Effect pigments for textile coating: a review of the broad range of advantageous functionalization

The presented review will introduce the use of effect pigments as a powerful tool for the functionalization of textiles. This review starts with a short introduction on the basics of effect pigments and their properties. Subsequently, some principles of effect pigment application onto textiles and the interaction of pigment to binder systems are reported. Different possible functionalizations realized on textiles are presented. Four main types of application are discussed: optical properties, electrical properties, barrier coatings, and antimicrobial applications. Also a view of some prospective anisotropic materials is given. Altogether it is shown that the application of effect pigments can be a powerful tool to realize functional textiles for a broad range of applications in different fields.     

Antimicrobial Effects of Wine: Separating the Role of Polyphenols,pH, Ethanol,and Other Wine Components

Abstract: While the antimicrobial effectiveness of wine is well documented, relative contributions of the wine components to its antimicrobial activity is controversial. To separate the role of wine phenolics, ethanol, and pH from other wine constituents, the antimicrobial effects of intact wine were compared to that of phenols-stripped wine, dealcoholized wine, ethanol, and low pH applied separately and in combination, against 2 common foodborne pathogens, Salmonella enterica serovar Enteritidis and Escherichia coli. All samples were biochemically characterized with respect to their total phenolics and resveratrol content, antioxidant capacity, ethanol content, and pH. Antioxidative activity of the samples corresponded to their total phenolics content. Except for respective controls, pH and ethanol content were similar in all samples. The order of antibacterial activity of the samples was: intact wine > phenols-stripped wine > dealcoholized wine > combination of ethanol and low pH > low pH > ethanol. Separate application of ethanol or low pH showed negligible antibacterial activity while their combination showed synergistic effect. Antibacterial activity of the samples could not be related to their total phenolics and resveratrol content, antioxidant capacity, ethanol content, or pH. Our study indicates that antimicrobial activity of complex solutions such as intact wine cannot be exclusively attributed to its phenolic or nonphenolic constituents, nor can the antimicrobial activity of wine be predicted on the basis of its particular components.     

Identification of solitary-wave solutions as an inverse problem: Application to shapes with oscillatory tails

The propagation of stationary solitary waves on an infinite elastic rod on elastic foundation equation is considered. The asymptotic boundary conditions admit the trivial solution along with the solution of type of solitary wave, which is a bifurcation problem.     

Intelligent modeling with agent‐based fuzzy cognitive map

This article presents an agent‐based fuzzy cognitive map (ABFCM) developed injecting the concept of multi‐agent system (MAS) into the fuzzy cognitive map (FCM). Fuzzy cognitive map is used for qualitative modeling and simulation. Compared to the FCM, the ABFCM enables different inference algorithms in each node enabling simulation of systems with diverse behavior concepts. Each map node can exhibit individual, more or less intelligent, behavior and still can interact with other nodes to conclude on system behavior. Resulting method also enables automatic results interpretation adding additional intelligence to a classic FCM. Explanation of the obtained system architecture with FCM and MAS integration is presented in the article. The experimental results in the article are obtained with the ABFCM prototype, developed on the basis of ABFCM structure given in the article. Multi‐agent technology can bring new properties into existing fields and methods, like in the ABFCM case. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Two‐Colored Pixels

In this paper we show how to use two‐colored pixels as a generic tool for image processing. We apply two‐colored pixels as a basic operator as well as a supporting data structure for several image processing applications. Traditionally, images are represented by a regular grid of square pixels with one constant color each. In the two‐colored pixel representation, we reduce the image resolution and replace blocks of N × N pixels by one square that is split by a (feature) line into two regions with constant colors. We show how the conversion of standard mono‐colored pixel images into two‐colored pixel images can be computed efficiently by applying a hierarchical algorithm along with a CUDA‐based implementation. Two‐colored pixels overcome some of the limitations that classical pixel representations have, and their feature lines provide minimal geometric information about the underlying image region that can be effectively exploited for a number of applications. We show how to use two‐colored pixels as an interactive brush tool, achieving realtime performance for image abstraction and non‐photorealistic filtering. Additionally, we propose a realtime solution for image retargeting, defined as a linear minimization problem on a regular or even adaptive two‐colored pixel image. The concept of two‐colored pixels can be easily extended to a video volume, and we demonstrate this for the example of video retargeting.     

Modeling, identification, and validation of models for predictive ammonia control in a wastewater treatment plant--a case study

The aim of this work is to develop the ammonia models that could be used for model predictive control (MPC) of nitrification process in a wastewater treatment plant. First, a reduced nonlinear model is presented, which is based on expression for nitrification reaction rate in activated sludge model No. 1 and modified for attached biomass processes, while second, a linear black-box model is shown. The data used for model identification were collected during several weeks of experiments on a real plant so that good identification data were obtained. The designed models were validated based on open loop simulations and predictions. Validation results show that the reduced nonlinear model performs better compared to the linear model, however, both models show relatively large errors compared to the real plant data. Hence, a closed loop simulation study was performed to see the differences between the performance of model predictive controller using previously estimated linear and nonlinear models and a standard proportional integral (PI) controller. From the simulation study results it was seen that in spite of relatively large model errors the MPC algorithms give better results in terms of ammonia removal compared to the PI controller, while MPC with the nonlinear model shows additional improvements over the MPC with the linear model.     

Gene Mutation Profiles in Primary Diffuse Large B Cell Lymphoma of Central Nervous System: Next Generation Sequencing Analyses

The existence of a potential primary central nervous system lymphoma-specific genomic signature that differs from the systemic form of diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL) has been suggested, but is still controversial. We investigated 19 patients with primary DLBCL of central nervous system (DLBCL CNS) using the TruSeq Amplicon Cancer Panel (TSACP) for 48 cancer-related genes. Next generation sequencing (NGS) analyses have revealed that over 80% of potentially protein-changing mutations were located in eight genes (CTNNB1, PIK3CA, PTEN, ATM, KRAS, PTPN11, TP53 and JAK3), pointing to the potential role of these genes in lymphomagenesis. TP53 was the only gene harboring mutations in all 19 patients. In addition, the presence of mutated TP53 and ATM genes correlated with a higher total number of mutations in other analyzed genes. Furthermore, the presence of mutated ATM correlated with poorer event-free survival (EFS) (p = 0.036). The presence of the mutated SMO gene correlated with earlier disease relapse (p = 0.023), inferior event-free survival (p = 0.011) and overall survival (OS) (p = 0.017), while mutations in the PTEN gene were associated with inferior OS (p = 0.048). Our findings suggest that the TP53 and ATM genes could be involved in the molecular pathophysiology of primary DLBCL CNS, whereas mutations in the PTEN and SMO genes could affect survival regardless of the initial treatment approach.