A Physical Model to Study the Effects of Nozzle Design on Dispersed Two-Phase Flows in a Slab Mold Casting Ultra-Low-Carbon Steels

Metallurgical and Materials Transactions B - The effects of nozzle design on dispersed, two-phase flows of the steel-argon system in a slab mold are studied using a water-air model with particle...     

Seasonal patterns of thermal stratification and primary production in the northern parts of Lake Tanganyika

Thermal stratification in meromictic Lake Tanganyika weakens during the cool, dry and windy season, allowing intrusions of deeper nutrient-rich waters into the upper mixed layer enhancing primary productivity. The current study examined the seasonal influence of thermal structure on the patterns of primary production in Lake Tanganyika. Two sites (Kigoma Bay and Mahale) were sampled on a monthly basis for 1?year. Water temperature and chlorophyll a fluorescence profiles (0–100?m) were measured using a multisonde. Water samples were taken every 20?m (0–100?m) to measure soluble reactive phosphorus (SRP), chlorophyll a and primary production. Pulse Amplitude Modulated Fluorometry was used for the measurements of primary production. The results show that the dry season coincided with higher wind speeds, elevated SRP and some peaks of chlorophyll a and primary production at both sites. During the wet season, high levels of chlorophyll a and primary production coincided with an increase in the euphotic depth, a deep chlorophyll maximum (DCM) and a contribution from metalimnetic areal production at both sites. Our results suggest that the vertical distribution of primary production in Lake Tanganyika is affected by the lake thermal structure, nutrient availability and the extent of the euphotic zone. In Lake Tanganyika, estimates of areal primary production were significantly affected by DCM and required estimation throughout the entire upper mixed layer and the metalimnion which extended to ~89?m.     

Experimental Bond Behavior of FRP Sheets Glued on Brick Masonry

This paper deals with the experimental characterization of the mechanical tensile and shear bond behavior of fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) sheets externally glued on masonry prisms, in terms of load capacity and stress distribution along the bonded length. The brick masonry adopted tries to replicate ancient brick masonry, by using handmade low-strength solids bricks and low-strength lime-based mortar. Key parameters relative to the FRP-masonry interface response, particularly bonded length, FRP materials, anchor scheme adopted, and shape of masonry substrate, were studied. Finally, an analytical bond stress-slip formulation was developed, allowing deducing local bond stress-slip curves directly from the experiments.     

Deuterium Plasma Focus as a Tool for Testing Materials of Plasma Facing Walls in Thermonuclear Fusion Reactors

This paper presents the first verification of the fast ion beam (FIB) and fast plasma stream (FPS) properties computed using the Lee code. Recent estimates of FIB and FPS properties in PF-400J from interferometric images are compared to our computed results. Reasonable agreement is found in the comparison of several quantities. Our computed power flow density (energy flux) and integral damage factor are 2.45 × 10¹² Wm^?2 (2 times of experimental value) and 1.78 × 10⁸ Wm^?2 s^0.5 (~almost the same as experimental value) respectively, for target placed at 1.5 cm from the anode top of PF-400J. This verification gives us confidence to proceed to systematic numerical calculations on the PF-400J and similar small plasma focus devices (PF50, NX2, NX3, FMPF-3, INTI PF) to obtain FIB properties (ion beam energy, ion beam flux, ion beam fluence, beam ion number, ion beam current, power flow density, and damage factor). These results confirm that the plasma focus, including small ones, could be useful to study the effects of cumulative pulses on target materials being considered for plasma facing walls in future tokamak or laser-implosion fusion reactors.     

Ion Temperature Effect on Bohm Criterion for Magnetized Plasma Sheath

A two-fluid model has been used to study the characteristics of the plasma sheath in the presence of an external magnetic field and by taking into account both the ion temperature and the ion-neutral collision force. The model is solved numerically and sheath characteristics are obtained. The dependence of the Bohm magnetized sheath criterion to ion temperature is examined. Then it is concluded that the ion temperature has significant effects on the sheath characteristics such as ion velocity, particles densities and electric potential.     

Experimental Behavior of FRP Strengthened Masonry Arches

This paper deals with the experimental behavior of solid clay brick masonry arches strengthened with glass fiber-reinforced polymer composites. Twelve half-scaled segmental masonry arches subjected to a load applied at the quarter span were tested under displacement control up to failure. The arches were built using handmade low strength bricks and a commercial lime-based mortar, trying to mimic ancient structures. Besides reference unreinforced arches, five different strengthening arrangements, including the use of spike anchors, were studied. The experimental results provide significant information for validation of advanced numerical models and analytical tools and for code drafting. The experimental results also show that (1) only continuous strengthening strategies are able to prevent typical local failure mechanisms of unreinforced arches; (2) strengthening at the intrados is the most effective option to increase strength; and (3) strengthening applied at the extrados provides the higher deformation capacity prior to failure, endowing arches with considerable ductility behavior.     

Training deep neural networks with non-uniform frame-level cost function for automatic speech recognition

Multimedia Tools and Applications - The aim of this paper is to exhibit two new variations of the frame-level cost function for training a deep neural network in order to achieve better word error...     

Egg yolk hydrolysed granules: Characteristics,rheological properties and applications

Given its low-cholesterol content feature, granules from egg yolk can be used as a substitute of the whole egg yolk. However, the functional properties of the granular fraction should be improved. In this sense, hydrolysis of proteins frequently produces improvements in some of its nutritional and technological properties. For that reason, in this work egg yolk granules were treated with a proteolytic enzyme, trypsin (E.C. 3.4.21.4) with the purpose of making a comparative characterization of the products.Results showed that the enzymatic reaction produced a degree of hydrolysis of 12%, being the size of the different peptides obtained and quantified by chromatographic and electrophoretic techniques. Mayonnaises made with these hydrolysed granules resulted more stable to temperature changes between 4 and 20 °C than the one made with non-hydrolysed ones. In the rheological tests carried out, the mayonnaise elaborated with hydrolysed granules has the most similar rheological behaviour to that of a commercial one used as reference. In general, the results obtained suggest that the recipe elaborated with hydrolysed granules had better rheological characteristics than those prepared using non-hydrolysed granules, maintaining the low-cholesterol feature.     

The structural plasticity of the C terminus of p21Cip1 is a determinant for target protein recognition

The cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitory protein p21(Cip1) might play multiple roles in cell-cycle regulation through interaction of its C-terminal domain with a defined set of cellular proteins such as proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), calmodulin (CaM), and the oncoprotein SET. p21(Cip1) could be described as an intrinsically unstructured protein in solution although the C-terminal domain adopts a well-defined extended conformation when bound to PCNA. However, the molecular mechanism of the interaction with CaM and the oncoprotein SET is not well understood, partly because of the lack of structural information. In this work, a peptide derived from the C-terminal domain of p21(Cip1) that covers the binding domain of the three above-mentioned proteins was used to demonstrate that the C-terminal domain of p21 recognizes multiple ligands through its ability to adopt multiple conformations. The conformation is dictated by tertiary contacts rather than by the primary sequence of the protein. Our results suggest that the C-terminal domain of p21(Cip1) adopts an extended structure when bound to PCNA and probably when bound to the oncoprotein SET, but an alpha helix when bound to CaM.     

Comparative analysis of body composition assessment methods in healthy men and in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients: anthropometry, bioelectrical impedance and dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry

The aim of this study was to examine the agreement between the results of body fat (BF and BF%), fat-free mass (FFM) and FFM index (FFMI= FFM/height2) as estimated by skinfold anthropometry (ANT), bioelectrical impedance (BIA) and dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) in two groups of men (> or = 50 y), one comprising healthy individuals (n=23) and the other, patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (n=24). Comparisons between body composition techniques were done by repeated measures ANOVA; the Bland & Altman procedure was used to analyse agreement. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: 1) comparison between healthy and COPD groups showed significant differences between all studied variables; 2) in the healthy group, values for BF, BF%, FFM and FFMI were not significantly different when BIA or ANT was compared to DXA; however, in COPD, values for BF and BF% were significantly higher and for FFM and FFMI significantly lower when BIA was compared to DXA; in contrast, no differences were shown between values for these variables when ANT was compared with DXA; 3) Bland & Altman test, in both groups, showed no agreement between BIA and DXA and between ANT and DXA; it was also shown that body fat was overestimated and fat free mass underestimated by BIA in relation to DXA.