A Fully-Differential Complementary Hartley VCO in 0.18 m CMOS Technology

In this letter, a new complementary Hartley (C-Hartley) voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) with fully differential outputs is proposed, in which the self-biasing configuration is introduced to solve the biasing difficulty of a Hartley VCO by employing a five-port transformer. The proposed C-Hartley VCO with the center frequency of 5.6 GHz is implemented in a 1P6M 0.18 $mu$m CMOS process. The measurement result shows that the phase noise is ${-}123.6$ dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset frequency, while dissipating 6.5 mA from 1.6 V supply with the FOM of ${-}188.5$ dBc.      

Background arsenic concentrations in Southeastern Spanish soils

The arsenic content in the province of Granada (SE Spain) was quantified, based on 93 soils at two different depths and their corresponding parent materials. The arsenic concentrations fit a log-normal distribution. Four different statistical procedures to estimate the arsenic background range in the region were tested. Upper background limits clearly exceeded limits reported for natural soils when based on the Tukey box plot or means and standard deviations of the dataset (M+/-2sdev) or of the calculated distribution function (Mf+/-2sigma) but not when based on median values (Md+/-2MAD). The relative cumulative frequency curve not only adequately estimates the background range but also delivers a clear and detailed visualisation of the data distribution and identifies subpopulations with specific background ranges related to combinations of parent materials and degree of soil development.     

Effects of dietary α-linolenic acid on the fatty acid composition, storage stability and sensory characteristics of pork loin

Effects of dietary α-linolenic acid on the fatty acid composition, storage stability and sensory characteristics of cooked pork were studied. Dietary α-linolenic acid (LNA) significantly (p < 0.05) increased the proportion of n−3 fatty acids and the degree of unsaturation in the neutral lipids and phospholipids. The increases in n−3 fatty acids were observed in the total lipids, triglycerides, phosphatidylethanolamine and phosphatidylcholine, and mainly consisted of C18:3n3, C20:5n3 and/or C22:5n3.The thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS) values (mg malondialdehyde per kg meat) of cooked vacuum packaged loins remained below 1.5, but in loose packaged loins TBARS values increased more than 3 times those of 0 time values during 2-day storage at 4 °C. The TBARS values of loins after LNA-enrichment were significantly higher than those of the control in both vacuum and loose packaging, and the increase of unsaturation in fatty acids had a strong prooxidant effect. The increase in dietary LNA enrichment increased oxidation (TBARS values) and had a detrimental effect on the acceptability of cooked pork loins held for 2 days in loose packaging.     

From coffee industry waste materials to skin‐friendly products with improved skin fat levels

Spent coffee grounds (SCG), which are the residue obtained from the treatment of coffee with hot water or steam, can be used for industrial applications, due to the high content in lipids. The cosmetic products might be a suitable application for these types of residues because the barrier properties of the stratum corneum (SC) are largely dependent on the intactness of the lipid lamellae that surrounds the corneocytes. The purpose of this work was to assess the feasibility of using the lipid fraction of SCG extracted with supercritical carbon dioxide in the development of new cosmetic formulations with improved skin lipids (sebum) and hydration. The use of spent coffee lipid extract in cosmetic industry seems to be a suitable approach to recycle the wastes from coffee industry. Emulsion containing 10% of the lipid fraction of SCG (SpentCofOil cream) presented promising characteristics in the improvement of sebum skin levels with a good acceptance by consumers when compared to an emulsion containing 10% w/w of green coffee oil (GreenCofOil cream) and a placebo without coffee oil (NoCofOil cream). Practical applications: In this work, the authors develop and characterize a cream containing 10% of the lipid fraction of SCG extracted with supercritical carbon dioxide with improved skin lipids (sebum) and hydration.     

The ITU-T Software Tool Library

The advancement of speech coding technology has led to new and improved standards. The Telecommunication Standardization Sector of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU-T) has been a leader in developing speech coding standards for telecommunications applications. To increase the efficiency of the coding standard selection process, a group called User's Group on Software Tools (UGST) was established in 1990 to produce a framework of speech coding-related software tools that would allow a common ground for activities across different organizations. Over the years, this group produced a high-quality software tool library (STL), which has been used in the definition of ITU and non-ITU standards, such as G.723.1, G.729, half-rate and enhanced full-rate GSM, among others. However, despite its usefulness, the ITU-T STL is largely unknown outside the telecommunications standards community. This paper introduces the ITU-T STL concepts and functionalities to the wider communications community.     

Static strength analysis of CANDU-6 reactor fuel bundle

A static analysis, finite-element (FE) model was developed to simulate out-reactor fuel–string strength tests with use of the well-known, structural analysis computer code ABAQUS. The FE model takes into account the deflection of fuel elements, and stress and displacement in endplates subjected to hydraulic drag loads. It was adapted to the strength tests performed for CANFLEX 43-element bundles and the existing 37-element bundles. The FE model was found to be in good agreement with experiment results. With use of the FE model, the static behavior of the fuel bundle string, such as load transfer between ring elements, endplate rib effects, hydraulic drag load incurring plastic deformation in fuel string and hydraulic flow rate effects were investigated.     

Targeted reconstruction with differential planar computed tomography

In computed tomography, targeted (or zoomed) reconstruction is usually used to achieve high-resolution reconstruction to a small region-of-interest (ROI). This paper reports a novel targeted reconstruction method based on the recently developed differential planar computed tomography technology. With the central-slice sinogram of scanning a planar object, the primary orientation of the object is first determined for the first projection. Then by identifying the dimensions of the ROI and its offsets to the centre-of-rotation (COR), the targeted reconstruction matrix is defined, which just covers the ROI and follows its initial orientation at the scan start time. By scanning and reconstructing a small planar ROI soldered on a large planar substrate, we demonstrate the advantages of the proposed method over traditional CT, including the smaller reconstruction size and less computation time, high-resolution reconstruction and good-orientated CT image for subsequent de-layering and visualization.     

<Emphasis Type="Italic">Trans</Emphasis> Fatty Acids in Human Milk are an Indicator of Different Maternal Dietary Sources Containing <Emphasis Type="Italic">Trans</Emphasis> Fatty Acids

The trans fatty acid (TFA) patterns in the fats of ruminant meat and dairy products differ from those found in other (processed) fats. We have evaluated different TFA isomers in human breast milk as an indicator of dietary intake of ruminant and dairy fats of different origins. Breast milk samples were collected 1 month postpartum from 310 mothers participating in the KOALA Birth Cohort Study (The Netherlands). The study participants had different lifestyles and consumed different amounts of dairy products. Fatty acid methyl esters were determined by GC-FID and the data were evaluated by principal component analysis (PCA), ANOVA/Post Hoc test and linear regression analysis. The two major principal components were (1) 18:1 trans-isomers and (2) markers of dairy fat including 15:0, 17:0, 11(trans)18:1 and 9(cis),11(trans)18:2 (CLA). Despite similar total TFA values, the 9(trans)18:1/11(trans)18:1-ratio and the 10(trans)18:1/11(trans)18:1-ratio were significantly lower in milk from mothers with high dairy fat intake (40–76 g/day: 0.91 ± 0.48, P < 0.05) compared to low dairy fat intake (0–10 g/day: 1.59 ± 0.48), and lower with strict organic meat and dairy use (>90% organic: 0.92 ± 0.46, P < 0.05) compared to conventional origin of meat and dairy (1.40 ± 0.61). Similar results were obtained for the 10(trans)18:1/11(trans)18:1-ratio. We conclude that both ratios are indicators of different intake of TFA from ruminant and dairy origin relative to other (including industrial) sources.     

Linear-Time Construction of Two-Dimensional Suffix Trees

The two-dimensional suffix tree of a matrix A is a compacted tree that represents all square submatrices of A. We present the first complete version of a deterministic linear-time algorithm to construct the two-dimensional suffix tree by applying a divide-and-conquer approach.