CMV colitis masquerading as colon cancer--an unusual presentation of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome

To determine whether there is any correlation between sudden decrease in barometric pressure and onset of labor, a non-experimental, retrospective study at a 948-bed tertiary care hospital was done. Pregnant patients of 36 weeks gestation or more who presented with spontaneous onset of labor during the 48 hours surrounding the 12 occurrences of significant drop in barometric pressure in 1992 were included in the study. Significantly more occurrences of onset of labor were identified in the 24 hours after a drop in barometric pressure than were identified in the 24 hours prior to the drop in barometric pressure (P < 0.05). Therefore, the overall number of labor onsets increased in the 24 hours following a significant drop in barometric pressure.     

Large-scale simulation studies in image pattern recognition

Many obstacles to progress in image pattern recognition result from the fact that per-class distributions are often too irregular to be well-approximated by simple analytical functions. Simulation studies offer one way to circumvent these obstacles. We present three closely related studies of machine-printed character recognition that rely on synthetic data generated pseudo-randomly in accordance with an explicit stochastic model of document image degradations. The unusually large scale of experiments - involving several million samples that makes this methodology possible have allowed us to compute sharp estimates of the intrinsic difficulty (Bayes risk) of concrete image recognition problems, as well as the asymptotic accuracy and domain of competency of classifiers     

Evaluation of Monkman-Grant parameters for type 316LN and modified 9Cr-Mo stainless steels

The Monkman-Grant (M-G) and its modified parameters were evaluated for type 316LN and modified 9Cr-Mo stainless steels prepared with minor element variations. Several sets of creep data for the two alloy systems were obtained by constant-load creep tests in 550-650°C temperature range. The M-G parameters,m, m’,C, andC’ were proposed and discussed for the two alloy systems. Them value of the M-G relation was 0.90 in type 316LN steel and 0.84 in modified 9Cr-Mo steel. Them’, value of the modified relation was 0.94 in type 316LN steel and 0.89 in 9Cr-Mo steel. Although creep fracture modes and creep properties between type 316LN and modified 9Cr-Mo steels showed a basic difference, the M-G and its modified relations demonstrated linearity quite well. Them’ of modified relation almost overlapped regardless of the creep testing conditions and chemical variations in the two alloy systems, and the parameterm’ was closer to unity than that of the M-G relation.     

An EM‐based adaptive multiple target tracking filter

Tracking targets of interest is one of the major research areas in radar surveillance systems. We formulate the problem as incomplete data estimation and apply EM to the MAP estimate. The resulting filter has a recursive structure analogous to the Kalman filter. The advantage is that the measurement‐update deals with multiple measurements in parallel and the parameter‐update estimates the system parameters on the fly. Experiments tracking separate targets in parallel show that tracking maintenance ratio of the proposed system is better than that of NNF and RMS position error is smaller than that of PDAF. Also, the system parameters are correctly obtained even from incorrect initial values. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A simple handling technique for mammalian oocytes and embryos during preparation for transmission electron microscopy

Due to their small size, mammalian oocytes and embryos pose unique problems during preparation for transmission electron microscopy. This paper outlines a method which combines protein embedding with centrifugation to locate the specimens on the face of a Beem capsule mould. This method facilitates both the processing of oocytes with minimal loss and rapid location of the specimens within the block for simultaneous sectioning, staining and examination.     

Identify unrepairability to speed-up spare allocation for repairing memories

In this paper, we discuss some strategies for identifying unrepairable memories, and from that to introduce a novel theorem that can make more precise identification. A new algorithm for searching repair solutions is also proposed, which characterizes the rows, and columns of defective memory cells with revised effective coefficients. We have simulated it on many generated example maps, and compared it with the previous algorithms to verify its efficiency. It's combined with those arranged strategies of judging unrepairability to generate a complete flow. The complete algorithm has also been run on many examples with various memory sizes, defect numbers, and distribution types. The simulation results further show that identifying unrepairability in advance can help the reconfiguration procedure run much faster than searching solutions directly.     

Protein binding study of isoflavone, perillyl alcohol and S-ibuprofen by high-performance frontal analysis

High-performance frontal analysis (HPFA) was used for a protein binding study of isoflavones (daidzein, genistin, and genistein), enantiomers of perillyl alcohol and S-ibuprofen to human serum albumin (HSA). The analyses were performed on a Develosil and Inertsil 100-Diol-5 column (10 cm×4.6mm). Sodium phosphate solution (pH 7.4, ionic strength 0.17) was used as the mobile phase at a flow rate of 1 ml/min. To ensure the drug to be eluted as a trapezoidal peak with a plateau, injection volumes were each fixed up the zonal profile with an evident plateau appears. The unbound drug concentration was determined from a plateau height of the plateau region after that experimental data were fitted by Scatchard equation. The binding constants (K) and total binding affinities (nK) of drugs to HSA were calculated, respectively.     

2/spl times/4 optical add-drop module with no difference in propagation length

We developed a micromachined X-type 2/spl times/4 optical add-drop module (OADM) featuring no difference in propagation length. Four pairs of lensed fibers are aligned in "X" position, and four micromirrors are located between the pairs of optical fibers. The OADM was fabricated utilizing a silicon-on-insulator process. Electrostatic comb actuators can be driven up to 90 /spl mu/m to change the light path within 1 ms. The insertion loss and the on-off ratio were less than 3 and 70 dB, respectively. The loss uniformity in every channel was 1.5 dB.     

Effects of surfactant/silica and silica/cerium ratios on the characteristics of mesoporous Ce-MCM-41

Using the surfactant CTMABr (cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide) and cerium(IV) sulfate, mesoporous Ce-MCM-41 molecular sieves were produced under a hydrothermal condition with various surfactant/silica (surfactant/Si) and silica/cerium (Si/Ce) ratios. Changes to the structural traits caused by changing the molar ratios of both surfactant/Si and Si/Ce were investigated. XRD (X-ray diffraction), FT-IR (fourier transform infrared spectroscopy), and SEM (scanning electro microscopy) were used for the characterization of prepared mesoporous samples. Among the tested molar ratios, surfactant/Si ratio of 0.5 and 0.2 showed highest values of d_1 0 0 and intensity, respectively, for the Si-MCM-41. XRD analysis also identified a quintessential hexagonal structure of Ce-MCM-41 for the Si/Ce molar ratio higher than 40 (maintaining the surfactant/Si ratio at 0.2). When cerium content was increased to have the Si/Ce molar ratio of 20, the hexagonal structure of Ce-MCM-41 was collapsed due to the structural stress of substituted cerium. FT-IR results confirmed calcination of Ce-MCM-41 and the incorporation of Ce⁴⁺ ions of cerium sulfate into the silica surface with proper removal of the surfactant. Rod-like shape with rounded edges of the prepared Ce-MCM-41 samples was identified by SEM. These results suggest surfactant/Si ratio of 0.2 and Si/Ce ratio of 40 for the production of Ce-MCM-41 with the highest level of crystallinity.     

Prediction and quality control of the melt index during production of high-density polyethylene

In polyolefin processes the melt index (MI) is the most important control variable indicating product quality. Because of the difficulty in the on-line measurement of MI, a lot of MI estimation and correlation methods have been proposed. In this work a new dynamic MI estimation scheme is developed based on system identification techniques. The empirical MI estimation equation proposed in the present study is derived from the 1 ^st -order dynamic models. Effectiveness of the present estimation scheme was illustrated by numerical simulations based on plant operation data including grade change operations in high density polyethylene (HDPE) processes. From the comparisons with other estimation methods it was found that the proposed estimation scheme showed better performance in MI predictions. The virtual sensor model developed based on the estimation scheme was combined with the virtual on-line analyzer (VOA) to give a quality control system to be implemented in the actual HDPE plant. From the application of the present control system, significant reduction of transition time and the amount of off-spec during grade changes was achieved