The effects of withholding feed and water on carcass shrinkage and meat quality in beef cattle

Eighty beef crossbred steers with an average weight of 493 kg (4·66 kg SD) were allocated at random to one of five treatments to assess the effects of withholding feed and water on carcass shrinkage and meat quality. The five treatments were: slaughter from the feedlot (T1); and 12, 24, 36 and 48 h periods without feed and water prior to slaughter (T2-5).Weights were taken of the live animal and the carcass to monitor shrinkage along with relevant meat quality measurements. There were no treatment differences (P > 0·05) in initial farm weight, but plant weight shrinkage increased from 31gkg(-1) for T1 to 106 g kg(-1) for T5. Warm carcass weight decreased (P < 0·05) from 278·8 kg for T1, to 270·7 kg for T3 and 261·9 kg for T5. Liver, alimentary tract components, hide and head decreased as a proportion of farm weight as time without feed and water increased. Muscle pH at 6 days post mortem was increased (P < 0·05) in T3-5 compared to T1, with the result that muscle colour became darker, and steaks had less drip loss. Shear values increased (P < 0·05) from 6·3 kg in T1 to 7·7 kg in T4 and T5 indicating an increase in muscle toughness as time without feed and water increased. It was concluded that steers lose live weight rapidly within the first 24 h without feed and water, and that these relatively short periods of time (24 h) can have detrimental effects on carcass shrinkage and muscle quality.     

Enhancement of deep epileptiform activity in the EEG via 3-Dadaptive spatial filtering

The detection of epileptiform discharges (ED's) in the electroencephalogram (EEG) is an important component in the diagnosis of epilepsy. However, when the epileptogenic source is located deep in the brain, the ED's at the scalp are often masked by more superficial, higher-amplitude EEG activity. A noninvasive technique which uses an adaptive "beamformer" spatial filter has been investigated for the enhancement of signals from deep sources in the brain suspected of containing ED's. A forward three-layer spherical model was used to relate a dipolar source to recorded signals to determine the beamformer's spatial response constraints. The beamformer adapts, using the least-mean-squares (LMS) algorithm, to reduce signals from sources distant to some arbitrarily defined location in the brain. The beamformer produces three outputs, being the orthogonal components of the signal estimated to have arisen at or near the assumed location. Simulations were performed by using the same forward model to superimpose realistic ED's on normal EEG recordings. The simulations show the beamformer's ability to enhance signals emanating from deep foci by way of an enhancement ratio (ER), being the improvement in signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) to that observed at any of the scalp electrodes. The performance of the beamformer has been evaluated for 1) the number of scalp electrodes, 2) the recording montage, 3) dependence on the background EEG, 4) dependence on magnitude, depth, and orientation of epileptogenic focus, and 5) sensitivity to inaccuracies in the estimated location of the focus. Results from the simulations show the beamformer's performance to be dependent on the number of electrodes and moderately sensitive to variations in the EEG background. Conversely, its performance appears to be largely independent of the amplitude and morphology of the ED. The dependence studies indicated that the beamformer's performance was moderately dependent on eccentricity with the ER increasing as the dipolar source and the beamformer were moved from the center to the surface of the brain (1.51-2.26 for radial dipoles and 1.17-2.69 for tangential dipoles). The beamformer was also moderately dependent on variations in polar or azimuthal angle for radial and tangential dipoles. Higher ER's tended to be seen for locations between electrode sites. The beamformer was more sensitive to inaccuracies in both polar and azimuthal location than depth of the dipolar source. For polar locations, an ER > 1.0 was achieved when the beamformer was located within +/- 25 degrees of a radial dipole and +/- 35 degrees of a tangential dipole. Similarly, angular ranges of +/- 37.5 degrees and +/- 45 degrees, respectively, for inaccuracies in azimuthal locations. Preliminary results from real EEG records, comprising 12 definite or questionable epileptiform events, from four patients, demonstrated the beamformer's ability to enhance these events by a mean 100% (52%-215%) for referential data and a mean 104% (50%-145%) for bipolar data.     

Metal-organic vapor-phase epitaxial growth of HgCdTe device heterostructures on three-inch-diameter substrates

A new metal-organic vapor-phase epitaxial (MOVPE) reactor-cell design has been developed to grow on 3-in.-diameter substrates. This was required to produce uniform, fully doped heterostructures needed for array producibility and wafer-scale processing compatibility. The reactor has demonstrated epitaxial growth of HgCdTe (MCT) with good morphology onto both GaAs and GaAs on Si wafers. The density of surface-growth defects, typical of MOVPE growth, has been reduced to <5 cm⁻² at a sufficient yield to make the production of low cluster-defect, two-dimensional (2-D) arrays possible. The new horizontal reactor cell uses substrate rotation to achieve improved uniformity and is able to incorporate substrates up to 4-in. diameter. Good compositional and thickness uniformity was achieved on epilayers grown on 3-in.-diameter, low-cost GaAs and GaAs on Si wafers. Sufficient uniformity has been achieved to produce 12 sites of full-TV format 2-D arrays per slice. To yield the benefits of heterostructure design, the MCT epilayers also needed to demonstrate efficient and uniform activation of both arsenic (acceptor) and iodine (donor) dopants. Secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) and Hall assessment showed that the uniformity of As and I doping was ±10%. Fully doped heterostructures have been grown to investigate the device performance in the 3–5 μm and 8–12 μm infrared bands. The 2-D array performance has shown that at 180 K near-background-limited performance (BLIP) diodes have been produced in the 3–5 μm band.     

Free-Space Optical Communications for Next-generation Military Networks

There is a continuing need for increased capacity for military applications, especially in network-centric operational concepts that promote the use of information as fundamental for gaining superiority on the battlefield. As an example, the access to, and distribution of, sensor data is a major tenet of network-centric warfare and yet radio frequency (RF) links will struggle to provide the needed capacity. Free-space optical communications (FSOC) has the potential to meet these emerging military needs by offering dramatic increases in capacity. However, there are many technical challenges al multiple layers of the communications protocol stack. This article describes these challenges and discusses some mitigation approaches to provide a path to realizing this capability on the battlefield     

Deep-space calibration of the WindSat radiometer

The WindSat microwave polarimetric radiometer consists of 22 channels of polarized brightness temperatures operating at five frequencies: 6.8, 10.7, 18.7, 23.8, and 37.0 GHz. The 10.7-, 18.7-, and 37.0-GHz channels are fully polarimetric (vertical/horizontal, /spl plusmn/45/spl deg/ and left-hand and right-hand circularly polarized) to measure the four Stokes radiometric parameters. The principal objective of this Naval Research Laboratory experiment, which flys on the USAF Coriolis satellite, is to provide the proof of concept of the first passive measurement of ocean surface wind vector from space. This paper presents details of the on-orbit absolute radiometric calibration procedure, which was performed during of a series of satellite pitch maneuvers. During these special tests, the satellite pitch was slowly ramped to +45/spl deg/ (and -45/spl deg/), which caused the WindSat conical spinning antenna to view deep space during the forward (or aft portion) of the azimuth scan. When viewing the homogeneous and isotropic brightness of space (2.73 K) through both the main reflector and the cold-load calibration reflector, it is possible to determine the absolute calibration of the individual channels and the relative calibration bias between polarimetric channels. Results demonstrate consistent and stable channel calibrations (with very small brightness biases) that exceed the mission radiometric calibration requirements.     

Solution Processable Monosubstituted Hexa‐Peri‐Hexabenzocoronene Self‐Assembling Dyes

Molecular organization behavior and visible light absorption ability are important factors for organic materials to be used in efficient bulk heterojunction solar cells applications. In this context, a series of monosubstituted fluorenyl hexa‐peri‐hexabenzocoronene (FHBC) are synthesized with the aim to combine the self‐association property of the FHBC unit with broadened light absorption of a small molecule organic dye, bisthienylbenzothiadiazole (TBT). Optical and electrochemical properties of the FHBC compounds vary according to their structures. Introduction of a TBT unit into the FHBC system broadens the absorption. All of the FHBC compounds show strong π–π intermolecular association in solution. X‐ray scattering measurements on thermally extruded filaments and thin films showed ordered alignment of these compounds in the solid state. In atomic force microscopy experiments, nanoscale phase separation is observed in thin films of FHBC and fullerene derivative blends. Solar cell devices with these compounds as donors are fabricated. FHBC compounds with the TBT unit show higher short circuit current while the high open circuit voltages are maintained. With C₆₀ derivative as acceptor, power conversion efficiency of 1.12% is achieved in the unoptimized solar cell devices under simulated solar irradiation. The efficiency was further improved to 1.64% when C₇₀ derivative was used as the acceptor.     

The electron microscopy of post-growth induced defects of ZnSe/GaAs epilayers

A fundamental research of structural defects induced upon post-growth processing of ZnSe/GaAs epilayers grown on (100) GaAs was done by identifying defect-related reflections in the transmission electron diffraction (TED) patterns of ZnSe. Structural artifacts, other than the as-grown defects, on this material system could be excluded according to our results. Four types of abnormal reflections have been observed in addition to primary reflections. These extra reflections are sensitive to the post-growth processing of ZnSe epilayers and may arise from various external effects, rather than epitaxy growth, such as irradiation damage, surface oxidation, and surface contamination. By mapping these reflections at several major zone axes using TED patterns, we found that the reciprocal lattice for a ZnSe crystal with structural defects consists of two distinct types of extra reflections associated with irradiation damage. The first type of extra reflections is ±1/3{111} and the other is ±1/2{111} corresponding to pure-edge and non-edge dislocation loops, respectively. For (100) oriented wafers, the ±1/3{111} and ±1/2{111} reflections were observed only on two of the four possible 〈111〉 variants (i.e. [111]_Zn and [111]_Zn)and this phenomenon was attributed to the anisotropy of defect distribution. Extra reflections associated with surface oxidation and contamination are also observed. The orientation relationships between a surface hexagonal ZnO and a cubic ZnSe film are [0001]_ZnO//[−111]_ZnSe, and [01−11]_ZnO//[011]_ZnSe. The origin, characterization, and elimination of these induced reflections are discussed. With the knowledge about these extra effects on structural defect formation, we have shown the real microstructure of ZnSe epilayers.     

Shear madness: new orthonormal bases and frames using chirpfunctions

The proportional-bandwidth and constant-bandwidth time-frequency signal decompositions of the wavelet, Gabor, and Wilson orthonormal bases have attracted substantial interest for representing nonstationary signals. However, these representations are limited in that they are based on rectangular tessellations of the time-frequency plane. While much effort has gone into methods for designing nice wavelet and window functions for these frameworks, little consideration has been given to methods for constructing orthonormal bases employing nonrectangular time-frequency tilings. The authors take a first step in this direction by deriving two new families of orthonormal bases and frames employing elements that shear, or chirp, in the time-frequency plane, in addition to translate and scale. The new scale-shear fan bases and shift-shear chevron bases are obtained by operating on an existing: wavelet, Gabor (1946), or Wilson basis set with two special unitary warping transformations. In addition to the theoretical benefit of broadening the class of valid time-frequency plane tilings, these new bases could possibly also be useful for representing certain types of signals, such as chirping and dispersed signals     

Efficient computation of time-varying and adaptive filters

Two techniques for efficient computation of filters that support time-varying coefficients are developed. These methods are forms of distributed arithmetic that encode the data, rather than the filter coefficients. The first approach efficiently computes scalar-vector products, with which a digital filter is easily implemented in a transpose-form structure. This method, based on digital coding, supports time-varying coefficients with no additional overhead. Alternatively, distributed-arithmetic schemes that encode the data stream in sliding blocks support efficient direct-form filter computation with time-varying coefficients. A combination of both of these techniques greatly reduces the computation required to implement LMS adaptive filters     

A study of the effect of in situ doping on the crystallinity of LPCVD polysilicon

Results are presented for the degree of crystallinity, determined by Raman spectroscopy, of in situ B-doped LPCVD polysilicon as a function of deposition temperature. The results are compared with those reported in the literature for P-doped polysilicon and it is found that for B doping full crystallinity of the layer is achieved at a significantly lower deposition temperature than is required for P doping. An attempt to understand this effect is made in terms of a quantitative model which allows an estimation of values for silicon self-diffusivity and which is in accord with the experimental observations.