Search results for: classical Chinese

Authors: Gyu-Dong Kim, Wuk-Jae Yoo, Sang-Youl Lee

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Composite structures offer numerous advantages over conventional structural systems in the form of higher specific stiffness and strength, lower life-cycle costs, and benefits such as easy installation and improved safety. Recently, there has been a considerable increase in the use of composites in engineering applications and as wraps for seismic upgrading and repairs. However, these composites deteriorate with time because of outdated materials, excessive use, repetitive loading, climatic conditions, manufacturing errors, and deficiencies in inspection methods. In particular, damaged fibers in a composite result in significant degradation of structural performance. In order to reduce the failure probability of composites in service, techniques to assess the condition of the composites to prevent continual growth of fiber damage are required. Condition assessment technology and nondestructive evaluation (NDE) techniques have provided various solutions for the safety of structures by means of detecting damage or defects from static or dynamic responses induced by external loading. A variety of techniques based on detecting the changes in static or dynamic behavior of isotropic structures has been developed in the last two decades. These methods, based on analytical approaches, are limited in their capabilities in dealing with complex systems, primarily because of their limitations in handling different loading and boundary conditions. Recently, investigators have introduced direct search methods based on metaheuristics techniques and artificial intelligence, such as genetic algorithms (GA), simulated annealing (SA) methods, and neural networks (NN), and have promisingly applied these methods to the field of structural identification. Among them, GAs attract our attention because they do not require a considerable amount of data in advance in dealing with complex problems and can make a global solution search possible as opposed to classical gradient-based optimization techniques. In this study, we propose an alternative damage-detection technique that can determine the degraded stiffness distribution of vibrating laminated composites made of Glass Fiber-reinforced Polymer (GFRP). The proposed method uses a modified form of the bivariate Gaussian distribution function to detect degraded stiffness characteristics. In addition, this study presents a method to detect the fiber property variation of laminated composite plates from the micromechanical point of view. The finite element model is used to study free vibrations of laminated composite plates for fiber stiffness degradation. In order to solve the inverse problem using the combined method, this study uses only first mode shapes in a structure for the measured frequency data. In particular, this study focuses on the effect of the interaction among various parameters, such as fiber angles, layup sequences, and damage distributions, on fiber-stiffness damage detection.

Keywords: stiffness detection, fiber damage, genetic algorithm, layup sequences

Procedia PDF Downloads 272

Authors: Alena Kulikova, Leonid Parmaksiz, Ekaterina Orel

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Social and emotional skills are considered by modern researchers as predictors of a person's success both in specific areas of activity and in the life of a person as a whole. The popularity of this scientific direction ensures the emergence of a large number of practices aimed at developing and evaluating socio-emotional skills. Assessment of social and emotional development is carried out at the national level, as well as at the level of individual regions and institutions. Despite the fact that many of the already existing social and emotional skills assessment tools are quite convenient and reliable, there are now more and more new technologies and task formats which improve the basic characteristics of the tools. Thus, the goal of the current study is to develop a tool for assessing social and emotional skills such as emotion recognition, emotion regulation, empathy and a culture of self-care. To develop a tool assessing social and emotional skills, Rasch-Gutman scenario-based approach was used. This approach has shown its reliability and merit for measuring various complex constructs: parental involvement; teacher practices that support cultural diversity and equity; willingness to participate in the life of the community after psychiatric rehabilitation; educational motivation and others. To assess emotion recognition, we used a situational judgment task based on OCC (Ortony, Clore, and Collins) emotions theory. The main advantage of these two approaches compare to classical Likert scales is that it reduces social desirability in answers. A field test to check the psychometric properties of the developed instrument was conducted. The instrument was developed for the presidential autonomous non-profit organization “Russia - Land of Opportunity” for nationwide soft skills assessment among higher education students. The sample for the field test consisted of 500 people, students aged from 18 to 25 (mean = 20; standard deviation 1.8), 71% female. 67% of students are only studying and are not currently working and 500 employed adults aged from 26 to 65 (mean = 42.5; SD 9), 57% female. Analysis of the psychometric characteristics of the scales was carried out using the methods of IRT (Item Response Theory). A one-parameter rating scale model RSM (Rating scale model) and Graded Response model (GRM) of the modern testing theory were applied. GRM is a polyatomic extension of the dichotomous two-parameter model of modern testing theory (2PL) based on the cumulative logit function for modeling the probability of a correct answer. The validity of the developed scales was assessed using correlation analysis and MTMM (multitrait-multimethod matrix). The developed instrument showed good psychometric quality and can be used by HR specialists or educational management. The detailed results of a psychometric study of the quality of the instrument, including the functioning of the tasks of each scale, will be presented. Also, the results of the validity study by MTMM analysis will be discussed.

Keywords: social and emotional skills, psychometrics, MTMM, IRT

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Authors: Ja-Keoung Koo, Kensuke Nakamura, Hyohun Kim, Dongwha Shin, Yeonseok Kim, Ji-Su Ahn, Byung-Woo Hong

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The machine learning techniques based on a convolutional neural network (CNN) have been actively developed and successfully applied to a variety of image analysis tasks including reconstruction, noise reduction, resolution enhancement, segmentation, motion estimation, object recognition. The classical visual information processing that ranges from low level tasks to high level ones has been widely developed in the deep learning framework. It is generally considered as a challenging problem to derive visual interpretation from high dimensional imagery data. A CNN is a class of feed-forward artificial neural network that usually consists of deep layers the connections of which are established by a series of non-linear operations. The CNN architecture is known to be shift invariant due to its shared weights and translation invariance characteristics. However, it is often computationally intractable to optimize the network in particular with a large number of convolution layers due to a large number of unknowns to be optimized with respect to the training set that is generally required to be large enough to effectively generalize the model under consideration. It is also necessary to limit the size of convolution kernels due to the computational expense despite of the recent development of effective parallel processing machinery, which leads to the use of the constantly small size of the convolution kernels throughout the deep CNN architecture. However, it is often desired to consider different scales in the analysis of visual features at different layers in the network. Thus, we propose a CNN model where different sizes of the convolution kernels are applied at each layer based on the random projection. We apply random filters with varying sizes and associate the filter responses with scalar weights that correspond to the standard deviation of the random filters. We are allowed to use large number of random filters with the cost of one scalar unknown for each filter. The computational cost in the back-propagation procedure does not increase with the larger size of the filters even though the additional computational cost is required in the computation of convolution in the feed-forward procedure. The use of random kernels with varying sizes allows to effectively analyze image features at multiple scales leading to a better generalization. The robustness and effectiveness of the proposed CNN based on random kernels are demonstrated by numerical experiments where the quantitative comparison of the well-known CNN architectures and our models that simply replace the convolution kernels with the random filters is performed. The experimental results indicate that our model achieves better performance with less number of unknown weights. The proposed algorithm has a high potential in the application of a variety of visual tasks based on the CNN framework. Acknowledgement—This work was supported by the MISP (Ministry of Science and ICT), Korea, under the National Program for Excellence in SW (20170001000011001) supervised by IITP, and NRF-2014R1A2A1A11051941, NRF2017R1A2B4006023.

Keywords: deep learning, convolutional neural network, random kernel, random projection, dimensionality reduction, object recognition

Procedia PDF Downloads 289

Authors: Istvan Szilagyi, Marko Pavlovic, Paul Rouster

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Antioxidant enzymes are the most efficient defense systems against reactive oxygen species, which cause severe damage in living organisms and industrial products. However, their supplementation is problematic due to their high sensitivity to the environmental conditions. Immobilization on carrier nanoparticles is a promising research direction towards the improvement of their functional and colloidal stability. In that way, their applications in biomedical treatments and manufacturing processes in the food, textile and cosmetic industry can be extended. The main goal of the present research was to prepare and formulate antioxidant bionanocomposites composed of superoxide dismutase (SOD) enzyme, anionic clay (layered double hydroxide, LDH) nanoparticle and heparin (HEP) polyelectrolyte. To characterize the structure and the colloidal stability of the obtained compounds in suspension and solid state, electrophoresis, dynamic light scattering, transmission electron microscopy, spectrophotometry, thermogravimetry, X-ray diffraction, infrared and fluorescence spectroscopy were used as experimental techniques. LDH-SOD composite was synthesized by enzyme immobilization on the clay particles via electrostatic and hydrophobic interactions, which resulted in a strong adsorption of the SOD on the LDH surface, i.e., no enzyme leakage was observed once the material was suspended in aqueous solutions. However, the LDH-SOD showed only limited resistance against salt-induced aggregation and large irregularly shaped clusters formed during short term interval even at lower ionic strengths. Since sufficiently high colloidal stability is a key requirement in most of the applications mentioned above, the nanocomposite was coated with HEP polyelectrolyte to develop highly stable suspensions of primary LDH-SOD-HEP particles. HEP is a natural anticoagulant with one of the highest negative line charge density among the known macromolecules. The experimental results indicated that it strongly adsorbed on the oppositely charged LDH-SOD surface leading to charge inversion and to the formation of negatively charged LDH-SOD-HEP. The obtained hybrid materials formed stable suspension even under extreme conditions, where classical colloid chemistry theories predict rapid aggregation of the particles and unstable suspensions. Such a stabilization effect originated from electrostatic repulsion between the particles of the same sign of charge as well as from steric repulsion due to the osmotic pressure raised during the overlap of the polyelectrolyte chains adsorbed on the surface. In addition, the SOD enzyme kept its structural and functional integrity during the immobilization and coating processes and hence, the LDH-SOD-HEP bionanocomposite possessed excellent activity in decomposition of superoxide radical anions, as revealed in biochemical test reactions. In conclusion, due to the improved colloidal stability and the good efficiency in scavenging superoxide radical ions, the developed enzymatic system is a promising antioxidant candidate for biomedical or other manufacturing processes, wherever the aim is to decompose reactive oxygen species in suspensions.

Keywords: clay, enzyme, polyelectrolyte, formulation

Procedia PDF Downloads 268

Authors: Andres Nieto-Leal, Victor N. Kaliakin, Tania P. Molina

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The nature of most engineering materials is quite complex. It is, therefore, difficult to devise a general mathematical model that will cover all possible ranges and types of excitation and behavior of a given material. As a result, the development of mathematical models is based upon simplifying assumptions regarding material behavior. Such simplifications result in some material idealization; for example, one of the simplest material idealization is to assume that the material behavior obeys the elasticity. However, soils are nonhomogeneous, anisotropic, path-dependent materials that exhibit nonlinear stress-strain relationships, changes in volume under shear, dilatancy, as well as time-, rate- and temperature-dependent behavior. Over the years, many constitutive models, possessing different levels of sophistication, have been developed to simulate the behavior geomaterials, particularly cohesive soils. Early in the development of constitutive models, it became evident that elastic or standard elastoplastic formulations, employing purely isotropic hardening and predicated in the existence of a yield surface surrounding a purely elastic domain, were incapable of realistically simulating the behavior of geomaterials. Accordingly, more sophisticated constitutive models have been developed; for example, the bounding surface elastoplasticity. The essence of the bounding surface concept is the hypothesis that plastic deformations can occur for stress states either within or on the bounding surface. Thus, unlike classical yield surface elastoplasticity, the plastic states are not restricted only to those lying on a surface. Elastoplastic bounding surface models have been improved; however, there is still need to improve their capabilities in simulating the response of anisotropically consolidated cohesive soils, especially the response in extension tests. Thus, in this work an improved constitutive model that can more accurately predict diverse stress-strain phenomena exhibited by cohesive soils was developed. Particularly, an improved rotational hardening rule that better simulate the response of cohesive soils in extension. The generalized definition of the bounding surface model provides a convenient and elegant framework for unifying various previous versions of the model for anisotropically consolidated cohesive soils. The Generalized Bounding Surface Model for cohesive soils is a fully three-dimensional, time-dependent model that accounts for both inherent and stress induced anisotropy employing a non-associative flow rule. The model numerical implementation in a computer code followed an adaptive multistep integration scheme in conjunction with local iteration and radial return. The one-step trapezoidal rule was used to get the stiffness matrix that defines the relationship between the stress increment and the strain increment. After testing the model in simulating the response of cohesive soils through extensive comparisons of model simulations to experimental data, it has been shown to give quite good simulations. The new model successfully simulates the response of different cohesive soils; for example, Cardiff Kaolin, Spestone Kaolin, and Lower Cromer Till. The simulated undrained stress paths, stress-strain response, and excess pore pressures are in very good agreement with the experimental values, especially in extension.

Keywords: bounding surface elastoplasticity, cohesive soils, constitutive model, modeling of geomaterials

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Authors: Jing Jiang, Wenhuan XU, Lei Zhang, Shiyi Zhang, Tongli Wang

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Climate data quality significantly affects the reliability of ecological modeling. In the Asia Pacific (AP) region, low-quality climate data hinders ecological modeling. ClimateAP, a software developed in 2017, generates high-quality climate data for the AP region, benefiting researchers in forestry and agriculture. However, its adoption remains limited. This study aims to confirm the validity of biologically relevant variable data generated by ClimateAP during the normal climate period through comparison with the currently available gridded data. Climate data from 2,366 weather stations were used to evaluate the prediction accuracy of ClimateAP in comparison with the commonly used gridded data from WorldClim1.4. Univariate regressions were applied to 48 monthly biologically relevant variables, and the relationship between the observational data and the predictions made by ClimateAP and WorldClim was evaluated using Adjusted R-Squared and Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE). Locations were categorized into mountainous and flat landforms, considering elevation, slope, ruggedness, and Topographic Position Index. Univariate regressions were then applied to all biologically relevant variables for each landform category. Random Forest (RF) models were implemented for the climatic niche modeling of Cunninghamia lanceolata. A comparative analysis of the prediction accuracies of RF models constructed with distinct climate data sources was conducted to evaluate their relative effectiveness. Biologically relevant variables were obtained from three unpublished Chinese meteorological datasets. ClimateAPv3.0 and WorldClim predictions were obtained from weather station coordinates and WorldClim1.4 rasters, respectively, for the normal climate period of 1961-1990. Occurrence data for Cunninghamia lanceolata came from integrated biodiversity databases with 3,745 unique points. ClimateAP explains a minimum of 94.74%, 97.77%, 96.89%, and 94.40% of monthly maximum, minimum, average temperature, and precipitation variances, respectively. It outperforms WorldClim in 37 biologically relevant variables with lower RMSE values. ClimateAP achieves higher R-squared values for the 12 monthly minimum temperature variables and consistently higher Adjusted R-squared values across all landforms for precipitation. ClimateAP's temperature data yields lower Adjusted R-squared values than gridded data in high-elevation, rugged, and mountainous areas but achieves higher values in mid-slope drainages, plains, open slopes, and upper slopes. Using ClimateAP improves the prediction accuracy of tree occurrence from 77.90% to 82.77%. The biologically relevant climate data produced by ClimateAP is validated based on evaluations using observations from weather stations. The use of ClimateAP leads to an improvement in data quality, especially in non-mountainous regions. The results also suggest that using biologically relevant variables generated by ClimateAP can slightly enhance climatic niche modeling for tree species, offering a better understanding of tree species adaptation and resilience compared to using gridded data.

Keywords: climate data validation, data quality, Asia pacific climate, climatic niche modeling, random forest models, tree species

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Authors: Petra Hypšová, Martin Seitl

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One of the challenges of forensic psychology is to detect deception during a face-to-face interview. In addition to the classical approaches of monitoring the utterance and its components, detection is also sought by observing behavioral and physiological changes that occur as a result of the increased emotional and cognitive load caused by the production of distorted information. Typical are changes in facial temperature, eye movements and their fixation, pupil dilation, emotional micro-expression, heart rate and its variability. Expanding technological capabilities have opened the space to detect these psychophysiological changes and behavioral manifestations through non-contact technologies that do not interfere with face-to-face interaction. Non-contact deception detection methodology is still in development, and there is a lack of studies that combine multiple non-contact technologies to investigate their accuracy, as well as studies that show how different types of lies produced by different interviewers affect physiological and behavioral changes. The main objective of this study is to apply a specific non-contact technology for deception detection. The next objective is to investigate scenarios in which non-contact deception detection is possible. A series of psychophysiological experiments using infrared thermal imaging, eye tracking and behavioral analysis with FaceReader 9.0 software was used to achieve our goals. In the laboratory experiment, 16 adults (12 women, 4 men) between 18 and 35 years of age (SD = 4.42) were instructed to produce alternating prepared and spontaneous truths and lies. The baseline of each proband was also measured, and its results were compared to the experimental conditions. Because the personality of the examiner (particularly gender and facial appearance) to whom the subject is lying can influence physiological and behavioral changes, the experiment included four different interviewers. The interviewer was represented by a photograph of a face that met the required parameters in terms of gender and facial appearance (i.e., interviewer likability/antipathy) to follow standardized procedures. The subject provided all information to the simulated interviewer. During follow-up analyzes, facial temperature (main ROIs: forehead, cheeks, the tip of the nose, chin, and corners of the eyes), heart rate, emotional expression, intensity and fixation of eye movements and pupil dilation were observed. The results showed that the variables studied varied with respect to the production of prepared truths and lies versus the production of spontaneous truths and lies, as well as the variability of the simulated interviewer. The results also supported the assumption of variability in physiological and behavioural values during the subject's resting state, the so-called baseline, and the production of prepared and spontaneous truths and lies. A series of psychophysiological experiments provided evidence of variability in the areas of interest in the production of truths and lies to different interviewers. The combination of technologies used also led to a comprehensive assessment of the physiological and behavioral changes associated with false and true statements. The study presented here opens the space for further research in the field of lie detection with non-contact technologies.

Keywords: emotional expression decoding, eye-tracking, functional infrared thermal imaging, non-contact deception detection, psychophysiological experiment

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Authors: Yu-Mei Hsueh, Wei-Jen Chen, Yung-Kai Huang, Cheng-Shiuan Tsai, Kuo-Cheng Yeh

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Prostate cancer occurs in men over the age of 50, and rank sixth of the top ten cancers in Taiwan, and the incidence increased gradually over the past decade in Taiwan. Arsenic is confirmed as a carcinogen by International Agency for Research on (IARC). Arsenic induces oxidative stress may be a risk factor for prostate cancer, but the mechanism is not clear. Selenium is an important antioxidant element. Whether the association between plasma selenium levels and risk of prostate cancer are modified by different genotype of selenoprotein is still unknown. Glutathione peroxidase, selenoprotein P (SEPP1) and 15 kDa selenoprotein (SEP 15) are selenoprotein and regulates selenium transport and the oxidation and reduction reaction. However, the association between gene polymorphisms of selenoprotein and prostate cancer is not yet clear. The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between plasma selenium, polymorphism of selenoprotein, urinary total arsenic concentration and prostate cancer. This study is a hospital-based case-control study. Three hundred twenty-two cases of prostate cancer and age (±5 years) 1:1 matched 322 control group were recruited from National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei Medical University Hospital, and Wan Fang Hospital. Well-trained personnel carried out standardized personal interviews based on a structured questionnaire. Information collected included demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, lifestyle and disease history. Blood and urine samples were also collected at the same time. The Research Ethics Committee of National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, approved the study. All patients provided informed consent forms before sample and data collection. Buffy coat was to extract DNA, and the polymerase chain reaction - restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) was used to measure the genotypes of SEPP1 rs3797310, SEP15 rs5859, GPX1 rs1050450, GPX2 rs4902346, GPX3 rs4958872, and GPX4 rs2075710. Plasma concentrations of selenium were determined by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS).Urinary arsenic species concentrations were measured by high-performance liquid chromatography links hydride generator and atomic absorption spectrometer (HPLC-HG-AAS). Subject with high education level compared to those with low educational level had a lower prostate cancer odds ratio (OR) Mainland Chinese and aboriginal people had a lower OR of prostate cancer compared to Fukien Taiwanese. After adjustment for age, educational level, subjects with GPX1 rs1050450 CT and TT genotype compared to the CC genotype have lower, OR of prostate cancer, the OR and 95% confidence interval (Cl) was 0.53 (0.31-0.90). SEPP1 rs3797310 CT+TT genotype compared to those with CC genotype had a marginally significantly lower OR of PC. The low levels of plasma selenium and the high urinary total arsenic concentrations had the high OR of prostate cancer in a significant dose-response manner, and SEPP1 rs3797310 genotype modified this joint association.

Keywords: prostate cancer, plasma selenium concentration, urinary total arsenic concentrations, glutathione peroxidase, selenoprotein P, selenoprotein 15, gene polymorphism

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Authors: Vinodhini Elangovan, Jen Heng Pek

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Background: An ectopic pregnancy is defined as any pregnancy implanted outside of the endometrial cavity. Cornual pregnancy, a rare variety of ectopic pregnancies, is seen in about 2-4% of ectopic pregnancies. It develops in the interstitial portion of the fallopian tube and invades through the uterine wall. This case describes a third-trimester cornual pregnancy that resulted in a uterine rupture. Case: A 38-year old Chinese lady was brought to the Emergency Department (ED) as a standby case for hypotension. She was 30+6 weeks pregnant (Gravida 3, Parous 1). Her past obstetric history included a live birth delivered via lower segment Caesarean section due to non-reassuring fetal status in 2002 and a miscarriage in 2012. She developed generalized abdominal pain. There was no per vaginal bleeding or leaking liquor. There was also no fever, nausea, vomiting, constipation, diarrhea, or urinary symptoms. On arrival in the ED, she was pale, diaphoretic, and lethargic. She had generalized tenderness with guarding and rebound over her abdomen. Point of care ultrasound was performed and showed a large amount of intra-abdominal free fluid, and the fetal heart rate was 170 beats per minute. The point of care hemoglobin was 7.1 g/dL, and lactate was 6.8 mmol/L. The patient’s blood pressure dropped precipitously to 50/36 mmHg, and her heart rate went up to 141 beats per minute. The clinical impression was profound shock secondary to uterine rupture. Intra-operatively, there was extensive haemoperitoneum, and the fetus was seen in the abdominal cavity. The fetus was delivered immediately and handed to the neonatal team. On exploration of the uterus, the point of rupture was at the left cornual region where the placenta was attached to. Discussion: Cornual pregnancies are difficult to diagnose pre-operatively with low ultrasonographic sensitivity and hence are commonly confused with normal intrauterine pregnancies. They pose a higher risk of rupture and hemorrhage compared to other types of ectopic pregnancies. In very rare circumstances, interstitial pregnancies can result in a viable fetus. Uterine rupture resulting in hemorrhagic shock is a true obstetric emergency that can result in significant morbidity and mortality for the patient and the fetus, and early diagnosis in the emergency department is crucial. The patient in this case presented with known risk factors of multiparity, advanced maternal age, and previous lower segment cesarean section, which increased the suspicion of uterine rupture. Ultrasound assessment may be beneficial to any patient who presents with symptoms and a history of uterine surgery to assess the possibility of uterine dehiscence or rupture. Management of a patient suspected of uterine rupture should be systematic in the emergency department and follow an ABC approach. Conclusion: This case demonstrates the importance for an emergency physician to maintain the suspicion for ectopic pregnancy even at advanced gestational ages. It also highlights how even though all emergency physicians may not be qualified to do a detailed pelvic ultrasound, it is essential for them to be competent with a point of care ultrasound to make a prompt diagnosis of conditions such as uterine rupture.

Keywords: cornual ectopic , ectopic pregnancy, emergency medicine, obstetric emergencies

Procedia PDF Downloads 129

Authors: Tuyuan Cheng

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As we age, many things become more difficult. Among the abilities are the linguistic and cognitive ones. Competing theories have shown that these two functions could diminish together or that one is selectively affected by the other. In other words, some proposes aging affects sentence production in the same way it affects sentence comprehension and other cognitive functions, while some argues it does not.To address this question, the current investigation is conducted into the critical aspect of sentences as well as cognitive abilities – the syntactic complexity and the number of perspective shifts being contained in the elicited production. Healthy non-pathological aging is often characterized by a cognitive and neural decline in a number of cognitive abilities. Although the language is assumed to be of the more stable domain, a variety of findings in the cognitive aging literature would suggest otherwise. Older adults often show deficits in language production and multiple aspects of comprehension. Nevertheless, while some age differences likely reflect cognitive decline, others might reflect changes in communicative goals, and some even display cognitive advantages. In the domain of language processing, research efforts have been made in tests that probed a variety of communicative abilities. In general, there exists a distinction: Comprehension seems to be selectively unaffected, while production does not. The current study raises a novel question and investigates whether aging affects the production of relative clauses (RCs) under the cognitive factor of perspective shifts. Based on Perspective Hypothesis (MacWhinney, 2000, 2005), our cognitive processes build upon a fundamental system of perspective-taking, and language provides a series of cues to facilitate the construction and shifting of perspectives. These cues include a wide variety of constructions, including RCs structures. In this regard, linguistic complexity can be determined by the number of perspective shifts, and the processing difficulties of RCs can be interpreted within the theory of perspective shifting. Two experiments were conducted to study language production under controlled conditions. In Experiment 1, older healthy participants were tested on standard measures of cognitive aging, including MMSE (Mini-Mental State Examination), ToMI-2 (a simplified Theory of Mind Inventory-2), and a perspective-shifting comprehension task programmed with E-Prime. The results were analyzed to examine if/how they are correlated with aging people’s subsequent production data. In Experiment 2, the production profile of differing RCs, SRC vs. ORC, were collected with healthy aging participants who perform a picture elicitation task. Variable containing 0, 1, or 2 perspective shifts were juxtaposed respectively to the pictures and counterbalanced presented for elicitation. In parallel, a controlled group of young adults were recruited to examine the linguistic and cognitive abilities in question. The results lead us to the discussion whetheraging affects RCs production in a manner determined by its semantic structure or the number of perspective shifts it contains or the status of participants’ mental understanding. The major findingsare: (1) Elders’ production on Chinese RCtypes did not display intrinsic difficulty asymmetry. (2) RC types (the linguistic structural features) and the cognitiveperspective shifts jointly play important roles in the elders’ RCproduction. (3) The production of RC may defy the aging in the case offlexibly preserved cognitive ability.

Keywords: cognition aging, perspective hypothesis, perspective shift, relative clauses, sentence complexity

Procedia PDF Downloads 118

Authors: Maksim Barsakov

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Introduction. In modern plastic surgery, there are a large number of breast lift techniques.Due to the spreading information about the "side effects" of silicone implants, interest in implant-free mastopexy is increasing year after year. However, despite the variety of techniques, patients sometimes do not get full satisfaction from the results of mastopexy because of the unexpressed filling of the upper pole, extended anchoring postoperative scars and sometimes because of obtaining an aesthetically unattractive breast shape. The stability of the result after mastopexy depends on many factors, including postoperative rehabilitation. Stability of weight and hormonal background, stretchability of tissues. The high recurrence rate of ptosis and short-term aesthetic effect of mastopexy indicate the urgency of improving surgical techniques and increasing the stabilization of breast tissue. Purpose of the study. To develop and introduce into practice a technique of mastopexy based on the use of a modified Ribeiro flap, as well as elements of tissue movement and fixation designed to increase the stability of postoperative mastopexy. In addition, to give indications for the application of this surgical technique. Materials and Methods. it operated on 103 patients aged 18 to 53 years from 2019 to 2023 according to the reported method. These were patients with primary mastopexy, secondary mastopexy, and also patient with implant removal and one-stage mastopexy. The patients were followed up for 12 months to assess the stability of the result. Results and their discussion. Observing the patients, we noted greater stability of the breast shape and upper pole filling compared to the conventional classical methods. We did not have to resort to anchoring scars. In 90 percent of cases, a inverted T-shape scar was used. In 10 percent, the J-scar was used. The quantitative distribution of complications identified among the operated patients is as follows: worsened healing of the junction of vertical and horizontal sutures at the period of 1-1.5 months after surgery - 15 patients; at treatment with ointment method healing was observed in 7-30 days; permanent loss of NAC sensitivity - 0 patients; vascular disorders in the area of NAC/areola necrosis - 0 patients; marginal necrosis of the areola-2 patients. independent healing within 3-4 weeks without aesthetic defects. Aesthetically unacceptable mature scars-3 patients; partial liponecrosis of the autoflap unilaterally - 1 patient. recurrence of ptosis - 1 patient (after weight loss of 12 kg). In the late postoperative period, 2 patients became pregnant, gave birth, and no lactation problems were observed. Conclusion. Thus, in the world of plastic surgery methods of breast lift continue to improve, which is especially relevant in modern times, due to the increased attention to this operation. The author's proposed method of mastopexy with glandular autoflap allows obtaining in most cases a stable result, a fuller breast shape, avoiding the presence of extended anchoring scars, and also preserves the possibility of lactation. The author of this article has obtained a patent for invention for this method of mastopexy.

Keywords: mastopexy, mammoplasty, autoflap, personal technique

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Authors: Andreas Kerstan, Darren Robey, Wesam Alvan, David Troiani

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Over the last 3.5 years, Quantum Cascade Lasers (QCL) technology has become increasingly important in infrared (IR) microscopy. The advantages over fourier transform infrared (FTIR) are that large areas of a few square centimeters can be measured in minutes and that the light intensive QCL makes it possible to obtain spectra with excellent S/N, even with just one scan. A firmly established solution of the laser direct infrared imaging (LDIR) 8700 is the analysis of microplastics. The presence of microplastics in the environment, drinking water, and food chains is gaining significant public interest. To study their presence, rapid and reliable characterization of microplastic particles is essential. Significant technical hurdles in microplastic analysis stem from the sheer number of particles to be analyzed in each sample. Total particle counts of several thousand are common in environmental samples, while well-treated bottled drinking water may contain relatively few. While visual microscopy has been used extensively, it is prone to operator error and bias and is limited to particles larger than 300 µm. As a result, vibrational spectroscopic techniques such as Raman and FTIR microscopy have become more popular, however, they are time-consuming. There is a demand for rapid and highly automated techniques to measure particle count size and provide high-quality polymer identification. Analysis directly on the filter that often forms the last stage in sample preparation is highly desirable as, by removing a sample preparation step it can both improve laboratory efficiency and decrease opportunities for error. Recent advances in infrared micro-spectroscopy combining a QCL with scanning optics have created a new paradigm, LDIR. It offers improved speed of analysis as well as high levels of automation. Its mode of operation, however, requires an IR reflective background, and this has, to date, limited the ability to perform direct “on-filter” analysis. This study explores the potential to combine the filter with an infrared reflective surface filter. By combining an IR reflective material or coating on a filter membrane with advanced image analysis and detection algorithms, it is demonstrated that such filters can indeed be used in this way. Vibrational spectroscopic techniques play a vital role in the investigation and understanding of microplastics in the environment and food chain. While vibrational spectroscopy is widely deployed, improvements and novel innovations in these techniques that can increase the speed of analysis and ease of use can provide pathways to higher testing rates and, hence, improved understanding of the impacts of microplastics in the environment. Due to its capability to measure large areas in minutes, its speed, degree of automation and excellent S/N, the LDIR could also implemented for various other samples like food adulteration, coatings, laminates, fabrics, textiles and tissues. This presentation will highlight a few of them and focus on the benefits of the LDIR vs classical techniques.

Keywords: QCL, automation, microplastics, tissues, infrared, speed

Procedia PDF Downloads 66

Authors: Toufic Sarieddine

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The current debate on the hegemonic impact of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is of two opposing strands: Resilient and absolute US hegemony on the one hand and various models of multipolar hegemony such as bifurcation on the other. Bifurcation theories illustrate an unprecedented division of hegemonic functions between China and the US, whereby Beijing becomes the world’s economic hegemon, leaving Washington the world’s military hegemon and security guarantor. While consensus points to China being the main driver of unipolarity’s rupturing, the debate among bifurcationists is on the location of the first rupture. In this regard, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has seen increasing Chinese foreign direct investment in recent years while that to other regions has declined, ranking it second in 2018 as part of the financing for the Maritime Silk Road Initiative (MSRI). China has also become the top trade partner of 11 states in the MENA region, as well as its top source of machine imports, surpassing the US and achieving an overall trade surplus almost double that of Washington’s. These are among other features outlined in world-systems analysis (WSA) literature which correspond with the emergence of a new hegemon. WSA is further utilized to gauge other facets of China’s increasing involvement in MENA and assess whether bifurcation is unfolding therein. These features of hegemony include the adoption of China’s modi operandi, economic dominance in production, trade, and finance, military capacity, cultural hegemony in ideology, education, and language, and the promotion of a general interest around which to rally potential peripheries (MENA states in this case). China’s modi operandi has seen some adoption with regards to support against the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, oil bonds denominated in the yuan, and financial institutions such as the Shanghai Gold Exchange enjoying increasing Arab patronage. However, recent elections in Qatar, as well as liberal reforms in Saudi Arabia, demonstrate Washington’s stronger normative influence. Meanwhile, Washington’s economic dominance is challenged by China’s sizable machine exports, increasing overall imports, and widening trade surplus, but retains some clout via dominant arms and transport exports, as well as free-trade deals across the region. Militarily, Washington bests Beijing’s arms exports, has a dominant and well-established presence in the region, and successfully blocked Beijing’s attempt to penetrate through the UAE. Culturally, Beijing enjoys higher favorability in Arab public opinion, and its broadcast networks have found some resonance with Arab audiences. In education, the West remains MENA students’ preferred destination. Further, while Mandarin has become increasingly available in schools across MENA, its usage and availability still lag far behind English. Finally, Beijing’s general interest in infrastructure provision and prioritizing economic development over social justice and democracy provides an avenue for increased incorporation between Beijing and the MENA region. The overall analysis shows solid progress towards bifurcation in MENA.

Keywords: belt and road initiative, hegemony, Middle East and North Africa, world-systems analysis

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Authors: Sonika Sharma, Mohan G. Vairale, Sibnarayan Datta, Soumya Chatterjee, Dharmendra Dubey, Rajesh Prasad, Raghvendra Budhauliya, Bidisha Das, Vijay Veer

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Bacteriophages are viruses that parasitize specific bacteria and multiply in metabolising host bacteria. Bacteriophages hunt for a single or a subset of bacterial species, making them potential antibacterial agents. Utilizing the ability of phages to control bacterial populations has several applications from medical to the fields of agriculture, aquaculture and the food industry. However, harnessing phage based techniques in wastewater treatments to improve quality of effluent and sludge release into the environment is a potential area for R&D application. Phage mediated bactericidal effect in any wastewater treatment process has many controlling factors that lead to treatment performance. In laboratory conditions, titer of bacteriophages (coliphages) isolated from effluent water of a specially designed anaerobic digester of human night soil (DRDO Biotoilet) was successfully increased with a modified protocol of the classical double layer agar technique. Enrichment of the same was carried out and efficacy of the phage enriched medium was evaluated at different conditions (specific media, temperature, storage conditions). Growth optimization study was carried out on different media like soybean casein digest medium (Tryptone soya medium), Luria-Bertani medium, phage deca broth medium and MNA medium (Modified nutrient medium). Further, temperature-phage yield relationship was also observed at three different temperatures 27˚C, 37˚C and 44˚C at laboratory condition. Results showed the higher activity of coliphage 27˚C and at 37˚C. Further, addition of divalent ions (10mM MgCl2, 5mM CaCl2) and 5% glycerol resulted in a significant increase in phage titer. Besides this, effect of antibiotics addition like ampicillin and kanamycin at different concentration on plaque formation was analysed and reported that ampicillin at a concentration of 1mg/ml ampicillin stimulates phage infection and results in more number of plaques. Experiments to test viability of phage showed that it can remain active for 6 months at 4˚C in fresh tryptone soya broth supplemented with fresh culture of coliforms (early log phase). The application of bacteriophages (especially coliphages) for treatment of effluent of human faecal matter contaminated effluent water is unique. This environment-friendly treatment system not only reduces the pathogenic coliforms, but also decreases the competition between nuisance bacteria and functionally important microbial populations. Therefore, the phage based cocktail to treat fecal pathogenic bacteria present in black water has many implication in wastewater treatment processes including ‘DRDO Biotoilet’, which is an ecofriendly appropriate and affordable human faecal matter treatment technology for different climates and situations.

Keywords: wastewater, microbes, virus, biotoilet, phage viability

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Authors: Pavel Bulai, Taras Pitlik, Tatsiana Kulahava, Timofei Lipski

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The method of Electrocardiography (ECG) interpretation for post-exercise recovery tracking was developed. Metabolic indices (aerobic and anaerobic) were designed using ECG-derived features. This study reports the associations between aerobic and anaerobic indices and classical parameters of the person’s physiological state, including blood biochemistry, glycogen concentration and VO2max changes. During the study 9 participants, healthy, physically active medium trained men and women, which trained 2-4 times per week for at least 9 weeks, fulfilled (i) ECG monitoring using Apple Watch Series 4 (AWS4); (ii) blood biochemical analysis; (iii) maximal oxygen consumption (VO2max) test, (iv) bioimpedance analysis (BIA). ECG signals from a single-lead wrist-wearable device were processed with detection of QRS-complex. Aerobic index (AI) was derived as the normalized slope of QR segment. Anaerobic index (ANI) was derived as the normalized slope of SJ segment. Biochemical parameters, glycogen content and VO2max were evaluated eight times within 3-60 hours after training. ECGs were recorded 5 times per day, plus before and after training, cycloergometry and BIA. The negative correlation between AI and blood markers of the muscles functional status including creatine phosphokinase (r=-0.238, p < 0.008), aspartate aminotransferase (r=-0.249, p < 0.004) and uric acid (r = -0.293, p<0.004) were observed. ANI was also correlated with creatine phosphokinase (r= -0.265, p < 0.003), aspartate aminotransferase (r = -0.292, p < 0.001), lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) (r = -0.190, p < 0.050). So, when the level of muscular enzymes increases during post-exercise fatigue, AI and ANI decrease. During recovery, the level of metabolites is restored, and metabolic indices rising is registered. It can be concluded that AI and ANI adequately reflect the physiology of the muscles during recovery. One of the markers of an athlete’s physiological state is the ratio between testosterone and cortisol (TCR). TCR provides a relative indication of anabolic-catabolic balance and is considered to be more sensitive to training stress than measuring testosterone and cortisol separately. AI shows a strong negative correlation with TCR (r=-0.437, p < 0.001) and correctly represents post-exercise physiology. In order to reveal the relation between the ECG-derived metabolic indices and the state of the cardiorespiratory system, direct measurements of VO2max were carried out at various time points after training sessions. The negative correlation between AI and VO2max (r = -0.342, p < 0.001) was obtained. These data testifying VO2max rising during fatigue are controversial. However, some studies have revealed increased stroke volume after training, that agrees with findings. It is important to note that post-exercise increase in VO2max does not mean an athlete’s readiness for the next training session, because the recovery of the cardiovascular system occurs over a substantially longer period. Negative correlations registered for ANI with glycogen (r = -0.303, p < 0.001), albumin (r = -0.205, p < 0.021) and creatinine (r = -0.268, p < 0.002) reflect the dehydration status of participants after training. Correlations between designed metabolic indices and physiological parameters revealed in this study can be considered as the sufficient evidence to use these indices for assessing the state of person’s aerobic and anaerobic metabolic systems after training during fatigue, recovery and supercompensation.

Keywords: aerobic index, anaerobic index, electrocardiography, supercompensation

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Authors: Noury Bakrim

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When dealing with motivation/arbitrariness, forming form (Forma Formans) and morphodynamics are to be grasped as relevant implications of enunciation/enactment, schematization within the specificity of language as sound/meaning articulation. Thus, the fact that a language is a form does not contradict stasis/dynamic enunciation (reflexivity vs double articulation). Moreover, some languages exemplify the role of the forming form, uttering, and schematization (roots in Semitic languages, the Chinese case). Beyond the evolutionary biosemiotic process (form/substance bifurcation, the split between realization/representation), non-isomorphism/asymmetry between linguistic form/norm and linguistic realization (phonetics for instance) opens up a new horizon problematizing the role of Brain – sensorimotor contribution in the continuous forming form. Therefore, we hypothesize biotization as both process/trace co-constructing motivation/forming form. Henceforth, referring to our findings concerning distribution and motivation patterns within Berber written texts (pulse based obstruents and nasal-lateral levels in poetry) and oral storytelling (consonant intensity clustering in quantitative and semantic/prosodic motivation), we understand consonant clustering, motivation and schematization as a complex phenomenon partaking in patterns of oral/written iconic prosody and reflexive metalinguistic representation opening the stable form. We focus our inquiry on both Amazigh and English clusters (/spl/, /spr/) and iconic consonant iteration in [gnunnuy] (to roll/tumble), [smummuy] (to moan sadly or crankily). For instance, the syllabic structures of /splaeʃ/ and /splaet/ imply an anamorphic representation of the state of the world: splash, impact on aquatic surfaces/splat impact on the ground. The pair has stridency and distribution as distinctive features which specify its phonetic realization (and a part of its meaning) /ʃ/ is [+ strident] and /t/ is [+ distributed] on the vocal tract. Schematization is then a process relating both physiology/code as an arthron vocal/bodily, vocal/practical shaping of the motor-articulatory system, leading to syntactic/semantic thematization (agent/patient roles in /spl/, /sm/ and other clusters or the tense uvular /qq/ at the initial position in Berber). Furthermore, the productivity of serial syllable sequencing in Berber points out different expressivity forms. We postulate two Components of motivated formalization: i) the process of memory paradigmatization relating to sequence modeling under sensorimotor/verbal specific categories (production/perception), ii) the process of phonotactic selection - prosodic unconscious/subconscious distribution by virtue of iconicity. Basing on multiple tests including a questionnaire, phonotactic/visual recognition and oral/written reproduction, we aim at patterning/conceptualizing consonant schematization and motivation among EFL and Amazigh (Berber) learners and speakers integrating biolinguistic hypotheses.

Keywords: consonant motivation and prosody, language and order of life, anamorphic representation, represented representation, biotization, sensori-motor and brain representation, form, formalization and schematization

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Authors: Ursula Das, Manavjit Singh Dhindsa, Kshirasagar Naik, Marzia Zaman, Richard Purcell, Srinivas Sampalli, Abdul Mutakabbir, Chung-Horng Lung, Thambirajah Ravichandran

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Wildland fires, also known as forest fires or wildfires, are exhibiting an alarming surge in frequency in recent times, further adding to its perennial global concern. Forest fires often lead to devastating consequences ranging from loss of healthy forest foliage and wildlife to substantial economic losses and the tragic loss of human lives. Despite the existence of substantial literature on the detection of active forest fires, numerous potential research avenues in forest fire management, such as preventative measures and ancillary effects of forest fires, remain largely underexplored. This paper undertakes a systematic review of these underexplored areas in forest fire research, meticulously categorizing them into distinct phases, namely pre-fire, during-fire, and post-fire stages. The pre-fire phase encompasses the assessment of fire risk, analysis of fuel properties, and other activities aimed at preventing or reducing the risk of forest fires. The during-fire phase includes activities aimed at reducing the impact of active forest fires, such as the detection and localization of active fires, optimization of wildfire suppression methods, and prediction of the behavior of active fires. The post-fire phase involves analyzing the impact of forest fires on various aspects, such as the extent of damage in forest areas, post-fire regeneration of forests, impact on wildlife, economic losses, and health impacts from byproducts produced during burning. A comprehensive understanding of the three stages is imperative for effective forest fire management and mitigation of the impact of forest fires on both ecological systems and human well-being. Artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) methods have garnered much attention in the cyber-physical systems domain in recent times leading to their adoption in decision-making in diverse applications including disaster management. This paper explores the current state of AI/ML applications for managing the activities in the aforementioned phases of forest fire. While conventional machine learning and deep learning methods have been extensively explored for the prevention, detection, and management of forest fires, a systematic classification of these methods into distinct AI research domains is conspicuously absent. This paper gives a comprehensive overview of the state of forest fire research across more recent and prominent AI/ML disciplines, including big data, classical machine learning, computer vision, explainable AI, generative AI, natural language processing, optimization algorithms, and time series forecasting. By providing a detailed overview of the potential areas of research and identifying the diverse ways AI/ML can be employed in forest fire research, this paper aims to serve as a roadmap for future investigations in this domain.

Keywords: artificial intelligence, computer vision, deep learning, during-fire activities, forest fire management, machine learning, pre-fire activities, post-fire activities

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Authors: Daniela Velichová

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Plenty of ideas on how to adopt active learning methods in education are available nowadays. Mathematics is a subject where the active involvement of students is required in particular in order to achieve desirable results regarding sustainable knowledge and deep understanding. The present article is based on the outcomes of an Erasmus+ project DrIVE-MATH, that was aimed at developing a novel and integrated framework to teach maths classes in engineering courses at the university level. It is fundamental for students from the early years of their academic life to have agile minds. They must be prepared to adapt to their future working environments, where enterprises’ views are always evolving, where all collaborate in teams, and relations between peers are thought for the well-being of the whole - workers and company profit. This reality imposes new requirements on higher education in terms of adaptation of different pedagogical methods, such as project-based and active-learning methods used within the course curricula. Active learning methodologies are regarded as an effective way to prepare students to meet the challenges posed by enterprises and to help them in building critical thinking, analytic reasoning, and insight to the solved complex problems from different perspectives. Fostering learning-by-doing activities in the pedagogical process can help students to achieve learning independence, as they could acquire deeper conceptual understanding by experimenting with the abstract concept in a more interesting, useful, and meaningful way. Clear information about learning outcomes and goals might help students to take more responsibility for their learning results. Active learning methods implemented by the project team members in their teaching practice, eduScrum and Jigsaw in particular, proved to provide better scientific and soft skills support to students than classical teaching methods. EduScrum method enables teachers to generate a working environment that stimulates students' working habits and self-initiative as they become aware of their responsibilities within the team, their own acquired knowledge, and their abilities to solve problems independently, though in collaboration with other team members. This method enhances collaborative learning, as students are working in teams towards a common goal - knowledge acquisition, while they are interacting with each other and evaluated individually. Teams consisting of 4-5 students work together on a list of problems - sprint; each member is responsible for solving one of them, while the group leader – a master, is responsible for the whole team. A similar principle is behind the Jigsaw technique, where the classroom activity makes students dependent on each other to succeed. Students are divided into groups, and assignments are split into pieces, which need to be assembled by the whole group to complete the (Jigsaw) puzzle. In this paper, analysis of students’ perceptions concerning the achievement of deeper conceptual understanding in mathematics and the development of soft skills, such as self-motivation, critical thinking, flexibility, leadership, responsibility, teamwork, negotiation, and conflict management, is presented. Some new challenges are discussed as brought by introducing active learning methods in the basic mathematics courses. A few examples of sprints developed and used in teaching basic maths courses at technical universities are presented in addition.

Keywords: active learning methods, collaborative learning, conceptual understanding, eduScrum, Jigsaw, soft skills

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Authors: Martin Bloomfield

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This paper examines frictions that lie at the heart of any pragmatist conception of religion and moral progress. I take moral progress to require the ability to correctly analyse social problems, provide workable solutions to these problems, and then rationally justify the analyses and solutions used. I take religion here to involve, as a minimal requirement, belief in the existence of God, a god, or gods, such that they are recognisable to most informed observers within the Western tradition. I take pragmatism to belong to, and borrow from, the philosophical traditions of non-absolutism, anti-realism, historicism, and voluntarism. For clarity, the relevant brands of each of these traditions will be examined during the paper. The friction identified in the title may be summed up as follows: those who, like Cornel West (and, when he was alive, Hilary Putnam), are theistic pragmatists with an interest in realising moral progress, have all been aware of a problem inherent in their positions. Assuming it can be argued that religion and moral progress are compatible, a non-absolutist, anti-realist, historicist position nevertheless raises problems that, as Leon Wieseltier pointed out, the pragmatist still believes in a God who isn’t real, and that the truth of any religious statement (including “God exists”) is relative not to any objective reality but to communities of engaged interlocutors; and that, where there are no absolute standards of right and wrong, any analysis of (and solution to) social problems can only be rationally justified relative to one or another community or moral and epistemic framework. Attempts made to universalise these frameworks, notably by Dewey, Gadamer, and Bernstein, through democracy and hermeneutics, fall into either a vicious and infinite regress, or (taking inspiration from Habermas) the problem of moral truths being decided through structures of power. The paper removes this friction by highlighting the work of Christian pragmatist Cornel West through the lens of the philosopher of religion Eleanore Stump. While West recognises that for the pragmatist, the correctness of any propositions about God or moral progress is impossible to rationally justify to any outside the religious, moral or epistemic framework of the speakers themselves without, as he calls it, a ‘locus of truth’ (which is itself free from the difficulties Dewey, Gadamer and Bernstein fall victim to), Stump identifies routes to knowledge which provide such a locus while avoiding the problems of relativism, power dynamics, and regress. She describes “Dominican” and “Franciscan” knowledge (roughly characterised as “propositional” and “non-propositional”), and uses this distinction to identify something Bernstein saw as missing from Gadamer: culture-independent norms, upon which universal agreement can be built. The “Franciscan knowledge” Stump identifies as key is second-personal knowledge of Christ. For West, this allows the knower to access vital culture-independent norms. If correct, instead of the classical view (religion is incompatible with pragmatism), Christianity becomes key to pragmatist knowledge and moral-knowledge claims. Rather than being undermined by pragmatism, Christianity enables pragmatists to make moral and epistemic claims, free from troubling power dynamics and cultural relativism.

Keywords: Cornel West, Cultural Relativism, Gadamer, Philosophy of Religion, Pragmatism

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Authors: Manuel Alejandro Taborda Ceballos, Martin Sommerfeld

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Transport phenomena and dispersion of non-spherical particle in turbulent flows are found everywhere in industrial application and processes. Powder handling, pollution control, pneumatic transport, particle separation are just some examples where the particle encountered are not only spherical. These types of multiphase flows are wall bounded and mostly highly turbulent. The particles found in these processes are rarely spherical but may have various shapes (e.g., fibers, and rods). Although research related to the behavior of regular non-spherical particles in turbulent flows has been carried out for many years, it is still necessary to refine models, especially near walls where the interaction fiber-wall changes completely its behavior. Imaging-based experimental studies on dispersed particle-laden flows have been applied for many decades for a detailed experimental analysis. These techniques have the advantages that they provide field information in two or three dimensions, but have a lower temporal resolution compared to point-wise techniques such as PDA (phase-Doppler anemometry) and derivations therefrom. The applied imaging techniques in dispersed two-phase flows are extensions from classical PIV (particle image velocimetry) and PTV (particle tracking velocimetry) and the main emphasis was simultaneous measurement of the velocity fields of both phases. In a similar way, such data should also provide adequate information for validating the proposed models. Available experimental studies on the behavior of non-spherical particles are uncommon and mostly based on planar light-sheet measurements. Especially for elongated non-spherical particles, however, three-dimensional measurements are needed to fully describe their motion and to provide sufficient information for validation of numerical computations. For further providing detailed experimental results allowing a validation of numerical calculations of non-spherical particle dispersion in turbulent flows, a water channel test facility was built around a horizontal closed water channel. Into this horizontal main flow, a small cross-jet laden with fiber-like particles was injected, which was also solely driven by gravity. The dispersion of the fibers was measured by applying imaging techniques based on a LED array for backlighting and high-speed cameras. For obtaining the fluid velocity fields, almost neutrally buoyant tracer was used. The discrimination between tracer and fibers was done based on image size which was also the basis to determine fiber orientation with respect to the inertial coordinate system. The synchronous measurement of fluid velocity and fiber properties also allow the collection of statistics of fiber orientation, velocity fields of tracer and fibers, the angular velocity of the fibers and the orientation between fiber and instantaneous relative velocity. Consequently, an experimental study the behavior of elongated non-spherical particles in wall bounded turbulent flows was achieved. The development of a comprehensive analysis was succeeded, especially near the wall region, where exists hydrodynamic wall interaction effects (e.g., collision or lubrication) and abrupt changes of particle rotational velocity. This allowed us to predict numerically afterwards the behavior of non-spherical particles within the frame of the Euler/Lagrange approach, where the particles are therein treated as “point-particles”.

Keywords: crossflow, non-spherical particles, particle tracking velocimetry, PIV

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Authors: Leander Van Neste, Kirk Wojno

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The innate immune system reacts to foreign insult in several unique ways, one of which is phagocytosis of perceived threats such as cancer, bacteria, and viruses. The goal of this study was to look for evidence of phagocytosed RNA from tumor cells in circulating monocytes. While all monocytes possess phagocytic capabilities, the non-classical CD14+/FCGR3A+ monocytes and the intermediate CD14++/FCGR3A+ monocytes most actively remove threatening ‘external’ cellular materials. Purified CD14-positive monocyte samples from fourteen patients recently diagnosed with clinically localized prostate cancer (PCa) were investigated by single-cell RNA sequencing using the 10X Genomics protocol followed by paired-end sequencing on Illumina’s NovaSeq. Similarly, samples were processed and used as controls, i.e., one patient underwent biopsy but was found not to harbor prostate cancer (benign), three young, healthy men, and three men previously diagnosed with prostate cancer that recently underwent (curative) radical prostatectomy (post-RP). Sequencing data were mapped using 10X Genomics’ CellRanger software and viable cells were subsequently identified using CellBender, removing technical artifacts such as doublets and non-cellular RNA. Next, data analysis was performed in R, using the Seurat package. Because the main goal was to identify differences between PCa patients and ‘control’ patients, rather than exploring differences between individual subjects, the individual Seurat objects of all 21 patients were merged into one Seurat object per Seurat’s recommendation. Finally, the single-cell dataset was normalized as a whole prior to further analysis. Cell identity was assessed using the SingleR and cell dex packages. The Monaco Immune Data was selected as the reference dataset, consisting of bulk RNA-seq data of sorted human immune cells. The Monaco classification was supplemented with normalized PCa data obtained from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), which consists of bulk RNA sequencing data from 499 prostate tumor tissues (including 1 metastatic) and 52 (adjacent) normal prostate tissues. SingleR was subsequently run on the combined immune cell and PCa datasets. As expected, the vast majority of cells were labeled as having a monocytic origin (~90%), with the most noticeable difference being the larger number of intermediate monocytes in the PCa patients (13.6% versus 7.1%; p<.001). In men harboring PCa, 0.60% of all purified monocytes were classified as harboring PCa signals when the TCGA data were included. This was 3-fold, 7.5-fold, and 4-fold higher compared to post-RP, benign, and young men, respectively (all p<.001). In addition, with 7.91%, the number of unclassified cells, i.e., cells with pruned labels due to high uncertainty of the assigned label, was also highest in men with PCa, compared to 3.51%, 2.67%, and 5.51% of cells in post-RP, benign, and young men, respectively (all p<.001). It can be postulated that actively phagocytosing cells are hardest to classify due to their dual immune cell and foreign cell nature. Hence, the higher number of unclassified cells and intermediate monocytes in PCa patients might reflect higher phagocytic activity due to tumor burden. This also illustrates that small numbers (~1%) of circulating peripheral blood monocytes that have interacted with tumor cells might still possess detectable phagocytosed tumor RNA.

Keywords: circulating monocytes, phagocytic cells, prostate cancer, tumor immune response

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Authors: Dario Milani, Guido Morgenthal

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Fluid dynamic computation of wind caused forces on bluff bodies e.g light flexible civil structures or high incidence of ground approaching airplane wings, is one of the major criteria governing their design. For such structures a significant dynamic response may result, requiring the usage of small scale devices as guide-vanes in bridge design to control these effects. The focus of this paper is on the numerical simulation of the bluff body problem involving multiscale phenomena induced by small scale devices. One of the solution methods for the CFD simulation that is relatively successful in this class of applications is the Vortex Particle Method (VPM). The method is based on a grid free Lagrangian formulation of the Navier-Stokes equations, where the velocity field is modeled by particles representing local vorticity. These vortices are being convected due to the free stream velocity as well as diffused. This representation yields the main advantages of low numerical diffusion, compact discretization as the vorticity is strongly localized, implicitly accounting for the free-space boundary conditions typical for this class of FSI problems, and a natural representation of the vortex creation process inherent in bluff body flows. When the particle resolution reaches the Kolmogorov dissipation length, the method becomes a Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS). However, it is crucial to note that any solution method aims at balancing the computational cost against the accuracy achievable. In the classical VPM method, if the fluid domain is discretized by Np particles, the computational cost is O(Np2). For the coupled FSI problem of interest, for example large structures such as long-span bridges, the aerodynamic behavior may be influenced or even dominated by small structural details such as barriers, handrails or fairings. For such geometrically complex and dimensionally large structures, resolving the complete domain with the conventional VPM particle discretization might become prohibitively expensive to compute even for moderate numbers of particles. It is possible to reduce this cost either by reducing the number of particles or by controlling its local distribution. It is also possible to increase the accuracy of the solution without increasing substantially the global computational cost by computing a correction of the particle-particle interaction in some regions of interest. In this paper different strategies are presented in order to extend the conventional VPM method to reduce the computational cost whilst resolving the required details of the flow. The methods include temporal sub stepping to increase the accuracy of the particles convection in certain regions as well as dynamically re-discretizing the particle map to locally control the global and the local amount of particles. Finally, these methods will be applied on a test case and the improvements in the efficiency as well as the accuracy of the proposed extension to the method are presented. The important benefits in terms of accuracy and computational cost of the combination of these methods will be thus presented as long as their relevant applications.

Keywords: adaptation, fluid dynamic, remeshing, substepping, vortex particle method

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Authors: Xiaoqing Peng, Aijing Luo, Yang Chen

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Background: Cyberchondria, as an "emerging risk" accompanied by the information era, is a new abnormal pattern characterized by excessive or repeated online searches for health-related information and escalating health anxiety, which endangers people's physical and mental health and poses a huge threat to public health. Objective: To explore and discuss the research status, hotspots and trends of Cyberchondria. Methods: Based on a total of 77 articles regarding "Cyberchondria" extracted from Web of Science from the beginning till October 2019, the literature trends, countries, institutions, hotspots are analyzed by bibliometric analysis, the concept definition of Cyberchondria, instruments, relevant factors, treatment and intervention are discussed as well. Results: Since "Cyberchondria" was put forward for the first time in 2001, the last two decades witnessed a noticeable increase in the amount of literature, especially during 2014-2019, it quadrupled dramatically at 62 compared with that before 2014 only at 15, which shows that Cyberchondria has become a new theme and hot topic in recent years. The United States was the most active contributor with the largest publication (23), followed by England (11) and Australia (11), while the leading institutions were Baylor University(7) and University of Sydney(7), followed by Florida State University(4) and University of Manchester(4). The WoS categories "Psychiatry/Psychology " and "Computer/ Information Science "were the areas of greatest influence. The concept definition of Cyberchondria is not completely unified in the world, but it is generally considered as an abnormal behavioral pattern and emotional state and has been invoked to refer to the anxiety-amplifying effects of online health-related searches. The first and the most frequently cited scale for measuring the severity of Cyberchondria called “The Cyberchondria Severity Scale (CSS) ”was developed in 2014, which conceptualized Cyberchondria as a multidimensional construct consisting of compulsion, distress, excessiveness, reassurance, and mistrust of medical professionals which was proved to be not necessary for this construct later. Since then, the Brazilian, German, Turkish, Polish and Chinese versions were subsequently developed, improved and culturally adjusted, while CSS was optimized to a simplified version (CSS-12) in 2019, all of which should be worthy of further verification. The hotspots of Cyberchondria mainly focuses on relevant factors as follows: intolerance of uncertainty, anxiety sensitivity, obsessive-compulsive disorder, internet addition, abnormal illness behavior, Whiteley index, problematic internet use, trying to make clear the role played by “associated factors” and “anxiety-amplifying factors” in the development of Cyberchondria, to better understand the aetiological links and pathways in the relationships between hypochondriasis, health anxiety and online health-related searches. Although the treatment and intervention of Cyberchondria are still in the initial stage of exploration, there are kinds of meaningful attempts to seek effective strategies from different aspects such as online psychological treatment, network technology management, health information literacy improvement and public health service. Conclusion: Research on Cyberchondria is in its infancy but should be deserved more attention. A conceptual consensus on Cyberchondria, a refined assessment tool, prospective studies conducted in various populations, targeted treatments for it would be the main research direction in the near future.

Keywords: cyberchondria, hypochondriasis, health anxiety, online health-related searches

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Authors: Andrea Bertocchi, Alessio Barnaba Di Fonzo, Davide Talarico, Simone Rivaroli, Jeff Konin

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The patient is a 89 years old male (180cm/85kg) retired notary former golfer with no past medical history. He describes a progressive ideomotor slowdown for 14 months. The disorder is characterized by short-term memory deficits and, for some months, also by unstable walking with a broad base with skidding and risk of falling at directional changes and urinary urgency. There were also episodes of aggression towards his wife and staff. At the time, the patient takes no prescribed medications. He has difficulty eating, dressing, and some problems with personal hygiene. In the initial visit, the patient was alert, cooperating, and performed simple tasks; however, he has a hearing impairment, slowed spontaneous speech, and amnestic deficit to the short story. Ideomotor apraxia is not present. He scored 20 points in the MMSE. From a motor function, he has deficits using Medical Research Council (MRC) 3-/5 in bilateral lower limbs and requires maximum assistance from sit to stand with existing premature fatigue. He’s unable to walk for about 1 month. Tremors and hypertonia are absent. BERG was unable to be administered, and BARTHEL was obtained 45/100. An Amyloid Angiopathy is suspected and then confirmed at the neurological examination. Therehabilitation objectives were the recovery of mobility and reinforcement of the UE/LE, especially legs, for recovery of standing and walking. The cognitive aspect was also an essential factor for the patient's recovery. The literature doesn’t demonstrate any particular studies regarding motor and cognitive rehabilitation on this pathology. Failing to manage his attention on exercise and tending to be disinterested and falling asleep constantly, we used golf-specific gestures to stimulate his mind to work and get results because the patient has memory recall of golf related movement. We worked for 4 months with a frequency of 3 sessions per week. Every session lasted for 45 minutes. After 4 months of work, the patient walked independently with the use of a stick for about 120 meters without stopping. MRC 4/5 AI bilaterally andpostural steps performed independently with supervision. BERG 36/56. BARTHEL 65/100. 6 Minutes Walking Test (6MWT), at the beginning, it wasn’t measurable, now, he performs 151,5m with Numeric Rating Scale 4 at the beginning and 7 at the end. Cognitively, he no longer has episodes of aggression, although the short-term memory and concentration deficit remains. Amyloid Angiopathy is a mix of motor and cognitive disorder. It is worth the thought that cerebral amyloid angiopathy manifests with functional deficits due to strokes and bleedings and, as such, has an important rehabilitation indication, as classical stroke is not associated with amyloidosis. Exploring the motor patterns learned at a young age and remained in the implicit and explicit memory of the patient allowed us to set up effective work and to obtain significant results in the short-middle term. Surely many studies will still be done regarding this pathology and its rehabilitation, but the importance of the cognitive sphere applied to the motor sphere could represent an important starting point.

Keywords: amyloid angiopathy, cognitive rehabilitation, golf, motor disorder

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Authors: Guillaume Bélanger, Jean-Philippe Fontaine, Clémence Hauduc

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There is an undeniable thirst from organic chemists and from the pharmaceutical industry to access complex alkaloids with short syntheses. While medicinal chemists are interested in the fascinating wide range of biological properties of alkaloids, synthetic chemists are rather interested in finding new routes to access these challenging natural products of often low availability from nature. To synthesize complex polycyclic cores of natural products, reaction cascades or sequences performed one-pot offer a neat advantage over classical methods for their rapid increase in molecular complexity in a single operation. In counterpart, reaction cascades need to be run on substrates bearing all the required functional groups necessary for the key cyclizations. Chemoselectivity is thus a major issue associated with such a strategy, in addition to diastereocontrol and regiocontrol for the overall transformation. In the pursuit of synthetic efficiency, our research group developed an innovative one-pot transformation of linear substrates into bi- and tricyclic adducts applied to the construction of Aspidospermatan-type alkaloids. The latter is a rich class of indole alkaloids bearing a unique bridged azatricyclic core. Despite many efforts toward the synthesis of members of this family, efficient and versatile synthetic routes are still coveted. Indeed, very short, non-racemic approaches are rather scarce: for example, in the cases of aspidospermidine and aspidospermine, syntheses are all fifteen steps and over. We envisaged a unified approach to access several members of the Aspidospermatan alkaloids family. The key sequence features a highly chemoselective formamide activation that triggers a Vilsmeier-Haack cyclization, followed by an azomethine ylide generation and intramolecular cycloaddition. Despite the high density and variety of functional groups on the substrates (electron-rich and electron-poor alkenes, nitrile, amide, ester, enol ether), the sequence generated three new carbon-carbon bonds and three rings in a single operation with good yield and high chemoselectivity. A detailed study of amide, nucleophile, and dipolarophile variations to finally get to the successful combination required for the key transformation will be presented. To complete the indoline fragment of the natural products, we developed an original approach. Indeed, all reported routes to Aspidospermatan alkaloids introduce the indoline or indole early in the synthesis. In our work, the indoline needs to be installed on the azatricyclic core after the key cyclization sequence. As a result, typical Fischer indolization is not suited since this reaction is known to fail on such substrates. We thus envisaged a unique photocatalyzed decarboxylative radical cyclization. The development of this reaction as well as the scope and limitations of the methodology, will also be presented. The original Vilsmeier-Haack and azomethine ylide cyclization sequence as well as the new photocatalyzed decarboxylative radical cyclization will undoubtedly open access to new routes toward polycyclic indole alkaloids and derivatives of pharmaceutical interest in general.

Keywords: Aspidospermatan alkaloids, azomethine ylide cycloaddition, decarboxylative radical cyclization, indole and indoline synthesis, one-pot sequential cyclizations, photocatalysis, Vilsmeier-Haack Cyclization

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Authors: Steven W. Carruthers

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The purpose of the present research is to equate two test forms as part of a study to evaluate the educational effectiveness of the ARTé: Mecenas art history learning game. The researcher applied Item Response Theory (IRT) procedures to calculate item, test, and mean-sigma equating parameters. With the sample size n=134, test parameters indicated “good” model fit but low Test Information Functions and more acute than expected equating parameters. Therefore, the researcher applied equipercentile equating and linear equating to raw scores and compared the equated form parameters and effect sizes from each method. Item scaling in IRT enables the researcher to select a subset of well-discriminating items. The mean-sigma step produces a mean-slope adjustment from the anchor items, which was used to scale the score on the new form (Form R) to the reference form (Form Q) scale. In equipercentile equating, scores are adjusted to align the proportion of scores in each quintile segment. Linear equating produces a mean-slope adjustment, which was applied to all core items on the new form. The study followed a quasi-experimental design with purposeful sampling of students enrolled in a college level art history course (n=134) and counterbalancing design to distribute both forms on the pre- and posttests. The Experimental Group (n=82) was asked to play ARTé: Mecenas online and complete Level 4 of the game within a two-week period; 37 participants completed Level 4. Over the same period, the Control Group (n=52) did not play the game. The researcher examined between group differences from post-test scores on test Form Q and Form R by full-factorial Two-Way ANOVA. The raw score analysis indicated a 1.29% direct effect of form, which was statistically non-significant but may be practically significant. The researcher repeated the between group differences analysis with all three equating methods. For the IRT mean-sigma adjusted scores, form had a direct effect of 8.39%. Mean-sigma equating with a small sample may have resulted in inaccurate equating parameters. Equipercentile equating aligned test means and standard deviations, but resultant skewness and kurtosis worsened compared to raw score parameters. Form had a 3.18% direct effect. Linear equating produced the lowest Form effect, approaching 0%. Using linearly equated scores, the researcher conducted an ANCOVA to examine the effect size in terms of prior knowledge. The between group effect size for the Control Group versus Experimental Group participants who completed the game was 14.39% with a 4.77% effect size attributed to pre-test score. Playing and completing the game increased art history knowledge, and individuals with low prior knowledge tended to gain more from pre- to post test. Ultimately, researchers should approach test equating based on their theoretical stance on Classical Test Theory and IRT and the respective  assumptions. Regardless of the approach or method, test equating requires a representative sample of sufficient size. With small sample sizes, the application of a range of equating approaches can expose item and test features for review, inform interpretation, and identify paths for improving instruments for future study.

Keywords: effectiveness, equipercentile equating, IRT, learning games, linear equating, mean-sigma equating

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Authors: A. Newman-Tancredi, R. Depoortère, P. Gruca, E. Litwa, M. Lason, M. Papp

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The N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA) receptor antagonist, ketamine, can elicit rapid-acting antidepressant (RAAD) effects in treatment-resistant patients, but it requires parenteral co-administration with a classical antidepressant under medical supervision. In addition, ketamine can also produce serious side effects that limit its long-term use, and there is much interest in identifying RAADs based on ketamine’s mechanism of action but with safer profiles. Ketamine elicits GABAergic interneuron inhibition, glutamatergic neuron stimulation, and, notably, activation of serotonin 5-HT1A receptors in the prefrontal cortex (PFC). Direct activation of the latter receptor subpopulation with selective ‘biased agonists’ may therefore be a promising strategy to identify novel RAADs and, consistent with this hypothesis, the prototypical cortical biased agonist, NLX-101, exhibited robust RAAD-like activity in the chronic mild stress model of depression (CMS). The present study compared the effects of a novel, selective 5-HT1A receptor-biased agonist, NLX-204, with those of ketamine and NLX-101. Materials and methods: CMS procedure was conducted on Wistar rats; drugs were administered either intraperitoneally (i.p.) or by bilateral intracortical microinjection. Ketamine: 10 mg/kg i.p. or 10 µg/side in PFC; NLX-204 and NLX-101: 0.08 and 0.16 mg/kg i.p. or 16 µg/side in PFC. In addition, interaction studies were carried out with systemic NLX-204 or NLX-101 (each at 0.16 mg/kg i.p.) in combination with intracortical WAY-100635 (selective 5-HT1A receptor antagonist; 2 µg/side) or muscimol (GABA-A receptor agonist, 12.5 ng/side). Anhedonia was assessed by CMS-induced decrease in sucrose solution consumption; anxiety-like behavior was assessed using the Elevated Plus Maze (EPM), and cognitive impairment was assessed by the Novel Object Recognition (NOR) test. Results: A single administration of NLX-204 was sufficient to reverse the CMS-induced deficit in sucrose consumption, similarly to ketamine and NLX-101. NLX-204 also reduced CMS-induced anxiety in the EPM and abolished CMS-induced NOR deficits. These effects were maintained (EPM and NOR) or enhanced (sucrose consumption) over a subsequent 2-week period of treatment. The anti-anhedonic response of the drugs was also maintained for several weeks Following treatment discontinuation, suggesting that they had sustained effects on neuronal networks. A single PFC administration of NLX-204 reversed deficient sucrose consumption, similarly to ketamine and NLX-101. Moreover, the anti-anhedonic activities of systemic NLX-204 and NLX 101 were abolished by coadministration with intracortical WAY-100635 or muscimol. Conclusions: (i) The antidepressant-like activity of NLX-204 in the rat CMS model was as rapid as that of ketamine or NLX-101, supporting targeting cortical 5-HT1A receptors with selective, biased agonists to achieve RAAD effects. (ii)The anti-anhedonic activity of systemic NLX-204 was mimicked by local administration of the compound in the PFC, confirming the involvement of cortical circuits in its RAAD-like effects. (iii) Notably, the effects of systemic NLX-204 and NLX-101 were abolished by PFC administration of muscimol, indicating that they act by (indirectly) eliciting a reduction in cortical GABAergic neurotransmission. This is consistent with ketamine’s mechanism of action and suggests that there are converging NMDA and 5-HT1A receptor signaling cascades in PFC underlying the RAAD-like activities of ketamine and NLX-204. Acknowledgements: The study was financially supported by NCN grant no. 2019/35/B/NZ7/00787.

Keywords: depression, ketamine, serotonin, 5-HT1A receptor, chronic mild stress

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Authors: Jérémy Philippe, Lucien Baldas, Batoul Attar, Jean-Charles Mare

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The proposed communication deals with the research and development of a rotary direct-drive servo valve for aerospace applications. A key challenge of the project is to downsize the electromagnetic torque motor by reducing the torque required to drive the rotary spool. It is intended to optimize the spool and the sleeve geometries by combining a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) approach with commercial optimization software. The present communication addresses an important phase of the project, which consists firstly of gaining confidence in the simulation results. It is well known that the force needed to pilot a sliding spool valve comes from several physical effects: hydraulic forces, friction and inertia/mass of the moving assembly. Among them, the flow force is usually a major contributor to the steady-state (or Root Mean Square) driving torque. In recent decades, CFD has gradually become a standard simulation tool for studying fluid-structure interactions. However, in the particular case of high-pressure valve design, the authors have experienced that the calculated overall hydraulic force depends on the parameterization and options used to build and run the CFD model. To solve this issue, the authors have selected the standard case of the linear spool valve, which is addressed in detail in numerous scientific references (analytical models, experiments, CFD simulations). The first CFD simulations run by the authors have shown that the evolution of the equivalent discharge coefficient vs. Reynolds number at the metering orifice corresponds well to the values that can be predicted by the classical analytical models. Oppositely, the simulated flow force was found to be quite different from the value calculated analytically. This drove the authors to investigate minutely the influence of the studied domain and the setting of the CFD simulation. It was firstly shown that the flow recirculates in the inlet and outlet channels if their length is not sufficient regarding their hydraulic diameter. The dead volume on the uncontrolled orifice side also plays a significant role. These examples highlight the influence of the geometry of the fluid domain considered. The second action was to investigate the influence of the type of mesh, the turbulence models and near-wall approaches, and the numerical solver and discretization scheme order. Two approaches were used to determine the overall hydraulic force acting on the moving spool. First, the force was deduced from the momentum balance on a control domain delimited by the valve inlet and outlet and the spool walls. Second, the overall hydraulic force was calculated from the integral of pressure and shear forces acting at the boundaries of the fluid domain. This underlined the significant contribution of the viscous forces acting on the spool between the inlet and outlet orifices, which are generally not considered in the literature. This also emphasized the influence of the choices made for the implementation of CFD calculation and results analysis. With the step-by-step process adopted to increase confidence in the CFD simulations, the authors propose a set of best practices and recommendations for the efficient use of CFD to design high-pressure spool valves.

Keywords: computational fluid dynamics, hydraulic forces, servovalve, rotary servovalve

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Authors: Christiane Paulus

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Post-Islamism assumes that the Quran should not be viewed in terms of what Lyotard identifies as a ‘meta-narrative'. However, its socio-ethical content can be viewed as critical of power discourse (Foucault). Practicing religion seems to be limited to rites and individual spirituality, taqwa. Alternatively, can we build on Muhammad Abduh's classic-modern reform and develop it through a postmodernist frame? This is the main question of this study. Through his general and vague remarks on the context of the Quran, Abduh was the first to refer to the historical and cultural distance of the text as an obstacle for interpretation. His application, however, corresponded to the modern absolute idea of authentic sharia. He was followed by Amin al-Khuli, who hermeneutically linked the content of the Quran to the theory of evolution. Fazlur Rahman and Nasr Hamid abu Zeid remain reluctant to go beyond the general level in terms of context. The hermeneutic circle, therefore, persists in challenging, how to get out to overcome one’s own assumptions. The insight into and the acceptance of the lasting ambivalence of understanding can be grasped as a postmodern approach; it is documented in Derrida's discovery of the shift in text meanings, difference, also in Lyotard's theory of différend. The resulting mixture of meanings (Wolfgang Welsch) can be read together with the classic ambiguity of the premodern interpreters of the Quran (Thomas Bauer). Confronting hermeneutic difficulties in general, Niklas Luhmann proves every description an attribution, tautology, i.e., remaining in the circle. ‘De-tautologization’ is possible, namely by analyzing the distinctions in the sense of objective, temporal and social information that every text contains. This could be expanded with the Kantian aesthetic dimension of reason (critique of pure judgment) corresponding to the iʽgaz of the Coran. Luhmann asks, ‘What distinction does the observer/author make?’ Quran as a speech from God to the first listeners could be seen as a discourse responding to the problems of everyday life of that time, which can be viewed as the general goal of the entire Qoran. Through reconstructing koranic Lifeworlds (Alfred Schütz) in detail, the social structure crystallizes the socio-economic differences, the enormous poverty. The koranic instruction to provide the basic needs for the neglected groups, which often intersect (old, poor, slaves, women, children), can be seen immediately in the text. First, the references to lifeworlds/social problems and discourses in longer koranic passages should be hypothesized. Subsequently, information from the classic commentaries could be extracted, the classical Tafseer, in particular, contains rich narrative material for reconstructing. By selecting and assigning suitable, specific context information, the meaning of the description becomes condensed (Clifford Geertz). In this manner, the text gets necessarily an alienation and is newly accessible. The socio-ethical implications can thus be grasped from the difference of the original problem and the revealed/improved order/procedure; this small step can be materialized as such, not as an absolute solution but as offering plausible patterns for today’s challenges as the Agenda 2030.

Keywords: postmodern hermeneutics, condensed description, sociological approach, small steps of reform

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Authors: Adriana Haulica

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Powered by Machine Learning, Precise medicine is tailored by now to use genetic and molecular profiling, with the aim of optimizing the therapeutic benefits for cohorts of patients. As the majority of Machine Language algorithms come from heuristics, the outputs have contextual validity. This is not very restrictive in the sense that medicine itself is not an exact science. Meanwhile, the progress made in Molecular Biology, Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, and Precise Medicine, correlated with the huge amount of human biology data and the increase in computational power, opens new healthcare challenges. A more accurate diagnosis is needed along with real-time treatments by processing as much as possible from the available information. The purpose of this paper is to present a deeper vision for the future of Artificial Intelligence in Precise medicine. In fact, actual Machine Learning algorithms use standard mathematical knowledge, mostly Euclidian metrics and standard computation rules. The loss of information arising from the classical methods prevents obtaining 100% evidence on the diagnosis process. To overcome these problems, we introduce MEDICOMPILLS, a new architectural concept tool of information processing in Precise medicine that delivers diagnosis and therapy advice. This tool processes poly-field digital resources: global knowledge related to biomedicine in a direct or indirect manner but also technical databases, Natural Language Processing algorithms, and strong class optimization functions. As the name suggests, the heart of this tool is a compiler. The approach is completely new, tailored for omics and clinical data. Firstly, the intrinsic biological intuition is different from the well-known “a needle in a haystack” approach usually used when Machine Learning algorithms have to process differential genomic or molecular data to find biomarkers. Also, even if the input is seized from various types of data, the working engine inside the MEDICOMPILLS does not search for patterns as an integrative tool. This approach deciphers the biological meaning of input data up to the metabolic and physiologic mechanisms, based on a compiler with grammars issued from bio-algebra-inspired mathematics. It translates input data into bio-semantic units with the help of contextual information iteratively until Bio-Logical operations can be performed on the base of the “common denominator “rule. The rigorousness of MEDICOMPILLS comes from the structure of the contextual information on functions, built to be analogous to mathematical “proofs”. The major impact of this architecture is expressed by the high accuracy of the diagnosis. Detected as a multiple conditions diagnostic, constituted by some main diseases along with unhealthy biological states, this format is highly suitable for therapy proposal and disease prevention. The use of MEDICOMPILLS architecture is highly beneficial for the healthcare industry. The expectation is to generate a strategic trend in Precise medicine, making medicine more like an exact science and reducing the considerable risk of errors in diagnostics and therapies. The tool can be used by pharmaceutical laboratories for the discovery of new cures. It will also contribute to better design of clinical trials and speed them up.

Keywords: bio-semantic units, multiple conditions diagnosis, NLP, omics

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