Assessing stem cell research productivity

Honour Index (HoI), a method to evaluate research performance within different research fields, was derived from the impact factor (IF). It can be used to rate and compare different categories of journals. HoI was used in this study to determine the scientific productivity of stem cell research in the Asian Four Dragons (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan) from 1981 to 2001. The methodology applied in this study represents a synthesis of universal indicator studies and bibliometric analyses of subfields at the micro-level. We discuss several comparisons, and conclude the developmental trend in stem cell research for two decades. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Electrochemical synthesis and characterization of chloride doped polyaniline

Chloride doped polyaniline conducting polymer films have been prepared in a protic acid medium (HCl) by potentiodynamic method in an electrochemical cell and studied by cyclic voltammetry and FTIR techniques. The FTIR spectra confirmed Cl^- ion doping in the polymers. The polymerization rate was found to increase with increasing concentration of aniline monomer. But the films obtained at high monomer concentration were rough having a nonuniform flaky polyaniline distribution. Results showed that the polymerization rate did not increase beyond a critical HCl concentration. Cyclic voltammetry suggested that, the oxidation-reduction current increased with an increase in scan rate and that the undoped polyaniline films were not hygroscopic whereas chloride doped polyaniline films were found to be highly hygroscopic.     

A redundant multivalued logic for a 10-Gb/s CMOS demultiplexer IC

A redundant multivalued logic is proposed for high-speed communication ICs. In this logic, serial binary data are received and converted into parallel redundant multivalued data. Then they are restored into parallel binary data. Because of the multivalued data conversion, this logic makes it possible to achieve higher operating speeds than that of a conventional binary logic. Using this logic, a 1:4 demultiplexer (DEMUX, serial-parallel converter) IC was fabricated using a 0.18-/spl mu/m CMOS process. The IC achieved an operating speed of 10 Gb/s with a supply voltage of only 1.3 V and with power consumption of 38 mW. This logic may achieve CMOS communication ICs with an operating speed several times greater than 10 Gb/s.     

Lateral ion implant straggle and mask proximity effect

Lateral scattering of retrograde well implants is shown to have an effect on the threshold voltage of nearby devices. The threshold voltage of both NMOSFETs and PMOSFETs increases in magnitude for conventional retrograde wells, but for triple-well isolated NMOSFETs the threshold voltage decreases for narrow devices near the edge of the well. Electrical data, SIMS, and SUPREM4 simulations are shown that elucidate the phenomenon.     

降低成品油二次物流运输成本的思考

介绍了传统成品油进货和管理模式存在的诸如成品油物流以行政区划、中问环节多、信息化程度不高、运输路线未优化造成物流成本提高等问题。提出要降低成品油二次物流运输成本，当务之急是加强成品油物流的信息化建设；调整管理模式，打破行政区域界限，开展经济辐射半径内的库站物流配送；引进竞争机制，打破运输垄断，一、二次物流结合，大、小车型搭配，提高运营效率；做好运杂费全面预算、核算及运行费用的过程控制。     

丙烯腈装置回收塔内聚合物生成原因的分析

针对丙烯腈生产过程中回收塔内聚合物堵塞降液管造成回收塔运行周期短的问题,通过对丙烯腈回收塔内各组分分布的模拟计算,直观显示了回收塔内各组分的浓度分布,发现了回收塔的聚合段与丙烯醛的富集段相吻合的现象,初步得出了回收塔内局部聚合的原因;通过对塔内聚合物的特性分析和评判,进一步证实了“回收塔内局部聚合严重是由于在聚合段丙烯醛聚集引起”这一现象;根据模拟计算结果和实际运行经验,提出了预防聚合物堵塞降液管的措施,并进行了部分生产验证,为丙烯腈生产企业延长装置运行周期提供了理论指导。     

A New Hand-Held Microsystem Architecture for Biological Analysis

This paper presents a hand-held microsystem based on new fully integrated magnetoresistive biochips for biomolecular recognition (DNA hybridization, antibody antigen interaction, etc.). Magnetoresistive chip surfaces are chemically treated, enabling the immobilization of probe biomolecules such as DNA or antibodies. Fluid handling is also integrated in the biochip. The proposed microsystem not only integrates the biochip, which is an array of 16times16 magnetoresistive sensors, but it also provides all the electronic circuitry for addressing and reading out each transducer. The proposed architecture and circuits were specifically designed for achieving a compact, programmable and portable microsystem. The microsystem also integrates a hand-held analyzer connected through a wireless channel. A prototype of the system was already developed and detection of magnetic nanoparticles was obtained. This indicates that the system may be used for magnetic label based bioassays     

Analysis and architecture design of variable block-size motion estimation for H.264/AVC

Variable block-size motion estimation (VBSME) has become an important video coding technique, but it increases the difficulty of hardware design. In this paper, we use inter-/intra-level classification and various data flows to analyze the impact of supporting VBSME in different hardware architectures. Furthermore, we propose two hardware architectures that can support traditional fixed block-size motion estimation as well as VBSME with less chip area overhead compared to previous approaches. By broadcasting reference pixel rows and propagating partial sums of absolute differences (SADs), the first design has the fewer reference pixel registers and a shorter critical path. The second design utilizes a two-dimensional distortion array and one adder tree with the reference buffer that can maximize the data reuse between successive searching candidates. The first design is suitable for low resolution or a small search range, and the second design has advantages of supporting a high degree of parallelism and VBSME. Finally, we propose an eight-parallel SAD tree with a shared reference buffer for H.264/AVC integer motion estimation (IME). Its processing ability is eight times of the single SAD tree, but the reference buffer size is only doubled. Moreover, the most critical issue of H.264 IME, which is huge memory bandwidth, is overcome. We are able to save 99.9% off-chip memory bandwidth and 99.22% on-chip memory bandwidth. We demonstrate a 720-p, 30-fps solution at 108 MHz with 330.2k gate count and 208k bits on-chip memory.     

An optically clocked transistor array with dual serial-to-parallel and parallel-to-serial conversion capability for optical label swapping

We propose an optically clocked transistor array optoelectronic integrated circuit (OEIC) for both serial-to-parallel and parallel-to-serial conversion (demux/mux), enabling an interface between high-speed asynchronous burst optical labels and CMOS circuitry for optical label swapping. Dual functionality of the OEIC reduces size, power, and cost of the optical label swapper. The capability for greater than 20-Gb/s conversion operation is demonstrated.     

Co-digestion of manure and biowaste according to the EC animal by-products regulation and Finnish national regulations.

The objective of this study was to compare methane production and characteristics of digested material in anaerobic digestion concepts according to the Animal By-Products Regulation (ABP-Regulation) of the EC (hygienisation of biowaste for 1 hour at 70 degrees C, particle size < 12 mm) and Finnish national regulations (treatment temperature 55 degrees C, feeding interval 24 h, hydraulic retention time (HRT) 20 d, particle size < 40 mm) and with small variations in treatment methods for treating manure and biowaste. Moreover, the survival of three different salmonella bacteria in these processes was studied. Hygienisation of biowaste prior to digestion at 35 degrees C enhanced methane production by 14-18% compared to similar treatment without hygienisation. The differences in treatment temperature, HRT and hygienisation of biowaste prior to digestion did not significantly affect the characteristics of digested material. The concepts according to the ABP-Regulation and Finnish national regulations were effective in destroying salmonella bacteria to an undetectable level.