A Procedure for Decomposing the Myoelectric Signal Into Its Constituent Action Potentials?Part I: Technique, Theory, and Implementation

A technique has been developed which enables the decomposition (separation) of a myoelectric signal into its constituent motor unit action potential trains. It consists of a multichannel (via one electrode) myoelectric signal recording procedure, a data compression algorithm, a digital filtering algorithm, and a hybrid visual-computer decomposition scheme. The algorithms have been implemented on a PDP 11/34 computer. Of the four major segments of the technique, the decomposition scheme is by far the most involved. The decomposition algorithm uses a-sophisticated template matching routine and details of the firing statistics of the motor units to identify motor unit action potentials in the myoelectric signal, even when they are super-imposed with other motor unit action potentials. In general, the algorithms of the decomposition scheme do not run automatically. They require input from the human operator to maintain reliability and accuracy during a decomposition.     

Computer Graphics and the Practice of Architecture

By tying together a number of systems to create an integrated design and drafting facility, a large architectural firm enhanced the productivity of its designers and engineers.     

Contribution a l'etude de la pollution par les composes fluores au moyen de filtres statiques et de bioindicateurs

This paper studies the relationship between atmospheric fluoride measurements made with impregnated filters and fluoride contents in plant leaves (grass and poplar).A semi-empirical model was worked out for the calculation of fluoride accumulation in leaves as a function of concentrations in the atmosphere. A simple linear regression with 3 dependent variables adequately describes the relationship between both data sets.The encouraging results obtained with the poplar leaves allow considering these trees as good indicators of fluoride pollution. The grass samples, however, seem affected by non-controllable factors interfering with accumulating conditions which makes the model difficult to apply.     

Investigating the influence of QoS on personal evaluation behaviour in a mobile context

The efficiency of personal video suggestions generated by recommender systems is highly dependent on the quality of the obtained user feedback. This feedback has to reflect the personal interest in the content of the viewed video, to obtain accurate results. However, user feedback might undesirably be influenced by additional aspects such as the loading speed or the quality of the video. To date, this issue has received very little research attention. Therefore, this study investigates the direct influence of audio-visual quality parameters on explicit user feedback for the first time to our knowledge via a mobile, Living Lab experiment. This paper proposes a feedback model which takes the Quality of Service (QoS) parameters of the mobile network into account. This model can be used as an additional feedback filter for video recommendation systems that could help to eliminate the influences of QoS on explicit user feedback.     

‘Can I afford to help?’ How affordances of communication modalities guide bystanders' helping intentions towards harassment on social network sites

When bystanders want to help victims of harassment on social network sites, they can be guided by the affordances of different communication modalities in order to make a communicative choice. Elaborating on the data of a previous experimental study with 453 adolescents, we compared bystanders’ behavioural intentions to help the victim according to their ‘mediacy’ (via communication technologies (CT) or face-to-face) and their ‘privacy’ (in public or in private). Furthermore, we investigated whether the context of the harassing incident (incident severity, identity and behaviour of other bystanders) influenced the ‘mediacy’ and ‘privacy’ of bystanders’ helping intentions. The results showed that in general bystanders had higher behavioural intentions to help the victim in private (vs. in public) and via CT (vs. face-to-face). While incident severity influenced the ‘mediacy’ of bystanders’ helping intentions, the identity and behaviour of other bystanders affected the ‘privacy’ of their helping intentions.     

Clustering web people search results using fuzzy ants

Person name queries often bring up web pages that correspond to individuals sharing the same name. The Web People Search (WePS) task consists of organizing search results for ambiguous person name queries into meaningful clusters, with each cluster referring to one individual. This paper presents a fuzzy ant based clustering approach for this multi-document person name disambiguation problem. The main advantage of fuzzy ant based clustering, a technique inspired by the behavior of ants clustering dead nestmates into piles, is that no specification of the number of output clusters is required. This makes the algorithm very well suited for the Web Person Disambiguation task, where we do not know in advance how many individuals each person name refers to. We compare our results with state-of-the-art partitional and hierarchical clustering approaches (k-means and Agnes) and demonstrate favorable results. This is particularly interesting as the latter involve manual setting of a similarity threshold, or estimating the number of clusters in advance, while the fuzzy ant based clustering algorithm does not.     

The bake hardening behaviour of electro‐galvanized cold rolled CMnSi and CMnAlSi TRIP steels

Cold rolled, intercritically annealed TRIP steels will very likely be used as electrogalvanized sheet steel for passenger safety‐related automotive body parts. This implies that their properties during and after manufacturing, i.e. in the deformed and paint‐baked state, must be known to evaluate their actual in‐service properties. The ageing behaviour of electrogalvanized TRIP steels and the effect of controlled ageing of the complex microstructure by paint baking on the mechanical properties was therefore investigated. Electroplating tests showed that the H uptake during pretreatment and electrogalvanization is limited and that the paintability of the electroplated sheet steel is unaffected even after deformation induced transformation of the austenite. In addition, a strong bake hardening effect was found in the case of the CMnAlSi TRIP steel. Internal friction measurements indicated that a damping peak for interstitial C could be obtained but that the free C content was less than 1 ppm prior to paint baking. A BH mechanism for TRIP steels is proposed.     

Heat and pH stability of prebiotic arabinoxylooligosaccharides,xylooligosaccharides and fructooligosaccharides

The heat and pH stability of prebiotic non-digestible wheat bran-derived arabinoxylooligosaccharides (AXOS), xylooligosaccharides (XOS)-and chicory root inulin-derived fructooligosaccharides (FOS) were compared. Heat stability (at 100 and 121 °C) and shelf-life measurements (at 4 and 37 °C) revealed decomposition at alkaline pH (pH 11.0) for all three preparations tested. The short chain oligosaccharides, XOS and FOS (apparent peak molecular mass of 400 and 800 Da, respectively), were more sensitive to alkaline decomposition than were the longer chain AXOS (apparent peak molecular mass of 1500 Da), the latter being the result of the higher abundancy of reducing ends in short chain oligosaccharide preparations. At pH 2.0 and 3.0, hydrolysis of oligosaccharide linkages took place, with FOS being the most acid-sensitive component.     

The Ariadne Infrastructure for Managing and Storing Metadata

Reusing digital resources for learning has been a goal for several decades, driven by potential time savings and quality enhancements. Although the rapid development of Web-based learning has increased opportunities for reuse significantly, managing learning objects and making them accessible still entails many challenges. This article presents and analyzes the standards-based Ariadne infrastructure for managing learning objects in an open and scalable architecture. The architecture supports the integration of learning objects in multiple, distributed repository networks. The authors capture lessons learned in four architectural patterns.     

Attachment security and temperament in infancy and early childhood: Some conceptual clarifications.

Relations between attachment security and temperament were studied in 6 samples. Ages at temperament assessments ranged from 5 to 42 mo and attachment security was assessed between 12 and 45 mo. Attachment security was assessed using the Waters and Deane Attachment Behavior Q-set. Principal component analyses were used with the temperament data, and scores for the 1st component (Emotional Reactivity) served as correlates of attachment security. Analyses revealed significant associations between temperament and attachment at all ages when mothers completed both instruments, and when Q-sorts were independent from maternal temperament perceptions, temperament and attachment security correlations reached significance for older children. These results may help clarify relations between the domains of attachment and temperament, rather than affirm distinctions between them. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)