Predictive Validity of an Empirical Approach for Selecting Promising Message Topics: A Randomized‐Controlled Study

Several message topic selection approaches propose that messages based on beliefs pretested and found to be more strongly associated with intentions will be more effective in changing population intentions and behaviors when used in a campaign. This study aimed to validate the underlying causal assumption of these approaches which rely on cross‐sectional belief–intention associations. We experimentally tested whether messages addressing promising themes as identified by the above criterion were more persuasive than messages addressing less promising themes. Contrary to expectations, all messages increased intentions. Interestingly, mediation analyses showed that while messages deemed promising affected intentions through changes in targeted promising beliefs, messages deemed less promising also achieved persuasion by influencing nontargeted promising beliefs. Implications for message topic selection are discussed.     

CRSM: a practical crowdsourcing-based road surface monitoring system

Detecting road potholes and road roughness levels is key to road condition monitoring, which impacts transport safety and driving comfort. We propose a crowdsourcing-based road surface monitoring system, simply called CRSM. CRSM can effectively detect road potholes and evaluate road roughness levels using hardware modules mounted on distributed vehicles. These modules use low-end accelerometers and GPS devices to obtain vibration patterns, locations, and vehicle velocities. Considering the high cost of onboard storage and wireless transmission, a novel light-weight data mining algorithm is proposed to detect road surface events and transmit potential pothole information to a central server. The central server gathers reports from multiple vehicles, and makes a comprehensive evaluation on road surface quality. We have implemented a product-quality system, and have deployed it on 100 taxies in the Shenzhen urban area. The results show that CRSM can detect road potholes with 90 % accuracy, with nearly zero false alarms. CRSM can also evaluate road roughness levels correctly, even with some interferences from small bumps or potholes.     

Distributed probabilistic routing for sensor network lifetime optimization

A probabilistic and distributed routing approach for multi-hop sensor network lifetime optimization is presented in this paper. In particular, each sensor self-adjusts their routing probabilities locally to their forwarders based on its neighborhood knowledge, while aiming at optimizing the overall network lifetime (defined as the elapsed time before the first node runs out of energy). The theoretical feasibility and a practical routing algorithm are presented. Specifically, a sufficient distributed condition regarding the neighborhood state for distributed probabilistic routing to achieve the optimal network lifetime is presented theoretically. Based on it, a distributed adaptive probabilistic routing (DAPR) algorithm, which considered both the transmission scheduling and the routing probability evolvement is developed. We prove quantitatively that DAPR could lead the routing probabilities of the distributed sensors to converge to an optimal state which optimizes the network lifetime. Further, when network dynamics happen, such as topology changes, DAPR can adjust the routing probabilities quickly to converge to a new state for optimizing the remained network lifetime. We presented the convergence speed of DAPR. Extensive simulations verified its convergence and near-optimal properties. The results also showed its quick adaptation to both the network topology and data rate dynamics.     

Effects of the lateral ordering of self-assembled SiGe nanoislands grown on strained Si<Subscript>1 − <Emphasis Type="Italic">x</Emphasis></Subscript>Ge<Subscript><Emphasis Type="Italic">x</Emphasis></Subscript> buffer layers

Atomic-force microscopy, micro-Raman spectroscopy, and high resolution X-ray diffraction are applied to study the spatial ordering in single layers of SiGe nanoislands grown on a strained Si_{1 − x} Ge _x buffer sublayer. It is shown that, apart from stimulating the spatial ordering of nanoislands, the introduction of a Si_{1 − x} Ge _x sublayer leads to an enhanced role for interdiffusion processes. An unusually high increase in the volume of nanoislands in the process of the epitaxy is related to the anomalously strong diffusion from the buffer sublayer into the islands that is induced by nonuniform fields of elastic strains. The anisotropy of the islands shape and spatial ordering is discussed in terms of the anisotropy of the diffusion processes in spatially nonuniform fields of elastic strains.     

Static and dynamic photoinduced magnetic effects in yttrium-iron garnet lightly doped with barium ions

In yttrium-iron garnet lightly doped with barium, direct measurements of the photoinduced changes in magnetostrictive strains disagree with those in magnetostriction constants at 78–100 K. This is attributed to a considerable photoinduced modification of the initial state in this sample due to a redistribution of the charge (during illumination) between cations of the ferromagnetic octahedral sublattice. In the same sample, the temperature dependence of the photoinduced disaccomodation of magnetic permeability characterizing the initial demagnetized state is measured and calculated. A change in the electron mechanism of the phenomenon during the transition to room temperature is shown. The conclusion about the promising prospects for using such samples for remagnetization by light is advanced.     

Computer-aided lesion diagnosis in automated 3-D breast ultrasound using coronal spiculation

A computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) system for the classification of lesions as malignant or benign in automated 3-D breast ultrasound (ABUS) images, is presented. Lesions are automatically segmented when a seed point is provided, using dynamic programming in combination with a spiral scanning technique. A novel aspect of ABUS imaging is the presence of spiculation patterns in coronal planes perpendicular to the transducer. Spiculation patterns are characteristic for malignant lesions. Therefore, we compute spiculation features and combine them with features related to echotexture, echogenicity, shape, posterior acoustic behavior and margins. Classification experiments were performed using a support vector machine classifier and evaluation was done with leave-one-patient-out cross-validation. Receiver operator characteristic (ROC) analysis was used to determine performance of the system on a dataset of 201 lesions. We found that spiculation was among the most discriminative features. Using all features, the area under the ROC curve (A(z)) was 0.93, which was significantly higher than the performance without spiculation features (A(z)=0.90, p=0.02). On a subset of 88 cases, classification performance of CAD (A(z)=0.90) was comparable to the average performance of 10 readers (A(z)=0.87).     

Effect of parameters of Ge(Si)/Si(001) self-assembled islands on their electroluminescence at room temperature

The electroluminescence (EL) of multilayered p-i-n structures with the self-assembled Ge(Si)/Si(001) islands are investigated. It is found that the structures with islands grown at 600°C have the highest intensity of the electroluminescence signal at room temperature in the wavelength range of 1.3–1.55 μm. The annealing of structures with the Ge(Si) islands leads to an increase in the EL-signal intensity at low temperatures and hampers the temperature stability of this signal, which is related to the additional Si diffusion into islands during annealing. The found considerable increase in the electroluminescence-signal intensity with the thickness of the separating Si layer is associated with a decrease in the elastic stresses in the structure with an increase in this layer’s thickness. The highest EL quantum efficiency in the wavelength range of 1.3–1.55 μm obtained in investigated structures amounted to 0.01% at room temperature.     

Nonlinear Modeling of the Dynamic Effects of Infused Insulin on Glucose: Comparison of Compartmental With Volterra Models

This paper presents the results of a computational study that compares simulated compartmental (differential equation) and Volterra models of the dynamic effects of insulin on blood glucose concentration in humans. In the first approach, we employ the widely accepted ldquominimal modelrdquo and an augmented form of it, which incorporates the effect of insulin secretion by the pancreas, in order to represent the actual closed-loop operating conditions of the system, and in the second modeling approach, we employ the general class of Volterra-type models that are estimated from input-output data. We demonstrate both the equivalence between the two approaches analytically and the feasibility of obtaining accurate Volterra models from insulin-glucose data generated from the compartmental models. The results corroborate the proposition that it may be preferable to obtain data-driven (i.e., inductive) models in a more general and realistic operating context, without resorting to the restrictive prior assumptions and simplifications regarding model structure and/or experimental protocols (e.g., glucose tolerance tests) that are necessary for the compartmental models proposed previously. These prior assumptions may lead to results that are improperly constrained or biased by preconceived (and possibly erroneous) notions-a risk that is avoided when we let the data guide the inductive selection of the appropriate model within the general class of Volterra-type models, as our simulation results suggest.