Novel pearl millet couscous process for West African markets using a low-cost single-screw extruder

Traditional West African pearl millet couscous products are popular; however, their preparation is laborious, time-consuming and energy-demanding, involving agglomeration, steaming, drying and sieving steps. In this study, a process was developed to produce millet couscous using a high pressure, high temperature and low-cost single-screw extruder. The innovation was to directly process the cooked low-moisture extrudate to a couscous product by drying and milling to the appropriate particle size (ranging between 1 and 2 mm). Throughput for the traditional process as prepared for commercial sale is 50 kg per day, but with the same amount of labour, the extrusion process yields ~350 kg per day. A consumer sensory study held in Niamey (Niger) showed that the extruded millet couscous was comparable to traditional couscous, though this was dependent on selection of the proper millet variety. This novel extrusion process could stimulate small- to medium-scale manufacturing of couscous and couscous-type products in West Africa.     

Phosphorus seed coating increases phosphorus uptake,early growth and yield of pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.) grown on an acid sandy soil in Niger,West Africa

In pot and field experiments conducted in 1990 and 1991 on an acid sandy, phosphorus (P) deficient soil in Niger, West Africa, the effect of seed coating on seedling emergence, early growth and grain yield of pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.) was studied. Seeds of pearl millet were coated with different rates (0; 0.5; 1.0; 2.0; 5.0; 10.0 mg P seed^–1) and types of P fertilizers (single superphosphate, ammonium dihydrogen phosphate; monocalcium phosphate, sodium dihydrogen phosphate and sodium triphosphate). Seedling emergence was generally reduced at coating rates higher than 0.5 mg P seed^–1 and prevented with single superphosphate and sodium triphosphate at rates higher than 5 mg P seed^–1. No correlation was found between the pH and osmomolity of the coatings and final emergence of millet seedlings. The most favourable effect on plant growth and P content was achieved with ammonium dihydrogen phosphate (AHP) as seed coating. This was attributed to the enhancement effect of ammonium on P uptake. Compared to the untreated control dry matter production at 20 days after planting (DAP) was increased by 280%, P content per plant by 330%, total biomass at maturity by 30% and grain yield by 45%. Although seed coating with AHP may be harmful to seedlings emergence, it represents a suitable method to enhance early growth and increase yield of pearl millet.     

3D fingerprint reconstruction system using feature correspondences and prior estimated finger model

The paper studies a 3D fingerprint reconstruction technique based on multi-view touchless fingerprint images. This technique offers a solution for 3D fingerprint image generation and application when only multi-view 2D images are available. However, the difficulties and stresses of 3D fingerprint reconstruction are the establishment of feature correspondences based on 2D touchless fingerprint images and the estimation of the finger shape model. In this paper, several popular used features, such as scale invariant feature transformation (SIFT) feature, ridge feature and minutiae, are employed for correspondences establishment. To extract these fingerprint features accurately, an improved fingerprint enhancement method has been proposed by polishing orientation and ridge frequency maps according to the characteristics of 2D touchless fingerprint images. Therefore, correspondences can be established by adopting hierarchical fingerprint matching approaches. Through an analysis of 440 3D point cloud finger data (220 fingers, 2 pictures each) collected by a 3D scanning technique, i.e., the structured light illumination (SLI) method, the finger shape model is estimated. It is found that the binary quadratic function is more suitable for the finger shape model than the other mixed model tested in this paper. In our experiments, the reconstruction accuracy is illustrated by constructing a cylinder. Furthermore, results obtained from different fingerprint feature correspondences are analyzed and compared to show which features are more suitable for 3D fingerprint images generation.     

Gravity optimised particle filter for hand tracking

This paper presents a gravity optimised particle filter (GOPF) where the magnitude of the gravitational force for every particle is proportional to its weight. GOPF attracts nearby particles and replicates new particles as if moving the particles towards the peak of the likelihood distribution, improving the sampling efficiency. GOPF is incorporated into a technique for hand features tracking. A fast approach to hand features detection and labelling using convexity defects is also presented. Experimental results show that GOPF outperforms the standard particle filter and its variants, as well as state-of-the-art CamShift guided particle filter using a significantly reduced number of particles.     

手指再生技术中断指虚拟三维图像仿真

手指再生技术过程需要根据手指三维图像残缺特征,对手指残缺区域进行方向和角度再生虚拟估计,一旦手指三维图像残缺信息量过少,传统的虚拟三维图像仿真方法无法取得足够信息,只能根据简单的向上、角度旋转等信息完成再生手指三维图像的仿真,效果不好.提出一种新的多媒体虚拟手指再生技术三维图像仿真方法.在手指状态空间中寻找一组样本,运用近似估计概率密度函数,降低手指再生方向估计的误差,以样本均值替代积分运算,获得状态最小方差分布,对手指残缺三维图像的方向和角度进行估计,再通过角度信息对手指残缺三维图像进行多目标融合.实验结果表明,利用该算法进行手指再生技术的虚拟三维图像仿真,能够真实的反映手指再生技术中,不同三维图像残缺特征间的关联性,从而为手指再生技术提供准确的决策依据.     

Observed finger behaviour during computer mouse use

Two-button computer mouse users may exhibit sustained, static finger lifting behaviours to prevent inadvertent activations by avoiding finger pressure on the buttons, which leads to prolonged, static finger extensor muscle loading. One hundred graduate students were observed during normal computer work in a university computer facility to qualify and quantify the prevalence of lifted finger behaviours and extended finger postures, as well as wrist/forearm and grip behaviour, during specific mouse activities. The highest prevalences observed were 48% of the students lifted their middle finger during mouse drag activities, and 23% extended their middle finger while moving the mouse. In addition, 98% of the students rested their wrist and forearm (77%) or wrist only (21%) on the workstation surface, and 97% had an extended wrist posture (15 degrees -30 degrees ) when using the mouse. Potential applications of these findings include future computer input device designs to reduce finger lifting behaviour and exposures to risk factors of hand/forearm musculoskeletal pain.     

佛手凉果加工过程中功能性成分与抗氧化性分析

佛手凉果是具有功能特性的岭南特色凉果品种,探究佛手凉果制作过程中功能性成分及其体外抗氧化活性变化规律,可为佛手凉果产业工艺优化与改良提供依据。结果表明,加工提高了佛手中总酸、多糖、黄酮和膳食纤维含量,导致多酚含量下降。制作过程中,1,1－二苯基－2－三硝基苯(DPPH)自由基、2,20 -联氮- 2 -三硝基苯肼(ABTS)自由基清除能力和铁离子还原抗氧化能力(Ferric Reducing Antioxidant Power, FRAP)呈现先下降后上升的趋势,效果分别是新鲜佛手的1.35倍、1.57倍和2.16倍。总黄酮与FRAP之间呈现极显著相关性(P＜0.01);与DPPH、ABTS呈显著相关性(P＜0.05);有机酸、总多糖分别与ABTS和FRAP之间相关性(P＜0.05)。为此,在佛手凉果的制作过程中,糖制和干燥工艺对功能性成分的转化与浓缩起关键作用,可作为工艺优化的重点。     

一种懒惰的Chord指向表更新算法

在节点加入退出或者失效情况下,结构化P2P算法Chord搜索指向表(FT)出现大量指向错误,降低搜索效率。针对该问题,讨论和比较几种搜索 FT的更新策略,分析各算法维护指向正确的开销,提出一种懒惰算法解决搜索 FT更新效率低下的问题。该算法最小化搜索FT更新的消耗,可作为一种有效的错误恢复机制。通过实验对比证明了该算法的有效性。