Determination of solid fat content (SFC) of binary fat blends and use of these data to predict SFC of selected ternary fat blends containing low-erucic rapeseed oil

Several oils and fats often used for the industrial preparation of European shortenings were blended in binary systems. The equilibrium (after 48 h at 15°C) solid fat contents (SFC; determined by pulsed NMR spectroscopy) were measured and plotted against blend composition. SFC of the blends resulted from the SFC of each fat for the considered temperature as well as the type of interaction existing between those fats (namely, ideal behavior, monotectic interaction, eutectic interaction, and so on). The type of relationship fitted was dependent on the kind of interaction: Linear relationships were found for total compatibility between fats, and polynomial-type (order 2) relationships were found for fats exhibiting incompatibility. Some corresponding ternary oils and fats blends were also prepared and analyzed. Selected relationships (regression equations of the fitted curves) obtained for binary blends were combined in order to calculate the SFC of the corresponding ternary blends. Experimental values were generally close to predicted ones. The representation of SFC as a function of composition is interesting as it allows one to determine rapidly and easily the type of molecular interaction between two fats and also to determine equations that can be combined to calculate easily the SFC of corresponding ternary blends crystallized in the same way with a good accuracy. The texture (hardness) of several binary and ternary blends was also measured. The combination of the results obtained for SFC with the results obtained for the hardness of binary blends allows the prediction of the hardness of a corresponding ternary blend under the same conditions.     

Volatile compounds of original African black and white shea butter from Tchad and Cameroon

Shea butter is used as an edible vegetable fat in many African countries. It can be utilized as a substitute or complete replacement for cocoa butter in various applications and plays an important role in traditional African medicinal practice. Although detection of volatile compounds by solid‐phase micro‐extraction gas‐chromatography mass‐spectroscopy (SPME‐GC‐MS) is a very reliable and reproducible technique, which can be used as an important part of authenticity checking, production monitoring and contamination detection, no published data about volatile compounds of shea butter are available so far. In this investigation, the characteristic volatiles in the headspace of original African shea butter samples were identified by using SPME‐capillary‐GC coupled to a mass selective detector. Almost 100 different volatile components were identified, e.g. fatty acids, saturated and unsaturated aldehydes and ketones, terpenes, and typical Maillard reaction products such as methylfuranes and pyrazines. Furthermore, the samples have been olfactorily evaluated by a panel of professional flavorists and trained analytical chemists. It can be stated that variations in processing conditions of shea butter result in considerable differences in the composition of headspace volatiles, detected by SPME‐GC‐MS and human olfaction.     

Forming an intention to act on recommendations given via online social networks

Online social networks (OSN) are technology-enabled relationship tools in which a user creates a profile, connects to other individuals, and shares user-generated content with them. One of the many features OSN offer is the ability to post messages in the form of product and service recommendations. Although word-of-mouth research has examined this type of personal communication to intentionally influence consumer decisions, limited understanding exists regarding when a user acts upon a recommendation received from one of their contacts. In this study, we draw on relationship theories and research on trust to analyze the impact relationship characteristics and behaviors of the OSN contacts have on trust in the recommendation that subsequently leads a user to act on this OSN contact’s recommendation. The results of a survey of 116 OSN users showed that closeness, excessive posting behavior, and past recommendation experience have a positive impact on trust and intention to act on the recommendation. One characteristic of the relationships, that is, similarity, however, does not affect recommendation trust in the context of OSN. The findings enhance our understanding of relationships and their defining characteristics in OSN. The results also provide insights into how companies might leverage OSN in their marketing efforts.     

,,Location-based Services“ – Personalisierung mobiler Dienste durch Verortung

Zusammenfassung Im Zeitalter der Informationsgesellschaft, so wurde postuliert, spielten r?umliche Distanzen keine Rolle mehr und unsere r?umliche Mobilit?t n?hme ab. Die Mobilit?t in den letzten Jahren, speziell die Freizeitmobilit?t, hat hingegen zugenommen. Die Bereitstellung ortsbezogener Dienste – ,,Location-based Services“ – unterstützt und f?rdert dieses Verhalten.     

The relationship between learning styles and cognitive traits – Getting additional information for improving student modelling

Student modelling is an important process for adaptive virtual learning environments. Student models include a range of information about the learners such as their domain competence, learning style or cognitive traits. To be able to adapt to the learners’ needs in an appropriate way, a reliable student model is necessary, but getting enough information about a learner is quite challenging. Therefore, mechanisms are needed to support the detection process of the required information. In this paper, we investigate the relationship between learning styles, in particular, those pertaining to the Felder–Silverman learning style model and working memory capacity, one of the cognitive traits included in the cognitive trait model. The identified relationship is derived from links between learning styles, cognitive styles, and working memory capacity which are based on studies from the literature. As a result, we demonstrate that learners with high working memory capacity tend to prefer a reflective, intuitive, and sequential learning style whereas learners with low working memory capacity tend to prefer an active, sensing, visual, and global learning style. This interaction can be used to improve the student model. Systems which are able to detect either only cognitive traits or only learning styles retrieve additional information through the identified relationship. Otherwise, for systems that already incorporate learning styles and cognitive traits, the interaction can be used to improve the detection process of both by including the additional information of a learning style into the detection process of cognitive traits and vice versa. This leads to a more reliable student model.     

Insights into the assessment of myocardial perfusion offered by different cardiac imaging modalities

Myocardial perfusion may be very broadly defined as the tightly regulated nutrient delivery to cardiac tissue. The different components of perfusion are myocardial blood flow, oxygen delivery, myocardial oxygen consumption, and myocardial blood volume. Historically, focus has been placed mostly on the assessment of blood flow. In many instances, knowledge of flow without information about these other aspects is inadequate. This review discusses the various cardiac imaging techniques used for the assessment of myocardial perfusion that represent diverse physiologic measures of "perfusion." Their strengths and limitations are discussed as is their relevance to specific clinicopathologic conditions. Significant work still needs to be performed before all the aspects of myocardial perfusion can be precisely measured in human beings.     

Ultra-dense planar metallic nanowire arrays with extremely large anisotropic optical and magnetic properties

A nanofabrication method for the production of ultra-dense planar metallic nanowire arrays scalable to wafer-size is presented. The method is based on an efficient template deposition process to grow diverse metallic nanowire arrays with extreme regularity in only two steps. First, III–V semiconductor substrates are irradiated by a low-energy ion beam at an elevated temperature, forming a highly ordered nanogroove pattern by a “reverse epitaxy” process due to self-assembly of surface vacancies. Second, diverse metallic nanowire arrays (Au, Fe, Ni, Co, FeAl alloy) are fabricated on these III–V templates by deposition at a glancing incidence angle. This method allows for the fabrication of metallic nanowire arrays with periodicities down to 45 nm scaled up to wafer-size fabrication. As typical noble and magnetic metals, the Au and Fe nanowire arrays produced here exhibited large anisotropic optical and magnetic properties, respectively. The excitation of localized surface plasmon resonances (LSPRs) of the Au nanowire arrays resulted in a high electric field enhancement, which was used to detect phthalocyanine (CoPc) in surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS). Furthermore, the Fe nanowire arrays showed a very high in-plane magnetic anisotropy of approximately 412 mT, which may be the largest in-plane magnetic anisotropy field yet reported that is solely induced via shape anisotropy within the plane of a thin film.

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Grundrechtsschutz im Europa des Lissaboner Vertrags

Nachdem als letzter Mitgliedstaat der Europ?ischen Union auch Tschechien im November 2009 den Lissaboner Vertrag ratifiziert hatte, konnte das Vertragswerk¹ zum 01. Dezember 2009 in Kraft treten. Seither sind allerdings die mit der neuen Rechtsgrundlage der Europ?ischen Union verbundenen vielf?ltigen Wirkungen kaum ins Bewusstsein der europ?ischen ?ffentlichkeit gelangt. Sie werden von den globalen Banken- und Wirtschaftsproblemen sowie von der aktuellen Krise der europ?ischen W?hrungsunion überlagert, die die nationalen Politiken der EU-Mitgliedstaaten und die gemeinschaftliche europ:aische Politik vor gro?e Herausforderungen stellen und deren Aufmerksamkeit in hohem Ma?e in Anspruch nehmen. Es mag also noch dauern, bis Europa in absehbarer Zeit und hoffentlich ohne an seinen politischkonstitutiven Fundamenten Schaden zu nehmen die aktuellen Krisen überwunden haben wird. Erst dann dürfte den Bürgerinnen und Bürgern Europas deutlicher werden, dass mit dem Inkrafttreten des Vertrages von Lissabon eine unter mehreren Gesichtspunkten neue Epoche des Europ?ischen Integrationsprozesses begonnen hat. Das gilt nicht nur, aber vor allem für die Innen- und Rechtspolitik — für jene Bereiche europ?ischer Politik also, die die Herstellung des seit 1999 im Amsterdamer Vertrag avisierten „Raumes der Freiheit, der Sicherheit und des Rechts“ zum Ziel haben. Innerhalb dieser im hohen Ma?e grundrechtssensiblen Politikfelder wird die neue Epoche vor allem von erheblichen Ver?nderungen sowohl im materiellen, rechtlichen als auch im institutionellen, gerichtlichen Schutz der Grund- und Freiheitsrechte der europ?ischen Bürgerinnen und Bürger gepr?gt sein.