Quantification of character-impact odour compounds of roasted beef

Beef was roasted for 7 min in frying pans made of glass (A) or of stainless steel (B). The lower temperature in A yielded a more roasty-sweet flavour and the higher temperature in B a roasty-harsh, more caramellike flavour. Using stable isotope dilution assays the concentration levels of the odour compounds 4-hydroxy-2,5-dimethyl-3(2H)-furanone (I), 2-acetyl-2-thiazoline (II), 2-ethyl-3,5-dimethylpyrazine (III), 2,3-diethyl-5-methylpyrazine (IV), guaiacol (V) and methional (VI) were determined in samples A and B. The data obtained were divided by the corresponding odour thresholds which were evaluated nasally and retronasally. The results indicated that the flavour differences of A and B were preferentially caused by differences in the concentration levels of odorantsI, II, IV, andVI.

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Quantitative Analyse charakteristischer Geruchsstoffe von gebratenem Rindfleisch

Zusammenfassung Rindfleisch wurde 7 min in Pfannen aus Glas (A) und rostfreiem Stahl (B) gebraten. Die niedrigere Temperatur in A führte zu einem stärker röstig-süßen Aroma und die höhere Temperatur in B zu einem röstig-herben, stärker caramelartigen Aroma. Die Konzentrationen der Geruchsstoffe 4-Hydroxy-2,5-dimethyl-3(2H)-furanon (I), 2-Acetyl-2-thiazolin (II), 2-Ethyl-3,5-dimethyl-pyrazin (III), 2,3-Diethyl-5-methylpyrazin (IV), Guajacol (V) und Methional (VI) wurden in den Proben A und B mit Hilfe von Isotopenverdünnungsanalysen bestimmt. Die erhaltenen Werte wurden dividiert durch die entsprechenden nasal und retronasal ermittelten Geruchsschwellen. Die Ergebnisse zeigten, daß die Aromaunterschiede von A und B in erster Linie auf Unterschiede in den Konzentrationen der GeruchsstoffeI,II, IV undVI beruhen.

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Presented in part at the symposium Flavour Precursors, University of Würzburg, Sept. 30th to Oct. 2nd, 1992     

Variational optical flow computation in real time.

This paper investigates the usefulness of bidirectional multigrid methods for variational optical flow computations. Although these numerical schemes are among the fastest methods for solving equation systems, they are rarely applied in the field of computer vision. We demonstrate how to employ those numerical methods for the treatment of variational optical flow formulations and show that the efficiency of this approach even allows for real-time performance on standard PCs. As a representative for variational optic flow methods, we consider the recently introduced combined local-global method. It can be considered as a noise-robust generalization of the Horn and Schunck technique. We present a decoupled, as well as a coupled, version of the classical Gauss-Seidel solver, and we develop several multgrid implementations based on a discretization coarse grid approximation. In contrast, with standard bidirectional multigrid algorithms, we take advantage of intergrid transfer operators that allow for nondyadic grid hierarchies. As a consequence, no restrictions concerning the image size or the number of traversed levels have to be imposed. In the experimental section, we juxtapose the developed multigrid schemes and demonstrate their superior performance when compared to unidirectional multgrid methods and nonhierachical solvers. For the well-known 316 x 252 Yosemite sequence, we succeeded in computing the complete set of dense flow fields in three quarters of a second on a 3.06-GHz Pentium4 PC. This corresponds to a frame rate of 18 flow fields per second which outperforms the widely-used Gauss-Seidel method by almost three orders of magnitude.     

RTS-MAC: A Relative Time Synchronization MAC Protocol for Low Duty Cycle Body Sensor Networks

Emerging applications in the medical field require body sensor networks to communicate in real-time in a very energy-efficient way. An example is the Artificial Accommodation System??a set of two small active medical implants aiming at restoring accommodation of the human eye??in which sensor data have to be exchanged continuously between both eyes. To achieve energy efficiency, it is essential to operate the radios with a very low duty cycle. Therefore, idle listening and general protocol overhead must be reduced as much as possible. In this paper, we present a relative time synchronization medium access control protocol (RTS-MAC), which keeps relative time synchronization between two or more sensor nodes in a very energy-efficient manner: RTS-MAC makes use of the periodic broadcast of regular data messages and exploits the inter-arrival times to predict future arrivals within tight boundaries. Thereby, no overhead is generated for synchronization purposes, and still, idle listening is reduced to a minimum, which solely depends on the short-term accuracy of the underlying clock systems. We implemented the proposed protocol using off-the-shelf components and employed the internal low-accuracy oscillators of the microcontrollers as clock sources. Thereby, we achieved very low duty cycles close to an ideal minimum. Further, our results indicate that through omitting external crystals in favor of a minimally larger battery, the battery life of a sensor node can be prolonged.     

Monitoring the Channel Formation in Organic Field‐Effect Transistors via Photoinduced Charge Transfer

Conducting channel formation in organic field‐effect transistors (OFETs) is considered to happen in the organic semiconductor layer very close to the interface with the gate dielectric. In the gradual channel approximation, the local density of accumulated charge carriers varies as a result of applied gate bias, with the majority of the charge carriers being localized in the first few semiconductor monolayers close to the dielectric interface. In this report, a new concept is employed which enables the accumulation of charge carriers in the channel by photoinduced charge transfer. An OFET employing C₆₀ as a semiconductor and divinyltetramethyldisiloxane‐bis(benzocyclobutene) as the gate dielectric is modified by a very thin noncontinuous layer of zinc‐phthalocyanine (ZnPc) at the semiconductor/dielectric interface. With this device geometry, it is possible to excite the phthalocyanine selectively and photogenerate charges directly at the semiconductor/dielectric interface via photoinduced electron transfer from ZnPc onto C₆₀. Thus the formation of a gate induced and a photoinduced channel in the same device can be correlated.     

Visualizing the performance loss of solar cells by IR thermography — an evaluation study on CIGS with artificially induced defects

Local electric defects may result in considerable performance losses in solar cells. Infrared (IR) thermography is one important tool to detect these defects on photovoltaic modules. Qualitative interpretation of IR images has been carried out successfully, but quantitative interpretation has been hampered by the lack of “calibration” defects. The aims of this study are to (i) establish methods to induce well‐defined electric defects in thin‐film solar cells serving as “calibration” defects and to (ii) assess the accuracy of IR imaging methods by using these artificially induced defects. This approach paves the way for improving quality control methods based on imaging in photovoltaic. We created ohmic defects (“shunts”) by using a focused ion beam and weak diodes (“interface shunts”) by applying a femto‐second laser at rather low power on copper indium gallium selenide cells. The defects can be induced precisely and reproducibly, and the severity of the defects on the electrical performance can be well adjusted by focused ion beam/laser parameters. The successive assessment of the IR measurement (ILIT‐Voc) revealed that this method can predict the losses in P_mpp (maximal power extractable) with a mean error of below 10%. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Composition Engineering of All‐Inorganic Perovskite Film for Efficient and Operationally Stable Solar Cells

Cesium‐based inorganic perovskites have recently attracted great research focus due to their excellent optoelectronic properties and thermal stability. However, the operational instability of all‐inorganic perovskites is still a main hindrance for the commercialization. Herein, a facile approach is reported to simultaneously enhance both the efficiency and long‐term stability for all‐inorganic CsPbI_2.5Br_0.5 perovskite solar cells via inducing excess lead iodide (PbI₂) into the precursors. Comprehensive film and device characterizations are conducted to study the influences of excess PbI₂ on the crystal quality, passivation effect, charge dynamics, and photovoltaic performance. It is found that excess PbI₂ improves the crystallization process, producing high‐quality CsPbI_2.5Br_0.5 films with enlarged grain sizes, enhanced crystal orientation, and unchanged phase composition. The residual PbI₂ at the grain boundaries also provides a passivation effect, which improves the optoelectronic properties and charge collection property in optimized devices, leading to a power conversion efficiency up to 17.1% with a high open‐circuit voltage of 1.25 V. More importantly, a remarkable long‐term operational stability is also achieved for the optimized CsPbI_2.5Br_0.5 solar cells, with less than 24% degradation drop at the maximum power point under continuous illumination for 420 h.     

A two-stage capacitive-feedback differencing amplifier for temporal contrast IR sensors

This article presents a small-area, ultra low-power, low-mismatch differencing transient amplifier for ROIC pixels of micro-bolometer based temporal contrast IR sensors. The two-stage capacitive-feedback amplifier works in the sub-threshold domain, has a voltage gain of 46 dB, a 3 dB bandwidth of about 10 kHz and consumes 85 nW of static power. The amplifier circuit has been fabricated in a 0.35 μm standard CMOS process and consumes less than 2000 μm² of silicon area, enabling a square pixel size of 50 × 50 μm for the IR sensor array.     

Adaptive Call Admission Control for QoS/Revenue Optimization in CDMA Cellular Networks

In this paper, we show how online management of both quality of service (QoS) and provider revenue can be performed in CDMA cellular networks by adaptive control of system parameters to changing traffic conditions. The key contribution is the introduction of a novel call admission control and bandwidth degradation scheme for real-time traffic as well as the development of a Markov model for the admission controller. This Markov model incorporates important features of 3G cellular networks, such as CDMA intra- and inter-cell interference, different call priorities and soft handover. From the results of the Markov model the threshold for maximal call degradation is periodically adjusted according to the currently measured traffic in the radio access network. As a consequence, QoS and revenue measures can be optimized with respect to a predefined goal. To illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed QoS/revenue management approach, we present quantitative results for the Markov model and a comprehensive simulation study considering a half-day window of a daily usage pattern.