A SAS macro for parametric and semiparametric mixture cure models

Cure models have been developed to analyze failure time data with a cured fraction. For such data, standard survival models are usually not appropriate because they do not account for the possibility of cure. Mixture cure models assume that the studied population is a mixture of susceptible individuals, who may experience the event of interest, and non-susceptible individuals that will never experience it. The aim of this paper is to propose a SAS macro to estimate parametric and semiparametric mixture cure models with covariates. The cure fraction can be modelled by various binary regression models. Parametric and semiparametric models can be used to model the survival of uncured individuals. The maximization of the likelihood function is performed using SAS PROC NLMIXED for parametric models and through an EM algorithm for the Cox's proportional hazards mixture cure model. Indications and limitations of the proposed macro are discussed and an example in the field of cancer clinical trials is shown.     

Effect of Brood Pheromone on Survival and Nutrient Intake of African Honey Bees (<Emphasis Type=Italic>Apis mellifera scutellata</Emphasis>) under Controlled Conditions

The influence of pheromones on insect physiology and behavior has been thoroughly reported for numerous aspects, such as attraction, gland development, aggregation, mate and kin recognition. Brood pheromone (BP) is released by honey bee larvae to indicate their protein requirements to the colony. Although BP is known to modulate pollen and protein consumption, which in turn can affect physiological and morphological parameters, such as hypopharyngeal gland (HPG) development and ovarian activation, few studies have focused on the effect of BP on nutritional balance. In this study, we exposed newly emerged worker bees for 14 d and found that BP exposure increased protein intake during the first few days, with a peak in consumption at day four following exposure. BP exposure decreased survival of caged honey bees, but did not affect either the size of the HPG acini or ovarian activation stage. The uncoupling of the BP releaser effect, facilitated by working under controlled conditions, and the presence of larvae as stimulating cues are discussed.     

Building intelligent Web applications using lightweight wrappers

The Web so far has been incredibly successful at delivering information to human users. So successful actually, that there is now an urgent need to go beyond a browsing human. Unfortunately, the Web is not yet a well organized repository of nicely structured documents but rather a conglomerate of volatile HTML pages.

To address this problem, we present the World Wide Web Wrapper Factory (W4F), a toolkit for the generation of wrappers for Web sources, that offers: (1) an expressive language to specify the extraction of complex structures from HTML pages; (2) a declarative mapping to various data formats like XML; (3) some visual tools to make the engineering of wrappers faster and easier.     

Design and implementation of compact diplexers using dual‐mode cavities

In this paper, the design of compact diplexers with dual‐mode cavities for satellite payloads is detailed. Compact diplexers are composed of coupled resonators without additional waveguide element, leading to a more compact architecture. Two topologies are first implemented and compared with a standard manifold output diplexer, in terms of electrical performances, compactness, and power handling. Hardware prototypes are fabricated and measured for experimental verification. A third topology is finally introduced for the design of noncontiguous diplexers. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J RF and Microwave CAE 24:249–258, 2014.     

From Al2O3-supported Ni(II)-ethylenediamine Complexes to CO Hydrogenation Catalysts: Importance of the Hydrogen Post-treatment Evidenced by XPS

Ni (7 wt%)/Al₂O₃ catalysts prepared by decomposition of Ni(II)-ethylenediamine complexes in inert atmosphere initially contain a mixture of metallic and oxidized nickel. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy shows that after a hydrogen treatment at 500 °C, the system contains more metallic nickel than catalysts prepared from the usual precursor, nickel nitrate. Carbonaceous species resulting from the partial oxidation of ethylenediamine are also eliminated. The catalyst post-treated in hydrogen exhibits a high metallic surface area accessible to reactants and is able to catalyze CO methanation.     

Optimal adjustment of a machine tool for improving the geometrical quality of machined parts

The manufacturing industry has to improve the quality of its manufactured products. It is the reason why industry needs tools and methods that make the control of that quality possible. In this paper, we propose a method that allows an optimal adjustment of the machine tools in order to respect at best a set of standard functional requirements applied to a part. The requirements have to use the maximal material requirement defined by ISO standard.The proposed method works out a geometrical model. Interchangeability boundaries enriched with adjustment parameters constitute the basis of the model. Comparison between this geometrical model and a first manufactured part allows us to obtain the variations of adjustment parameters. These variations directly correct the machine tool being certain that the following parts respect at the very best the functional requirements. At least, this method brings the first step to statistically control a process.     

Optimal adjustment of a machine tool for improving the geometrical quality of machined parts

The manufacturing industry has to improve the quality of its manufactured products. It is the reason why industry needs tools and methods that make the control of that quality possible. In this paper, we propose a method that allows an optimal adjustment of the machine tools in order to respect at best a set of standard functional requirements applied to a part. The requirements have to use the maximal material requirement defined by ISO standard.The proposed method works out a geometrical model. Interchangeability boundaries enriched with adjustment parameters constitute the basis of the model. Comparison between this geometrical model and a first manufactured part allows us to obtain the variations of adjustment parameters. These variations directly correct the machine tool being certain that the following parts respect at the very best the functional requirements. At least, this method brings the first step to statistically control a process.     

Dependency of the Oxygen Storage Capacity in Zirconia–Ceria Solid Solutions upon Textural Properties

The oxygen storage capacity of Ce_0.2Zr_0.8O₂ solid solutions, prepared by different synthesis routes and aged at 1000°C, is investigated by means of temperature-programmed reduction, total- and dynamic-OSC measurements. The use of CO and H₂ as reducing agent is compared under dynamic conditions. It is observed that the dynamic OSC is critically dependent on sample pre-treatment and the nature of the reducing agent in the texturally unstable sample. In contrast, on a thermally stable Ce_0.2Zr_0.8O₂ only minor effects of the pre-treatment upon dynamic OSC are noticed.