution of common input to hand muscles based on their functional role in grasping.

  17. Calibration is action specific but perturbation of perceptual units is not.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Pan, Jing S; Coats, Rachel O; Bingham, Geoffrey P

    2014-02-01

    G. P. Bingham and C. C. Pagano (1998, The necessity of a perception/action approach to definite distance perception: Monocular distance perception to guide reaching. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 24, 145-168) argued that metric space perception should be investigated using relevant action measures because calibration is an intrinsic component of perception/action that yields accurate targeted actions. They described calibration as a mapping from embodied units of perception to embodied units of action. This mapping theory yields a number of predictions. We tested two of them. The first prediction is that calibration should be action specific because what is calibrated is a mapping from perceptual units to a unit of action. Thus, calibration does not generalize to other actions. This prediction is consistent with the "action-specific approach" to calibration (D. R. Proffitt, 2008, An action specific approach to spatial perception. In R. L. Klatzky, B. MacWhinney, & M. Behrmann (Eds.), Embodiment, ego-space and action (pp. 179-202). New York, NY: Psychology Press.). The second prediction is that a change in perceptual units should generalize to all relevant actions that are guided using that perceptual information. The same perceptual units can be mapped to different actions. Change in the unit affects all relevant actions. This prediction is consistent with the "general purpose perception approach" (J. M. Loomis & J. W. Philbeck, 2008, Measuring spatial perception with spatial updating and action. In R. L. Klatzky, B. MacWhinney, & M. Behrmann (Eds.), Embodiment, ego-space and action (pp. 1-43). New York, NY: Psychology Press). In Experiment 1, two targeted actions, throwing and extended reaching were tested to determine if they were comparable in precision and in response to distorted calibration. They were. Comparing these actions, the first prediction was tested in Experiment 2 and confirmed. The second prediction was

  18. Material specification for ductile cast iron in the United States

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sorenson, K.B.

    1987-01-01

    The United States currently does not have formal design criteria for qualifying ductile cast iron (DCI) transportation casks. There is also no dedicated material standard for DCI for this particular application. A draft ASTM material specification has been written and is currently in the ASTM approval process. This paper reviews the brief history of the development of the specification, the technical basis for the material properties, the ASTM approval process and the current status of the draft specification. The expected implications of having an adopted ASTM specification on the licensing process are also discussed. (orig./DG)

  19. Traumatic brain injury rehabilitation, the programs applied in French UEROS units, and the specificity of the Limoges experience.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hamonet-Torny, J; Fayol, P; Faure, P; Carrière, H; Dumond, J-J

    2013-04-01

    First created in 1996, the French evaluation, retraining, social and vocational orientation units (UEROS) now play a fundamental role in the social and vocational rehabilitation of patients with brain injury. As of today, there exist 30 UEROS centers in France. While their care and treatment objectives are shared, their means of assessment and retraining differ according to the experience of each one. The objective of this article is to describe the specific programs and the different tools put to work in the UEROS of Limoges. The UEROS of Limoges would appear to offer a form of holistic rehabilitation management characterized by the importance of psycho-education and its type of approach towards vocational reintegration. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

  20. Site-Specific Analyses for Demonstrating Compliance with 10 CFR 61 Performance Objectives - 12179

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Grossman, C.J.; Esh, D.W.; Yadav, P.; Carrera, A.G. [U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852 (United States)

    2012-07-01

    The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is proposing to amend its regulations at 10 CFR Part 61 to require low-level radioactive waste disposal facilities to conduct site-specific analyses to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives in Subpart C. The amendments would require licensees to conduct site-specific analyses for protection of the public and inadvertent intruders as well as analyses for long-lived waste. The amendments would ensure protection of public health and safety, while providing flexibility to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives, for current and potential future waste streams. NRC staff intends to submit proposed rule language and associated regulatory basis to the Commission for its approval in early 2012. The NRC staff also intends to develop associated guidance to accompany any proposed amendments. The guidance is intended to supplement existing low-level radioactive waste guidance on issues pertinent to conducting site-specific analyses to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives. The guidance will facilitate implementation of the proposed amendments by licensees and assist competent regulatory authorities in reviewing the site-specific analyses. Specifically, the guidance provides staff recommendations on general considerations for the site-specific analyses, modeling issues for assessments to demonstrate compliance with the performance objectives including the performance assessment, intruder assessment, stability assessment, and analyses for long-lived waste. This paper describes the technical basis for changes to the rule language and the proposed guidance associated with implementation of the rule language. The NRC staff, per Commission direction, intends to propose amendments to 10 CFR Part 61 to require licensees to conduct site-specific analyses to demonstrate compliance with performance objectives for the protection of public health and the environment. The amendments would require a

  1. The specifics of the Russian market of confectionery: subject-object certainty

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tsarenko Elena

    2012-12-01

    Full Text Available This article describes a study of the Russian confectionery market. Determining the specificity of the market in Russia, identified and examined the components of this market with the help of subject - object orientation. As well as the actuality of considering new approaches to promote sales of confectionery products.

  2. Category-specificity in visual object recognition

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerlach, Christian

    2009-01-01

    Are all categories of objects recognized in the same manner visually? Evidence from neuropsychology suggests they are not: some brain damaged patients are more impaired in recognizing natural objects than artefacts whereas others show the opposite impairment. Category-effects have also been...... demonstrated in neurologically intact subjects, but the findings are contradictory and there is no agreement as to why category-effects arise. This article presents a Pre-semantic Account of Category Effects (PACE) in visual object recognition. PACE assumes two processing stages: shape configuration (the...... binding of shape elements into elaborate shape descriptions) and selection (among competing representations in visual long-term memory), which are held to be differentially affected by the structural similarity between objects. Drawing on evidence from clinical studies, experimental studies...

  3. Sensitivity and specificity of a two-question screening tool for depression in a specialist palliative care unit.

    LENUS (Irish Health Repository)

    Payne, Ann

    2012-02-03

    OBJECTIVES: The primary objective in this study is to determine the sensitivity and specificity of a two-item screening interview for depression versus the formal psychiatric interview, in the setting of a specialist palliative in-patient unit so that we may identify those individuals suffering from depressive disorder and therefore optimise their management in this often-complex population. METHODS: A prospective sample of consecutive admissions (n = 167) consented to partake in the study, and the screening interview was asked separately to the formal psychiatric interview. RESULTS: The two-item questionnaire, achieved a sensitivity of 90.7% (95% CI 76.9-97.0) but a lower specificity of 67.7% (95% CI 58.7-75.7). The false positive rate was 32.3% (95% CI 24.3-41.3), but the false negative rate was found to be a low 9.3% (95% CI 3.0-23.1). A subgroup analysis of individuals with a past experience of depressive illness, (n = 95), revealed that a significant number screened positive for depression by the screening test, 55.2% (16\\/29) compared to those with no background history of depression, 33.3% (22\\/66) (P = 0.045). CONCLUSION: The high sensitivity and low false negative rate of the two-question screening tool will aid health professionals in identifying depression in the in-patient specialist palliative care unit. Individuals, who admit to a previous experience of depressive illness, are more likely to respond positively to the two-item questionnaire than those who report no prior history of depressive illness (P = 0.045).

  4. Optimal unit sizing for small-scale integrated energy systems using multi-objective interval optimization and evidential reasoning approach

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wei, F.; Wu, Q.H.; Jing, Z.X.; Chen, J.J.; Zhou, X.X.

    2016-01-01

    This paper proposes a comprehensive framework including a multi-objective interval optimization model and evidential reasoning (ER) approach to solve the unit sizing problem of small-scale integrated energy systems, with uncertain wind and solar energies integrated. In the multi-objective interval optimization model, interval variables are introduced to tackle the uncertainties of the optimization problem. Aiming at simultaneously considering the cost and risk of a business investment, the average and deviation of life cycle cost (LCC) of the integrated energy system are formulated. In order to solve the problem, a novel multi-objective optimization algorithm, MGSOACC (multi-objective group search optimizer with adaptive covariance matrix and chaotic search), is developed, employing adaptive covariance matrix to make the search strategy adaptive and applying chaotic search to maintain the diversity of group. Furthermore, ER approach is applied to deal with multiple interests of an investor at the business decision making stage and to determine the final unit sizing solution from the Pareto-optimal solutions. This paper reports on the simulation results obtained using a small-scale direct district heating system (DH) and a small-scale district heating and cooling system (DHC) optimized by the proposed framework. The results demonstrate the superiority of the multi-objective interval optimization model and ER approach in tackling the unit sizing problem of integrated energy systems considering the integration of uncertian wind and solar energies. - Highlights: • Cost and risk of investment in small-scale integrated energy systems are considered. • A multi-objective interval optimization model is presented. • A novel multi-objective optimization algorithm (MGSOACC) is proposed. • The evidential reasoning (ER) approach is used to obtain the final optimal solution. • The MGSOACC and ER can tackle the unit sizing problem efficiently.

  5. Aqueous treatment of water-sensitive paper objects: capillary unit, blotter wash or paraprint wash?

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Schalkx, H.; Iedema, P.; Reissland, B.; van Velzen, B.

    2011-01-01

    Blotter washing andwashing with the capillary unit are both methods used for aqueoustreatment of water-sensitive paper objects. The challenge of thistreatment is to remove water-soluble products while keeping thewater-sensitive medium in its place. In this article the two methodsare compared, along

  6. [Conservation Units.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Texas Education Agency, Austin.

    Each of the six instructional units deals with one aspect of conservation: forests, water, rangeland, minerals (petroleum), and soil. The area of the elementary school curriculum with which each correlates is indicated. Lists of general and specific objectives are followed by suggested teaching procedures, including ideas for introducing the…

  7. Motorcycle Education Curriculum Specifications. Final Report.

    Science.gov (United States)

    McKnight, A. James; And Others

    This report contains specifications for a motorcycle safety education curriculum designed to reduce the incidence and severity of motorcycle accidents. The specifications prescribe objectives, prerequisites, methods, materials, equipment, facilities, and proficiency measures for six units of instruction: (1) basic riding skills, (2) street riding…

  8. Stimulus Dependency of Object-Evoked Responses in Human Visual Cortex: An Inverse Problem for Category Specificity

    Science.gov (United States)

    Graewe, Britta; De Weerd, Peter; Farivar, Reza; Castelo-Branco, Miguel

    2012-01-01

    Many studies have linked the processing of different object categories to specific event-related potentials (ERPs) such as the face-specific N170. Despite reports showing that object-related ERPs are influenced by visual stimulus features, there is consensus that these components primarily reflect categorical aspects of the stimuli. Here, we re-investigated this idea by systematically measuring the effects of visual feature manipulations on ERP responses elicited by both structure-from-motion (SFM)-defined and luminance-defined object stimuli. SFM objects elicited a novel component at 200–250 ms (N250) over parietal and posterior temporal sites. We found, however, that the N250 amplitude was unaffected by restructuring SFM stimuli into meaningless objects based on identical visual cues. This suggests that this N250 peak was not uniquely linked to categorical aspects of the objects, but is strongly determined by visual stimulus features. We provide strong support for this hypothesis by parametrically manipulating the depth range of both SFM- and luminance-defined object stimuli and showing that the N250 evoked by SFM stimuli as well as the well-known N170 to static faces were sensitive to this manipulation. Importantly, this effect could not be attributed to compromised object categorization in low depth stimuli, confirming a strong impact of visual stimulus features on object-related ERP signals. As ERP components linked with visual categorical object perception are likely determined by multiple stimulus features, this creates an interesting inverse problem when deriving specific perceptual processes from variations in ERP components. PMID:22363479

  9. Object instance recognition using motion cues and instance specific appearance models

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schumann, Arne

    2014-03-01

    In this paper we present an object instance retrieval approach. The baseline approach consists of a pool of image features which are computed on the bounding boxes of a query object track and compared to a database of tracks in order to find additional appearances of the same object instance. We improve over this simple baseline approach in multiple ways: 1) we include motion cues to achieve improved robustness to viewpoint and rotation changes, 2) we include operator feedback to iteratively re-rank the resulting retrieval lists and 3) we use operator feedback and location constraints to train classifiers and learn an instance specific appearance model. We use these classifiers to further improve the retrieval results. The approach is evaluated on two popular public datasets for two different applications. We evaluate person re-identification on the CAVIAR shopping mall surveillance dataset and vehicle instance recognition on the VIVID aerial dataset and achieve significant improvements over our baseline results.

  10. Evaluation of River Bend Station Unit 1 Technical Specifications

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Baxter, D.E.; Bruske, S.J.

    1985-08-01

    This document was prepared for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to assist them in determining whether the River Bend Station Unit 1 Technical Specifications (T/S), which govern plant systems configurations and operations, are in conformance with the requirements of the Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR) as amended, and the requirements of the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) as supplemented. A comparative audit of the FSAR as amended, and the SER as supplemented was performed with the River Bend T/S. Several discrepancies were identified and subsequently resolved through discussions with the cognizant NRC reviewer, NRC staff reviewers and/or utility representatives. The River Bend Station Unit 1 T/S, to the extent reviewed, are in conformance with the FSAR and SER

  11. Planning for people? An evaluation of objectives for managing visitors at wildlife refuges in the United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jeffrey J. Brooks; Robert Massengale

    2011-01-01

    This study evaluates the quality of planning objectives for visitor services as written in Comprehensive Conservation Plans for the National Wildlife Refuge System of the United States. Planners in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are predominantly writing public use objectives that address wildlife recreation and education. Results indicate that planners are writing...

  12. Ranking Specific Sets of Objects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Maly, Jan; Woltran, Stefan

    2017-01-01

    Ranking sets of objects based on an order between the single elements has been thoroughly studied in the literature. In particular, it has been shown that it is in general impossible to find a total ranking - jointly satisfying properties as dominance and independence - on the whole power set of objects. However, in many applications certain elements from the entire power set might not be required and can be neglected in the ranking process. For instance, certain sets might be ruled out due to hard constraints or are not satisfying some background theory. In this paper, we treat the computational problem whether an order on a given subset of the power set of elements satisfying different variants of dominance and independence can be found, given a ranking on the elements. We show that this problem is tractable for partial rankings and NP-complete for total rankings.

  13. Working memory units are all in your head: Factors that influence whether features or objects are the favored units.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Vergauwe, Evie; Cowan, Nelson

    2015-09-01

    We compared two contrasting hypotheses of how multifeatured objects are stored in visual working memory (vWM); as integrated objects or as independent features. A new procedure was devised to examine vWM representations of several concurrently held objects and their features and our main measure was reaction time (RT), allowing an examination of the real-time search through features and/or objects in an array in vWM. Response speeds to probes with color, shape, or both were studied as a function of the number of memorized colored shapes. Four testing groups were created by varying the instructions and the way in which probes with both color and shape were presented. The instructions explicitly either encouraged or discouraged the use of binding information and the task-relevance of binding information was further suggested by presenting probes with both color and shapes as either integrated objects or independent features. Our results show that the unit used for retrieval from vWM depends on the testing situation. Search was fully object-based only when all factors support that basis of search, in which case retrieving 2 features took no longer than retrieving a single feature. Otherwise, retrieving 2 features took longer than retrieving a single feature. Additional analyses of change detection latency suggested that, even though different testing situations can result in a stronger emphasis on either the feature dimension or the object dimension, neither one disappears from the representation and both concurrently affect change detection performance. (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved).

  14. Technical specifications: Seabrook Station, Unit 1 (Docket No. 50-443)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1990-03-01

    The Seabrook Station, Unit 1 Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  15. Guidance and methods for satisfying low specific activity material and surface contaminated object regulatory requirements

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pope, R.B.; Shappert, L.B.; Michelhaugh, R.D.; Boyle, R.W.; Easton, E.P.; Coodk, J.R.

    1998-01-01

    The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) have prepared a comprehensive set of draft guidance for shippers and inspectors to use when applying the newly imposed regulatory requirements for low specific activity (LSA) material and surface contaminated objects (SCOs). These requirements represent significant departures in some areas from the manner in which these materials and objects were regulated by the earlier versions of the regulations. The proper interpretation and application of the regulatory criteria can require a fairly complex set of decisions be made. To assist those trying these regulatory requirements, a detailed set of logic-flow diagrams representing decisions related to multiple factors were prepared and included in the draft report for comment on Categorizing and Transporting Low Specific Activity Materials and Surface Contaminated Objects, (DOT/NRC, 1997). These logic-flow diagrams, as developed, are specific to the U.S. regulations, but were readily adaptable to the IAEA regulations. The diagrams have been modified accordingly and tied directly to specific paragraphs in IAEA Safety Series No. 6. This paper provides the logic-flow diagrams adapted in the IAEA regulations, and demonstrated how these diagrams can be used to assist consignors and inspectors in assessing compliance of shipments with the LSA material and SCO regulatory requirements. (authors)

  16. The USL NASA PC R and D project: Detailed specifications of objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dominick, Wayne D. (Editor); Chum, Frank Y.; Hall, Philip P.; Moreau, Dennis R.; Triantafyllopoulos, Spiros

    1984-01-01

    The specifications for a number of projects which are to be implemented within the University of Southwestern Louisiana NASA PC R and D Project are discussed. The goals and objectives of the PC development project and the interrelationships of the various components are discussed. Six projects are described. They are a NASA/RECON simulator, a user interface to multiple remote information systems, evaluation of various personal computer systems, statistical analysis software development, interactive presentation system development, and the development of a distributed processing environment. The relationships of these projects to one another and to the goals and objectives of the overall project are discussed.

  17. IAEA co-ordinated research programme on the transport of low specific activity materials and surface contaminated objects

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gray, I.L.S.

    2000-01-01

    The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) prepares regulations for the safe transport of radioactive material, and periodically revised editions of these are published. These regulations are adopted by individual countries across the world and by international organisations concerned with transport. Whilst it is desirable to have a stable framework of regulatory requirements, there is also a need to take account of technical advances and operational experience and revise the regulations. From time to time Co-ordinated Research Programmes (CRP) are established to investigate particular areas of the regulations that are giving concern. In 1996 the IAEA Standing Advisory Group on the Transport of Radioactive Material (SAGSTRAM) concluded that the requirements for classification, packaging and transport of low specific activity (LSA) material and surface contaminated objects (SCO) did not always have a strong radiation protection basis. Accordingly SAGSTRAM established a CRP with an overall objective to develop a dose-based approach for establishing LSA/SCO requirements. Six countries are participating in this CRP. Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, United Kingdom and United States. Each country is carrying out work that is outlined in agreements with the IAEA, with the work aimed at meeting the specific objective of the agreement and also contributing to achieving the overall objective of the CRP. Completion of the CRP usually involves the preparation of an IAEA TECDOC by a Consultant Services Meeting (CSM), and this TECDOC will summarise the work performed under the CRP and include any recommendations made by the CRP. Following the establishment of the CRP in 1997, the first Research Co-ordination Meeting (RCM) was held in December 1997. The second RCM was held in March 1999, with the final RCM planned for the end of 2000. The work being carried out by Brazil and Canada is focused upon the transport of uranium and thorium ores, and is a mixture of theoretical and

  18. Unit-Specific Contingency Plan for the 183-H Solar Evaporation Basins

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Edens, V.G.

    1998-04-01

    This document is a supplement to DOE/RL-93-75, 'Hanford Contingency Plan.' It provides the unit-specific information needed to fully comply with the Washington Administrative Code. General emergency and response information is contained in the Hanford Facility Contingency Plan and is not repeated in this supplement. The 183-H Solar Evaporation Basins were four concrete internal surfaces, which contained radiologically and hazardous contaminated waste. The 183-H Basin area is a final status treatment, storage, and disposal unit undergoing Resource Conservation and Recovery Act modified post- closure care

  19. Development of guidance on applications of regulatory requirements for low specific activity materials and surface contaminated objects

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pope, R.B.; Easton, E.P.; Shankman, S.F.

    1997-01-01

    In 1985, the International Atomic Energy Agency issued revised regulations for the safe transport of radioactive material. Significant among the changes were major revisions to requirements for Low Specific Activity (LSA) material and Surface Contaminated Objects (SCOs). In preparation for the adoption of these requirements into regulations in the United States, it became apparent that guidance on how to apply these requirements, clarifying technical uncertainties and ensuring proper implementation, would be needed both by the regulators and those regulated. Thus, the US Department of Transportation and the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, with the assistance of staff from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, are preparing regulatory guidance for LSA material and SCO transport. The guidance will present examples of acceptable methods for demonstrating compliance with the revised rules. Ideas being investigated for inclusion in the pending guidance are discussed in this paper. Under current plans, the guidance will be issued for public comment prior to final issuance of the guidance in 1997

  20. Development of guidance on applications of regulatory requirements for low specific activity materials and surface contaminated objects

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pope, R.B.; Easton, E.P.; Shankman, S.F.; Boyle, R.W.

    1997-01-01

    In 1985, the International Atomic Energy Agency issued revised regulations for the safe transport of radioactive material. Significant among the changes were major revisions to requirements for Low Specific Activity (LSA) material and Surface Contaminated Objects (SCOs). In preparation for the adoption of these requirements into regulations in the United States, it became apparent that guidance on how to apply these requirements, clarifying technical uncertainties and ensuring proper implementation, would be needed both by the regulators and those regulated. Thus, the US Department of Transportation and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, with the assistance of staff from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, are preparing regulatory guidance for LSA material and SCO transport. The guidance will present examples of acceptable methods for demonstrating compliance with the revised rules. Ideas being investigated for inclusion in the pending guidance are discussed in this paper. Under current plans, the guidance will be issued for public comment prior to final issue of the guidance in 1997. (Author)

  1. The USL NASA PC R and D project: General specifications of objectives

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dominick, Wayne D. (Editor)

    1984-01-01

    Given here are the general specifications of the objectives of the University of Southwestern Louisiana Data Base Management System (USL/DBMS) NASA PC R and D Project, a project initiated to address future R and D issues related to PC-based processing environments acquired pursuant to the NASA contract work; namely, the IBM PC/XT systems.

  2. Age specific interactions between smoking and radon among United States uranium miners

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Steenland, K.

    1994-01-01

    United States uranium miners who smoked have death rates from lung cancer that are intermediate between the rates predicted by the additive and multiplicative models (on a ratio scale) across all age groups. Age specific patterns of interaction have not been thoroughly examined, and most analyses have been internal ones in which there was no truly non-exposed group. Here age specific death rates of lung cancer among ever smoking uranium miners have been examined for conformity with the additive and multiplicative models. The multiplicative model fits well for the youngest and oldest categories, but poorly for the middle age ranges. In the middle age range, predicted rates under the multiplicative model were quite high, surpassing the corresponding United States death rates for all causes combined. (Author)

  3. Identification of Auditory Object-Specific Attention from Single-Trial Electroencephalogram Signals via Entropy Measures and Machine Learning

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yun Lu

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available Existing research has revealed that auditory attention can be tracked from ongoing electroencephalography (EEG signals. The aim of this novel study was to investigate the identification of peoples’ attention to a specific auditory object from single-trial EEG signals via entropy measures and machine learning. Approximate entropy (ApEn, sample entropy (SampEn, composite multiscale entropy (CmpMSE and fuzzy entropy (FuzzyEn were used to extract the informative features of EEG signals under three kinds of auditory object-specific attention (Rest, Auditory Object1 Attention (AOA1 and Auditory Object2 Attention (AOA2. The linear discriminant analysis and support vector machine (SVM, were used to construct two auditory attention classifiers. The statistical results of entropy measures indicated that there were significant differences in the values of ApEn, SampEn, CmpMSE and FuzzyEn between Rest, AOA1 and AOA2. For the SVM-based auditory attention classifier, the auditory object-specific attention of Rest, AOA1 and AOA2 could be identified from EEG signals using ApEn, SampEn, CmpMSE and FuzzyEn as features and the identification rates were significantly different from chance level. The optimal identification was achieved by the SVM-based auditory attention classifier using CmpMSE with the scale factor τ = 10. This study demonstrated a novel solution to identify the auditory object-specific attention from single-trial EEG signals without the need to access the auditory stimulus.

  4. 48 CFR 9904.410 - Allocation of business unit general and administrative expenses to final cost objectives.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... unit general and administrative expenses to final cost objectives. 9904.410 Section 9904.410 Federal Acquisition Regulations System COST ACCOUNTING STANDARDS BOARD, OFFICE OF FEDERAL PROCUREMENT POLICY, OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET PROCUREMENT PRACTICES AND COST ACCOUNTING STANDARDS COST ACCOUNTING...

  5. Specific and Class Object Recognition for Service Robots through Autonomous and Interactive Methods

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mansur, Al; Kuno, Yoshinori

    Service robots need to be able to recognize and identify objects located within complex backgrounds. Since no single method may work in every situation, several methods need to be combined and robots have to select the appropriate one automatically. In this paper we propose a scheme to classify situations depending on the characteristics of the object of interest and user demand. We classify situations into four groups and employ different techniques for each. We use Scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT), Kernel Principal Components Analysis (KPCA) in conjunction with Support Vector Machine (SVM) using intensity, color, and Gabor features for five object categories. We show that the use of appropriate features is important for the use of KPCA and SVM based techniques on different kinds of objects. Through experiments we show that by using our categorization scheme a service robot can select an appropriate feature and method, and considerably improve its recognition performance. Yet, recognition is not perfect. Thus, we propose to combine the autonomous method with an interactive method that allows the robot to recognize the user request for a specific object and class when the robot fails to recognize the object. We also propose an interactive way to update the object model that is used to recognize an object upon failure in conjunction with the user's feedback.

  6. Color- and motion-specific units in the tectum opticum of goldfish.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gruber, Morna; Behrend, Konstantin; Neumeyer, Christa

    2016-01-05

    Extracellular recordings were performed from 69 units at different depths between 50 and [Formula: see text]m below the surface of tectum opticum in goldfish. Using large field stimuli (86[Formula: see text] visual angle) of 21 colored HKS-papers we were able to record from 54 color-sensitive units. The colored papers were presented for 5[Formula: see text]s each. They were arranged in the sequence of the color circle in humans separated by gray of medium brightness. We found 22 units with best responses between orange, red and pink. About 12 of these red-sensitive units were of the opponent "red-ON/blue-green-OFF" type as found in retinal bipolar- and ganglion cells as well. Most of them were also activated or inhibited by black and/or white. Some units responded specifically to red either with activation or inhibition. 18 units were sensitive to blue and/or green, 10 of them to both colors and most of them to black as well. They were inhibited by red, and belonged to the opponent "blue-green-ON/red-OFF" type. Other units responded more selectively either to blue, to green or to purple. Two units were selectively sensitive to yellow. A total of 15 units were sensitive to motion, stimulated by an excentrically rotating black and white random dot pattern. Activity of these units was also large when a red-green random dot pattern of high L-cone contrast was used. Activity dropped to zero when the red-green pattern did not modulate the L-cones. Neither of these motion selective units responded to any color. The results directly show color-blindness of motion vision, and confirm the hypothesis of separate and parallel processing of "color" and "motion".

  7. Sludge Removal and Retrieval of Foreign Object in SG of Kori Nuclear Power Plant, Unit 4

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jeong, Wootae; Kim, Sangtae; Kim, Youngkug; Kang, Seokchul

    2014-01-01

    Sludge deposit was removed and foreign objects were inspected and retrieved on secondary side tube sheet of the SG during January 23 and February 22, April 15 and 27 in 2013. FOLAS-I lancing system, video probe and retrieval tools were used for lancing and foreign object removal respectively. Operators of the lancing system participated in mock-up training before doing the service to minimize operation time and radiation dose. Foreign objects were searched on top of 7 th TSP (tube support plate), on annulus and in tube bundle. Four objects were found and removed on annulus and in tube bundle. During the 21 st OH of Kori NPP unit 4, we removed 345.9 kilo gram of sludge and four foreign objects from three steam generators. Foreign objects which were removed from inside of SG showed us that relatively large object such as the hooked bolt might exists in steam generators. We can conclude that identifying and removing foreign object is very important to avoid possible tube failure. Removing circular metal of 152.4 gram also was successfully removed

  8. A Cross-cultural Comparison of Objectivity in Childhood Games: Iran and the United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rastegarpour, Ali

    2011-07-01

    Games have been introduced as a means for studying cross-cultural differences and societies. This paper presents a case study in analogous games played by children in two different countries with two different cultures - Iran and the United States. Four examples are presented to demonstrate that games played by Iranian children are subject to less objectivity in their rules. Therefore, nonobjectivity may be a phenomenon that has roots in the society and the many differences between the two societies may very well be the results of this fundamental difference. If the presence of objectivity in childhood game rules could be, in actuality, indicative of objectivity in social and civil interactions in the everyday lives of the people, the direction of causality remains to be established. In other words, it remains unclear whether the games influence the culture or are influenced by the mandates of the society.

  9. Evaluation of Watts Bar Nuclear Plant Unit 1 Technical Specifications

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Baxter, D.E.; Bruske, S.J.

    1985-08-01

    This document was prepared for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to assist them in determining whether the Watts Bar Nuclear Plant Unit 1 Technical Specifications (T/S), which govern plant systems configurations and operations, are in conformance with the assumption of the Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR) as amended, and the requirements of the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) as supplemented. A comparative audit of the FSAR as amended, and the SER as supplemented was performed with the Watts Bar T/S. Several discrepancies were identified and subsequently resolved through discussions with the cognizant NRC reviewer, NRC staff reviewers and/or utility representatives. The Watts Bar Nuclear Plant Unit 1 T/S, to the extent reviewed, are in conformance with the FSAR and SER

  10. Evaluation of Shoreham Nuclear Power Station, Unit 1 technical specifications

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Baxter, D.E.; Bruske, S.J.

    1985-08-01

    This document was prepared for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to assist them in determining whether the Shoreham Nuclear Power Station Unit 1 Technical Specifications (T/S), which govern plant systems configurations and operations, are in conformance with the assumptions of the Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR) as amended, and the requirements of the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) as supplemented. A comparative audit of the FSAR as amended, and the SER as supplemented was performed with the Shoreham T/S. Several discrepancies were identified and subsequently resolved through discussions with the cognizant NRC reviewer, NRC staff reviewers and/or utility representatives. The Shoreham Nuclear Power Station Unit 1 T/S, to the extent reviewed, are in conformance with the FSAR and SER

  11. Evaluation of Waterford Steam Electric Station Unit 3 technical specifications

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Baxter, D.E.; Bruske, S.J.

    1985-09-01

    This document was prepared for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to assist them in determining whether the Waterford Steam Electric Station Unit 3 Technical Specifications (T/S), which govern plant systems configurations and operations, are in conformance with the requirements of the Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR) as amended, and the requirements of the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) as supplemented. A comparative audit of the FSAR as amended, and the SER as supplemented was performed with the Waterford T/S. Several discrepancies were identified and subsequently resolved by the cognizant NRC reviewer. Pending completion of the resolutions noted in Part 3 of this report, the Waterford Steam Electric Station Unit 3 T/S, to the extent reviewed, are in conformance with the FSAR and SER

  12. A Case Study of Resources Management Planning with Multiple Objectives and Projects

    Science.gov (United States)

    David L. Peterson; David G. Silsbee; Daniel L. Schmoldt

    1995-01-01

    Each National Park Service unit in the United States produces a resources management plan (RMP) every four years or less. The plans commit budgets and personnel to specific projects for four years, but they are prepared with little quantitative and analytical rigor and without formal decisionmaking tools. We have previously described a multiple objective planning...

  13. Integrating complementary views on an exercise into an objectives-based training support toolset

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Geest, J. van; Gouweleeuw, R.G.W.

    2000-01-01

    A significant trend in the use of synthetic environments for military unit training is to move away from using generic scenarios that cover a multitude of training objectives. Instead, dedicated scenarios are designed that cover a smaller set of specific training objectives. A few tools exist that

  14. Mathematics Objectives and Measurement Specifications 1986-1990. Exit Level. Texas Educational Assessment of Minimum Skills (TEAMS).

    Science.gov (United States)

    Texas Education Agency, Austin. Div. of Educational Assessment.

    This document lists the objectives for the Texas educational assessment program in mathematics. Eighteen objectives for exit level mathematics are listed, by category: number concepts (4); computation (3); applied computation (5); statistical concepts (3); geometric concepts (2); and algebraic concepts (1). Then general specifications are listed…

  15. Allocation of Home Office Expenses to Segments and Business Unit General and Administrative Expenses to Final Cost Objectives

    Science.gov (United States)

    1992-02-16

    3 0 B. Cost Accounting Standard 418 ..................................................... 3 1 1. D efinitio n s ...objective" as an activity for which a separate measurement of cost is desired. C. Horngren , Cost Accounting . A Managerial Emphasis 21 (5th ed. 1982...Segments and Business Unit General and Administrative Expenses to Final Cost Objectives 6. AUTHOR( S ) Stephen Thomas Lynch, Major 7. PERFORMING

  16. Evaluation of Perry Nuclear Power Plant Unit 1 technical specifications

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Baxter, D.E.; Bruske, S.J.

    1985-11-01

    This document was prepared for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to assist them in determining whether the Perry Nuclear Power Plant Unit 1 Technical Specifications (T/S), which govern plant systems configurations and operations, are in conformance with the requirements of the Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR) as amended, and the requirements of the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) as supplemented. A comparative audit of the FSAR as amended, and the SER as supplemented was performed with the Perry T/S. Several discrepancies were identified and subsequently resolved through telephone conversations with the staff reviewer and the utility representative. Pending completion of the resolutions noted in Parts 3 and 4 of this report, the Perry Nuclear Power Plant Unit 1 T/S, to the extent reviewed, are in conformance with the FSAR and SER

  17. Domain-Specific Self-Reported and Objectively Measured Physical Activity in Children

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ole Sprengeler

    2017-03-01

    Full Text Available Little is known about the extent that different domains contribute to total sedentary (SED, light (LPA and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA. We aimed to identify domain-specific physical activity (PA patterns in school-aged children who were assessed by questionnaire and accelerometry. For the study, 298 German school children and adolescents aged 6–17 years wore an accelerometer for one week and completed a PA recall-questionnaire for the same period. Spearman coefficients (r were used to evaluate the agreement between self-reported and objectively measured PA in five domains (transport, school hours, physical education, leisure-time, organized sports activities. School hours mainly contributed to the total objectively measured SED, LPA and MVPA (55%, 53% and 46%, respectively, whilst sports activities contributed only 24% to total MVPA. Compared to accelerometry, the proportion of self-reported LPA and MVPA during school hours was substantially underestimated but overestimated during leisure-time. The agreement of self-reported and objectively measured PA was low for total LPA (r = 0.09, 95% CI (confidence interval: −0.03–0.20 and total MVPA (r = 0.21, 95% CI: 0.10–0.32, while moderate agreement was only found for total SED (r = 0.44, 95% CI: 0.34–0.53, LPA during transport (r = 0.59; 95% CI: 0.49–0.67 and MVPA during organized sports activities (r = 0.54; 95% CI: 0.38–0.67. Since school hours mainly contribute to total SED, LPA and MVPA and self-reported LPA and MVPA during school were importantly underestimated compared to objectively measured LPA and MVPA, the application of objective measurements is compulsory to characterize the entire activity pattern of school-aged children.

  18. Simplified conversions between specific conductance and salinity units for use with data from monitoring stations

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schemel, Laurence E.

    2001-01-01

    The U.S. Geological Survey, Bureau of Reclamation, and the California Department of Water Resources maintain a large number of monitoring stations that record specific conductance, often referred to as “electrical conductivity,” in San Francisco Bay Estuary and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Specific conductance units that have been normalized to a standard temperature are useful in fresh waters, but conversion to salinity units has some considerable advantages in brackish waters of the estuary and Delta. For example, salinity is linearly related to the mixing ratio of freshwater and seawater, which is not the case for specific conductance, even when values are normalized to a standard temperature. The Practical Salinity Scale 1978 is based on specific conductance, temperature, and pressure measurements of seawater and freshwater mixtures (Lewis 1980 and references therein). Equations and data that define the scale make possible conversions between specific conductance and salinity values.

  19. Material specification for ductile cast iron in the United States

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sorenson, K.B.

    1987-01-01

    The United States currently does not have formal design criteria for qualifying ductile cast iron (DCI) transportation casks. There is also no dedicated material standard for DCI for this particular application. Recognizing the importance of a material standard for this application, Lawrence Livermore Laboratories, in a report to the NRC, recommended that steps be taken to develop an ASTM material specification suitable for spent fuel shipping containers. A draft ASTM material specification has been written and is currently in the ASTM approval process. This paper reviews the brief history of the development of the specification, the technical basis for the material properties, the ASTM approval process and the current status of the draft specification. The expected implications of having an adopted ASTM specification on the licensing process are also discussed. The relationship of fracture toughness to composition, microstructure and tensile properties has been evaluated at Sandia National Laboratories. The first main conclusion reached is that static fracture toughness is essentially decoupled from tensile properties such as yield strength, tensile strength and ductility. The significance of this finding is that tensile properties provided for in existing DCI specifications should not be used as an indicator of a material's ability to resist crack initiation. A material specification which includes fracture toughness requirements is needed to address the brittle fracture concerns. Second, static fracture toughness was found to correlate well with material microstructure; specifically, graphite nodule count or nodule spacing

  20. Category-specificity in visual object recognition

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerlach, Christian

    2009-01-01

    binding of shape elements into elaborate shape descriptions) and selection (among competing representations in visual long-term memory), which are held to be differentially affected by the structural similarity between objects. Drawing on evidence from clinical studies, experimental studies...

  1. Brand-Specific Consumption of Flavored Alcoholic Beverages among Underage Youth in the United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fortunato, Erin K.; Siegel, Michael; Ramirez, Rebecca L.; Ross, Craig; DeJong, William; Albers, Alison B.; Jernigan, David H.

    2013-01-01

    Background Although several studies have identified flavored alcoholic beverages (FABs) as being popular among underage drinkers, no previous study has ascertained the prevalence of brand-specific FAB consumption among a national sample of underage youth. Objectives To ascertain the brand-specific consumption prevalence and consumption share of FABs among a national sample of underage drinkers in the United States. Methods In 2012, we conducted an online, self-administered survey of a national sample of 1,031 underage drinkers, ages 13-20, to determine the prevalence of past 30-day consumption for each of 898 alcoholic beverage brands, including 62 FABs, and each brand’s youth consumption share, based on the estimated total number of standard drinks consumed. There were three brand-specific outcome measures: prevalence of consumption, prevalence of consumption during heavy episodic drinking, and consumption share, defined as the percentage of the total drinks consumed by all respondents combined that was attributable to a particular brand. Results The FAB brands with the highest prevalence of past 30-day consumption were Smirnoff Malt Beverages, 17.7%; Mike’s, 10.8%; Bacardi Malt Beverages, 8.0%; and Four Loko/Four MaXed, 6.1%. Just five brands accounted for almost half (49.1%) of the total consumption share by volume within the FAB category. Conclusion Flavored alcoholic beverages are highly popular among underage drinkers, and their FAB brand preferences are highly concentrated among a small number of brands. To decrease the consumption of FABs by underage youth, all states should re-classify these beverages as distilled spirits rather than beer. PMID:24266600

  2. A Conceptual Model for Delineating Land Management Units (LMUs Using Geographical Object-Based Image Analysis

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Deniz Gerçek

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available Land management and planning is crucial for present and future use of land and the sustainability of land resources. Physical, biological and cultural characteristics of land can be used to define Land Management Units (LMUs that aid in decision making for managing land and communicating information between different research and application domains. This study aims to describe the classification of ecologically relevant land units that are suitable for land management, planning and conservation purposes. Relying on the idea of strong correlation between landform and potential landcover, a conceptual model for creating Land Management Units (LMUs from topographic data and biophysical information is presented. The proposed method employs a multi-level object-based classification of Digital Terrain Models (DTMs to derive landform units. The sensitivity of landform units to changes in segmentation scale is examined, and the outcome of the landform classification is evaluated. Landform classes are then aggregated with landcover information to produce ecologically relevant landform/landcover assemblages. These conceptual units that constitute a framework of connected entities are finally enriched given available socio-economic information e.g., land use, ownership, protection status, etc. to generate LMUs. LMUs attached to a geographic database enable the retrieval of information at various levels to support decision making for land management at various scales. LMUs that are created present a basis for conservation and management in a biodiverse area in the Black Sea region of Turkey.

  3. System for optical sorting of microscopic objects

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    2014-01-01

    The present invention relates to a system for optical sorting of microscopic objects and corresponding method. An optical detection system (52) is capable of determining the positions of said first and/or said second objects. One or more force transfer units (200, 205, 210, 215) are placed...... in a first reservoir, the one or more force units being suitable for optical momentum transfer. An electromagnetic radiation source (42) yields a radiation beam (31, 32) capable of optically displacing the force transfer units from one position to another within the first reservoir (1R). The force transfer...... units are displaced from positions away from the first objects to positions close to the first objects, and then displacing the first objects via a contact force (300) between the first objects and the force transfer units facilitates an optical sorting of the first objects and the second objects....

  4. Passive UHF RFID Tags with Specific Printed Antennas for Dielectric and Metallic Objects Applications

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    K. Siakavara

    2017-09-01

    Full Text Available Design process and respective results for the synthesis of specific Radiofrequency Identification(RFID tag antennas, suitable for dielectric and metallic objects, are presented. The antennas were designed for the UHF(865MHz-869MHz band and their basic configuration is that of the printed spiral type. Six modification steps to the classical spiral layout are proposed and it was proved that they can lead to tags with high readability and reading distances up to 10m when designed for dielectric object and up to 7m in the case of metallic objects. The results of the measurements of the fabricated tags are explained via theoretical evaluations which take into account reflection phenomena, that are present in a real environment at which the tags are used.

  5. Parent experiences of communication with healthcare professionals in neonatal intensive care units

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Weis, Janne; Lundqvist, Pia

    2016-01-01

    REVIEW QUESTION/OBJECTIVE: The objectives of this review are to explore parents' experiences of communication with healthcare professionals and to identify the meaningfulness of communication to parents in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).More specifically, the objectives are to identify....

  6. Optimization of Fuel Consumption and Emissions for Auxiliary Power Unit Based on Multi-Objective Optimization Model

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yongpeng Shen

    2016-02-01

    Full Text Available Auxiliary power units (APUs are widely used for electric power generation in various types of electric vehicles, improvements in fuel economy and emissions of these vehicles directly depend on the operating point of the APUs. In order to balance the conflicting goals of fuel consumption and emissions reduction in the process of operating point choice, the APU operating point optimization problem is formulated as a constrained multi-objective optimization problem (CMOP firstly. The four competing objectives of this CMOP are fuel-electricity conversion cost, hydrocarbon (HC emissions, carbon monoxide (CO emissions and nitric oxide (NO x emissions. Then, the multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO algorithm and weighted metric decision making method are employed to solve the APU operating point multi-objective optimization model. Finally, bench experiments under New European driving cycle (NEDC, Federal test procedure (FTP and high way fuel economy test (HWFET driving cycles show that, compared with the results of the traditional fuel consumption single-objective optimization approach, the proposed multi-objective optimization approach shows significant improvements in emissions performance, at the expense of a slight drop in fuel efficiency.

  7. Estimating a possibility for automatized monitoring radioactive aerosols in the Ukrytie Object air

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Zalmanzon, Yu.B.; Fertman, D.E.

    1989-01-01

    The aim of the paper is to study the measurement specifications of the BDAS-OZP industrial detection unit for monitoring aerosols, produced in the Ukrytie object rooms. It is shown that the unit ensures monitoring alpha-active aerosols with radionuclide content of 3x10 -15 Ci/l and beta-active ones - with 3x10 -13 Ci/l. 2 refs.; 1 tabs

  8. Fragile visual short-term memory is an object-based and location-specific store.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Pinto, Yaïr; Sligte, Ilja G; Shapiro, Kimron L; Lamme, Victor A F

    2013-08-01

    Fragile visual short-term memory (FM) is a recently discovered form of visual short-term memory. Evidence suggests that it provides rich and high-capacity storage, like iconic memory, yet it exists, without interference, almost as long as visual working memory. In the present study, we sought to unveil the functional underpinnings of this memory storage. We found that FM is only completely erased when the new visual scene appears at the same location and consists of the same objects as the to-be-recalled information. This result has two important implications: First, it shows that FM is an object- and location-specific store, and second, it suggests that FM might be used in everyday life when the presentation of visual information is appropriately designed.

  9. Technical Specifications, Limerick Generating Station, Unit No. 2 (Docket No. 50-353)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1989-08-01

    The Limerick, Unit 2, Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  10. Technical specifications, Limerick Generating Station, Unit No. 2 (Docket No. 50-353)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1989-07-01

    The Limerick, Unit 2, Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  11. Conformance Testing, the Elixer within the Chain for Learning Scenarios and Objects

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Nadolski, Rob; O'Neill, Owen; Vegt van der, Wim; Koper, Rob

    2006-01-01

    The chain for learning scenarios and learning objects includes five iterative links: (i) development, (ii) publication, (iii) making resources searchable and reusable and (iv) facilitating their arrangement (v) towards a runnable unit of learning. The use of e-learning specifications and

  12. Multi-objective superstructure-free synthesis and optimization of thermal power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wang, Ligang; Lampe, Matthias; Voll, Philip; Yang, Yongping; Bardow, André

    2016-01-01

    The merits of superstructure-free synthesis are demonstrated for bi-objective design of thermal power plants. The design of thermal power plants is complex and thus best solved by optimization. Common optimization methods require specification of a superstructure which becomes a tedious and error-prone task for complex systems. Superstructure specification is avoided by the presented superstructure-free approach, which is shown to successfully solve the design task yielding a high-quality Pareto front of promising structural alternatives. The economic objective function avoids introducing infinite numbers of units (e.g., turbine, reheater and feedwater preheater) as favored by pure thermodynamic optimization. The number of feasible solutions found per number of mutation tries is still high even after many generations but declines after introducing highly-nonlinear cost functions leading to challenging MINLP problems. The identified Pareto-optimal solutions tend to employ more units than found in modern power plants indicating the need for cost functions to reflect current industrial practice. In summary, the multi-objective superstructure-free synthesis framework is a robust approach for very complex problems in the synthesis of thermal power plants. - Highlights: • A generalized multi-objective superstructure-free synthesis framework for thermal power plants is presented. • The superstructure-free synthesis framework is comprehensively evaluated by complex bi-objective synthesis problems. • The proposed framework is effective to explore the structural design space even for complex problems.

  13. How learning might strengthen existing visual object representations in human object-selective cortex.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brants, Marijke; Bulthé, Jessica; Daniels, Nicky; Wagemans, Johan; Op de Beeck, Hans P

    2016-02-15

    Visual object perception is an important function in primates which can be fine-tuned by experience, even in adults. Which factors determine the regions and the neurons that are modified by learning is still unclear. Recently, it was proposed that the exact cortical focus and distribution of learning effects might depend upon the pre-learning mapping of relevant functional properties and how this mapping determines the informativeness of neural units for the stimuli and the task to be learned. From this hypothesis we would expect that visual experience would strengthen the pre-learning distributed functional map of the relevant distinctive object properties. Here we present a first test of this prediction in twelve human subjects who were trained in object categorization and differentiation, preceded and followed by a functional magnetic resonance imaging session. Specifically, training increased the distributed multi-voxel pattern information for trained object distinctions in object-selective cortex, resulting in a generalization from pre-training multi-voxel activity patterns to after-training activity patterns. Simulations show that the increased selectivity combined with the inter-session generalization is consistent with a training-induced strengthening of a pre-existing selectivity map. No training-related neural changes were detected in other regions. In sum, training to categorize or individuate objects strengthened pre-existing representations in human object-selective cortex, providing a first indication that the neuroanatomical distribution of learning effects depends upon the pre-learning mapping of visual object properties. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  14. Life table analysis of the United States' Year 2000 mortality objectives.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rockett, I R; Pollard, J H

    1995-06-01

    The US Year 2000 mortality objectives are model standards cast as targeted changes in age-adjusted cause-specific death rates. This research centred on the projected impact of such changes on life expectancy and the mortality toll for each sex. A computer simulation was conducted using single decrement, multiple decrement and cause-elimination life table techniques, together with a decomposition procedure. Male and female life expectancy at birth was projected to increase by 1.71 and 1.51 years, respectively, between the designated 1987 baseline and 2000. The leading beneficiaries would be those aged 65 and older, followed by those aged 45-64, and infants. Declines in coronary heart disease, stroke and injury death rates would most influence the projected life expectancy changes, irrespective of sex. Approximately 782,000 male deaths and 730,000 female deaths would be averted under Year 2000 assumptions. Life expectancy would be a useful summary measure to incorporate into official evaluations of the Year 2000 mortality objectives. Targeting of excess male mortality in the US and other highly industrialized nations is recommended.

  15. Comparing sensitivity and specificity of screening mammography in the United States and Denmark

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kemp Jacobsen, Katja; O'Meara, Ellen S; Key, Dustin

    2015-01-01

    Delivery of screening mammography differs substantially between the United States (US) and Denmark. We evaluated whether there are differences in screening sensitivity and specificity. We included screens from women screened at age 50-69 years during 1996-2008/2009 in the US Breast Cancer...

  16. Basic objects of marketing in project activities

    OpenAIRE

    Онищенко, Світлана Петрівна; Берневек, Тетяна Іванівна

    2013-01-01

    The article identified the main types of a project product from the point of view of a business level that is necessary to determine the specificity of the project marketing. As such objects of marketing - variants of the project product we have singled out: a product, a combination "product-market segment," a commodity group, a strategic business unit, a company. We have analyzed the relation "product life cycle - project-organization" and received a generalized representation of this relati...

  17. Multiple containment for LSA [low specific activity] and SCO [surface contaminated objects] wastes

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Burgess, M.H.

    1993-09-01

    Radioactive wastes are generally transported in the form of Low Specific Activity (LSA) materials or Surface Contaminated Objects (SCO). This report proposes that a method of acknowledging the beneficial effects of multiple containment for such wastes should be written into the 1996 Edition of the IAEA Transport Regulations. Experience used to assess risks from on-site movements of radioactive material in the UK can be applied to develop safety arguments justifying the alleviation of off-site transport risks. (UK)

  18. Using domain specific languages to improve the development of a power control unit

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Schuts, M.; Hooman, J.

    2015-01-01

    To improve the design of a power control unit at Philips, two Domain Specific Languages (DSLs) have been used. The first DSL provides a concise and readable notation for the essential state transitions. It is used to generate both configuration files and analysis models. In addition, we also

  19. Audit of Wolf Creek Generating Station, Unit 1 technical specifications. Final technical evaluation report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Stromberg, H.M.

    1985-07-01

    This document was prepared for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to assist them in determining whether the Wolf Creek Generating Station Unit 1 Technical Specifications (T/S), which govern plant systems configurations and operations, are in conformance with the assumptions of the Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR) as amended, the requirements of the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) as supplemented, and the Comments and Responses to the Wolf Creek Technical Specification Draft Inspection Report. A comparative audit of the FSAR as amended, the SER as supplemented, and the Draft Inspection Report was performed with the Wolf Creek T/S. Several discrepancies were identified and subsequently resolved through discussions with the cognizant NRC reviewer, NRC staff reviewers and/or utility representatives. The Wolf Creek Generating Station Unit 1 T/S, to the extent reviewed, are in conformance with the FSAR, SER, and Draft Inspection Report

  20. Radiological Effluent Technical Specifications (RETS) implementation: Zion Generating Station Units 1 and 2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Serrano, W.; Akers, D.W.; Duce, S.W.; Mandler, J.W.; Simpson, F.B.; Young, T.E.

    1985-06-01

    A review of the Radiological Effluent Technical Specifications (RETS) of the Zion Generating Station Units 1 and 2 was performed. The principal review guidelines used were NUREG-0133, ''Preparation of Radiological Effluent Technical Specifications for Nuclear Power Plants,'' and Draft 7 of NUREG-0472, Revision 3, ''Radiological Effluent Technical Specifications for Pressurized Water Reactors.'' Draft submittals were discussed with the Licensee by both EG and G and the NRC staff until all items requiring changes to the Technical Specifications were resolved. The Licensee then submitted final proposed RETS to the NRC which were evaluated and found to be in compliance with the NRC review guidelines. The proposed Offsite Dose Calculation Manual was reviewed and generally found to be consistent with the NRC review guidelines. 35 refs., 2 figs., 1 tab

  1. 100 Area source operable unit focused feasibility study report. Draft A

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1994-09-01

    In accordance with the Hanford Past-Practice Strategy (HPPS), a focused feasibility study (FFS) is performed for those waste sites which have been identified as candidates for interim remedial measures (IRM) based on information contained in applicable work plans and limited field investigations (LFI). The FFS process for the 100 Area source operable units will be conducted in two stages. This report, hereafter referred to as the Process Document, documents the first stage of the process. In this stage, IRM alternatives are developed and analyzed on the basis of waste site groups associated with the 100 Area source operable units. The second stage, site-specific evaluation of the IRM alternatives presented in this Process Document, is documented in a series of operable unit-specific reports. The objective of the FFS (this Process Document and subsequent operable unit-specific reports) is to provide decision makers with sufficient information to allow appropriate and timely selection of IRM for sites associated with the 100 Area source operable units. Accordingly, the following information is presented: a presentation of remedial action objectives; a description of 100 Area waste site groups and associated group profiles; a description of IRM alternatives; and detailed and comparative analyses of the IRM alternatives

  2. Spanish Tourist Behaviour: A Specific Objective-base Segmantation

    OpenAIRE

    González, Pablo Rodríguez; Molina, Oscar

    2009-01-01

    This work uses data from the Spanish Tourism Demand Segments Survey (N=6900) conducted by the IESA-CSIC for Turismo Andaluz, SA. The objective of the paper is to develop a statistical segmentation or typology of Spanish tourists based on objective aspects of tourist behaviour measured in the survey including destinations visited, theme of the trip, lodging, transportation and travel group. Initial categorical data are reduced using multiple correspondence analysis and grouped through cluster ...

  3. A Bayesian alternative for multi-objective ecohydrological model specification

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tang, Yating; Marshall, Lucy; Sharma, Ashish; Ajami, Hoori

    2018-01-01

    Recent studies have identified the importance of vegetation processes in terrestrial hydrologic systems. Process-based ecohydrological models combine hydrological, physical, biochemical and ecological processes of the catchments, and as such are generally more complex and parametric than conceptual hydrological models. Thus, appropriate calibration objectives and model uncertainty analysis are essential for ecohydrological modeling. In recent years, Bayesian inference has become one of the most popular tools for quantifying the uncertainties in hydrological modeling with the development of Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) techniques. The Bayesian approach offers an appealing alternative to traditional multi-objective hydrologic model calibrations by defining proper prior distributions that can be considered analogous to the ad-hoc weighting often prescribed in multi-objective calibration. Our study aims to develop appropriate prior distributions and likelihood functions that minimize the model uncertainties and bias within a Bayesian ecohydrological modeling framework based on a traditional Pareto-based model calibration technique. In our study, a Pareto-based multi-objective optimization and a formal Bayesian framework are implemented in a conceptual ecohydrological model that combines a hydrological model (HYMOD) and a modified Bucket Grassland Model (BGM). Simulations focused on one objective (streamflow/LAI) and multiple objectives (streamflow and LAI) with different emphasis defined via the prior distribution of the model error parameters. Results show more reliable outputs for both predicted streamflow and LAI using Bayesian multi-objective calibration with specified prior distributions for error parameters based on results from the Pareto front in the ecohydrological modeling. The methodology implemented here provides insight into the usefulness of multiobjective Bayesian calibration for ecohydrologic systems and the importance of appropriate prior

  4. Landform Evolution Modeling of Specific Fluvially Eroded Physiographic Units on Titan

    Science.gov (United States)

    Moore, J. M.; Howard, A. D.; Schenk, P. M.

    2015-01-01

    Several recent studies have proposed certain terrain types (i.e., physiographic units) on Titan thought to be formed by fluvial processes acting on local uplands of bedrock or in some cases sediment. We have earlier used our landform evolution models to make general comparisons between Titan and other ice world landscapes (principally those of the Galilean satellites) that we have modeled the action of fluvial processes. Here we give examples of specific landscapes that, subsequent to modeled fluvial work acting on the surfaces, produce landscapes which resemble mapped terrain types on Titan.

  5. Motor unit potential morphology differences in individuals with non-specific arm pain and lateral epicondylitis

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    McLean Linda

    2008-12-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background The pathophysiology of non-specific arm pain (NSAP is unclear and the diagnosis is made by excluding other specific upper limb pathologies, such as lateral epicondylitis or cervical radiculopathy. The purpose of this study was to determine: (i if the quantitative parameters related to motor unit potential morphology and/or motor unit firing patterns derived from electromyographic (EMG signals detected from an affected muscle of patients with NSAP are different from those detected in the same muscle of individuals with lateral epicondylitis (LE and/or control subjects and (ii if the quantitative EMG parameters suggest that the underlying pathophysiology in NSAP is either myopathic or neuropathic in nature. Methods Sixteen subjects with NSAP, 11 subjects with LE, eight subjects deemed to be at-risk for developing a repetitive strain injury, and 37 control subjects participated. A quantitative electromyography evaluation was completed using decomposition-based quantitative electromyography (DQEMG. Needle- and surface-detected EMG signals were collected during low-level isometric contractions of the extensor carpi radialis brevis (ECRB muscle. DQEMG was used to extract needle-detected motor unit potential trains (MUPTs, and needle-detected motor unit potential (MUP and surface detected motor unit potential (SMUP morphology and motor unit (MU firing rates were compared among the four groups using one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA. Post hoc analyses were performed using Tukey's pairwise comparisons. Results Significant group differences were found for all MUP variables and for MU firing rate (p p p p p Conclusion The size-related parameters suggest that the NSAP group had significantly smaller MUPs and SMUPs than the control and LE subjects. Smaller MUPs and SMUPs may be indicative of muscle fiber atrophy and/or loss. A prospective study is needed to confirm any causal relationship between smaller MUPs and SMUPs and NSAP as found

  6. Site Specific Waste Management Instruction for the 116-F-4 soil storage unit

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hopkins, G.G.

    1996-08-01

    This Site Specific Waste Management Instruction provides guidance for management of waste generated during the excavation and remediation of soil and debris from the 116-4 soil storage unit located at the Hanford Site in Richland, Washington. This document outlines the waste management practices that will be performed in the field to implement federal, state, and US Department of Energy requirements

  7. An Ada-based preprocessor language for concurrent object oriented programming

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Almulla, M.; Al-Haddad, M.; Loeper, H.

    2001-01-01

    In this paper, implementation issues of concurrent-objected programming using Ada 95 are addressed. Ada is not a pure object-oriented language; in order to make it so, a uniform template for structuring object classes is proposed. The template constitutes a basis for an Ada-based preprocessor language that handles concurrent object-oriented programming. The preprocessor accepts Ada-like object-oriented programs (object classes, subclasses and main program) as input and produces Ada 95 concurrent object-oriented program units as output. The preprocessor language has the advantage of adding a new component to the class specification called the protocol, which specifies the order for requesting methods f an object. The preprocessor also touches on the extensibility of object classes issue. It supports defining class hierarchies by inheritance and aggregation. In addition, the preprocessor language supports the re-use of Ada packages, which are not necessarily written according to the object-oriented approach. The paper also investigates the definition of circular dependent object classes and proposes a solution for introducing a collection of classes. (author)

  8. Placement of effective work-in-progress limits in route-specific unit-based pull systems

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Ziengs, N.; Riezebos, J.; Germs, R.

    2012-01-01

    Unit-based pull systems control the throughput time of orders in a production system by limiting the number of orders on the shop floor. In production systems where orders can follow different routings on the shop floor, route-specific pull systems that control the progress of orders on the shop

  9. Hierarchical Object-Based Mapping of Riverscape Units and in-Stream Mesohabitats Using LiDAR and VHR Imagery

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Luca Demarchi

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available In this paper, we present a new, semi-automated methodology for mapping hydromorphological indicators of rivers at a regional scale using multisource remote sensing (RS data. This novel approach is based on the integration of spectral and topographic information within a multilevel, geographic, object-based image analysis (GEOBIA. Different segmentation levels were generated based on the two sources of Remote Sensing (RS data, namely very-high spatial resolution, near-infrared imagery (VHR and high-resolution LiDAR topography. At each level, different input object features were tested with Machine Learning classifiers for mapping riverscape units and in-stream mesohabitats. The GEOBIA approach proved to be a powerful tool for analyzing the river system at different levels of detail and for coupling spectral and topographic datasets, allowing for the delineation of the natural fluvial corridor with its primary riverscape units (e.g., water channel, unvegetated sediment bars, riparian densely-vegetated units, etc. and in-stream mesohabitats with a high level of accuracy, respectively of K = 0.91 and K = 0.83. This method is flexible and can be adapted to different sources of data, with the potential to be implemented at regional scales in the future. The analyzed dataset, composed of VHR imagery and LiDAR data, is nowadays increasingly available at larger scales, notably through European Member States. At the same time, this methodology provides a tool for monitoring and characterizing the hydromorphological status of river systems continuously along the entire channel network and coherently through time, opening novel and significant perspectives to river science and management, notably for planning and targeting actions.

  10. Knowledge ecologies, "supple" objects, and different priorities across women's and gender studies programs and departments in the United States, 1970-2010.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wood, Christine Virginia

    2015-01-01

    This article examines the evolving connections between local conditions and knowledge processes in women's and gender studies, a research field in the social sciences and humanities. Data are historical records from five early-adopting women's and gender studies units in the United States and interviews with affiliated professors. In their formative years, these programs were consistent in their intellectual content. Scholars across sites defined the purpose of women's studies similarly: to address the lack of research on women and social problems of sex inequality. Gradually, scholars incorporated a range of analytic categories into women's studies' agenda, including gender identities and masculinities, leading to diverse understandings and redefinitions of the central objects of analysis. Analytic shifts are reflected in differences in the institutional and intellectual composition of programs and departments. To explain how local departmental conditions affect the conception of core objects of study in gender research, the author builds on the literature on knowledge ecologies and introduces the concept of the "supple object." © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

  11. Technical Specifications, Comanche Peak Steam Electric Station, Unit 1 (Docket No. 50-445)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1990-04-01

    The Technical Specifications for Comanche Peak Steam Electric Station, Unit 1 were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. They set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility, as set forth in Section 50.36 of Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations Part 50, for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  12. International Comparisons of Infant Mortality and Related Factors : United States and Europe, 2010

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    MacDorman, M.F.; Mathews, T.J.; Mohangoo, A.D.; Zeitlin, J.

    2014-01-01

    OBJECTIVES: This report investigates the reasons for the United States' high infant mortality rate when compared with European countries. Specifically, the report measures the impact on infant mortality differences of two major factors: the percentage of preterm births and gestational age-specific

  13. Enhancing State-of-the-art Multi-objective Optimization Algorithms by Applying Domain Specific Operators

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ghoreishi, Newsha; Sørensen, Jan Corfixen; Jørgensen, Bo Nørregaard

    2015-01-01

    optimization problems where the environment does not change dynamically. For that reason, the requirement for convergence in static optimization problems is not as timecritical as for dynamic optimization problems. Most MOEAs use generic variables and operators that scale to static multi-objective optimization...... problem. The domain specific operators only encode existing knowledge about the environment. A comprehensive comparative study is provided to evaluate the results of applying the CONTROLEUM-GA compared to NSGAII, e-NSGAII and e- MOEA. Experimental results demonstrate clear improvements in convergence time...

  14. Estimating State-Specific Contributions to PM2.5- and O3-Related Health Burden from Residential Combustion and Electricity Generating Unit Emissions in the United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Penn, Stefani L; Arunachalam, Saravanan; Woody, Matthew; Heiger-Bernays, Wendy; Tripodis, Yorghos; Levy, Jonathan I

    2017-03-01

    Residential combustion (RC) and electricity generating unit (EGU) emissions adversely impact air quality and human health by increasing ambient concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) and ozone (O 3 ). Studies to date have not isolated contributing emissions by state of origin (source-state), which is necessary for policy makers to determine efficient strategies to decrease health impacts. In this study, we aimed to estimate health impacts (premature mortalities) attributable to PM 2.5 and O 3 from RC and EGU emissions by precursor species, source sector, and source-state in the continental United States for 2005. We used the Community Multiscale Air Quality model employing the decoupled direct method to quantify changes in air quality and epidemiological evidence to determine concentration-response functions to calculate associated health impacts. We estimated 21,000 premature mortalities per year from EGU emissions, driven by sulfur dioxide emissions forming PM 2.5 . More than half of EGU health impacts are attributable to emissions from eight states with significant coal combustion and large downwind populations. We estimate 10,000 premature mortalities per year from RC emissions, driven by primary PM 2.5 emissions. States with large populations and significant residential wood combustion dominate RC health impacts. Annual mortality risk per thousand tons of precursor emissions (health damage functions) varied significantly across source-states for both source sectors and all precursor pollutants. Our findings reinforce the importance of pollutant-specific, location-specific, and source-specific models of health impacts in design of health-risk minimizing emissions control policies. Citation: Penn SL, Arunachalam S, Woody M, Heiger-Bernays W, Tripodis Y, Levy JI. 2017. Estimating state-specific contributions to PM 2.5 - and O 3 -related health burden from residential combustion and electricity generating unit emissions in the United States. Environ

  15. Site-specific waste management instruction for the 100-KR-4 Operable Unit drilling

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hadley, J.T.

    1996-07-01

    This site-specific waste management instruction provides guidance for the management of waste generated as a result of groundwater well installations in the 100-KR-4 Operable Unit (OU). The well installations are necessary to implement the Remedial Action (RA) option (pump-and-treat using ion exchange) to prevent discharge of hexavalent chromium at levels above those considered protective of aquatic life in the Columbia River and riverbed sediments

  16. Status of activities: Low-level radioactive waste management in the United States

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ozaki, C.B.; Shilkett, R.C.; Kirkpatrick, T.D.

    1989-01-01

    A primary objective of low-level radioactive waste management in the United States is to protect the health and safety of the public and the quality of the environment. In support of this objective is the development of waste treatment and disposal technologies designed to provide stabilization and long-term institutional control of low-level radioactive wastes. Presented herein is a technical review of specific low-level radioactive waste management activities in the United States. Waste treatment and disposal technologies are discussed along with the performance objectives of the technologies aimed at protecting the health and safety of the public and the quality of the environment. 13 refs., 4 figs

  17. Unit-specific contingency plan for the 183-H solar evaporation basins. Revision 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Zoric, J.P.

    1996-03-01

    This document is a supplement to the Hanford Facility Contingency Plan. It provides the unit-specific information needed to fully comply with the Washington Administrative Code, Chapter 173-303, ''Dangerous Waste Regulations,'' for contingency plans. General emergency and response information is contained in the Hanford Facility Contingency Plan and is not repeated in this supplement. The 183-H solar evaporation basins are four concrete internal surfaces which contained radiologically- and hazardous-contaminated waste. The 183-H basins are currently empty, inactive and designated as a Resource Conservation and Recovery Act interim-status treatment, storage, and disposal unit undergoing closure. There is no dangerous waste management actively occurring. There is very little likelihood of any incidents that would present hazards to public health or the environment occurring at the 183-H basins

  18. Unit-specific contingency plan for the 183-H Solar Evaporation Basins. Revision 2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Zoric, J.P.

    1997-01-01

    This document is a supplement to the Hanford Facility Contingency Plan. It provides the unit-specific information needed to fully comply with the Washington Administrative Code, Chapter 173-303, ''Dangerous Waste Regulations,'' for contingency plans. General emergency and response information is contained in the Hanford Facility Contingency Plan and is not repeated in this supplement. The 183-H Solar Evaporation Basins are four concrete internal surfaces which contained radiologically- and hazardous-contaminated waste. The 183-H basins are currently empty, inactive and designated as a Resource Conservation and Recovery Act interim-status treatment, storage, and disposal unit undergoing closure. There is no dangerous waste management actively occurring. There is very little likelihood of any incidents that would present hazards to public health or the environment occurring at the 183-H basins

  19. SEGMENT OF FINANCIAL CORPORATIONS AS AN OBJECT OF FINANCIAL AND STATISTICAL ANALYSIS

    OpenAIRE

    Marat F. Mazitov

    2013-01-01

    The article is devoted to the study specific features of the formation and change of economic assets of financial corporations as an object of management and financial analysis. He author identifies the features and gives the classification of institutional units belonging to the sector of financial corporations from the viewpoint of assessment and financial analysis of the flows, reflecting change of their assets.

  20. Object Oriented Programming Systems (OOPS) and frame representations: An investigation of programming paradigms

    Science.gov (United States)

    Auty, David

    1988-01-01

    The project was initiated to research Object Oriented Programming Systems (OOPS) and frame representation systems, their significance and applicability, and their implementation in or relationship to Ada. Object orientated is currently a very popular conceptual adjective. Object oriented programming, in particular, is promoted as a particularly productive approach to programming; an approach which maximizes opportunities for code reuse and lends itself to the definition of convenient and well-developed units. Such units are thus expected to be usable in a variety of situations, beyond the typical highly specific unit development of other approaches. Frame represenation systems share a common heritage and similar conceptual foundations. Together they represent a quickly emerging alternative approach to programming. The approach is to first define the terms, starting with relevant concepts and using these to put bounds on what is meant by OOPS and Frames. From this the possibilities were pursued to merge OOPS with Ada which will further elucidate the significant characteristics which make up this programming approach. Finally, some of the merits and demerits of OOPS were briefly considered as a way of addressing the applicability of OOPS to various programming tasks.

  1. The importance of lake-specific characteristics for water quality across the continental United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Read, Emily K; Patil, Vijay P; Oliver, Samantha K; Hetherington, Amy L; Brentrup, Jennifer A; Zwart, Jacob A; Winters, Kirsten M; Corman, Jessica R; Nodine, Emily R; Woolway, R Iestyn; Dugan, Hilary A; Jaimes, Aline; Santoso, Arianto B; Hong, Grace S; Winslow, Luke A; Hanson, Paul C; Weathers, Kathleen C

    2015-06-01

    Lake water quality is affected by local and regional drivers, including lake physical characteristics, hydrology, landscape position, land cover, land use, geology, and climate. Here, we demonstrate the utility of hypothesis testing within the landscape limnology framework using a random forest algorithm on a national-scale, spatially explicit data set, the United States Environmental Protection Agency's 2007 National Lakes Assessment. For 1026 lakes, we tested the relative importance of water quality drivers across spatial scales, the importance of hydrologic connectivity in mediating water quality drivers, and how the importance of both spatial scale and connectivity differ across response variables for five important in-lake water quality metrics (total phosphorus, total nitrogen, dissolved organic carbon, turbidity, and conductivity). By modeling the effect of water quality predictors at different spatial scales, we found that lake-specific characteristics (e.g., depth, sediment area-to-volume ratio) were important for explaining water quality (54-60% variance explained), and that regionalization schemes were much less effective than lake specific metrics (28-39% variance explained). Basin-scale land use and land cover explained between 45-62% of variance, and forest cover and agricultural land uses were among the most important basin-scale predictors. Water quality drivers did not operate independently; in some cases, hydrologic connectivity (the presence of upstream surface water features) mediated the effect of regional-scale drivers. For example, for water quality in lakes with upstream lakes, regional classification schemes were much less effective predictors than lake-specific variables, in contrast to lakes with no upstream lakes or with no surface inflows. At the scale of the continental United States, conductivity was explained by drivers operating at larger spatial scales than for other water quality responses. The current regulatory practice of using

  2. Use your head! Perception of action possibilities by means of an object attached to the head.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wagman, Jeffrey B; Hajnal, Alen

    2016-03-01

    Perceiving any environmental property requires spontaneously assembling a smart perceptual instrument-a task-specific measurement device assembled across potentially independent anatomical units. Previous research has shown that to a large degree, perception of a given environmental property is anatomically independent. We attempted to provide stronger evidence for this proposal by investigating perception by an organization of anatomical and inert components that likely requires the spontaneous assembly of a novel smart perceptual instrument-a rod attached to the head. Specifically, we compared cephalic and manual perception of whether an inclined surface affords standing on. In both conditions, perception reflected the action capabilities of the perceiver and not the appendage used to wield the rod. Such results provide stronger evidence for anatomical independence of perception within a given perceptual system and highlight that flexible task-specific detection units can be assembled across units that span the body and inert objects.

  3. Do infant Japanese macaques ( Macaca fuscata) categorize objects without specific training?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Murai, Chizuko; Tomonaga, Masaki; Kamegai, Kimi; Terazawa, Naoko; Yamaguchi, Masami K

    2004-01-01

    In the present study, we examined whether infant Japanese macaques categorize objects without any training, using a similar technique also used with human infants (the paired-preference method). During the familiarization phase, subjects were presented twice with two pairs of different objects from one global-level category. During the test phase, they were presented twice with a pair consisting of a novel familiar-category object and a novel global-level category object. The subjects were tested with three global-level categories (animal, furniture, and vehicle). It was found that they showed significant novelty preferences as a whole, indicating that they processed similarities between familiarization objects and novel familiar-category objects. These results suggest that subjects responded distinctively to objects without training, indicating the possibility that infant macaques possess the capacity for categorization.

  4. Ferromanganese Furnace Modelling Using Object-Oriented Principles

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Wasboe, S.O.

    1996-12-31

    This doctoral thesis defines an object-oriented framework for aiding unit process modelling and applies it to model high-carbon ferromanganese furnaces. A framework is proposed for aiding modelling of the internal topology and the phenomena taking place inside unit processes. Complex unit processes may consist of a number of zones where different phenomena take place. A topology is therefore defined for the unit process itself, which shows the relations between the zones. Inside each zone there is a set of chemical species and phenomena, such as reactions, phase transitions, heat transfer etc. A formalized graphical methodology is developed as a tool for modelling these zones and their interaction. The symbols defined in the graphical framework are associated with objects and classes. The rules for linking the objects are described using OMT (Object Modeling Technique) diagrams and formal language formulations. The basic classes that are defined are implemented using the C++ programming language. The ferromanganese process is a complex unit process. A general description of the process equipment is given, and a detailed discussion of the process itself and a system theoretical overview of it. The object-oriented framework is then used to develop a dynamic model based on mass and energy balances. The model is validated by measurements from an industrial furnace. 101 refs., 119 figs., 20 tabs.

  5. Technical Specifications, Seabrook Station, Unit 1 (Docket No. 50-443). Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-56

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1986-10-01

    This report provides specifications for the Seabrook Station Unit 1 reactor concerning: safety limits and limiting safety settings; limiting conditions for operation and surveillance requirements; design features; and administrative controls

  6. 75 FR 66419 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Object of Devotion...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-28

    ... Determinations: ``Object of Devotion: Medieval English Alabaster Sculpture From the Victoria and Albert Museum... Devotion: Medieval English Alabaster Sculpture from the Victoria and Albert Museum,'' imported from abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are...

  7. Action semantics: A unifying conceptual framework for the selective use of multimodal and modality-specific object knowledge.

    Science.gov (United States)

    van Elk, Michiel; van Schie, Hein; Bekkering, Harold

    2014-06-01

    Our capacity to use tools and objects is often considered one of the hallmarks of the human species. Many objects greatly extend our bodily capabilities to act in the physical world, such as when using a hammer or a saw. In addition, humans have the remarkable capability to use objects in a flexible fashion and to combine multiple objects in complex actions. We prepare coffee, cook dinner and drive our car. In this review we propose that humans have developed declarative and procedural knowledge, i.e. action semantics that enables us to use objects in a meaningful way. A state-of-the-art review of research on object use is provided, involving behavioral, developmental, neuropsychological and neuroimaging studies. We show that research in each of these domains is characterized by similar discussions regarding (1) the role of object affordances, (2) the relation between goals and means in object use and (3) the functional and neural organization of action semantics. We propose a novel conceptual framework of action semantics to address these issues and to integrate the previous findings. We argue that action semantics entails both multimodal object representations and modality-specific sub-systems, involving manipulation knowledge, functional knowledge and representations of the sensory and proprioceptive consequences of object use. Furthermore, we argue that action semantics are hierarchically organized and selectively activated and used depending on the action intention of the actor and the current task context. Our framework presents an integrative account of multiple findings and perspectives on object use that may guide future studies in this interdisciplinary domain. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  8. Stock keeping unit fill rate specification

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Teunter, R. H.; Syntetos, A. A.; Babai, M. Z.

    2017-01-01

    The fill rate is the most widely applied service level measure in industry and yet there is minimal advice available on how it should be differentiated on an individual Stock Keeping Unit (SKU) basis given that there is an overall system target service level. The typical approach utilized in

  9. A Multi-Objective Unit Commitment Model for Setting Carbon Tax to Reduce CO2 Emission: Thailand's Electricity Generation Case

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nuchjarin Intalar

    2015-07-01

    Full Text Available Carbon tax policy is a cost-effective instrument for emission reduction. However, setting the carbon tax is one of the challenging task for policy makers as it will lead to higher price of emission-intensive sources especially the utility price. In a large-scale power generation system, minimizing the operational cost and the environmental impact are conflicting objectives and it is difficult to find the compromise solution. This paper proposes a methodology of finding a feasible carbon tax rate on strategic level using the operational unit commitment model. We present a multi-objective mixed integer linear programming model to solve the unit commitment problem and consider the environmental impacts. The methodology of analyzing of the effect of carbon tax rates on the power generation, operating cost, and CO2 emission is also provided. The trade-off relationship between total operating cost and total CO2 emission is presented in the Pareto-optimal curve to analyze the feasible carbon tax rate that is influencing on electricity operating cost. The significant outcome of this paper is a modeling framework for the policy makers to determine the possible carbon tax that can be imposed on the electricity generation.

  10. Removal of Secondary Side Deposit and Foreign Objects in SG of Yonggwang Nuclear Power Plant, Unit 2

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jeong, Wootae [KHNP-CRI, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of); Yun, Sangjung; Choi, Yongseok; Kim, Taehwa; Seo, Hongchang [Byucksan Digital Valley II, Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

    2014-05-15

    Mock-up test and training before the service were made to minimize operation time and radiation dose. 8 bag filters and 49 cartridge filters were consumed for filtering of soft and hard sludge in SG A, B, and C. Total 21.05 kilograms of sludge was removed. Five foreign objects were found and removed in tube bundle of SG A, in annulus and tube bundle of SG B, and in tube bundle of SG C. During the 20{sup th} OH of Yonggwang NPP unit 2, we removed 21.05 kilograms of sludge and five foreign objects from three steam generators. Gradual increase in weight of sludge removed is assumed to show us that more sludge is created as operation time of steam generator increases. Low level chemical cleaning at 19{sup th} OH removed 517 kilograms of sludge which was dominant of all the sludge removal weight. We could assume, from this fact, that high level chemical cleaning could remove significant amount of sludge compared to mechanical lancing method. Five foreign objects which were removed from inside of SG showed us that more thorough inside cleaning and inspection is necessary during fabrication of steam generator.

  11. Reasoning about Function Objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nordio, Martin; Calcagno, Cristiano; Meyer, Bertrand; Müller, Peter; Tschannen, Julian

    Modern object-oriented languages support higher-order implementations through function objects such as delegates in C#, agents in Eiffel, or closures in Scala. Function objects bring a new level of abstraction to the object-oriented programming model, and require a comparable extension to specification and verification techniques. We introduce a verification methodology that extends function objects with auxiliary side-effect free (pure) methods to model logical artifacts: preconditions, postconditions and modifies clauses. These pure methods can be used to specify client code abstractly, that is, independently from specific instantiations of the function objects. To demonstrate the feasibility of our approach, we have implemented an automatic prover, which verifies several non-trivial examples.

  12. Ahdaf al-ta'lim al-fanni, al-tujari, al-zira'i, wal-sina'i (Vocational Education Objectives: Commercial, Agricultural and Industrial).

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ministry of Education, Cairo (United Arab Republic).

    This document is an English-language abstract (approximately 1,500 words) of a publication outlining the objectives and problems of vocational education in the United Arab Republic. The data presented include both the general objectives of vocational education and the specific goals of each type. The goal of vocational education is to prepare…

  13. Space Object Collision Probability via Monte Carlo on the Graphics Processing Unit

    Science.gov (United States)

    Vittaldev, Vivek; Russell, Ryan P.

    2017-09-01

    Fast and accurate collision probability computations are essential for protecting space assets. Monte Carlo (MC) simulation is the most accurate but computationally intensive method. A Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) is used to parallelize the computation and reduce the overall runtime. Using MC techniques to compute the collision probability is common in literature as the benchmark. An optimized implementation on the GPU, however, is a challenging problem and is the main focus of the current work. The MC simulation takes samples from the uncertainty distributions of the Resident Space Objects (RSOs) at any time during a time window of interest and outputs the separations at closest approach. Therefore, any uncertainty propagation method may be used and the collision probability is automatically computed as a function of RSO collision radii. Integration using a fixed time step and a quartic interpolation after every Runge Kutta step ensures that no close approaches are missed. Two orders of magnitude speedups over a serial CPU implementation are shown, and speedups improve moderately with higher fidelity dynamics. The tool makes the MC approach tractable on a single workstation, and can be used as a final product, or for verifying surrogate and analytical collision probability methods.

  14. The object of the unitization agreement under the Brazilian legal system; O objeto do acordo de unitizacao no sistema juridico brasileiro

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Pereira, Tatiana Zuma [PETROBRAS, Rio de Janeiro, RJ (Brazil)

    2008-07-01

    The concept of unitization was incorporated in the Brazilian law through the article 27 of Law n. 9.478/97 (Petroleum Act). There is unitization when a deposit of oil or natural gas extends by two or more contiguous blocks, whose rights of exploration and production belong to different concessionaires and in which case such concessionaires may conclude an Agreement for Individualization of Production (hereinafter referred to Unitization Agreement). This study intends to examine the object of the unitization agreement and to define the limits of the area on which the concessionaires of the neighbouring areas should exercise the production joint operations. Therefore, it was studied the concepts of Block (Petroleum Act, article 6, XIII), Field (Petroleum Act, article 6, XIV), and Reservoir (Petroleum Act, article 6, X and XI), and the articles 26 and 27 of the Petroleum Act were interpreted systematically. The Comparative Law has also been examined and used as a basis for the conclusions presented in this study. (author)

  15. Implementation of a mandatory checklist of protocols and objectives improves compliance with a wide range of evidence-based intensive care unit practices.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Byrnes, Matthew C; Schuerer, Douglas J E; Schallom, Marilyn E; Sona, Carrie S; Mazuski, John E; Taylor, Beth E; McKenzie, Wendi; Thomas, James M; Emerson, Jeffrey S; Nemeth, Jennifer L; Bailey, Ruth A; Boyle, Walter A; Buchman, Timothy G; Coopersmith, Craig M

    2009-10-01

    To determine a) if a checklist covering a diverse group of intensive care unit protocols and objectives would improve clinician consideration of these domains and b) if improved consideration would change practice patterns. Pre- and post observational study. A 24-bed surgical/burn/trauma intensive care unit in a teaching hospital. A total of 1399 patients admitted between June 2006 and May 2007. The first component of the study evaluated whether mandating verbal review of a checklist covering 14 intensive care unit best practices altered verbal consideration of these domains. Evaluation was performed using real-time bedside audits on morning rounds. The second component evaluated whether the checklist altered implementation of these domains by changing practice patterns. Evaluation was performed by analyzing data from the Project IMPACT database after patients left the intensive care unit. Verbal consideration of evaluable domains improved from 90.9% (530/583) to 99.7% (669/671, p < .0001) after verbal review of the checklist was mandated. Bedside consideration improved on the use of deep venous thrombosis prophylaxis (p < .05), stress ulcer prophylaxis (p < .01), oral care for ventilated patients (p < 0.01), electrolyte repletion (p < .01), initiation of physical therapy (p < .05), and documentation of restraint orders (p < .0001). Mandatory verbal review of the checklist resulted in a greater than two-fold increase in transferring patients out of the intensive care unit on telemetry (16% vs. 35%, p < .0001) and initiation of physical therapy (28% vs. 42%, p < .0001) compared with baseline practice. A mandatory verbal review of a checklist covering a wide range of objectives and goals at each patient's bedside is an effective method to improve both consideration and implementation of intensive care unit best practices. A bedside checklist is a simple, cost-effective method to prevent errors of omission in basic domains of intensive care unit management that might

  16. Orbiting objective lens telescope system and method

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Crooks, J.W. Jr.

    1984-01-01

    A large objective lens is placed in a highly eccentric orbit about the earth. The orbit and orientation of the lens are carefully chosen so that it focuses light or other radiation from a preselected astronomical object into an image which slowly moves across the surface of the earth. A row of optical sensing units is located on the surface of the earth so that the image focused by the orbiting objective lens will travel substantially perpendicularly across the row during an observation. Output data generated from the sensing units may be multiplexed and fed to a real time processor which produces display signals. Each of the sensing units provides one scan line of the image being observed. The display signals are fed to a suitable display device which produces a picture of the preselected astronomical object. The objective lens may comprise a large flexible Fresnel zone plate or a flexible convex lens carried by a bicycle wheel-type supporting structure. The lens and supporting structure may be unfolded from compact cargo configurations and rotated after being placed into orbit

  17. Specific MRI quality control: development and production of a multimodal test-object. Assessment of MRI sequences

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dedieu, Veronique; Bard, Jean-Jacques; Bonnet, Jacques; Buchheit, Isabelle; Confort-Gouny, Sylviane; Certaines, Jacques de; Lacaze, Brigitte; Vincensini, Dominique; Joffre, Francis

    2007-02-01

    After a first part recalling the operation principle of a MRI imager and the modalities of acquisition of MRI images (base MNR experiment, image quality, technical issues, artefacts and main defects of MRI imagers), this document addresses the different types of quality control in MRI and regulatory issues. The third part presents the characteristics of a multimodal test-object which has been developed, the parameters of the specific quality control, and control procedures

  18. ENEA`s mobile treatment units for specific waters; Impianti mobili ENEA di trattamento / smaltimento rifiuti

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Beone, G.; Barni, E.; Coronidi, M. [ENEA, Centro Ricerche Casaccia, Rome (Italy). Dipt. Ambiente; Bortone, G.; Gambaro, L.; Zanetti, P. [ENEA, Centro Ricerche `Ezio Clementel, Bologna (Italy). Dipt. Ambiente; Liccione, G. [ENEA, Centro Ricerche Trisaia, Matera (Italy). Dipt. Ambiente; Zanin, E.

    1997-11-01

    Solid waste production in turistic places is characterized by a large increase, up to 80 % for few months during the year. Generally a waste treatment plant is designed for a mean production and can support increases that non exceed 10 %. Treatment plants with higher capacity are not economically convenient and the excedent production is landfilled. An answer to this problem are mobile treatment units that could be used to support resident plants when higher treatment capacity is requested. Mobile units are very useful for other uses like as treatment of specific wastes (agricultural plastic bags and sheets contaminated by antiparasitics and herbicides) infective wastes from hospital and laboratories and leaches from landfills. Mobile units flexibility is also important for environmental protection actions, either scheduled on in an emergency, like as reclamation of contaminated soils, asbestos contaminated site and every time when waste transport is characterized by high cost or safety and sanitary problems.

  19. Pilot-Scale Laboratory Instruction for Chemical Engineering: The Specific Case of the Pilot-Unit Leading Group

    Science.gov (United States)

    Billet, Anne-Marie; Camy, Severine; Coufort-Saudejaud, Carole

    2010-01-01

    This paper presents an original approach for Chemical Engineering laboratory teaching that is currently applied at INP-ENSIACET (France). This approach, referred to as "pilot-unit leading group" is based on a partial management of the laboratories by the students themselves who become temporarily in charge of one specific laboratory. In…

  20. Atypical right hemisphere specialization for object representations in an adolescent with specific language impairment

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Timothy T. Brown

    2014-02-01

    Full Text Available Individuals with a diagnosis of specific language impairment (SLI show abnormal spoken language occurring alongside normal nonverbal abilities. Behaviorally, people with SLI exhibit diverse profiles of impairment involving phonological, grammatical, syntactic, and semantic aspects of language. In this study, we used a multimodal neuroimaging technique called anatomically constrained magnetoencephalography (aMEG to measure the dynamic functional brain organization of an adolescent with SLI. Using single-subject statistical maps of cortical activity, we compared this patient to a sibling and to a cohort of typically developing subjects during the performance of tasks designed to evoke semantic representations of concrete objects. Localized, real-time patterns of brain activity within the language impaired patient showed marked differences from the typical functional organization, with significant engagement of right hemisphere heteromodal cortical regions generally homotopic to the left hemisphere areas that usually show the greatest activity for such tasks. Functional neuroanatomical differences were evident at early sensoriperceptual processing stages and continued through later cognitive stages, observed specifically at latencies typically associated with semantic encoding operations. Our findings show with real-time temporal specificity evidence for an atypical right hemisphere specialization for the representation of concrete entities, independent of verbal motor demands. More broadly, our results demonstrate the feasibility and potential utility of using aMEG to characterize individual patient differences in the dynamic functional organization of the brain.

  1. Meeting performance objectives for Low-Level Radioactive Disposal Waste Facility at the Savannah River Site

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Taylor, G.E.

    1992-01-01

    A new Low-Level Radioactive Waste (LLW) disposal facility at the Savannah River Site is presently being constructed. The facility was designed to meet specific performance objectives (derived from DOE Order 5820.2A and proposed EPA Regulation 40CFR 193) in the disposal of containerized Class A and B wastes. The disposal units have been designed as below-grade concrete vaults. These vaults will be constructed using uniquely designed blast furnace slag + fly as concrete mix, surrounded by a highly permeable drainage layer, and covered with an engineered clay cap to provide the necessary environmental isolation of the waste form to meet the stated performance objectives. The concrete mix used in this facility, is the first such application in the United States. These vaults become operational in September 1992 and will become the first active facility of its kind, several years ahead of those planned in the commercial theater. This paper will discuss the selection of the performance objectives and conceptual design

  2. Fast neuromimetic object recognition using FPGA outperforms GPU implementations.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Orchard, Garrick; Martin, Jacob G; Vogelstein, R Jacob; Etienne-Cummings, Ralph

    2013-08-01

    Recognition of objects in still images has traditionally been regarded as a difficult computational problem. Although modern automated methods for visual object recognition have achieved steadily increasing recognition accuracy, even the most advanced computational vision approaches are unable to obtain performance equal to that of humans. This has led to the creation of many biologically inspired models of visual object recognition, among them the hierarchical model and X (HMAX) model. HMAX is traditionally known to achieve high accuracy in visual object recognition tasks at the expense of significant computational complexity. Increasing complexity, in turn, increases computation time, reducing the number of images that can be processed per unit time. In this paper we describe how the computationally intensive and biologically inspired HMAX model for visual object recognition can be modified for implementation on a commercial field-programmable aate Array, specifically the Xilinx Virtex 6 ML605 evaluation board with XC6VLX240T FPGA. We show that with minor modifications to the traditional HMAX model we can perform recognition on images of size 128 × 128 pixels at a rate of 190 images per second with a less than 1% loss in recognition accuracy in both binary and multiclass visual object recognition tasks.

  3. Forebrain-Specific Loss of BMPRII in Mice Reduces Anxiety and Increases Object Exploration.

    Science.gov (United States)

    McBrayer, Zofeyah L; Dimova, Jiva; Pisansky, Marc T; Sun, Mu; Beppu, Hideyuki; Gewirtz, Jonathan C; O'Connor, Michael B

    2015-01-01

    To investigate the role of Bone Morphogenic Protein Receptor Type II (BMPRII) in learning, memory, and exploratory behavior in mice, a tissue-specific knockout of BMPRII in the post-natal hippocampus and forebrain was generated. We found that BMPRII mutant mice had normal spatial learning and memory in the Morris water maze, but showed significantly reduced swimming speeds with increased floating behavior. Further analysis using the Porsolt Swim Test to investigate behavioral despair did not reveal any differences in immobility between mutants and controls. In the Elevated Plus Maze, BMPRII mutants and Smad4 mutants showed reduced anxiety, while in exploratory tests, BMPRII mutants showed more interest in object exploration. These results suggest that loss of BMPRII in the mouse hippocampus and forebrain does not disrupt spatial learning and memory encoding, but instead impacts exploratory and anxiety-related behaviors.

  4. Forebrain-Specific Loss of BMPRII in Mice Reduces Anxiety and Increases Object Exploration.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Zofeyah L McBrayer

    Full Text Available To investigate the role of Bone Morphogenic Protein Receptor Type II (BMPRII in learning, memory, and exploratory behavior in mice, a tissue-specific knockout of BMPRII in the post-natal hippocampus and forebrain was generated. We found that BMPRII mutant mice had normal spatial learning and memory in the Morris water maze, but showed significantly reduced swimming speeds with increased floating behavior. Further analysis using the Porsolt Swim Test to investigate behavioral despair did not reveal any differences in immobility between mutants and controls. In the Elevated Plus Maze, BMPRII mutants and Smad4 mutants showed reduced anxiety, while in exploratory tests, BMPRII mutants showed more interest in object exploration. These results suggest that loss of BMPRII in the mouse hippocampus and forebrain does not disrupt spatial learning and memory encoding, but instead impacts exploratory and anxiety-related behaviors.

  5. Testing of toxicity based methods to develop site specific clean up objectives - phase 1: Toxicity protocol screening and applicability

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hamilton, H.; Kerr, D.; Thorne, W.; Taylor, B.; Zadnik, M.; Goudey, S.; Birkholz, D.

    1994-03-01

    A study was conducted to develop a cost-effective and practical protocol for using bio-assay based toxicity assessment methods for remediation of decommissioned oil and gas production, and processing facilities. The objective was to generate site-specific remediation criteria for contaminated sites. Most companies have used the chemical-specific approach which, however, did not meet the ultimate land use goal of agricultural production. The toxicity assessment method described in this study dealt with potential impairment to agricultural crop production and natural ecosystems. Human health concerns were not specifically addressed. It was suggested that chemical-specific methods should be used when human health concerns exist. . Results showed that toxicity tests will more directly identify ecological stress caused by site contamination than chemical-specific remediation criteria, which can be unnecessarily protective. 11 refs., 7 tabs., 6 figs

  6. A unified computational model of the development of object unity, object permanence, and occluded object trajectory perception.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Franz, A; Triesch, J

    2010-12-01

    The perception of the unity of objects, their permanence when out of sight, and the ability to perceive continuous object trajectories even during occlusion belong to the first and most important capacities that infants have to acquire. Despite much research a unified model of the development of these abilities is still missing. Here we make an attempt to provide such a unified model. We present a recurrent artificial neural network that learns to predict the motion of stimuli occluding each other and that develops representations of occluded object parts. It represents completely occluded, moving objects for several time steps and successfully predicts their reappearance after occlusion. This framework allows us to account for a broad range of experimental data. Specifically, the model explains how the perception of object unity develops, the role of the width of the occluders, and it also accounts for differences between data for moving and stationary stimuli. We demonstrate that these abilities can be acquired by learning to predict the sensory input. The model makes specific predictions and provides a unifying framework that has the potential to be extended to other visual event categories. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  7. Site-specific waste management instruction for the 100-KR-4 Operable Unit drilling. Revision 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hadley, J.T.

    1996-08-01

    This site-specific waste management instruction provides guidance for the management of waste generated as a result of groundwater well installations in the 100-KR-4 Operable Unit (OU). The well installations are necessary to implement the Remedial Action (RA) option (pump-and-treat using ion exchange) to prevent discharge of hexavalent chromium at levels above those considered protective of aquatic life in the Columbia River and riverbed sediments

  8. Investigation of some specific industry objects effect on plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kadirova, M.; Mukhamedshina, N. M.; Mirsagatova, A. A.; Norboev, N.; Amanov, M.; Baynazarov, B.; Khushvaktov, T.

    2001-01-01

    Such industry objects as metallurgical works, chemical fertilizers manufacture, automobile industry and others are contribute to contaminate an environment. For example, it is known, that aluminum factories throw out in an environment fluorine hydride, solid fluorides, nitrogen dioxide, sulpher dioxide, hydrocarbons, ions of heavy metals and others. For comparison of harmful action of various industrial objects on plants we had investigate some leaves and seed of plants grown in areas of Tadjik aluminum factory, Chirchik works of heatproof and refractory metals, Asaka automobile works and Tashkent nuclear reactor action. Investigations were conduct by nuclear techniques and by physical and agrotechnical ethods. The alternative methods have been used by Tashkent state agrarian university. High sensitive and reliable multielement instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) and X-ray radiometric techniques for determination of 27 elements in plant have been developed in the Institute of nuclear physics (INP)

  9. Category-Specific Visual Recognition and Aging from the PACE Theory Perspective: Evidence for a Presemantic Deficit in Aging Object Recognition

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bordaberry, Pierre; Gerlach, Christian; Lenoble, Quentin

    2016-01-01

    Background/Study Context: The objective of this study was to investigate the object recognition deficit in aging. Age-related declines were examined from the presemantic account of category effects (PACE) theory perspective (Gerlach, 2009, Cognition, 111, 281–301). This view assumes that the stru......Background/Study Context: The objective of this study was to investigate the object recognition deficit in aging. Age-related declines were examined from the presemantic account of category effects (PACE) theory perspective (Gerlach, 2009, Cognition, 111, 281–301). This view assumes...... that the structural similarity/dissimilarity inherent in living and nonliving objects, respectively, can account for a wide range of category-specific effects. Methods: In two experiments on object recognition, young (36 participants, 18–27 years) and older (36 participants, 53–69 years) adult participants...... in the selection stage of the PACE theory (visual long-term memory matching) could be responsible for these impairments. Indeed, the older group showed a deficit when this stage was most relevant. This article emphasize on the critical need for taking into account structural component of the stimuli and type...

  10. Night Vision Goggles Objectives Lens Focusing Methodology

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    Pinkus, Alan; Task, H. L

    2000-01-01

    ...: interpupillary distance, tilt, eye relief, height, eyepiece and objective lens focus. Currently, aircrew use a Hoffman 20/20 test unit to pre-focus their NVG objective lenses at optical infinity before boarding their aircraft...

  11. Technical specifications, South Texas Project, Unit No. 1 (Docket No. 50-498): Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-71

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1987-08-01

    This report presents specifications for the South Texas Project, Unit No. 1 concerning: safety limits, and limiting safety system settings; limiting conditions for operation and surveillance requirements; design features; and administrative controls

  12. No Evidence for Phase-Specific Effects of 40 Hz HD–tACS on Multiple Object Tracking

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nicholas S. Bland

    2018-03-01

    Full Text Available Phase synchronization drives connectivity between neural oscillators, providing a flexible mechanism through which information can be effectively and selectively routed between task-relevant cortical areas. The ability to keep track of objects moving between the left and right visual hemifields, for example, requires the integration of information between the two cerebral hemispheres. Both animal and human studies have suggested that coherent (or phase-locked gamma oscillations (30–80 Hz might underlie this ability. While most human evidence has been strictly correlational, high-density transcranial alternating current stimulation (HD-tACS has been used to manipulate ongoing interhemispheric gamma phase relationships. Previous research showed that 40 Hz tACS delivered bilaterally over human motion complex could bias the perception of a bistable ambiguous motion stimulus (Helfrich et al., 2014. Specifically, this work showed that in-phase (0° offset stimulation boosted endogenous interhemispheric gamma coherence and biased perception toward the horizontal (whereby visual tokens moved between visual hemifields—requiring interhemispheric integration. By contrast, anti-phase (180° offset stimulation decreased interhemispheric gamma coherence and biased perception toward the vertical (whereby tokens moved within separate visual hemifields. Here we devised a multiple object tracking arena comprised of four quadrants whereby discrete objects moved either entirely within the left and right visual hemifields, or could cross freely between visual hemifields, thus requiring interhemispheric integration. Using the same HD-tACS montages as Helfrich et al. (2014, we found no phase-specific effect of 40 Hz stimulation on overall tracking performance. While tracking performance was generally lower during between-hemifield trials (presumably reflecting a cost of integration, this difference was unchanged by in- vs. anti-phase stimulation. Our null results

  13. Specification of Eight 2400 W @ 1.8 K Refrigeration Units for the LHC

    CERN Document Server

    Claudet, S; Jäger, B; Millet, F; Roussel, P; Tavian, L; Wagner, U

    2000-01-01

    The cooling capacity below 2 K for the superconducting magnets in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), at CERN, will be provided by eight refrigeration units at 1.8 K, each of them coupled to a 4.5 K refrigerator. Taking into account the cryogenic architecture of the LHC and corresponding process design constraints, a reference solution based on a combination of cold centrifugal and warm volumetric compressors was established in 1997. The process and technical requirements expressed in the specification issued in 1998 and the procurement scenario based on pre-series acceptance prior to final series delivery between 2002 and 2004 are presented in this paper.

  14. Effect of objective function on multi-objective inverse planning of radiation therapy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Li Guoli; Wu Yican; Song Gang; Wang Shifang

    2006-01-01

    There are two kinds of objective functions in radiotherapy inverse planning: dose distribution-based and Dose-Volume Histogram (DVH)-based functions. The treatment planning in our days is still a trial and error process because the multi-objective problem is solved by transforming it into a single objective problem using a specific set of weights for each object. This work investigates the problem of objective function setting based on Pareto multi-optimization theory, and compares the effect on multi-objective inverse planning of those two kinds of objective functions including calculation time, converge speed, etc. The basis of objective function setting on inverse planning is discussed. (authors)

  15. Challenges encountered by critical care unit managers in the large intensive care units

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mokgadi C. Matlakala

    2014-04-01

    Full Text Available Background: Nurses in intensive care units (ICUs are exposed regularly to huge demands interms of fulfilling the many roles that are placed upon them. Unit managers, in particular, are responsible for the efficient management of the units and have the responsibilities of planning, organising, leading and controlling the daily activities in order to facilitate the achievement of the unit objectives. Objectives: The objective of this study was to explore and present the challenges encountered by ICU managers in the management of large ICUs. Method: A qualitative, exploratory and descriptive study was conducted at five hospital ICUs in Gauteng province, South Africa. Data were collected through individual interviews from purposively-selected critical care unit managers, then analysed using the matic coding. Results: Five themes emerged from the data: challenges related to the layout and structure of the unit, human resources provision and staffing, provision of material resources, stressors in the unit and visitors in the ICU. Conclusion: Unit managers in large ICUs face multifaceted challenges which include the demand for efficient and sufficient specialised nurses; lack of or inadequate equipment that goes along with technology in ICU and supplies; and stressors in the ICU that limit the efficiency to plan, organise, lead and control the daily activities in the unit. The challenges identified call for multiple strategies to assist in the efficient management of large ICUs.

  16. Care management in nursing within emergency care units

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Roberta Juliane Tono de Oliveira

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available Objective.Understand the conditions involved in the management of nursing care in emergency care units. Methodology. Qualitative research using the methodological framework of the Grounded Theory. Data collection occurred from September 2011 to June 2012 through semi-structured interviews with 20 participants of the two emergency care units in the city of Florianopolis, Brazil. Results. Hindering factors to care management are: lack of experience and knowledge of professionals in emergency services; inadequate number of professionals; work overload of emergency care units in the urgent care network; difficulty in implementing nursing care systematization, and need for team meetings. Facilitating factors are: teamwork; importance of professionals; and confidence of the nursing technicians in the presence of the nurse. Conclusion. Whereas the hindering factors in care management are related to the organizational aspects of the emergency care units in the urgency care network, the facilitating ones include specific aspects of teamwork.

  17. Technical Specifications, Seabrook Station, Unit 1 (Docket No. 50-443): Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-67

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1989-05-01

    The Seabrook Station, Unit 1 Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  18. Calculating the Unit Cost Factors for Decommissioning Cost Estimation of the Nuclear Research Reactor

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jeong, Kwan Seong; Lee, Dong Gyu; Jung, Chong Hun; Lee, Kune Woo

    2006-01-01

    The estimated decommissioning cost of nuclear research reactor is calculated by applying a unit cost factor-based engineering cost calculation method on which classification of decommissioning works fitted with the features and specifications of decommissioning objects and establishment of composition factors are based. Decommissioning cost of nuclear research reactor is composed of labor cost, equipment and materials cost. Labor cost of decommissioning costs in decommissioning works are calculated on the basis of working time consumed in decommissioning objects. In this paper, the unit cost factors and work difficulty factors which are needed to calculate the labor cost in estimating decommissioning cost of nuclear research reactor are derived and figured out.

  19. Object formation in visual working memory: Evidence from object-based attention.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhou, Jifan; Zhang, Haihang; Ding, Xiaowei; Shui, Rende; Shen, Mowei

    2016-09-01

    We report on how visual working memory (VWM) forms intact perceptual representations of visual objects using sub-object elements. Specifically, when objects were divided into fragments and sequentially encoded into VWM, the fragments were involuntarily integrated into objects in VWM, as evidenced by the occurrence of both positive and negative object-based attention effects: In Experiment 1, when subjects' attention was cued to a location occupied by the VWM object, the target presented at the location of that object was perceived as occurring earlier than that presented at the location of a different object. In Experiment 2, responses to a target were significantly slower when a distractor was presented at the same location as the cued object (Experiment 2). These results suggest that object fragments can be integrated into objects within VWM in a manner similar to that of visual perception. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  20. Genetic specificity of face recognition.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shakeshaft, Nicholas G; Plomin, Robert

    2015-10-13

    Specific cognitive abilities in diverse domains are typically found to be highly heritable and substantially correlated with general cognitive ability (g), both phenotypically and genetically. Recent twin studies have found the ability to memorize and recognize faces to be an exception, being similarly heritable but phenotypically substantially uncorrelated both with g and with general object recognition. However, the genetic relationships between face recognition and other abilities (the extent to which they share a common genetic etiology) cannot be determined from phenotypic associations. In this, to our knowledge, first study of the genetic associations between face recognition and other domains, 2,000 18- and 19-year-old United Kingdom twins completed tests assessing their face recognition, object recognition, and general cognitive abilities. Results confirmed the substantial heritability of face recognition (61%), and multivariate genetic analyses found that most of this genetic influence is unique and not shared with other cognitive abilities.

  1. CFL Labeling Harmonization in the United States, China, Brazil andELI Member Countries: Specifications, Testing, and MutualRecognition

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Fridley, David; Lin, Jiang; Denver, Andrea; Biermayer, Peter; Dillavou, Tyler

    2005-07-20

    This report examines critical differences among energy-efficient labeling programs for CFLs in Brazil, China, the United States, and the seven members of the international Efficient Lighting Initiative (ELI) in terms of technical specifications and test procedures, and review issues related to international harmonization of these standards.

  2. Objective-guided image annotation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mao, Qi; Tsang, Ivor Wai-Hung; Gao, Shenghua

    2013-04-01

    Automatic image annotation, which is usually formulated as a multi-label classification problem, is one of the major tools used to enhance the semantic understanding of web images. Many multimedia applications (e.g., tag-based image retrieval) can greatly benefit from image annotation. However, the insufficient performance of image annotation methods prevents these applications from being practical. On the other hand, specific measures are usually designed to evaluate how well one annotation method performs for a specific objective or application, but most image annotation methods do not consider optimization of these measures, so that they are inevitably trapped into suboptimal performance of these objective-specific measures. To address this issue, we first summarize a variety of objective-guided performance measures under a unified representation. Our analysis reveals that macro-averaging measures are very sensitive to infrequent keywords, and hamming measure is easily affected by skewed distributions. We then propose a unified multi-label learning framework, which directly optimizes a variety of objective-specific measures of multi-label learning tasks. Specifically, we first present a multilayer hierarchical structure of learning hypotheses for multi-label problems based on which a variety of loss functions with respect to objective-guided measures are defined. And then, we formulate these loss functions as relaxed surrogate functions and optimize them by structural SVMs. According to the analysis of various measures and the high time complexity of optimizing micro-averaging measures, in this paper, we focus on example-based measures that are tailor-made for image annotation tasks but are seldom explored in the literature. Experiments show consistency with the formal analysis on two widely used multi-label datasets, and demonstrate the superior performance of our proposed method over state-of-the-art baseline methods in terms of example-based measures on four

  3. VLTI auxiliary telescopes: a full object-oriented approach

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chiozzi, Gianluca; Duhoux, Philippe; Karban, Robert

    2000-06-01

    The Very Large Telescope (VLT) Telescope Control Software (TCS) is a portable system. It is now in use or will be used in a whole family of ESO telescopes VLT Unit Telescopes, VLTI Auxiliary Telescopes, NTT, La Silla 3.6, VLT Survey Telescope and Astronomical Site Monitors in Paranal and La Silla). Although it has been developed making extensive usage of Object Oriented (OO) methodologies, the overall development process chosen at the beginning of the project used traditional methods. In order to warranty a longer lifetime to the system (improving documentation and maintainability) and to prepare for future projects, we have introduced a full OO process. We have taken as a basis the United Software Development Process with the Unified Modeling Language (UML) and we have adapted the process to our specific needs. This paper describes how the process has been applied to the VLTI Auxiliary Telescopes Control Software (ATCS). The ATCS is based on the portable VLT TCS, but some subsystems are new or have specific characteristics. The complete process has been applied to the new subsystems, while reused code has been integrated in the UML models. We have used the ATCS on one side to tune the process and train the team members and on the other side to provide a UML and WWW based documentation for the portable VLT TCS.

  4. Technical Specifications, Clinton Power Station, Unit No. 1 (Docket No. 50-461). Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-55

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1986-09-01

    This report presents information on the technical specifications of the Clinton Unit No. 1 Reactor in the areas of: safety limits and limiting safety system settings; limiting conditions for operation and surveillance requirements; design features; and administrative controls

  5. Specific aspects for Cernavoda - Unit 1 NPP life assurance

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rucareanu, R.

    2002-01-01

    Full text: The main scope of a Plant Life Management Program is to operate the NPP in a safe manner and at a competitive cost during the reactor life. To achieve this goal, it is important to continuously evaluate the degradation of the main structures and components of the NPP. Background -Cernavoda NPP design life is 30 years. Compared with this target, the operation history is not long (Unit 1 is in commercial operation since 1997). It is still important to begin a plant life management program early to identify the critical components and structures, to establish the data needed for their monitoring and to find methods to mitigate their degradation. A specific aspect for Cernavoda NPP - Unit 1 is the long delay between the fabrication of the main components and the start-up. Most components were procured 10-15 years before start-up. First criticality was achieved in 1996, but the containment perimeter wall sliding was complete in 1983, the Calandria vessel was installed in 1985, the Steam Generators were in position in 1987, the fuel channels were installed in 1989. In evaluating the history of these components, the preservation period must be observed. For Unit 2, which will be in service around 2005, the delay will be longer. For this reason, CNCAN (the Romanian Regulatory Authority) imposed, as a condition to resume the work, to evaluate the ageing of the existing components and structures in order to establish their acceptability for use in the plant. The results of this evaluation can be used as references for subsequent evaluations. Plant Life Assurance Programme - The first step of a PLIM programme is to identify the components and structures that are important for the plant life management. Critical components and structures selection is done using the following criteria: safety criteria - components and structures whose failure can cause a release of radioactivity or which have to mitigate the release of radioactivity in case of a failure of other

  6. Java Test Driver Generation from Object-Oriented Interaction Traces

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    M.M. Bonsangue (Marcello); F.S. de Boer (Frank); A. Gruener; M. Steffen

    2009-01-01

    htmlabstractIn the context of test-driven development for object-oriented programs, mock objects are increasingly used for unit testing. Several Java mock object frameworks exist, which all have in common that mock objects, realizing the test environment, are directly specied at the Java program

  7. Multi-objective engineering design using preferences

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sanchis, J.; Martinez, M.; Blasco, X.

    2008-03-01

    System design is a complex task when design parameters have to satisy a number of specifications and objectives which often conflict with those of others. This challenging problem is called multi-objective optimization (MOO). The most common approximation consists in optimizing a single cost index with a weighted sum of objectives. However, once weights are chosen the solution does not guarantee the best compromise among specifications, because there is an infinite number of solutions. A new approach can be stated, based on the designer's experience regarding the required specifications and the associated problems. This valuable information can be translated into preferences for design objectives, and will lead the search process to the best solution in terms of these preferences. This article presents a new method, which enumerates these a priori objective preferences. As a result, a single objective is built automatically and no weight selection need be performed. Problems occuring because of the multimodal nature of the generated single cost index are managed with genetic algorithms (GAs).

  8. Resolution 26/97 Creating of the Protection and Hygiene Radiation Center Presupuested Unit

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1997-01-01

    The Center of Protection and Hygiene of the Radiations (CPHR) had been created in 1995 (Resolution 128) as Unit of Investigation Development (UID), belonging to the Nuclear Executive Secretary of Matters (SEAN). The objective of the present resolution is to create it now as Unit Bud gotten Center, science unit and integral technique of the Agency of Nuclear Energy (AEN), belonging to the Ministry of Science Technology and environment (CITMA) that has as generic objective to develop in the country the scientific-technical base of to the protection and the radiological security, guaranteeing with it that the applications pacify of the nuclear techniques is developed in harmony with the politics of protection of the health of the workers, the population in general and the environment, in agreement with the technical scientific advances and the international recommendations of this sphere. It also includes the specific objectives of the CPHR, their functions, the services scientific-technicians that it can toast, the entrance date into effect of the law (1 January 1997) and the final dispositions

  9. Infrared system for monitoring movement of objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Valentine, Kenneth H.; Falter, Diedre D.; Falter, Kelly G.

    1991-01-01

    A system for monitoring moving objects, such as the flight of honeybees and other insects, using a pulsed laser light source. This system has a self-powered micro-miniaturized transmitting unit powered, in the preferred embodiment, with an array solar cells. This transmitting unit is attached to the object to be monitored. These solar cells provide current to a storage energy capacitor to produce, for example, five volts for the operation of the transmitter. In the simplest embodiment, the voltage on the capacitor operates a pulse generator to provide a pulsed energizing signal to one or more very small laser diodes. The pulsed light is then received at a receiving base station using substantially standard means which converts the light to an electrical signal for processing in a microprocessor to create the information as to the movement of the object. In the case of a unit for monitoring honeybees and other insects, the transmitting unit weighs less than 50 mg, and has a size no larger than 1.times.3.times.5 millimeters. Also, the preferred embodiment provides for the coding of the light to uniquely identify the particular transmitting unit that is being monitored. A "wake-up" circuit is provided in the preferred embodiment whereby there is no transmission until the voltage on the capacitor has exceeded a pre-set threshold. Various other uses of the motion-detection system are described.

  10. A case study of resources management planning with multiple objectives and projects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Peterson, David L.; Silsbee, David G.; Schmoldt, Daniel L.

    1994-09-01

    Each National Park Service unit in the United States produces a resources management plan (RMP) every four years or less. The plans commit budgets and personnel to specific projects for four years, but they are prepared with little quantitative and analytical rigor and without formal decision-making tools. We have previously described a multiple objective planning process for inventory and monitoring programs (Schmoldt and others 1994). To test the applicability of that process for the more general needs of resources management planning, we conducted an exercise on the Olympic National Park (NP) in Washington State, USA. Eight projects were selected as typical of those considered in RMPs and five members of the Olympic NP staff used the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to prioritize the eight projects with respect to their implicit management objectives. By altering management priorities for the park, three scenarios were generated. All three contained some similarities in rankings for the eight projects, as well as some differences. Mathematical allocations of money and people differed among these scenarios and differed substantially from what the actual 1990 Olympic NP RMP contains. Combining subjective priority measures with budget dollars and personnel time into an objective function creates a subjective economic metric for comparing different RMP’s. By applying this planning procedure, actual expenditures of budget and personnel in Olympic NP can agree more closely with the staff’s management objectives for the park.

  11. Early (M170) activation of face-specific cortex by face-like objects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hadjikhani, Nouchine; Kveraga, Kestutis; Naik, Paulami; Ahlfors, Seppo P

    2009-03-04

    The tendency to perceive faces in random patterns exhibiting configural properties of faces is an example of pareidolia. Perception of 'real' faces has been associated with a cortical response signal arising at approximately 170 ms after stimulus onset, but what happens when nonface objects are perceived as faces? Using magnetoencephalography, we found that objects incidentally perceived as faces evoked an early (165 ms) activation in the ventral fusiform cortex, at a time and location similar to that evoked by faces, whereas common objects did not evoke such activation. An earlier peak at 130 ms was also seen for images of real faces only. Our findings suggest that face perception evoked by face-like objects is a relatively early process, and not a late reinterpretation cognitive phenomenon.

  12. The ChemCam Instrument Suite on the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Rover: Science Objectives and Mast Unit Description

    Science.gov (United States)

    Maurice, S.; Wiens, R.C.; Saccoccio, M.; Barraclough, B.; Gasnault, O.; Forni, O.; Mangold, N.; Baratoux, D.; Bender, S.; Berger, G.; Bernardin, J.; Berthé, M.; Bridges, N.; Blaney, D.; Bouyé, M.; Caïs, P.; Clark, B.; Clegg, S.; Cousin, A.; Cremers, D.; Cros, A.; DeFlores, L.; Derycke, C.; Dingler, B.; Dromart, G.; Dubois, B.; Dupieux, M.; Durand, E.; d'Uston, L.; Fabre, C.; Faure, B.; Gaboriaud, A.; Gharsa, T.; Herkenhoff, K.; Kan, E.; Kirkland, L.; Kouach, D.; Lacour, J.-L.; Langevin, Y.; Lasue, J.; Le Mouélic, S.; Lescure, M.; Lewin, E.; Limonadi, D.; Manhès, G.; Mauchien, P.; McKay, C.; Meslin, P.-Y.; Michel, Y.; Miller, E.; Newsom, Horton E.; Orttner, G.; Paillet, A.; Parès, L.; Parot, Y.; Pérez, R.; Pinet, P.; Poitrasson, F.; Quertier, B.; Sallé, B.; Sotin, Christophe; Sautter, V.; Séran, H.; Simmonds, J.J.; Sirven, J.-B.; Stiglich, R.; Striebig, N.; Thocaven, J.-J.; Toplis, M.J.; Vaniman, D.

    2012-01-01

    ChemCam is a remote sensing instrument suite on board the "Curiosity" rover (NASA) that uses Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) to provide the elemental composition of soils and rocks at the surface of Mars from a distance of 1.3 to 7 m, and a telescopic imager to return high resolution context and micro-images at distances greater than 1.16 m. We describe five analytical capabilities: rock classification, quantitative composition, depth profiling, context imaging, and passive spectroscopy. They serve as a toolbox to address most of the science questions at Gale crater. ChemCam consists of a Mast-Unit (laser, telescope, camera, and electronics) and a Body-Unit (spectrometers, digital processing unit, and optical demultiplexer), which are connected by an optical fiber and an electrical interface. We then report on the development, integration, and testing of the Mast-Unit, and summarize some key characteristics of ChemCam. This confirmed that nominal or better than nominal performances were achieved for critical parameters, in particular power density (>1 GW/cm2). The analysis spot diameter varies from 350 μm at 2 m to 550 μm at 7 m distance. For remote imaging, the camera field of view is 20 mrad for 1024×1024 pixels. Field tests demonstrated that the resolution (˜90 μrad) made it possible to identify laser shots on a wide variety of images. This is sufficient for visualizing laser shot pits and textures of rocks and soils. An auto-exposure capability optimizes the dynamical range of the images. Dedicated hardware and software focus the telescope, with precision that is appropriate for the LIBS and imaging depths-of-field. The light emitted by the plasma is collected and sent to the Body-Unit via a 6 m optical fiber. The companion to this paper (Wiens et al. this issue) reports on the development of the Body-Unit, on the analysis of the emitted light, and on the good match between instrument performance and science specifications.

  13. VIMOS Instrument Control Software Design: an Object Oriented Approach

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brau-Nogué, Sylvie; Lucuix, Christian

    2002-12-01

    The Franco-Italian VIMOS instrument is a VIsible imaging Multi-Object Spectrograph with outstanding multiplex capabilities, allowing to take spectra of more than 800 objects simultaneously, or integral field spectroscopy mode in a 54x54 arcsec area. VIMOS is being installed at the Nasmyth focus of the third Unit Telescope of the European Southern Observatory Very Large Telescope (VLT) at Mount Paranal in Chile. This paper will describe the analysis, the design and the implementation of the VIMOS Instrument Control System, using UML notation. Our Control group followed an Object Oriented software process while keeping in mind the ESO VLT standard control concepts. At ESO VLT a complete software library is available. Rather than applying waterfall lifecycle, ICS project used iterative development, a lifecycle consisting of several iterations. Each iteration consisted in : capture and evaluate the requirements, visual modeling for analysis and design, implementation, test, and deployment. Depending of the project phases, iterations focused more or less on specific activity. The result is an object model (the design model), including use-case realizations. An implementation view and a deployment view complement this product. An extract of VIMOS ICS UML model will be presented and some implementation, integration and test issues will be discussed.

  14. Early (N170) activation of face-specific cortex by face-like objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hadjikhani, Nouchine; Kveraga, Kestutis; Naik, Paulami; Ahlfors, Seppo P.

    2009-01-01

    The tendency to perceive faces in random patterns exhibiting configural properties of faces is an example of pareidolia. Perception of ‘real’ faces has been associated with a cortical response signal arising at about 170ms after stimulus onset; but what happens when non-face objects are perceived as faces? Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), we found that objects incidentally perceived as faces evoked an early (165ms) activation in the ventral fusiform cortex, at a time and location similar to that evoked by faces, whereas common objects did not evoke such activation. An earlier peak at 130 ms was also seen for images of real faces only. Our findings suggest that face perception evoked by face-like objects is a relatively early process, and not a late re-interpretation cognitive phenomenon. PMID:19218867

  15. Quick setup of test unit for accelerator control system

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Fu, W.; D'Ottavio, T.; Gassner, D.; Nemesure, S.; Morris, J.

    2011-01-01

    Testing a single hardware unit of an accelerator control system often requires the setup of a program with graphical user interface. Developing a dedicated application for a specific hardware unit test could be time consuming and the application may become obsolete after the unit tests. This paper documents a methodology for quick design and setup of an interface focused on performing unit tests of accelerator equipment with minimum programming work. The method has three components. The first is a generic accelerator device object (ADO) manager which can be used to setup, store, and log testing controls parameters for any unit testing system. The second involves the design of a TAPE (Tool for Automated Procedure Execution) sequence file that specifies and implements all te testing and control logic. The sting third is the design of a PET (parameter editing tool) page that provides the unit tester with all the necessary control parameters required for testing. This approach has been used for testing the horizontal plane of the Stochastic Cooling Motion Control System at RHIC.

  16. Language Cultural Specificity of the Language Units “Cat” and “Dog” in English and Chinese Languages

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Жером Багана

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available The article deals with the national and cultural features of zoonyms “cat” and “dog” in English and Chinese languages. The authors point out zoonyms’ main characteristics and their national cultural originality. Zoonyms represent the special features of national linguistic world view and values in the comparative analysis’ aspect The article represents interpretation of the language units in the monolingual explanatory dictionaries. The dictionary definitions of the terms phraseology and zoonym are given. The research is devoted to phraseology in the English and Chinese languages. The historical notes about the attitude toward cats and dogs in Britain and China are shown. Also some peculiarities of zoonyms function in English and Chinese animal fairy-tales are observed. Based on the differences the authors notice differences of phraseology between zoonyms “cat” and “dog”. Some examples in the English and Chinese languages are observed. The analysis represents universal and national specific semantic features of the present units in the languages so far as phraseology contains the most vivid representation of the national-cultural specificity of world view, connotative features and values peoples in Europe and Asia.

  17. Context-specific activation of hippocampus and SN/VTA by reward is related to enhanced long-term memory for embedded objects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Loh, Eleanor; Kumaran, Dharshan; Koster, Raphael; Berron, David; Dolan, Ray; Duzel, Emrah

    2016-10-01

    Animal studies indicate that hippocampal representations of environmental context modulate reward-related processing in the substantia nigra and ventral tegmental area (SN/VTA), a major origin of dopamine in the brain. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in humans, we investigated the neural specificity of context-reward associations under conditions where the presence of perceptually similar neutral contexts imposed high demands on a putative hippocampal function, pattern separation. The design also allowed us to investigate how contextual reward enhances long-term memory for embedded neutral objects. SN/VTA activity underpinned specific context-reward associations in the face of perceptual similarity. A reward-related enhancement of long-term memory was restricted to the condition where the rewarding and the neutral contexts were perceptually similar, and in turn was linked to co-activation of the hippocampus (subfield DG/CA3) and SN/VTA. Thus, an ability of contextual reward to enhance memory for focal objects is closely linked to context-related engagement of hippocampal-SN/VTA circuitry. Copyright © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  18. Automatic video segmentation employing object/camera modeling techniques

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Farin, D.S.

    2005-01-01

    Practically established video compression and storage techniques still process video sequences as rectangular images without further semantic structure. However, humans watching a video sequence immediately recognize acting objects as semantic units. This semantic object separation is currently not

  19. Infants' Recognition of Objects Using Canonical Color

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kimura, Atsushi; Wada, Yuji; Yang, Jiale; Otsuka, Yumiko; Dan, Ippeita; Masuda, Tomohiro; Kanazawa, So; Yamaguchi, Masami K.

    2010-01-01

    We explored infants' ability to recognize the canonical colors of daily objects, including two color-specific objects (human face and fruit) and a non-color-specific object (flower), by using a preferential looking technique. A total of 58 infants between 5 and 8 months of age were tested with a stimulus composed of two color pictures of an object…

  20. Technical specifications, Millstone Nuclear Power Station, Unit No. 3 (Docket No. 50-423). Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-49

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1986-01-01

    Information is presented concerning specifications on the following aspects of the Millstone Nuclear Power Station, Unit No. 3: safety limits and limiting safety system settings; limiting conditions for operation and surveillance requirements; design features; and administrative controls

  1. Objective specific beam generation for image guided robotic radiosurgery

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Schlaefer, A.; Jungmann, O.; Schweikard, A.; Kilby, W.

    2007-01-01

    Robotic radiosurgery enables precise dose delivery throughout the body. Planning for robotic radiosurgery comprises of finding a suitable set of beams and beam weights. The problem can be addressed by generating a large set of candidate beams, and selection of beams with nonzero weight by mathematical programming. We propose to use different randomized beam generation methods depending on the type of lesion and the clinical objective. Results for three patient cases indicate that this can improve the plan quality. (orig.)

  2. Objective specific beam generation for image guided robotic radiosurgery

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Schlaefer, A.; Jungmann, O.; Schweikard, A. [Inst. for Robotics and Cognitive Systems, Univ. of Luebeck (Germany); Kilby, W. [Accuray Inc., Sunnyvale, CA (United States)

    2007-06-15

    Robotic radiosurgery enables precise dose delivery throughout the body. Planning for robotic radiosurgery comprises of finding a suitable set of beams and beam weights. The problem can be addressed by generating a large set of candidate beams, and selection of beams with nonzero weight by mathematical programming. We propose to use different randomized beam generation methods depending on the type of lesion and the clinical objective. Results for three patient cases indicate that this can improve the plan quality. (orig.)

  3. Magnesium Object Manager Sandbox, A More Effective Sandbox Method for Windows 7

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-03-01

    keys, synchronization primitives , etc.). The object body is specific to, and the same for, each object type; it contains information common to each...the Object Directory Specific Rights Synchronization Object (Event, Mutex, Semaphore , Timer) Synchronization objects allow multiple threads to... Synchronization Object Specific Rights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 2.5 File Object Specific Rights

  4. Channels as Objects in Concurrent Object-Oriented Programming

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Joana Campos

    2011-10-01

    Full Text Available There is often a sort of a protocol associated to each class, stating when and how certain methods should be called. Given that this protocol is, if at all, described in the documentation accompanying the class, current mainstream object-oriented languages cannot provide for the verification of client code adherence against the sought class behaviour. We have defined a class-based concurrent object-oriented language that formalises such protocols in the form of usage types. Usage types are attached to class definitions, allowing for the specification of (1 the available methods, (2 the tests clients must perform on the result of methods, and (3 the object status - linear or shared - all of which depend on the object's state. Our work extends the recent approach on modular session types by eliminating channel operations, and defining the method call as the single communication primitive in both sequential and concurrent settings. In contrast to previous works, we define a single category for objects, instead of distinct categories for linear and for shared objects, and let linear objects evolve into shared ones. We introduce a standard sync qualifier to prevent thread interference in certain operations on shared objects. We formalise the language syntax, the operational semantics, and a type system that enforces by static typing that methods are called only when available, and by a single client if so specified in the usage type. We illustrate the language via a complete example.

  5. Category-specific responses to faces and objects in primate auditory cortex

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kari L Hoffman

    2008-03-01

    Full Text Available Auditory and visual signals often occur together, and the two sensory channels are known to infl uence each other to facilitate perception. The neural basis of this integration is not well understood, although other forms of multisensory infl uences have been shown to occur at surprisingly early stages of processing in cortex. Primary visual cortex neurons can show frequency-tuning to auditory stimuli, and auditory cortex responds selectively to certain somatosensory stimuli, supporting the possibility that complex visual signals may modulate early stages of auditory processing. To elucidate which auditory regions, if any, are responsive to complex visual stimuli, we recorded from auditory cortex and the superior temporal sulcus while presenting visual stimuli consisting of various objects, neutral faces, and facial expressions generated during vocalization. Both objects and conspecifi c faces elicited robust fi eld potential responses in auditory cortex sites, but the responses varied by category: both neutral and vocalizing faces had a highly consistent negative component (N100 followed by a broader positive component (P180 whereas object responses were more variable in time and shape, but could be discriminated consistently from the responses to faces. The face response did not vary within the face category, i.e., for expressive vs. neutral face stimuli. The presence of responses for both objects and neutral faces suggests that auditory cortex receives highly informative visual input that is not restricted to those stimuli associated with auditory components. These results reveal selectivity for complex visual stimuli in a brain region conventionally described as non-visual unisensory cortex.

  6. Modeling task-specific neuronal ensembles improves decoding of grasp

    Science.gov (United States)

    Smith, Ryan J.; Soares, Alcimar B.; Rouse, Adam G.; Schieber, Marc H.; Thakor, Nitish V.

    2018-06-01

    Objective. Dexterous movement involves the activation and coordination of networks of neuronal populations across multiple cortical regions. Attempts to model firing of individual neurons commonly treat the firing rate as directly modulating with motor behavior. However, motor behavior may additionally be associated with modulations in the activity and functional connectivity of neurons in a broader ensemble. Accounting for variations in neural ensemble connectivity may provide additional information about the behavior being performed. Approach. In this study, we examined neural ensemble activity in primary motor cortex (M1) and premotor cortex (PM) of two male rhesus monkeys during performance of a center-out reach, grasp and manipulate task. We constructed point process encoding models of neuronal firing that incorporated task-specific variations in the baseline firing rate as well as variations in functional connectivity with the neural ensemble. Models were evaluated both in terms of their encoding capabilities and their ability to properly classify the grasp being performed. Main results. Task-specific ensemble models correctly predicted the performed grasp with over 95% accuracy and were shown to outperform models of neuronal activity that assume only a variable baseline firing rate. Task-specific ensemble models exhibited superior decoding performance in 82% of units in both monkeys (p  <  0.01). Inclusion of ensemble activity also broadly improved the ability of models to describe observed spiking. Encoding performance of task-specific ensemble models, measured by spike timing predictability, improved upon baseline models in 62% of units. Significance. These results suggest that additional discriminative information about motor behavior found in the variations in functional connectivity of neuronal ensembles located in motor-related cortical regions is relevant to decode complex tasks such as grasping objects, and may serve the basis for more

  7. Accuracy of specific BIVA for the assessment of body composition in the United States population.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Roberto Buffa

    Full Text Available BACKGROUND: Bioelectrical impedance vector analysis (BIVA is a technique for the assessment of hydration and nutritional status, used in the clinical practice. Specific BIVA is an analytical variant, recently proposed for the Italian elderly population, that adjusts bioelectrical values for body geometry. OBJECTIVE: Evaluating the accuracy of specific BIVA in the adult U.S. population, compared to the 'classic' BIVA procedure, using DXA as the reference technique, in order to obtain an interpretative model of body composition. DESIGN: A cross-sectional sample of 1590 adult individuals (836 men and 754 women, 21-49 years old derived from the NHANES 2003-2004 was considered. Classic and specific BIVA were applied. The sensitivity and specificity in recognizing individuals below the 5(th and above the 95(th percentiles of percent fat (FMDXA% and extracellular/intracellular water (ECW/ICW ratio were evaluated by receiver operating characteristic (ROC curves. Classic and specific BIVA results were compared by a probit multiple-regression. RESULTS: Specific BIVA was significantly more accurate than classic BIVA in evaluating FMDXA% (ROC areas: 0.84-0.92 and 0.49-0.61 respectively; p = 0.002. The evaluation of ECW/ICW was accurate (ROC areas between 0.83 and 0.96 and similarly performed by the two procedures (p = 0.829. The accuracy of specific BIVA was similar in the two sexes (p = 0.144 and in FMDXA% and ECW/ICW (p = 0.869. CONCLUSIONS: Specific BIVA showed to be an accurate technique. The tolerance ellipses of specific BIVA can be used for evaluating FM% and ECW/ICW in the U.S. adult population.

  8. Technical Specifications, Shearon Harris Nuclear Power Plant, Unit No. 1 (Docket No. 50-400). Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-53

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1986-10-01

    This report presents specifications for the Shearon Harris Nuclear Power Plant Unit No. 1 concerning: safety limits and limiting safety system settings; limiting conditions for operation and surveillance requirements; design features; and administrative controls

  9. Modeling the longitudinal variation in wood specific gravity of planted loblolly pine (Pinus taeda) in the United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    F. Antony; L. R. Schimleck; R. F. Daniels; Alexander Clark; D. B. Hall

    2010-01-01

    Loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.) is a major plantation species grown in the southern United States, producing wood having a multitude of uses including pulp and lumber production. Specific gravity (SG) is an important property used to measure the quality of wood produced, and it varies regionally and within the tree with height and radius. SG at different height levels...

  10. Safety objectives for 2014

    CERN Multimedia

    HSE Unit

    2014-01-01

    This is the third year in which the CERN Management has presented annual safety objectives for the Organization, the “HSE Objectives”.   The HSE objectives for 2014, which were announced by the Director-General at his traditional New Year’s address to the staff and were presented at the first Enlarged Directorate meeting of the year, have been drawn up and agreed in close collaboration between the DSOs, the HSE Unit and the DG himself. From safety in the workplace to radiation and environmental protection, the document emphasises that “Safety is a priority for CERN” and that safety policy is a key element in how the Organization is run. And, like all policies, it generates objectives that “serve as a general framework for action”. The HSE objectives are broken down into the following fields: occupational health and safety on sites and in the workplace, radiation protection, radiation safety, environmental protection, emerge...

  11. Multi-objective optimization in systematic conservation planning and the representation of genetic variability among populations.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schlottfeldt, S; Walter, M E M T; Carvalho, A C P L F; Soares, T N; Telles, M P C; Loyola, R D; Diniz-Filho, J A F

    2015-06-18

    Biodiversity crises have led scientists to develop strategies for achieving conservation goals. The underlying principle of these strategies lies in systematic conservation planning (SCP), in which there are at least 2 conflicting objectives, making it a good candidate for multi-objective optimization. Although SCP is typically applied at the species level (or hierarchically higher), it can be used at lower hierarchical levels, such as using alleles as basic units for analysis, for conservation genetics. Here, we propose a method of SCP using a multi-objective approach. We used non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II in order to identify the smallest set of local populations of Dipteryx alata (baru) (a Brazilian Cerrado species) for conservation, representing the known genetic diversity and using allele frequency information associated with heterozygosity and Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium. We worked in 3 variations for the problem. First, we reproduced a previous experiment, but using a multi-objective approach. We found that the smallest set of populations needed to represent all alleles under study was 7, corroborating the results of the previous study, but with more distinct solutions. In the 2nd and 3rd variations, we performed simultaneous optimization of 4 and 5 objectives, respectively. We found similar but refined results for 7 populations, and a larger portfolio considering intra-specific diversity and persistence with populations ranging from 8-22. This is the first study to apply multi-objective algorithms to an SCP problem using alleles at the population level as basic units for analysis.

  12. Multi-agent system for Knowledge-based recommendation of Learning Objects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Paula Andrea RODRÍGUEZ MARÍN

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available Learning Object (LO is a content unit being used within virtual learning environments, which -once found and retrieved- may assist students in the teaching - learning process. Such LO search and retrieval are recently supported and enhanced by data mining techniques. In this sense, clustering can be used to find groups holding similar LOs so that from obtained groups, knowledge-based recommender systems (KRS can recommend more adapted and relevant LOs. In particular, prior knowledge come from LOs previously selected, liked and ranked by the student to whom the recommendation will be performed. In this paper, we present a KRS for LOs, which uses a conventional clustering technique, namely K-means, aimed at finding similar LOs and delivering resources adapted to a specific student. Obtained promising results show that proposed KRS is able to both retrieve relevant LO and improve the recommendation precision.Learning Object (LO is a content unit being used within virtual learning environments, which -once found and retrieved- may assist students in the teaching - learning process. Such LO search and retrieval are recently supported and enhanced by data mining techniques. In this sense, clustering can be used to find groups holding similar LOs so that from obtained groups, knowledge-based recommender systems (KRS can recommend more adapted and relevant LOs. In particular, prior knowledge come from LOs previously selected, liked and ranked by the student to whom the recommendation will be performed. In this paper, we present a KRS for LOs, which uses a conventional clustering technique, namely K-means, aimed at finding similar LOs and delivering resources adapted to a specific student. Obtained promising results show that proposed KRS is able to both retrieve relevant LO and improve the recommendation precision.

  13. MULTIPLE OBJECTS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. A. Bosov

    2015-04-01

    Full Text Available Purpose. The development of complicated techniques of production and management processes, information systems, computer science, applied objects of systems theory and others requires improvement of mathematical methods, new approaches for researches of application systems. And the variety and diversity of subject systems makes necessary the development of a model that generalizes the classical sets and their development – sets of sets. Multiple objects unlike sets are constructed by multiple structures and represented by the structure and content. The aim of the work is the analysis of multiple structures, generating multiple objects, the further development of operations on these objects in application systems. Methodology. To achieve the objectives of the researches, the structure of multiple objects represents as constructive trio, consisting of media, signatures and axiomatic. Multiple object is determined by the structure and content, as well as represented by hybrid superposition, composed of sets, multi-sets, ordered sets (lists and heterogeneous sets (sequences, corteges. Findings. In this paper we study the properties and characteristics of the components of hybrid multiple objects of complex systems, proposed assessments of their complexity, shown the rules of internal and external operations on objects of implementation. We introduce the relation of arbitrary order over multiple objects, we define the description of functions and display on objects of multiple structures. Originality.In this paper we consider the development of multiple structures, generating multiple objects.Practical value. The transition from the abstract to the subject of multiple structures requires the transformation of the system and multiple objects. Transformation involves three successive stages: specification (binding to the domain, interpretation (multiple sites and particularization (goals. The proposed describe systems approach based on hybrid sets

  14. Formal Transformations from Graphically-Based Object-Oriented Representations to Theory-Based Specifications

    Science.gov (United States)

    1996-06-01

    for Software Synthesis." KBSE 󈨡. IEEE, 1993. 51. Kang, Kyo C., et al. Feature-Oriented Domain Analysis ( FODA ) Feasibility Study. Technical Report...Algebra. New York, NY: Chelsea Publishing Company , 1993. 72. Martin, James. Principles of Object-Oriented Analysis and Design. Englewood Cliffs, New...and usefulness in domain analysis and modeling. Rumbaugh uses three distinct views to describe a domain: (1) the object model describes structural

  15. Recent Patterns in Shared Decision Making for Prostate-Specific Antigen Testing in the United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fedewa, Stacey A; Gansler, Ted; Smith, Robert; Sauer, Ann Goding; Wender, Richard; Brawley, Otis W; Jemal, Ahmedin

    2018-03-01

    Previous studies report infrequent use of shared decision making for prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing. It is unknown whether this pattern has changed recently considering increased emphasis on shared decision making in prostate cancer screening recommendations. Thus, the objective of this study is to examine recent changes in shared decision making. We conducted a retrospective cross-sectional study among men aged 50 years and older in the United States using 2010 and 2015 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) data (n = 9,598). Changes in receipt of shared decision making were expressed as adjusted prevalence ratios (aPR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI). Analyses were stratified on PSA testing (recent [in the past year] or no testing). Elements of shared decision making assessed included the patient being informed about the advantages only, advantages and disadvantages, and full shared decision making (advantages, disadvantages, and uncertainties). Among men with recent PSA testing, 58.5% and 62.6% reported having received ≥1 element of shared decision making in 2010 and 2015, respectively ( P = .054, aPR = 1.04; 95% CI, 0.98-1.11). Between 2010 and 2015, being told only about the advantages of PSA testing significantly declined (aPR = 0.82; 95% CI, 0.71-0.96) and full shared decision making prevalence significantly increased (aPR = 1.51; 95% CI, 1.28-1.79) in recently tested men. Among men without prior PSA testing, 10% reported ≥1 element of shared decision making, which did not change with time. Between 2010 and 2015, there was no increase in shared decision making among men with recent PSA testing though there was a shift away from only being told about the advantages of PSA testing towards full shared decision making. Many men receiving PSA testing did not receive shared decision making. © 2018 Annals of Family Medicine, Inc.

  16. Per Object statistical analysis

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    2008-01-01

    of a specific class in turn, and uses as pair of PPO stages to derive the statistics and then assign them to the objects' Object Variables. It may be that this could all be done in some other, simply way, but several other ways that were tried did not succeed. The procedure ouptut has been tested against...

  17. Technical Specifications: Clinton Power Station, Unit No. 1 (Docket No. 50-461): Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-62

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1987-04-01

    The Clinton Power Station, Unit No. 1 Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  18. Improving rapeseed production practices in the southeastern United States

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Thomas, D.L.; Breve, M.A.; Raymer, P.L.; Minton, N.A.; Sumner, D.R. (Georgia Univ., Tifton, GA (USA). Georgia Coastal Plain Experiment Station)

    1990-04-01

    Oilseed rape or rapeseed is a crop which offers a potential for double-cropping in the southeastern United States. This final project report describes the results from a three year study aimed at evaluating the effect of different planting and harvesting practices on establishment and yield of three rape cultivars, and the double cropping potential of rapeseed in the southeastern United States. The project was conducted on two yield sites in Tifton, Georgia during 1986--87, 1987--88 and 1988--89. The general objective of this research is to improve the seed and biomass yield of winter rapeseed in the southeastern United States by developing appropriate agronomic practices for the region. The primary constraint is to grow rapeseed within the allowable period for double cropping with an economically desirable crop, such as peanut or soybean. Planting and harvesting are the most critical steps in this process. Therefore, the specific objectives of this research were: evaluate and improve the emergence of rapeseed by developing planting techniques that enhance the soil, water and seed regimes for winter rapeseed in the southeast, and evaluate and improve the yields of harvested rapeseed by developing techniques for determining the optimum timing of harvest and efficient methods for harvesting winter rapeseed in the southeast. 6 refs., 12 figs., 9 tabs.

  19. Technical Specifications, Byron Station, Unit Nos. 1 and 2 (Docket Nos. STN 50-454 and STN 50-455). Appendix A to license No. NPF-37

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1985-02-01

    The Byron Station, Unit No. 1 and Unit No. 2 Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public. Specifications are presented for limiting conditions for operation for the reactor control system, power distribution limits, instrumentation, primary coolant circuit, ECCS, containment systems, plant systems, electrical power systems, refueling operations, radioactive effluents, and radiological environmental monitoring

  20. Challenges encountered by critical care unit managers in the large intensive care units.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Matlakala, Mokgadi C; Bezuidenhout, Martie C; Botha, Annali D H

    2014-04-04

    Nurses in intensive care units (ICUs) are exposed regularly to huge demands interms of fulfilling the many roles that are placed upon them. Unit managers, in particular, are responsible for the efficient management of the units and have the responsibilities of planning, organising, leading and controlling the daily activities in order to facilitate the achievement of the unit objectives. The objective of this study was to explore and present the challenges encountered by ICU managers in the management of large ICUs. A qualitative, exploratory and descriptive study was conducted at five hospital ICUs in Gauteng province, South Africa. Data were collected through individual interviews from purposively-selected critical care unit managers, then analysed using the matic coding. Five themes emerged from the data: challenges related to the layout and structure of the unit, human resources provision and staffing, provision of material resources, stressors in the unit and visitors in the ICU. Unit managers in large ICUs face multifaceted challenges which include the demand for efficient and sufficient specialised nurses; lack of or inadequate equipment that goes along with technology in ICU and supplies; and stressors in the ICU that limit the efficiency to plan, organise, lead and control the daily activities in the unit. The challenges identified call for multiple strategies to assist in the efficient management of large ICUs.

  1. Object interaction competence model v. 2.0

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bennedsen, Jens; Schulte, C.

    2013-01-01

    Teaching and learning object oriented programming has to take into account the specific object oriented characteristics of program execution, namely the interaction of objects during runtime. Prior to the research reported in this article, we have developed a competence model for object interaction...

  2. Early (N170) activation of face-specific cortex by face-like objects

    OpenAIRE

    Hadjikhani, Nouchine; Kveraga, Kestutis; Naik, Paulami; Ahlfors, Seppo P.

    2009-01-01

    The tendency to perceive faces in random patterns exhibiting configural properties of faces is an example of pareidolia. Perception of ‘real’ faces has been associated with a cortical response signal arising at about 170ms after stimulus onset; but what happens when non-face objects are perceived as faces? Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), we found that objects incidentally perceived as faces evoked an early (165ms) activation in the ventral fusiform cortex, at a time and location similar t...

  3. Object-oriented Programming Laws for Annotated Java Programs

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Gabriel Falconieri Freitas

    2010-03-01

    Full Text Available Object-oriented programming laws have been proposed in the context of languages that are not combined with a behavioral interface specification language (BISL. The strong dependence between source-code and interface specifications may cause a number of difficulties when transforming programs. In this paper we introduce a set of programming laws for object-oriented languages like Java combined with the Java Modeling Language (JML. The set of laws deals with object-oriented features taking into account their specifications. Some laws deal only with features of the specification language. These laws constitute a set of small transformations for the development of more elaborate ones like refactorings.

  4. Specific and Optional Curriculum: An Experience in the Undergraduate Program of Chemical Engineering in Cienfuegos University, Cuba

    Science.gov (United States)

    Martínez, Yolanda García; Velázquez, Claudia Alvarado; Castillo, Rolando Delgado

    2016-01-01

    This paper pursues to define the pillars for designing the specific (SC) and optional curricula (OC) of Unit Operations and Processes (UOP) Discipline in the Chemical Engineering Program. To achieve this objective a methodology was developed, which was characterized by the participation of every member in the educational process: professors,…

  5. Task-specific recruitment of motor units for vibration damping.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wakeling, James M; Liphardt, Anna-Maria

    2006-01-01

    Vibrations occur within the soft tissues of the lower extremities due to the heel-strike impact during walking. Increases in muscle activity in the lower extremities result in increased damping to reduce this vibration. The myoelectric intensity spectra were compared using principal component analysis from the tibialis anterior and lateral gastrocnemius of 40 subjects walking with different shoe conditions. The soft insert condition resulted in a significant, simultaneous increase in muscle activity with a shift to higher myoelectric frequencies in the period 0-60 ms after heel-strike which is the period when the greater vibration damping occurred. These increases in myoelectric frequency match the spectral patterns which indicate increases in recruitment of faster motor units. It is concluded that fast motor units are recruited during the task of damping the soft-tissue resonance that occurs following heel-strike.

  6. Improved perception of communication and compliance with a revised, intensive care unit-specific bedside communication sheet.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aponte-Patel, Linda; Sen, Anita

    2015-01-01

    Although many pediatric intensive care units (PICUs) use beside communication sheets (BCSs) to highlight daily goals, the optimal format is unknown. A site-specific BCS could improve both PICU communication and compliance completing the BCS. Via written survey, PICU staff at an academic children's hospital provided recommendations for improving and revising an existing BCS. Pre- and post-BCS revision, PICU staff were polled regarding PICU communication and BCS effectiveness, and daily compliance for completing the BCS was monitored. After implementation of the revised BCS, staff reporting "excellent" or "very good" day-to-day communication within the PICU increased from 57% to 77% (P = .02). Compliance for completing the BCS also increased significantly (75% vs 83%, P = .03). Introduction of a focused and concise BCS tailored to a specific PICU leads to improved perceptions of communication by PICU staff and increased compliance completing the daily BCS. © The Author(s) 2014.

  7. Snakes: An Integrated Unit Plan.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lawrence, Lisa

    This document presents an integrated unit plan on snakes targeting second grade students. Objectives of the unit include developing concepts of living things, understanding the contribution and importance of snakes to the environment, and making connections between different disciplines. The unit integrates the topic of snakes into the areas of…

  8. Unit Testing for the Application Control Language (ACL) Software

    Science.gov (United States)

    Heinich, Christina Marie

    2014-01-01

    In the software development process, code needs to be tested before it can be packaged for release in order to make sure the program actually does what it says is supposed to happen as well as to check how the program deals with errors and edge cases (such as negative or very large numbers). One of the major parts of the testing process is unit testing, where you test specific units of the code to make sure each individual part of the code works. This project is about unit testing many different components of the ACL software and fixing any errors encountered. To do this, mocks of other objects need to be created and every line of code needs to be exercised to make sure every case is accounted for. Mocks are important to make because it gives direct control of the environment the unit lives in instead of attempting to work with the entire program. This makes it easier to achieve the second goal of exercising every line of code.

  9. The Auto Industry. Grade Nine. Resource Unit (Unit IV). Project Social Studies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Minnesota Univ., Minneapolis. Project Social Studies Curriculum Center.

    Unit four of this curriculum plan for ninth grade social studies outlines a study of the automobile industry in the United States. Objectives state the desired generalizations, skills, and attitudes to be developed. A condensed outline of course content precedes expanded guidelines for teaching procedures and suggested resource materials. A…

  10. THREE TYPES OF ETHNO-SPECIFICITY IN PHRASEOLOGY: ETHNO-LINGUISTIC, ETHNO-CULTURAL, AND ETHNO-COGNITIVE SPECIFICITY

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marina Gutovskaya

    2015-04-01

    Full Text Available The ethno-specific phraseology – the phraseology which manifests interlanguage differences – is contemplated in the paper considering the phraseology corpora of the Russian and English languages. The popular opinion that ethno-specificity in phraseology is predetermined solely by unique features of the national culture is questioned. The three types of phraseological ethno-specificity are differentiated: ethno-linguistic (ensured by distinctive features of the national language, ethno-cultural (connected with the originality of the national culture, and ethno-cognitive (ordained by the uniqueness of the national worldview. The characteristics of the phraseological units that belong to each of the three types of ethno-specificity are enumerated, and the circles of questions on the ethno-specific phraseology to be studied within traditional linguistics, cultural linguistics, and cognitive linguistics are outlined. The possibility of coexistence of several types of ethno-specificity in one phraseological unit is shown. It is noted that in order to comprehend ethno-specific phraseological units of the three types a different degree of immersion in the foreign linguistic-cultural-cognitive space is required.

  11. 40 CFR 60.4114 - Objections concerning Hg designated representative.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-07-01

    ... 40 Protection of Environment 6 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Objections concerning Hg designated... Times for Coal-Fired Electric Steam Generating Units Hg Designated Representative for Hg Budget Sources § 60.4114 Objections concerning Hg designated representative. (a) Once a complete certificate of...

  12. Multi-objective differential evolution with adaptive Cauchy mutation for short-term multi-objective optimal hydro-thermal scheduling

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Qin Hui [College of Hydropower and Information Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074 (China); Zhou Jianzhong, E-mail: jz.zhou@hust.edu.c [College of Hydropower and Information Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074 (China); Lu Youlin; Wang Ying; Zhang Yongchuan [College of Hydropower and Information Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074 (China)

    2010-04-15

    A new multi-objective optimization method based on differential evolution with adaptive Cauchy mutation (MODE-ACM) is presented to solve short-term multi-objective optimal hydro-thermal scheduling (MOOHS) problem. Besides fuel cost, the pollutant gas emission is also optimized as an objective. The water transport delay between connected reservoirs and the effect of valve-point loading of thermal units are also taken into account in the presented problem formulation. The proposed algorithm adopts an elitist archive to retain non-dominated solutions obtained during the evolutionary process. It modifies the DE's operators to make it suit for multi-objective optimization (MOO) problems and improve its performance. Furthermore, to avoid premature convergence, an adaptive Cauchy mutation is proposed to preserve the diversity of population. An effective constraints handling method is utilized to handle the complex equality and inequality constraints. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is tested on a hydro-thermal system consisting of four cascaded hydro plants and three thermal units. The results obtained by MODE-ACM are compared with several previous studies. It is found that the results obtained by MODE-ACM are superior in terms of fuel cost as well as emission output, consuming a shorter time. Thus it can be a viable alternative to generate optimal trade-offs for short-term MOOHS problem.

  13. Fixed, object-specific intensity compensation for cone beam optical CT radiation dosimetry

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dekker, Kurtis H.; Hazarika, Rubin; Silveira, Matheus A.; Jordan, Kevin J.

    2018-03-01

    Optical cone beam computed tomography (CT) scanning of radiochromic gel dosimeters, using a CCD camera and a low stray light convergent source, provides fast, truly 3D radiation dosimetry with high accuracy. However, a key limiting factor in radiochromic gel dosimetry at large (⩾10 cm diameter) volumes is the initial attenuation of the dosimeters. It is not unusual to observe a 5–10×  difference in signal intensity through the dosimeter center versus through the surrounding medium in pre-irradiation images. Thus, all dosimetric information in a typical experiment is measured within the lower 10%–20% of the camera sensor’s range, and re-use of gels is often not possible due to a lack of transmission. To counteract this, in this note we describe a simple method to create source compensators by printing on transparent films. This technique, which is easily implemented and inexpensive, is an optical analogue to the bowtie filter in x-ray CT. We present transmission images and solution phantom reconstructions to demonstrate that (1) placing compensators beyond the focal zone of the imaging lens prevents high spatial frequency features of the printed films from generating reconstruction artifacts, and (2) object-specific compensation considerably reduces the range of intensities measured in projection images. This will improve the measurable dose range in optical CT dosimetry, and will enable imaging of larger gel volumes (∼15 cm diameter). Additionally, it should enable re-use of dosimeters by printing a new compensator for a second experiment.

  14. Planeamiento de la unidad didactica en le ensenanza del ingles como idioma extranjero (Planning the Teaching Unit in the Instruction of English as a Foreign Language).

    Science.gov (United States)

    Medina T., Rene

    1971-01-01

    This paper discusses the use of the teaching unit as a means for organization in English-as-a-foreign-language classes. It lists the essential elements in the construction of such a unit: cultural topic, linguistic elements, time period, main objectives, instructional materials, focus, specific activities, intended results, evaluation techniques,…

  15. Proposal for a United Nations Basic Space Technology Initiative

    Science.gov (United States)

    Balogh, Werner

    Putting space technology and its applications to work for sustainable economic and social development is the primary objective of the United Nations Programme on Space Applications, launched in 1971. A specific goal for achieving this objective is to establish a sustainable national space capacity. The traditional line of thinking has supported a logical progression from building capacity in basic space science, to using space applications and finally - possibly - to establishing indigenous space technology capabilities. The experience in some countries suggests that such a strict line of progression does not necessarily hold true and that priority given to the establishment of early indigenous space technology capabilities may contribute to promoting the operational use of space applications in support of sustainable economic and social development. Based on these findings and on the experiences with the United Nations Basic Space Science Initiative (UNBSSI) as well as on a series of United Nations/International Academy of Astronautics Workshops on Small Satellites in the Service of Developing Countries, the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) is considering the launch of a dedicated United Nations Basic Space Technology Initiative (UNBSTI). The initiative would aim to contribute to capacity building in basic space technology and could include, among other relevant fields, activities related to the space and ground segments of small satellites and their applications. It would also provide an international framework for enhancing cooperation between all interested actors, facilitate the exchange of information on best practices, and contribute to standardization efforts. It is expected that these activities would advance the operational use of space technology and its applications in an increasing number of space-using countries and emerging space nations. The paper reports on these initial considerations and on the potential value-adding role

  16. 100-KR-1 Operable Unit focused feasibility study report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1994-11-01

    The standard Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 Feasibility Study (FS) includes development and screening of alternatives and the detailed analysis of alternatives. This focused feasibility study (FFS) was conducted for the 100-KR-1 Operable Unit at the Hanford Site in southeastern Washington. The objective of this operable unit-specific FFS is to provide decision makers with sufficient information to allow appropriate and timely selection of interim remedial measures (IRM) for the five sites (116-K-1 crib, 116-K-2 trench, 116-KE-4 and 116-KW-3 retention basins, and process effluent pipelines) associated with the 100-KR-1 Operable Unit. The IRM candidate waste sites are determined in the limited field investigation. Site profiles are developed for each of these waste site. The site profiles are used in the application of the plug-in approach. The waste site either plugs into the analysis of the alternatives for the group, or deviations from the developed group alternatives are described and documented

  17. Accounting and analysis of the real labour input for objects and types of works during NPP construction

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Shuvaev, P.P.

    1983-01-01

    A technique for determining the actual labour input for PP construction according to types of works, construction units and objects is considered. The data are presented on specific expenditures on civil engineering, heat and electric installation, insulation and anticorrosion works for construction of the Chernobylsk and Kursk NPPs. A conclusion is drawn about the necessity of computer utilization in calculating the labour input for different types of works, number of workers and planning works during the NPP construction

  18. Technical specifications: Susquehanna Steam Electric Station, Unit No. 2 (Docket No. 50-388). Appendix A to License No. NPF-22

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1984-03-01

    Susquehanna Steam Electric Station, Unit 2 Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  19. Technical specifications for Grand Gulf Nuclear Station, Unit 1 (Docket No. 50-416). Appendix A to License No. NPF-13

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1984-08-01

    The Grand Gulf Nuclear Station, Unit 1 Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions and other requirements applicable to a nuclear facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  20. The joint industry development of a recommended practice for the site specific assessment of mobile jackup units

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jones, D.E.; Bennett, W.T.; Hoyle, M.J.R.

    1993-01-01

    The mobile self-elevating (drilling) unit, or jack-up, has been central to the exploration and development of offshore oil and gas reserves. In recent years there has been an increased desire to benefit from the potential economics of using these units in longer term production roles either in association with a fixed platform or as a stand-alone facility. However, until recently there had been no concerted effort to develop a consistent and commonly accepted standard for general industry use in site specific assessment of jack-ups. This paper describes the background and work carried out to develop such a standard. The project is nearing completion and has resulted in the publication of a Guideline document. A Recommended Practice and associated Commentary are (at the time of writing) in the final stage of drafting for release to the project sponsors for trial and comment prior to issuing the first Edition early in 1994

  1. 26 CFR 31.3121(b)(5)-1 - Services in employ of an instrumentality of the United States specifically exempted from the...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... Internal Revenue INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY (CONTINUED) EMPLOYMENT TAXES AND... employ of an instrumentality of the United States specifically exempted from the employer tax. Services... 26 Internal Revenue 15 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Services in employ of an instrumentality of the...

  2. Media, journalism, objectivity

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vlajki Emil

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available This is the text around the themes: Media and Journalism, are confronted two directions of opinions: humanism and elitism. Humanism believes that media and journalism must be metaphysically objective: able to tell the truth regardless of time, place and terms of events. Another approach, elitism, is connected with Hegel's philosophy of history. Hegel's conceptual apparatus includes: Idea, History dialectic, 'cunning mind,' self- development and self-realization. In this context, media and journalism are considered as organic unity, an inseparable part of some dialectical totality. More specifically media and journalism can be objective only if they defend concrete ideological assumptions of society to which they belong. Any other understanding of these two concepts is non-objective, mere moralizing and / or demagoguery.

  3. Review of Meeting Objectives

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Braams, B.J.; Chung, H.-K.

    2011-01-01

    This is the 21st meeting of the International Atomic and Molecular Data Centres Network. The traditional DCN meeting objectives are: to exchange information about activities in the Centres and review progress; to coordinate work in the Centres; to assess priorities in data evaluation and data production; to make plans for specific evaluations; and to evaluate and revise procedures for collection and exchange of bibliographical and numerical data. All of these are objectives for the present meeting too. In addition to the presentations from DCN and prospective DCN members we have two participants from outside the field of fusion data: Dr N. Mason will tell us about coordination of the Virtual Atomic and Molecular Data Centre and Dr S. Simakov will describe the manner in which nuclear structure and cross-section database development is coordinated by our colleagues in the Nuclear Data Section. In the discussions on Thursday and Friday there are two topics that need special attention this year: the future of our bibliographical data compilation and ways in which we can strengthen data evaluation activities, all with emphasis on collision processes and plasma-material interaction. The first 3 Data Centre Network meetings were held in 1977, 1980 and 1982 and the reports of those meetings make interesting reading and can still provide inspiration for the present meeting. I show some excerpts in the presentation. In 1977 the emphasis was on the coordination of the bibliographical database, AMBDAS, and a collision data index, CIAMDA, as the initial activities of the Network and of the newly formed IAEA A+M Data Unit. In 1980 the central topic of discussion at the meeting shifted to the numerical database and to data evaluation. The Network recommended that numerical data be reviewed by a selected group of scientists and that no unevaluated numerical A+M collision data should be distributed by the IAEA. The report of the meeting in 1982 shows that the bibliographical

  4. Technical Specifications, South Texas Project, Unit No. 1 (Docket No. 50-498): Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-76

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1988-03-01

    The South Texas Project, Unit No. 1, Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public. This report is Appendix A to License No. NPF-76

  5. Time-of-flight data acquisition unit (DAU) for neutron scattering experiments. Specification of the requirements and design concept. Version 3.1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Herdam, G.; Klessmann, H.; Wawer, W.; Adebayo, J.; David, G.; Szatmari, F.

    1989-12-01

    This specification describes the requirements for the Data Acquisition Unit (DAU) and defines the design concept for the functional units involved. The Data Acquisition Unit will be used in the following neutron scattering experiments: Time-of-Flight Spectrometer NEAT, Time-of-Flight Spectrometer SPAN. In addition, the data of the SPAN spectrometer in Spin Echo experiments will be accumulated. The Data Acquisition Unit can be characterised by the following requirements: Time-of-flight measurement with high time resolution (125 ns), sorting the time-of-flight in up to 4096 time channels (channel width ≥ 1 μs), selection of different time channel widths for peak and background, on-line time-of-flight correction for neutron flight paths of different lengths, sorting the detector position information in up to 4096 position channels, accumulation of two-dimensional spectra in a 32 Mbyte RAM memory (4 K time channels*4 K position channels*16 bits). Because of the stringent timing requirements the functional units of the DAU are hardware controlled via tables. The DAU is part of a process control system which has access to the functional units via the VMEbus in order to initialise, to load tables and control information, and to read status information and spectra. (orig.) With 18 figs

  6. Racial Conflict in the United States: What Should Be Done? Grade Twelve. [Resource Unit V.] Project Social Studies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Minnesota Univ., Minneapolis. Project Social Studies Curriculum Center.

    This is the fifth of seven resource units for a twelfth grade course on value conflicts and policy decisions. The topic for this unit is racial conflict in the United States. The introduction explains how this unit coincides with other units of the K-12 series which have treated intergroup relations. The objectives are listed as to…

  7. A Critique of Stephen Downes' "Learning Objects": A Chinese perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fuhua (Oscar Lin

    2001-07-01

    Full Text Available This paper by Stephen Downes recommends a way of sharing online teaching/ course materials to accelerate course development and make education more cost-effective. His paper is a review of basic information about learning objects (LOs and includes examples that illustrate such technical terms as XML and TML. His paper, however, does not identify several important issues such as: a the level of granularity of learning objects; b selection and integration of learning objects in an appropriate way to form higher level units of study; c training of professors in the use of learning objects; d appropriate use of metadata to facilitate composition of higher level units; and e the potential of computer agents to facilitate the dynamic composition of personalized lessons. An unorganized aggregate of learning objects simply does not constitute a course. In order to create a properly designed final course, student and instructor interaction must be built in.

  8. Multi-objective genetic optimization of linear construction projects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fatma A. Agrama

    2012-08-01

    Full Text Available In the real world, the majority cases of optimization problems, met by engineers, are composed of several conflicting objectives. This paper presents an approach for a multi-objective optimization model for scheduling linear construction projects. Linear construction projects have many identical units wherein activities repeat from one unit to another. Highway, pipeline, and tunnels are good examples that exhibit repetitive characteristics. These projects represent a large portion of the construction industry. The present model enables construction planners to generate optimal/near-optimal construction plans that minimize project duration, total work interruptions, and total number of crews. Each of these plans identifies, from a set of feasible alternatives, optimal crew synchronization for each activity and activity interruptions at each unit. This model satisfies the following aspects: (1 it is based on the line of balance technique; (2 it considers non-serial typical activities networks with finish–start relationship and both lag or overlap time between activities is allowed; (3 it utilizes a multi-objective genetic algorithms approach; (4 it is developed as a spreadsheet template that is easy to use. Details of the model with visual charts are presented. An application example is analyzed to illustrate the use of the model and demonstrate its capabilities in optimizing the scheduling of linear construction projects.

  9. Liquid hydrogen production and commercial demand in the United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    Heydorn, Barbara

    1990-01-01

    Kennedy Space Center, the single largest purchaser of liquid hydrogen (LH2) in the United States, evaluated current and anticipated hydrogen production and consumption in the government and commercial sectors. Specific objectives of the study are as follows: (1) identify LH2 producers in the United States and Canada during 1980-1989 period; (2) compile information in expected changes in LH2 production capabilities over the 1990-2000 period; (3) describe how hydrogen is used in each consuming industry and estimate U.S. LH2 consumption for the chemicals, metals, electronics, fats and oil, and glass industries, and report data on a regional basis; (4) estimate historical and future consumption; and (5) assess the influence of international demands on U.S. plants.

  10. Imaging Young Stellar Objects with VLTi/PIONIER

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kluska, J.; Malbet, F.; Berger, J.-P.; Benisty, M.; Lazareff, B.; Le Bouquin, J.-B.; Baron, F.; Dominik, C.; Isella, A.; Juhasz, A.; Kraus, S.; Lachaume, R.; Ménard, F.; Millan-Gabet, R.; Monnier, J.; Pinte, C.; Soulez, F.; Tallon, M.; Thi, W.-F.; Thiébaut, É.; Zins, G.

    2014-04-01

    Optical interferometry imaging is designed to help us to reveal complex astronomical sources without a prior model. Among these complex objects are the young stars and their environments, which have a typical morphology with a point-like source, surrounded by circumstellar material with unknown morphology. To image them, we have developed a numerical method that removes completely the stellar point source and reconstructs the rest of the image, using the differences in the spectral behavior between the star and its circumstellar material. We aim to reveal the first Astronomical Units of these objects where many physical phenomena could interplay: the dust sublimation causing a puffed-up inner rim, a dusty halo, a dusty wind or an inner gaseous component. To investigate more deeply these regions, we carried out the first Large Program survey of HAeBe stars with two main goals: statistics on the geometry of these objects at the first astronomical unit scale and imaging their very close environment. The images reveal the environment, which is not polluted by the star and allows us to derive the best fit for the flux ratio and the spectral slope. We present the first images from this survey and the application of the imaging method on other astronomical objects.

  11. 100-HR-1 Operable Unit focused feasibility study report. Draft A

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1994-09-01

    The standard Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 Feasibility Study (FS) includes development and screening of alternatives (phases 1 and 2) and the detailed analysis of alternatives (phase 3). This focused feasibility study (FFS) constitutes the phase 3 portion of the FS process. The FFS process is conducted in two stages, a Process Document (DOE-RL 1994a) and an operable unit-specific FFS document, such as this one. The FFS process is performed by implementing a ''plug-in'' style approach as defined in great detail in the Process Document. The objective of this operable unit-specific FFS is to provide decision makers with sufficient information to allow appropriate and timely selection of interim remedial measures (IRM) for sites associated with the 100-HR-1 Operable Unit. The IRM candidate waste sites are determined in the limited field investigation. Site profiles are developed for each of these waste sites. The site profiles are used in the application of the plug-in approach. The waste site either plugs into the analysis of the alternatives for the group, or deviations from the developed group alternatives are described and documented

  12. Technical specifications, Shoreham Nuclear Power Station, Unit No. 1 (Docket No. 50-322): Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-82

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1989-04-01

    The Shoreham, Unit 1, Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public. 20 figs., 75 tabs

  13. [Aftercare for durability and profitability of single-unit and multi-unit fixed dental prostheses

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Baat, C. de; Loveren, C. van; Maarel-Wierink, C.D. van der; Witter, D.J.; Creugers, N.H.J.

    2013-01-01

    An important aim ofa treatment with single-unit and multi-unit fixed dental prostheses is a durable and profitable treatment outcome. That requires aftercare, too. First, the frequency of routine oral examinations should be assessed, using an individual risk profile. The objectives of the routine

  14. Study of cancer-specific chimeric promoters induced by irradiation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Xiong Jie; Zhou Yunfeng; Sun Wenjie; Wang Weifeng; Liao Zhengkai; Zhou Fuxiang; Xie Conghua

    2010-01-01

    Objective: To combine the radio-inducible CArG element with cancer-specific human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) gene promoter, and to construct the novel chimeric promoters. Methods: The synthetic hTERT promoters containing different number of radio-inducible CArG elements were constructed, and the activities of the promoters in the cancer cells (HeLa, A549, and MHCC97 cells) and nomal cells (hEL cells) were detected by using luciferase-reporter assays after the treatment of irradiation (a single or fractionated irradiation dose). Results: Synthetic promoter containing 6 repeated CArG units was better in radio-inducibility than any other promoters containing different number of CArG units, and nearly maximum levels obtained at 4-6 Gy. The very low activities of the chimeric promoters could be detected in normal hEL cells. A similar level of reporter gene expression was observed after 3 fractionated doses of 2 Gy compared with a single dose of 6 Gy in cancer cells. Conclusions: The cancer-specific chimeric promoter containing 6 CArG elements showes the best radio-response, and the chimeric promoter system has the potential in cancer gene therapy. (authors)

  15. Scientists' Prioritization of Communication Objectives for Public Engagement.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anthony Dudo

    Full Text Available Amid calls from scientific leaders for their colleagues to become more effective public communicators, this study examines the objectives that scientists' report drive their public engagement behaviors. We explore how scientists evaluate five specific communication objectives, which include informing the public about science, exciting the public about science, strengthening the public's trust in science, tailoring messages about science, and defending science from misinformation. We use insights from extant research, the theory of planned behavior, and procedural justice theory to identify likely predictors of scientists' views about these communication objectives. Results show that scientists most prioritize communication designed to defend science from misinformation and educate the public about science, and least prioritize communication that seeks to build trust and establish resonance with the public. Regression analyses reveal factors associated with scientists who prioritize each of the five specific communication objectives. Our findings highlight the need for communication trainers to help scientists select specific communication objectives for particular contexts and audiences.

  16. Scientists’ Prioritization of Communication Objectives for Public Engagement

    Science.gov (United States)

    2016-01-01

    Amid calls from scientific leaders for their colleagues to become more effective public communicators, this study examines the objectives that scientists’ report drive their public engagement behaviors. We explore how scientists evaluate five specific communication objectives, which include informing the public about science, exciting the public about science, strengthening the public’s trust in science, tailoring messages about science, and defending science from misinformation. We use insights from extant research, the theory of planned behavior, and procedural justice theory to identify likely predictors of scientists' views about these communication objectives. Results show that scientists most prioritize communication designed to defend science from misinformation and educate the public about science, and least prioritize communication that seeks to build trust and establish resonance with the public. Regression analyses reveal factors associated with scientists who prioritize each of the five specific communication objectives. Our findings highlight the need for communication trainers to help scientists select specific communication objectives for particular contexts and audiences. PMID:26913869

  17. Modelling local government unit credit risk in the Republic of Croatia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Petra Posedel

    2012-12-01

    Full Text Available The objective of this paper is to determine possible indicators that affect local unit credit risk and investigate their effect on default (credit risk of local government units in Croatia. No system for the estimation of local unit credit risk has been established in Croatia so far causing many practical problems in local unit borrowing. Because of the specific nature of the operations of local government units and legislation that does not allow local government units to go into bankruptcy, conventional methods for estimating credit risk are not applicable, and the set of standard potential determinants of credit risk has to be expanded with new indicators. Thus in the paper, in addition to the usual determinants of credit risk, the hypothesis of the influence of political factors on local unit credit risk in Croatia is also tested out, with the use of a Tobit model. Results of econometric analysis show that credit risk of local government units in Croatia is affected by the political structure of local government, the proportion of income tax and surtax in operating revenue, the ratio of net operating balance, net financial liabilities and direct debt to operating revenue, as well as the ratio of debt repayment and cash, and direct debt and operating revenue.

  18. BOSS: context-enhanced search for biomedical objects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Choi Jaehoon

    2012-04-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background There exist many academic search solutions and most of them can be put on either ends of spectrum: general-purpose search and domain-specific "deep" search systems. The general-purpose search systems, such as PubMed, offer flexible query interface, but churn out a list of matching documents that users have to go through the results in order to find the answers to their queries. On the other hand, the "deep" search systems, such as PPI Finder and iHOP, return the precompiled results in a structured way. Their results, however, are often found only within some predefined contexts. In order to alleviate these problems, we introduce a new search engine, BOSS, Biomedical Object Search System. Methods Unlike the conventional search systems, BOSS indexes segments, rather than documents. A segment refers to a Maximal Coherent Semantic Unit (MCSU such as phrase, clause or sentence that is semantically coherent in the given context (e.g., biomedical objects or their relations. For a user query, BOSS finds all matching segments, identifies the objects appearing in those segments, and aggregates the segments for each object. Finally, it returns the ranked list of the objects along with their matching segments. Results The working prototype of BOSS is available at http://boss.korea.ac.kr. The current version of BOSS has indexed abstracts of more than 20 million articles published during last 16 years from 1996 to 2011 across all science disciplines. Conclusion BOSS fills the gap between either ends of the spectrum by allowing users to pose context-free queries and by returning a structured set of results. Furthermore, BOSS exhibits the characteristic of good scalability, just as with conventional document search engines, because it is designed to use a standard document-indexing model with minimal modifications. Considering the features, BOSS notches up the technological level of traditional solutions for search on biomedical information.

  19. Environmental stressors afflicting tailwater stream reaches across the United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    Miranda, Leandro E.; Krogman, R. M.

    2014-01-01

    The tailwater is the reach of a stream immediately below an impoundment that is hydrologically, physicochemically and biologically altered by the presence and operation of a dam. The overall goal of this study was to gain a nationwide awareness of the issues afflicting tailwater reaches in the United States. Specific objectives included the following: (i) estimate the percentage of reservoirs that support tailwater reaches with environmental conditions suitable for fish assemblages throughout the year, (ii) identify and quantify major sources of environmental stress in those tailwaters that do support fish assemblages and (iii) identify environmental features of tailwater reaches that determine prevalence of key fish taxa. Data were collected through an online survey of fishery managers. Relative to objective 1, 42% of the 1306 reservoirs included in this study had tailwater reaches with sufficient flow to support a fish assemblage throughout the year. The surface area of the reservoir and catchment most strongly delineated reservoirs maintaining tailwater reaches with or without sufficient flow to support a fish assemblage throughout the year. Relative to objective 2, major sources of environmental stress generally reflected flow variables, followed by water quality variables. Relative to objective 3, zoogeography was the primary factor discriminating fish taxa in tailwaters, followed by a wide range of flow and water quality variables. Results for objectives 1–3 varied greatly among nine geographic regions distributed throughout the continental United States. Our results provide a large-scale view of the effects of reservoirs on tailwater reaches and may help guide research and management needs.

  20. Unit area control in California forests

    Science.gov (United States)

    William E. Hallin

    1951-01-01

    There is a definite distinction between the basic concept of unit area control and the specific techniques or treatments used for specific units. Unit area control as a term was first used in connection with a cutting trial in the sugar pine-fir type; consequently, many foresters think the term refers merely to the technique used in sugar pine management, This is not...

  1. The Athena X-ray Integral Field Unit

    Science.gov (United States)

    Barret, D.

    2017-10-01

    The Athena X-ray Integral Field Unit (X-IFU) is a high-resolution X-ray spectrometer, providing 2.5 eV spectral resolution, over a 5' (equivalent diameter) field of view, and count rate capabilities up to 1 Crab in the 0.2-12 keV range. Approaching the end of its feasibility study (scheduled around the end of 2017), I will briefly recall the scientific objectives of Athena driving the X-IFU specifications and will describe its current baseline configuration and the expected performances. I will outline the on-going technology developments that will enable the X-IFU. The X-IFU will be developed by an international consortium led by France (IRAP/CNES), the Netherlands (SRON), Italy (IAPS), with ESA member state contributions from Belgium, Finland, Germany, Poland, Spain and Switzerland, and international partner contributions from Japan and the United States. This talk is given on behalf of the X-IFU Consortium.

  2. 77 FR 31909 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-05-30

    ... exhibition ``50th Anniversary Remembrance of the Tragedy at Orly,'' imported from abroad by the High Museum of Art for temporary exhibition within the United States, is of cultural significance. The object is... exhibition or display of the exhibit object at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia from on or about...

  3. Primary phonological planning units in spoken word production are language-specific: Evidence from an ERP study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wang, Jie; Wong, Andus Wing-Kuen; Wang, Suiping; Chen, Hsuan-Chih

    2017-07-19

    It is widely acknowledged in Germanic languages that segments are the primary planning units at the phonological encoding stage of spoken word production. Mixed results, however, have been found in Chinese, and it is still unclear what roles syllables and segments play in planning Chinese spoken word production. In the current study, participants were asked to first prepare and later produce disyllabic Mandarin words upon picture prompts and a response cue while electroencephalogram (EEG) signals were recorded. Each two consecutive pictures implicitly formed a pair of prime and target, whose names shared the same word-initial atonal syllable or the same word-initial segments, or were unrelated in the control conditions. Only syllable repetition induced significant effects on event-related brain potentials (ERPs) after target onset: a widely distributed positivity in the 200- to 400-ms interval and an anterior positivity in the 400- to 600-ms interval. We interpret these to reflect syllable-size representations at the phonological encoding and phonetic encoding stages. Our results provide the first electrophysiological evidence for the distinct role of syllables in producing Mandarin spoken words, supporting a language specificity hypothesis about the primary phonological units in spoken word production.

  4. 40 CFR 270.23 - Specific part B information requirements for miscellaneous units.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-07-01

    ... address and ensure compliance of the unit with each factor in the environmental performance standards of § 264.601. If the applicant can demonstrate that he does not violate the environmental performance... the Director to be necessary for evaluation of compliance of the unit with the environmental...

  5. The main objectives of lifetime management of reactor unit components

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dragunov, Y.; Kurakov, Y.

    1998-01-01

    The main objectives of the work concerned with life management of reactor components in Russian Federation are as follows: development of regulations in the field of NPP components ageing and lifetime management; investigations of ageing processes; residual life evaluation taking into account the actual state of NPP systems, real loading conditions and number of load cycles, results of in-service inspections; development and implementation of measures for maintaining/enhancing the NPP safety

  6. SPECIFIC EMISSIONS FROM BIOMASS COMBUSTION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pavel Skopec

    2014-02-01

    Full Text Available This paper deals with determining the specific emissions from the combustion of two kinds of biomass fuels in a small-scale boiler. The tested fuels were pellets made of wood and pellets made of rape plant straw. In order to evaluate the specific emissions, several combustion experiments were carried out using a commercial 25 kW pellet-fired boiler. The specific emissions of CO, SO2 and NOx were evaluated in relation to a unit of burned fuel, a unit of calorific value and a unit of produced heat. The specific emissions were compared with some data acquired from the reference literature, with relatively different results. The differences depend mainly on the procedure used for determining the values, and references provide no information about this. Although some of our experimental results may fit with one of the reference sources, they do not fit with the other. The reliability of the references is therefore disputable.

  7. Climate-Specific Passive Building Standards

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Wright, Graham S. [Passive House Inst., Westford, MA (United States); Klingenberg, Katrin [Passive House Inst., Westford, MA (United States)

    2015-07-01

    Passive design principles (super insulation, airtight envelopes, elimination of thermal bridges, etc.) - pioneered in North America in the 70s and 80s and refined in Europe in the 90s have proven to be universally effective to significantly reduce heating and cooling loads. However, a single, rigid performance metric developed in Germany has led to limited uptake of passive building principles in many regions of the United States. It has also, in many cases, promoted some design decisions that had negative effects on economic feasibility and thermal comfort. This study's main objective is to validate (in a theoretical sense) verifiable, climate-specific passive standards and space conditioning criteria that retain ambitious, environmentally-necessary energy reduction targets and are economically feasible, such standards provide designers an ambitious but achievable performance target on the path to zero.

  8. Where Is the Beef In the Objective Force?

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    Reynolds, Robert

    2003-01-01

    The United States Army Transformation Campaign Plan is designed as a means of ensuring an innovative and flexible transformation from the current force structure to the transformational goal of the Objective Force...

  9. Bruce Unit 2 lay-up engineering assessment

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Iley, D.

    1995-01-01

    The overall lay-up program initiated as a result of the strategic decision to shut down Bruce A unit 2 is briefly described as an introduction to the engineering assessment of the unit 2 systems. The assessment has identified the need to prepare 67 system and 9 equipment lay-up specifications. A summary of the selected system specifications is described. A complete summary and the specifications and the status of unit 2 systems and equipment required to support lay-up and/or the other three operating units is available on request due to the volume of the information. Some logistical details of the lay-up implementation plans, results, and problems to date demonstrate the complexity of the lay-up requirements for a nuclear unit in a multi-unit CANDU station. (author)

  10. The Eldicus prospective, observational study of triage decision making in European intensive care units. Part II: Intensive care benefit for the elderly

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Sprung, Charles L; Artigas, Antonio; Kesecioglu, Jozef

    2012-01-01

    on mortality and intensive care unit benefit, specifically for elderly patients. DESIGN:: Prospective, observational study of triage decisions from September 2003 until March 2005. SETTING:: Eleven intensive care units in seven European countries. PATIENTS:: All patients >18 yrs with an explicit request......RATIONALE:: Life and death triage decisions are made daily by intensive care unit physicians. Admission to an intensive care unit is denied when intensive care unit resources are constrained, especially for the elderly. OBJECTIVE:: To determine the effect of intensive care unit triage decisions...... care unit rejections than younger patients and have a higher mortality when admitted, the mortality benefit appears greater for the elderly. Physicians should consider changing their intensive care unit triage practices for the elderly....

  11. OAI Object Re-Use and Exchange

    CERN Multimedia

    CERN. Geneva

    2007-01-01

    There is a growing interest in appropriating these tools and modalities to support the scholarly communication process. This begins with leveraging the intrinsic value of scholarly digital objects beyond the borders of the hosting repository. There are numerous examples of the need to re-use objects across repositories in scholarly communication. These include citation, preservation, virtual collections of distributed objects, and the progression of units of scholarly communication through the registration-certification-awareness-archiving chain. The last several years have brought about numerous open source repository systems and their associated communities. The Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) has been the initial catalyst for repository interoperability. However, there is now a rising interest in repositories no longer bein...

  12. Science Unit Plans. PACE '94.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schoon, Kenneth J., Ed.; Wiles, Clyde A., Ed.

    This booklet contains mathematics unit plans for Biology, Chemistry, and Physical Science developed by PACE (Promoting Academic Excellence In Mathematics, Science & Technology for Workers of the 21st Century). Each unit plan contains suggested timing, objectives, skills to be acquired, workplace relationships, learning activities with suggested…

  13. Registration of Space Objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schmidt-Tedd, Bernhard

    2017-07-01

    Space objects are subject to registration in order to allocate "jurisdiction and control" over those objects in the sovereign-free environment of outer space. This approach is similar to the registration of ships in view of the high sea and for aircrafts with respect to the international airspace. Registration is one of the basic principles of space law, starting with UN General Assembly Resolution 1721 B (XVI) of December 20, 1961, followed by Resolution 1962 (XVIII) of December 13, 1963, then formulated in Article VIII of the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and as specified in the Registration Convention of 1975. Registration of space objects can be seen today as a principle of customary international law, relevant for each spacefaring state. Registration is divided into a national and an international level. The State Party establishes a national registry for its space objects, and those registrations have to be communicated via diplomatic channel to the UN Register of space objects. This UN Register is handled by the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) and is an open source of information for space objects worldwide. Registration is linked to the so-called launching state of the relevant space object. There might be more than one launching state for the specific launch event, but only one state actor can register a specific space object. The state of registry gains "jurisdiction and control" over the space object and therefore no double registration is permissible. Based on the established UN Space Law, registration practice was subject to some adaptions due to technical developments and legal challenges. After the privatization of the major international satellite organizations, a number of non-registrations had to be faced. The state actors reacted with the UN Registration Practice Resolution of 2007 as elaborated in the Legal Subcommittee of UNCOPUOS, the Committee for the Peaceful Use of Outer Space. In this context an UNOOSA Registration Information

  14. Economic Objects: How Policy Discourse in the United Kingdom Represents International Students

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lomer, Sylvie

    2014-01-01

    Despite the significant and increasing presence of international students in the United Kingdom, on a national level there has been a lack of formal policy towards international students. Instead, in policy discourse, international students are represented in economic terms to the exclusion of other dimensions of experience and action. This…

  15. Predicting biological system objectives de novo from internal state measurements

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Maranas Costas D

    2008-01-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Optimization theory has been applied to complex biological systems to interrogate network properties and develop and refine metabolic engineering strategies. For example, methods are emerging to engineer cells to optimally produce byproducts of commercial value, such as bioethanol, as well as molecular compounds for disease therapy. Flux balance analysis (FBA is an optimization framework that aids in this interrogation by generating predictions of optimal flux distributions in cellular networks. Critical features of FBA are the definition of a biologically relevant objective function (e.g., maximizing the rate of synthesis of biomass, a unit of measurement of cellular growth and the subsequent application of linear programming (LP to identify fluxes through a reaction network. Despite the success of FBA, a central remaining challenge is the definition of a network objective with biological meaning. Results We present a novel method called Biological Objective Solution Search (BOSS for the inference of an objective function of a biological system from its underlying network stoichiometry as well as experimentally-measured state variables. Specifically, BOSS identifies a system objective by defining a putative stoichiometric "objective reaction," adding this reaction to the existing set of stoichiometric constraints arising from known interactions within a network, and maximizing the putative objective reaction via LP, all the while minimizing the difference between the resultant in silico flux distribution and available experimental (e.g., isotopomer flux data. This new approach allows for discovery of objectives with previously unknown stoichiometry, thus extending the biological relevance from earlier methods. We verify our approach on the well-characterized central metabolic network of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Conclusion We illustrate how BOSS offers insight into the functional organization of biochemical networks

  16. Credit assignment between body and object probed by an object transportation task.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kong, Gaiqing; Zhou, Zhihao; Wang, Qining; Kording, Konrad; Wei, Kunlin

    2017-10-17

    It has been proposed that learning from movement errors involves a credit assignment problem: did I misestimate properties of the object or those of my body? For example, an overestimate of arm strength and an underestimate of the weight of a coffee cup can both lead to coffee spills. Though previous studies have found signs of simultaneous learning of the object and of the body during object manipulation, there is little behavioral evidence about their quantitative relation. Here we employed a novel weight-transportation task, in which participants lift the first cup filled with liquid while assessing their learning from errors. Specifically, we examined their transfer of learning when switching to a contralateral hand, the second identical cup, or switching both hands and cups. By comparing these transfer behaviors, we found that 25% of the learning was attributed to the object (simply because of the use of the same cup) and 58% of the learning was attributed to the body (simply because of the use of the same hand). The nervous system thus seems to partition the learning of object manipulation between the object and the body.

  17. Visual Working Memory Capacity for Objects from Different Categories: A Face-Specific Maintenance Effect

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wong, Jason H.; Peterson, Matthew S.; Thompson, James C.

    2008-01-01

    The capacity of visual working memory was examined when complex objects from different categories were remembered. Previous studies have not examined how visual similarity affects object memory, though it has long been known that similar-sounding phonological information interferes with rehearsal in auditory working memory. Here, experiments…

  18. Searching for the Pareto frontier in multi-objective protein design.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nanda, Vikas; Belure, Sandeep V; Shir, Ofer M

    2017-08-01

    The goal of protein engineering and design is to identify sequences that adopt three-dimensional structures of desired function. Often, this is treated as a single-objective optimization problem, identifying the sequence-structure solution with the lowest computed free energy of folding. However, many design problems are multi-state, multi-specificity, or otherwise require concurrent optimization of multiple objectives. There may be tradeoffs among objectives, where improving one feature requires compromising another. The challenge lies in determining solutions that are part of the Pareto optimal set-designs where no further improvement can be achieved in any of the objectives without degrading one of the others. Pareto optimality problems are found in all areas of study, from economics to engineering to biology, and computational methods have been developed specifically to identify the Pareto frontier. We review progress in multi-objective protein design, the development of Pareto optimization methods, and present a specific case study using multi-objective optimization methods to model the tradeoff between three parameters, stability, specificity, and complexity, of a set of interacting synthetic collagen peptides.

  19. Cross-connected onsite emergency A.C. power supplies for multi-unit nuclear power plant sites

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Martore, J.A.; Voss, J.D.; Duncil, B.

    1987-01-01

    Recently, utility management, both at the corporate and plant operations levels, have reinforced their commitment to assuring increased plant reliability and availability. One means of achieving this objective involves an effective preventive maintenance program with technical specifications which allow implementation of certain preventive maintenance without plant shutdown. To accomplish this, Southern California Edison Company (SCE) has proposed a design change for San Onofre nuclear generating station (SONGS) units 2 and 3 to permit on emergency diesel generator for one unit to perform as an available AC power source for both units. Technical specifications for SCE's SONGS units 2 and 3, as at most nuclear power plants, currently require plant shutdown should one of the two dedicated onsite emergency AC power sources (diesel generators) become inoperable for more than 72 hours. This duration hinders root cause failure analysis, tends to limit the flexibility of preventive maintenance and precludes plant operation in the event of component failure. Therefore, this proposed diesel generator cross-connect design change offers an innovative means for averting plant shutdown should a single diesel generator become inoperable for longer than 72 hours. (orig./GL)

  20. Cross-cultural generality and specificity in self-regulation: avoidance personal goals and multiple aspects of well-being in the United States and Japan.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elliot, Andrew J; Sedikides, Constantine; Murayama, Kou; Tanaka, Ayumi; Thrash, Todd M; Mapes, Rachel R

    2012-10-01

    The authors examined avoidance personal goals as concurrent (Study 1) and longitudinal (Study 2) predictors of multiple aspects of well-being in the United States and Japan. In both studies, participants adopted more avoidance personal goals in Japan relative to the United States. Both studies also demonstrated that avoidance personal goals were significant negative predictors of the most relevant aspects of well-being in each culture. Specifically, avoidance personal goals were negative predictors of intrapersonal and eudaimonic well-being in the United States and were negative predictors of interpersonal and eudaimonic well-being in Japan. The findings clarify and extend puzzling findings from prior empirical work in this area, and raise provocative possibilities about the nature of avoidance goal pursuit.

  1. Integrated approach to e-learning enhanced both subjective and objective knowledge of aEEG in a neonatal intensive care unit.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Poon, W B; Tagamolila, V; Toh, Y P; Cheng, Z R

    2015-03-01

    Various meta-analyses have shown that e-learning is as effective as traditional methods of continuing professional education. However, there are some disadvantages to e-learning, such as possible technical problems, the need for greater self-discipline, cost involved in developing programmes and limited direct interaction. Currently, most strategies for teaching amplitude-integrated electroencephalography (aEEG) in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) worldwide depend on traditional teaching methods. We implemented a programme that utilised an integrated approach to e-learning. The programme consisted of three sessions of supervised protected time e-learning in an NICU. The objective and subjective effectiveness of the approach was assessed through surveys administered to participants before and after the programme. A total of 37 NICU staff (32 nurses and 5 doctors) participated in the study. 93.1% of the participants appreciated the need to acquire knowledge of aEEG. We also saw a statistically significant improvement in the subjective knowledge score (p = 0.041) of the participants. The passing rates for identifying abnormal aEEG tracings (defined as ≥ 3 correct answers out of 5) also showed a statistically significant improvement (from 13.6% to 81.8%, p e-learning can help improve subjective and objective knowledge of aEEG.

  2. Effect of object location on the density measurement and Hounsfield conversion in a NewTom 3G cone beam computed tomography unit.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lagravère, M O; Carey, J; Ben-Zvi, M; Packota, G V; Major, P W

    2008-09-01

    The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of an object's location in a cone beam CT imaging chamber (CBCT-NewTom 3G) on its apparent density and to develop a linear conversion coefficient for Hounsfield units (HU) to material density (g cm(-3)) for the NewTom 3G Scanner. Three cylindrical models of materials with different densities were constructed and scanned at five different locations in a NewTom 3G Volume Scanner. The average HU value for each model at each location was obtained using two different types of software. Next, five cylinders of different known densities were scanned at the exact centre of a NewTom 3G Scanner. The collected data were analysed using the same two types of software to determine a standard linear relationship between density and HU for each type of software. There is no statistical significance of location of an object within the CBCT scanner on determination of its density. A linear relationship between the density of an object and the HU of a scan was rho = 0.001(HU)+1.19 with an R2 value of 0.893 (where density, rho, is measured in g cm(-3)). This equation is to be used on a range between 1.42 g cm(-3) and 0.4456 g cm(-3). A linear relationship can be used to determine the density of materials (in the density range of bone) from the HU values of a CBCT scan. This relationship is not affected by the object's location within the scanner itself.

  3. Geometrical objects architecture and the mathematical sciences 1400-1800

    CERN Document Server

    2014-01-01

    This volume explores the mathematical character of architectural practice in diverse pre- and early modern contexts. It takes an explicitly interdisciplinary approach, which unites scholarship in early modern architecture with recent work in the history of science, in particular, on the role of practice in the scientific revolution. As a contribution to architectural history, the volume contextualizes design and construction in terms of contemporary mathematical knowledge, attendant forms of mathematical practice, and relevant social distinctions between the mathematical professions. As a contribution to the history of science, the volume presents a series of micro-historical studies that highlight issues of process, materiality, and knowledge production in specific, situated, practical contexts. Our approach sees the designer’s studio, the stone-yard, the drawing floor, and construction site not merely as places where the architectural object takes shape, but where mathematical knowledge itself is depl...

  4. 32 CFR 636.2 - Program objectives.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-07-01

    ... 32 National Defense 4 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 true Program objectives. 636.2 Section 636.2 National Defense Department of Defense (Continued) DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY (CONTINUED) LAW ENFORCEMENT AND CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS MOTOR VEHICLE TRAFFIC SUPERVISION (SPECIFIC INSTALLATIONS) Fort Stewart, Georgia § 636.2 Program objectives. In addition to the...

  5. Intermediary object for participative design processes based on the ergonomic work analysis

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Souza da Conceição, Carolina; Duarte, F.; Broberg, Ole

    2012-01-01

    The objective of this paper is to present and discuss the use of an intermediary object, built from the ergonomic work analysis, in a participative design process. The object was a zoning pattern, developed as a visual representation ‘mapping’ of the interrelations among the functional units of t...

  6. Shape configuration and category-specificity

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerlach, Christian; Law, Ian; Paulson, Olaf B.

    2006-01-01

    a recent account of category-specificity and lends support to the notion that category-specific impairments can occur for both natural objects and artefacts following damage to pre-semantic stages in visual object recognition. The implications of the present findings are discussed in relation to theories...

  7. Critical evaluation of the nonradiological environmental technical specifications. Volume 3. Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station Units 2 and 3

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Adams, S.M.; Cunningham, P.A.; Gray, D.D.; Kumar, K.D.; Witten, A.J.

    1976-01-01

    A comprehensive study of the data collected as part of the environmental Technical Specifications program for Units 2 and 3 of the Peach Bottom Nuclear Power Plant was conducted for the Office of Regulatory Research of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The program included an analysis of both the hydrothermal and ecological monitoring data collected from 1967 through 1976. Specific recommendations are made for improving both the present hydrothermal and ecological monitoring programs. Hydrothermal monitoring would be improved by more complete reporting of in-plant operating parameters. In addition, the present boat surveys could be discontinued, and monitoring efforts could be directed toward expanding the present thermograph network. Ecological monitoring programs were judged to be of high quality because standardized collection techniques, consistent reporting formats, and statistical analyses were performed on all of the data and were presented in an annual report. Sampling for all trophic groups was adequate for the purposes of assessing power plant induced perturbations. Considering the extensive period of preoperational data (six years) and operational data (three years) available for analysis, consideration could be given to reducing monitoring effort after data have been collected for a period when both units are operating at full capacity. In this way, an assessment of the potential ecological impact of the Peach Bottom facility can be made under conditions of maximum plant induced perturbations

  8. Conceptual Modeling of Events as Information Objects and Change Agents

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bækgaard, Lars

    as a totality of an information object and a change agent. When an event is modeled as an information object it is comparable to an entity that exists only at a specific point in time. It has attributes and can be used for querying and specification of constraints. When an event is modeled as a change agent...... it is comparable to an executable transaction schema. Finally, we briefly compare our approach to object-oriented approaches based on encapsulated objects....

  9. What Makes an Object Memorable?

    KAUST Repository

    Dubey, Rachit

    2016-02-19

    Recent studies on image memorability have shed light on what distinguishes the memorability of different images and the intrinsic and extrinsic properties that make those images memorable. However, a clear understanding of the memorability of specific objects inside an image remains elusive. In this paper, we provide the first attempt to answer the question: what exactly is remembered about an image? We augment both the images and object segmentations from the PASCAL-S dataset with ground truth memorability scores and shed light on the various factors and properties that make an object memorable (or forgettable) to humans. We analyze various visual factors that may influence object memorability (e.g. color, visual saliency, and object categories). We also study the correlation between object and image memorability and find that image memorability is greatly affected by the memorability of its most memorable object. Lastly, we explore the effectiveness of deep learning and other computational approaches in predicting object memorability in images. Our efforts offer a deeper understanding of memorability in general thereby opening up avenues for a wide variety of applications. © 2015 IEEE.

  10. What Makes an Object Memorable?

    KAUST Repository

    Dubey, Rachit; Peterson, Joshua; Khosla, Aditya; Yang, Ming-Hsuan; Ghanem, Bernard

    2016-01-01

    Recent studies on image memorability have shed light on what distinguishes the memorability of different images and the intrinsic and extrinsic properties that make those images memorable. However, a clear understanding of the memorability of specific objects inside an image remains elusive. In this paper, we provide the first attempt to answer the question: what exactly is remembered about an image? We augment both the images and object segmentations from the PASCAL-S dataset with ground truth memorability scores and shed light on the various factors and properties that make an object memorable (or forgettable) to humans. We analyze various visual factors that may influence object memorability (e.g. color, visual saliency, and object categories). We also study the correlation between object and image memorability and find that image memorability is greatly affected by the memorability of its most memorable object. Lastly, we explore the effectiveness of deep learning and other computational approaches in predicting object memorability in images. Our efforts offer a deeper understanding of memorability in general thereby opening up avenues for a wide variety of applications. © 2015 IEEE.

  11. Remembering perceptual features unequally bound in object and episodic tokens: Neural mechanisms and their electrophysiological correlates.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zimmer, Hubert D; Ecker, Ullrich K H

    2010-06-01

    We present a neurocognitive model of long-term object memory. We propose that perceptual priming and episodic recognition are phenomena based on three distinct kinds of representations. We label these representations types and tokens. Types are prototypical representations needed for object identification. The network of non-arbitrary features necessary for object categorization is sharpened in the course of repeated identification, an effect that we call type trace and which causes perceptual priming. Tokens, on the other hand, support episodic recognition. Perirhinal structures are proposed to bind intrinsic within-object features into an object token that can be thought of as a consolidated perceptual object file. Hippocampal structures integrate object- with contextual information in an episodic token. The reinstatement of an object token is assumed to generate a feeling of familiarity, whereas recollection occurs when the reinstatement of an episodic token occurs. Retrieval mode and retrieval orientation dynamically modulate access to these representations. In this review, we apply the model to recent empirical research (behavioral, fMRI, and ERP data) including a series of studies from our own lab. We put specific emphasis on the effects that sensory features and their study-test match have on familiarity. The type-token approach fits the data and additionally provides a framework for the analysis of concepts like unitization and associative reinstatement. Copyright (c) 2010. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

  12. Laser sources for object illumination

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Albrecht, G.F. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)

    1994-11-15

    The considerations which formulate the specifications for a laser illuminator are explained, using the example of an underwater object. Depending on the parameters which define the scenario, widely varying laser requirements result.

  13. Applying Quality Function Deployment Model in Burn Unit Service Improvement.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Keshtkaran, Ali; Hashemi, Neda; Kharazmi, Erfan; Abbasi, Mehdi

    2016-01-01

    Quality function deployment (QFD) is one of the most effective quality design tools. This study applies QFD technique to improve the quality of the burn unit services in Ghotbedin Hospital in Shiraz, Iran. First, the patients' expectations of burn unit services and their priorities were determined through Delphi method. Thereafter, burn unit service specifications were determined through Delphi method. Further, the relationships between the patients' expectations and service specifications and also the relationships between service specifications were determined through an expert group's opinion. Last, the final importance scores of service specifications were calculated through simple additive weighting method. The findings show that burn unit patients have 40 expectations in six different areas. These expectations are in 16 priority levels. Burn units also have 45 service specifications in six different areas. There are four-level relationships between the patients' expectations and service specifications and four-level relationships between service specifications. The most important burn unit service specifications have been identified in this study. The QFD model developed in the study can be a general guideline for QFD planners and executives.

  14. Quasi-objects, Cult Objects and Fashion Objects

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Andersen, Bjørn Schiermer

    2011-01-01

    This article attempts to rehabilitate the concept of fetishism and to contribute to the debate on the social role of objects as well as to fashion theory. Extrapolating from Michel Serres’ theory of the quasi-objects, I distinguish two phenomenologies possessing almost opposite characteristics. T...... as a unique opportunity for studying the interchange between these two forms of fetishism and their respective phenomenologies. Finally, returning to Serres, I briefly consider the theoretical consequences of introducing the fashion object as a quasi-object.......This article attempts to rehabilitate the concept of fetishism and to contribute to the debate on the social role of objects as well as to fashion theory. Extrapolating from Michel Serres’ theory of the quasi-objects, I distinguish two phenomenologies possessing almost opposite characteristics....... These two phenomenologies are, so I argue, essential to quasi-object theory, yet largely ignored by Serres’ sociological interpreters. They correspond with the two different theories of fetishism found in Marx and Durkheim, respectively. In the second half of the article, I introduce the fashion object...

  15. Parallel object-oriented term rewriting : the booleans

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Rodenburg, P.H.; Vrancken, J.L.M.

    As a first case study in parallel object-oriented term rewriting, we give two implementations of term rewriting algorithms for boolean terms, using the parallel object-oriented features of the language Pool-T. The term rewriting systems are specified in the specification formalism

  16. POMP - Pervasive Object Model Project

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Schougaard, Kari Rye; Schultz, Ulrik Pagh

    The focus on mobile devices is continuously increasing, and improved device connectivity enables the construction of pervasive computing systems composed of heterogeneous collections of devices. Users who employ different devices throughout their daily activities naturally expect their applications...... computing environment. This system, named POM (Pervasive Object Model), supports applications split into coarse-grained, strongly mobile units that communicate using method invocations through proxies. We are currently investigating efficient execution of mobile applications, scalability to suit...

  17. Dynamic information processing states revealed through neurocognitive models of object semantics

    Science.gov (United States)

    Clarke, Alex

    2015-01-01

    Recognising objects relies on highly dynamic, interactive brain networks to process multiple aspects of object information. To fully understand how different forms of information about objects are represented and processed in the brain requires a neurocognitive account of visual object recognition that combines a detailed cognitive model of semantic knowledge with a neurobiological model of visual object processing. Here we ask how specific cognitive factors are instantiated in our mental processes and how they dynamically evolve over time. We suggest that coarse semantic information, based on generic shared semantic knowledge, is rapidly extracted from visual inputs and is sufficient to drive rapid category decisions. Subsequent recurrent neural activity between the anterior temporal lobe and posterior fusiform supports the formation of object-specific semantic representations – a conjunctive process primarily driven by the perirhinal cortex. These object-specific representations require the integration of shared and distinguishing object properties and support the unique recognition of objects. We conclude that a valuable way of understanding the cognitive activity of the brain is though testing the relationship between specific cognitive measures and dynamic neural activity. This kind of approach allows us to move towards uncovering the information processing states of the brain and how they evolve over time. PMID:25745632

  18. Plant specific PTS analysis of Kori Unit 1

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Sung-Yull, Hong; Changheui, Jang; Ill-Seok, Jeong [Korea Eletric Power Research Inst., Daejon (Korea, Republic of); Tae-Eun, Jin [Korea Power Engineering Company, Yonging (Korea, Republic of)

    1997-09-01

    Currently, a nuclear PLIM (Plant Lifetime Management) program is underway in Korea to extend the operation life of Kori-1 which was originally licensed for 30 years. For the life extension of nuclear power plants, the residual lives of major components should be evaluated for the extended operation period. According to the residual life evaluation of reactor pressure vessel, which was classified as one of the major components crucial to life extension, it was found by screening analysis that reference PTS temperature would exceed screening criteria before the target extended operation years. In order to deal with this problem, a plant-specific PTS analysis for Kori-1 RPV has been initiated. In this paper, the relationship between PTS analysis and Kori-1 PLIM program is briefly described. The plant-specific PTS analysis covers system transient analysis, downcomer mixing analysis, and probabilistic fracture mechanics analysis to check the integrity or RPV during various PTS transients. The step-by-step procedure of the analysis will be described in detail. Finally, various issues regarding RPV materials and its integrity will be briefly mentioned, and their implications on Kori-1 PTS analysis will be discussed. Despite of the screening analysis result concern, it is now expected that Kori-1 PTS issues can be handled through the plant-specific PTS analysis. (author). 14 refs, 4 figs, 2 tabs.

  19. Object-oriented biomedical system modelling--the language.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hakman, M; Groth, T

    1999-11-01

    The paper describes a new object-oriented biomedical continuous system modelling language (OOBSML). It is fully object-oriented and supports model inheritance, encapsulation, and model component instantiation and behaviour polymorphism. Besides the traditional differential and algebraic equation expressions the language includes also formal expressions for documenting models and defining model quantity types and quantity units. It supports explicit definition of model input-, output- and state quantities, model components and component connections. The OOBSML model compiler produces self-contained, independent, executable model components that can be instantiated and used within other OOBSML models and/or stored within model and model component libraries. In this way complex models can be structured as multilevel, multi-component model hierarchies. Technically the model components produced by the OOBSML compiler are executable computer code objects based on distributed object and object request broker technology. This paper includes both the language tutorial and the formal language syntax and semantic description.

  20. The unit cost factors and calculation methods for decommissioning - Cost estimation of nuclear research facilities

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kwan-Seong Jeong; Dong-Gyu Lee; Chong-Hun Jung; Kune-Woo Lee

    2007-01-01

    Available in abstract form only. Full text of publication follows: The uncertainties of decommissioning costs increase high due to several conditions. Decommissioning cost estimation depends on the complexity of nuclear installations, its site-specific physical and radiological inventories. Therefore, the decommissioning costs of nuclear research facilities must be estimated in accordance with the detailed sub-tasks and resources by the tasks of decommissioning activities. By selecting the classified activities and resources, costs are calculated by the items and then the total costs of all decommissioning activities are reshuffled to match with its usage and objectives. And the decommissioning cost of nuclear research facilities is calculated by applying a unit cost factor method on which classification of decommissioning works fitted with the features and specifications of decommissioning objects and establishment of composition factors are based. Decommissioning costs of nuclear research facilities are composed of labor cost, equipment and materials cost. Of these three categorical costs, the calculation of labor costs are very important because decommissioning activities mainly depend on labor force. Labor costs in decommissioning activities are calculated on the basis of working time consumed in decommissioning objects and works. The working times are figured out of unit cost factors and work difficulty factors. Finally, labor costs are figured out by using these factors as parameters of calculation. The accuracy of decommissioning cost estimation results is much higher compared to the real decommissioning works. (authors)

  1. Fabrication of MTF measurement system for a mobile phone lens using multi-square objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hong, Sung Mok; Jo, Jae Heung; Lee, Hoi Youn; Yang, Ho Soon; Lee, Yun Woo; Lee, In Won

    2007-12-01

    The mobile phone market grows rapidly and the performance estimation about camera module is required. Accordingly, we fabricate the MTF measurement system for a mobile phone lens having extremely small diameter and large f-number. The objective lens with the magnification of X20 for MTF measurement for high resolution lens and a detector of CCD that is pixel size of 7.4 um are adapted to the system. Also, the CCD is translated by using a linear motor to reduce measurement errors. The measurement lens is placed at the most suitable imaging point by a precise auto-focusing motor. The measuring equipment which we developed for off-axis MTF measurement of a mobile phone lens used the multi-square objects. The square objects of measuring equipment are arranged a unit in the on-axis and total 12 units (0.3 field: 4 units, 0.5 field: 4 units, 0.7 field: 4 units) in the off-axis. When the measurement is started, the linear motors of signal detection part are transferred from on-axis to off-axis. And a detected signals from the each square objects are used for MTF measurement. System driver and MTF measure are using application program that developed us. This software can be measure the on-axis and the off-axis sequentially. In addition to that it did optimization of motor transfer for measurement time shortening.

  2. 24 CFR 234.285 - Waived title objections.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... have not been violated to a material extent. (f) Federal tax liens and rights of redemption arising... Commissioner will not object to an outstanding right of redemption in IRS if: (1) The Federal tax lien was... CONDOMINIUM OWNERSHIP MORTGAGE INSURANCE Contract Rights and Obligations-Individually Owned Units § 234.285...

  3. 77 FR 31420 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-05-25

    ... also determine that the exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at The Museum of Modern Art, New...: Game Plan'' imported from abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural...

  4. Constraints on reusability of learning objects

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    May, Michael; Hussmann, Peter Munkebo; Jensen, Anne Skov

    2010-01-01

    It is the aim of this paper to discuss some didactic constraints on the use and reuse of digital modular learning objects. Engineering education is used as the specific context of use with examples from courses in introductory electronics and mathematics. Digital multimedia and modular learning....... Constraints on reuse arise from the nature of conceptual understanding in higher education and the functionality of learning objects within present technologies. We will need didactic as well as technical perspectives on learning objects in designing for understanding....

  5. Pricing objectives in nonprofit hospitals.

    OpenAIRE

    Bauerschmidt, A D; Jacobs, P

    1985-01-01

    This article reports on a survey of 60 financial managers of nonprofit hospitals in the eastern United States relating to the importance of a number of factors which influence their pricing decisions and the pricing objectives which they pursue. Among the results uncovered by the responses: that trustees are the single most important body in the price-setting process (doctors play a relatively unimportant role); that hospital pricing goals are more related to target net revenue than profit ma...

  6. Towards an Artificial Space Object Taxonomy

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wilkins, M.; Schumacher, P.; Jah, M.; Pfeffer, A.

    2013-09-01

    Object recognition is the first step in positively identifying a resident space object (RSO), i.e. assigning an RSO to a category such as GPS satellite or space debris. Object identification is the process of deciding that two RSOs are in fact one and the same. Provided we have appropriately defined a satellite taxonomy that allows us to place a given RSO into a particular class of object without any ambiguity, one can assess the probability of assignment to a particular class by determining how well the object satisfies the unique criteria of belonging to that class. Ultimately, tree-based taxonomies delineate unique signatures by defining the minimum amount of information required to positively identify a RSO. Therefore, taxonomic trees can be used to depict hypotheses in a Bayesian object recognition and identification process. This work describes a new RSO taxonomy along with specific reasoning behind the choice of groupings. An alternative taxonomy was recently presented at the Sixth Conference on Space Debris in Darmstadt, Germany. [1] The best example of a taxonomy that enjoys almost universal scientific acceptance is the classical Linnaean biological taxonomy. A strength of Linnaean taxonomy is that it can be used to organize the different kinds of living organisms, simply and practically. Every species can be given a unique name. This uniqueness and stability are a result of the acceptance by biologists specializing in taxonomy, not merely of the binomial names themselves. Fundamentally, the taxonomy is governed by rules for the use of these names, and these are laid down in formal Nomenclature Codes. We seek to provide a similar formal nomenclature system for RSOs through a defined tree-based taxonomy structure. Each categorization, beginning with the most general or inclusive, at any level is called a taxon. Taxon names are defined by a type, which can be a specimen or a taxon of lower rank, and a diagnosis, a statement intended to supply characters that

  7. The Relationship between Exposure to Brand-Specific Alcohol Advertising and Brand-Specific Consumption among Underage Drinkers—United States, 2011-2012

    Science.gov (United States)

    Siegel, Michael; Ross, Craig S.; Albers, Alison B.; DeJong, William; King, Charles; Naimi, Timothy S.; Jernigan, David H.

    2015-01-01

    Background Marketing is increasingly recognized as a potentially important contributor to youth drinking, yet few studies have examined the relationship between advertising exposure and alcohol consumption among underage youth at the brand level. Objectives To examine the relationship between brand-specific exposure to alcohol advertising among underage youth and the consumption prevalence of each brand in a national sample of underage drinkers. Methods We analyzed the relationship between population-level exposure of underage youth ages 12-20 to brand-specific alcohol advertising in national magazines and television programs and the 30-day consumption prevalence—by brand—among a national sample of underage drinkers ages 13-20. Underage youth exposure to alcohol advertising by brand for each month in 2011, measured in gross rating points (GRPs), was obtained from GfK MRI and Nielsen for all measured national issues of magazines and all national television programs, respectively. The 30-day consumption prevalence for each brand was obtained from a national survey of 1,031 underage drinkers conducted between December 2011 and May 2012. Results Underage youth were more than five times more likely to consume brands that advertise on national television and 36% more likely to consume brands that advertise in national magazines. The consumption prevalence of a brand increased by 36% for each 1.5 standard deviation (50 GRPs) increase in television adstock among underage youth and by 23% for each 1.5 standard deviation (10 GRPs) increase in magazine adstock. Conclusion These findings suggest that alcohol advertising influences an important aspect of drinking behavior— brand choice—among youth who consume alcohol. PMID:26479468

  8. Critical evaluation of the nonradiological environmental technical specifications. Volume 4. San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, Unit 1

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Adams, S.M.; Cunningham, P.A.; Gray, D.D.; Kumar, K.D.

    1976-08-10

    A comprehensive study of the data collected as part of the environmental Technical Specifications program for Unit 1 of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS 1) was conducted for the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The program included an analysis of the hydrothermal and ecological monitoring data collected during 1975. The hydrothermal analysis includes a discussion of models used in plume predictions prior to plant operation and an evaluation of the present hydrothermal monitoring program. The ecological evaluation was directed toward reviewing the strengths and weaknesses of the various sampling programs designed to monitor the planktonic, benthic, and nektonic communities inhabiting the inshore coastal area in the vicinity of San Onofre.

  9. Critical evaluation of the nonradiological environmental technical specifications. Volume 4. San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, Unit 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Adams, S.M.; Cunningham, P.A.; Gray, D.D.; Kumar, K.D.

    1976-01-01

    A comprehensive study of the data collected as part of the environmental Technical Specifications program for Unit 1 of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS 1) was conducted for the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The program included an analysis of the hydrothermal and ecological monitoring data collected during 1975. The hydrothermal analysis includes a discussion of models used in plume predictions prior to plant operation and an evaluation of the present hydrothermal monitoring program. The ecological evaluation was directed toward reviewing the strengths and weaknesses of the various sampling programs designed to monitor the planktonic, benthic, and nektonic communities inhabiting the inshore coastal area in the vicinity of San Onofre

  10. Identification of specific organic contaminants in different units of a chemical production site.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dsikowitzky, L; Botalova, O; al Sandouk-Lincke, N A; Schwarzbauer, J

    2014-07-01

    Due to the very limited number of studies dealing with the chemical composition of industrial wastewaters, many industrial organic contaminants still escape our view and consequently also our control. We present here the chemical characterization of wastewaters from different units of a chemical complex, thereby contributing to the characterization of industrial pollution sources. The chemicals produced in the investigated complex are widely and intensively used and the synthesis processes are common and applied worldwide. The chemical composition of untreated and treated wastewaters from the chemical complex was investigated by applying a non-target screening which allowed for the identification of 39 organic contaminants. According to their application most of them belonged to four groups: (i) unspecific educts or intermediates of industrial syntheses, (ii) chemicals for the manufacturing of pharmaceuticals, (iii) educts for the synthesis of polymers and resins, and (iv) compounds known as typical constituents of municipal sewage. A number of halogenated compounds with unknown toxicity and with very high molecular diversity belonged to the second group. Although these compounds were completely removed or degraded during wastewater treatment, they could be useful as "alarm indicators" for industrial accidents in pharmaceutical manufacturing units or for malfunctions of wastewater treatment plants. Three potential branch-specific indicators for polymer manufacturing were found in the outflow of the complex. Among all compounds, bisphenol A, which was present in the leachate water of the on-site waste deposit, occurred in the highest concentrations of up to 20 000 μg L(-1). The comparison of contaminant loads in the inflow and outflow of the on-site wastewater treatment facility showed that most contaminants were completely or at least significantly removed or degraded during the treatment, except two alkylthiols, which were enriched during the treatment process

  11. Critical issues related to registration of space objects and transparency of space activities

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jakhu, Ram S.; Jasani, Bhupendra; McDowell, Jonathan C.

    2018-02-01

    The main purpose of the 1975 Registration Convention is to achieve transparency in space activities and this objective is motivated by the belief that a mandatory registration system would assist in the identification of space objects launched into outer space. This would also consequently contribute to the application and development of international law governing the exploration and use of outer space. States Parties to the Convention furnish the required information to the United Nations' Register of Space Objects. However, the furnished information is often so general that it may not be as helpful in creating transparency as had been hoped by the drafters of the Convention. While registration of civil satellites has been furnished with some general details, till today, none of the Parties have described the objects as having military functions despite the fact that a large number of such objects do perform military functions as well. In some cases, the best they have done is to indicate that the space objects are for their defense establishments. Moreover, the number of registrations of space objects is declining. This paper addresses the challenges posed by the non-registration of space objects. Particularly, the paper provides some data about the registration and non-registration of satellites and the States that have and have not complied with their legal obligations. It also analyses the specific requirements of the Convention, the reasons for non-registration, new challenges posed by the registration of small satellites and the on-orbit transfer of satellites. Finally, the paper provides some recommendations on how to enhance the registration of space objects, on the monitoring of the implementation of the Registration Convention and consequently how to achieve maximum transparency in space activities.

  12. Diagnostic specificity of the African swine fever virus antibody detection enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay in feral and domestic pigs in the United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bergeron, H C; Glas, P S; Schumann, K R

    2017-12-01

    African swine fever (ASF) is a highly contagious haemorrhagic disease of pigs that has the potential to cause mortality nearing 100% in naïve animals. While an outbreak of ASF in the United States' pig population (domestic and feral) has never been reported, an introduction of the disease has the potential to cause devastation to the pork industry and food security. During the recovery phase of an outbreak, an antibody detection diagnostic assay would be required to prove freedom of disease within the previously infected zone and eventually nationwide. Animals surviving an ASF infection would be considered carriers and could be identified through the persistence of ASF viral antibodies. These antibodies would demonstrate exposure to the disease and not vaccination, as there is no ASF vaccine available. A well-established commercial enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) detects antibodies against ASF virus (ASFV), but the diagnostic specificity of the assay had not been determined using serum samples from the pig population of the United States. This study describes an evaluation of the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE)-recommended Ingezim PPA COMPAC ELISA using a comprehensive cohort (n = 1791) of samples collected in the United States. The diagnostic specificity of the assay was determined to be 99.4% (95% confidence interval (CI): [98.9, 99.7]). The result of this study fills a gap in understanding the performance of the Ingezim PPA COMPAC ELISA in the ASF naïve pig population of the United States. Published 2017. This article is a U.S. Government work and is in the public domain in the USA.

  13. The production of direct object clitics in pre-school- and primary school-aged children with specific language impairments.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Guasti, Maria Teresa; Palma, Silvia; Genovese, Elisabetta; Stagi, Paolo; Saladini, Gabriella; Arosio, Fabrizio

    2016-01-01

    Third-person direct object (DO) clitic pronoun production is examined through an elicited production method in pre-school- and primary school-aged groups of Italian children with specific language impairment (SLI) to establish whether there is an improvement from age 5 years to age 7 years and whether there are qualitative differences in the two groups' responses. It was found that 5- and 7-year-old Italian children with SLI produce fewer third-person DO clitics than same-age peers. The kind of responses they provide changes: at 5 years, children with SLI tend to omit clitics, while at 7 years, they use a full noun. Production of third-person DO clitics is a persistent challenge for children with SLI and is confirmed to be a good clinical marker both at 5 and 7 years of age.

  14. OAI Object Re-Use and Exchange

    CERN Document Server

    CERN. Geneva; Jacobs, Neil

    2007-01-01

    YouTube, Flickr, del.icio.us, blogs, message boards and other "Web 2.0" related technologies are indicative of the contemporary web experience. There is a growing interest in appropriating these tools and modalities to support the scholarly communication process. This begins with leveraging the intrinsic value of scholarly digital objects beyond the borders of the hosting repository. There are numerous examples of the need to re-use objects across repositories in scholarly communication. These include citation, preservation, virtual collections of distributed objects, and the progression of units of scholarly communication through the registration-certification-awareness-archiving chain. The last several years have brought about numerous open source repository systems and their associated communities. The Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) has been the initial catalyst for repository interoperability. However, there is now a rising interest in repositories no longer being stat...

  15. 78 FR 8682 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Henri Labrouste...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-02-06

    ... exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, from on or... abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are...

  16. 78 FR 62355 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Ileana Sonnabend...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-10-18

    ... exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, from on or... abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are...

  17. O-ODM Framework for Object-Relational Databases

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Carlos Alberto Rombaldo Jr

    2012-09-01

    Full Text Available Object-Relational Databases introduce new features which allow manipulating objects in databases. At present, many DBMS offer resources to manipulate objects in database, but most application developers just map class to relations tables, failing to exploit the O-R model strength. The lack of tools that aid the database project contributes to this situation. This work presents O-ODM (Object-Object Database Mapping, a persistent framework that maps objects from OO applications to database objects. Persistent Frameworks have been used to aid developers, managing all access to DBMS. This kind of tool allows developers to persist objects without solid knowledge about DBMSs and specific languages, improving the developers’ productivity, mainly when a different DBMS is used. The results of some experiments using O-ODM are shown.

  18. Compact objects and accretion disks

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Blandford, Roger; Agol, Eric; Broderick, Avery; Heyl, Jeremy; Koopmans, Leon; Lee, Hee-Won

    2002-01-01

    Recent developments in the spectropolarimetric study of compact objects, specifically black holes (stellar and massive) and neutron stars are reviewed. The lectures are organized around five topics: disks, jets, outflows, neutron stars and black holes. They emphasize physical mechanisms and are

  19. Finding Specification Pages from the Web

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yoshinaga, Naoki; Torisawa, Kentaro

    This paper presents a method of finding a specification page on the Web for a given object (e.g., ``Ch. d'Yquem'') and its class label (e.g., ``wine''). A specification page for an object is a Web page which gives concise attribute-value information about the object (e.g., ``county''-``Sauternes'') in well formatted structures. A simple unsupervised method using layout and symbolic decoration cues was applied to a large number of the Web pages to acquire candidate attributes for each class (e.g., ``county'' for a class ``wine''). We then filter out irrelevant words from the putative attributes through an author-aware scoring function that we called site frequency. We used the acquired attributes to select a representative specification page for a given object from the Web pages retrieved by a normal search engine. Experimental results revealed that our system greatly outperformed the normal search engine in terms of this specification retrieval.

  20. Biogeography of Missouri. Instructional Unit. Conservation Education Series.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Castillon, David A.

    This unit is designed to help social studies or science teachers incorporate ecological concepts into the teaching of science and Missouri geography. The unit includes: (1) a topic outline; (2) general unit objectives; (3) an introduction to basic biogeographical concepts; (4) descriptions of the glaciated prairie, unglaciated prairie, ozark, and…

  1. Shape configuration and category-specificity

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerlach, Christian; Law, I; Paulson, Olaf B.

    2006-01-01

    and fragmented drawings. We also examined whether fragmentation had different impact on the recognition of natural objects and artefacts and found that recognition of artefacts was more affected by fragmentation than recognition of natural objects. Thus, the usual finding of an advantage for artefacts...... in difficult object decision tasks, which is also found in the present experiments with outlines, is reversed when the stimuli are fragmented. This interaction between category (natural versus artefacts) and stimulus type (outlines versus fragmented forms) is in accordance with predictions derived from...... a recent account of category-specificity and lends support to the notion that category-specific impairments can occur for both natural objects and artefacts following damage to pre-semantic stages in visual object recognition. The implications of the present findings are discussed in relation to theories...

  2. Performance and burnout in intensive care units

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Keijsers, GJ; Schaufeli, WB; LeBlanc, P; Zwerts, C; Miranda, DR

    1995-01-01

    The relationship between three different performance measures and burnout was explored in 20 Dutch Intensive Care Units (ICUs). Burnout (i.e. emotional exhaustion and depersonalization) proved to be significantly related to nurses' perceptions of performance as well as to objectively assessed unit

  3. United States Transuranium Registry. Annual report, October 1, 1983-September 30, 1984

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Swint, M.J.; Kathren, R.L.

    1985-04-01

    This report provides an overview of the objectives, program, facilities and FY-84 accomplishments of the United States Transuranium Registry. Specific activities summarized include postmortem radiochemical analysis of two whole bodies, one with a significant deposition of 241 Am and the other with a deposition of 239 Pu. Results of a followup of early Manhattan District workers as potential registrants, a possible relationship between actinide concentration in bone and ash content, and interlaboratory cooperative activities are briefly discussed along with the initiation of studies of actinides in bone marrow and hair

  4. 78 FR 79057 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Gauguin: Metamorphoses”

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-12-27

    ... objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, from on or about March 8, 2014, until on or about... United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements with...

  5. Associative Symmetry versus Independent Associations in the Memory for Object-Location Associations

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sommer, Tobias; Rose, Michael; Buchel, Christian

    2007-01-01

    The formation of associations between objects and locations is a vital aspect of episodic memory. More specifically, remembering the location where one experienced an object and, vice versa, the object one encountered at a specific location are both important elements for the memory of an event. Whether episodic associations are holistic…

  6. Object similarity affects the perceptual strategy underlying invariant visual object recognition in rats

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Federica Bianca Rosselli

    2015-03-01

    Full Text Available In recent years, a number of studies have explored the possible use of rats as models of high-level visual functions. One central question at the root of such an investigation is to understand whether rat object vision relies on the processing of visual shape features or, rather, on lower-order image properties (e.g., overall brightness. In a recent study, we have shown that rats are capable of extracting multiple features of an object that are diagnostic of its identity, at least when those features are, structure-wise, distinct enough to be parsed by the rat visual system. In the present study, we have assessed the impact of object structure on rat perceptual strategy. We trained rats to discriminate between two structurally similar objects, and compared their recognition strategies with those reported in our previous study. We found that, under conditions of lower stimulus discriminability, rat visual discrimination strategy becomes more view-dependent and subject-dependent. Rats were still able to recognize the target objects, in a way that was largely tolerant (i.e., invariant to object transformation; however, the larger structural and pixel-wise similarity affected the way objects were processed. Compared to the findings of our previous study, the patterns of diagnostic features were: i smaller and more scattered; ii only partially preserved across object views; and iii only partially reproducible across rats. On the other hand, rats were still found to adopt a multi-featural processing strategy and to make use of part of the optimal discriminatory information afforded by the two objects. Our findings suggest that, as in humans, rat invariant recognition can flexibly rely on either view-invariant representations of distinctive object features or view-specific object representations, acquired through learning.

  7. Modified-hybrid optical neural network filter for multiple object recognition within cluttered scenes

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kypraios, Ioannis; Young, Rupert C. D.; Chatwin, Chris R.

    2009-08-01

    Motivated by the non-linear interpolation and generalization abilities of the hybrid optical neural network filter between the reference and non-reference images of the true-class object we designed the modifiedhybrid optical neural network filter. We applied an optical mask to the hybrid optical neural network's filter input. The mask was built with the constant weight connections of a randomly chosen image included in the training set. The resulted design of the modified-hybrid optical neural network filter is optimized for performing best in cluttered scenes of the true-class object. Due to the shift invariance properties inherited by its correlator unit the filter can accommodate multiple objects of the same class to be detected within an input cluttered image. Additionally, the architecture of the neural network unit of the general hybrid optical neural network filter allows the recognition of multiple objects of different classes within the input cluttered image by modifying the output layer of the unit. We test the modified-hybrid optical neural network filter for multiple objects of the same and of different classes' recognition within cluttered input images and video sequences of cluttered scenes. The filter is shown to exhibit with a single pass over the input data simultaneously out-of-plane rotation, shift invariance and good clutter tolerance. It is able to successfully detect and classify correctly the true-class objects within background clutter for which there has been no previous training.

  8. Nurse-Patient Communication Interactions in the Intensive Care Unit

    Science.gov (United States)

    Happ, Mary Beth; Garrett, Kathryn; Thomas, Dana DiVirgilio; Tate, Judith; George, Elisabeth; Houze, Martin; Radtke, Jill; Sereika, Susan

    2011-01-01

    Background The inability to speak during critical illness is a source of distress for patients, yet nurse-patient communication in the intensive care unit has not been systematically studied or measured. Objectives To describe communication interactions, methods, and assistive techniques between nurses and nonspeaking critically ill patients in the intensive care unit. Methods Descriptive observational study of the nonintervention/usual care cohort from a larger clinical trial of nurse-patient communication in a medical and a cardiothoracic surgical intensive care unit. Videorecorded interactions between 10 randomly selected nurses (5 per unit) and a convenience sample of 30 critically ill adults (15 per unit) who were awake, responsive, and unable to speak because of respiratory tract intubation were rated for frequency, success, quality, communication methods, and assistive communication techniques. Patients self-rated ease of communication. Results Nurses initiated most (86.2%) of the communication exchanges. Mean rate of completed communication exchange was 2.62 exchanges per minute. The most common positive nurse act was making eye contact with the patient. Although communication exchanges were generally (>70%) successful, more than one-third (37.7%) of communications about pain were unsuccessful. Patients rated 40% of the communication sessions with nurses as somewhat difficult to extremely difficult. Assistive communication strategies were uncommon, with little to no use of assistive communication materials (eg, writing supplies, alphabet or word boards). Conclusions Study results highlight specific areas for improvement in communication between nurses and nonspeaking patients in the intensive care unit, particularly in communication about pain and in the use of assistive communication strategies and communication materials. PMID:21362711

  9. Edexcel A2 Physics Student Unit Guide

    CERN Document Server

    Benn, Mike

    2010-01-01

    Student Unit Guides are perfect for revision. Each guide is written by an examiner and explains the unit requirements, summarises the relevant unit content and includes a series of specimen questions and answers. There are three sections to each guide:. Introduction - includes advice on how to use the guide, an explanation of the skills being tested by the assessment objectives, an outline of the unit or module and, depending on the unit, suggestions for how to revise effectively and prepare for the examination questions. Content Guidance - provides an examiner's overview of the module's key t

  10. AQA A2 Chemistry Student Unit Guide

    CERN Document Server

    Cross, Margaret

    2010-01-01

    Student Unit Guides are perfect for revision. Each guide is written by an examiner and explains the unit requirements, summarises the relevant unit content and includes a series of specimen questions and answers. There are three sections to each guide:. Introduction - includes advice on how to use the guide, an explanation of the skills being tested by the assessment objectives, an outline of the unit or module and, depending on the unit, suggestions for how to revise effectively and prepare for the examination questions. Content Guidance - provides an examiner's overview of the module's key t

  11. Convergent synthesis of a tetrasaccharide repeating unit of the O-specific polysaccharide from the cell wall lipopolysaccharide of Azospirillum brasilense strain Sp7

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pintu Kumar Mandal

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available A straightforward convergent synthesis has been carried out for the tetrasaccharide repeating unit of the O-specific cell wall lipopolysaccharide of the strain Sp7 of Azospirillum brasilense. The target tetrasaccharide has been synthesized from suitably protected monosaccharide intermediates in 42% overall yield in seven steps by using a [2 + 2] block glycosylation approach.

  12. Popularity and user diversity of online objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wang, Jia-Hua; Guo, Qiang; Yang, Kai; Zhang, Yi-Lu; Han, Jingti; Liu, Jian-Guo

    2016-11-01

    The popularity has been widely used to describe the object property of online user-object bipartite networks regardless of the user characteristics. In this paper, we introduce a measurement namely user diversity to measure diversity of users who select or rate one type of objects by using the information entropy. We empirically calculate the user diversity of objects with specific degree for both MovieLens and Diggs data sets. The results indicate that more types of users select normal-degree objects than those who select large-degree and small-degree objects. Furthermore, small-degree objects are usually selected by large-degree users while large-degree objects are usually selected by small-degree users. Moreover, we define 15% objects of smallest degrees as unpopular objects and 10% ones of largest degrees as popular objects. The timestamp is introduced to help further analyze the evolution of user diversity of popular objects and unpopular objects. The dynamic analysis shows that as objects become popular gradually, they are more likely accepted by small-degree users but lose attention among the large-degree users.

  13. Cosmic bombardment V: Threat object-dispersing approaches to active planetary defense

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Teller, E.; Wood, L. [Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace]|[Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States); Ishikawa, M. [Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics]|[Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States); Hyde, R. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)

    1995-05-24

    Earth-impacting comets and asteroids with diameters {approx}0.03 - 10 km pose the greatest threats to the terrestrial biosphere in terms of impact frequency-weighted impact consequences, and thus are of most concern to designers of active planetary defenses. Specific gravitational binding energies of such objects range from 10{sup -7} to 10{sup -2} J/gm, and are small compared with the specific energies of 1x10{sup 3} to 3x10{sup 3} J/gm required to vaporize objects of typical composition or the specific energies required to pulverize them, which are 10{sup -1} to 10 J/gm. All of these are small compared to the specific kinetic energy of these objects in the Earth- centered frame, which is 2x10{sup 5} to 2x10{sup 6} J/gm. The prospect naturally arises of negating all such threats by deflecting, pulverizing or vaporizing the objects. Pulverization-with-dispersal is an attractive option of reasonable defensive robustness. Examples of such equipments - which employ no explosives of any type - are given. Vaporization is the maximally robust defensive option, and may be invoked to negate threat objects not observed until little time is left until Earth-strike, and pulverization-with-dispersal has proven inadequate. Physically larger threats may be vaporized with nuclear explosives. No contemporary technical means of any kind appear capable of directly dispersing the -100 km diameter scale Charon- class cometary objects recently observed in the outer solar system, although such objects may be deflected to defensively useful extents. Means of implementing defenses of each of these types are proposed for specificity, and areas for optimization noted. Biospheric impacts of threat object debris are briefly considered, for bounding purposes. Experiments are suggested on cometary and asteroidal objects.

  14. Technical evaluation report on the proposed design modifications and technical-specification changes on grid voltage degradation for the San Onofre Nuclear Genetating Station, Unit 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Selan, J.C.

    1982-01-01

    This report documents the technical evaluation of the proposed design modifications and Technical Specification changes for protection of Class 1E equipment from grid voltage degradation for the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, Unit 1. The review criteria are based on several IEEE standards and the Code of Federal Regulations. The evaluation finds that the proposed design modifications and Technical Specification changes will ensure that the Class 1E equipment will be protected from sustained voltage degradation

  15. Multi objective multi refinery optimization with environmental and catastrophic failure effects objectives

    Science.gov (United States)

    Khogeer, Ahmed Sirag

    2005-11-01

    Petroleum refining is a capital-intensive business. With stringent environmental regulations on the processing industry and declining refining margins, political instability, increased risk of war and terrorist attacks in which refineries and fuel transportation grids may be targeted, higher pressures are exerted on refiners to optimize performance and find the best combination of feed and processes to produce salable products that meet stricter product specifications, while at the same time meeting refinery supply commitments and of course making profit. This is done through multi objective optimization. For corporate refining companies and at the national level, Intea-Refinery and Inter-Refinery optimization is the second step in optimizing the operation of the whole refining chain as a single system. Most refinery-wide optimization methods do not cover multiple objectives such as minimizing environmental impact, avoiding catastrophic failures, or enhancing product spec upgrade effects. This work starts by carrying out a refinery-wide, single objective optimization, and then moves to multi objective-single refinery optimization. The last step is multi objective-multi refinery optimization, the objectives of which are analysis of the effects of economic, environmental, product spec, strategic, and catastrophic failure. Simulation runs were carried out using both MATLAB and ASPEN PIMS utilizing nonlinear techniques to solve the optimization problem. The results addressed the need to debottleneck some refineries or transportation media in order to meet the demand for essential products under partial or total failure scenarios. They also addressed how importing some high spec products can help recover some of the losses and what is needed in order to accomplish this. In addition, the results showed nonlinear relations among local and global objectives for some refineries. The results demonstrate that refineries can have a local multi objective optimum that does not

  16. Pressurized thermal shock evaluation of the Calvert Cliffs Unit 1 Nuclear Power Plant

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Abbott, L [ed.

    1985-09-01

    An evaluation of the risk to the Calvert Cliffs Unit 1 nuclear power plant due to pressurized thermal shock (PTS) has been completed by Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) with the assistance of several other organizations. This evaluation was part of a Nuclear Regulatory Commission program designed to study the PTS risk to three nuclear plants, the other two plants being Oconee Unit 1 and H.B. Robinson Unit 2. The specific objectives of the program were to (1) provide a best estimate of the frequency of a through-the-wall crack in the pressure vessel at each of the three plants, together with the uncertainty in the estimated frequency and its sensitivity to the variables used in the evaluation; (2) determine the dominant overcooling sequences contributing to the estimated frequency and the associated failures in the plant systems or in operator actions; and (3) evaluate the effectiveness of potential corrective measures.

  17. Pressurized thermal shock evaluation of the Calvert Cliffs Unit 1 Nuclear Power Plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Abbott, L.

    1985-09-01

    An evaluation of the risk to the Calvert Cliffs Unit 1 nuclear power plant due to pressurized thermal shock (PTS) has been completed by Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) with the assistance of several other organizations. This evaluation was part of a Nuclear Regulatory Commission program designed to study the PTS risk to three nuclear plants, the other two plants being Oconee Unit 1 and H.B. Robinson Unit 2. The specific objectives of the program were to (1) provide a best estimate of the frequency of a through-the-wall crack in the pressure vessel at each of the three plants, together with the uncertainty in the estimated frequency and its sensitivity to the variables used in the evaluation; (2) determine the dominant overcooling sequences contributing to the estimated frequency and the associated failures in the plant systems or in operator actions; and (3) evaluate the effectiveness of potential corrective measures

  18. Object color affects identification and repetition priming.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Uttl, Bob; Graf, Peter; Santacruz, Pilar

    2006-10-01

    We investigated the influence of color on the identification of both non-studied and studied objects. Participants studied black and white and color photos of common objects and memory was assessed with an identification test. Consistent with our meta-analysis of prior research, we found that objects were easier to identify from color than from black and white photos. We also found substantial priming in all conditions, and study-to-test changes in an object's color reduced the magnitude of priming. Color-specific priming effects were large for color-complex objects, but minimal for color-simple objects. The pattern and magnitude of priming effects was not influenced either by the extent to which an object always appears in the same color (i.e., whether a color is symptomatic of an object) or by the object's origin (natural versus fabricated). We discuss the implications of our findings for theoretical accounts of object perception and repetition priming.

  19. Health Policy Brief: Global Mental Health and the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cratsley, Kelso; Mackey, Tim K

    2018-01-25

    Increased awareness of the importance of mental health for global health has led to a number of new initiatives, including influential policy instruments issued by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations (UN). This policy brief describes two WHO instruments, the Mental Health Action Plan for 2013-2020 (World Health Organization, 2013) and the Mental Health Atlas (World Health Organization, 2015), and presents a comparative analysis with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN's 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (United Nations, 2015). The WHO's Action Plan calls for several specific objectives and targets, with a focus on improving global mental health governance and service coverage. In contrast, the UN's Sustainable Development Goals include only one goal specific to mental health, with a single indicator tracking suicide mortality rates. The discrepancy between the WHO and UN frameworks suggests a need for increased policy coherence. Improved global health governance can provide the basis for ensuring and accelerating progress in global mental health. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

  20. Leukoreduction by centrifugation does not eliminate Trypanosoma cruzi from infected blood units.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dzib, Doris; Hernández, Virginia Peña; Ake, Baldemar Canche; López, Ruth Alacantara; Monteón, Victor Manuel

    2009-06-01

    Current strategies to prevent transfusion-associated Chagas disease include the identification of Trypanosoma cruzi-infected blood donors through questionnaires and serologic tests. There are other procedures such as leukoreduction that prevent the transmission of infectious agents associated to white cells. The objective of the present work was to estimate the seroprevalence, evaluate the efficacy of leukoreduction by centrifugation to eliminate T. cruzi in infected blood units, and the correlation of immunoglobulin G (IgG) subclasses of seropositive blood donors with chronic chagasic cardiopathy. Over a period of 14 months, 33 out of 6600 blood donors (0.5%) at Centro Estatal de la Transfusión Sanguínea in Campeche State, México were seropositive for T. cruzi. Twenty seropositive blood units were submitted through leukoreduction by centrifugation, and in the fractions generated (red cell fraction, platelets, and the buffy-coat), we searched for the presence of T. cruzi using specific polymerase chain reaction. We detected parasite DNA in 50% to 60% of the fractions tested, suggesting that leukoreduction by centrifugation does not eliminate the microorganisms in the infected blood unit. We also observed that the level of IgG2 and IgG4 subclasses specific for T. cruzi in seropositive blood donors was lower than in chronic cardiopathic chagasic patients. In conclusion, leukoreduction by centrifugation has a limited role in eliminating T. cruzi in infected blood supply, and the low level of specific IgG2 and IgG4 could be a marker in the indeterminate phase of infection.

  1. Partial Evaluation for Class-Based Object-Oriented Languages

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Schultz, Ulrik Pagh

    2001-01-01

    Object-oriented programming facilitates the development of generic software, but at a significant cost in terms of performance. We apply partial evaluation to object-oriented programs, to automatically map generic software into specific implementations. In this paper we give a concise, formal...... description of a simple partial evaluator for a minimal object-oriented language, and give directions for extending this partial evaluator to handle realistic programs....

  2. GA/particle swarm intelligence based optimization of two specific varieties of controller devices applied to two-area multi-units automatic generation control

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Bhatt, Praghnesh [Department of Electrical Engineering, Charotar Institute of Technology, Changa 388 421, Gujarat (India); Roy, Ranjit [Department of Electrical Engineering, S.V. National Institute of Technology, Surat 395 007, Gujarat (India); Ghoshal, S.P. [Department of Electrical Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Durgapur 713 209, West Bengal (India)

    2010-05-15

    This paper presents the comparative performance analysis of the two specific varieties of controller devices for optimal transient performance of automatic generation control (AGC) of an interconnected two-area power system, having multiple thermal-hydro-diesels mixed generating units. The significant improvement of optimal transient performance is observed with the addition of a thyristor-controlled phase shifter (TCPS) in the tie-line or capacitive energy storage (CES) units fitted in both the areas. Three different optimization algorithms are adopted for the sake of comparison of optimal performances and obtaining the optimal values of the gain settings of the devices independently. Craziness based particle swarm optimization (CRPSO) proves to be moderately fast algorithm and yields true optimal gains and minimum overshoot, minimum undershoot and minimum settling time of the transient response for any system. Comparative studies of TCPS and CES by any algorithm reveals that the CES units fitted in both the areas improve the transient performance to a greater extent following small load disturbance(s) in both the areas. (author)

  3. Ritualized Space and Objects of Sacrosanctity

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    2010-01-01

    : such areas, buildings, places, and objects, stand out as ritualized physical structures. In the West, historically, such traditions have included hierarchies of sacred places (e.g. Jerusalem, Mecca, Rome), defined by mythical events and religious memory; sacred bodies (dead or alive) as manifested......The idea that formalized performative acts may manifest sacrosanctity spatially or in specific physical objects is often brought out in descriptions of ritual practices. Rituals of sanctification or dedication of sacred areas, temples, churches, and objects of veneration provide well-known examples...... by different kinds of ordination or initiation (e.g. saints, kings, priests, ordinary Christians); sacred buildings, places, and objects (churches and monasteries with their precincts including graveyards; various kinds of vessels, reliquaries, altars, crucifixes, books, thrones, statues, pictures, etc). Each...

  4. RAMS+C informed decision-making with application to multi-objective optimization of technical specifications and maintenance using genetic algorithms

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Martorell, S.; Villanueva, J.F.; Carlos, S.; Nebot, Y.; Sanchez, A.; Pitarch, J.L.; Serradell, V.

    2005-01-01

    The role of technical specifications and maintenance (TSM) activities at nuclear power plants (NPP) aims to increase reliability, availability and maintainability (RAM) of Safety-Related Equipment, which, in turn, must yield to an improved level of plant safety. However, more resources (e.g. costs, task force, etc.) have to be assigned in above areas to achieve better scores in reliability, availability, maintainability and safety (RAMS). Current situation at NPP shows different programs implemented at the plant that aim to the improvement of particular TSM-related parameters where the decision-making process is based on the assessment of the impact of the change proposed on a subgroup of RAMS+C attributes. This paper briefly reviews the role of TSM and two main groups of improvement programs at NPP, which suggest the convenience of considering the approach proposed in this paper for the Integrated Multi-Criteria Decision-Making on changes to TSM-related parameters based on RAMS+C criteria as a whole, as it can be seem as a decision-making process more consistent with the role and synergic effects of TSM and the objectives and goals of current improvement programs at NPP. The case of application to the Emergency Diesel Generator system demonstrates the viability and significance of the proposed approach for the Multi-objective Optimization of TSM-related parameters using a Genetic Algorithm

  5. The burden of disease and injury in the United States 1996

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Salomon Joshua A

    2006-10-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Burden of disease studies have been implemented in many countries using the Disability-Adjusted Life Year (DALY to assess major health problems. Important objectives of the study were to quantify intra-country differentials in health outcomes and to place the United States situation in the international context. Methods We applied methods developed for the Global Burden of Disease (GBD to data specific to the United States to compute Disability-Adjusted Life Years. Estimates are provided by age and gender for the general population of the United States and for each of the four official race groups: White; Black; American Indian or Alaskan Native; and Asian or Pacific Islander. Several adjustments of GBD methods were made: the inclusion of race; a revised list of causes; and a revised algorithm to allocate cardiovascular disease garbage codes to ischaemic heart disease. We compared the results of this analysis to international estimates published by the World Health Organization for developed and developing regions of the world. Results In the mid-1990s the leading sources of premature death and disability in the United States, as measured by DALYs, were: cardiovascular conditions, breast and lung cancers, depression, osteoarthritis, diabetes mellitus, and alcohol use and abuse. In addition, motor vehicle-related injuries and the HIV epidemic exacted a substantial toll on the health status of the US population, particularly among racial minorities. The major sources of death and disability in these latter populations were more similar to patterns of burden in developing rather than developed countries. Conclusion Estimating DALYs specifically for the United States provides a comprehensive assessment of health problems for this country compared to what is available using mortality data alone.

  6. Audiovisual communication of object-names improves the spatial accuracy of recalled object-locations in topographic maps.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lammert-Siepmann, Nils; Bestgen, Anne-Kathrin; Edler, Dennis; Kuchinke, Lars; Dickmann, Frank

    2017-01-01

    Knowing the correct location of a specific object learned from a (topographic) map is fundamental for orientation and navigation tasks. Spatial reference systems, such as coordinates or cardinal directions, are helpful tools for any geometric localization of positions that aims to be as exact as possible. Considering modern visualization techniques of multimedia cartography, map elements transferred through the auditory channel can be added easily. Audiovisual approaches have been discussed in the cartographic community for many years. However, the effectiveness of audiovisual map elements for map use has hardly been explored so far. Within an interdisciplinary (cartography-cognitive psychology) research project, it is examined whether map users remember object-locations better if they do not just read the corresponding place names, but also listen to them as voice recordings. This approach is based on the idea that learning object-identities influences learning object-locations, which is crucial for map-reading tasks. The results of an empirical study show that the additional auditory communication of object names not only improves memory for the names (object-identities), but also for the spatial accuracy of their corresponding object-locations. The audiovisual communication of semantic attribute information of a spatial object seems to improve the binding of object-identity and object-location, which enhances the spatial accuracy of object-location memory.

  7. Prospective gas turbine and combined-cycle units for power engineering (a Review)

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ol'khovskii, G. G.

    2013-02-01

    The modern state of technology for making gas turbines around the world and heat-recovery combined-cycle units constructed on their basis are considered. The progress achieved in this field by Siemens, Mitsubishi, General Electric, and Alstom is analyzed, and the objectives these companies set forth for themselves for the near and more distant future are discussed. The 375-MW gas turbine unit with an efficiency of 40% produced by Siemens, which is presently the largest one, is subjected to a detailed analysis. The main specific features of this turbine are that the gas turbine unit's hot-path components have purely air cooling, due to which the installation has enhanced maneuverability. The single-shaft combined-cycle plant constructed on the basis of this turbine has a capacity of 570 MW and efficiency higher than 60%. Programs adopted by different companies for development of new-generation gas turbine units firing synthesis gas and fitted with low-emission combustion chambers and new cooling systems are considered. Concepts of rotor blades for new gas turbine units with improved thermal barrier coatings and composite blades different parts of which are made of materials selected in accordance with the conditions of their operation are discussed.

  8. Are Alcohol Taxation and Pricing Policies Regressive? Product-Level Effects of a Specific Tax and a Minimum Unit Price for Alcohol.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Vandenberg, Brian; Sharma, Anurag

    2016-07-01

    To compare estimated effects of two policy alternatives, (i) a minimum unit price (MUP) for alcohol and (ii) specific (per-unit) taxation, upon current product prices, per capita spending (A$), and per capita consumption by income quintile, consumption quintile and product type. Estimation of baseline spending and consumption, and modelling policy-to-price and price-to-consumption effects of policy changes using scanner data from a panel of demographically representative Australian households that includes product-level details of their off-trade alcohol spending (n = 885; total observations = 12,505). Robustness checks include alternative price elasticities, tax rates, minimum price thresholds and tax pass-through rates. Current alcohol taxes and alternative taxation and pricing policies are not highly regressive. Any regressive effects are small and concentrated among heavy consumers. The lowest-income consumers currently spend a larger proportion of income (2.3%) on alcohol taxes than the highest-income consumers (0.3%), but the mean amount is small in magnitude [A$5.50 per week (95%CI: 5.18-5.88)]. Both a MUP and specific taxation will have some regressive effects, but the effects are limited, as they are greatest for the heaviest consumers, irrespective of income. Among the policy alternatives, a MUP is more effective in reducing consumption than specific taxation, especially for consumers in the lowest-income quintile: an estimated mean per capita reduction of 11.9 standard drinks per week (95%CI: 11.3-12.6). Policies that increase the cost of the cheapest alcohol can be effective in reducing alcohol consumption, without having highly regressive effects. © The Author 2015. Medical Council on Alcohol and Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.

  9. United Kingdom's experience

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Drummond, S.M.

    1994-01-01

    This is a presentation of the United Kingdom's experience with power transmission open access. The topics of the presentation include the objectives of changing, commercial arrangements and economic drivers, long term effects, the effects of moving to a more competitive environment, and factors affecting open access such as political climate and market regulation

  10. Structured Course Objects in a Digital Library

    Science.gov (United States)

    Maly, K.; Zubair, M.; Liu, X.; Nelson, M.; Zeil, S.

    1999-01-01

    We are developing an Undergraduate Digital Library Framework (UDLF) that will support creation/archiving of courses and reuse of existing course material to evolve courses. UDLF supports the publication of course materials for later instantiation for a specific offering and allows the addition of time-dependent and student-specific information and structures. Instructors and, depending on permissions, students can access the general course materials or the materials for a specific offering. We are building a reference implementation based on NCSTRL+, a digital library derived from NCSTRL. Digital objects in NCSTRL+ are called buckets, self-contained entities that carry their own methods for access and display. Current bucket implementations have a two level structure of packages and elements. This is not a rich enough structure for course objects in UDLF. Typically, courses can only be modeled as a multilevel hierarchy and among different courses, both the syntax and semantics of terms may vary. Therefore, we need a mechanism to define, within a particular library, course models, their constituent objects, and the associated semantics in a flexible, extensible way. In this paper, we describe our approach to define and implement these multilayered course objects. We use XML technology to emulate complex data structures within the NCSTRL+ buckets. We have developed authoring and browsing tools to manipulate these course objects. In our current implementation a user downloading an XML based course bucket also downloads the XML-aware tools: an applet that enables the user to edit or browse the bucket. We claim that XML provides an effective means to represent multi-level structure of a course bucket.

  11. Multi-objective compared to single-objective optimization with application to model validation and uncertainty quantification

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Schulze-Riegert, R.; Krosche, M.; Stekolschikov, K. [Scandpower Petroleum Technology GmbH, Hamburg (Germany); Fahimuddin, A. [Technische Univ. Braunschweig (Germany)

    2007-09-13

    History Matching in Reservoir Simulation, well location and production optimization etc. is generally a multi-objective optimization problem. The problem statement of history matching for a realistic field case includes many field and well measurements in time and type, e.g. pressure measurements, fluid rates, events such as water and gas break-throughs, etc. Uncertainty parameters modified as part of the history matching process have varying impact on the improvement of the match criteria. Competing match criteria often reduce the likelihood of finding an acceptable history match. It is an engineering challenge in manual history matching processes to identify competing objectives and to implement the changes required in the simulation model. In production optimization or scenario optimization the focus on one key optimization criterion such as NPV limits the identification of alternatives and potential opportunities, since multiple objectives are summarized in a predefined global objective formulation. Previous works primarily focus on a specific optimization method. Few works actually concentrate on the objective formulation and multi-objective optimization schemes have not yet been applied to reservoir simulations. This paper presents a multi-objective optimization approach applicable to reservoir simulation. It addresses the problem of multi-objective criteria in a history matching study and presents analysis techniques identifying competing match criteria. A Pareto-Optimizer is discussed and the implementation of that multi-objective optimization scheme is applied to a case study. Results are compared to a single-objective optimization method. (orig.)

  12. 77 FR 24554 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition; Determinations: “Quay Brothers: On...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-04-24

    ... display of the exhibit objects at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, from on or about August 12, 2012... temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported...

  13. Multi-objective optimization using genetic algorithms: A tutorial

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Konak, Abdullah; Coit, David W.; Smith, Alice E.

    2006-01-01

    Multi-objective formulations are realistic models for many complex engineering optimization problems. In many real-life problems, objectives under consideration conflict with each other, and optimizing a particular solution with respect to a single objective can result in unacceptable results with respect to the other objectives. A reasonable solution to a multi-objective problem is to investigate a set of solutions, each of which satisfies the objectives at an acceptable level without being dominated by any other solution. In this paper, an overview and tutorial is presented describing genetic algorithms (GA) developed specifically for problems with multiple objectives. They differ primarily from traditional GA by using specialized fitness functions and introducing methods to promote solution diversity

  14. An institution for object-z with inheritance and polymorphism

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Baumeister, Hubert; Bettaz, Mohamed; Maouche, Mourad

    2015-01-01

    logical systems and their connections. This is the foundation of multi-modelling languages allowing one to deal with heterogeneous specifications in a consistent way. To make Object-Z accessible as part of such a multi-modelling language, we define the institution OZS for Object-Z. We have chosen Object......-Z in part because it is a prominent software modelling language and in part because it allows us to study the formalisation of object-oriented concepts, like object identity, object state, dynamic behaviour, polymorphic sorts and inheritance....

  15. Adapting United States training practices to European utilities

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Walsh, T.E.

    1983-01-01

    The factors which must be considered in the process of adapting United States nuclear utility training programs to the needs of a European utility are discussed. Following a review of the present situation and drawing up of a new training program, the management commitments in terms of personnel and finance must be considered. Short term, medium and long term programs are outlined. The long term objectives should include the establishment of a total training centre. This facility should be capable of providing all the training necessary to operate a power plant safely. This would include specific simulator training, classroom training for operators, technician training, staff training, management training etc. In addition to a simulator, it should include an emergency response facility to train personnel. (U.K.)

  16. Visual object agnosia is associated with a breakdown of object-selective responses in the lateral occipital cortex.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ptak, Radek; Lazeyras, François; Di Pietro, Marie; Schnider, Armin; Simon, Stéphane R

    2014-07-01

    Patients with visual object agnosia fail to recognize the identity of visually presented objects despite preserved semantic knowledge. Object agnosia may result from damage to visual cortex lying close to or overlapping with the lateral occipital complex (LOC), a brain region that exhibits selectivity to the shape of visually presented objects. Despite this anatomical overlap the relationship between shape processing in the LOC and shape representations in object agnosia is unknown. We studied a patient with object agnosia following isolated damage to the left occipito-temporal cortex overlapping with the LOC. The patient showed intact processing of object structure, yet often made identification errors that were mainly based on the global visual similarity between objects. Using functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) we found that the damaged as well as the contralateral, structurally intact right LOC failed to show any object-selective fMRI activity, though the latter retained selectivity for faces. Thus, unilateral damage to the left LOC led to a bilateral breakdown of neural responses to a specific stimulus class (objects and artefacts) while preserving the response to a different stimulus class (faces). These findings indicate that representations of structure necessary for the identification of objects crucially rely on bilateral, distributed coding of shape features. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  17. Critical Concerns for Oral Communication Education in the United States and the United Kingdom

    Science.gov (United States)

    Emanuel, Richard

    2011-01-01

    An examination of oral communication education in the United States (U.S.) and United Kingdom (U.K.) identified four critical concerns: (1) Today's college students are not getting adequate oral communication education; (2) Oral communication education is being relegated to a "module" in another discipline-specific course; (3) When an…

  18. Multiple Level Crowding: Crowding at the Object Parts Level and at the Object Configural level.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kimchi, Ruth; Pirkner, Yossef

    2015-01-01

    In crowding, identification of a peripheral target in the presence of nearby flankers is worse than when the target appears alone. Prevailing theories hold that crowding occurs because of integration or "pooling" of low-level features at a single, relatively early stage of visual processing. Recent studies suggest that crowding can occur also between high-level object representations. The most relevant findings come from studies with faces and may be specific to faces. We examined whether crowding can occur at the object configural level in addition to part-level crowding, using nonface objects. Target (a disconnected square or diamond made of four elements) identification was measured at varying eccentricities. The flankers were similar either to the target parts or to the target configuration. The results showed crowding in both cases: Flankers interfered with target identification such that identification accuracy decreased with an increase in eccentricity, and no interference was observed at the fovea. Crowding by object parts, however, was weaker and had smaller spatial extent than crowding by object configurations; we related this finding to the relationship between crowding and perceptual organization. These results provide strong evidence that crowding occurs not only between object parts but also between configural representations of objects. © The Author(s) 2015.

  19. The United States and the Arab Gulf Monarchies

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kechichian, J.A.

    1999-01-01

    The United States has enduring strategic interests in the Persian Gulf region. To understand these interests and the Usa policy towards the Arab Gulf Monarchies, the french institute of international relations (IFRI) proposes this document. The following chapters are detailed: the United States and the Arab Gulf Monarchies, overview, Chief Unites States Objective: Access to oil, re-evaluating United States Foreign Policy in the Gulf, the second term (Usa strategy). (A.L.B.)

  20. Freestanding midwifery unit versus obstetric unit

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Overgaard, Charlotte; Møller, Anna Margrethe; Fenger-Grøn, Morten

    2011-01-01

    low-risk women intending FMU birth and a matched control group of 839 low-risk women intending OU birth were included at the start of care in labour. OU women were individually chosen to match selected obstetric/socio-economic characteristics of FMU women. Analysis was by intention to treat. Main......Objective To compare perinatal and maternal morbidity and birth interventions in low-risk women giving birth in two freestanding midwifery units (FMUs) and two obstetric units (OUs). Design A cohort study with a matched control group. Setting The region of North Jutland, Denmark. Participants 839...... women were significantly less likely to experience an abnormal fetal heart rate (RR: 0.3, 95% CI 0.2 to 0.5), fetal–pelvic complications (0.2, 0.05 to 0.6), shoulder dystocia (0.3, 0.1 to 0.9), occipital–posterior presentation (0.5, 0.3 to 0.9) and postpartum haemorrhage >500 ml (0.4, 0.3 to 0...

  1. Base compaction specification feasibility analysis.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-12-01

    The objective of this research is to establish the technical engineering and cost : analysis concepts that will enable WisDOT management to objectively evaluate the : feasibility of switching construction specification philosophies for aggregate base...

  2. 77 FR 17104 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Ecstatic Alphabets/Heaps...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-03-23

    ... objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, from on or about May 6, 2012, until on or about... United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements with...

  3. 76 FR 18291 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Boris Mikhailov: Case...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-04-01

    ... objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, from on or about May 26, 2011, until on or about... the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements...

  4. 75 FR 1110 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Marina Abramovic: The...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-08

    ... objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, from on or about March 14, 2010, until on or about May... the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements...

  5. Common Input to Motor Units of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Hand Muscles During Two-Digit Object Hold

    OpenAIRE

    Winges, Sara A.; Kornatz, Kurt W.; Santello, Marco

    2008-01-01

    Anatomical and physiological evidence suggests that common input to motor neurons of hand muscles is an important neural mechanism for hand control. To gain insight into the synaptic input underlying the coordination of hand muscles, significant effort has been devoted to describing the distribution of common input across motor units of extrinsic muscles. Much less is known, however, about the distribution of common input to motor units belonging to different intrinsic muscles and to intrinsi...

  6. On the Concepts of Usability and Reusability of Learning Objects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Miguel-Angel Sicilia

    2003-10-01

    Full Text Available “Reusable learning objects” oriented towards increasing their potential reusability are required to satisfy concerns about their granularity and their independence of concrete contexts of use. Such requirements also entail that the definition of learning object “usability,” and the techniques required to carry out their “usability evaluation” must be substantially different from those commonly used to characterize and evaluate the usability of conventional educational applications. In this article, a specific characterization of the concept of learning object usability is discussed, which places emphasis on “reusability,” the key property of learning objects residing in repositories. The concept of learning object reusability is described as the possibility and adequacy for the object to be usable in prospective educational settings, so that usability and reusability are considered two interrelated – and in many cases conflicting – properties of learning objects. Following the proposed characterization of two characteristics or properties of learning objects, a method to evaluate usability of specific learning objects will be presented.

  7. Object technology: A white paper

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jordan, S.R.; Arrowood, L.F.; Cain, W.D.; Stephens, W.M.; Vickers, B.D.

    1992-05-11

    Object-Oriented Technology (OOT), although not a new paradigm, has recently been prominently featured in the trade press and even general business publications. Indeed, the promises of object technology are alluring: the ability to handle complex design and engineering information through the full manufacturing production life cycle or to manipulate multimedia information, and the ability to improve programmer productivity in creating and maintaining high quality software. Groups at a number of the DOE facilities have been exploring the use of object technology for engineering, business, and other applications. In this white paper, the technology is explored thoroughly and compared with previous means of developing software and storing databases of information. Several specific projects within the DOE Complex are described, and the state of the commercial marketplace is indicated.

  8. Geospatial Database for Strata Objects Based on Land Administration Domain Model (ladm)

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nasorudin, N. N.; Hassan, M. I.; Zulkifli, N. A.; Rahman, A. Abdul

    2016-09-01

    Recently in our country, the construction of buildings become more complex and it seems that strata objects database becomes more important in registering the real world as people now own and use multilevel of spaces. Furthermore, strata title was increasingly important and need to be well-managed. LADM is a standard model for land administration and it allows integrated 2D and 3D representation of spatial units. LADM also known as ISO 19152. The aim of this paper is to develop a strata objects database using LADM. This paper discusses the current 2D geospatial database and needs for 3D geospatial database in future. This paper also attempts to develop a strata objects database using a standard data model (LADM) and to analyze the developed strata objects database using LADM data model. The current cadastre system in Malaysia includes the strata title is discussed in this paper. The problems in the 2D geospatial database were listed and the needs for 3D geospatial database in future also is discussed. The processes to design a strata objects database are conceptual, logical and physical database design. The strata objects database will allow us to find the information on both non-spatial and spatial strata title information thus shows the location of the strata unit. This development of strata objects database may help to handle the strata title and information.

  9. Ecology of Missouri Forests. Instructional Unit. Conservation Education Series.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jackson, Jim

    This unit is designed to help science, social studies, vocational agriculture, and other teachers incorporate forest ecology concepts into their subject matter. The unit includes: (1) topic outline; (2) unit objectives; (3) background information on climate and soils, levels of a deciduous forest, age classes, food and energy relationships, forest…

  10. Benchmarks for dynamic multi-objective optimisation

    CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

    Helbig, M

    2013-06-01

    Full Text Available When algorithms solve dynamic multi-objective optimisation problems (DMOOPs), benchmark functions should be used to determine whether the algorithm can overcome specific difficulties that can occur in real-world problems. However, for dynamic multi...

  11. An ODP computational model of a cooperative binding object

    Science.gov (United States)

    Logé, Christophe; Najm, Elie; Chen, Ken

    1997-12-01

    A next generation of systems that should appear will have to manage simultaneously several geographically distributed users. These systems belong to the class of computer-supported cooperative work systems (CSCW). The development of such complex systems requires rigorous development methods and flexible open architectures. Open distributed processing (ODP) is a standardization effort that aims at providing such architectures. ODP features appropriate abstraction levels and a clear articulation between requirements, programming and infrastructure support. ODP advocates the use of formal methods for the specification of systems and components. The computational model, an object-based model, one of the abstraction levels identified within ODP, plays a central role in the global architecture. In this model, basic objects can be composed with communication and distribution abstractions (called binding objects) to form a computational specification of distributed systems, or applications. Computational specifications can then be mapped (in a mechanism akin to compilation) onto an engineering solution. We use an ODP-inspired method to computationally specify a cooperative system. We start from a general purpose component that we progressively refine into a collection of basic and binding objects. We focus on two issues of a co-authoring application, namely, dynamic reconfiguration and multiview synchronization. We discuss solutions for these issues and formalize them using the MT-LOTOS specification language that is currently studied in the ISO standardization formal description techniques group.

  12. Object Pragmatics and Language Development.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Béguin, Marie

    2016-12-01

    The purpose of this contribution is to investigate the advent of language in the light of the appropriation of the cultural uses of the material objects related to material culture and the constitution of their public and shared meanings linked to their uses. First, we suggest that the Object Pragmatics paradigm offers a framework which allows us to take into account the uses of objects in daily life as a site of social conventions, communication and public and shared meanings. Second, we would like to underline the key role of the adult's mediations in the child's ability to evolve towards linguistic development. This contribution will discuss the notion of scenario involving primarily the object, as a possible semiotic tool to support the child's transition to language. We will finally illustrate that it is possible to take into consideration the mastery of conventional uses of the object in the child's ability to engage in a scenario and then to move towards communication and speech development. These issues will be addressed in the context of a research project which focuses on the observation of children interacting with an adult at 16, 20 and 24 months. These longitudinal data were collected by video in a semi-experimental triadic interaction design. The triadic interaction is considered as a relevant unit for the observation and analysis of the role of material culture in speech development, suggesting the existence of new mechanisms to be taken into account in addition to the interactive conditions largely mentioned in literature.

  13. Applying of component system development in object methodology

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Milan Mišovič

    2013-01-01

    components. They are a system of rules for components, connectors and configuration. Component meta-models for dynamic and mobile architectures also describe the concept of rules for configuration changes (rules for reconfiguration. As well-known meta-models are now considered: Wright for static architecture, SOFA and Darvin for dynamic architecture and SOFA 2.0 for mobile architecture, see (Rych, Weis, 2008.The CBD approach verbally defines the basic terms as component (primitive / composite, interface, component system, configuration, reconfiguration, logical (structural view, process view (behavioral, static component architecture, dynamic architecture, mobile architecture (fully dynamic architecture, see (IEEE Report, 2000 and (Crnk, Chaud, 2006.The CBD approach also presents several ​​ADL languages (Architecture Description Languages which are able to describe software architecture. The known languages ​​are integration ACME and UML (Unified Modeling Language, see (Garl, Mon, Wil, 2000 and (UNIFEM, 2005.The second approach to SWC / SWA systems is formed on SOA, but this article does not deal with it consistently.SOA is a philosophy of architecture. SOA is not a methodology for the comprehensive development of the target software. Nevertheless, SOA successfully filled the role of software design philosophy and on the other hand, also gave an important concept linking software components and their architectural units – business services. SOA understands any software as a Component System of a business service and solved life components in it. The physical implementation of components is given by a Web services platform. A certain lack of SOA is its weak link to the business processes that are a universally recognized platform for business activities and the source for the creation of enterprise services.This paper deals with a specific activity in the CBD, i.e. the integration of the concept of component-based system into an advanced procedural, object

  14. Study on the Development of Household Wastewater Treatment Unit

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ali Hadi Ghawi

    2018-03-01

    Full Text Available The cities of Iraq in general and the city of Al Diwaniyah in particular are characterized by the fact that the majority of households use septic tank to dispose of sewage, leading to contamination of ground and surface water and a disturbance to the environment. The objective of this study is to protect the water and soil sources from the risk of pollution, eliminate the process of perfusion and thus, reduce costs, maintain public health, as well as design and implement the proposed purification unit for domestic wastewater treatment. A domestic wastewater treatment unit has been improved to meet the standard specifications for the quality of the effluent wastewater. In this study, a compact non-electric sewage treatment unit was improved and implemented. Treatment is based on an effective modern biological purification process. Experimental verification and analysis of results were performed to demonstrate the improvement of physical and chemical parameters. The performance of the septic tanks-bioreactor gave satisfactory results. The removal efficiencies of Total Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD, Total Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD, NH4-N, Total Nitrogen and Total Suspended Solid (TSS were 96.9%, 84.6%, 78.8%, 79.9% and 95.3%, respectively.

  15. Technical evaluation report on the proposed amendment to the technical specifications on the reactor protection system and the engineered safety features actuation system for Ft. Calhoun, Unit No. 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Selan, J.C.

    1982-01-01

    This report documents the technical evaluation of the application to amend the Technical Specifications for the Ft. Calhoun Unit No. 1 Nuclear Generating Plant. The review criteria are based on the Technical Specifications of St. Lucie and Calvert Cliffs, IEEE Standards, Combustion Engineering Standard Technical Specifications, and the Code of Federal Regulations. The evaluation compares the submittal made by the licensee with the NRC staff position and the review criteria and presents the reviewer's conclusion on the acceptability of the application to amend the Technical Specifications

  16. Optimal coordinated scheduling of combined heat and power fuel cell, wind, and photovoltaic units in micro grids considering uncertainties

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bornapour, Mosayeb; Hooshmand, Rahmat-Allah; Khodabakhshian, Amin; Parastegari, Moein

    2016-01-01

    In this paper, a stochastic model is proposed for coordinated scheduling of combined heat and power units in micro grid considering wind turbine and photovoltaic units. Uncertainties of electrical market price; the speed of wind and solar radiation are considered using a scenario-based method. In the method, scenarios are generated using roulette wheel mechanism based on probability distribution functions of input random variables. Using this method, the probabilistic specifics of the problem are distributed and the problem is converted to a deterministic one. The type of the objective function, coordinated scheduling of combined heat and power, wind turbine, and photovoltaic units change this problem to a mixed integer nonlinear one. Therefore to solve this problem modified particle swarm optimization algorithm is employed. The mentioned uncertainties lead to an increase in profit. Moreover, the optimal coordinated scheduling of renewable energy resources and thermal units in micro grids increase the total profit. In order to evaluate the performance of the proposed method, its performance is executed on modified 33 bus distributed system as a micro grid. - Highlights: • Stochastic model is proposed for coordinated scheduling of renewable energy sources. • The effect of combined heat and power is considered. • Maximizing profits of micro grid is considered as objective function. • Considering the uncertainties of problem lead to profit increasing. • Optimal scheduling of renewable energy sources and thermal units increases profit.

  17. Development of Object and Grasping Knowledge by Robot Exploration

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kraft, Dirk; Detry, Renaud; Pugeault, Nicolas

    2010-01-01

    We describe a bootstrapping cognitive robot system that—mainly based on pure exploration—acquires rich object representations and associated object-specific grasp affordances. Such bootstrapping becomes possible by combining innate competences and behaviours by which the system gradually enriches...

  18. A multi-objective approach to the assignment of stock keeping units to unidirectional picking lines

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Le Roux, G. J.

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available An order picking system in a distribution centre consisting of parallel unidirectional picking lines is considered. The objectives are to minimise the walking distance of the pickers, the largest volume of stock on a picking line over all picking lines, the number of small packages, and the total penalty incurred for late distributions. The problem is formulated as a multi-objective multiple knapsack problem that is not solvable in a realistic time. Population-based algorithms, including the artificial bee colony algorithm and the genetic algorithm, are also implemented. The results obtained from all algorithms indicate a substantial improvement on all objectives relative to historical assignments. The genetic algorithm delivers the best performance.

  19. The emerging causal understanding of institutional objects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Noyes, Alexander; Keil, Frank C; Dunham, Yarrow

    2018-01-01

    Institutional objects, such as money, drivers' licenses, and borders, have functions because of their social roles rather than their immediate physical properties. These objects are causally different than standard artifacts (e.g. hammers, chairs, and cars), sharing more commonality with other social roles. Thus, they inform psychological theories of human-made objects as well as children's emerging understanding of social reality. We examined whether children (N=180, ages 4-9) differentiate institutional objects from standard artifacts. Specifically, we examine whether children understand that mutual intentions (i.e., the intentions of a social collective) underlie the functional affordances of institutional objects in ways that they do not for standard artifacts. We find that young children assimilate institutional objects into their intuitive theories of standard artifacts; children begin to differentiate between the domains in the elementary school years. Published by Elsevier B.V.

  20. Mitigating an increase of specific power consumption in a cryogenic air separation unit at reduced oxygen production

    Science.gov (United States)

    Singla, Rohit; Chowdhury, Kanchan

    2017-02-01

    Specific power consumed in a Linde double column air separation unit (ASU) increases as the quantity of oxygen produced at a given purity is decreased due to the changes of system requirement or market demand. As the plant operates in part load condition, the specific power consumption (SPC) increases as the total power consumption remains the same. In order to mitigate the increase of SPC at lower oxygen production, the operating pressure of high pressure column (HPC) can be lowered by extending the low pressure column (LPC) by a few trays and adding a second reboiler. As the duty of second reboiler in LPC is increased, the recovery of oxygen decreases with a lowering of the HPC pressure. This results in mitigation of the increase of SPC of the plant. A Medium pressure ASU with dual reboiler that produces pressurised gaseous and liquid products of oxygen and nitrogen is simulated in Aspen Hysys 8.6®, a commercial process simulator to determine SPC at varying oxygen production. The effects of reduced pressure of air feed into the cold box on the size of heat exchangers (HX) are analysed. Operation strategy to obtain various oxygen production rates at varying demand is also proposed.

  1. Improvement of FK506 Production in Streptomyces tsukubaensis by Genetic Enhancement of the Supply of Unusual Polyketide Extender Units via Utilization of Two Distinct Site-Specific Recombination Systems

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chen, Dandan; Zhang, Qi; Zhang, Qinglin; Cen, Peilin

    2012-01-01

    FK506 is a potent immunosuppressant that has a wide range of clinical applications. Its 23-member macrocyclic scaffold, mainly with a polyketide origin, features two methoxy groups at C-13 and C-15 and one allyl side chain at C-21, due to the region-specific incorporation of two unusual extender units derived from methoxymalonyl-acyl carrier protein (ACP) and allylmalonyl-coenzyme A (CoA), respectively. Whether their intracellular formations can be a bottleneck for FK506 production remains elusive. In this study, we report the improvement of FK506 yield in the producing strain Streptomyces tsukubaensis by the duplication of two sets of pathway-specific genes individually encoding the biosyntheses of these two extender units, thereby providing a promising approach to generate high-FK506-producing strains via genetic manipulation. Taking advantage of the fact that S. tsukubaensis is amenable to two actinophage (ΦC31 and VWB) integrase-mediated recombination systems, we genetically enhanced the biosyntheses of methoxymalonyl-ACP and allylmalonyl-CoA, as indicated by transcriptional analysis. Together with the optimization of glucose supplementation, the maximal FK506 titer eventually increased by approximately 150% in comparison with that of the original strain. The strategy of engineering the biosynthesis of unusual extender units described here may be applicable to improving the production of other polyketide or nonribosomal peptide natural products that contain pathway-specific building blocks. PMID:22582065

  2. Implementation of an Integrated Neuroscience Unit.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Breslin, Rory P; Franker, Lauren; Sterchi, Suzanne; Sani, Sepehr

    2016-02-01

    Many challenges exist in today's health care delivery system, and much focus and research are invested into ways to improve care with cost-effective measures. Specialty-specific dedicated care units are one solution for inpatient hospital care because they improve outcomes and decrease mortality. The neuroscience population encompasses a wide variety of diagnoses of spinal to cranial issues with a wide spectrum of needs varying from one patient to the next. Neuroscience care must be patient-specific during the course of frequent acuity changes, and one way to achieve this is through a neuroscience-focused unit. Few resources are available on how to implement this type of unit. Advanced practice nurses are committed to providing high-quality, safe, and cost-effective care and are instrumental in the success of instituting a unit dedicated to the care of neuroscience patients.

  3. OCR(A) A2 Physics Student Unit Guide

    CERN Document Server

    Chadha, Gurinder

    2009-01-01

    Student Unit Guides are perfect for revision. Each guide is written by an examiner and explains the unit requirements, summarises the relevant unit content and includes a series of specimen questions and answers. There are three sections to each guide:. Introduction - includes advice on how to use the guide, an explanation of the skills being tested by the assessment objectives, an outline of the unit or module and, depending on the unit, suggestions for how to revise effectively and prepare for the examination questions. Content Guidance - provides an examiner's overview of the module's key t

  4. Effects of Maternal Age and Age-Specific Preterm Birth Rates on Overall Preterm Birth Rates - United States, 2007 and 2014.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ferré, Cynthia; Callaghan, William; Olson, Christine; Sharma, Andrea; Barfield, Wanda

    2016-11-04

    Reductions in births to teens and preterm birth rates are two recent public health successes in the United States (1,2). From 2007 to 2014, the birth rate for females aged 15-19 years declined 42%, from 41.5 to 24.2 per 1,000 females. The preterm birth rate decreased 8.4%, from 10.41% to 9.54% of live births (1). Rates of preterm births vary by maternal age, being higher among the youngest and oldest mothers. It is unknown how changes in the maternal age distribution in the United States have affected preterm birth rates. CDC used birth data to assess the relative contributions of changes in the maternal age distribution and in age-specific preterm birth rates to the overall decrease in preterm birth rates. The preterm birth rate declined in all age groups. The effects of age distribution changes on the preterm birth rate decrease were different in younger and older mothers. The decrease in the proportion of births to mothers aged ≤19 and 20-24 years and reductions in age-specific preterm rates in all age groups contributed to the overall decline in the preterm birth rate. The increase in births to mothers aged ≥30 years had no effect on the overall preterm birth rate decrease. The decline in preterm births from 2007 to 2014 is related, in part, to teen pregnancy prevention and the changing maternal age distribution. Effective public health strategies for further reducing preterm birth rates need to be tailored to different age groups.

  5. Examining the Correlation between Objective Injury Parameters, Personality Traits and Adjustment Measures among Burn Victims

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Josef Mordechai Haik

    2015-03-01

    Full Text Available Background: Burn victims experience immense physical and mental hardship during their process of rehabilitation and regaining functionality. We examined different objective burn related factors as well as psychological ones, in the form of personality traits, that may affect the rehabilitation process and its outcome. Objective: To assess the influence and correlation of specific personality traits and objective injury related parameters on the adjustment of burn victims post-injury. Methods: 62 male patients admitted to our burn unit due to burn injuries were compared with 36 healthy male individuals by use of questionnaires to assess each group's psychological adjustment parameters. Multivariate and hierarchical regression analysis was conducted to identify differences between the groups. Results: A significant negative correlation was found between the objective burn injury severity (e.g. TBSA and burn depth and the adjustment of burn victims (p<0.05, p<0.001, table 3. Moreover, patients more severely injured tend to be more neurotic (p<0.001, and less extroverted and agreeable (p<0.01, table 4. Conclusions: Extroverted burn victims tend to adjust better to their post-injury life while the neurotic patients tend to have difficulties adjusting. This finding may suggest new tools for early identification of maladjustment-prone patients and therefore provide them with better psychological support in a more dedicated manner.

  6. Logarithmic r-θ mapping for hybrid optical neural network filter for multiple objects recognition within cluttered scenes

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kypraios, Ioannis; Young, Rupert C. D.; Chatwin, Chris R.; Birch, Phil M.

    2009-04-01

    θThe window unit in the design of the complex logarithmic r-θ mapping for hybrid optical neural network filter can allow multiple objects of the same class to be detected within the input image. Additionally, the architecture of the neural network unit of the complex logarithmic r-θ mapping for hybrid optical neural network filter becomes attractive for accommodating the recognition of multiple objects of different classes within the input image by modifying the output layer of the unit. We test the overall filter for multiple objects of the same and of different classes' recognition within cluttered input images and video sequences of cluttered scenes. Logarithmic r-θ mapping for hybrid optical neural network filter is shown to exhibit with a single pass over the input data simultaneously in-plane rotation, out-of-plane rotation, scale, log r-θ map translation and shift invariance, and good clutter tolerance by recognizing correctly the different objects within the cluttered scenes. We record in our results additional extracted information from the cluttered scenes about the objects' relative position, scale and in-plane rotation.

  7. Neural representations of novel objects associated with olfactory experience.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ghio, Marta; Schulze, Patrick; Suchan, Boris; Bellebaum, Christian

    2016-07-15

    Object conceptual knowledge comprises information related to several motor and sensory modalities (e.g. for tools, how they look like, how to manipulate them). Whether and to which extent conceptual object knowledge is represented in the same sensory and motor systems recruited during object-specific learning experience is still a controversial question. A direct approach to assess the experience-dependence of conceptual object representations is based on training with novel objects. The present study extended previous research, which focused mainly on the role of manipulation experience for tool-like stimuli, by considering sensory experience only. Specifically, we examined the impact of experience in the non-dominant olfactory modality on the neural representation of novel objects. Sixteen healthy participants visually explored a set of novel objects during the training phase while for each object an odor (e.g., peppermint) was presented (olfactory-visual training). As control conditions, a second set of objects was only visually explored (visual-only training), and a third set was not part of the training. In a post-training fMRI session, participants performed an old/new task with pictures of objects associated with olfactory-visual and visual-only training (old) and no training objects (new). Although we did not find any evidence of activations in primary olfactory areas, the processing of olfactory-visual versus visual-only training objects elicited greater activation in the right anterior hippocampus, a region included in the extended olfactory network. This finding is discussed in terms of different functional roles of the hippocampus in olfactory processes. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  8. 77 FR 51606 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Extravagant Inventions...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-08-24

    ... temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The additional objects are... exhibition or display of the additional exhibit objects at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY, from... at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, three of the works will continue to be displayed at The...

  9. Site-specific sediment clean-up objectives developed by the sediment quality triad

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Redman, S.; Janisch, T.

    1995-01-01

    Sediment chemistry, sediment toxicity, and benthic macroinvertebrate community data were collected and evaluated in concert (1) to characterize adverse effects of hydrocarbon and metal contaminants in the sediments of a small inlet of Superior Bay, Lake Superior and a tributary creek and (2) to derive numeric objectives for the clean up of this system. Sediments from reference locations and eight study sites were analyzed for a range of contaminants, including hydrocarbons (measured both as diesel range organics (DRO) and oil and grease), lead, chromium, and ammonia. A range of sediment toxicity was observed across the eight study sites using a variety of tests and endpoints: Hyalella azteca (10 day survival and growth), Chironomus tentans (10 day survival and growth), Ceriodaphnia dubia (48 hour survival), and Daphnia magna (48 hour survival and 10 day survival and reproduction). A range of alterations of the benthic macroinvertebrate community compared with communities from reference locations were observed. Benthic community alterations were summarized quantitatively by taxa richness and Shannon-Weiner mean diversity. Lowest effect levels determined through this study included 150 microg/g dry sediment for DRO (as measured in this study) and 40 microg/g dry sediment for lead. Effects thresholds determined through this study included 1,500 microg/g dry sediment for DRO and 90 microg/g dry sediment for lead. These levels and concentrations measured in relevant reference locations are being used to define objectives for sediment clean up in the inlet and creek

  10. 16 CFR 307.9 - Requirements for disclosure on utilitarian objects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... utilitarian object with a permanence and durability that is comparable to the permanence and durability of the... objects. 307.9 Section 307.9 Commercial Practices FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION REGULATIONS UNDER SPECIFIC ACTS... Advertising Disclosures § 307.9 Requirements for disclosure on utilitarian objects. (a) In the case of...

  11. The Timing of Visual Object Categorization

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mack, Michael L.; Palmeri, Thomas J.

    2011-01-01

    An object can be categorized at different levels of abstraction: as natural or man-made, animal or plant, bird or dog, or as a Northern Cardinal or Pyrrhuloxia. There has been growing interest in understanding how quickly categorizations at different levels are made and how the timing of those perceptual decisions changes with experience. We specifically contrast two perspectives on the timing of object categorization at different levels of abstraction. By one account, the relative timing implies a relative timing of stages of visual processing that are tied to particular levels of object categorization: Fast categorizations are fast because they precede other categorizations within the visual processing hierarchy. By another account, the relative timing reflects when perceptual features are available over time and the quality of perceptual evidence used to drive a perceptual decision process: Fast simply means fast, it does not mean first. Understanding the short-term and long-term temporal dynamics of object categorizations is key to developing computational models of visual object recognition. We briefly review a number of models of object categorization and outline how they explain the timing of visual object categorization at different levels of abstraction. PMID:21811480

  12. A new multi-objective reserve constrained combined heat and power dynamic economic emission dispatch

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Niknam, Taher; Azizipanah-Abarghooee, Rasoul; Roosta, Alireza; Amiri, Babak

    2012-01-01

    Combined heat and power units are playing an ever increasing role in conventional power stations due to advantages such as reduced emissions and operational cost savings. This paper investigates a more practical formulation of the complex non-convex, non-smooth and non-linear multi-objective dynamic economic emission dispatch that incorporates combined heat and power units. Integrating these types of units, and their power ramp constraints, require an efficient tool to cope with the joint characteristics of power and heat. Unlike previous approaches, the spinning reserve requirements of this system are clearly formulated in the problem. In this way, a new multi-objective optimisation based on an enhanced firefly algorithm is proposed to achieve a set of non-dominated (Pareto-optimal) solutions. A new tuning parameter based on a chaotic mechanism and novel self adaptive probabilistic mutation strategies are used to improve the overall performance of the algorithm. The numerical results demonstrate how the proposed framework was applied in real time studies. -- Highlights: ► Investigate a practical formulation of the DEED (Dynamic Economic Emission Dispatch). ► Consider combined heat and power units. ► Consider power ramp constraints. ► Consider the system spinning reserve requirements. ► Present a new multi-objective optimization firefly.

  13. The extended object-grasping network.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gerbella, Marzio; Rozzi, Stefano; Rizzolatti, Giacomo

    2017-10-01

    Grasping is the most important skilled motor act of primates. It is based on a series of sensorimotor transformations through which the affordances of the objects to be grasped are transformed into appropriate hand movements. It is generally accepted that a circuit formed by inferior parietal areas AIP and PFG and ventral premotor area F5 represents the core circuit for sensorimotor transformations for grasping. However, selection and control of appropriate grip should also depend on higher-order information, such as the meaning of the object to be grasped, and the overarching goal of the action in which grasping is embedded. In this review, we describe recent findings showing that specific sectors of the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex are instrumental in controlling higher-order aspects of grasping. We show that these prefrontal sectors control the premotor cortex through two main gateways: the anterior subdivision of ventral area F5-sub-area F5a-, and the pre-supplementary area (area F6). We then review functional studies showing that both F5a and F6, besides being relay stations of prefrontal information, also play specific roles in grasping. Namely, sub-area F5a is involved in stereoscopic analysis of 3D objects, and in planning cue-dependent grasping activity. As for area F6, this area appears to play a crucial role in determining when to execute the motor program encoded in the parieto-premotor circuit. The recent discovery that area F6 contains a set of neurons encoding specific grip types suggests that this area, besides controlling "when to go", also may control the grip type, i.e., "how to go". We conclude by discussing clinical syndromes affecting grasping actions and their possible mechanisms.

  14. Dynamic multi-objective optimization using PSO

    CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

    Helbig, M

    2012-01-01

    Full Text Available by replacing objective functions with new ones at specific times. DMOOPs based on the static MOO two- objective ZDT functions [9] and the scalable DTLZ functions [10] was presented by Farina et al. [5]. Some adaptions to these test functions were proposed.... if space in archive 9. add new solutions to archive 10. else 11. remove solutions from archive 12. add new solutions to archive 13. select sentry particles The default configuration of DVEPSO algorithm that is used for this research is as follows...

  15. Integration trumps selection in object recognition.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Saarela, Toni P; Landy, Michael S

    2015-03-30

    Finding and recognizing objects is a fundamental task of vision. Objects can be defined by several "cues" (color, luminance, texture, etc.), and humans can integrate sensory cues to improve detection and recognition [1-3]. Cortical mechanisms fuse information from multiple cues [4], and shape-selective neural mechanisms can display cue invariance by responding to a given shape independent of the visual cue defining it [5-8]. Selective attention, in contrast, improves recognition by isolating a subset of the visual information [9]. Humans can select single features (red or vertical) within a perceptual dimension (color or orientation), giving faster and more accurate responses to items having the attended feature [10, 11]. Attention elevates neural responses and sharpens neural tuning to the attended feature, as shown by studies in psychophysics and modeling [11, 12], imaging [13-16], and single-cell and neural population recordings [17, 18]. Besides single features, attention can select whole objects [19-21]. Objects are among the suggested "units" of attention because attention to a single feature of an object causes the selection of all of its features [19-21]. Here, we pit integration against attentional selection in object recognition. We find, first, that humans can integrate information near optimally from several perceptual dimensions (color, texture, luminance) to improve recognition. They cannot, however, isolate a single dimension even when the other dimensions provide task-irrelevant, potentially conflicting information. For object recognition, it appears that there is mandatory integration of information from multiple dimensions of visual experience. The advantage afforded by this integration, however, comes at the expense of attentional selection. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  16. Multi-objective evolutionary algorithms for fuzzy classification in survival prediction.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jiménez, Fernando; Sánchez, Gracia; Juárez, José M

    2014-03-01

    This paper presents a novel rule-based fuzzy classification methodology for survival/mortality prediction in severe burnt patients. Due to the ethical aspects involved in this medical scenario, physicians tend not to accept a computer-based evaluation unless they understand why and how such a recommendation is given. Therefore, any fuzzy classifier model must be both accurate and interpretable. The proposed methodology is a three-step process: (1) multi-objective constrained optimization of a patient's data set, using Pareto-based elitist multi-objective evolutionary algorithms to maximize accuracy and minimize the complexity (number of rules) of classifiers, subject to interpretability constraints; this step produces a set of alternative (Pareto) classifiers; (2) linguistic labeling, which assigns a linguistic label to each fuzzy set of the classifiers; this step is essential to the interpretability of the classifiers; (3) decision making, whereby a classifier is chosen, if it is satisfactory, according to the preferences of the decision maker. If no classifier is satisfactory for the decision maker, the process starts again in step (1) with a different input parameter set. The performance of three multi-objective evolutionary algorithms, niched pre-selection multi-objective algorithm, elitist Pareto-based multi-objective evolutionary algorithm for diversity reinforcement (ENORA) and the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II), was tested using a patient's data set from an intensive care burn unit and a standard machine learning data set from an standard machine learning repository. The results are compared using the hypervolume multi-objective metric. Besides, the results have been compared with other non-evolutionary techniques and validated with a multi-objective cross-validation technique. Our proposal improves the classification rate obtained by other non-evolutionary techniques (decision trees, artificial neural networks, Naive Bayes, and case

  17. A Survey of Complex Object Technologies for Digital Libraries

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nelson, Michael L.; Argue, Brad; Efron, Miles; Denn, Sheila; Pattuelli, Maria Cristina

    2001-01-01

    Many early web-based digital libraries (DLs) had implicit assumptions reflected in their architecture that the unit of focus in the DL (frequently "reports" or "e-prints") would only be manifested in a single, or at most a few, common file formats such as PDF or PostScript. DLs have now matured to the point where their contents are commonly no longer simple files. Complex objects in DLs have emerged from in response to various requirements, including: simple aggregation of formats and supporting files, bundling additional information to aid digital preservation, creating opaque digital objects for e-commerce applications, and the incorporation of dynamic services with the traditional data files. We examine a representative (but not necessarily exhaustive) number of current and recent historical web-based complex object technologies and projects that are applicable to DLs: Aurora, Buckets, ComMentor, Cryptolopes, Digibox, Document Management Alliance, FEDORA, Kahn-Wilensky Framework Digital Objects, Metadata Encoding & Transmission Standard, Multivalent Documents, Open eBooks, VERS Encapsulated Objects, and the Warwick Framework.

  18. NSGA-II algorithm for multi-objective generation expansion planning problem

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Murugan, P.; Kannan, S. [Electronics and Communication Engineering Department, Arulmigu Kalasalingam College of Engineering, Krishnankoil 626190, Tamilnadu (India); Baskar, S. [Electrical Engineering Department, Thiagarajar College of Engineering, Madurai 625015, Tamilnadu (India)

    2009-04-15

    This paper presents an application of Elitist Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm version II (NSGA-II), to multi-objective generation expansion planning (GEP) problem. The GEP problem is considered as a two-objective problem. The first objective is the minimization of investment cost and the second objective is the minimization of outage cost (or maximization of reliability). To improve the performance of NSGA-II, two modifications are proposed. One modification is incorporation of Virtual Mapping Procedure (VMP), and the other is introduction of controlled elitism in NSGA-II. A synthetic test system having 5 types of candidate units is considered here for GEP for a 6-year planning horizon. The effectiveness of the proposed modifications is illustrated in detail. (author)

  19. 78 FR 7849 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-02-04

    ... Century,'' imported from abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural... also determine that the exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at The Yale Center for British Art..., Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, Department of State. [FR Doc. 2013-02401 Filed 2-1-13; 8:45...

  20. Unit-specific calibration of Actigraph accelerometers in a mechanical setup - is it worth the effort? The effect on random output variation caused by technical inter-instrument variability in the laboratory and in the field

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Moeller, Niels C; Korsholm, Lars; Kristensen, Peter L

    2008-01-01

    BACKGROUND: Potentially, unit-specific in-vitro calibration of accelerometers could increase field data quality and study power. However, reduced inter-unit variability would only be important if random instrument variability contributes considerably to the total variation in field data. Therefor...

  1. Unit type differences in RN workgroup job satisfaction.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Boyle, Diane K; Miller, Peggy A; Gajewski, Byron J; Hart, Sara E; Dunton, Nancy

    2006-10-01

    Using cross-sectional data from the 2004 National Database of Nursing Quality Indicators (NDNQI) RN Satisfaction Survey, differences in RN workgroup job satisfaction were examined among 10 unit types--medical-surgical, step-down, critical care, pediatric, maternal-newborn, psychiatric, emergency department, rehabilitation, surgical services, and outpatient clinics and labs. The national sample included RN workgroups in 2,900 patient care units (55,516 RNs; 206 hospitals in 44 states). Workgroup satisfaction across all unit types was moderate. RN workgroups in pediatric units were the most satisfied, whereas those in surgical services and emergency department unit types were least satisfied. A consistent finding across all unit types was high satisfaction with the specific domains of nurse-to-nurse interaction, professional status, and professional development versus much lower satisfaction with task, decision making, and pay. Findings can be used to inform and develop investigations that examine specific aspects of the work environment for RN workgroups in various unit types.

  2. Energy problems of the United States

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pertuzio, A.

    2006-01-01

    The united states are the third world producer of oil which accounts for 440% of world production and 20 million barrels/day of which 60% are imported. That dependence on imports is likely to increase in the next decades. Such supplies and their security are therefore a fundamental factor of the United States foreign policy in combination with their political, economic and strategic objectives in a world both unsure and dangerous

  3. An Approach to Object Recognition: Aligning Pictorial Descriptions.

    Science.gov (United States)

    1986-12-01

    PERFORMING 0RGANIZATION NAMIE ANDORS IS551. PROGRAM ELEMENT. PROJECT. TASK Artificial Inteligence Laboratory AREKA A WORK UNIT NUMBERS ( 545 Technology... ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE LABORATORY A.I. Memo No. 931 December, 1986 AN APPROACH TO OBJECT RECOGNITION: ALIGNING PICTORIAL DESCRIPTIONS Shimon Ullman...within the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Support for the A.I. Laboratory’s artificial intelligence

  4. Multi-objective decision-making model based on CBM for an aircraft fleet

    Science.gov (United States)

    Luo, Bin; Lin, Lin

    2018-04-01

    Modern production management patterns, in which multi-unit (e.g., a fleet of aircrafts) are managed in a holistic manner, have brought new challenges for multi-unit maintenance decision making. To schedule a good maintenance plan, not only does the individual machine maintenance have to be considered, but also the maintenance of the other individuals have to be taken into account. Since most condition-based maintenance researches for aircraft focused on solely reducing maintenance cost or maximizing the availability of single aircraft, as well as considering that seldom researches concentrated on both the two objectives: minimizing cost and maximizing the availability of a fleet (total number of available aircraft in fleet), a multi-objective decision-making model based on condition-based maintenance concentrated both on the above two objectives is established. Furthermore, in consideration of the decision maker may prefer providing the final optimal result in the form of discrete intervals instead of a set of points (non-dominated solutions) in real decision-making problem, a novel multi-objective optimization method based on support vector regression is proposed to solve the above multi-objective decision-making model. Finally, a case study regarding a fleet is conducted, with the results proving that the approach efficiently generates outcomes that meet the schedule requirements.

  5. 77 FR 34455 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Century of the Child...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-06-11

    ... exhibit objects at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, from on or about July 29, 2012, until on or... exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan...

  6. 77 FR 41473 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Projects 98: Slavs and...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-07-13

    ... objects at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, New York from on or about August 8, 2012, until on or... United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements with...

  7. Structural similarity and category-specificity

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerlach, Christian; Law, Ian; Paulson, Olaf B

    2004-01-01

    It has been suggested that category-specific recognition disorders for natural objects may reflect that natural objects are more structurally (visually) similar than artefacts and therefore more difficult to recognize following brain damage. On this account one might expect a positive relationshi...

  8. The covariant formulation of Maxwell's equations expressed in a form independent of specific units

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Heras, Jose A; Baez, G

    2009-01-01

    The covariant formulation of Maxwell's equations can be expressed in a form independent of the usual systems of units by introducing the constants α, β and γ into these equations. Maxwell's equations involving these constants are then specialized to the most commonly used systems of units: Gaussian, SI and Heaviside-Lorentz by giving the constants α, β and γ the values appropriate to each system

  9. Mechanistic model of mass-specific basal metabolic rate: evaluation in healthy young adults.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wang, Z; Bosy-Westphal, A; Schautz, B; Müller, M

    2011-12-01

    Mass-specific basal metabolic rate (mass-specific BMR), defined as the resting energy expenditure per unit body mass per day, is an important parameter in energy metabolism research. However, a mechanistic explanation for magnitude of mass-specific BMR remains lacking. The objective of the present study was to validate the applicability of a proposed mass-specific BMR model in healthy adults. A mechanistic model was developed at the organ-tissue level, mass-specific BMR = Σ( K i × F i ), where Fi is the fraction of body mass as individual organs and tissues, and K i is the specific resting metabolic rate of major organs and tissues. The Fi values were measured by multiple MRI scans and the K i values were suggested by Elia in 1992. A database of healthy non-elderly non-obese adults (age 20 - 49 yrs, BMI BMR of all subjects was 21.6 ± 1.9 (mean ± SD) and 21.7 ± 1.6 kcal/kg per day, respectively. The measured mass-specific BMR was correlated with the predicted mass-specific BMR (r = 0.82, P BMR, versus the average of measured and predicted mass-specific BMR. In conclusion, the proposed mechanistic model was validated in non-elderly non-obese adults and can help to understand the inherent relationship between mass-specific BMR and body composition.

  10. Map Specifications and Exchange of Geographical Information

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Frederiksen, Poul

    1999-01-01

    Specifications for Technical Maps 1993 – 99 are described giving an overview of the specification structure including the object description of the latest version: TK99.The technical map specifications are related to the standards for topographical maps - especially the TOP10DK standard. Common...... object definitions are essential for the standards. Technical as well as topographical map information is exchangeable through the Danish developed “Standard for Exchange of Digital Map Information”, known as the DSFL-format....

  11. Indexing of Network-Constrained Moving Objects

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Pfoser, Dieter; Jensen, Christian Søndergaard

    2003-01-01

    With the proliferation of mobile computing, the ability to index efficiently the movements of mobile objects becomes important. Objects are typically seen as moving in two-dimensional (x,y) space, which means that their movements across time may be embedded in the three-dimensional (x,y,t) space....... Further, the movements are typically represented as trajectories, sequences of connected line segments. In certain cases, movement is restricted, and specifically in this paper, we aim at exploiting that movements occur in transportation networks to reduce the dimensionality of the data. Briefly, the idea...

  12. Running tests in isolation using mock objects

    CERN Multimedia

    CERN. Geneva

    2014-01-01

    "Mocking" is a technique used in unit-testing that replace external dependencies with "fake" objects, simulating the behavior of the real ones. This process is usually applied when the existence of these dependencies makes impossible to write proper tests or when its result can be non-deterministic, hard to reproduce and/or slow to calculate. In this talk, I will briefly describe this technique and show how and where to use it through some examples.

  13. Neurocomputational bases of object and face recognition.

    OpenAIRE

    Biederman, I; Kalocsai, P

    1997-01-01

    A number of behavioural phenomena distinguish the recognition of faces and objects, even when members of a set of objects are highly similar. Because faces have the same parts in approximately the same relations, individuation of faces typically requires specification of the metric variation in a holistic and integral representation of the facial surface. The direct mapping of a hypercolumn-like pattern of activation onto a representation layer that preserves relative spatial filter values in...

  14. Curriculum development for a national cardiotocography education program: a Delphi survey to obtain consensus on learning objectives.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Thellesen, Line; Hedegaard, Morten; Bergholt, Thomas; Colov, Nina P; Hoegh, Stinne; Sorensen, Jette L

    2015-08-01

    To define learning objectives for a national cardiotocography (CTG) education program based on expert consensus. A three-round Delphi survey. One midwife and one obstetrician from each maternity unit in Denmark were appointed based on CTG teaching experience and clinical obstetric experience. Following national and international guidelines, the research group determined six topics as important when using CTG: fetal physiology, equipment, indication, interpretation, clinical management, and communication/responsibility. In the first Delphi round, participants listed one to five learning objectives within the predefined topics. Responses were analyzed by a directed approach to content analysis. Phrasing was modified in accordance with Bloom's taxonomy. In the second and third Delphi rounds, participants rated each objective on a five-point relevance scale. Consensus was predefined as objectives with a mean rating value of ≥ 3. A prioritized list of CTG learning objectives. A total of 42 midwives and obstetricians from 21 maternity units were invited to participate, of whom 26 completed all three Delphi rounds, representing 18 maternity units. The final prioritized list included 40 objectives. The highest ranked objectives emphasized CTG interpretation and clinical management. The lowest ranked objectives emphasized fetal physiology. Mean ratings of relevance ranged from 3.15 to 5.00. National consensus on CTG learning objectives was achieved using the Delphi methodology. This was an initial step in developing a valid CTG education program. A prioritized list of objectives will clarify which topics to emphasize in a CTG education program. © 2015 Nordic Federation of Societies of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

  15. The hollow-face illusion: object-specific knowledge, general assumptions or properties of the stimulus?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hill, Harold; Johnston, Alan

    2007-01-01

    The hollow-face illusion, in which a mask appears as a convex face, is a powerful example of binocular depth inversion occurring with a real object under a wide range of viewing conditions. Explanations of the illusion are reviewed and six experiments reported. In experiment 1 the detrimental effect of figural inversion, evidence for the importance of familiarity, was found for other oriented objects. The inversion effect held for masks lit from the side (experiment 2). The illusion was stronger for a mask rotated by 90 degrees lit from its forehead than from its chin, suggesting that familiar patterns of shading enhance the illusion (experiment 2). There were no effects of light source visibility or any left/right asymmetry (experiment 3). In experiments 4-6 we used a 'virtual' hollow face, with illusion strength quantified by the proportion of noise texture needed to eliminate the illusion. Adding characteristic surface colour enhanced the illusion, consistent with the familiar face pigmentation outweighing additional bottom-up cues (experiment 4). There was no difference between perspective and orthographic projection. Photographic negation reduced, but did not eliminate, the illusion, suggesting shading is important but not essential (experiment 5). Absolute depth was not critical, although a shallower mask was given less extreme convexity ratings (experiment 6). We argue that the illusion arises owing to a convexity preference when the raw data have ambiguous interpretations. However, using a familiar object with typical orientation, shading, and pigmentation greatly enhances the effect.

  16. 76 FR 68808 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-11-07

    ... also determine that the exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Onassis Cultural Center... Century AD,'' imported from abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural... Cultural Affairs, Department of State. [FR Doc. 2011-28805 Filed 11-4-11; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 4710-05-P ...

  17. Object recognition and generalisation during habituation in horses

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Christensen, Janne Winther; Zharkikh, Tjatjana; Chovaux, Elodie

    2011-01-01

    The ability of horses to habituate to frightening stimuli greatly increases safety in the horse–human relationship. A recent experiment suggested, however, that habituation to frightening visual stimuli is relatively stimulus-specific in horses and that shape and colour are important factors...... for object generalisation (Christensen et al., 2008). In a series of experiments, we aimed to further explore the ability of horses (n = 30, 1 and 2-year-old mares) to recognise and generalise between objects during habituation. TEST horses (n = 15) were habituated to a complex object, composed of five...... simple objects of varying shape and colour, whereas CONTROL horses (n = 15) were habituated to the test arena, but not to the complex object. In the first experiment, we investigated whether TEST horses subsequently reacted less to i) simple objects that were previously part of the complex object (i...

  18. Ultrasonic inspection technology development and search units design examples of practical applications

    CERN Document Server

    Brook, Mark V

    2012-01-01

    "Ultrasonic testing is a relatively new branch of science and industry. The development of ultrasonic testing started in the late 1920s. At the beginning, the fundamentals of this method were borrowed from basic physics, geometrical and wave optics, acoustics and seismology. Later it became clear that some of these theories and calculation methods could not always explain the phenomena observed in many specific cases of ultrasonic testing. Without knowing the nuances of the ultrasonic wave propagation in the test object it is impossible to design effective inspection technique and search units for it realization. This book clarifies the theoretical differences of ultrasonics from the other wave propagation theories presenting both basics of physics in the wave propagation, elementary mathematic and advanced practical applications. Almost every specific technique presented in this book is proofed by actual experimental data and examples of calculations"--

  19. Leadership Development in Agricultural Economics: Challenges for Academic Units

    OpenAIRE

    Boland, Michael A.

    2009-01-01

    Crafting and executing strategy are key tasks to be carried out by a manager of an enterprise. Unit leaders are managers of an academic enterprise called a department. The objective of this paper is to provide an overview of information collected from interviews with unit leaders of departments of agricultural economics and discuss challenges being faced by these unit leaders in March 2009.

  20. An object-based visual attention model for robotic applications.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yu, Yuanlong; Mann, George K I; Gosine, Raymond G

    2010-10-01

    By extending integrated competition hypothesis, this paper presents an object-based visual attention model, which selects one object of interest using low-dimensional features, resulting that visual perception starts from a fast attentional selection procedure. The proposed attention model involves seven modules: learning of object representations stored in a long-term memory (LTM), preattentive processing, top-down biasing, bottom-up competition, mediation between top-down and bottom-up ways, generation of saliency maps, and perceptual completion processing. It works in two phases: learning phase and attending phase. In the learning phase, the corresponding object representation is trained statistically when one object is attended. A dual-coding object representation consisting of local and global codings is proposed. Intensity, color, and orientation features are used to build the local coding, and a contour feature is employed to constitute the global coding. In the attending phase, the model preattentively segments the visual field into discrete proto-objects using Gestalt rules at first. If a task-specific object is given, the model recalls the corresponding representation from LTM and deduces the task-relevant feature(s) to evaluate top-down biases. The mediation between automatic bottom-up competition and conscious top-down biasing is then performed to yield a location-based saliency map. By combination of location-based saliency within each proto-object, the proto-object-based saliency is evaluated. The most salient proto-object is selected for attention, and it is finally put into the perceptual completion processing module to yield a complete object region. This model has been applied into distinct tasks of robots: detection of task-specific stationary and moving objects. Experimental results under different conditions are shown to validate this model.

  1. Towards a general object-oriented software development methodology

    Science.gov (United States)

    Seidewitz, ED; Stark, Mike

    1986-01-01

    Object diagrams were used to design a 5000 statement team training exercise and to design the entire dynamics simulator. The object diagrams are also being used to design another 50,000 statement Ada system and a personal computer based system that will be written in Modula II. The design methodology evolves out of these experiences as well as the limitations of other methods that were studied. Object diagrams, abstraction analysis, and associated principles provide a unified framework which encompasses concepts from Yourdin, Booch, and Cherry. This general object-oriented approach handles high level system design, possibly with concurrency, through object-oriented decomposition down to a completely functional level. How object-oriented concepts can be used in other phases of the software life-cycle, such as specification and testing is being studied concurrently.

  2. Identifying marine pelagic ecosystem management objectives and indicators

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Trenkel, Verena M.; Hintzen, Niels T.; Farnsworth, Keith D.

    2015-01-01

    . Overall 26 objectives were proposed, with 58% agreement in proposed objectives between two workshops. Based on published evidence for pressure-state links, examples of operational objectives and suitable indicators for each of the 26 objectives were then selected. It is argued that given the strong......International policy frameworks such as the Common Fisheries Policy and the European Marine Strategy Framework Directive define high-level strategic goals for marine ecosystems. Strategic goals are addressed via general and operational management objectives. To add credibility and legitimacy...... scale in some cases. In the evidence-based approach used in this study, the selection of species or region specific operational objectives and indicators was based on demonstrated pressure-state links. Hence observed changes in indicators can reliably inform on appropriate management measures. (C) 2015...

  3. Technical specifications for the provision of heat and steam sources for INPP and Visaginas. Final report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2003-01-01

    In October 1999, the National Energy Strategy was approved by the Lithuanian Parliament. The National Energy Strategy included the decision to close Unit-1 of INPP before 2005. Later is has been decided to close Unit 2 before the end of 2009 as well. The closure and decommissioning will have heavy impact on the heat supply for the city of Visaginas. Unit 1 and Unit 2 of INPP supplies hot water and steam to INPP for process purposes and for space heating of residential and commercial buildings. When Unit 1 is permanently shut down, reliable heat and steam sources independent of the power plants own heat and steam generation facilities are required for safety reasons in the event of shutdown of the remaining unit for maintenance or in an emergency. These steam and heat sources must be operational before single unit operation is envisaged. Provision of a reliable independent heat and steam source is therefore urgent. After both reactors are shut down permanently, a steam source will be needed at the plant for radioactive waste storage and disposal. INPP and DEA has performed a feasibility study for the provision of a reliable heat source for Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant and Visaginas, and the modernisation of Visaginas district heating system. The objective of this project is to prepare technical specifications for the provision of new heat and steam sources for INPP and Visaginas, and for rehabilitation of the heat transmission pipeline between INPP, the back-up boiler station and Visaginas City. The results of the study are presented in detail in the reports and technical specifications: 1. Transient analysis for Visaginas DH system, 2. Non-destructive testing of boiler stations, pump stations and transmission lines, 3. Conceptual design, 4. Technical specifications, Package 1 to 6. The study has suggested: 1. Construction of new steam boiler station, 2. Construction of new heat only boiler station, 3. Renovation of existing back-up heat only boiler station, 4

  4. 77 FR 65603 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Inventing Abstraction...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-10-29

    ... objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, from on or about December 23, 2012, until on or... United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements with... Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, from on or about May 5, 2013, until on or about...

  5. Multi-Objective Sensitivity Analyses for Power Generation Mix: Malaysia Case Study

    OpenAIRE

    Siti Mariam Mohd Shokri; Nofri Yenita Dahlan; Hasmaini Mohamad

    2017-01-01

    This paper presents an optimization framework to determine long-term optimal generation mix for Malaysia Power Sector using Dynamic Programming (DP) technique. Several new candidate units with a pre-defined MW capacity were included in the model for generation expansion planning from coal, natural gas, hydro and renewable energy (RE). Four objective cases were considered, 1) economic cost, 2) environmental, 3) reliability and 4) multi-objectives that combining the three cases. Results show th...

  6. Verifying object-oriented programs with higher-order separation logic in Coq

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bengtson, Jesper; Jensen, Jonas Braband; Sieczkowski, Filip

    2011-01-01

    We present a shallow Coq embedding of a higher-order separation logic with nested triples for an object-oriented programming language. Moreover, we develop novel specification and proof patterns for reasoning in higher-order separation logic with nested triples about programs that use interfaces...... and interface inheritance. In particular, we show how to use the higher-order features of the Coq formalisation to specify and reason modularly about programs that (1) depend on some unknown code satisfying a specification or that (2) return objects conforming to a certain specification. All of our results have...

  7. Modeling real conditions of 'Ukrytie' object in 3D measurement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Podbereznyj, S.S.

    2001-01-01

    The article covers a technology of creation on soft products basis for designing: AutoCad, and computer graphics and animation 3D Studio, 3DS MAX, of 3D model of geometrical parameters of current conditions of building structures, technological equipment, fuel-containing materials, concrete, water of ruined Unit 4, 'Ukryttia' object, of Chernobyl NPP. The model built using the above technology will be applied in the future as a basis when automating the design and computer modeling of processes at the 'Ukryttia' object

  8. Object recognition memory: neurobiological mechanisms of encoding, consolidation and retrieval.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Winters, Boyer D; Saksida, Lisa M; Bussey, Timothy J

    2008-07-01

    Tests of object recognition memory, or the judgment of the prior occurrence of an object, have made substantial contributions to our understanding of the nature and neurobiological underpinnings of mammalian memory. Only in recent years, however, have researchers begun to elucidate the specific brain areas and neural processes involved in object recognition memory. The present review considers some of this recent research, with an emphasis on studies addressing the neural bases of perirhinal cortex-dependent object recognition memory processes. We first briefly discuss operational definitions of object recognition and the common behavioural tests used to measure it in non-human primates and rodents. We then consider research from the non-human primate and rat literature examining the anatomical basis of object recognition memory in the delayed nonmatching-to-sample (DNMS) and spontaneous object recognition (SOR) tasks, respectively. The results of these studies overwhelmingly favor the view that perirhinal cortex (PRh) is a critical region for object recognition memory. We then discuss the involvement of PRh in the different stages--encoding, consolidation, and retrieval--of object recognition memory. Specifically, recent work in rats has indicated that neural activity in PRh contributes to object memory encoding, consolidation, and retrieval processes. Finally, we consider the pharmacological, cellular, and molecular factors that might play a part in PRh-mediated object recognition memory. Recent studies in rodents have begun to indicate the remarkable complexity of the neural substrates underlying this seemingly simple aspect of declarative memory.

  9. 77 FR 75253 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Wait, Later This Will Be...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-12-19

    ... exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, from on or... abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are...

  10. Authoring Systems Delivering Reusable Learning Objects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    George Nicola Sammour

    2009-10-01

    Full Text Available A three layer e-learning course development model has been defined based on a conceptual model of learning content object. It starts by decomposing the learning content into small chunks which are initially placed in a hierarchic structure of units and blocks. The raw content components, being the atomic learning objects (ALO, were linked to the blocks and are structured in the database. We set forward a dynamic generation of LO's using re-usable e-learning raw materials or ALO’s In that view we need a LO authoring/ assembling system fitting the requirements of interoperability and reusability and starting from selecting the raw learning content from the learning materials content database. In practice authoring systems are used to develop e-learning courses. The company EDUWEST has developed an authoring system that is database based and will be SCORM compliant in the near future.

  11. Meteorite Unit Models for Structural Properties

    Science.gov (United States)

    Agrawal, Parul; Carlozzi, Alexander A.; Karajeh, Zaid S.; Bryson, Kathryn L.

    2017-10-01

    To assess the threat posed by an asteroid entering Earth’s atmosphere, one must predict if, when, and how it fragments during entry. A comprehensive understanding of the asteroid material properties is needed to achieve this objective. At present, the meteorite material found on earth are the only objects from an entering asteroid that can be used as representative material and be tested inside a laboratory. Due to complex composition, it is challenging and expensive to obtain reliable material properties by means of laboratory test for a family of meteorites. In order to circumvent this challenge, meteorite unit models are developed to determine the effective material properties including Young’s modulus, compressive and tensile strengths and Poisson’s ratio, that in turn would help deduce the properties of asteroids. The meteorite unit model is a representative volume that accounts for diverse minerals, porosity, cracks and matrix composition.The Young’s Modulus and Poisson’s Ratio in the meteorite units are calculated by performing several hundreds of Monte Carlo simulations by randomly distributing the various phases inside these units. Once these values are obtained, cracks are introduced in these units. The size, orientation and distribution of cracks are derived by CT-scans and visual scans of various meteorites. Subsequently, simulations are performed to attain stress-strain relations, strength and effective modulus values in the presence of these cracks. The meteorite unit models are presented for H, L and LL ordinary chondrites, as well as for terrestrial basalt. In the case of the latter, data from the simulations is compared with experimental data to validate the methodology. These meteorite unit models will be subsequently used in fragmentation modeling of full scale asteroids.

  12. 75 FR 8424 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Matisse: Radical...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-02-24

    ... objects at the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL, from on or about March 20, 2010, until on or about June 20, 2010; at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, from on or about July 18, 2010, until on or... United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements with...

  13. It takes two-skilled recognition of objects engages lateral areas in both hemispheres.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Merim Bilalić

    Full Text Available Our object recognition abilities, a direct product of our experience with objects, are fine-tuned to perfection. Left temporal and lateral areas along the dorsal, action related stream, as well as left infero-temporal areas along the ventral, object related stream are engaged in object recognition. Here we show that expertise modulates the activity of dorsal areas in the recognition of man-made objects with clearly specified functions. Expert chess players were faster than chess novices in identifying chess objects and their functional relations. Experts' advantage was domain-specific as there were no differences between groups in a control task featuring geometrical shapes. The pattern of eye movements supported the notion that experts' extensive knowledge about domain objects and their functions enabled superior recognition even when experts were not directly fixating the objects of interest. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI related exclusively the areas along the dorsal stream to chess specific object recognition. Besides the commonly involved left temporal and parietal lateral brain areas, we found that only in experts homologous areas on the right hemisphere were also engaged in chess specific object recognition. Based on these results, we discuss whether skilled object recognition does not only involve a more efficient version of the processes found in non-skilled recognition, but also qualitatively different cognitive processes which engage additional brain areas.

  14. Audits of oncology units – an effective and pragmatic approach ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Background. Audits of oncology units are part of all quality-assurance programmes. However, they do not always come across as pragmatic and helpful to staff. Objective. To report on the results of an online survey on the usefulness and impact of an audit process for oncology units. Methods. Staff in oncology units who ...

  15. An object model for beamline descriptions

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hill, B.W.; Martono, H.; Gillespie, J.S.

    1997-01-01

    Translation of beamline model descriptions between different accelerator codes presents a unique challenge due to the different representations used for various elements and subsystems. These differences range from simple units conversions to more complex translations involving multiple beamline components. A representation of basic accelerator components is being developed in order to define a meta-structure from which beamline models, in different codes, can be described and to facilitate the translation of models between these codes. Sublines of basic components will be used to represent more complex beamline descriptions and bridge the gap between codes which may represent a beamline element as a single entity, and those which use multiple elements to describe the same physical device. A C++ object model for supporting this beamline description and a grammar for describing beamlines in terms of these components is being developed. The object model will support a common graphic user interface and translation filters for representing native beamline descriptions for a variety of accelerator codes. An overview of our work on the object model for beamline descriptions is presented here. copyright 1997 American Institute of Physics

  16. Port-O-Sim Object Simulation Application

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lanzi, Raymond J.

    2009-01-01

    Port-O-Sim is a software application that supports engineering modeling and simulation of launch-range systems and subsystems, as well as the vehicles that operate on them. It is flexible, distributed, object-oriented, and realtime. A scripting language is used to configure an array of simulation objects and link them together. The script is contained in a text file, but executed and controlled using a graphical user interface. A set of modules is defined, each with input variables, output variables, and settings. These engineering models can be either linked to each other or run as standalone. The settings can be modified during execution. Since 2001, this application has been used for pre-mission failure mode training for many Range Safety Scenarios. It contains range asset link analysis, develops look-angle data, supports sky-screen site selection, drives GPS (Global Positioning System) and IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) simulators, and can support conceptual design efforts for multiple flight programs with its capacity for rapid six-degrees-of-freedom model development. Due to the assembly of various object types into one application, the application is applicable across a wide variety of launch range problem domains.

  17. Object recognition with hierarchical discriminant saliency networks.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Han, Sunhyoung; Vasconcelos, Nuno

    2014-01-01

    The benefits of integrating attention and object recognition are investigated. While attention is frequently modeled as a pre-processor for recognition, we investigate the hypothesis that attention is an intrinsic component of recognition and vice-versa. This hypothesis is tested with a recognition model, the hierarchical discriminant saliency network (HDSN), whose layers are top-down saliency detectors, tuned for a visual class according to the principles of discriminant saliency. As a model of neural computation, the HDSN has two possible implementations. In a biologically plausible implementation, all layers comply with the standard neurophysiological model of visual cortex, with sub-layers of simple and complex units that implement a combination of filtering, divisive normalization, pooling, and non-linearities. In a convolutional neural network implementation, all layers are convolutional and implement a combination of filtering, rectification, and pooling. The rectification is performed with a parametric extension of the now popular rectified linear units (ReLUs), whose parameters can be tuned for the detection of target object classes. This enables a number of functional enhancements over neural network models that lack a connection to saliency, including optimal feature denoising mechanisms for recognition, modulation of saliency responses by the discriminant power of the underlying features, and the ability to detect both feature presence and absence. In either implementation, each layer has a precise statistical interpretation, and all parameters are tuned by statistical learning. Each saliency detection layer learns more discriminant saliency templates than its predecessors and higher layers have larger pooling fields. This enables the HDSN to simultaneously achieve high selectivity to target object classes and invariance. The performance of the network in saliency and object recognition tasks is compared to those of models from the biological and

  18. Coding Transparency in Object-Based Video

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Aghito, Shankar Manuel; Forchhammer, Søren

    2006-01-01

    A novel algorithm for coding gray level alpha planes in object-based video is presented. The scheme is based on segmentation in multiple layers. Different coders are specifically designed for each layer. In order to reduce the bit rate, cross-layer redundancies as well as temporal correlation are...

  19. Applying Distributed Object Technology to Distributed Embedded Control Systems

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Jørgensen, Bo Nørregaard; Dalgaard, Lars

    2012-01-01

    In this paper, we describe our Java RMI inspired Object Request Broker architecture MicroRMI for use with networked embedded devices. MicroRMI relieves the software developer from the tedious and error-prone job of writing communication protocols for interacting with such embedded devices. MicroR...... in developing control systems for distributed embedded platforms possessing severe resource restrictions.......RMI supports easy integration of high-level application specific control logic with low-level device specific control logic. Our experience from applying MicroRMI in the context of a distributed robotics control application, clearly demonstrates that it is feasible to use distributed object technology...

  20. Technical specifications, Braidwood Station, Unit Nos. 1 and 2 (Docket Nos. STN 50-456 and STN 50-457): Appendix ''A'' to License No. NPF-70

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1987-05-01

    The Braidwood Station, Unit Nos. 1 and 2, Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public. 18 figs., 55 tabs

  1. Birth of the Object: Detection of Objectness and Extraction of Object Shape through Object Action Complexes

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kraft, Dirk; Pugeault, Nicolas; Baseski, Emre

    2008-01-01

    We describe a process in which the segmentation of objects as well as the extraction of the object shape becomes realized through active exploration of a robot vision system. In the exploration process, two behavioral modules that link robot actions to the visual and haptic perception of objects...... interact. First, by making use of an object independent grasping mechanism, physical control over potential objects can be gained. Having evaluated the initial grasping mechanism as being successful, a second behavior extracts the object shape by making use of prediction based on the motion induced...... system, knowledge about its own embodiment as well as knowledge about geometric relationships such as rigid body motion. This prior knowledge allows the extraction of representations that are semantically richer compared to many other approaches....

  2. An ISOLDE target unit

    CERN Multimedia

    Maximilien Brice

    2002-01-01

    A good dozen different targets are available for ISOLDE, made of different materials and equipped with different kinds of ion-sources, according to the needs of the experiments. Each separator (GPS: general purpose; HRS: high resolution) has its own target. Because of the high radiation levels, robots effect the target changes, about 80 times per year. In the standard unit shown in picture _01, the target is the cylindrical object in the front. It contains uranium-carbide kept at a temperature of 2200 deg C, necessary for the isotopes to be able to escape. At either end, one sees the heater current leads, carrying 700 A. The Booster beam, some 3E13 protons per pulse, enters the target from left. The evaporated isotope atoms enter a hot-plasma ion source (the black object behind the target). The whole unit sits at 60 kV potential (pulsed in synchronism with the arrival of the Booster beam) which accelerates the ions (away from the viewer) towards one of the 2 separators.

  3. Building and Programming a Smart Robotic System for Distinguishing Objects Based on their Shape and Colour

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sharari, T. M.

    2015-03-01

    This paper presents a robotic system designed for holding and placing objects based on their colour and shape. The presented robot is given a complete set of instructions of positions and orientation angles for each manipulation motion. The main feature in this paper is that the developed robot used a combination of vision and motion systems for holding and placing the work-objects, mounted on the flat work-plane, based on their shapes and colors. This combination improves the flexibility of manipulation which may help eliminate the use of some expensive manipulation tasks in a variety of industrial applications. The robotic system presented in this paper is designed as an educational robot that possesses the ability for holding-and-placing operations with limited load. To process the various instructions for holding and placing the work objects, a main control unit - Manipulation Control Unit (MCU) is used as well as a slave unit that performed the actual instructions from the MCU.

  4. Mathematics Education: Student Terminal Goals, Program Goals, and Behavioral Objectives.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mesa Public Schools, AZ.

    Behavioral objectives are listed for the primary, intermediate and junior high mathematics curriculum in the Mesa Public Schools (Arizona). Lists of specific objectives are given by level for sets, symbol recognition, number operations, mathematical structures, measurement and problem solving skills. (JP)

  5. 75 FR 74126 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Picasso: Guitars 1912-1914”

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-11-30

    ... objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, from on or about February 13, 2011, until on or [[Page... the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan agreements...

  6. Objects and Objectivity: The Evolution Controversy at the American Museum of Natural History, 1915-1928

    Science.gov (United States)

    Homchick, Julie

    2010-01-01

    For the purpose of this essay, I examine how evolutionary theory was treated and responded to in the American Museum of Natural History's Hall of the Age of Man during the early 1900s. Specifically, I examine how the curatorial work of the museum's president, Henry Fairfield Osborn, relied on the purported use of objectivity as a means by which to…

  7. Use of experience for the improvement of technical specifications for operation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Schweitz, J.P.; Seveon, J.J.

    1987-11-01

    The lessons drawn from experience led EdF to define in 1980 a national specification standard, to be applied to the first standardized series of 900 MWe units and to be adapted to the later 1300 MWe units. This document is periodically revised, every two years or so, to take into account new trends in safety thinking and lessons learnt from operating experience. In this paper we present the main developments in the field of technical specifications, particularly: the definition of rules applicable in the event of unavailability of safety-related equipment, the integration of plant unit operating feedback for specifications optimization

  8. Science Experience Unit: Conservation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ferguson-Florissant School District, Ferguson, MO.

    GRADES OR AGES: Intermediate grades. SUBJECT MATTER: Conservation. ORGANIZATION AND PHYSICAL APPEARANCE: The guide is divided into 24 experiments. It is mimeographed and staple-bound with a paper cover. OBJECTIVES AND ACTIVITIES: A specific skill or knowledge objective is stated at the beginning of each experiment. Detailed procedures are listed…

  9. Development of Wolsong Unit 2 Containment Analysis Model

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hoon, Choi [Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co., Ltd., Daejeon (Korea, Republic of); Jin, Ko Bong; Chan, Park Young [Hanbat National Univ., Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    2014-05-15

    To be prepared for the full scope safety analysis of Wolsong unit 2 with modified fuel, input decks for the various objectives, which can be read by GOTHIC 7.2b(QA), are developed and tested for the steady state simulation. A detailed nodalization of 39 control volumes and 92 flow paths is constructed to determine the differential pressure across internal walls or hydrogen concentration and distribution inside containment. A lumped model with 15 control volumes and 74 flow paths has also been developed to reduce the computer run time for the assessments in which the analysis results are not sensitive to detailed thermal hydraulic distribution inside containment such as peak pressure, pressure dependent signal and radionuclide release. The input data files provide simplified representations of the geometric layout of the containment building (volumes, dimensions, flow paths, doors, panels, etc.) and the performance characteristics of the various containment subsystems. The parameter values are based on best estimate or design values for that parameter. The analysis values are determined by conservatism depending on the analysis objective and may be different for various analysis objectives. Basic input decks of Wolsong unit 2 were developed for the various analysis purposes with GOTHIC 7.2b(QA). Depend on the analysis objective, two types of models are prepared. Detailed model models each confined room in the containment as a separate node. All of the geometric data are based on the drawings of Wolsong unit 2. Developed containment models are simulating the steady state well to the designated initial condition. These base models will be used for Wolsong unit 2 in case of safety analysis of full scope is needed.

  10. 76 FR 35068 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations; “Monet/Lichtenstein: Rouen...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-06-15

    ... for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are... exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Boston, Massachusetts, from on or about July 3, 2011, until on or about September 18, 2011, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art...

  11. Multi-unit auctions with budget-constrained bidders

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ghosh, Gagan Pratap

    In my dissertation, I investigate the effects of budget-constraints in multi-unit auctions. This is done in three parts. First, I analyze a case where all bidders have a common budget constraint. Precisely, I analyze an auction where two units of an object are sold at two simultaneous, sealed bid, first-price auctions, to bidders who have demand for both units. Bidders differ with respect to their valuations for the units. All bidders have an identical budget constraint which binds their ability to spend in the auction. I show that if valuation distribution is atom-less, then their does not exist any symmetric equilibrium in this auction game. In the second and third parts of my thesis, I analyze the sale of licenses for the right to drill for oil and natural gas in the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) of the United States. These sales are conducted using simultaneous sealed-bid first-price auctions for multiple licenses, each representing a specific area (called a tract). Using aspects of observed bidding-behavior, I first make a prima facie case that bidders are budget-constrained in these auctions. In order to formalize this argument, I develop a simple extension of the standard model (where bidders differ in their valuations for the objects) by incorporating (random) budgets for the bidders. The auction-game then has a two-dimensional set of types for each player. I study the theoretical properties of this auction, assuming for simplicity that two units are being sold. I show that this game has an equilibrium in pure strategies that is symmetric with respect to the players and with respect to the units. The strategies are essentially pure in the sense that each bidder-type has a unique split (up to a permutation) of his budget between the two auctions. I then characterize the equilibrium in terms of the bid-distribution and iso-bid curves in the value-budget space. I derive various qualitative features of this equilibrium, among which are: (1) under mild

  12. Object-Based Benefits without Object-Based Representations

    OpenAIRE

    Alvarez, George Angelo; Fougnie, Daryl; Cormiea, Sarah M

    2012-01-01

    The organization of visual information into objects strongly influences visual memory: Displays with objects defined by two features (e.g. color, orientation) are easier to remember than displays with twice as many objects defined by one feature (Olson & Jiang, 2002). Existing theories suggest that this ‘object-benefit’ is based on object-based limitations in working memory: because a limited number of objects can be stored, packaging features together so that fewer objects have to be remembe...

  13. Corrective action investigation plan for Corrective Action Unit Number 427: Area 3 septic waste system numbers 2 and 6, Tonopah Test Range, Nevada

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1997-01-01

    This Corrective Action Investigation Plan (CAIP) contains the environmental sample collection objectives and the criteria for conducting site investigation activities at the Area 3 Compound, specifically Corrective Action Unit (CAU) Number 427, which is located at the Tonopah Test Range (TTR). The TTR, included in the Nellis Air Force Range, is approximately 255 kilometers (140 miles) northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada. The Corrective Action Unit Work Plan, Tonopah Test Range, Nevada divides investigative activities at TTR into Source Groups. The Septic Tanks and Lagoons Group consists of seven CAUs. Corrective Action Unit Number 427 is one of three septic waste system CAUs in TTR Area 3. Corrective Action Unit Numbers 405 and 428 will be investigated at a future data. Corrective Action Unit Number 427 is comprised of Septic Waste Systems Number 2 and 6 with respective CAS Numbers 03-05-002-SW02 and 03-05-002-SW06

  14. Automatic Adviser on Mobile Objects Status Identification and Classification

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shabelnikov, A. N.; Liabakh, N. N.; Gibner, Ya M.; Saryan, A. S.

    2018-05-01

    A mobile object status identification task is defined within the image discrimination theory. It is proposed to classify objects into three classes: object operation status; its maintenance is required and object should be removed from the production process. Two methods were developed to construct the separating boundaries between the designated classes: a) using statistical information on the research objects executed movement, b) basing on regulatory documents and expert commentary. Automatic Adviser operation simulation and the operation results analysis complex were synthesized. Research results are commented using a specific example of cuts rolling from the hump yard. The work was supported by Russian Fundamental Research Fund, project No. 17-20-01040.

  15. The Vibration Monitoring of the Gascompressor Units with Application of Hurst's Statistics

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Zakharov, O V; Novichkov, S V; Kochetkov, A V

    2016-01-01

    The gascompressor units work in the unsteady regime which depends on many internal and external factors. For the solution of problems of control, management and forecasting the statistical assessment of a condition of object in real time according to noisy observations of one realization of stochastic process is carried out. The traditional spectral analysis on the basis of Fast Fourier Transformation in this case is inefficient if time scale is much less than duration, which is subject to the analysis. Therefore for monitoring of a condition of the equipment it is offered to use Hurst's statistics by means of which it is possible to investigate quantitatively law of development of a vibration signal and unambiguously to analyze a condition of the gascompressor units. Calculation of economic efficiency from introduction of such technology of monitoring will provide decrease on average by 2.5% of a consumption of gas and specific costs of capital repairs of the gascompressor units at the expense of increase in a total operating time by 20%. (paper)

  16. State-Specific Prevalence of Tobacco Product Use Among Adults - United States, 2014-2015.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Odani, Satomi; Armour, Brian S; Graffunder, Corinne M; Willis, Gordon; Hartman, Anne M; Agaku, Israel T

    2018-01-26

    Despite recent declines in cigarette smoking prevalence, the tobacco product landscape has shifted to include emerging tobacco products* (1,2). Previous research has documented adult use of smokeless tobacco and cigarettes by state (3); however, state-specific data on other tobacco products are limited. To assess tobacco product use in the 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia (DC), CDC and the National Cancer Institute analyzed self-reported use of six tobacco product types: cigarettes, cigars, regular pipes, water pipes, electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes), and smokeless tobacco products among adults aged ≥18 years using data from the 2014-2015 Tobacco Use Supplement to the Current Population Survey (TUS-CPS). Prevalence of ever-use of any tobacco product ranged from 27.0% (Utah) to 55.4% (Wyoming). Current (every day or some days) use of any tobacco product ranged from 10.2% (California) to 27.7% (Wyoming). Cigarettes were the most common currently used tobacco product in all states and DC. Among current cigarette smokers, the proportion who currently used one or more other tobacco products ranged from 11.5% (Delaware) to 32.3% (Oregon). Differences in tobacco product use across states underscore the importance of implementing proven population-level strategies to reduce tobacco use and expanding these strategies to cover all forms of tobacco marketed in the United States. Such strategies could include comprehensive smoke-free policies, tobacco product price increases, anti-tobacco mass media campaigns, and barrier-free access to clinical smoking cessation resources (1,4).

  17. ADANS database specification

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    1997-01-16

    The purpose of the Air Mobility Command (AMC) Deployment Analysis System (ADANS) Database Specification (DS) is to describe the database organization and storage allocation and to provide the detailed data model of the physical design and information necessary for the construction of the parts of the database (e.g., tables, indexes, rules, defaults). The DS includes entity relationship diagrams, table and field definitions, reports on other database objects, and a description of the ADANS data dictionary. ADANS is the automated system used by Headquarters AMC and the Tanker Airlift Control Center (TACC) for airlift planning and scheduling of peacetime and contingency operations as well as for deliberate planning. ADANS also supports planning and scheduling of Air Refueling Events by the TACC and the unit-level tanker schedulers. ADANS receives input in the form of movement requirements and air refueling requests. It provides a suite of tools for planners to manipulate these requirements/requests against mobility assets and to develop, analyze, and distribute schedules. Analysis tools are provided for assessing the products of the scheduling subsystems, and editing capabilities support the refinement of schedules. A reporting capability provides formatted screen, print, and/or file outputs of various standard reports. An interface subsystem handles message traffic to and from external systems. The database is an integral part of the functionality summarized above.

  18. Object width modulates object-based attentional selection.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nah, Joseph C; Neppi-Modona, Marco; Strother, Lars; Behrmann, Marlene; Shomstein, Sarah

    2018-04-24

    Visual input typically includes a myriad of objects, some of which are selected for further processing. While these objects vary in shape and size, most evidence supporting object-based guidance of attention is drawn from paradigms employing two identical objects. Importantly, object size is a readily perceived stimulus dimension, and whether it modulates the distribution of attention remains an open question. Across four experiments, the size of the objects in the display was manipulated in a modified version of the two-rectangle paradigm. In Experiment 1, two identical parallel rectangles of two sizes (thin or thick) were presented. Experiments 2-4 employed identical trapezoids (each having a thin and thick end), inverted in orientation. In the experiments, one end of an object was cued and participants performed either a T/L discrimination or a simple target-detection task. Combined results show that, in addition to the standard object-based attentional advantage, there was a further attentional benefit for processing information contained in the thick versus thin end of objects. Additionally, eye-tracking measures demonstrated increased saccade precision towards thick object ends, suggesting that Fitts's Law may play a role in object-based attentional shifts. Taken together, these results suggest that object-based attentional selection is modulated by object width.

  19. Multi-objective Optimization of Process Parameters in Friction Stir Welding

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Tutum, Cem Celal; Hattel, Jesper Henri

    The objective of this paper is to investigate optimum process parameters in Friction Stir Welding (FSW) to minimize residual stresses in the work piece and maximize production efficiency meanwhile satisfying process specific constraints as well. More specifically, the choices of tool rotational...... speed and traverse welding speed have been sought in order to achieve the goals mentioned above using an evolutionary multi-objective optimization (MOO) algorithm, i.e. non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II), integrated with a transient, 2- dimensional sequentially coupled thermo...

  20. Ecological validity and infant research: An example from an experimental study on object individuation with familiar objects in 8-month-old infants

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Krøjgaard, Peter

    shall attempt to apply an analysis based on the concept of ecological validity on a specific experimental study within the field of infant cognition. I will attempt to show that such an analysis can be worthwhile.The presentation falls in three sections. The first section is a presentation...... might make a difference when infants reason about the physical world. For example, it might be argued that infants would probably pay more attention to ‘disappearing' familiar objects compared to novel ones. Using the so-called "violation-of-expectation" method, the study employed a design that recently...... on the infants' ability to individuate objects in the present design.In the third and final section the results obtained in the experiment are discussed, not only in relation to the existing litterature within the field of research of object individuation, but also by specificly applying the concept...

  1. Water Quality Monitoring: An Environmental Studies Unit for Biology 20/30. Teacher's Guide.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Alberta Environment, Edmonton. Environmental Education Resources Branch.

    The objective of this environmental studies unit is to establish a water quality monitoring project for high school students in Alberta while simultaneously providing a unit which meets the objectives of the Biology 20 program (and which may also be used in Biology 10 and 30). Through this project, students assist in the collection,…

  2. Water Quality Monitoring: An Environmental Studies Unit for Biology 20/30. Student Manual.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Alberta Environment, Edmonton. Environmental Education Resources Branch.

    The objective of this environmental studies unit is to establish a water quality monitoring project for high school students in Alberta while simultaneously providing a unit which meets the objectives of the Biology 20 program (and which may also be used in Biology 10 and 30). Through this project, students assist in the collection,…

  3. Significance of specific activity and a possible universal unit for its definition

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Svoboda, K.

    1985-01-01

    The growing importance of specific activity is reviewed. It concerns especially surface phenomena, toxicity, labelling of radiopharmaceuticals, isotope exchange, enzymatic and pharmacological ligand-receptor reactions. The present state of evaluating the specific activity is analyzed. Introduction of the coefficient Dsub(CF) (deviation from true carrier free state) is proposed as a possibility for universal declaration of the specific activity. (author)

  4. Electric motor-transformer aggregate in hermetic objects of transport vehicles

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zabora, Igor

    2017-10-01

    The construction and features of operation for new electrical unit - electric motor-transformer aggregate (DTA) are considered. Induction motors are intended for operation in hermetic plants with extreme conditions surrounding gas, steam-to-gas and liquid environment at a high temperature (to several hundred of degrees). Main objective of spent researches is the substantiation of possibility reliable and effective electric power transform with electric machine means directly in hermetic objects with extreme conditions environment by means of new DTA. The principle and job analysis of new disk induction motors of block-module type are observed.

  5. Apricot - An Object-Oriented Modeling Language for Hybrid Systems

    OpenAIRE

    Fang, Huixing; Zhu, Huibiao; Shi, Jianqi

    2013-01-01

    We propose Apricot as an object-oriented language for modeling hybrid systems. The language combines the features in domain specific language and object-oriented language, that fills the gap between design and implementation, as a result, we put forward the modeling language with simple and distinct syntax, structure and semantics. In addition, we introduce the concept of design by convention into Apricot.As the characteristic of object-oriented and the component architecture in Apricot, we c...

  6. Changes Coming to the International System of Units

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aubrecht, Gordon J., II

    2012-01-01

    The International System of Units (SI) is a coherent system based originally on measurements of properties of material objects. In more recent times, the adopted definitions depend on setting values of universal constants wherever possible. The last remaining human-made material object on which a standard is based is a platinum-iridium kilogram…

  7. METRIC context unit architecture

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Simpson, R.O.

    1988-01-01

    METRIC is an architecture for a simple but powerful Reduced Instruction Set Computer (RISC). Its speed comes from the simultaneous processing of several instruction streams, with instructions from the various streams being dispatched into METRIC's execution pipeline as they become available for execution. The pipeline is thus kept full, with a mix of instructions for several contexts in execution at the same time. True parallel programming is supported within a single execution unit, the METRIC Context Unit. METRIC's architecture provides for expansion through the addition of multiple Context Units and of specialized Functional Units. The architecture thus spans a range of size and performance from a single-chip microcomputer up through large and powerful multiprocessors. This research concentrates on the specification of the METRIC Context Unit at the architectural level. Performance tradeoffs made during METRIC's design are discussed, and projections of METRIC's performance are made based on simulation studies.

  8. 77 FR 8943 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Rembrandt's Self-Portrait”

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-02-15

    ...-Portrait,'' imported from abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, is of cultural... determine that the exhibition or display of the exhibit object at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York... of the object at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston from on or about June 3, 2012 until on or about...

  9. Nuclear Fuel Cycle Objectives

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2013-01-01

    One of the IAEA's statutory objectives is to 'seek to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity throughout the world'. One way this objective is achieved is through the publication of a range of technical series. Two of these are the IAEA Nuclear Energy Series and the IAEA Safety Standards Series. According to Article III.A.6 of the IAEA Statute, the safety standards establish 'standards of safety for protection of health and minimization of danger to life and property'. The safety standards include the Safety Fundamentals, Safety Requirements and Safety Guides. These standards are written primarily in a regulatory style, and are binding on the IAEA for its own programmes. The principal users are the regulatory bodies in member States and other national authorities. The IAEA Nuclear Energy Series comprises reports designed to encourage and assist R and D on, and application of, nuclear energy for peaceful uses. This includes practical examples to be used by owners and operators of utilities in member States, implementing organizations, academia and government officials, among others. This information is presented in guides, reports on technology status and advances, and best practices for peaceful uses of nuclear energy based on inputs from international experts. The IAEA Nuclear Energy Series complements the IAEA Safety Standards Series. The Nuclear Energy Basic Principles is the highest level publication in the IAEA Nuclear Energy Series, and describes the rationale and vision for the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. It presents eight Basic Principles on which nuclear energy systems should be based to fulfil nuclear energy's potential to help meet growing global energy needs. The Nuclear Energy Series Objectives are the second level publications. They describe what needs to be considered and the specific goals to be achieved at different stages of implementation, all of which are consistent with the Basic Principles

  10. An object-oriented approach to energy-economic modeling

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Wise, M.A.; Fox, J.A.; Sands, R.D.

    1993-12-01

    In this paper, the authors discuss the experiences in creating an object-oriented economic model of the U.S. energy and agriculture markets. After a discussion of some central concepts, they provide an overview of the model, focusing on the methodology of designing an object-oriented class hierarchy specification based on standard microeconomic production functions. The evolution of the model from the class definition stage to programming it in C++, a standard object-oriented programming language, will be detailed. The authors then discuss the main differences between writing the object-oriented program versus a procedure-oriented program of the same model. Finally, they conclude with a discussion of the advantages and limitations of the object-oriented approach based on the experience in building energy-economic models with procedure-oriented approaches and languages.

  11. Attention-spreading based on hierarchical spatial representations for connected objects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kasai, Tetsuko

    2010-01-01

    Attention selects objects or groups as the most fundamental unit, and this may be achieved through a process in which attention automatically spreads throughout their entire region. Previously, we found that a lateralized potential relative to an attended hemifield at occipito-temporal electrode sites reflects attention-spreading in response to connected bilateral stimuli [Kasai, T., & Kondo, M. Electrophysiological correlates of attention-spreading in visual grouping. NeuroReport, 18, 93-98, 2007]. The present study examined the nature of object representations by manipulating the extent of grouping through connectedness, while controlling the symmetrical structure of bilateral stimuli. The electrophysiological results of two experiments consistently indicated that attention was guided twice in association with perceptual grouping in the early phase (N1, 150-200 msec poststimulus) and with the unity of an object in the later phase (N2pc, 310/330-390 msec). This suggests that there are two processes in object-based spatial selection, and these are discussed with regard to their cognitive mechanisms and object representations.

  12. The United Nations University: The Concept, History, Structure, Financing, Objectives, Centres and Programmes. Guest Editorial.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Reddy, J.

    2000-01-01

    The United Nations University (UNU) is an international academic organization which brings together leading international scholars to tackle world problems. This article describes for South African scholars, institutions, governments, and their agencies the importance of the work being undertaken by the UNU and encourages their participation. (EV)

  13. United Nations opens gender coordinating unit for Afghanistan.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Morris, K

    1999-02-06

    The UN has created a gender coordinating unit for Afghanistan in an effort to combat some problems encountered by women and girls in the country. Reports continue to come in of women in Afghanistan being denied the right to work, to be educated, and to have access to medical care. The gap in education between men and women continues to widen as a result of edicts issued by Taliban authorities banning girls from attending formal schools and female teachers from working. The situation has grown worse since the UN and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) withdrew international workers last year due to security concerns. Although a UN mission will travel to the country this week to discuss the return of international staff, the gender coordinating unit will for now have to work out of Islamabad, Pakistan. The unit will create guidelines for gender mainstreaming, a strategy in which mainstream policies and resource allocations are changed to reflect the principle of gender equality. Other goals include setting realistic objectives for gender activities, working with partners on pilot projects, and establishing minimum standards for best practices. MERLIN, a NGO with a primary health care program run by local staff in the Taliban-controlled province of Farah, welcomes the move.

  14. [Mobile Health Units: An Analysis of Concepts and Implementation Requirements in Rural Regions.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hämel, K; Kutzner, J; Vorderwülbecke, J

    2017-12-01

    Access to health services in rural regions represents a challenge. The development of care models that respond to health service shortages and pay particular attention to the increasing health care needs of the elderly is an important concern. A model that has been implemented in other countries is that of mobile health units. But until now, there is no overview of their possible objectives, functions and implementation requirements. This paper is based on a literature analysis and an internet research on mobile health units in rural regions. Mobile health units aim to avoid regional undersupply and address particularly vulnerable population groups. In the literature, mobile health units are described with a focus on specific illnesses, as well as those that provide comprehensive, partly multi-professional primary care that is close to patients' homes. The implementation of mobile health units is demanding; the key challenges are (a) alignment to the needs of the regional population, (b) user-oriented access and promotion of awareness and acceptance of mobile health units by the local population, and (c) network building within existing care structures to ensure continuity of care for patients. To fulfill these requirements, a community-oriented program development and implementation is important. Mobile health units could represent an interesting model for the provision of health care in rural regions in Germany. International experiences are an important starting point and should be taken into account for the further development of models in Germany. © Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart · New York.

  15. Ecological units: definitions and application.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jax, Kurt

    2006-09-01

    Concepts of ecological units, such as population, community, and ecosystem, are at the basis of ecological theory and research and have increasingly become the focus of conservation strategies. Concepts of these units still suffer from inconsistencies and confusions over terminology. The different concepts are treated here together as a common "conceptual cluster," with similar ecological functions (roles) and similar problems in their definition and use. An analysis of the multitude of existing terms and concepts that have been developed for these units reveals that they differ with respect to at least four basic criteria: (i) the questions as to whether they are defined statistically or via a network of interactions; (ii) if their boundaries are drawn by topographical or process-related criteria; (iii) how high the required internal relationships are; and (iv) if they are perceived as "real" entities or abstractions by an observer The various definitions cannot be easily sorted into just a few types, but they can be characterized by several independent criteria. I argue that serious problems arise if the different possibilities of defining ecological units are not recognized and if the concepts are perceived as self-evident. The different concepts of ecological units should be defined and used in a philosophically informed manner I propose a dual approach to the use of ecological units. Generic meanings of the main concepts (especially population, community, and ecosystem) should be retained only as heuristically useful perspectives, while specific and "operational" definitions of the concepts as units should be developed, depending on specific purposes of their use. Some thoughts on the basic requirements for such definitions and the domains of their uses are briefly explained.

  16. Knowledge-Based Topic Model for Unsupervised Object Discovery and Localization.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Niu, Zhenxing; Hua, Gang; Wang, Le; Gao, Xinbo

    Unsupervised object discovery and localization is to discover some dominant object classes and localize all of object instances from a given image collection without any supervision. Previous work has attempted to tackle this problem with vanilla topic models, such as latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA). However, in those methods no prior knowledge for the given image collection is exploited to facilitate object discovery. On the other hand, the topic models used in those methods suffer from the topic coherence issue-some inferred topics do not have clear meaning, which limits the final performance of object discovery. In this paper, prior knowledge in terms of the so-called must-links are exploited from Web images on the Internet. Furthermore, a novel knowledge-based topic model, called LDA with mixture of Dirichlet trees, is proposed to incorporate the must-links into topic modeling for object discovery. In particular, to better deal with the polysemy phenomenon of visual words, the must-link is re-defined as that one must-link only constrains one or some topic(s) instead of all topics, which leads to significantly improved topic coherence. Moreover, the must-links are built and grouped with respect to specific object classes, thus the must-links in our approach are semantic-specific , which allows to more efficiently exploit discriminative prior knowledge from Web images. Extensive experiments validated the efficiency of our proposed approach on several data sets. It is shown that our method significantly improves topic coherence and outperforms the unsupervised methods for object discovery and localization. In addition, compared with discriminative methods, the naturally existing object classes in the given image collection can be subtly discovered, which makes our approach well suited for realistic applications of unsupervised object discovery.Unsupervised object discovery and localization is to discover some dominant object classes and localize all of object

  17. Alcohol and homicide in Russia and the United States: a comparative analysis.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Landberg, Jonas; Norström, Thor

    2011-09-01

    The object of this study was to perform a comparative analysis of the aggregate relationship between alcohol and homicide in Russia and in the United States. The comparison was based on the magnitude of the alcohol effect, the alcohol attributable fraction (AAF), and the degree to which total consumption could account for trends in homicide. We analyzed total and sex-specific homicide rates for the age groups 15-64 years, 15-34 years, and 35-64 years. The study period was 1959-1998 for Russia and 1950-2002 for the United States. For the United States, alcohol consumption was gauged by sales of alcohol; for Russia, estimated unrecorded consumption was included as well. The data were analyzed through autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) modeling. The results show that, for Russia as well as for the United States, a 1-L increase in consumption was associated with an increase in homicides of about 10%, although the absolute effect was markedly larger in Russia because of differences in homicide rates. The AAF estimates suggested that 73% and 57% of the homicides would be attributable to alcohol in Russia and in the United States, respectively. Most of the temporal variation in the Russian homicide rate could be accounted for by the trend in drinking, whereas the U.S. trend in total alcohol consumption had a more limited ability to predict the trend in homicides. We conclude that the role of alcohol in homicide seems to be larger in Russia than in the United States.

  18. Objectives and functions of ionizing radiation metrology

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rothe, H.

    1981-01-01

    Proceeding from the fundamental objectives of ionizing radiation metrology, the main tasks of metrological research and assurances of accurate measurements in dosimetry and activity determination are summarized. With a view to the technical performance of these tasks the state-of-the-art and the trends in reproduction and dissemination of dosimetric and activity units are outlined. Problems are derived that should be solved within the framework of the CMEA Standing Commissions on Standardization and on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy. (author)

  19. 26 CFR 1.862-1 - Income specifically from sources without the United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... formulas, goodwill, trademarks, trade brands, franchises, and other like property; (v) Gains, profits, and income from the sale of real property located without the United States; and (vi) Gains, profits, and...

  20. Multi-Unit Initiating Event Analysis for a Single-Unit Internal Events Level 1 PSA

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kim, Dong San; Park, Jin Hee; Lim, Ho Gon [KAERI, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    2016-05-15

    The Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011 highlighted the importance of considering the risks from multi-unit accidents at a site. The ASME/ANS probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) standard also includes some requirements related to multi-unit aspects, one of which (IE-B5) is as follows: 'For multi-unit sites with shared systems, DO NOT SUBSUME multi-unit initiating events if they impact mitigation capability [1].' However, the existing single-unit PSA models do not explicitly consider multi-unit initiating events and hence systems shared by multiple units (e.g., alternate AC diesel generator) are fully credited for the single unit and ignores the need for the shared systems by other units at the same site [2]. This paper describes the results of the multi-unit initiating event (IE) analysis performed as a part of the at-power internal events Level 1 probabilistic safety assessment (PSA) for an OPR1000 single unit ('reference unit'). In this study, a multi-unit initiating event analysis for a single-unit PSA was performed, and using the results, dual-unit LOOP initiating event was added to the existing PSA model for the reference unit (OPR1000 type). Event trees were developed for dual-unit LOOP and dual-unit SBO which can be transferred from dual- unit LOOP. Moreover, CCF basic events for 5 diesel generators were modelled. In case of simultaneous SBO occurrences in both units, this study compared two different assumptions on the availability of the AAC D/G. As a result, when dual-unit LOOP initiating event was added to the existing single-unit PSA model, the total CDF increased by 1∼ 2% depending on the probability that the AAC D/G is available to a specific unit in case of simultaneous SBO in both units.

  1. Leadership Stability in Army Reserve Component Units

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-01-01

    OMB control number. 1. REPORT DATE 2013 2. REPORT TYPE 3. DATES COVERED 00-00-2013 to 00-00-2013 4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE Leadership Stability in...standards for research quality and objectivity. Leadership Stability in Army Reserve Component Units Thomas F. Lippiatt, J. Michael Polich NATIONAL SECURITY...RESEARCH DIVISION Leadership Stability in Army Reserve Component Units Thomas F. Lippiatt, J. Michael Polich Prepared for the Office of the

  2. Review and Status of Wind Integration and Transmission in the United States. Key Issues and Lessons Learned

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Milligan, M. [National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Kirby, B. [National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Acker, T. [Northern Arizona Univ., Flagstaff, AZ (United States); Ahlstrom, M. [National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Frew, B. [National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Goggin, M. [American Wind Energy Association, Washington, DC (United States); Lasher, W. [Electric Reliability Council of Texas, Austin, TX (United States); Marquis, M. [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminstration, Washington, DC (United States); Osborn, D. [Midcontinent Independent System Operator, Carmel, IN (United States)

    2015-03-01

    The objective in electric power system operation is to use generation and transmission resources within organizational constraints and operational rules and regulations to reliably and costeffectively balance load and generation. To meet this objective, system operational practices have been created to accommodate the innate variability and uncertainty that comes from a variety of sources, such as uncertainty of demand forecasts, whether a specific generating unit will be available when called upon, the variability of demand from many different types of customers, and others. As more wind power is connected to the power system, operating experiences acquired during the past several years have generally confirmed the findings of wind integration studies: wind energy increases the level of variability and uncertainty that a system operator must manage.

  3. Human resource management and unit performance in knowledge-intensive work.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kehoe, Rebecca R; Collins, Christopher J

    2017-08-01

    To clarify the potential value of a targeted system of human resource (HR) practices, we explore the unique effects of a relationship-oriented HR system and the more commonly studied high commitment HR system on unit performance in the context of knowledge-intensive work. We develop theoretical arguments suggesting that the high commitment HR system contributes to unit performance through its positive effects on employees' collective organizational commitment, general and firm-specific human capital, and access to knowledge. We argue that the relationship-oriented HR system contributes to unit performance through its positive effects on employees' collective access to knowledge by fostering a social context and interpersonal exchange conditions which support employees' ongoing access to knowledge flows within and outside their unit and broader organization. Based on unit-level data collected from a matched sample of employees and managers in 128 units in the science and engineering division of a large hydroelectric power organization, our results suggest that the targeted, relationship-oriented HR system is related to firm performance and may complement a broader, high commitment approach to managing knowledge workers. Specifically, the positive relationship between the high commitment HR system and unit performance is mediated by employees' collective organizational commitment, firm-specific human capital, and access to knowledge in other organizational units; whereas the positive relationship between the relationship-oriented HR system and unit performance is mediated by units' access to knowledge within the unit, in other units, and outside the organization. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

  4. Risk-informed approach in US-APWR technical specifications

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Saji, Etsuro; Tanaka, Futoshi; Kuroiwa, Katsuya; Kawai, Katsunori

    2009-01-01

    The Risk-Managed Technical Specifications and the Surveillance Frequency Control Program have been adopted in the US-APWR Technical Specifications. These risk-informed approaches are unique among the technical specifications for the advanced light water reactor designs adopted by planned nuclear power stations in the United States. (author)

  5. Nuclear Energy General Objectives

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2011-01-01

    considered and the specific goals to be achieved at different stages of implementation, all of which are consistent with the Basic Principles. The four Objectives publications include Nuclear General Objectives, Nuclear Power Objectives, Nuclear Fuel Cycle Objectives, and Radioactive Waste Management and Decommissioning Objectives. All four Objectives publications follow the same structure. For each topic in the area, the objectives are described in accordance with the sequence in the Basic Principles publication. Within each of these four Objectives publications, the individual topics that make up each area are addressed. The topics included in Nuclear General Objectives are Energy Systems Analysis and Development of Strategies for Nuclear Energy, Economics, Infrastructure, Management Systems, Human Resources and Knowledge Management. The diversity of the topics contained in Nuclear General Objectives necessitated incorporating some repetition in order to simplify access to the relevant information for the various interested audiences.

  6. Quantified safety objectives in high technology: Meaning and demonstration

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Vinck, W.F.; Gilby, E.; Chicken, J.

    1986-01-01

    An overview and trends-analysis is given of the types of quantified criteria and objectives which are presently applied or envisaged and discussed in Europe in the nuclear application, more specifically Nuclear Power Plants (NPPs), and in non-nuclear applications, more specifically in the chemical and petrochemical process industry. Some comparative deductions are made. Attention is paid to the similarities or discrepancies between such criteria and objectives and to problems associated with the demonstration that they are implemented. The role of cost-effectiveness of Risk deduction is briefly discussed and mention made of a search made into combining the technical, economic and socio-political factors playing a role in Risk acceptance

  7. Planning and setting objectives in field studies: Chapter 2

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fisher, Robert N.; Dodd, C. Kenneth

    2016-01-01

    This chapter enumerates the steps required in designing and planning field studies on the ecology and conservation of reptiles, as these involve a high level of uncertainty and risk. To this end, the chapter differentiates between goals (descriptions of what one intends to accomplish) and objectives (the measurable steps required to achieve the established goals). Thus, meeting a specific goal may require many objectives. It may not be possible to define some of them until certain experiments have been conducted; often evaluations of sampling protocols are needed to increase certainty in the biological results. And if sampling locations are fixed and sampling events are repeated over time, then both study-specific covariates and sampling-specific covariates should exist. Additionally, other critical design considerations for field study include obtaining permits, as well as researching ethics and biosecurity issues.

  8. Developing a User Oriented Design Methodology for Learning Activities Using Boundary Objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fragou, ?lga; Kameas, Achilles

    2013-01-01

    International Standards in High and Open and Distance Education are used for developing Open Educational Resources (OERs). Current issues in e-learning community are the specification of learning chunks and the definition of describing designs for different units of learning (activities, units, courses) in a generic though expandable format.…

  9. HDS unit revamp and operating experience

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Reinhardt, J. [Veba Oel Verarbeitungs-GmbH, Gelsenkirchen (Germany); Balfanz, U. [Aral Forschung, Gelsenkirchen (Germany); Dimmig, T. [TU Bergakademie Freiberg, Freiberg (Germany)

    2002-12-01

    Ruhr Oel GmbH, a joint venture between BP and PDVSA, operates a HDS unit at its Gelsenkirchen-Scholven site. The unit produces a major blend component for diesel fuel. Driven by ambitious German environmental policy and by an agreement between the German car and oil industries on the one hand and the government on the other, more stringent low sulphur fuel specifications will be enforced in Germany much earlier than in the rest of the European Union. In view of this situation a project was developed to fulfill the new product specifications with minimum investment. In a joint effort involving the refinery, the company research facilities and the catalyst supplier (AKZO NOBEL), pilot plant tests were performed to develop the best catalyst system and the new process conditions. Based on these results, an existing HDS unit was accordingly revamped. After the revamp, the unit produced diesel fuel with 50 ppm sulphur content and furthermore test runs at 10 ppm were carried out successfully. These results are displayed in this article. (orig.)

  10. The Object Context-place-location Paradigm for Testing Spatial Memory in Mice.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lesburguères, Edith; Tsokas, Panayiotis; Sacktor, Todd Charlton; Fenton, André Antonio

    2017-04-20

    This protocol was originally designed to examine long-term spatial memory in PKMζ knockout ( i.e ., PKMζ-null) mice (Tsokas et al ., 2016). Our main goal was to test whether the ability of these animals to maintain previously acquired spatial information was sensitive to the type and complexity of the spatial information that needs to be remembered. Accordingly, we modified and combined into a single protocol, three novelty-preference tests, specifically the object-in-context, object-in-place and object-in-location tests, adapted from previous studies in rodents (Mumby et al ., 2002; Langston and Wood, 2010; Barker and Warburton, 2011). During the training (learning) phase of the procedure, mice are repeatedly exposed to three different environments in which they learn the spatial arrangement of an environment-specific set of non-identical objects. After this learning phase is completed, each mouse receives three different memory tests configured as environment mismatches, in which the previously learned objects-in-space configurations have been modified from the original training situation. The mismatch tests differ in their cognitive demands due to the type of spatial association that is manipulated, specifically evaluating memory for object-context and object-place associations. During each memory test, the time differential spent exploring the novel (misplaced) and familiar objects is computed as an index of novelty discrimination. This index is the behavioral measure of memory recall of the previously acquired spatial associations.

  11. Soil Formation and Distribution in Missouri. Instructional Unit. Conservation Education Series.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Castillon, David A.

    This unit is designed to help vocational agriculture teachers incorporate information on soil formation and the soils geography of Missouri into their curriculum. The unit consists of: (1) a topic outline; (2) general unit objectives; (3) discussions of processes and factors of soil formation, the soils geography of Missouri, and some soil…

  12. Model Commissioning Plan and Guide Specifications

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    1997-03-01

    The objectives of Model Commissioning Plan and Guide Specifications are to ensure that the design team applies commissioning concepts to the design and prepares commissioning specifications and a commission plan for inclusion in the bid construction documents.

  13. 78 FR 71022 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Christopher Williams: The...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-11-27

    ... objects at The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL, from on or about January 25, 2014, until on or about May 18, 2014; the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, from on or about August 2, 2014, until on or... exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported pursuant to loan...

  14. 75 FR 3781 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “The Mourners: Tomb...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-22

    ... abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are... exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY, from on or about March 1, 2010, until on or about May 23, 2010; the St. Louis Art Museum, St. Louis, MO, from on or...

  15. Firm- and drug-specific patterns of generic drug payments by US medicaid programs: 1991-2008.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kelton, Christina M L; Chang, Lenisa V; Guo, Jeff J; Yu, Yan; Berry, Edmund A; Bian, Boyang; Heaton, Pamela C

    2014-04-01

    The entry of generic drugs into markets previously monopolized by patented, branded drugs often represents large potential savings for healthcare payers in the USA. Our objectives were to describe and explain the trends in drug reimbursement by public Medicaid programmes post-generic entry for as many drug markets and for as long a time period as possible. The data were the Medicaid State Drug Utilization Data maintained by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Quarterly utilization and expenditure data from 1991 to 2008 were extracted for 83 drugs, produced by 229 firms, that experienced initial generic entry between 1992 and 2004. A relative 'price' for a specific drug, firm and quarter was constructed as Medicaid reimbursement per unit (e.g. tablet, capsule or vial) divided by average reimbursement per unit for the branded drug the year before entry. Fixed-effects models controlling for time-, firm- and drug-specific differences were estimated to explain reimbursement. Twelve quarters after generic entry, 18 % of drugs had average per-unit reimbursement less than 50 % of the original branded-drug reimbursement. For each additional firm manufacturing the drug, reimbursement per unit, relative to the pre-generic-entry branded-drug reimbursement, was estimated to fall by 17 (p < 0.01) and 3 (p < 0.01) percentage points for generic and branded-drug companies, respectively. Each additional quarter post-generic entry brought a 2 (p < 0.01) percentage point drop in relative reimbursement. State Medicaid programmes generally have been able to obtain relief from high drug prices following patent expirations for many branded-drug medications by adjusting reimbursement following the expanded competition in the pharmaceutical market.

  16. Radioactive Waste Management Objectives

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2011-01-01

    considered and the specific goals to be achieved at different stages of implementation, all of which are consistent with the Basic Principles. The four Objectives publications include Nuclear General Objectives, Nuclear Power Objectives, Nuclear Fuel Cycle Objectives, and Radioactive Waste Management and Decommissioning Objectives. This publication sets out the objectives that need to be achieved in the area of radioactive waste management, including decommissioning and environmental remediation, to ensure that the Nuclear Energy Basic Principles are satisfied.

  17. Adapting the Mathematical Task Framework to Design Online Didactic Objects

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bowers, Janet; Bezuk, Nadine; Aguilar, Karen

    2011-01-01

    Designing didactic objects involves imagining how students can conceive of specific mathematical topics and then imagining what types of classroom discussions could support these mental constructions. This study investigated whether it was possible to design Java applets that might serve as didactic objects to support online learning where…

  18. Objective consensus from decision trees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Putora, Paul Martin; Panje, Cedric M; Papachristofilou, Alexandros; Dal Pra, Alan; Hundsberger, Thomas; Plasswilm, Ludwig

    2014-12-05

    Consensus-based approaches provide an alternative to evidence-based decision making, especially in situations where high-level evidence is limited. Our aim was to demonstrate a novel source of information, objective consensus based on recommendations in decision tree format from multiple sources. Based on nine sample recommendations in decision tree format a representative analysis was performed. The most common (mode) recommendations for each eventuality (each permutation of parameters) were determined. The same procedure was applied to real clinical recommendations for primary radiotherapy for prostate cancer. Data was collected from 16 radiation oncology centres, converted into decision tree format and analyzed in order to determine the objective consensus. Based on information from multiple sources in decision tree format, treatment recommendations can be assessed for every parameter combination. An objective consensus can be determined by means of mode recommendations without compromise or confrontation among the parties. In the clinical example involving prostate cancer therapy, three parameters were used with two cut-off values each (Gleason score, PSA, T-stage) resulting in a total of 27 possible combinations per decision tree. Despite significant variations among the recommendations, a mode recommendation could be found for specific combinations of parameters. Recommendations represented as decision trees can serve as a basis for objective consensus among multiple parties.

  19. Objective consensus from decision trees

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Putora, Paul Martin; Panje, Cedric M; Papachristofilou, Alexandros; Pra, Alan Dal; Hundsberger, Thomas; Plasswilm, Ludwig

    2014-01-01

    Consensus-based approaches provide an alternative to evidence-based decision making, especially in situations where high-level evidence is limited. Our aim was to demonstrate a novel source of information, objective consensus based on recommendations in decision tree format from multiple sources. Based on nine sample recommendations in decision tree format a representative analysis was performed. The most common (mode) recommendations for each eventuality (each permutation of parameters) were determined. The same procedure was applied to real clinical recommendations for primary radiotherapy for prostate cancer. Data was collected from 16 radiation oncology centres, converted into decision tree format and analyzed in order to determine the objective consensus. Based on information from multiple sources in decision tree format, treatment recommendations can be assessed for every parameter combination. An objective consensus can be determined by means of mode recommendations without compromise or confrontation among the parties. In the clinical example involving prostate cancer therapy, three parameters were used with two cut-off values each (Gleason score, PSA, T-stage) resulting in a total of 27 possible combinations per decision tree. Despite significant variations among the recommendations, a mode recommendation could be found for specific combinations of parameters. Recommendations represented as decision trees can serve as a basis for objective consensus among multiple parties

  20. Intensive care unit nurses' perceptions of safety after a highly specific safety intervention.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elder, N C; Brungs, S M; Nagy, M; Kudel, I; Render, M L

    2008-02-01

    It is unknown if successful changes in specific safety practices in the intensive care unit (ICU) generalize to broader concepts of patient safety by staff nurses. To explore perceptions of patient safety among nursing staff in ICUs following participation in a safety project that decreased hospital acquired infections. After implementation of practices that reduced catheter-related bloodstream infections in ICUs at four community hospitals, ICU nurses participated in focus groups to discuss patient safety. Audiotapes from the focus groups were transcribed, and two independent reviewers categorised the data which were triangulated with responses from selected questions of safety climate surveys and with the safety checklists used by management leadership on walk rounds. Thirty-three nurses attended eight focus groups; 92 nurses and managers completed safety climate surveys, and three separate leadership checklists were reviewed. In focus groups, nurses predominantly related patient safety to dangers in the physical environment (eg, bed rails, alarms, restraints, equipment, etc.) and to medication administration. These areas also represented 47% of checklist items from leadership walk rounds. Nurses most frequently mentioned self-initiated "double checking" as their main safety task. Focus-group participants and survey responses both noted inconsistency between management's verbal and written commitment compared with their day-to-day support of patient safety issues. ICU nurses who participated in a project to decrease hospital acquired infections did not generalize their experience to other aspects of patient safety or relate it to management's interest in patient safety. These findings are consistent with many adult learning theories, where self-initiated tasks, combined with immediate, but temporary problem-solving, are stronger learning forces than management-led activities with delayed feedback.

  1. Ecological aspects od electromagnetic irradiation effects of biological objects

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Volobuev, A.P.; Donnik, I.M.; Alekseenko, N.N.

    2005-01-01

    General description of electromagnetic field effects on biological objects depending on its frequency properties is stated in the paper. Basic principles of low frequency field effect (10 -1 -0 2 Hz) are detailed. General and specific regularities of biological objects response to a low frequency field on subcell, cell, and system levels were considered taking into account their functional state. (author)

  2. 3D high- and super-resolution imaging using single-objective SPIM.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Galland, Remi; Grenci, Gianluca; Aravind, Ajay; Viasnoff, Virgile; Studer, Vincent; Sibarita, Jean-Baptiste

    2015-07-01

    Single-objective selective-plane illumination microscopy (soSPIM) is achieved with micromirrored cavities combined with a laser beam-steering unit installed on a standard inverted microscope. The illumination and detection are done through the same objective. soSPIM can be used with standard sample preparations and features high background rejection and efficient photon collection, allowing for 3D single-molecule-based super-resolution imaging of whole cells or cell aggregates. Using larger mirrors enabled us to broaden the capabilities of our system to image Drosophila embryos.

  3. BN-1200 Reactor Power Unit Design Development

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Vasilyev, B.A.; Shepelev, S.F.; Ashirmetov, M.R.; Poplavsky, V.M.

    2013-01-01

    Main goals of BN-1200 design: • Develop a reliable new generation reactor plant for the commercial power unit with fast reactor to implement the first-priority objectives in changing over to closed nuclear fuel cycle; • Improve technical and economic indices of BN reactor power unit to the level of those of Russian VVER of equal power; • Enhance the safety up to the level of the requirements for the 4th generation RP

  4. Shape Analysis of Planar Multiply-Connected Objects Using Conformal Welding.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lok Ming Lui; Wei Zeng; Shing-Tung Yau; Xianfeng Gu

    2014-07-01

    Shape analysis is a central problem in the field of computer vision. In 2D shape analysis, classification and recognition of objects from their observed silhouettes are extremely crucial but difficult. It usually involves an efficient representation of 2D shape space with a metric, so that its mathematical structure can be used for further analysis. Although the study of 2D simply-connected shapes has been subject to a corpus of literatures, the analysis of multiply-connected shapes is comparatively less studied. In this work, we propose a representation for general 2D multiply-connected domains with arbitrary topologies using conformal welding. A metric can be defined on the proposed representation space, which gives a metric to measure dissimilarities between objects. The main idea is to map the exterior and interior of the domain conformally to unit disks and circle domains (unit disk with several inner disks removed), using holomorphic 1-forms. A set of diffeomorphisms of the unit circle S(1) can be obtained, which together with the conformal modules are used to define the shape signature. A shape distance between shape signatures can be defined to measure dissimilarities between shapes. We prove theoretically that the proposed shape signature uniquely determines the multiply-connected objects under suitable normalization. We also introduce a reconstruction algorithm to obtain shapes from their signatures. This completes our framework and allows us to move back and forth between shapes and signatures. With that, a morphing algorithm between shapes can be developed through the interpolation of the Beltrami coefficients associated with the signatures. Experiments have been carried out on shapes extracted from real images. Results demonstrate the efficacy of our proposed algorithm as a stable shape representation scheme.

  5. Patient-specific electric field simulations and acceleration measurements for objective analysis of intraoperative stimulation tests in the thalamus

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Simone Hemm-Ode

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available Despite an increasing use of deep brain stimulation (DBS the fundamental mechanisms of action remain largely unknown. Simulation of electric entities has previously been proposed for chronic DBS combined with subjective symptom evaluations, but not for intraoperative stimulation tests. The present paper introduces a method for an objective exploitation of intraoperative stimulation test data to identify the optimal implant position of the chronic DBS lead by relating the electric field simulations to the patient-specific anatomy and the clinical effects quantified by accelerometry. To illustrate the feasibility of this approach, it was applied to five patients with essential tremor bilaterally implanted in the ventral intermediate nucleus (VIM. The VIM and its neighborhood structures were preoperatively outlined in 3D on white matter attenuated inversion recovery MR images. Quantitative intraoperative clinical assessments were performed using accelerometry. Electric field simulations (n = 272 for intraoperative stimulation test data performed along two trajectories per side were set-up using the finite element method for 143 stimulation test positions. The resulting electric field isosurface of 0.2V/mm was superimposed to the outlined anatomical structures. The percentage of volume of each structure's overlap was calculated and related to the corresponding clinical improvement. The proposed concept has been successfully applied to the five patients. For higher clinical improvements, not only the VIM but as well other neighboring structures were covered by the electric field isosurfaces. The percentage of the volumes of the VIM, of the nucleus intermediate lateral of the thalamus and the prelemniscal radiations within the prerubral field of Forel increased for clinical improvements higher than 50% compared to improvements lower than 50%. The presented new concept allows a detailed and objective analysis of a high amount of intraoperative data to

  6. Specification for nuclear-grade beryllium oxide powder

    CERN Document Server

    American Society for Testing and Materials. Philadelphia

    2008-01-01

    1.1 This specification defines the physical and chemical requirements of nuclear-grade beryllium oxide (BeO) powder to be used in fabricating nuclear components. 1.2 This specification does not include requirements for health and safety. , , It recognizes the material as a Class B poison and suggests that producers and users become thoroughly familiar with and comply to applicable federal, state, and local regulations and handling guidelines. 1.3 Special tests and procedures are given in Annex A1 and Annex A2. 1.4 The values stated in SI units are to be regarded as standard. No other units of measurement are included in this standard.

  7. 77 FR 3320 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Print/Out”

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-01-23

    ... that the exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York... from abroad for temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The...

  8. 77 FR 26353 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Lygia Clark”

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-05-03

    ... that the exhibition or display of the exhibit objects at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York... in the exhibition ``Lygia Clark,'' within the United States, are of cultural significance. The...

  9. Identification of the Area for Proper Integration of Three Current Storage Objects into One Complex Logistics Point

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Li Chenguang

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available The paper presents an option to identify the suitable area for locating the specific storage object in order to integrate three current storage objects into one complex logistics point. Initial chapters of the paper are focused on overview of theoretical terms related to the storage objects, their activities, services, parameters as well as their location and allocation. Other parts of this paper outline specific methods regarding the issue of storage objects location. Its main part describes individual steps for identifying the suitable storage object location in the certain area using the specific method.

  10. Energy management in power grids with a high share of decentralized generator units; Energiemanagement in Verteilnetzen mit hohem Anteil an dezentralen Erzeugungsanlagen

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Schlebusch, V.; Wolff, M.; Nestle, D. [Inst. fuer Solare Energieversorgungstechnik e.V. (ISET), Kassel (Germany); Gjardy, G. [BTU Cottbus, Lehrstuhl Dezentrale Energiesysteme und Speichertechnik (DES), Cottbus (Germany); Borchard, Th. [RWTH Aachen, Inst. fuer Elektrische Anlagen und Energiewirtschaft (IAEW), Aachen (Germany); Bukvic-Schaefer, A.S. [Univ. Kassel, Fachgebiet Rationelle Energiewandlung (IEE-RE), Kassel (Germany); Erge, Th. [Fraunhofer-Inst. fuer Solare Energiesysteme (ISE), Freiburg (Germany); Klobasa, M. [Fraunhofer Inst. fuer System- und Innovationsforschung (ISI), Karlsruhe (Germany); Hollmann, M. [Univ. Paderborn, Fachgebiet Nachhaltige Energiekonzepte (NEK), Paderborn (Germany)

    2006-07-01

    In order to achieve the European Union objectives of increasing the share of energy from renewable sources and from combined heat and power plants, new distributed generation units with different supply characteristics will have to be integrated in the nearer future into the existing power supply system (medium and low voltage grids). The use of these new distributed power producers opens up whole new possibilities for optimizing the system integration which however do necessitate more advanced system management strategies. Therefore the main objective of the working group 'energy management and system strategies', within the thematic network 'Energie und Kommunikation', was to investigate a market compatible and integrated energy management consisting of specific resource scheduling for individual power producers and of dedicated load management concepts. With this background, the working group developed an advanced energy management concept for distributed generation units and loads and specified the corresponding communication requirements respectively. (orig.)

  11. Requirement for Naval Reserve Component Units Not Assigned to Support Regional Contingencies

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    Gimble, Thomas

    1996-01-01

    Our primary objective was to determine whether a valid need exists for Naval Reserve units and non-unit Reserve personnel who are not assigned to meet the needs of anticipated regional contingencies...

  12. Technical Specifications, South Texas Project, Unit Nos. 1 and 2 (Docket Nos. 50-498 and 50-499): Appendix ''A'' to License Nos. NPF-76 and NPF-80

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1989-03-01

    The South Texas Project, Unit Nos. 1 and 2, Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  13. Technical specifications, South Texas Project, Unit Nos. 1 and 2 (Docket Nos. 50-498 and 50-499): Appendix ''A'' to License Nos. NPF-76 and NPF-78

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1989-01-01

    The South Texas Project, Unit Nos. 1 and 2, Technical Specifications were prepared by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to set forth the limits, operating conditions, and other requirements applicable to a nuclear reactor facility as set forth in Section 50.36 of 10 CFR Part 50 for the protection of the health and safety of the public

  14. Object reasoning for waste remediation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pennock, K.A.; Bohn, S.J.; Franklin, A.L.

    1991-08-01

    A large number of contaminated waste sites across the United States await size remediation efforts. These sites can be physically complex, composed of multiple, possibly interacting, contaminants distributed throughout one or more media. The Remedial Action Assessment System (RAAS) is being designed and developed to support decisions concerning the selection of remediation alternatives. The goal of this system is to broaden the consideration of remediation alternatives, while reducing the time and cost of making these considerations. The Remedial Action Assessment System is a hybrid system, designed and constructed using object-oriented, knowledge- based systems, and structured programming techniques. RAAS uses a combination of quantitative and qualitative reasoning to consider and suggest remediation alternatives. The reasoning process that drives this application is centered around an object-oriented organization of remediation technology information. This paper describes the information structure and organization used to support this reasoning process. In addition, the paper describes the level of detail of the technology related information used in RAAS, discusses required assumptions and procedural implications of these assumptions, and provides rationale for structuring RAAS in this manner. 3 refs., 3 figs

  15. Analysis spectral shapes from California and central United States ground motion

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1994-01-01

    The objective of this study is to analyze the spectral shapes from earthquake records with magnitudes and distances comparable to those that dominate seismic hazard at Oak Ridge, in order to provide guidance for the selection of site-specific design-spectrum shapes for use in Oak Ridge. The authors rely heavily on California records because the number of relevant records from the central and eastern United States (CEUS) is not large enough for drawing statistically significant conclusions. They focus on the 0.5 to 10-Hz frequency range for two reasons: (1) this is the frequency range of most engineering interest, and (2) they avoid the effect of well-known differences in the high-frequency energy content between California and CEUS ground motions

  16. 75 FR 30459 - Culturally Significant Objects Imported for Exhibition Determinations: “Dynasty and Divinity: Ife...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-06-01

    ... temporary exhibition within the United States, are of cultural significance. The objects are imported... display of the exhibit objects at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX, from on or about September 19, 2010, until on or about January 9, 2011; at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA, from on or...

  17. Object tracking system using a VSW algorithm based on color and point features

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lim Hye-Youn

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available Abstract An object tracking system using a variable search window (VSW algorithm based on color and feature points is proposed. A meanshift algorithm is an object tracking technique that works according to color probability distributions. An advantage of this algorithm based on color is that it is robust to specific color objects; however, a disadvantage is that it is sensitive to non-specific color objects due to illumination and noise. Therefore, to offset this weakness, it presents the VSW algorithm based on robust feature points for the accurate tracking of moving objects. The proposed method extracts the feature points of a detected object which is the region of interest (ROI, and generates a VSW using the given information which is the positions of extracted feature points. The goal of this paper is to achieve an efficient and effective object tracking system that meets the accurate tracking of moving objects. Through experiments, the object tracking system is implemented that it performs more precisely than existing techniques.

  18. The International Accounting Standards Board’s Progress in Promoting Judgement Through Objectives-Oriented Accounting Standards

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tanja Lakovic

    2013-07-01

    Full Text Available This study analyzes how the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB promotes professional judgement by issuing objectives-oriented accounting standards and exposure drafts.  We focus on the the role of judgement as outlined in Phase I of the IASB Conceptual Framework (CF, Chapter 1, “Objective of General Purpose Financial Statements” and Chapter 3, “Qualitative Characteristics of Useful Financial Information” (IASB 2010. We discuss how the framework, when viewed through the prism of 'objectives-oriented accounting standards' as recommended by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC Report in its “Study Pursuant to Section 108(d of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 on the Adoption by the United States Financial Reporting System of a Principles-Based Accounting System” (July 2003, encourages professional judgement. We analyze International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS and Exposure Drafts (ED issued by the IASB since its inception in 2002 to determine if those documents are consistent with objectives-oriented accounting standards. Our analysis is useful for gaining insights into how the IASB integrates the CF with the SEC’s recommended objectives-oriented accounting approach to promote judgement in the interest of IASB/FASB convergence of accounting standards.

  19. MAPPING A BASIC HEALTH UNIT: AN EXPERIENCE REPORT

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bárbara Carvalho Malheiros

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Backgound and Objectives: This study is an experience report on the construction of a map of a Basic Health Unit (BHU. The objective was to understand the relevance and/or importance of mapping a BHU and acquire more knowledge on the health-disease status of the registered population and identify the importance of cartography as a working tool. Case description: After reading some texts, evaluating information systems and on-site visits, it was possible to identify the health status of the population of the neighborhoods. The proposed objectives were considered to be achieved, considering the mapping of the assessed population’s health-disease situation with a closer-to-reality viewpoint, identifying the number of individuals, the diseases, living situation and health care. Conclusion: The mapping approach is a powerful working tool for allowing the planning of strategic interventions that enables the development of assistance activities, aiming to promote health and disease prevention. KEYWORDS: Mapping; Basic Health Unit; Health Planning.

  20. Bayesian object classification of gold nanoparticles

    KAUST Repository

    Konomi, Bledar A.

    2013-06-01

    The properties of materials synthesized with nanoparticles (NPs) are highly correlated to the sizes and shapes of the nanoparticles. The transmission electron microscopy (TEM) imaging technique can be used to measure the morphological characteristics of NPs, which can be simple circles or more complex irregular polygons with varying degrees of scales and sizes. A major difficulty in analyzing the TEM images is the overlapping of objects, having different morphological properties with no specific information about the number of objects present. Furthermore, the objects lying along the boundary render automated image analysis much more difficult. To overcome these challenges, we propose a Bayesian method based on the marked-point process representation of the objects. We derive models, both for the marks which parameterize the morphological aspects and the points which determine the location of the objects. The proposed model is an automatic image segmentation and classification procedure, which simultaneously detects the boundaries and classifies the NPs into one of the predetermined shape families. We execute the inference by sampling the posterior distribution using Markov chainMonte Carlo (MCMC) since the posterior is doubly intractable. We apply our novel method to several TEM imaging samples of gold NPs, producing the needed statistical characterization of their morphology. © Institute of Mathematical Statistics, 2013.

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