Experimentally-induced osteoarthritis in guinea pigs: effect of surgical procedure and dietary intake of vitamin C

The effect of variation in dietary ascorbic acid on surgically induced osteoarthritis was examined in the stifle joints of guniea pigs. Two different surgical procedures were used to induce osteoarthritis in the right stifle joint of these animals. Guinea pigs were maintained either on a high (150 mg/day) or low (2.4 mg/day) dietary intake of vitamin C. Regardless of the surgical procedure used to induce osteoarthritis, the animals maintained on the high level of vitamin C consistently showed severe joint damage than animals on the low level of the vitamin.     

A self-limiting anodic etch-to-voltage (AETV) technique for fabrication of modified read-impatts

The use of modified Read doping profiles in IMPATT diodes has resulted in a dramatic increase in microwave efficiency compared to the standard IMPATT with a constant doping profile. However, the modified Read-IMPATT profile demands a more stringent material control than does the uniform profile to achieve a specific-frequency device. A self-limiting anodization technique is described which is ideally suited for the fabrication of controlled breakdown voltage (i.e. controlled frequency) modified Read-IMPATTs. For any doping profile where the breakdown voltage increases as the anodization proceeds, the process can be made self-limiting by setting the anodization voltage at the desired breakdown voltage.Experimental data are presented which show much improved control in achieving both a specific breakdown voltage device and minimizing the effect of lateral doping profile variations. Data on Read-IMPATTs diodes made from anodized material demonstrate the expected high efficiency microwave performance and are as resistant to microwave tuning induced burnouts as Read-IMPATT diodes made without anodization.The effect of epi-loss mechanisms arising from the interaction of Pt with GaAs during the formation of the device Pt Schottky barrier and/or the thinning by anodization of GaAs in aqueous solutions under zero applied voltage conditions is discussed. Once recognized, allowance can be made in the AETV processing for the voltage shift resulting from these epi-loss mechanisms to minimize these second order effects.     

Computation of steady and time-dependent temperature distribution for building elements: A general three-dimensional solution

A computational method of temperature distribution calculation for building elements in two- and three-dimensional time-dependent heat flow problems is developed with a general approximate solution using, as a numerical approach, the finite difference method. An analytical evaluation method of the accuracy of calculations is developed. The method described was compared with experimental values and good correspondence was obtained. The time-dependent study which is presented includes thermal resistance and inertia (heat capacity) of the components' materials and different geometric compositions.     

Unperturbed dimensions of polyacrylamide in salt-water-methanol mixtures

The unperturbed dimensions of polyacrylamide are determined by light scattering measurements, in methanol-water solutions and correspond to: R_G?=0.39±0.01 M^0.5. This result is compared to that obtained from viscosity measurements in aqueous solution, through Stockmayer-Fixmann method. A possible explanation based upon the recent blob theory of polymers is proposed for the observed differences.     

Comment on "Backward masking as a measure of slow processing in schizophrenia spectrum disorders" by Saccuzzo and Schubert.

D. P. Saccuzzo and D. L. Schubert (see record 1981-28173-001) proposed that schizophrenic individuals have deficient posticonic processes. The deficiency accounts for the observed general slowness in visual information processing. It is argued that a major methodological mistake in the choice of target durations in a backward masking task invalidates Saccuzzo and Schubert's conclusions. (1 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Melt granulation and heat treatment for wax matrix-controlled drug release

The purpose of this study was to evaluate sustained drug release after melt granulation and heat treatment. Theophylline (anhydrous) and phenylpropanolamine hydrochloride (PPA) were used as model drugs. Compritol® 888 ATO (Glyceryl Behenate NF) was incorporated as the wax matrix material. Formulations with drug:wax in 3:1 and 1:1 ratios were evaluated. Tablets were made by dry blending or melt granulation; some of the tablets were heat treated at 80°C for 30 min. Tablets with or without heat treatment were tested for drug release using in vitro drug dissolution. The results showed that melt granulation gave slower drug release than dry blending. Heat treatment further retarded drug release for both dry blending and melt granulation. The drug release rates for theophylline were slower than for PPA at the same wax level and processing method. The drug release profiles were linear using a square root of time scale. In conclusion, melt granulation and heat treatment slowed drug release for the wax matrix-controlled release tablets. Heat treatment of the tablets made by melt granulation further retarded drug release. Heat treatment redistributed the wax, forming a new matrix system with higher tortuosity. The application of melt granulation or heat treatment can successfully retard drug release.     

Personality and mortality risk across the life span: The importance of conscientiousness as a biopsychosocial attribute.

Objective: This study addressed whether personality in childhood and personality in adulthood are independent predictors of mortality risk and the extent to which behavioral and other psychosocial factors can explain observed relationships between personality and mortality risk. Design: This was a prospective longitudinal cohort study of 1,253 male and female Californians over 7 decades (1930-2000). Proportional hazards regressions were the principal analyses. Main Outcome Measures: Mortality risk (in the form of relative hazards) was the primary outcome. Additional tests of mediators and moderators ascertained whether associations between personality and mortality risk remained significant when psychosocial and behavioral variables were statistically controlled. Results: The findings, including a new 14-year additional follow-up in old age, revealed that conscientiousness, measured independently in childhood and adulthood, predicted mortality risk across the full life span. The link from childhood remained robust when adult conscientiousness and certain behavioral variables were controlled. Psychosocial and behavioral variables partly explained the adult conscientiousness-longevity association. Conclusion: The findings demonstrate the utility and complexity of modern personality concepts in understanding health and point to conscientiousness as a key underexplored area for future biopsychosocial studies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Level‐of‐Detail Streaming and Rendering using Bidirectional Sparse Virtual Texture Functions

Bidirectional Texture Functions (BTFs) are among the highest quality material representations available today and thus well suited whenever an exact reproduction of the appearance of a material or complete object is required. In recent years, BTFs have started to find application in various industrial settings and there is also a growing interest in the cultural heritage domain. BTFs are usually measured from real‐world samples and easily consist of tens or hundreds of gigabytes. By using data‐driven compression schemes, such as matrix or tensor factorization, a more compact but still faithful representation can be derived. This way, BTFs can be employed for real‐time rendering of photo‐realistic materials on the GPU. However, scenes containing multiple BTFs or even single objects with high‐resolution BTFs easily exceed available GPU memory on today's consumer graphics cards unless quality is drastically reduced by the compression. In this paper, we propose the Bidirectional Sparse Virtual Texture Function, a hierarchical level‐of‐detail approach for the real‐time rendering of large BTFs that requires only a small amount of GPU memory. More importantly, for larger numbers or higher resolutions, the GPU and CPU memory demand grows only marginally and the GPU workload remains constant. For this, we extend the concept of sparse virtual textures by choosing an appropriate prioritization, finding a trade off between factorization components and spatial resolution. Besides GPU memory, the high demand on bandwidth poses a serious limitation for the deployment of conventional BTFs. We show that our proposed representation can be combined with an additional transmission compression and then be employed for streaming the BTF data to the GPU from from local storage media or over the Internet. In combination with the introduced prioritization this allows for the fast visualization of relevant content in the users field of view and a consecutive progressive refinement.     

Oscillation control in non-linear systems using a first-order filter

In this paper we shall address the oscillation control problems in certain classes of non-linear systems whose outputs are required to follow their inputs. It is assumed that the non-linear systems can be well represented by a set of state-space equations and undergo Hopf bifurcation at some particular value of their parameters or their inputs. A simple first-order output feedback controller is proposed for oscillation control in these non-linear systems. First it is shown that in most cases the first-order controller is effective in locally stabilizing a second-order non-linear system which is undergoing Hopf bifurcation. Then a state separation method based on the solution of the associated Riccati equation is applied to the oscillation control of higher-order non-linear systems and a second-order approximated model is developed for the purpose of designing an oscillation controller. The closed-loop stability of the reduced-order model based design is analysed and some sufficient stability conditions are provided. Finally, a detailed application example of a stepper motor is given to show how the controller design method developed in this paper is applied to practical oscillation control problems.