Ice sheet survey over Antarctica using satellite altimetry: ERS-2, Envisat,SARAL/AltiKa,the key importance of continuous observations along the same repeat orbit

From September 2002 to October 2010, the Envisat radar altimeter surveyed Greenland and Antarctica ice sheets on a 35 day repeat orbit, providing a unique data set for ice sheet mass balance studies. Up to 85 repeat cycles are available and the whole Envisat data set may be along-track processed in order to provide height variability and trend with a good spatial resolution for the objectives of ice sheet survey.

Soon, a joint Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales/Indian Space Research Organisation mission, SARAL (Satellite with Argos and AltiKa), with the AltiKa payload on board, will be launched on exactly the same orbit (less than 1 km of the nomimal orbit in the across-track direction). This will allow an extension of previous European Remote Sensing (ERS) satellite, ERS-1 and ERS-2, and Envisat missions of the European Space Agency (ESA), in particular from the point of view of ice altimetry. However, AltiKa operates in the Ka band (36.8 GHz), a higher frequency than the classical Ku band (13.6 GHz), leading to important modifications and potential improvements in the interactions between radar wave and snow-pack.

In this paper, a synthesis is presented of all available information relevant to ice altimetry scientific purposes as derived from the Envisat mission: mean and temporal derivatives of the height ? but also of the backscatter and of the two waveform parameters ? snow-pack change corrections, across-track surface slope at 1 km scale, etc. The spatial and temporal variability of ice sheet surface elevation is investigated with the help of the high-resolution Envisat along-track observations. We show that at least 50 repeat cycles are needed to reach the required accuracy for the elevation trend. It is thus advocated as potentially highly beneficial for SARAL/AltiKa as a follow-on mission. Moreover, the novel characteristics of SARAL/AltiKa are promising in improving our understanding of snow penetration impact.     

A simple method for the objective characterisation of fabric softness. Part 1: Influence of bleaching,dyeing and crosslinking of wool*

A simple method for the characterisation of fabric softness using a conventional tensile tester and a special measurement device has been developed. The method is demonstrated to be especially useful in detecting changes in softness of a given substrate due to different treatments. The results obtained, particularly hysteresis at 75% of the maximum extension, provide a good correlation with subjective ranking for samples that are subjectively distinguishable; they also differentiate well between samples which seem subjectively indistinguishable. Screening tests were carried out, mainly on wool fabrics, to find the effect of different treatments such as oxidative (alkaline and acidic) and reductive (Blankit IN) bleaching, dyeing with acid and a 1:2 metal complex, chrome and (mono and bi)reactive dyes, the effect of the antisetting agent Basolan AS (BASF) and of crosslinking with Irgasol HTW (CGY) on fabric softness.     

Compatibilisation of PPE/SAN blends by triblock terpolymers: Correlation between block terpolymer composition, morphology and properties

Immiscible blends of poly(2,6-dimethyl-1,4-phenylene ether) (PPE) and poly(styrene-co-acrylonitrile) (SAN) with a weight composition of 60/40 were compatibilised by polystyrene-block-polybutadiene-block-poly(methyl methacrylate) triblock terpolymers (SBM) using a two-stage melt-processing approach. In order to investigate the influence of the SBM composition on the compatibilisation efficiency, the block lengths of the triblock terpolymers were systematically varied. The resulting morphological features of the blend systems as function of SBM composition and processing parameters are correlated with the resulting thermal and thermo-mechanical properties. In the ideal case, SBM should be located at the interface as PS is miscible with PPE while PMMA is miscible with SAN. The elastomeric middle block as an immiscible component should remain at the interface. This particular morphological arrangement is known as the ‘raspberry morphology’. A detailed TEM analysis of the blend morphologies following initial extrusion-compounding revealed a high compatibilisation efficiency of the SBM types with equal lengths of the end blocks and, furthermore, the desired raspberry morphology was achieved. In contrast, high PS contents in comparison to the other blocks led to a pronounced micelle formation in the PPE phase. Further evaluation of the blend structures following injection-moulding indicated that the morphologies remain relatively stable during this second melt-processing step. A detailed thermal analysis of all blend systems supports the interpretation of the observed morphological features. The fundamental correlation between SBM composition and blend morphology established in this study opens the door for the controlled development of interfacial properties of such compatibilised PPE/SAN blends during melt-processing.     

Recovery of Phosphoric Acid from Spent Petrochemical Catalysts

Petrochemical catalysts are widely used in the industry. For the production of cumene, zeolite-based catalysts containing phosphoric acid are applied. Over the time, coking deactivates the surface, and the catalyst has to be exchanged and disposed of. Different process approaches for recycling the phosphoric acid-containing catalysts were investigated. Related preliminary investigations have shown that calcination of the used catalyst is necessary prior to reprocessing. By digesting the catalyst with hydrofluoric acid, ∼96 % phosphate was recovered. However, this process is very costly in terms of process technology. More promising is digestion by basic or acidic routes. Several options are possible here, and digestion with H₃PO₄ proved to be particularly suitable. Here, phosphate yields reached up to 98.8 %, with a positive balance of economic efficiency at the same time. The catalyst can be produced and recycled in the same plant with the same reagents, what constitutes a major breakthrough towards sustainability in industrial catalysis.     

Solving linear generalized Nash equilibrium problems numerically

This paper considers the numerical solution of linear generalized Nash equilibrium problems (LGNEPs). Since many methods for nonlinear problems require the nonsingularity of some second-order derivative, standard convergence conditions are not satisfied in our linear case. We provide new convergence criteria for a potential reduction algorithm (PRA) that allow its application to LGNEPs. Furthermore, we discuss a projected subgradient method (PSM) and a penalty method that exploit some known Nikaido–Isoda function-based constrained and unconstrained optimization reformulations of the LGNEP. Moreover, it is shown that normalized Nash equilibria of an LGNEP can be obtained by solving a single linear program. All proposed algorithms are tested on randomly generated instances of economic market models that are introduced and analysed in this paper and that lead to LGNEPs with shared and with non-shared constraints. It is shown that these problems have some favourable properties that can be exploited to obtain their solutions. With the PRA and in particular with the PSM we are able to compute solutions with satisfying precision even for problems with up 10,000 variables.     

Assessment of crowdsourcing and gamification loss in user-assisted object segmentation

There has been a growing interest in applying human computation – particularly crowdsourcing techniques – to assist in the solution of multimedia, image processing, and computer vision problems which are still too difficult to solve using fully automatic algorithms, and yet relatively easy for humans. In this paper we focus on a specific problem – object segmentation within color images – and compare different solutions which combine color image segmentation algorithms with human efforts, either in the form of an explicit interactive segmentation task or through an implicit collection of valuable human traces with a game. We use Click’n’Cut, a friendly, web-based, interactive segmentation tool that allows segmentation tasks to be assigned to many users, and Ask’nSeek, a game with a purpose designed for object detection and segmentation. The two main contributions of this paper are: (i) We use the results of Click’n’Cut campaigns with different groups of users to examine and quantify the crowdsourcing loss incurred when an interactive segmentation task is assigned to paid crowd-workers, comparing their results to the ones obtained when computer vision experts are asked to perform the same tasks. (ii) Since interactive segmentation tasks are inherently tedious and prone to fatigue, we compare the quality of the results obtained with Click’n’Cut with the ones obtained using a (fun, interactive, and potentially less tedious) game designed for the same purpose. We call this contribution the assessment of the gamification loss, since it refers to how much quality of segmentation results may be lost when we switch to a game-based approach to the same task. We demonstrate that the crowdsourcing loss is significant when using all the data points from workers, but decreases substantially (and becomes comparable to the quality of expert users performing similar tasks) after performing a modest amount of data analysis and filtering out of users whose data are clearly not useful. We also show that – on the other hand – the gamification loss is significantly more severe: the quality of the results drops roughly by half when switching from a focused (yet tedious) task to a more fun and relaxed game environment.     

Confirmation Bias in Online Searches: Impacts of Selective Exposure Before an Election on Political Attitude Strength and Shifts

Impacts of Internet use on political information seeking and subsequent processes have been subject to much debate. A 2‐session online field study presented online search results on political topics to examine selective exposure and its attitudinal impacts. Session 1 captured attitudes, including their accessibility. Session 2 tracked what online search results participants selected and how long they read them; participants then reported attitudes again. The study represented a 4x8x2x2 within‐subjects design: 4 topics, 8 browsing intervals each, with articles presenting opposing stances, with low versus high source credibility. Attitude‐consistent messages and messages from high‐credibility sources were preferred. Exposure to attitude‐consistent search results increased attitude accessibility and reinforced attitudes, whereas exposure to attitude‐discrepant content had opposite effects, regardless of messages' source credibility.