Applying EuroWordNet to Cross-Language Text Retrieval

We discuss ways in which EuroWordNet (EWN) can be used in multilingual information retrieval activities, focusing on two approaches to Cross-Language Text Retrieval that use the EWN database as a large-scale multilingual semantic resource. The first approach indexes documents and queries in terms of the EuroWordNet Inter-Lingual-Index, thus turning term weighting and query/document matching into language-independent tasks. The second describes how the information in the EWN database could be integrated with a corpus-based technique, thus allowing retrieval of domain-specific terms that may not be present in our multilingual database. Our objective is to show the potential of EuroWordNet as a promising alternative to existing approaches to Cross-Language Text Retrieval.     

Review of ECSC research work in ironmaking

The Treaty of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), which expired in 2002, states in its Article 55 to promote technical and economic research with respect to the production and growing application of coal and steel. The results of funded research projects shall be made available to all representatives and partners concerned. For the European steel industry Article 55 was the basis for building up a steel research programme covering topics from raw materials to steel application and instigated a European network of researchers from the steel industry, research institutes and universities. On the basis of these research and development activities carried out by the ECSC steel research, the iron and steel industry has shown important advances in technology and environmental compatibility. Furthermore, the ECSC steel research has contributed to nearly all important technological developments. The main objective of the ECSC steel Research and Technology Development (RTD) programme was to sustain and develop the Community steel industry's competitiveness. The following report describes fundamental developments and activities within the framework of ECSC research with particular respect to hot metal production in the last 15 years.     

Development of a Temporal Extension to Query Travel Behavior Time Paths Using an Object-Oriented GIS

An essential requirement to better understand activity-based travel behavior (ABTB) at the disaggregate level is the development of a spatio-temporal model able to support queries related to activities of individuals or groups of individuals. This paper describes the development and implementation of a temporal extension to a geographic information system (GIS) object-oriented model for the modeling of the time path and the retrieval of its event chaining. In this approach, time path is formulated as a totally time ordered set composed by activity events and trip events, themselves organized into time ordered sets. As sets, the time path and its components can be searched using their respective indexes. A series of methods were built that implement temporal predicates as an interface to temporally query the database. A set of positional operator methods were also designed that transform temporal topological queries into retrieval functions based on set ordering indices. Taken together, the temporal predicates and the positional operator methods define a temporal query extension that meets the retrieval needs of an ABTB database.     

Mapping of polished coal surfaces by automated reflectance microscopy

The capabilities of Rapid Scan, a system of automated reflectance microscopy, has been extended to the actual mapping of petrographic variation across polished coal surfaces. This is accomplished through computer control of a microscope stepping stage and the storage of binary reflectance data on disc in a matrix form which permits the proper spatial arrangement of values to be re-created. The maps depict lithotype variation, and the distribution of mineral occurrences, cracks and cleat. An image processor can be employed in further map analysis such as the compilation of reflectance profiles from selected areas.     

Recent Developments in Drug Delivery to Prolong Allograft Survival in Lung Transplant Patients

Since the discovery of cyclosporine in 1971, calcineurin inhibitors have played a critical role in the therapeutic suppression of the immune response. Patients receiving solid organ transplants rely heavily on these medications to prevent the acute and chronic rejection of allografted tissue. These therapies can prove difficult because of potential toxicity, heightened risk of invasive infection, and erratic oral bioavailability, requiring frequent blood samples for monitoring of systemic levels. Added challenges are presented in immunosuppression of lung transplant patients owing to the increased susceptibility to invasive infection and extensive immune mechanisms inherent in lung tissue. With the introduction of tacrolimus, a more potent calcineurin inhibitor, clinical outcomes of transplants have continued to improve; however, little improvement has been noted in lung transplantation. While very effective upon arrival at the site of action, tacrolimus and cyclosporine present a variety of formulation challenges such as poor solubility, potential systemic toxicity, and extensive first pass metabolism. Initial attempts to improve solubility in both oral and intravenous formulations have resulted in variable drug absorption and increased systemic toxicity, respectfully, creating a need for formulation improvement. Through alternative routes of delivery and novel formulation techniques, researchers have addressed these issues and, in some cases, demonstrated improved clinical outcomes. Through enhanced solubilization, reduction in absorption variability, and more effective drug targeting with reduced systemic levels, improvements in outcomes and overall patient survival in lung and other solid organ transplantation can be expected.     

Experimental analysis of the dynamic noise behavior of a two-stage cylindrical gearbox

There are several objectives in the design phase of gears: Besides a sufficient load capacity and a high efficiency of the gearbox, the acoustic behavior has to be taken into account. For a single-stage gearbox, several research projects have been carried out regarding the improvement of the noise behavior. Because of the mutual interactions between the gear meshes at a multi-stage gearbox, the knowledge at single-stage gearboxes cannot be transferred without restrictions. In this report, experimental investigations are carried out on a two-stage test gearbox. The experimental tests are analyzed by means of the stiffness of the intermediate shaft and the number of teeth of the two gear stages. The noise generation process will be investigated by the measured signals along the machine acoustic noise generation process. First, the excitation behavior of the gear mesh is analyzed by the detected rotational acceleration using angular rotation measurement systems. Subsequently, the transfer path between the gear meshes is determined to evaluate the mutual interactions between source and receiver. Based on the results, a guideline will be provided which stage has to be focused during the design phase.     

Neutron poison distribution in the central reflector to reduce the DLOFC temperature of a Th-LEU fueled OTTO PBMR DPP-400 core

In a previous study using a mixture of thorium and 20 a/o% LEU at 16 gram per fuel sphere heavy metal loading and adjusting the effective fuel enrichment to produce the same amount of cumulative energy per fuel sphere as with the 10 a/o% Low Enriched Uranium (LEU), the maximum Depressurized Loss Of Forced Cooling (DLOFC) temperature was reduced from 2273 to 1925 °C and 1811 °C for a symmetric and asymmetric core, respectively using an once-through-then-out (OTTO) fuelling scheme. This article presents an additional strategy for reducing the maximum DLOFC temperature by placing an optimized distribution of neutron poisons in the central reflector. This strategy produced maximum DLOFC temperatures of 1509 and 1448 °C for the symmetric and the asymmetric cores, respectively. These results are impressive as it means that the less complicated OTTO cycle with its lower capital cost achieved the same cumulative energy produced per fuel sphere than the standard six-pass refuelling scheme and that at substantially lower maximum DLOFC temperatures. Both the addition of the neutron poisons to the central reflector and the creation of a radially asymmetric core resulted in lower burn-ups that had to be reversed by increasing the enrichment of the fuel.     

Optimization of a plate with holes

We consider a simply supported plate with constant thickness, defined on an unknown multiply connected domain. We optimize its shape according to some given performance functional. Our method is of fixed domain type, easy to be implemented, based on a fictitious domain approach and the control variational method. The algorithm that we introduce is of gradient type and performs simultaneous topological and boundary variations. Numerical experiments are also included and show its efficiency.