Nutritional status and aminoglycoside dosing

Serum amyloid P component (SAP) is a glycoprotein in human plasma. We previously showed that SAP is specifically localized in human atherosclerotic lesions, suggesting that SAP may play a role in atherogenesis. In this study, the interactions between human SAP and high density lipoprotein (HDL), low density lipoprotein (LDL) and very low density lipoprotein (VLDL) were investigated by using a solid phase plate assay. Biotinylated SAP bound to immobilized HDL and VLDL in a calcium-dependent, saturable manner. The SAP-HDL and SAP-VLDL bindings reached saturation at 4 nM and 16 nM of SAP, respectively. The bindings were inhibited by native SAP in a dose-dependent manner. No binding between SAP and LDL was found in the presence of calcium or EDTA, which indicates the specificity of SAP-lipoproteins interactions. These results suggest that the function of SAP is related to its capability to interact with lipoproteins and this may have important implications in atherosclerosis and in amyloidosis.     

Anemia increases gastric blood flow in noncirrhotic and cirrhotic patients

BACKGROUND: Previous studies in rats have demonstrated that anemia induces a significant increment in gastric mucosal blood flow. In the present study, we investigated whether chronic anemia induces similar changes in gastric blood perfusion in humans, and if this effect is also present in cirrhotic patients in whom gastric blood flow is usually increased in basal conditions. METHODS: Gastric mucosal blood perfusion was assessed by means of laser-Doppler flowmetry and reflectance spectrophotometry applied through the endoscope. RESULTS: Anemia significantly increases laser-Doppler signal in cirrhotic (2.3 +/- 0.11 vs 2.9 +/- 0.22 volts, p < 0.05) and noncirrhotic patients (1.71 +/- 0.15 vs 2.24 +/- 0.17, p < 0.05). In anemic patients the index of hemoglobin concentration of the gastric mucosa, assessed by reflectance spectrophotometry, was significantly decreased in cirrhotic patients (107.6 +/- 4.7 vs 95.5 +/- 3.3, p < 0.05) and noncirrhotic patients (93.9 +/- 4.1 vs 76.1 +/- 4.2, p < 0.01), whereas the index of oxygen saturation was increased (36.7 +/- 0.7 vs 40.4 +/- 1.4, p = 0.05; and 36.4 +/- 1.1 vs 43.2 +/- 1.9, p < 0.01, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: In conclusion, chronic anemia is associated with an enhanced gastric blood perfusion reflected by an increased laser-doppler signal and gastric mucosal oxygen index despite a decrease in gastric hemoglobin concentration. In cirrhotic patients, anemia promotes a further increment in its basal gastric hyperemia.     

Numerical Optimization of an Active Voltage Controller for High-Power IGBT Converters

Feedback control of insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) in the active region can be used to regulate the device switching trajectory. This facilitates series connection of devices without the use of external snubber networks. Control must be achieved across the full active region of the IGBT and must balance a number of conflicting system goals including diode recovery. To date, the choice of control parameters has been a largely empirical process. This paper uses accurate device models and formalized optimization procedures to evaluate IGBT active voltage controllers. A detailed optimization for the control of IGBT turn-on is presented in this paper     

An efficient approach for the S‐shaped penalty function

Interval goal programming (IGP) with a marginal penalty function (PF) was first proposed by Charnes and Collomb in 1972, and further improved by Kvanli and other researchers. Recently, Lu and Chen proposed an efficient logarithmic method to formulate IGP with an S‐shaped PF. However, their method requires adding many binary variables when the problem size becomes large, which increases the computational burden in the solution process. This study proposes an efficient approach for the S‐shaped PF. The arbitrary PF frequently appears in the fields of business and industry. However, none of the previous approaches have addressed arbitrary PFs without adding binary variables. The proposed approach can be easily extended to formulate an arbitrary PF in which binary variables are no longer required, regardless of the number of break points. The proposed method can improve the efficiency of IGP for solving large size management and decision problems in considering PFs. In order to demonstrate the correctness, usefulness of the proposed model, illustrative examples are provided.     

Comprehensive Warpage Analysis of Stacked Die MEMS Package in Accelerometer Application

<正>Packaging of MEMS ( micro-electro-mechanical system ) devices poses more challenges than conventional IC packaging, since the performance of the MEMS devices is highly dependent on packaging processes. A Land Grid Array ( LGA ) package is introduced for MEMS technology based linear multi-axis accelerometers. Finite element modeling is conducted to simulate the warpage behavior of the LGA packages. A method to correlate the package warpage to matrix block warpage has been developed. Warpage for both package and sensor substrate are obtained. Warpage predicted by simulation correlates very well with experimental measurements. Based on this validated method, detailed design analysis with different package geometrical variations are carried out to optimize the package design. With the optimized package structure, the packaging effect on accelerometer signal performance is well controlled.     

A sample purification method for rugged and high-performance DNA sequencing by capillary electrophoresis using replaceable polymer solutions. A. Development of the cleanup protocol

A method for the cleanup of Sanger DNA sequencing reaction products for capillary electrophoresis analysis with replaceable polymer solutions has been developed. A poly(ether sulfone) ultrafiltration membrane pretreated with linear polyacrylamide was first used to remove template DNA from the sequencing samples. Then, gel filtration in a spin column format (two columns per sample) was employed to decrease the concentration of salts below 10 microM in the sample solution. The method was very reproducible and increased the injected amount of the sequencing fragments 10-50-fold compared to traditional cleanup protocols. Using M13mp18 as template, the resulting cleaned-up single DNA sequencing fragments could routinely be separated to more than 1000 bases with a base-calling accuracy of at least 99% for 800 bases. The method is simple and universal and can be easily automated. In the following paper, a systematic study to determine quantitatively the effects of the sample solution components such as high-mobility ions (e.g., chloride and dideoxynucleotides) and template DNA on the injected amount and separation efficiency of the sequencing fragments is presented.     

Electrodeionization 2: The migration of nickel ions absorbed in a flexible ion-exchange resin

The removal of nickel ions from a low cross-linked ion-exchange resin using an applied electrical potential gradient was studied. The potential gradient across a bed of ion-exchange particles, in which nickel ions were absorbed, was varied by two methods. One involved a change of cell voltage across beds of constant width, the other a change of bed width at constant cell voltage. In this way, various characteristics concerning the electrodialytic regeneration of a bed of ion-exchange particles in the nickel form were ascertained. The diffusion coefficient, current efficiency and migration rate of nickel in the bed are discussed. It is shown that the current efficiency for the removal of nickel is nearly one hundred percent when the bed is in the nickel form, and that the rate of regeneration is proportional to the cell voltage.     

Engineering solutions related to the furnace arrangement of a boiler designed for operating at supercritical steam conditions

When developing a coal-fired power unit designed for operating at supercritical steam conditions (SSCs), it is necessary not only to achieve high economic performance and the high reliability of a new power unit, but also to tackle many problems related to the efficient combustion of the solid fuel without exceeding the future standards for limitations on emissions of harmful substances into the atmosphere. The technological methods of suppression of nitrogen oxides capable of providing the permissible NO _x emissions are discussed. The results of calculations are given that demonstrate the feasibility of achieving the purpose in view by means of installation of new low-NO _x burners and staged injection of the fuel even on combustion of the Ekibastuz black coal high in ash content.     

Fabrication-tolerant active-passive integration scheme for vertically coupled microring resonator

The large-scale photonic integration of microring resonators in three dimensions made possible by recent developments in vertical coupling and wafer bonding technology is shown to be sensitive to lateral mask misalignment for the ring and bus waveguides introduced during the fabrication process. For a typical 20-/spl mu/m radius, vertically coupled microring calculations reveal a linear relationship between deviation in the coupling coefficient and lateral misalignment. A coupling coefficient reduction of 50% is predicted for a lateral misalignment of 0.3 /spl mu/m, which is typical for an alignment accuracy limited by the current state-of-the-art mask alignment process. The use of a wide multimode bus waveguide is proposed to ameliorate this alignment sensitivity. The mode-expanded bus waveguide, together with its physically wider structure, reduces the dependence of modal overlap and coupling length on precise alignment, resulting in significantly relaxed fabrication tolerance. Deviation of coupling coefficient decreases by an order of magnitude for the new ring coupler geometry, where a sole reduction of 5% is obtained for the same amount of misalignment. The implications of the proposed structure are subsequently investigated for microring laser performance. The differential slope efficiency is shown to be at least five times less sensitive to lateral misalignment for the proposed structure within a small misalignment regime. This readily adaptable coupler geometry based on existing vertical coupling architectures is transferable to any fabrication scheme with multiple waveguide layers coupled vertically, and is of particular importance to microring resonators with small radii.     

Effects of irradiation on the mechanical,electrical, and flammability properties of (low‐density polyethylene)/(ethylene‐[vinyl acetate] copolymer) blends containing alumina trihydrate

Alumina trihydrate (ATH) was added to (low‐density polyethylene)/(ethylene‐[vinyl acetate] copolymer) blends (LPEs) to enhance their flame resistance. The addition of substantial amounts of ATH has been known to have deleterious effects on the mechanical properties of such blends. Hence, electron beam irradiation was used to improve the mechanical properties of our ATH‐filled LPE specimens. The specimens were irradiated at 50 to 150 kGy before being cut into specified shapes for analysis. The increase in the irradiation dosage increased the gel content as a result of the formation of crosslinked networks. Also, the flame resistance of the LPE blends was enhanced by increasing both the loading level of ATH and the irradiation dosage. However, a high ATH loading level reduced tensile strength and elongation at break. Nevertheless, the electron beam irradiation maintained the tensile strength and elongation of the ATH‐filled blends. In addition, a higher content of ATH in the LPE blends showed reactive interaction with irradiation effects. A higher amount of ATH reduced the electrical resistivity of the blends, but analysis of their surface and volume resistivity showed that the electrical resistance of the ATH‐filled LPE blends could be improved by electron beam irradiation in the range of 50 to 150 kGy. J. VINYL ADDIT. TECHNOL., 20:91–98, 2014. © 2014 Society of Plastics Engineers