Off-line quality control for V-process castings

In the present work Taguchi's approach has been applied to the V-process castings of Al-11 per cent Si alloy to acertain the most influential control factors which will provide better and consistent surface finish to the castings regardless of the noise factors present. The control factors of the V-process that may affect the quality of the castings are the molding sand, vibration frequency, vibrating time, degree of vacuum imposed, and pouring temperature. In order to understand how these factors affect the surface roughness of the V-process castings, response surface methodology has been applied, and to obtain the optimal setting of the control factors Taguchi's method has been used. It is found that the pouring temperature has a significant effect on the surface roughness of Al-11 per cent Si alloy castings made by a V-process. Thus the pouring temperature must be kept at the lower level. All other factors are insignificant. Therefore, any setting of the insignificant factors/variables that give the minimum cost can be used.     

Bridging scientist and practitioner perspectives in clinical psychology.

Literature suggests that a complex and often hostile relationship exists between the science and practice of clinical psychology. Contributors to this conflict of viewpoints are reconsidered within the proposition that there are different roads to discovery and that there may be good reasons to keep the science and practice of clinical psychology somewhat separate. Results of a national survey of 325 psychologists are reviewed that support the view that psychological practitioners value research and consider their practices to be augmented by scientific findings. However, they are in need of vehicles of communication that will help them translate scientific findings into practice. Results suggest that practitioners do more to understand scientific findings than scientists do to understand the problems that face clinical practitioners. Ways to facilitate communication between and among these groups are considered. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Ischemic preconditioning prior to myocardial protection with cold blood cardioplegia in coronary surgery

OBJECTIVE: Encouraging results on myocardial preconditioning in experimental models of infarction, stunning or prolonged ischemia raise the question whether preconditioning techniques may enhance conventional cardioplegic protection used for routine coronary surgery. METHODS: A prospective clinical trial was conducted to investigate the effect of additional ischemic normothermic preconditioning prior to cardioplegic arrest applying cold blood cardioplegia in patients scheduled for routine coronary surgery (3 vessel disease, left ventricular ejection fraction > 50%). Two cross clamp periods of 5 min with the hearts beating in sinus rhythm were applied followed by 10 min of reperfusion, each (n = 7, group I). Inducing moderate hypothermia cold blood cardioplegia was delivered antegradely. In control groups, cold intermittent blood cardioplegia (n = 7, group II) was used alone. Coronary sinus effluents were analyzed for release of creatine kinase (CK), CK-MB, lactate, and troponin T at 1, 3, 6, 9, and 12 h. In addition, postoperative catecholamine requirements were monitored. RESULTS: The procedure was tolerated well, and no perioperative myocardial infarction in any of the groups studied occurred. Concentrations of lactate tended to be higher in group I, but this difference was not significant. In addition, no significant differences for concentrations of CK, CK-MB, and troponin T were found. Following ischemic preconditioning an increased dosage of dopamine was required within the first 12 h postoperatively (group I: 2.63 +/- 1.44 microg/kg/min, group II: 0.89 +/- 1.06 microg/kg/min). CONCLUSIONS: Combining ischemic preconditioning and cardioplegic protection with cold blood cardioplegia does not appear to ameliorate myocardial protection when compared to cardioplegic protection applying cold blood cardioplegia alone. Inversely, contractile function seemed to be impaired when applying this protocol of ischemic preconditioning.     

Expression of INK4 inhibitors of cyclin D-dependent kinases during mouse brain development

In situ hybridization of mouse embryo sections demonstrated expression of mRNAs encoding two polypeptide inhibitors (p18INK4c and p19INK4d) of cyclin D-dependent kinase (CDK) 4 and CDK6 in the central nervous system. No expression of two other INK4 members, p16INK4a and p15INK4b, was observed. The p19INK4d and p18INK4c proteins formed complexes with either CDK4 or CDK6 in a temporal pattern consistent with the results of in situ hybridization. Expression of INK4c was observed at embryonic day 13.5 in neuroepithelial zones of the developing brain, being restricted to dividing neuroblasts but absent from differentiating postmitotic neurons. In the neocortex, p18INK4c was expressed precisely at those developmental stages when neuroblasts switch from a symmetric to an asymmetric pattern of cell division with concomitant increases in their G1 interval. INK4d RNA was detected from embryonic day 11.5 onward, at higher levels than INK4c and with a distinctly different spatial and temporal pattern. Marked INK4d expression was seen in dorsal root ganglia, spinal cord, and focally throughout the brain, but primarily in postmitotic neurons. Neural expression of INK4d continued postnatally into adulthood in postmitotic cells of the dentate gyrus, the pyramidal layer of the hippocampus, and in discrete regions of the cerebral cortex, cerebellum, thalamus, and brainstem. Downregulation of p19INK4d in the dentate gyrus after kainic acid-induced seizures indicated that its expression could also be modified in nondividing cells by excitotoxic stress. Therefore, p19INK4d may contribute to maintaining the quiescent state, acting as a buffer to prevent reactivation of cyclin D-dependent kinases in terminally differentiated cells.     

Experiments of Fast Learning with High Order Boltzmann Machines

This work reports the results obtained with the application of High Order Boltzmann Machines without hidden units to construct classifiers for some problems that represent different learning paradigms. The Boltzmann Machine weight updating algorithm remains the same even when some of the units can take values in a discrete set or in a continuous interval. The absence of hidden units and the restriction to classification problems allows for the estimation of the connection statistics, without the computational cost involved in the application of simulated annealing. In this setting, the learning process can be sped up several orders of magnitude with no appreciable loss of quality of the results obtained.     

Topographical Properties of Generic Images

Topographical curves in images are defined by certain extremality conditions involving the gradient of the greyvalue function. Curves extracted by some edge operators and watersheds studied in geography are both examples of such topographical curves.In the first part of this article we list the possible geometrical features of certain topographical curves—such as intersection points, singular points, endpoints, curvature extrema and inflections—for generic images and for generic 1-parameter families of, linearly or non-linearly, diffused images (intuitively, generic phenomena arise with probability 1).In a second experimental part the same topographical curves are computed in discrete images and in Gaussian blurred families of images. It turns out that the geometrical features of the smooth classification also figure in these discrete approximations. The consequences of these results for edge-linking algorithms are briefly discussed.     

Studies on Cercariae from Kuwait Bay. X. Description and surface topography of Cercaria kuwaitae X sp. n. (Digenea: Renicolidae)

A new renicolid cercaria, Cercaria kuwaitae X sp. n., from the prosobranch gastropod Cerithium scabridum from Kuwait Bay is described. The new cercaria is nonstyleted gymnocephalous with voluminous Y-shaped excretory vesicle, flame cell formula 2[(3 + 3 + 3) + (3 + 3 + 3)] = 36, and without caudal fins. Surface topography of the new cercaria is studied by scanning electron microscopy. Domed papillae are abundant on the anterior and lateral aspects of the body, ciliated papillae are sparse dorsally. The ventral sucker bears nine domed papillae. Domed papillae form two circles around the oral sucker with three circles of spines in between. This is the first renicolid cercaria to be recorded in a gastropod from the Arabian Gulf region.     

Electrophysiologic and electrocardiographic aspects of the transplanted heart

The authors suggest that academic institutions build business-oriented policies and practices into the development of any nurse-run clinic to set the stage for financial independence when special or development funding ends. One university-affiliated program that provides 4,000 to 5,000 annual visits drastically changed its strategies when threatened with closure after free rent and other subsidies were withdrawn. The growing emphasis on ambulatory care roles for nurses at all levels makes such clinics critical to the success of the broad-based curricula of nursing education programs, as well as the clinic's value to communities they serve. Funding difficulties frequently threaten the existence of such nurse-run clinics once the initial grant funding is no longer available. This has caused a new emphasis on running such clinics in a business-wise manner. Among the strategies initiated were: direct full-pay at the time of service; a realistic business management plan; aggressive planned marketing; contracts and agreements with other agencies; obtaining provider status with selected HMOs.