Farmers' preferences for adopting on-farm concentration of raw milk: Results from a discrete choice experiment in Germany

Milk concentrates are used in the manufacturing of dairy products such as yogurt and cheese or are processed into milk powder. Processes for the nonthermal separation of water and valuable milk ingredients are becoming increasingly widespread at farm level. The technical barriers to using farm-manufactured milk concentrate in dairies are minimal, hence the suspicion that the practice of on-farm raw milk concentration is still fairly uncommon for economic reasons. This study, therefore, set out to investigate farmers' potential willingness to adopt a raw milk concentration plant. The empirical analysis was based on discrete choice experiments with 75 German dairy farmers to identify preferences and the possible adoption of on-farm raw milk concentration. The results showed that, in particular, farmers who deemed the current milk price to be insufficient viewed on-farm concentration using membrane technology as an option for diversifying their milk sales. We found no indication that adoption would be impeded by a lack of trustworthy information on milk processing technologies or capital.     

宁夏红寺堡盆地隐伏古隆起成因机制及其对区域沙漠化的影响

目前对于青藏高原东北缘活动构造研究多集中于活动断裂带的活动性,而对夹持于其间的沉积盆地构造格架及活动性研究甚少。以夹持于烟筒山断裂与牛首山—罗山断裂之间的宁夏红寺堡盆地为研究对象,采用重力资料重处理解译、音频大地电磁测深(AMT)和地震勘探相结合,揭示红寺堡盆地隐伏构造特征,并进一步采用盆山一体化思路分析隐伏构造的成因机制及其对区域沙漠化的控制作用。结果表明:青藏高原在中新世末发生强烈的NE向推挤、扩展和隆升,红寺堡盆地由坳陷盆地转变为挠曲盆地; 在青藏高原NE向扩展的影响下,烟筒山断裂发生强烈的逆冲作用,古生代—中生代基底逆冲于古近系—新近系之上,受构造变形影响的最新地层为中新统彰恩堡组; 红寺堡盆地内的隐伏古隆起呈NW—SE向,与烟筒山构造带具有相同的构造动力学背景,受青藏高原NE向扩展影响形成于中新世末,并且至今仍具有活动性; 隐伏古隆起周缘断裂的活动破坏了地表稳定性、蓄水能力和地表植被,导致区域沙漠化呈现有规律的NW—SE向带状展布。该研究成果对于宁夏红寺堡盆地区域稳定性评价及沙漠化的综合治理具有现实指导意义。     

Manpower supply planning for aircraft line maintenance under stochastic incidents

We plan the manpower supply for aircraft line maintenance, taking into account two types of stochastic incidents: manpower demands for a flight and the number of aircraft needing to be serviced at one time. The problem is solved to find the shift and maintenance group combinations best suited for the given airline. The optimal aircraft maintenance certification for a crew is also analyzed to improve the entire manpower structure. In addition, the addition of temporary manpower required for actual daily operations is also considered as a part of understanding the total manpower utilized in actual operations. An integrated method including scenario generation and a stochastic model is developed to deal with the problem. Finally, we perform a case study based on operating data obtained from a major airline in Taiwan. The results and findings are compared with the airline’s current manpower plan in the discussion, and suggestions for improvement are made.     

瞬态闭锁试验在0.13 μm大规模集成电路中引起的潜在损伤

瞬态剂量率辐射试验会引起集成电路发生损伤或失效，其原因至少有两种：闭锁大电流引起的电路内部金属互连熔融；累积电离总剂量引起的氧化层电荷造成阈值电压偏移。本文以一种0.13 μm体硅CMOS处理器为对象，研究了瞬态剂量率和稳态电离总剂量辐射效应规律。结果表明：瞬态剂量率闭锁效应对处理器造成了显著的潜在损伤，导致其总剂量失效阈值从1 030 Gy(Si)降低至600 Gy(Si)。研究结论对于大规模集成电路的可靠性评估和指导辐射加固设计有重要参考意义。     

融合时间隐语义填充和子群划分的推荐算法

随着个性化推荐技术的发展，推荐系统面临着越来越多的挑战。传统的推荐算法通常存在数据稀疏性和推荐精度低等问题。针对以上问题，提出了一种融合时间隐语义填充和子群划分的推荐算法[K]-TLFM（Time Based Latent Factor Model Integrated with [k]-means）。该算法利用融合时间因素的隐语义模型对原始用户物品评分矩阵缺失项进行填充，避免了用全局平均值或者用户/物品平均值补全矩阵带来的误差，有效缓解了数据稀疏性问题，同时融合时间因素有效地刻画了用户偏好随时间的变化；完成评分矩阵缺失项填充后，基于二分[k]-means聚类算法将偏好、兴趣特征相似的对象划分到同一个子群中，在目标用户所属的子群中基于选定的协同过滤算法为用户产生推荐列表，提高了推荐效率和准确性。在MovieLens和Netflix数据集上对该算法的推荐性能进行了对比实验，结果表明该算法具有更高的推荐精度。     

变分自编码器模型综述

变分自编码器（VAE）作为深度隐空间生成模型的一种，近年来其表现性能取得了极大的成功，尤其是在图像生成方面。变分自编码器模型作为无监督式特征学习的重要工具之一，可以通过学习隐编码空间与数据生成空间的特征映射，进而在输出端重构生成输入数据。梳理了传统变分自编码器模型及其衍生变体模型的发展与研究现状，并就此做了总结和对比，最后分析了变分自编码器模型存在的问题与挑战，并就可能的发展趋势做了展望。     

Some picture fuzzy Bonferroni mean operators with their application to multicriteria decision making

In this paper, we extend the Bonferroni mean (BM) operator with the picture fuzzy numbers (PFNs) to propose novel picture fuzzy aggregation operators and demonstrate their application to multicriteria decision making (MCDM). On the basis of the algebraic operational rules of PFNs and BM, we introduce some aggregation operators: the picture fuzzy Bonferroni mean, the picture fuzzy normalized weighted Bonferroni mean, and the picture fuzzy ordered weighted Bonferroni mean. Then, a new picture fuzzy MCDM method is proposed with the help of the proposed operators. Lastly, a practical application of proposed model is given to verify the developed model and related results of the proposed model is compared with the results of the existing models to indicate its applicability.     

An automated patient monitoring using discrete‐time wireless sensor networks

In recent years, Internet of Things (IoT) devices are used for remote health monitoring. For remotely monitoring a patient, only the health information at different time points are not sufficient; predicted values of biomarkers (for some future time points) are also important. In this article, we propose a powerful statistical model for an efficient dynamic patient monitoring using wireless sensor nodes through Bayesian Learning (BL). We consider the setting where a set of correlated biomarkers are measured from a patient through wireless sensors, but the sensors only report the ordinal outcomes (say, good, fair, high, or very high) to the sink based on some prefixed thresholds. The challenge is to use the ordinal outcomes for monitoring and predicting the health status of the patient under consideration. We propose a linear mixed model where interbiomarker correlations and intrabiomarker dependence are modeled simultaneously. The estimated and the predicted values of the biomarkers are transferred over the internet so that health care providers and the family members of the patient can remotely monitor the patient. Extensive simulation studies are performed to assess practical usefulness of our proposed joint model, and the performance of the proposed joint model is compared to that of some other traditional models used in the literature.     

高性能三水醋酸钠-尿素-膨胀石墨混合相变材料的制备及其在电地暖中的应用性能

采用尿素调节三水醋酸钠的相变温度到合适范围再添加膨胀石墨来降低过冷度，研制了高性能的三水醋酸钠-尿素-膨胀石墨混合相变材料，并对其在电地暖中的应用性能进行了研究。结果表明，当尿素质量分数为36.5%、膨胀石墨添加量为4%(质量)时，所得混合相变材料的熔化焓高达209.1 J/g，熔点在31.98℃，过冷度仅为2.04℃，热导率为2.349 W/(m·K)，热可靠性良好；将用该混合相变材料制成的相变板安装在实验房的电地暖中时，实验房的热舒适度随着相变材料层厚度的增加而增加，但也带来加热时间和用电量的增加；当相变材料层厚度为10 mm时，电加热温度适宜设置在45℃；在热舒适度相当的条件下，有相变板的实验房与无相变板的参比房相比具有用电量小及电费低的优势。     

Design standardization of unit operations for reducing the capital intensity and cost of small-scale chemical processes

A methodology is proposed to reduce the cost and capital intensity of small-scale chemical processes by creating new opportunities for economies of numbers through standardizing the equipment designs across multiple processes. We depart from asynchronous design of single-processes and adopt a common-functionality based simultaneous design of multiple processes that use similar unit operations. A generalized cost function is used to appropriately balance the trade-offs between economies of scale and economies of numbers. An optimization-based framework for design standardization is developed and illustrated using two case studies. The first involves the simultaneous synthesis of methanol and ammonia processes, and the second addresses the optimal synthesis of multi-column natural gas liquid (NGL) fractionation processes for different natural gas sources. We observe that considerable reduction in capital intensity of small-scale processes is possible through equipment standardization.