From the individual element test to finite element templates: Evolution of the patch test

This paper starts a sequence of three articles that follow an unconventional approach in finite element research. The ultimate objective is to construct high-performance elements and element-level error estimators for those elements. The approach takes off from our previous work in high-performance elements and culminates with the development of finite element templates. The present paper concentrates on the patch test and evolved versions of the test that have played a key role in this research. Following a brief review of the historical roots, we present the Individual Element Test (IET) of Bergan and Hanssen in an expanded context that encompasses several important classes of new elements. The relationship of the IET to the multielement forms A, B and C of the patch test and to the single-element test are investigated. An important consequence of the IET application is that the element stiffness equations decompose naturally into basic and higher-order parts. The application of this decomposition to the “sanitization” of the non-convergent BCIZ element is described and verified with numerical experiments. Two sequel papers in preparation are subtitled ‘the algebraic approach’ and ‘element-level error estimation’. These apply the fundamental decomposition to the derivation of templates for specific mechanical elements and to the construction of element-level error estimators, respectively.     

Direct Methods Optimised for Solving Crystal Structure by Powder Diffraction Data: Limits,Strategies, and Prospects

The ab-initio crystal structure solution by powder diffraction data requires great efforts because of the collapse of the experimental information onto the one dimensional 2θ axis of the pattern. Different strategies will be described aiming at improving the process of extraction of the integrated intensities from the experimental pattern in order to make more straightforward the structure solution process by direct methods. Particular attention will be devoted to the EXPO program. Some of its performance will be analysed and results will be shown.     

Fascial Innervation: A Systematic Review of the Literature

Currently, myofascial pain has become one of the main problems in healthcare systems. Research into its causes and the structures related to it may help to improve its management. Until some years ago, all the studies were focused on muscle alterations, as trigger points, but recently, fasciae are starting to be considered a new, possible source of pain. This systematic review has been conducted for the purpose of analyze the current evidence of the muscular/deep fasciae innervation from a histological and/or immunohistochemical point of view. A literature search published between 2000 and 2021 was made in PubMed and Google Scholar. Search terms included a combination of fascia, innervation, immunohistochemical, and different immunohistochemical markers. Of the 23 total studies included in the review, five studies were performed in rats, four in mice, two in horses, ten in humans, and two in both humans and rats. There were a great variety of immunohistochemical markers used to detect the innervation of the fasciae; the most used were Protein Gene Marker 9.5 (used in twelve studies), Calcitonin Gene-Related Peptide (ten studies), S100 (ten studies), substance P (seven studies), and tyrosine hydroxylase (six studies). Various areas have been studied, with the thoracolumbar fascia being the most observed. Besides, the papers highlighted diversity in the density and type of innervation in the various fasciae, going from free nerve endings to Pacini and Ruffini corpuscles. Finally, it has been observed that the innervation is increased in the pathological fasciae. From this review, it is evident that fasciae are well innerved, their innervation have a particular distribution and precise localization and is composed especially by proprioceptors and nociceptors, the latter being more numerous in pathological situations. This could contribute to a better comprehension and management of pain.     

Self-Assembly and Neurotoxicity of β-Amyloid (21–40) Peptide Fragment: The Regulatory Role of GxxxG Motifs

The three GxxxG repeating motifs from the C-terminal region of β-amyloid (Aβ) peptide play a significant role in regulating the aggregation kinetics of the peptide. Mutation of these glycine residues to leucine greatly accelerates the fibrillation process but generates a varied toxicity profile. Using an array of biophysical techniques, we demonstrated the uniqueness of the composite glycine residues in these structural repeats. We used solvent relaxation NMR spectroscopy to investigate the role played by the surrounding water molecules in determining the corresponding aggregation pathway. Notably, the conformational changes induced by Gly³³ and Gly³⁷ mutations result in significantly decreased toxicity in a neuronal cell line. Our results indicate that G³³xxxG³⁷ is the primary motif responsible for Aβ neurotoxicity, hence providing a direct structure–function correlation. Targeting this motif, therefore, can be a promising strategy to prevent neuronal cell death associated with Alzheimer's and other related diseases, such as type II diabetes and Parkinson's.     

Fast Separation of Capsaicinoids from Peppers by Reversed Phase Ultra-Performance Liquid Chromatography: Comparation with Traditional High-Performance Liquid Chromatography Methods

A new chromatographic method for the separation of major capsaicinoids in peppers has been developed. Nordihydrocapsaicin, capsaicin, dihydrocapsaicin, homocapsaicin, and homodihydrocapsaicin have been separated by reversed-phase ultra-performance liquid chromatography. A gradient method has been developed using two solvents: 0.1% acetic acid in water and 0.1% acetic acid in methanol. The developed method allows the full separation of capsaicinoids in less than 3 min, with high reproducibility (relative standard deviation < 4.3%) and repeatability (relative standard deviation < 3.6%). Robustness regarding the total amount of methanol in the sample was determined. Comparison with previous reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography methods using both monolithic and conventional columns was also studied. Finally, the method was applied in the determination of major capsaicinoids in 16 hot pepper samples produced in Spain.     

Enhancing density-based clustering: Parameter reduction and outlier detection

Clustering is a widely used unsupervised data mining technique. It allows to identify structures in collections of objects by grouping them into classes, named clusters, in such a way that similarity of objects within any cluster is maximized and similarity of objects belonging to different clusters is minimized. In density-based clustering, a cluster is defined as a connected dense component and grows in the direction driven by the density. The basic structure of density-based clustering presents some common drawbacks: (i) parameters have to be set; (ii) the behavior of the algorithm is sensitive to the density of the starting object; and (iii) adjacent clusters of different densities could not be properly identified. In this paper, we address all the above problems. Our method, based on the concept of space stratification, efficiently identifies the different densities in the dataset and, accordingly, ranks the objects of the original space. Next, it exploits such a knowledge by projecting the original data into a space with one more dimension. It performs a density based clustering taking into account the reverse-nearest-neighbor of the objects. Our method also reduces the number of input parameters by giving a guideline to set them in a suitable way. Experimental results indicate that our algorithm is able to deal with clusters of different densities and outperforms the most popular algorithms DBSCAN and OPTICS in all the standard benchmark datasets.     

Suitability of the SWAT Model for Simulating Water Discharge and Sediment Load in a Karst Watershed of the Semiarid Mediterranean Basin

Water Resources Management - This paper presents a case study conducted in the Upper Argos River, in southeast Spain, to verify the applicability of the SWAT model for prediction of the water...