Control of locomotion in the marine mollusc Clione limacina. XI. Effects of serotonin

The locomotor activity in the marine mollusc Clione limacina has been found to be strongly excited by serotonergic mechanisms. In the present study putative serotonergic cerebropedal neurons were recorded simultaneously with pedal locomotor motoneurons and interneurons. Stimulation of serotonergic neurons produced acceleration of the locomotor rhythm and strengthening of motoneuron discharges. These effects were accompanied by depolarization of motoneurons, while depolarization of the generator interneurons was considerably lower (if it occurred at all). Effects of serotonin application on isolated locomotor and non-locomotor pedal neurons were studied. Serotonin (5 x 10(-7) to 1 x 10(-6) M) affected most pedal neurons. All locomotor neurons were excited by serotonin. This suggests that serotonergic command neurons exert direct influence on locomotor neurons. Effects of serotonin on nonlocomotor neurons were diverse, most neurons being inhibited by serotonin. Some effects of serotonin on locomotor neurons could not be reproduced by neuron depolarization. This suggests that, along with depolarization, serotonin modulates voltage-sensitive membrane properties of the neurons. As a result, serotonin promotes the endogenous rhythmical activity in neurons of the C. limacina locomotor central pattern generator.     

Effects of acetylcholine and glutamate on isolated neurons of locomotory network of Clione

In Clione limacina, locomotory rhythm is produced in the central pattern generator by reciprocal activity of two groups of interneurons. Dorsal (D) and ventral (V) phase interneurons activate neurons of the same phase and inhibit neurons of the opposite phase. Which neurotransmitters are used by these interneurons is not clear. In this study, identified follower neurons to V and D interneurons were isolated, and their responses to the local application of potential neurotransmitters were examined. Acetylcholine exerted inhibitory action on the isolated D-phase neurons and excitatory action on V-phase neurons. Glutamate produced excitation in D-phase neurons, and inhibition in V-phase neurons. These results suggest that acetylcholine is the neurotransmitter of D-phase interneurons, while glutamate might be the neurotransmitter of V-phase interneurons.     

Sol–Gel Processing for Optical Communication Technology

Sol–gel is a versatile technology offering advantageous processing of complex shapes as well as material compositions. In the realm of optical communications, the applicability of a number of dielectric and hybrid materials in various photonic devices makes the technology particularly appealing vis-a-vis the vapor-phase methods that dominate the field today. One can find numerous reports of sol–gel processing for photonic components, although instances where this has been developed for product manufacture are far fewer. Here, we examine the different classes of optical communication devices from fibers to waveguides to photonic crystals and the ability of sol–gel processing to address their needs. Successful deployment appears to depend on two aspects: making innovative modifications to the traditional concept and developing supporting technologies to overcome the key drawbacks.     

Video personalization in heterogeneous and resource-constrained environments

Access to multimedia data and multimedia services is becoming increasingly common in networked mobile environments. In such environments, both the mobile client devices and multimedia servers are typically resource constrained. Moreover, the mobile client population is often heterogeneous in terms of the clients’ preferences with regard to multimedia content, the clients’ quality of service requirements and system-level resource constraints. In order to provide a resource-constrained mobile client with its desired video content, it is often necessary to personalize the requested multimedia content in a manner that satisfies simultaneously the various client-specified content preferences and the system-level resource constraints. Also, in order to simultaneously reduce the client-experienced latency, provide optimal quality of service to the clients and ensure efficient utilization of server and network resources, it is necessary to perform client request aggregation on the server end. To this end, a video personalization strategy is proposed to provide mobile, resource-constrained clients with personalized video content that is most relevant to the clients’ requests while satisfying simultaneously multiple client-side system-level resource constraints. A client request aggregation strategy is also proposed to cluster client requests with similar video content preferences and similar client-side resource constraints such that the number of requests the server needs to process and service, and the client-experienced latency are both reduced simultaneously. The primary contributions of the paper are: (1) the formulation and implementation of a Multiple-choice Multi-dimensional Knapsack Problem (MMKP)-based video personalization strategy; and (2) the design and implementation of a client request aggregation strategy based on a multi-stage clustering algorithm. Experimental results comparing the proposed MMKP-based video personalization strategy to existing 0/1 Knapsack Problem (0/1KP)-based and the Fractional Knapsack Problem (FKP)-based video personalization strategies are presented. It is observed that: (1) the proposed MMKP-based personalization strategy includes more relevant video content in response to the client’s request compared to the existing 0/1KP-based and FKP-based personalization strategies; and (2) in contrast to the 0/1KP-based and FKP-based personalization strategies which can satisfy only a single client-side resource constraint at a time, the proposed MMKP-based personalization strategy is capable of satisfying multiple client-side resource constraints simultaneously. Experimental results comparing the client-experienced latency with and without the proposed server-side client request aggregation strategy are also presented. It is shown that the proposed client request aggregation strategy reduces the mean client-experienced latency without significant reduction in the average relevance of the delivered video content and without significant deviation in the client-side resources actually consumed by the delivered video content from the client-specified resource constraints.     

电弧热丝变极性等离子弧增材制造成型尺寸预测

电弧热丝变极性等离子弧(arcing-VPPA)对传热与传质的可靠控制使其在电弧增材制造方面拥有独特的优点。针对单道多层铝合金堆砌试样,利用二次通用旋转组合方法针对性地设计了单壁墙试验样本,通过多次回归方程建立了单壁墙成型尺寸与工艺参数之间关系的数学模型。结果表明,模型能够较好地预测单壁墙的熔敷尺寸,真实值与拟合值基本一致。同时发现,等离子电流、行走速度、送丝速度对层高的影响较为明显,且等离子电流与焊接速度对层高的影响存在交互作用;而对熔宽影响较明显的是等离子电流、变极性脉冲MIG电流以及焊接速度。同时分析了增材成型熔宽尺寸稳定性控制策略,发现等离子电流以等差数列排序的控制方案在增材宽度的稳定性控制上具有明显优势。     

Hf-ZnO酪氨酸酶生物传感器检测邻苯二酚

以四氯化铪(HfCl4)和硝酸锌为原料,通过水热法制得Hf掺杂氧化锌纳米材料(Hf-ZnO),并将Hf-ZnO、酪氨酸酶(Tyr)和壳聚糖(CS)修饰在玻碳电极(GCE)上,制得Tyr/Hf-ZnO/CS/GCE生物电极。利用FESEM、DLS、XRD和XPS对Hf-ZnO的结构和性能进行表征。采用循环伏安伏安法(CV)和计时电流法(IT)对Tyr/Hf-ZnO/CS/GCE电极进行电化学测试。结果表明,Tyr/Hf-ZnO/CS/GCE电极在pH 5和-50 mV的低电势下对邻苯二酚有最佳检测能力,对邻苯二酚检测的线性范围是0.5~47 μmol/L,灵敏度为195 μA/(mmol/L),检测限是0.1215 μmol/L(S/N=3)。此外,该生物电极的稳定性和重复性好,可有效避免尿素、多巴胺、抗坏血酸等与邻苯二酚电活性相近物质的干扰。     

卧式数控车削中心小圆轨迹测试研究

采用光栅非接触式轨迹测头和平面光栅得到数控机床轨迹真实情况的数据，数控机床按编程命令走过轨迹的实际表现数据对于分析精度影响因素有重要的参考价值，所做的研究主要是对于不同直径的圆轨迹特点进行测试与分析，尝试分离数控机床误差并进行补偿的可行性。