Histometric study of meat products. A literature review

In the present paper, the literature on the development of methods for histometric monitoring the quality of meats is reviewed. The value of specific techniques, statistical interpretation of results and the practicability of automation of histometric analysis are examined more closely. It is concluded from the study of the literature that histometric examination of meats allows an objective assessment of volume percentages of tissue components. When a distinct difference in contrast between various tissues is achieved by specific staining methods, developments in the field of image analysis systems will allow automation of the quantitative histological examination of meats.     

An instructional study: Improving the inferential comprehension of good and poor fourth-grade readers.

Four classroom teachers provided instruction to improve the inferential comprehension of 40 good and poor 4th-grade readers, as determined by scores on the Stanford Achievement Test. The experimental treatment consisted of 3 parts: (a) making students aware of the importance of drawing inferences between new information and existing knowledge structures; (b) getting students to discuss, prior to reading, something they had done that was similar to the events in the text and to hypothesize what would happen in the text; and (c) providing students with many inferential questions to discuss after reading the selection. Results show that poor readers benefited significantly from the instruction, but good readers did not. This differential effect was attributed to the dissimilar aptitudes of good and poor readers and the dissimilar instructional methods that are used with good and poor readers in schools. Conclusions focus on the positive prospect of modeling successful instructional procedures on theoretical, basic research. (24 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Combining concatenation and formant synthesis for improved intelligibility and naturalness in text-to-speech systems

A general method which combines formant synthesis by rule and time-domain concatenation is proposed. This method utilizes the advantages of both techniques by maintaining naturalness while minimizing difficulties such as prosodic modification and spectral discontinuities at the point of concatenation. An integrated sampled natural glottal source (Matsui et al., 1991) and sampled voiceless consonants were incorporated into a real-time text-to-speech formant synthesizer. In special cases, voicing amplitude envelopes and formant transitions dirived from natural speech were also utilized. Several listening tests were performed to evaluate these methods. We obtained a significant overall improvement in intelligibility over our previous formant synthesizer. Such improvements in intelligibility were previously obtained with a Japanese text-to-speech system using a related hybrid system (Kamai and Matsui, 1993), indicating the applicability of this method for multi-lingual synthesis. The results of subjective analyses showed that these methods can alo improve naturalness and listenability factors.     

A Critical Evaluation of Interlaboratory Data on Total,Elemental, and Isotopic Carbon in the Carbonaceous Particle Reference Material,NIST SRM 1649a

Because of increased interest in the marine and atmospheric sciences in elemental carbon (EC), or black carbon (BC) or soot carbon (SC), and because of the difficulties in analyzing or even defining this pervasive component of particulate carbon, it has become quite important to have appropriate reference materials for intercomparison and quality control. The NIST “urban dust” Standard Reference Material^® SRM 1649a is useful in this respect, in part because it comprises a considerable array of inorganic and organic species, and because it exhibits a large degree of (¹⁴C) isotopic heterogeneity, with biomass carbon source contributions ranging from about 2 % (essentially fossil aliphatic fraction) to about 32 % (polar fraction).A primary purpose of this report is to provide documentation for the new isotopic and chemical particulate carbon data for the most recent (31 Jan. 2001) SRM 1649a Certificate of Analysis. Supporting this is a critical review of underlying international intercomparison data and methodologies, provided by 18 teams of analytical experts from 11 institutions. Key results of the intercomparison are: (1) a new, Certified Value for total carbon (TC) in SRM 1649a; (2) ¹⁴C Reference Values for total carbon and a number of organic species, including for the first time 8 individual PAHs; and (3) elemental carbon (EC) Information Values derived from 13 analytical methods applied to this component. Results for elemental carbon, which comprised a special focus of the intercomparison, were quite diverse, reflecting the confounding of methodological-matrix artifacts, and methods that tended to probe more or less refractory regions of this universal, but ill-defined product of incomplete combustion. Availability of both chemical and ¹⁴C speciation data for SRM 1649a holds great promise for improved analytical insight through comparative analysis (e.g., fossil/biomass partition in EC compared to PAH), and through application of the principle of isotopic mass balance.     

Preparation of methyl malvalate fromSterculia foetida seed oil

Methyl malvalate has been prepared from mixed methyl esters ofSterculia foetida seed oil fatty acids by reversed-phase liquid-liquid partition chromatography, and confirmatory evidence adduced for its structure.     

Stability of wedge and channel flow of highly viscous and elastic liquids

Experiments are reported on the flow of a highly elasticoviscous polymer solution into a slit, in which instability was observed. This instability was manifest as an irregularity in the output along the slit and as an unsteadiness in the extentional flow into the slit. The onset of irregular flow was well-defined, and its intensity increased with flow rate. Similar results were noted for axial flow into a tube. Simplified linearized stability analyses bearing on the observed flow are given briefly in Appendixes 2 and 3. It is concluded that existing theories are inadequate to explain the observed phenomena.     

Application of chemical methods for the assessment of beef quality. IV. Physicochemical and miscellaneous methods

Methods which are used either to assess physicochemical changes during beef spoilage or to measure general effects not necessarily related to the breakdown of protein or fat directly are considered in relation to various criteria discussed in Part I. From the point of view of routine quality control, measurements of the extract-release volume and pH appear to be useful for spoilage assessment, provided that allowance is made for the differing results obtained during the pre-rigor period. From statistical correlations with odour scores most meats were considered acceptable provided that the ERV (extract-release volume, using the standardised method described) was at least 17 ml. The pH of the meat should preferably not exceed about 6.0. The joint use of total volatile nitrogen, free fatty acids, and ERV for deciding upon general acceptability in industrial control is considered.     

The examination of disperse crystalline phases in polyvinyl chloride

The examination by microscopy and X-ray diffraction, of fine crystalline powders embedded in polyvinyl chloride is described. These techniques are applied to an investigation of the stabilising reaction of white lead during thermal degradation of PVC. It is shown that the white lead reacts as a compound, being completely converted to lead chloride by the time hydrogen chloride gas is evolved from the PVC specimen. An unidentified intermediate crystalline phase is also formed. Both this phase and the final lead chloride, nucleate at sites away from the white-lead stabiliser particles, which indicates that lead compounds must have a solubility in hot PVC plastic. During the thermal degradation neither normal lead carbonate nor gas bubbles have been detected. The PVC fabrication processes cause the stabiliser crystallites to take up preferred orientation and this makes microscopic examination of the crystallites easier, but can cause difficulty in identification by X-ray diffraction.