Differently sized native milk fat globules separated by microfiltration: fatty acid composition of the milk fat globule membrane and triglyceride core

The aim of this study was to characterize the fatty acid composition of the core and membrane of differently sized milk fat globules separated by microfiltration, which can now be used to manufacture dairy products. Native milk fat globules of various mean diameters, ranging from d₄₃ = 2.3 µm to 8.0 µm, were obtained using microfiltration of raw whole milk. After milk fat globule washing, the milk fat globule membrane (MFGM) and the triglyceride core (TC) were separated by manual churning. After total lipid extraction from each fraction, their fatty acid composition was characterized using methyl ester analysis by gas chromatography. Regardless of season, no significant differences were observed in the fatty acid composition of the MFGM phospholipids. Conversely, significant differences were found in the fatty acid composition of TC; particularly, small fat globule TC contained more medium‐chain fatty acids and less stearic acid than large fat globule TC. These results show that the previously observed differences in total fatty acid composition among differently sized milk fat globules are due to their triglyceride composition and MFGM amount rather than to the composition of the MFGM.     

Measuring Cognitive Load Using Linguistic Features: Implications for Usability Evaluation and Adaptive Interaction Design

An intelligent adaptable system, aware of a user’s experienced cognitive load, may help improve performance in complex, time-critical situations by dynamically deploying more appropriate output strategies to reduce cognitive load. However, measuring a user’s cognitive load robustly, in real-time is not a trivial task. Many research studies have attempted to assess users’ cognitive load using different measurements, but these are often unsuitable for deployment in real-life applications due to high intrusiveness. Relatively novel linguistic behavioral features as potential indices of user’s cognitive load is proposed. These features may be collected implicitly and nonintrusively supporting real-time assessment of users’ cognitive load and accordingly allowing adaptive usability evaluation and interaction. Results from a laboratory experiment show significantly different linguistic patterns under different task complexities and cognitive load levels. Implications of the research for adaptive interaction are also discussed, that is, how the cognitive load measurement-based approach could be used for user interface evaluation and interaction design improvement.     

Influence of the preparation conditions on the properties of gold catalysts for the oxidation of glucose

In this work, two deposition–precipitation methods for the preparation of gold catalysts for glucose oxidation were investigated. Thus far, gold colloids immobilized on carbon have been used for catalytic glucose oxidation, but the long-term stability of these systems was not sufficient. To improve the long-term stability we used the deposition–precipitation methods using NaOH (DP NaOH) or urea (DP urea) as precipitation agents as they were described by Haruta and Dekkers, respectively, using alumina as a support material. With these methods, it was possible to prepare highly active and selective catalysts which showed an excellent long-term stability. DP urea was found to be the preferred method, because in contrast to DP NaOH, no losses of gold occurred during the preparation, and it was possible to adjust various gold contents up to 10 wt% Au.     

Detection and evaluation of the fibers' deposition parameters during wet filament winding

Wet filament winding technology has been extensively used for the manufacture of rotationally symmetric parts made of fiber-reinforced plastics (FRP). As the design and modeling of FRP-parts require numerous assumptions, deviations between calculated and achieved mechanical properties are expected. One aspect that contributes to this discrepancy is the assumption of a homogeneous rectangular cross-section of the fiber-band. In this work, the fiber-band geometry in a wet-winding process of carbon fiber cylinders is analyzed. An Infrared-optical system for the detection of the fiber bandwidth and winding-angle is implemented. The influence of the winding speed and the resin temperature is analyzed. An image processing algorithm for the automatic measurement of the fiber's bandwidth and winding-angle is developed. Manual and adaptive gamma corrections are implemented to improve image quality. A parameter study for the suitable selection of image processing parameters is performed.     

Design of microfluidic channels for magnetic separation of malaria-infected red blood cells

This study is motivated by the development of a blood cell filtration device for removal of malaria-infected, parasitized red blood cells (pRBCs). The blood was modeled as a multi-component fluid using the computational fluid dynamics discrete element method (CFD-DEM), wherein plasma was treated as a Newtonian fluid and the red blood cells (RBCs) were modeled as soft-sphere solid particles which move under the influence of drag, collisions with other RBCs, and a magnetic force. The CFD-DEM model was first validated by a comparison with experimental data from Han and Frazier (Lab Chip 6:265–273, 2006) involving a microfluidic magnetophoretic separator for paramagnetic deoxygenated blood cells. The computational model was then applied to a parametric study of a parallel-plate separator having hematocrit of 40 % with 10 % of the RBCs as pRBCs. Specifically, we investigated the hypothesis of introducing an upstream constriction to the channel to divert the magnetic cells within the near-wall layer where the magnetic force is greatest. Simulations compared the efficacy of various geometries upon the stratification efficiency of the pRBCs. For a channel with nominal height of 100 µm, the addition of an upstream constriction of 80 % improved the proportion of pRBCs retained adjacent to the magnetic wall (separation efficiency) by almost twofold, from 26 to 49 %. Further addition of a downstream diffuser reduced remixing and hence improved separation efficiency to 72 %. The constriction introduced a greater pressure drop (from 17 to 495 Pa), which should be considered when scaling up this design for a clinical-sized system. Overall, the advantages of this design include its ability to accommodate physiological hematocrit and high throughput, which is critical for clinical implementation as a blood-filtration system.     

Position‐Based Skinning for Soft Articulated Characters

In this paper, we introduce a two‐layered approach addressing the problem of creating believable mesh‐based skin deformation. For each frame, the skin is first deformed with a classic linear blend skinning approach, which usually leads to unsightly artefacts such as the well‐known candy‐wrapper effect and volume loss. Then we enforce some geometric constraints which displace the positions of the vertices to mimic the behaviour of the skin and achieve effects like volume preservation and jiggling. We allow the artist to control the amount of jiggling and the area of the skin affected by it. The geometric constraints are solved using a position‐based dynamics (PBDs) schema. We employ a graph colouring algorithm for parallelizing the computation of the constraints. Being based on PBDs guarantees efficiency and real‐time performances while enduring robustness and unconditional stability. We demonstrate the visual quality and the performance of our approach with a variety of skeleton‐driven soft body characters.     

Instructional animations can be superior to statics when learning human motor skills

Based on the assumption of a working memory processor devoted to human movement, cognitive load theory is used to explore some conditions under which animated instructions are hypothesised to be more effective for learning than equivalent static graphics. Using paper-folding tasks dealing with human movement, results from three experiments confirmed our hypothesis, indicating a superiority of animation over static graphics. These results are discussed in terms of a working memory processor that may be facilitated by our mirror-neuron system and may explain why animated instructional animations are superior to static graphics for cognitively based tasks that involve human movement.     

alt.metadata.health: Ontological Context for Data Use and Integration

Increasingly powerful computers and increased emphasis on evidence based decision making are creating a demand for merging and integrating data from different sources into a single data set. The demand for data is outstripping our ability to ensure data integrity, and sometimes analysis is performed on data that are not appropriate for the purposes they are used for. Here we describe problems that arise when data from different sources are merged, and we suggest that one way to add context to data so that users can make informed decisions about their ontological context is through ontology-based metadata. Examples of the problem are taken from health data with emphasis on difficulties in standardizing Emergency Room wait times. We describe eight fields that can be used to capture contextual metadata. These fields are captured using ethnographic methods from users and database stewards who frequently understand precisely how context and institutional usage have shaped interpretation of semantic fields. We argue that attaching a portable archive of ontological context to travel with data—based on information from users and developers—is a means of ensuring that data are integrated and compared in multiple contexts with greater integrity and more robust results.

Utilising psychophysical techniques to investigate the effects of age,typeface design,size and display polarity on glance legibility

Psychophysical research on text legibility has historically investigated factors such as size, colour and contrast, but there has been relatively little direct empirical evaluation of typographic design itself, particularly in the emerging context of glance reading. In the present study, participants performed a lexical decision task controlled by an adaptive staircase method. Two typefaces, a ‘humanist’ and ‘square grotesque’ style, were tested. Study I examined positive and negative polarities, while Study II examined two text sizes. Stimulus duration thresholds were sensitive to differences between typefaces, polarities and sizes. Typeface also interacted significantly with age, particularly for conditions with higher legibility thresholds. These results are consistent with previous research assessing the impact of the same typefaces on interface demand in a simulated driving environment. This simplified methodology of assessing legibility differences can be adapted to investigate a wide array of questions relevant to typographic and interface designs.

Practitioner Summary: A method is described for rapidly investigating relative legibility of different typographical features. Results indicate that during glance-like reading induced by the psychophysical technique and under the lighting conditions considered, humanist-style type is significantly more legible than a square grotesque style, and that black-on-white text is significantly more legible than white-on-black.