A New Method for Comparing Orthonasal and Retronasal Olfaction.

Odors seem to be perceived differently when presented ortho- or retronasally. In this study, stimuli of controlled concentration and duration were applied in either the anterior nasal cavity or epipharynx by means of air-dilution olfactometry. Stimulus concentration was monitored in the olfactory cleft. In Experiment 1, odor thresholds to a food (chocolate) and a nonfood (lavender) odor were lower for orthonasal, compared with retronasal, stimulation. In Experiment 2, intensity ratings to suprathreshold odor concentrations were significantly higher for orthonasal than for retronasal stimulation with hydro- hydrogen sulfide, but not phenyl ethyl alcohol. Accordingly, amplitudes and latencies of olfactory event-related gen potentials to retronasal stimuli were found to be smaller and prolonged, respectively. This indicates differential processing of olfactory stimuli presented through the retronasal or orthonasal routes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Credibility and applicability of virtual reality models in design and construction

In this paper, we present the findings from an extensive study of the use of virtual reality (VR) models in large construction projects. The study includes two parts: The first part presents a quantitative questionnaire designed to investigate how VR models are experienced and assessed by the workforce at a building site. The second part includes a qualitative field survey of how VR models can be applied and accepted by professionals in the design and planning process of a large pelletizing plant. Through mainly studying persons who had little or no experience with advanced information technology (IT), we hoped to reveal the attitudes of the average person working at a construction site rather than of an IT expert. In summary, the study shows that the VR models in both projects have been very useful and well accepted by the users. Today’s information flow is, from a general point of view, considered to be insufficient and the hypothesis is that using VR models in the construction process have the potential to minimize waste of resources and improve the final result.     

Near-wall porosity characteristics of fixed beds packed with wood chips

Packed beds of fuel wood chips are commonly found in thermal conversion processes such as combustion or gasification. Wood chips in particular are mostly used as fuel for small-scale domestic heating boilers but also for commercial-scale combustion units. The characterization of spatial voidage distribution inside the wood chip beds is of great importance for flow and reactor modelling. This study focuses on the radial porosity variations of cylindrical beds of three different types of commercially available wood chips including chips classified as G30 size class. The conventional technique of consolidating packed beds with a resin was chosen as the experimental procedure. The radial voidage distribution in different cylindrical beds is determined by image analysis of sections of the solidified packings. Additionally, a packing of monosized spheres was investigated in order to assess the selected procedure in comparison with widely available literature data for spheres. The results are discussed and summarized in a mathematical expression correlating the radial voidage distribution depending on average wood chip size, packing core porosity and dimensionless distance from the tube wall.     

Performance evaluation of a biotrickling filter degrading mixtures of hydrophobic and hydrophilic compounds

The removal of a mixture of painting solvents from waste air using a biofiltration process was evaluated in this project. The pollutants removed included hydrophobic (aromatic hydrocarbons) and hydrophilic (water soluble ketones and esters) compounds. A trickle bed reactor with a defined immobilized mixed culture on polyethylene Pall rings was utilized in this biodegradation study. The removal efficiencies (RE) of the individual groups of pollutants during loading experiments were determined. An increase of the aromatic hydrocarbons loading resulted in a drop of their RE_AROM with no effect on the RE value of ketones. The overloading of ketones caused a rapid drop in RE_AROM and a small drop in RE_KET. To achieve a restoration of the biocatalyst degradation properties after the increase in loading, an addition of phosphate to the aqueous medium was implemented which successfully restored the removal efficiency.     

Generating stochastic dispersed and periodic clustered textures using a composite hybrid screen.

In electrophotographic printing, a periodic clustered-dot halftone pattern is preferred for a smooth and stable result. In addition, the screen frequency should be high enough to minimize the visibility of the halftone textures and to ensure good detail rendition. However, at these frequencies, the halftone cell may contain too few pixels to provide a sufficient number of distinct gray levels. This will result in contouring and posterization. The traditional solution is to grow the clusters asynchronously within a repeating block of clusters known as a supercell. The growth of each individual cluster is governed by a microscreen. The order in which the clusters grow within the supercell is determined by a macroscreen. Typically, the macroscreen is a recursive pattern due to Bayer. In highlights and shadows, this ordering results in visible artifacts. Replacing the Bayer screen by a stochastic macroscreen eliminates these artifacts, but results in new artifacts. In this paper, we propose a new composite screen architecture that employs multiple microscreens and multiple macroscreens in the highlights and shadows. These screens are jointly designed by using the direct binary search (DBS) algorithm.     

Child negative emotionality and parenting from infancy to preschool: A meta-analytic review.

This meta-analytic review (k = 62 studies; N = 7,613 mother-child dyads) shows that effect sizes for the association between child negative emotionality and parenting were generally small and were moderated by sample and measurement characteristics. The association between more child negative emotionality and less supportive parenting was relatively strong in lower socioeconomic status families, reversed in higher socioeconomic status families, and limited to studies with relatively high percentages of participants from ethnic minorities and studies using parent report to assess negative emotionality. Higher levels of child negative emotionality were associated with more restrictive control in samples with less than 75% 1st-born children, as well as in infants and preschoolers, and in studies using parent report or composite measures to assess both negative emotionality and restrictive parenting. Finally, more child negative emotionality was associated with less inductive control. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

斯芬克司住宅，赫依曾，荷兰

5座斯芬克司住宅的每一栋各容纳了14间为了充分利用地段和阳光而组织起来的公寓。建筑的体量在背向水面的方向被斜切，从而使得从湖岸和公寓所能看到的湖景不被阻隔。当人在从楼里往上走时，公寓的数目逐层递减。结果产生了一种斯芬克司式的轮廓，面向太阳的屋顶退台置于这个神话中的怪兽的脊背上。每个建筑体量的雨篷设计是不同的，从而使其独特的头部产生一种韵律感——从连接新开拓地和现有大陆的stichtse桥上看去的一条激动人心的天际线。     

Societal Safety: Concept,Borders and Dilemmas

In most industrialized countries, the end of the Cold War marked a change in focus from preparedness for war to an increasing focus on civil society's own vulnerability and safety. To meet new threats and changing risks, there is also a need for new analytical concepts. Societal safety is a concept developed in Norway during the last decade. It could be defined as: ‘The society's ability to maintain critical social functions, to protect the life and health of the citizens and to meet the citizens' basic requirements in a variety of stress situations’. It aims to be a systematic approach for understanding, mitigating and responding to social problems such as extraordinary stresses and losses, interferences in complex and mutual dependent systems, or lack of trust in vital social institutions. Future threats to society are not limited to specific sectors or areas, but stem from complex interactions amongst economic, technological, social and cultural factors. Thus, the main challenges to improve societal safety will be the ability to coordinate, organize and assign clear roles to different actors at the international, national and local levels. Societal safety has interfaces with other safety‐related areas such as national security, sustainable development, human security and incident management (handling of isolated accidents, common illness and ordinary criminal acts). Societal safety is, however, a sensitive political issue containing dilemmas and value choices that are hardly possible to perceive or solve as pure scientific problems.     

On the Locus of Speed-Accuracy Trade-Off in Reaction Time: Inferences From the Lateralized Readiness Potential.

Lateralized readiness potentials (LRPs) were used to determine the stage(s) of reaction time (RT) responsible for speed-accuracy trade-offs (SATs). Speeded decisions based on several types of information were examined in 3 experiments, involving, respectively, a line discrimination task, lexical decisions, and an Erikson flanker task. Three levels of SAT were obtained in each experiment by adjusting response deadlines with an adaptive tracking algorithm. Speed stress affected the duration of RT stages both before and after the start of the LRP in all experiments. The latter effect cannot be explained by guessing strategies, by variations in response force, or as an indirect consequence of the pre-LRP effect. Contrary to most models, it suggests that SAT can occur at a late postdecisional stage. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)