Households and businesses are generating unprecedented levels of electrical and electronic wastes (e-waste), fueled by modernisation and rapid obsolescence. While the challenges imposed by e-waste are similar everywhere in the world, disparities in progress to deal with it exists; with developing nations such as South Africa lagging. The increase in e-waste generation increases the need to formulate strategies to manage it. This paper presents an overview of e-waste management on a global and South African scenarios with a specific case for Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) waste management practices in South Africa. CRTs present the biggest problem for recyclers and policy makers because they contain hazardous elements such as lead and antimony. Common disposal practices have been either landfilling or incineration. The research into the South African practices with regards to CRT waste management showed that there is still more to be done to effectively manage this waste stream. This is despite clear waste regulatory frameworks in the country. However, recent developments have placed e-waste as a priority waste stream, which should lead to intensified efforts in dealing with it. Overall, these efforts should aim to maximise diversion from landfilling and to create value-addition opportunities, leading to social and environmental benefits.

The paper presents an error model of a measurement chain containing link performing discrete wavelet transform algorithm which is most often the last stage of measurement signal processing. The goal is to determine the uncertainty budget of the input quantities of the wavelet transform algorithm. The error model takes into account parts of analog, analog-to-digital and digital processing, describing the properties of subsequent fragments of the chain using their transmittance and processing functions. The proposed model enables the description of both deterministic and non-deterministic properties of signal errors. The proposed model was validated using an example measurement chain created for this purpose.

Although advertising literacy leads to critical thinking in the face of advertising, but so far, no action has been taken in Iran regarding a tool to measure this type of literacy. And after the investigations, it was determined that although much research has been done on advertising, but the lack of appropriate measurement tools to measure the level of advertising literacy is clearly evident. Therefore, this research provides a valid tool for measuring advertising literacy from students' perspective. In this study, referring to the dimensions of advertising literacy from the perspective of Malmelin (2010) and the views of related professors, a questionnaire was developed and to determine the validity of the structure, confirmatory factor analysis was used. In this study, the statistical population was high school students, considering the impact of advertising in this age range; finally, a tool with four dimensions of informational literacy, aesthetic literacy, rhetorical literacy and promotional literacy was obtained. According to the confirmation of this tool in the present study, it can be used to examine the status of items, their order and prioritization from the perspective of the mentioned population.

In higher education, the cultivation of research competency is pivotal for students’ critical thinking development and their subsequent transition into the professional workforce. While statistics plays a fundamental role in supporting the completion of a research project, it is often perceived as challenging, particularly by students in majors outside mathematics or statistics. The connection between students’ statistical proficiency and their research competency remains unexplored despite its significance. To address this gap, we utilized the supervised machine learning approach to predict students’ research competency, as represented by their performance in a research methods class, with predictors of students’ proficiency in statistical topics. Predictors relating to students’ learning behavior in a statistics course such as assignment completion and academic dishonesty are also included as auxiliary variables. Results indicate that the three primary categories of statistical skills—namely, understanding of statistical concepts, proficiency in selecting appropriate statistical methods, and statistics interpretation skills— can be used to predict students’ research competency, as demonstrated by their final course scores and letter grades. This study advocates for strategic emphasis on the identified influential topics to enhance efficiency in developing students’ research competency. Findings could inform instructors in adopting a strategic approach to teaching the statistical component of research for enhanced efficiency.

This article is about a framework for determining the degree of realism of any given 1 passenger ride motion discomfort measurement formula. After providing some context and reviewing 2 evidence of deficiency in currently popular ride motion discomfort measurement formulas, the article 3 outlines the research program that needs to be carried out in order to establish such a framework. 4 The research begins with gathering recordings of uncomfortable ride motion episodes encountered in 5 a chosen type of passenger transport service. It then has test subjects compare the episodes via a ride 6 motion simulator and adjust their amplitudes pair wise until they cause equal discomfort. It explains 7 how to take the pair wise amplitude adjustments and determine amplitude adjustments that bring all 8 of the motion episode recordings to a common level of discomfort so that they form a normalized set. 9 Then, the lower the scatter of the scores assigned by any given discomfort measurement formula to 10 the members of that set, the more realistic that formula will be for the chosen service.

The building envelope has the most significant contribution in the reduction of the building energy consumption. Application of new, alternative and improved materials and systems has an important impact on the buildings performances. This paper is focused on the thermal transmittance, as an indicator of the thermal conductance of the construction element. It includes comparisons of the U-values, calculated by software, with those measured in situ on three representative façade walls. The walls have been constructed with the new wall system Fragmat NZ-1, a new product in Macedonian buildings. This research provides basic information on the thermal transmittance of the system. The results of the analysis show that the in situ measuring is a useful tool in validation of the precision of analytically calculated values, since it was difficult to obtain precise results from the analytical calculations only, especially when the layers are with non-uniform thickness.

Direct Behavior Rating (DBR) as a behavioral progress monitoring tool can be designed as longitudinal assessment with only short intervals between measurement points. The reliability of these instruments has been evaluated mostly in observational studies with small samples based on generalizability theory. However, for standardized use in the pedagogical field, a larger and broader sample is required in order to assess measurement invariance between different participant groups and over time. Therefore, we constructed a DBR with multiple items to measure the occurrence of specific externalizing and internalizing student classroom behaviors on a Likert scale (1 = never to 7 = always). In a pilot study, two trained raters observed 16 primary school students and rated the student behavior over all items with a satisfactory reliability. In the main study, 108 regular primary school students, 97 regular secondary school students and 14 students in a clinical setting were rated daily over one week (five measurement points). IRT analyses confirmed the instrument’s technical adequacy, and latent growth models demonstrated the instrument’s stability over time. Further development of the instrument and study designs to implement DBRs are discussed.

Mindfulness interventions have been implemented in many countries. This study aimed to examine the psychometric properties of English and Thai-version of the 15-item mindfulness attention awareness scale (MAAS) across five samples. A descriptive correlation research was conducted in the Philippines and Thailand, and five data sets were generated using self-reported and online questionnaires. Exploratory factor analyses were used to explore the factorial structure of the MAAS. Confirmatory factor analyses were performed to test measurement invariance across samples. Concurrent validity was tested by examining relationships between the MAAS and psychological well-being (PWB). A unidimensional structure of the MAAS was documented across the five samples. The MAAS demonstrated measurement invariance across samples for both English and Thai versions. Concurrent validity was displayed through significant correlations with PWB. This study produced evidence to support the construct validity, concurrent validity, and reliability of the English and Thai versions of MAAS. This study was not registered.

The up-to-date challenge towards clean road transport are non-exhaust emissions. Important advances regarding measurement systems, including well defined characterisation techniques, as well as regulation, will happen in the next few years. In this work we present detailed results of particle emissions from a test bed for wheel suspension and brakes, consisting of aerosol (size distribution, particle number (PN) and mass (PM)) and electron microscopy measurements (EM) under different load conditions. Standard tyres and brakes from series production were tested with a high-load driving cycle while particle measurements were conducted by gravimetric measurements and with a TSI SMPS, a TSI APS and a GRIMM OPS. Furthermore, samples were analyzed by electron microscopy. A bimodal particle size distribution (PSD) was obtained with the SMPS, with peaks at 20nm and around 400nm. EM analysis of >1400 single particles from the electrostatic sampler matches the PSD results. EM analysis also showed ultrafine particles, mainly from O, Fe, Si, Ba, Mg and S and also fractal particles with high C fractions. Our results suggest, in agreement with previously published literature, that particulate emissions are related to brake disc temperature and occur in significant amounts above a threshold temperature.

As the adoption of renewable energy sources grows, ensuring a stable power balance across various time frames has become a central challenge for modern power systems. In line with the "dual carbon" objectives and the seamless integration of renewable energy sources, harnessing the advantages of various energy storage resources and coordinating the operation of long-term and short-term storage have become pivotal directions for future energy storage deployment. To address the complexities arising from the coupling of different time scales in optimizing energy storage capacity, this paper proposes a method for energy storage planning that accounts for power imbalance risks across multiple time scales. Initially, the Seasonal and Trend decomposition using the Loess (STL) decomposition method is utilized to temporally decouple actual operational data. Subsequently, power balance computations are performed based on the obtained data at various time scales to optimize the allocation of different types of energy storage capacities and assess the associated imbalance risks. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed approach is validated through hourly applications using real-world data from a province in China over recent years.

The prevalence of internet gaming disorders (IGD) is considerably high among youth, especially with social isolation imposed by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. IGD adversely affects mental health, quality of life, and academic performance. The Internet Gaming Disorder Scale (IGDS9-SF) is designed to detect IGD according to DSM-IV diagnostic criteria. However, inconsistent results are reported on its capacity to diagnose IGD evenly across different cultures. To ensure the suitability of the IGDS9-SF as a global measure of IGD, this study examined the psychometric properties of the IGDS9-SF in a sample of Sri Lankan university students (N = 322, mean age =17.2 ± 0.6, range = 16-18 years, 56.5% males) and evaluated its measurement invariance across samples from Sri Lanka, Turkey, Australia, and the USA. Among Sri Lankan students, a unidimensional structure expressed good fit, invariance across different groups (e.g., gender, ethnicity, and income), adequate criterion validity (strong correlation with motives of internet gaming, daily gaming duration, and sleep quality), and good reliability (alpha = 0.81). Males and online multiplayers expressed higher IGD levels, greater time spent gaming, and more endorsement of gaming motives (e.g., Social and Coping) than females and offline players. Across countries, the IGDS9-SF was invariant at the configural, metric, and scalar levels, albeit strict invariance was not maintained. The lowest and highest IGD levels were reported among Turkish and American respondents, respectively. In conclusion, the IGDS9-SF can be reliably used to measure IGD among Sri Lankan youth. Because the scale holds scalar invariance across countries, its scores can be used to compare IGD levels in the studied countries.

Ecosystem physical structure, defined by the quantity and spatial distribution of biomass, influences a range of ecosystem functions. Remote sensing tools permit the non-destructive characterization of canopy and root features, potentially providing opportunities to link above- and belowground structure at fine spatial resolution in functionally meaningful ways. To test this possibility, we employed ground-based portable canopy lidar (PCL) and ground penetrating radar (GPR) along co-located transects in forested sites spanning multiple stages of ecosystem development and, consequently, of structural complexity. We examined canopy and root structural data for coherence at multiple spatial scales ≤ 10 m within each site using wavelet analysis. Forest sites varied substantially in vertical canopy and root structure, with leaf area index and root mass more evenly distributed by height and depth, respectively, as forests aged. In all sites, above- and belowground structure, characterized as mean maximum canopy height and root mass, exhibited significant coherence at a scale of 3.5-4 meters, and results suggest that the scale of coherence may increase with stand age. Our findings demonstrate that canopy and root structure are linked at characteristic spatial scales, which provides the basis to optimize scales of observation. Our study highlights the potential, and limitations, for fusing lidar and radar technologies to quantitatively couple above- and belowground ecosystem structure.

This paper proposed three-dimensional numerical simulation method by coupling of electrostatic and fluid fields to evaluating the performance of electrical sensor in the concentration measurement of gas/solid two-phase flow. Compared with the static numerical simulation, this real-time dynamic 3-D simulation method can research on a designed capacitance sensor combining the dynamic characteristics of the two-phase flows for concentration measurement. Several fluid-electrostatic models of transmission pipes with different sensor structures are built. Under different test positions and different particle concentrations, the flow characteristics and the corresponding electric signals can be obtained, and the correlation coefficient between the concentration values and the capacitance values are used for performance evaluation of the sensors. The effects of flow regimes on concentration measurement are also been investigated in this paper. To validate the results of simulation, an experimental platform with horizontal straight pipe for phase volume concentration measurement of solid/air two-phase flow is built, and the experimental results agree well with simulation conclusions. The simulation and test results show that the coupling models can give constructive reference opinions for the sensor design and collection of installation position in different transmission pipelines, which are very important for the practical process of pneumatic conveying system.

The main objective of this study was to compare the removal efficiency of nutrients using Lactuca sativa, Medicago sativa and Phragmites australis in subsurface flow constructed wetlands with horizontal flow. In order to test water quality, fabricated reactors designed and the plants cultivated in the soil while their root were inside the wastewater. A long time study carried out from spring till end of autumn (9 months) in order to evaluate the difference in removal rate based on the seasonal changes. The highest removal rate was during summer which followed by spring and autumn. Thus, the effect of plants on the removal efficiency of organic matter (COD, BOD), TSS and nutrient (P and TN) appeared to be dependent on the seasonal growth. Phragmites australis the most sensitive species in order the removal of nutrient from wastewater.

The scope of this study was twofold: first, to introduce a new method in examining measurement invariance, especially with large-scale studies where a large number of group comparisons are involved: the alignment approach, where only configural invariance is necessary to achieve measurement invariance. Second, to evaluate the psychometric robustness of this approach using real-life data. Particularly, we applied this approach to examine whether the factor structure of a cognitive ability test (PGAT) exhibits measurement invariance across the 26 universities of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The sample consisted of 9,849 graduate students from 26 universities around the Kingdom. The results indicated a robust configural model suggesting that the P-GAT subscales were invariant across the 26 universities. Finally, the aligned factor mean values were estimated, and factor mean comparisons of every group’s mean with all other group means were conducted for both cognitive domains (Verbal and Quantitative). In both domains, King Saud University had the highest mean score among all universities. Moreover, its mean factor score was significantly higher than any other university besides Dammam University. On the other hand, several universities allocated at the northern and Southern borders of the country exhibited the lowest factor mean scores.

Objective: This study aimed to demonstrate the availability of portable devices for nasal FeNO measurement, which could replace exhaled NO measurement based on the continuous aspiration of multiple flow measurement systems. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study. The healthy subjects without rhinosinusis disorders (control group) and those with diagnosed allergic rhinitis (AR group) were enrolled in the study. They underwent nasal and bronchial FeNO measurements by both fixed flow NObreath® connected to nasal mask and multiple flows HypAir FeNO®. Results: A total of 153 people were recruited including 63 healthy subjects and 90 subjects with AR. There were no statistically significant differences in anthropometric characteristics between the two groups (P > 0.05). There were a significant increase in FeNO values in the AR group compared to the control group; concentrations of nasal and bronchial FeNO mearsured by NObreath® were 76.0 ± 50.7 ppb (vs 36.0 ± 28.1 ppb, P < 0.01) and 32.3 ± 15.4 ppb (vs 9.2 ± 5.6 ppb, P < 0.001), and those mearsured by NObreath® Hypair FeNO® were 1796.9 ± 523.3 ppb (vs 400.2 ± 123.1 ppb, P < 0.001) and 37.3 ± 23.0 ppb (vs 17.4 ± 18.3 ppb, P < 0.01). A weak correlation between the values measured by NObreath® and Hypair FeNO® devices was observed (r = 0.023 and r = 0.089, respectively; p < 0.05). Conclusions: The handheld NObreath® device is effective in measuring FeNO concentrations in both normal subjects and AR patients. The advantages in price and size, creating a compact, low-cost device that is convenient for use and research.

Despite extensive investigations of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21) since its development in 1995, its factor structure and other psychometric properties still need to be firmly established, with several calls for revising its item structure. Employing confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), this study examined the factor structure of the DASS-21 and five shortened versions of the DASS-21 among psychiatric patients (N = 168) and the general public (N = 992) during the COVID-19 confinement period in Saudi Arabia. Multigroup CFA, Mann Whitney W test, Spearman’s correlation, and coefficient alpha were used to examine the shortened versions of the DASS-21 (DASS-13, DASS-12, DASS-9 (two versions), and DASS-8) for invariance across age and gender groups, discriminant validity, predictive validity, item coverage, and internal consistency, respectively. Compared with the DASS-21, all three-factor structures of the shortened versions expressed good fit, with the DASS-8 demonstrating the best fit and highest item loadings on the corresponding factors in both samples (χ2(16, 15) = 16.5, 67.0; p = 0.420, 0.000; CFI= 1.000, 0.998; TLI = 0.999, 0.997; RMSEA = 0.013, 0.059, SRMR = 0.0186, 0.0203). It expressed configural, metric, and scalar invariance across age and gender groups. Its internal consistency was comparable to other versions (α = 0.94). Strong positive correlations of the DASS-8 and its subscales with the DASS-21 and its subscales (r = 0.97 to 0.81) suggest adequate item coverage and good predictive validity of this version. The DASS-8 and its subscales distinguished the clinical sample from the general public at the same level of significance expressed by the DASS-21 and other shortened versions, supporting its discriminant validity. Neither the DASS-21 nor the shortened versions distinguished patients diagnosed with depression and anxiety from other conditions. The DASS-8 represents a valid short version of the DASS-21, which may be useful in research and clinical practice for quick identification of individuals with potential psychopathologies. Diagnosing depression/anxiety disorders may be further confirmed in a next step by clinician-facilitated examinations. Brevity of the DASS-21 would save time and effort used for filling the questionnaire and support comprehensive assessments by allowing the inclusion of more measures on test batteries.

A multiscale model that enables quantitative understanding and prediction of the size effect on scattering properties of micro- and nanostructures is crucial for the design of LED surface textures optimized for high light extraction efficiency (LEE). In this paper, a hybrid process for combining full-wave finite-difference time-domain simulation and a ray-tracing technique based on a bidirectional scattering distribution function model is proposed. We apply this method to study the influence of different pattern sizes of a patterned sapphire substrate on GaN-based LED light extraction from the microscale to the nanoscale. The results show that near-wavelength–scaled patterns with strong diffraction are not expected to enhance LEE. By contrast, microscaled patterns with optical diffusion behavior have the highest LEE at a specific aspect ratio, and subwavelength-scaled patterns that have antireflection properties show marked enhancement of LEE for a wide range of aspect ratios.

A preliminary study of a wind turbine design is carried out using a wind tunnel to obtain its aerodynamic characteristics. Utilization of data from the study to develop large-scale wind turbines requires further study. This paper aims to discuss the use of wind turbine data obtained from the wind tunnel measurements to estimate the characteristics of wind turbines that have field size. The torque of two small-scale turbines was measured inside the wind tunnel. The first small-scale turbine has a radius of 0.14 m and the second small turbine has a radius of 0.19 m. Torque measurement results from both turbines were analyzed using Buckingham π theorem to obtain a correlation between torsion and diameter variations. The obtained correlation equation is used to estimate the field measurement of turbine power with a radius of 1.2 m. The resulting correlation equation can be used to estimate the power generated by the turbine by the size of the field well in the operating area of the tip speed ratio of the turbine design.

A space charge density wireless measurement system based on the idea of distributed measurement is proposed for collecting and monitoring the space charge density in an ultra-high-voltage direct-current (UHVDC) environment. The proposed system architecture is composed of a number of wireless nodes connected with space charge density sensors and a base station. The space charge density sensor based on atmospheric ion counter method is elaborated and developed, and the ARM microprocessor and Zigbee radio frequency module are applied. The wireless network communication quality and the relationship between energy consumption and transmission distance in the complicated electromagnetic environment is tested. Based on the experimental results, the proposed measurement system demonstrates that it can adapt to the complex electromagnetic environment under the UHVDC transmission lines and can accurately measure the space charge density.

The group delay response of chirped fiber Bragg gratings (CFBG) written in polarization-maintaining fiber can be measured using the beat spectrum of the reflections from the two polarization axis, with a resolution and reproducibility better than 50 fs. The method is theoretically described, and we analyze the effect of group delay ripples (GDR) on the performance of a stretcher-compressor pair used in chirped pulse amplification systems. Ripples with a spectral period of the order of the pulse bandwidth are the most deleterious. Those are readily captured with our method, despite the limit on resolution due to the fiber polarization beat length. As a rule of thumb, the GDR should not exceed half the pulse duration. The reconstructed phase of the CFBG is also used to predict the pulse compression performance for a given device. Measurement of GDR as low as 161 fs is experimentally demonstrated.

Tumor to stroma ratio is a highly debated prognostic factor in the management of several solid tumors and there is no universal agreement on its practicality. In our study we proposed to confirm or dismiss the hypothesis that a simple measurement of stroma quantity is an easy-to-use and strong prognostic tool. We have included 74 consecutive patients with colorectal cancer who underwent primary curative abdominal surgery. The tumors have been grouped into stroma-poor (stroma &lt;10%), medium-stroma (between 10 and 50%) and stroma-rich (over 50%). The proportion of tumor stroma ranged from 5% to 70% with a median of 25%. Very few, only 6.8% of patients had stroma-rich tumors, 4% stroma-poor tumors and 89.2%tumors with a medium quantity of stroma. The proportion of stroma, at any cut-off, had no statistically significant influence on the disease specific survival. This can be explained by the low proportion of stroma-rich tumors in our patient group and the inverse correlation of stroma proportion with tumor grade. The real-life proportion of stroma-rich tumors and the complex nature of the stroma-tumor interaction has to be further elucidated.

Energy Measurement and Verification (M&V) aims to make inferences about the savings achieved in energy projects, given the data and other information at hand. Traditionally, a frequentist approach has been used to quantify these savings and their associated uncertainties. We demonstrate that the Bayesian paradigm is an intuitive, coherent, and powerful alternative framework within which M&V can be done. Its advantages and limitations are discussed, and two examples from the industry-standard International Performance Measurement and Verification Protocol (IPMVP) are solved using the framework. Bayesian analysis is shown to describe the problem more thoroughly and yield richer information and uncertainty quantification than the standard methods while not sacrificing model simplicity. We also show that Bayesian methods can be more robust to outliers. Bayesian alternatives to standard M&V methods are listed, and examples from literature are cited.

This paper presents a novel approach to power management techniques in energy storage system (ESS) interoperability with the energy power system (EPS) by inserting a SCADA controlled directional protection relay for improving the mode switching sequence. According with latest European standards, all necessary measures for re-synchronization and reconnection for health work of the system must be taken. The proposed approach intends to improve the “interface” between storage systems and electric power grid by using a directional relay which provides interoperability improvement by automatic recognizing and differentiating the switching sequence of the mode of operation from the fault mode. Simulated results from a small scale electrical generating system are provided. The results demonstrate that the proposed power management solution is technically ideal to achieve high quality energy while retaining the stability of the power grid network. The interoperability of PHS systems integrated with the electric power grid usually leads to perturbations in terms of frequency of the generated voltage, and for improving it we designed an automatic treating and re-connecting software module. This work regards the importance of producing electricity from green and renewable energy sources, while retaining the stability and reliability of the power grid. ESS systems are widely used to help balancing of intermittent forms of load demand on the electrical power grid at specific key moments. In this article, the pumped hydro storage (PHS) technologies are proposed as an economical way to utilize smoothly the off-peak energy or surplus energy, by pumping water to a reservoir at a higher level. During peak load periods, the stored water is discharged through the reversible pump-turbine to generate electricity to meet the peak demand controlled by designed SCADA application.

There is a need to find methods to intensify the anaerobic digestion process. One possibility is the use of pre-treatment techniques. Many laboratory tests confirm their effectiveness, but in most cases, there is no verification work carried out on industrial plants. The aim of the research carried out under laboratory conditions and on a large scale was to determine the technological and energy efficiency of the use of hydrodynamic cavitation in the pre-treatment of a waste mixture from dairy farms. It has been shown that hydrodynamic cavitation significantly increases the concentration of organic compounds in the dissolved phase. In the most effective variants, the increase in the content of these indicators was over 90% for both COD and TOC. The degree of solubilisation achieved was 49±2.6% for COD and almost 52±4.4% for TOC. Under laboratory conditions, the highest effects of anaerobic digestion were achieved after 10 minutes of pre-treatment. The amount of biogas was on average 367±18 mL/gCOD and the amount of methane 233±13 mL/gCOD. Further large-scale optimisation trials showed that after 8 minutes of hydrodynamic cavitation, the biogas yield was 327±8 L/kgCOD with a CH4 content of 62.9±1.9%. With this variant, the net energy yield was 66.4±2.6 kWh/day, a value that was 13.9% higher than the original variant with 10 minutes of disintegration and 3.1% higher than the variant without pre-treatment.

Forest ecosystems make a greater contribution to carbon (C) stocks than any other terrestrial ecosystem. To understand the role of regional forest ecosystems in global climate change and carbon exchange, forest C stock and its spatial distribution within the small (2,300 km2) Liuxihe River basin were analyzed to determine the different contributors to the C stock. Forest C stocks were quantified by measuring the biomass of trees, understory vegetation, litter and roots, as well as soil organic C, using data from field samples and laboratory experiments. The results showed that forests stored 38.04 Tg C in the entire basin, with secondary and planted forests accounting for 89.82% and 10.18%, respectively, of the stored C. Five types of forests, a subtropical evergreen broad-leaved forest, a subtropical coniferous and broad-leaved mixed forest, a subtropical coniferous forest, a timber forest, and a non-wood forest, stored 257.55 ± 15.01, 218.92 ± 9.59, 195.24 ± 18.29, 177.42 ± 17.55, and 117.86 ± 6.04 Mg C ha−1, respectively. In the forest ecosystem C stocks of the basin, soils averagely contribute about 73.78%, not including root underground biomass. It provides a comprehensive method for forest ecosystem carbon investigation and forest management in small basin scale.

Models of quantum measurements are presented, including observers subject to the laws of quantum mechanics. Observers perform multiple measurements in an attempt to disprove the collapse hypothesis. It is shown that under reasonable assumptions the effort cannot succeed. Under a unitary evolution the end state is a correlation between the result of the first measurement and the result(s) of the others, consistent with the observer's collapse hypothesis. The observer may conclude that the laws of nature include a non-unitary collapse mechanism, even if one does not actually exist. Discard of information is the crucial factor which distinguishes entanglement from measurement.

A variant of the von Neumann-Wigner Interpretation is proposed. It does not make use of the familiar language of wave functionsand observers. Instead it pictures the state of the physical world as a vector in a Fock space and, therefore not, literally, a functionof any spacetime coordinates. And, rather than segregating consciousness into individual points of view (each carrying with it asense of its proper time), this model proposes only unitary states of consciousness, Q(t), where t represents a fiducial time withrespect to which both the state of the physical world and the state of consciousness evolve. States in our world's Fock space areclassified as either 'admissible' (meaning they correspond to definite states of consciousness) or 'inadmissible' (meaning they donot). The evolution of the state vector of the world is such as to always keep it restricted to 'admissible' states. Consciousness istreated very much like what Chalmers calls an "M-Property." But we try to show that problems with the quantum Zeno effect do not arise from this model.

Small scale carp polyculture plays a key role for food supply in Bangladesh, however, factors including water pollution, limited infrastructure and inadequate disease management hinder its sustainability. This paper reports on a survey of 231 farmers across the 6 major carp producing regions in Bangladesh, analyzing factors including, farmers’ social aspects, farm characteristics, information on disease and approaches adopted to combat them, and biosecurity practices. Almost half (46.8%) of the farms surveyed experienced disease in carp species, with clear regional variations. Eighty four percent of farms reported carp mortalities during disease outbreak, with an average mortality level 10.23±11.81%. Clinical signs during outbreaks lasted between a week and a month, and there was a peak in disease outbreaks in two seasonal periods between June to July and October to December. Disease incidence was related to a range of factors including the farmer experience, ponds/farm type, stocked species, and biosecurity practice. A combination of disinfecting measures during pond preparation and measures during stocking, including discarding fingerling transport water off-farm, fingerling disinfection and check the health of fingerlings before stocking significantly reduced disease occurrence. Treatments involving the antibiotics, ciprofloxacin, erythromycin, and azithromycin were reported as ineffective, raising concerns about non-prudent use, inadequate dosing (perhaps without appropriate veterinary guidance) and the potential for further driving antimicrobial resistance in the environment. The research unveils a concerning pattern of disease high disease incidence across small-scale carp farms in Bangladesh and the significant potential for disease spread highlights the need for responsible disposal practices. The study emphasizes the need for improving training and awareness programs are vital for addressing biosecurity and disease management challenges, ensuring sustainable aquaculture and community well-being.

In this nano era, nanomaterials and nanostructures are popular in developing novel functional materials. However, the combinations of nanoproducts with materials at micro and macro scale can open new routes for conceiving novel materials with an improved or even new functional performances. In this study, a brand-new hybrid, containing both nanofibers and particles having a microsize, was fabricated using a sequential electrohydrodynamic atomization (EHDA) process. Firstly, the microparticles loaded with drug (berberine hydrochloride, BH) molecules in the cellulose acetate (CA) were fabricated using a solution electrospraying process. Later, these microparticles were suspended into a co-dissolved solution containned BH and a hydrophilic polymer (polypyrrolidone, PVP), and were co-electrospun into the nanofiber/microparticle hybrids. The EHDA processes were clearly recorded, and the resultant products showed a typical hybrid topography, with microparticles distributed all over the nanofibers, which was demonstrated by SEM assessments. FTIR and XRD demonstrated that the components within the hybrids were presented in an amorphous state and have fine compatibility with each other. In vitro dissolution tests verified that the hybrids were able to provide the designed dula-step drug release profiles, a combination of the fast release step of BH from the hydrophilic PVP nanofibers through an erosion mechanism and the sustained release step of BH from the insoluble CA microparticles via a typical Fickian diffusion mechanism. The present protocols pave a new way for developing trans-scale functional materials.

Different values of the Hubble constant for extragalactic objects are not considered here. We give a number of examples of the extreme accordance of expansion rates of different fields of knowledge with the cosmological expansion rate. The coincidence of the expansion rates means that a common cause is almost inevitable. All these examples are gravitationally bound in themselves and in this case are subject to cosmological expansion. According to standard theory, this should not happen. We therefore question the common boundary of gravity and expansion for both theoretical and observational reasons and conclude that all gravitationally dominated objects participate in cosmological expansion or scale drift, contrary to general doctrine. The space expands with its contents while numerically maintaining distance, radius, rotation time and density. What is generally interpreted as an expansion is obviously a scale drift with a drift rate that corresponds to the size of the Hubble constant. The Earth is subject to expansion and scale drift. This results in numerically constant measured values. This drift apparently also applies to distant galaxies and other objects. The cosmological red shift is not interpreted here as a Doppler effect and numerical increase in distances, but in accordance with standard theory as an expansion or drift of the space-time scale. The expansion of the radii of galaxies makes the assumption of dark matter superfluous. The continents and our everyday environment are not subject to expansion or scale drift.

It is important to realize the transformation behavior of wüstite because it greatly affects the final structure of the oxide layer and the surface quality of the steel products. In the present study, the transformation behaviors of the wüstite layer are examined under nearly-oxygen-free conditions, to simulate the cooling processes after the hot rolled strip is coiled. As the single phase wüstite was prepared at 950˚C, the 460˚C transformed oxide layer was composed of a mixture of iron and magnetite formed through eutectoid reactions. For the 750˚C-fabricated wüstite, only magnetite was observed after transformation, without iron precipitates and residual wüstite. It is speculated that the unusual transformation behavior of the low-temperature-made wüstite results from the pseudo-structural intermediate phase transformation between wüstite and magnetite. This pseudo-structure is a pre-transformed wüstite and of various concentration of ferrous ion, which is determined by the fabrication conditions. During the hot strip mill process, the so-called wet scale, wüstite, is produced continuously from finish mill to laminar flow sections and ended at 570˚C. Consequently, the final eutectoid transformation below 570˚C is dominantly controlled by the surface temperature ranged from 750˚C to 950˚C for low carbon steel.

The result of the multidisciplinary collaboration of researchers from different areas of knowledge to validate a solar radiation model is presented. The MAPsol is a 3D local-scale adaptive solar radiation model that allows to estimate direct, diffuse and reflected irradiance for clear sky conditions. The model includes the adaptation of the mesh to complex orography and albedo, and considers the shadows cast by the terrain and buildings. The surface mesh generation is based on surface refinement, smoothing and parameterisation techniques and allows the generation of high quality adapted meshes with a reasonable number of elements. Another key aspect of the paper is the generation of a high-resolution digital elevation model (DEM). This high-resolution DEM is constructed from LiDAR data and its resolution if two times more accurate than the publicly available DEMs. The validation process uses direct and global solar irradiance data obtained from pyranometers at the University of Salamanca located in an urban area affected by systematic shading from nearby buildings. This work provides an efficient protocol for studying solar resources, with particular emphasis on areas of complex orography and dense buildings where shadows can potentially make solar energy production facilities less efficient.

In this study, we address the formidable challenge of solving large-scale Max-Cut problems (MCP). We introduce a rapid computational procedure utilizing a hybrid 1-flip/r-flip local search heuristic. This innovative strategy significantly reduces the computational time required for MCP problems while consistently generating solutions of exceptional quality. The paper presents substantial computational insights, showcasing the effectiveness of our approach on very-large-scale Max-Cut instances with varying densities. Our proposed heuristic is rigorously evaluated by comparing its performance against a quantum annealing solver, leveraging a multi-start Tabu Search framework. The results underscore the potency of this unique combination as an efficient and effective solution for large-scale QUBO problems. Notably, our hybrid heuristic consistently delivers high-quality solutions within the stringent CPU time limits of 600 seconds, demonstrating its efficacy across Max-Cut instances ranging from 10,000 to 40,000 variables. This research contributes to advancing the state-of-the-art in large-scale QUBO problem-solving, offering a powerful and time-efficient approach with broad applicability.

The present work studies the concept of productivity in shipbuilding and how it should be measured. The existing metrics, shipbuilding process and shipyard organization were studies in order to choose the most adequate metrics which would allow the measuring of a shipyard productivity in a systematic and holistic way. This is achieved by gathering the man-hours spent in each ship organized by cost centre and using Compensated Gross Tonnages as the measure of output from the shipyard. Data was gathered for thirty ships built in the same European yard organized by cost centre. From the data collected it was found that the ratio of hours spent in outfitting to the hours spent in structures is proportional to the complexity of the ship. There was also opportunity to study the work reduction resulting from building ships in series and the shares of labour for ships series and across ship types.

Qualitative and quantitative values estimation is a crucial aspect of social data science and plays a vital role in social and psychological research. Numerous methods of personal values measurement such as Schwartz Value Survey (SVS) and its re-modified versions have been proposed and invented, but many are challenged with one or more limitations. In this article, an alternative approach in a new paradigm of values measurement called Kabiru’s Value Survey (KVS) was proposed to measure the relative degree of importance or significance attached to particular value-actions of an individual(s) in a given population over a period. The methodological innovations in KVS unlike other existing methods of human value measurement include the use of habitually reported practices associated with a particular value-action in place of judging the series of Schwartz hypothetical statements, the use of multiple dependent variables rather than a single coded hypothetical statement. In terms of data analysis, a new approach of multivariate compression is introduced which merges the chain of multiple dependent variables into one coded scale. Psychometric result interpretation is also another innovative aspect of KVS methodology. Finally, the proposed methodology however solved some of the criticized limitations of the other methods of human value measurement.

This study aimed to conduct a cross-cultural adaptation of the development of the cat-owner/dog-owner relationship scales. The method encompassed several stages: conceptual, item, semantic, operational, measurement, and functional equivalence. Processes included translations, synthesis of translations, back-translations, consensus on the English versions, external evaluation by the original authors, expert committee evaluation, and pre-tests. The study involved surveying 342 pet owners throughout Brazil using a 20-item questionnaire. Data analyses utilized confirmatory factor analysis, covariance-based modeling, and multigroup analysis. The techniques confirmed that the scale preserved its psychometric properties and showed no variance between dog and cat owners, indicating that the measured constructs are universal and unaffected by specific cultural nuances. Hence, the cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the scale facilitate applying and testing concepts and measures in diverse contexts, enriching our understanding of the dynamics between owners and their pets (dogs and cats) in different living situations. In addition, this research holds particular significance in Brazil, given the country’s vast cultural diversity.

Earth's global surface temperature shows variability on an extended range of temporal scales and satisfies an emergent scaling symmetry. Recent studies indicate that scale invariance is not only a feature of the observed temperature fluctuations, but an inherent property of the temperature response to radiative forcing, and a principle that links the fast and slow climate responses. It provides a bridge between the decadal- and centennial-scale fluctuations in the instrumental temperature record, and the millennial-scale equilibration following perturbations in the radiative balance. In particular, the emergent scale invariance makes it possible to infer equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS) from the observed relation between radiative forcing and global temperature in the instrumental era. This is verified in ensembles of Earth system models (ESMs), where the inferred values of ECS correlate strongly to estimates from idealized model runs. For the range of forcing data explored in this paper, the method gives best estimates of ECS between 2.3 and 3.4 K.

Background: Patients with allergic rhinitis (AR) have bothersome symptoms that may assess using the visual analog scale (VAS). Asthma frequently is associated with AR. The present study investigated the role of VAS in children with newly-diagnosed AR. Methods: Parameters were VAS for nasal and asthma symptoms, and doctor’s perception of these diseases, medication use, and asthma comorbidity. Results: 67% of AR children had asthma. Severity of perceived nasal symptoms was associated with more intense asthma symptoms and doctor’s perception of disease severity (p<0.001 and p=0.02, re-spectively. Conclusions: Allergic rhinitis frequently is associated with asthma in child-hood. Symptom perception assessment using VAS is a simple tool for assessing their intensity. Moreover, the severity of nasal symptoms is associated with asthma symptom severity. Therefore, asthma should be carefully considered in AR children and require appropriate symptom perception assessment.

Starting with unitary quantum dynamics, we investigate how to add quantum measurements. Quantum measurements have four essential components: the furcation, the witness production, an alignment projection, and the actual choice decision. The first two components still lie in the domain of unitary quantum dynamics. The decoherence concept explains the third contribution. It can be based on the requirement that witnesses reaching the end of time on the wave function side and the conjugate one have to be identical. In this way, it also stays within the quantum dynamics domain. The surjection hypothesis explains the actual choice decision. It is based on a two boundary interpretation applied to the complete quantum universe. It offers a simple way to reduce these seemingly random projections to purely deterministic unitary quantum dynamics, eliminating the measurement problem.

In order to enhance the accuracy of the relative velocity measurement for the Mars explorer formation flight, we develop a relative velocity measurement method. In this method, the spectrometers at two Mars explorers are adopted to measure the starlight frequency shift and to estimate the velocity with respect to the star. Unfortunately, the instantaneous velocity of star can not be predicted accurately, which results in a large error in the velocity measurement. The difference of these two velocities, which does not include the proper motion of star, is the relative velocity between a pair of Mars explorers at the direction of the star. However, this navigation method can not work alone because of unobservability. To make the navigation system observable and improve the accuracy of both absolute and relative navigation for the Mars explorer formation flight, we combine it with X-ray pulsar navigation and the inter-satellite links, and propose an autonomous integrated navigation method with observability. In this integrated navigation scheme, the extended Kalman filter is adopted to deal with the relative velocity, the inter-satellite links and the pulse time-of-arrival, and estimate the absolute and relative navigation information for the Mars explorer formation flight. The simulation results demonstrate that both absolute and relative navigation accuracy of the proposed method are higher than that of the pulsar navigation, especially the relative one.

Objective: To explore the inter-rater reliability of the Measurement Of adherence Via Exercise Demonstration (MOVED) adherence tool. Design: Reliability study of a patient adherence measurement tool.Setting: Simulated physiotherapist-patient consultations. Participants: Sixteen experienced physiotherapists rated patient adherence to exercise. Interventions: N/A Main Outcome Measure: Inter-rater reliability of MOVED.Methods: The MOVED tool consists of two parts. Part one asks patients to self-report their adherence to exercise dose (including number of completed sessions, sets and repetitions in the last seven days). Part two asks patients to demonstrate each exercise. Component scores are totalled to give an overall level of patient adherence to each exercise.Participants were provided with a copy of five physiotherapist-prescribed exercises. Participants were then shown five corresponding video vignettes of simulated physiotherapist-patient consultations where patients were asked to self-report exercise frequency, sets and repetitions and demonstrate each exercise within the context of a consultation. Participants were asked to rate the level of patient adherence to each of the five exercises using the MOVED tool. Inter-rater reliability of MOVED scores was assessed using Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC) and 95% Confidence Intervals. Results: The ICC of part one (self-report) was .90 (95%CI .74-.98), part two (demonstration) was .98 (95%CI .94-.99) and total score was .96 (95%CI .88-.99), demonstrating excellent inter-rater reliability. Conclusion: The MOVED tool, which can highlight whether patients are adhering to exercise technique as well as exercise dose, may provide clinicians and researchers with a more robust measure of exercise adherence when compared with other measures currently available.

Background: The adoption of self-care behaviors among patients with congestive heart failure (CHF) is essential for the management of their health condition. However, there is a lack of tools for estimating self-care in CHF patients. We aim to develop and validate the Hippocratic heart failure self-care scale (HHFSCS). Methods: the scale includes 22 items which are reviewed by a committee of experts. Individuals indicate the frequency at which they follow each self-behavior on a five-point Likert scale. Adult patients with CHF (n=250) from a General Hospital, in Athens, were participated in the study from June 2020 to March 2021. Reliability coefficients and Explanatory Factor Analysis (EFA), using a Varimax rotation and the Principal Components Method were used to assess the psychometric measurements. Results: The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of the HHFSCS was 0.807. The exploratory factor analysis identified two domains that accounted for 88.44% of the variance of the scale items; however, each sub-scale could not be used as an independent scale. Finally, the test-retest showed a significant strong correlation (r=0.973, p&lt;0.001). Conclusions: The HHFSCS is a reliable and valid tool for assessing self-behaviors in CHF patients. Health professionals can use it in their clinical practice to improve the management of patient’s health conditions.

One of the most popular techniques for determining electrical properties of material is the free-space measurement technique. With the potential for new applications requiring efficient, accurate and broadband material measurement systems using higher millimeter-wave and terahertz frequencies, the free-space measurement method has received renewed interest. This is mainly due to its simplicity, favorable properties as a non-destructive method, and it allows transmission and reflection measurements without any physical contact with the sample. This paper reviews and discusses state- of-the-art free space material measurement systems, starting with the different measurement techniques available for material characterization, their important concepts, post-processing in determining their properties, and progress towards expanding their use at higher frequencies. Also, this paper reviews dielectric material characterization using the free space method focusing on their application extension towards the higher frequencies. Besides, the algorithms for conversion methods and usage of lens in free space material measurement system was discussed in this paper. Finally, a future perspective on the outlook of this free space method is presented prior to the conclusion.

Acquisition of real-time hydraulic data is an essential component for flood forecasting. However, we frequently face difficulties in obtaining discharge data using classical contact methods during high magnitude floods and for systems experiencing rapid hydro-geomorphological adjustment. Therefore, we developed low-cost, non-contact sensors and platforms that are designed to overcome these difficulties. These advances enable flood flow properties to be monitored at multiple locations across a river catchment, at low-cost, and communicated in near real-time by using an image velocimetry method. This is an optics-based approach for stream flow measurement using commercially available near-infrared digital cameras to acquire video footage in full HD (30fps). Video footage is then subjected to optical flow tracking techniques based on cross-correlation, and feature-based tracking, enabling the displacement rates of detected features (for example natural foam, seeds, woody debris, and turbulent structures) to be computed. This manual provides step by step guidance to install an image-based gauging station. It contains the list of necessary components, the calibration process of a new camera and the assembly procedure of the system.

Self-report measurement is frequently used in human sports to assess training adaptations [1, 2]. This is a technique novel to the equestrian sport. The aim of this study was to describe how elite event riders of Germany evaluate their own fitness as well as that of their horses for the entire duration of an eventing season. Additionally, correlations with possible influencing external factors such as type of training or duration of grazing were also investigated. Short online questionnaires were used to allow eight riders to describe the training of their horses. Five criteria (general performance, ability to concentrate, general state of mind, general muscular condition and emotional wellbeing) were used to assess both, their horse's, as well as their own wellbeing. A 1-10 rating scale was used to score each criterion resulting in an average of 38 points out of 50 (maximum wellbeing) for horse (Std. dev. 0.55) and rider (Std. dev. 0.65) respectively. A total of 120 questionnaires were analysed. A correlation could be demonstrated (Spearman's correlation coefficient = 0.5) between rider and horse score, whereby it only became a linear correlation above 30 points. In addition, the horse score correlates positively with its success at competitions. While the horses were rated similarly throughout the season, the riders’ perceived welfare was higher in the middle of the season compared with the beginning and end of the season. Regularly turned-out horses resulted in higher horse scores (Linear mixed model, p=0,04, n=120). It can be concluded that the self-report measurement of fatigue and wellbeing can be a useful tool for trainers and riders to better determine the horse’s fatigue and recovery. It should be noted that external factors influence both, rider and horse assessment.

Introduction and Problem: With conventional mechanical rotation measurement of joints, only static measurements are possible with the patient at rest. In the future, however, it would be interesting to carry out dynamic rotation measurements, for example when walking or doing sports. Therefore, a measurement method with an elastic capacitive measuring system was developed and validated. Material and Methods: The measurement system consists of a capacitive strain gauge connected to a flexible printed circuit board. The electronics on the printed circuit board are used for data acquisition and transmission. When the sensor strip is stretched, the distance between the fingers of the strain gauge changes and with it the capacitance. Consequently, the strain can be measured via the change in capacitance. The measurement system is taped to the knee with the sensor on the skin in the direction of the anterolateral ligament (ALL). The bottom of the sensor (silicone) and the bottom of the circuit board are in contact with the knee surface. The sensor must be attached to the knee without pre-stretching The system is validated with an in vivo test on 11 patients. For this purpose, the internal rotational laxity of the knee was tested on healthy volunteers and the results compared with the measurements on the static measuring device (Laxitester). The subjects are placed in the supine position. First the left and then the right leg is clinically examined one after the other and documented using an examination form. Exclusion criteria are the presence of a pathological ligament findings in the area of the collateral/cruciate ligaments, previous knee operations or limitations in the range of motion. The distal thigh rests on a support bench on which a knee joint flexion of 30° is set by height adjustment. The femoral condyles are secured against rotation in the positioning aid by posts. This also prevents internal rotation and displacement of the thigh. The foot is strapped into the holding device without shoes. The second toe beam is centered using an adjustable side clamp on the medial and lateral edge of the foot. Dorsiflexion is set at 2 Nm with a torque meter, in accordance with previous studies, to rule out rotational laxity in the ankle. The strain gauge sensor is taped to Gerdii’s tubercle in the course of the antero-lateral ligament below the lateral epicondyle of the thigh. Then, in three repeated measurements, the internal rotation of the foot and thus the lower leg is measured with a torque of 2 Nm. The change in length of the stretch mark is compared with the measured internal rotation angle in the static measuring device (Laxitester). Results: A significant difference between the sexes was found in the internal rotation range of the knee (p=0.003). The range of rotation was greater for female participants than for male participants. Regarding the measured length change values, the measurements presented showed an individual result for each participant, which tended to decrease with increasing internal rotation angle, with no age or gender differences being observed. The stiffness of the strain gauge was in the linear range for all measurements, within the first 20% strain of the sensor. The differences determined do not result from a different stretching of the sensor, but from individual differences between the test persons. The comparison between length change and internal rotation angle of the knee showed a strong positive correlation (r=1, p&lt;0.01). Conclusion: Elastic capacitive strain gauges can be used to reliably measure the internal rotation angle of the knee joint. This will allow dynamic measurements in the future.

The purpose of this study was to examine the problem of violent extremism among young people. Additionally, a youth violent extremism scale (YVES) was developed that takes into account the differences between and within Arab cultures. The goal was to produce a scale that could be used and tested within an Arab country or between Arab countries. The scale was developed in three stages: generation, refinement, and validation. A literature review and nomological network were utilized to show the scale's dimensions, correlations to those dimensions, and other relevant variables (such as the LSC, LSE, and criminality scale). A sample of 6726 young students from fifteen Arab countries and the authorities involved were selected. Findings showed that six factors were obtained through principal component factor analysis using Varimax and Kaiser normalization (29 items). A significant positive association was found (r=.651, p = 0.000), supporting the scale's validity. Using Cronbach's alpha, the scale reliability was strong and assessed at 0.98. The scale's construct validity was estimated by assessing the correlation between the Youth Violent Extremism scale and low self-control. A significant positive correlation (r=.651, p = 0.000) indicates the scale's validity. Findings showed significant differences between males and females in youth violent extremism (F = 13.678, α ≤0.000). Descriptive results showed, however, that females have a slightly higher mean of violent extremism than males (M =85.2 vs. 87.6), with a close variation (26 vs. 27) for males and females, respectively. In this study, a measurement tool was provided that can be used as a knowledge base for security strategies. The scale can be applied to identify legal, social, and educational policies and applications of violent extremism. Future research is needed to test the scale on different professions like teachers, police officers, and parents. Also, a need to test the scale on different age groups, settings, and cultures. A need for atheoretical and empirical framework for understanding and preventing youth violent extremism through promoting a more cohesive and resilient youth society.

To solve the problem of complex sensor installation and easy damage in contact displacement measurement, a non-contact measurement method of brace displacement in bridge swivel construction based on binocular vision is proposed in this study. Combined with monitoring data in a swivel construction interchange project, binocular vision system was compared and analyzed with the traditional displacement meter and total station. Results showed that force versus displacement variation plots were obtained by binocular visual measurement in the weighing test, the inflection point can be clearly distinguished, and the position of the inflection point was the same as that of the displacement meter; monitoring data of binocular vision measurement and total station were compared and analyzed in the bridge swivel process, the average error was no more than 0.18 mm, the maximum error was no more than 0.42 mm, and the standard deviation was no more than 0.12. The method proposed in this study can be used as an alternative to displacement meter and total station measurement methods in bridge swivel construction, the problem of complex sensor installation and easy damage is solved in brace displacement measurement, equipment and labor costs can be effectively saved.

The importance of frailty in older people is getting constant recognition as an important aspect both in terms of public health, as well in personal level for the appropriate management of an older person health condition. This is reflected by the continuously increasing number of research studies carried out in several settings across different countries. Sometimes this is very solid, but in other cases there is a considerable gap in terms of accurate and well grounded documentation of frailty status. This is the case in Greece, where we are missing clinically validated tools to approach frailty. We are missing frailty screening tools, such as for instance PRISMA 7, the gold standard tool of Fried criteria is somehow problematic since the question referring to physical activity originates from a questionnaire that has not been translated and validated, while Clinical Frailty Scale has been validated for the translation but not for the capacity to detect frailty. Aim of this study is to validate these tools for their accuracy to detect frailty by using a measurable index of frailty, previously proposed for use in clinical studies: the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB). 74 male and female participants have been evaluated for their frailty status using different tools. We observed that PRISMA 7 translation detects frailty only when one question is removed at a cut-off of ≥ 2 and indicated a sensitivity of 88.1%, and specificity of 99.9% with a good correlation with SPPB measurements (r = 0.858; p &lt; 0.001). When CFS was validated using SPPB it demonstrated a very good correlation (r = -0.838; p &lt; 0.001 respectively) as it was the case for the modified Fried Criteria (r = -0.725; p &lt; 0.001). All items demonstrated a good correlation between them. We can here propose that we can accurately assess frailty status in the community setting by using a modified version of Fried criteria, Clinical Frailty Scale translation in Greek and we can screen for frailty by using the Greek translation of PRISMA 7 only after removing the item 6 of the questionnaire.

Artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) has been an important source of income for communities in the Madre de Dios River Basin in Peru for hundreds of years. However, in recent decades, the scale of ASGM activities in the region has increased dramatically, and exposures to a variety of occupational and environmental hazards related to ASGM, including mercury, are becoming more widespread. The aims of our study were to: (1) examine patterns in the total hair mercury level of human participants in several communities in the region and compare these results to the 2.2 µg/g total hair mercury level equivalent to the World Health Organization (WHO) Expert Committee of Food Additives (JECFA)’s Provisional Tolerable Weekly Intake (PTWI); and (2), to measure the mercury levels of paco (Piaractus brachypomus) fish raised in local aquaculture ponds, in order to compare these levels to the EPA Fish Tissue Residue Criterion of 0.3 µg Hg/g fish (wet weight). We collected hair samples from 80 participants in four communities (one control and three where ASGM activities occurred) in the region, and collected 111 samples from fish raised in 24 local aquaculture farms. We then analyzed the samples for total mercury. Total mercury levels in hair were statistically significantly higher in the mining communities than in the control community, and increased with increasing distance away from the Madre de Dios headwaters (as the crow flies), did not differ by sex, and frequently exceeded the reference level. Regression analyses indicated that higher hair mercury levels were associated with residence in ASGM communities. The analysis of paco fish samples found no samples that exceeded the EPA tissue residue criterion. Collectively, these results align with other recent studies showing that ASGM activities are associated with elevated human mercury exposure. The fish farmed through the relatively new process of aquaculture in ASGM areas appeared to have little potential to contribute to human mercury exposure. More research is needed on human health risks associated with ASGM to discern occupational, residential, and nutritional exposure, especially through tracking temporal changes in mercury levels as fish ponds age, and assessing levels in different farmed fish species. Additionally, research is needed to definitively determine that elevated mercury levels in humans and fish result from the elemental mercury from mining, rather than from a different source, such as the mercury released from soil erosion during deforestation events from mining or other activities.

In the rapidly evolving landscape of the AI era, the measurement of Computational Thinking ability among Computer Science (CS) University students is of paramount importance. This study introduces UniCTCheck, a novel method designed to assess the main components of Computational Thinking in CS students. Utilizing two key instruments, namely the web application CTScore and the psychometric scale CTProg, this research aims to precisely evaluate seven core components of Computational Thinking and six programming concepts skills essential for CS students. The study, conducted at Rey Juan Carlos University and Atlantic Technological University Galway, involved a diverse sample of students from different year levels and program specializations. Through a rigorous research design, including sampling strategies and data collection tools, this study seeks to address critical research questions related to measurement of variations in students' Computational Thinking and programming skills by gender, university level, and location. By shedding light on the significance of Computational Thinking and programming in the educational realm, this research contributes to the existing literature and underscores the essential role of computational skills in the modern era.

This research work was aimed at investigating and determining the depth resolution of a 500Mhz GPR Antenna. The survey was conducted in an open space at the Physics Department, College of science-KNUST. The MALA GPR equipment with 500MHz shielded Antenna in the common offset-mode was used to investigate the depth at which materials were buried. Concrete block, tree roots, plastic bottle with water, glass bottle and Electric wire were each buried in cavities with five different burial depths. The real depth of each material was measured both along and across the cavity and compared to their corresponding GPR measured depth. The comparison of the Real depth and the GPR depth showed almost identical depth measurements with a root mean square deviation of 0.028m. The implication of this is that the 500 Mhz GPR antenna can accurately locate and detect the position of buried materials in the subsurface at a depth within the range (0.20-0.66) m.

This review paper provides a comprehensive overview of machine vision pose measurement algorithms. The paper focuses on the state-of-the-art algorithms and their applications. The paper is structured as follows: The introduction in Section 1 provides a brief overview of the field of machine vision pose measurement. Section 2 describes the commonly used algorithms for machine vision pose measurement. Section 3 discusses the factors that affect the accuracy and reliability of machine vision pose measurement algorithms. Section 4 presents the applications of machine vision pose measurement in various fields. The paper provides specific examples of how machine vision pose measurement is used in each of these fields. Finally, Section 5 summarizes the paper and provides future research directions. The paper highlights the need for more robust and accurate algorithms that can handle varying lighting conditions and occlusion. It also suggests that the integration of machine learning techniques may improve the performance of machine vision pose measurement algorithms. Overall, this review paper provides a comprehensive overview of machine vision pose measurement algorithms, their applications, and the factors that affect their accuracy and reliability. It provides a valuable resource for researchers and practitioners working in the field of computer vision.

Ethics is a research field that is obtaining more and more attention in Computer Science due to the proliferation of artificial intelligence software, machine learning algorithms, robot agents (like chatbot), and so on. Indeed, ethics research has produced till now a set of guidelines, such as ethical codes, to be followed by people involved in Computer Science. However, a little effort has been spent for producing formal requirements to be included in the design process of software able to act ethically with users. In the paper, we investigate those issues that make a software product ethical and propose a set of metrics devoted to quantitatively evaluate if a software product can be considered ethical or not.

Online social networking techniques and large-scale multimedia retrieval are developing rapidly, which not only has brought great convenience to our daily life, but generated, collected, and stored large-scale multimedia data as well. This trend has put forward higher requirements and greater challenges on massive multimedia retrieval. In this paper, we investigate the problem of image similarity measurement, which is one of the key problems of multimedia retrieval. Firstly, the definition of similarity measurement of images and the related notions are proposed. Then, an efficient similarity measurement framework is proposed. Besides, we present a novel basic method of similarity measurement named SMIN. To improve the performance of similarity measurement, we carefully design a novel indexing structure called SMI Temp Index (SMII for short). Moreover, we establish an index of potential similar visual words off-line to solve to problem that the index cannot be reused. Experimental evaluations on two real image datasets demonstrate that the proposed approach outperforms state-of-the-arts.

Three-dimensional (3D) imaging has attracted more and more interests because of its widespread applications, especially in information and life science. These techniques can be broadly divided into two types: ray-based and wavefront-based 3D imaging. Issues such as imaging quality and system complexity of these techniques limit the applications significantly, and therefore many investigations have focused on 3D imaging from depth measurements. This paper presents an overview of 3D imaging from depth measurements, and provides a summary of the connection between these the ray-based and wavefront-based 3D imaging techniques.

Recently, there has been renewed interest in the performance, functionality, and sustainability of traditional small-scale storage interventions (check dams, farm bunds and tanks) used across India for the improvement of local water security. The Central Groundwater Board of India is en-couraging the construction of such interventions for the alleviation of water scarcity. It is of critical importance to understand the hydrological effect of these interventions at basin scales to maximise their effectiveness. The quantification of small-scale interventions in hydrological modelling is often neglected, especially in large-scale modelling exercises. A bespoke version of the GWAVA model was developed to assess the impact of interventions on the water balance of the Cauvery Basin and two smaller sub-catchments. Model results demonstrate that farm bunds appear to have a negligible effect on the estimated average annual simulated streamflow at the outlets of the two sub-catchments and the basin whereas tanks and check dams have a more significant effect. In-terventions generally were found to increase evaporation losses across the catchment. The model adaption used in this study provides a step-change in the conceptualisation and quantification of the consequences of small-scale storage interventions in large- or basin-scale hydrological models.

China's economic development has shifted from high speed to high quality. This study constructs an evaluation index for China’s high-quality development utilizing a new development concept. The entropy method and cluster analysis were used to assess the level of high-quality development in China between 2015 and 2021. Kernel density estimation method was employed to explore spatiotemporal dynamics. The results reveal significant differences in the level of economic development among provinces in China; the eastern region is significantly better than the central, northeastern, and western regions. From the perspective of the sub-item evaluation, challenges with uneven, uncoordinated, and insufficient economic development exist in various Chinese provinces.

This study investigates the suitability of the timestamp approach algorithm for predicting blood pressure (BP) using wearable and comfortable devices, showcasing its accuracy even with low-frequency sampled signals. Developed within the SINTEC European project, the algorithm utilizes Electrocardiogram (ECG) and Photoplethysmogram (PPG) sensors, demonstrating promising results in both laboratory and hospital settings. The research emphasizes the algorithm’s potential to transform continuous and non-invasive BP monitoring through wearable technology, offering frequent measurements with minimal discomfort. While the study shows promise, further exploration is needed, focusing on optimizing machine learning coefficients for long-term monitoring applications and addressing potential changes over time. Technological improvements, including the implementation of edge computing algorithms, hold the key to enhancing BP accuracy, denoising techniques, and integrating alarm systems for future wearable solutions. This study emphasizes the adaptability of the algorithm for diverse healthcare environments, paving the way for broader applications in convenient and reliable BP monitoring.

The accurate assessment of wound size is a critical step in advanced wound care management. This study aims to introduce and validate a Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technique for measuring wound size. Twenty-eight wounds treated from December 2022 to April 2023 at the Chunganam National University Hospital were analyzed. All wounds were measured using three techniques; conventional ruler methods, the LiDAR technique, and ImageJ analysis. Correlation analysis, linear regression, and Bland-Altman plot analysis were conducted to validate the accuracy of the newly introduced method. The measurement results (Mean ± Standard deviation) obtained using the Ruler method, LiDAR technique, and ImageJ analysis were 112.99 ± 110.07 cm², 73.59 ± 72.97 cm², and 74.29 ± 72.15 cm², respectively. The Pearson correlation coefficient was higher in the LiDAR application (0.995) than the conventional ruler methods (Mean difference; -5.0000 cm2), as was the degree of agreement (Mean difference; 38.6933 cm2). Wound size measurement using LiDAR is a simple and reliable method that allows practitioners to conveniently assess wounds with a flattened and irregular shape. However, non-flattened wounds cannot be assessed owing to the technical limitations of LiDAR.

The straightness error of guideway is one of the key indicators of ultra-precision machine, which plays an important role in the machining accuracy of work-piece. In order to measure straightness error of long distance ultra-precision guideway accurately, a splicing measurement for straightness error of guideway using high-precision flat mirror and displacement sensor was proposed in this paper, and the data splicing processing algorithm based on coordinate transformation was studied. Then comparative experiments on splicing measurement and direct measurement of straightness error were carried out on a hydrostatic guideway grinder. The maximum difference between the two measurements was about 0.3μm, which was far less than the straightness error of 5.8μm. The experiment demonstrated the correctness of the proposed splicing measurement method and data processing algorithm. To suppress the influence of straightness error on machining accuracy, a straightness error compensation algorithm based on error rotation transformation and vertical axis position correction was proposed, and the grinding experiment of a plane optics with size of 1400mm×500mm was carried out, whose flatness error after grinding was about 2.98μm. The straightness error of the grinding machine had been well suppressed.

A novel scheme that can simultaneously measure the Doppler frequency shift (DFS) and angle of arrival (AOA) of microwave signals is proposed. At the signal receiving unit (SRU), two echo signals and the reference signal are modulated by a Sagnac loop structure and sent to the central station (CS) for processing. At the CS, two low-frequency electrical signals are generated after polarization control and photoelectric conversion. The DFS without direction ambiguity and wide AOA measurement can be real-time acquired by monitoring the frequency and power of the two low-frequency electrical signals. In the simulation, an unambiguous DFS measurement with errors of ±3×10-3 Hz and a -90° to 90° AOA measurement range with errors of less than ±0.5° are realized. The safety and robustness of the system to environmental disturbance are improved, and it is more suitable for the modern electronic warfare system.

FPGA-based data acquisition and processing systems play an important role in modern high-speed, multichannel measurement systems, especially in High-Energy and Plasma Physics. Such FPGA-based systems require an extended control and diagnostics part corresponding to the complexity of the controlled system. Managing the complex structure of registers while keeping the tight coupling between hardware and software is a tedious and potentially error-prone process. Various existing solutions aimed at helping that task do not perfectly match all specific requirements of that application area. The paper presents a new solution based on the XML system description, facilitating the automated generation of the control system’s HDL code and software components and enabling easy integration with the control software. The emphasis is put on reusability, ease of maintenance in case of system modification, easy detection of mistakes, and the possibility of use in modern FPGAs. The presented system has been successfully used in data acquisition and preprocessing projects in High-Energy Physics experiments. It enables easy creation and modification of the control system definition and convenient access to the control and diagnostic blocks. The presented system is an open-source solution and may be adopted by the user for particular needs.

Cellular redox state is highly dynamic and delicately balanced between constant production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), and neutralization by endogenous antioxidants, such as glutathione. Physiologic ROS levels can function as signal transduction messengers, while high levels of ROS can react with and damage various molecules eliciting cellular toxicity. The redox state is reflective of the cell’s metabolic status and can inform on regulated cell-state transitions or various pathologies including aging and cancer. Therefore, methods that enable reliable, quantitative readout of the cellular redox state are imperative for scientists from multiple fields. Liquid-chromatography mass-spectrometry (LC-MS) based methods to detect small molecules that reflect the redox balance in the cell such as glutathione, NADH and NADPH, have been developed and applied successfully, but because redox metabolites are very labile, these methods are not easily standardized or consolidated. Here we report a robust LC-MS method for the simultaneous detection of several redox-reactive metabolites that is compatible with parallel global metabolic profiling in mammalian cells. We performed a comprehensive comparison between three commercial hydrophilic interaction chromatography (HILIC) columns, and we describe the application of our method in mammalian cells and tissues. The presented method is easily applicable and will enable the study of ROS function and oxidative stress in mammalian cells by researchers from various fields.

We present organic, diamagnetic materials based on structurally simple (hetero-) tolane derivatives. They form crystalline thin-film aggregates that are suitable for Faraday rotation (FR) spectroscopy. The resulting new materials are characterized appropriately by common spectroscopic (NMR, UV-Vis), microscopy (POM), and XRD techniques. The spectroscopic studies give extremely high FR activities thus makes these materials promising candidates for future practical applications. Other than a proper explanation, we insist in the complexity of designing efficient FR materials starting off from single molecules.

To understand the mystery of final unification, in our earlier publications, we proposed two bold concepts: 1) There exist three atomic gravitational constants associated with electroweak, strong and electromagnetic interactions. 2) There exists a strong elementary charge in such a way that its squared ratio with normal elementary charge is close to reciprocal of the strong coupling constant. In this paper we propose that, can be considered as a compound physical constant associated with proton mass, electron mass and the three atomic gravitational constants. With these ideas, an attempt is made to understand nuclear stability and binding energy. In this new approach, nuclear binding energy can be fitted with four simple terms having one unique energy coefficient with a formula, where is an estimated mean stable mass number. With this new approach, Newtonian gravitational constant can be estimated in a verifiable approach with a model relation of the form, where is the Fine structure constant. Estimated and is 62 ppm higher than the CODATA recommended It needs further investigation. Proceeding further, an attempt is made to fit the recommended quark masses.

The aim of this study is to evaluate the optimal conditions of membrane filtration process. Both laboratory test and pilot-scale test were conducted to examine a treated water on blending water. The water sample were prepared by blending a raw water and the effluent water filtered through an organic membrane. The optimal efficiency in the treatment of water quality at the lab-scale test was generated under conditions of flux at 2.0 m³/m²∙day, the blending ratio of 4:1, and the optimal dosage of coagulant at 20 ppm. The pilot-scale test resulted in that the optimal efficiency was obtained under conditions of flux at 2.0 m³/m²∙day and the blending ratio of 6.0:1. However, the different results between lab-scale and pilot-scale tests on the optimal dosage of coagulant implied that it is difficult to achieve the stable condition of process operation at the low level of coagulant. In summary, the results indicated that, in the combination process of organic membrane and ceramic membrane, the recovery efficiency was achieved above the level of 98.4 %. Compared to 92.1 % in a single organic membrane process, the combination process is 6.3 % more efficient than the single one. This combination process of water treatment lead to stable recovery rates by the optimal input of dosage, less pollution load to water, and a stabilized filtration system.

The feasibility of hydroelectric plants depends on a variety of factors: water resource regime, geo-graphical, geological and environmental context, available technology, construction cost and eco-nomic value of produced energy. Choices about the building or renewal of hydroelectric plants should be based on the forecast of the future trend of these factors at least during the project life of the system. Focusing on the economic value of the produced energy this paper examines its influ-ence on the feasibility of hydroelectric plants. Analysis, referred to Italian case, were based on three different phases: i) the economic sustainability of small-scale hydroelectric plants under a minimum price guaranteed to the hydroelectric operator; ii) the estimate of the incentives to reach the thresholds of "acceptability" and "bankability" of the investment; iii) the analysis of results ob-tained in the previous phases using a model of the evolution of the electricity price in the period 2014-2100.

Three-dimensional (3D) printing has allowed for production of geometrically complex 3D objects with extreme flexibility, which is currently undergoing rapid expansions in terms of materials, functionalities, as well as areas of application. When attempting to print 3D microstructures in glass, femtosecond laser induced chemical etching (FLICE) – which is a subtractive 3D printing technique – has proved itself a powerful approach. Here, we demonstrate fabrication of macro-scale 3D glass objects of large heights up to ~3.8 cm with an identical lateral and longitudinal spatial resolution of ~20 μm. The remarkable accomplishment is achieved by revealing an unexplored regime in the interaction of ultrafast laser pulses with fused silica which results in aberration-free focusing of the laser pulses deeply inside fused silica.

The Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) and the Brief Resilience Scale (BRS) are two widely used scales to measure resilience. Although both scales seek to assess an individual’s ability to recover from and adapt to disruptions or stressful events, they may capture different aspects of resilience. While the CD-RISC focuses on resources that can help individuals recover from and adapt to disruptions or stressful events, the BRS directly measures one’s ability to bounce back or be resilient. The aim of this study is to empirically examine the differences between the CD-RISC and the BRS. Two samples (n = 202, 246) consisting of undergraduate students from Taiwan were used. The results of confirmatory factor analysis show that the CD-RISC and the BRS are highly correlated but still distinct. The results of regression analyses show that the CD-RISC and the BRS have unique predictive effects on depression and life satisfaction. The research findings suggest that the CD-RISC and the BRS capture different aspects of resilience. For future research on resilience, researchers should pay attention to the differences between these scales and choose the one that most closely fits their research purpose.

Within the past decade, the aerospace engineering industry has evolved outside the constraints of using single, large, custom satellites. Due to increased reliability and robustness of commercial off the shelf (COTS) printed circuit board (PCB) components, missions instead have transitioned towards deploying swarms of smaller satellites. This approach significantly decreases the mission cost by reducing custom engineering and deployment expenses. Nanosatellites are able to be quickly developed with a more modular design at lowered risk. The Alpha mission at Cornell Space Systems Studio is fabricated in this manner. However, for the purpose of this mission, only one satellite was initially developed. This manuscript will discuss a systems engineering approach to the development of this satellite. As a disclaimer, this manuscript is written from a systems perspective. Therefore it will follow many subsystems from a wide range of functionalities. The research in this manuscript was kept broad with the hope to contribute to the mission as a system, through a range of development phases including validation and verification of existing methods. The two systems that will be primarily focused on are the Attitude Control System (ACS) of the carrier nanosatellite (cubesat), and the RF communications on the ex-creted picosatellites (chipsat). Milestones achieved in chipsat RF include chipsat to chipsat communication, chipsat to SDR ground station communication, packet creation, error correction, appending a preamble, and filtering the signal. Achievements on the ACS side included controller traceability/verification and validation, software rigidity tests, hardware endurance testing, Kane damper and IMU tuning. These developments matured the technological readiness level (TRL) of our systems in preparation for satellite deployment.

Federated learning is an effective approach for preserving data privacy and security, enabling machine learning to occur in a distributed environment and promoting its development. However, an urgent problem that needs to be addressed is how to encourage active client participation in federated learning. The Shapley Value, a classical concept in cooperative game theory, has been utilized for data valuation in machine learning services. Nevertheless, existing numerical evaluation schemes based on the Shapley Value are impractical as they necessitate additional model training, leading to increased communication overhead. Moreover, participants’ data may exhibit Non-IID characteristics, posing a significant challenge to evaluating participant contributions. Non-IID data weakens the marginal effects of participants, which in turn affects model accuracy and leads to underestimated contribution measurements. Current works often overlook the impact of heterogeneity on model aggregation. This paper presents a fair federated learning contribution measurement scheme that addresses the need for additional model computations. By introducing a noval aggregation weight, it enhances the accuracy of contribution measurement. Experiments on the MNIST dataset show that the proposed method can accurately compute the contributions of participants. Compared to existing baseline algorithms, the model accuracy is significantly improved, with a similar time cost.

The present paper reports an alternative solution of the measurement problem in quantum theory. The measurement problem can be characterized as that the U-procedure verses the R-procedure. The R-procedure is tested by the Yes/No measurement originally proposed by von Neuman and discussed in details by Penrose. We propose a novel stochastic sampling method to tackle the measurement paradox. Each testing sample produces a pair of Yes-number c and No-number d, which in turn generates a sample phase with respect to the exponential form of (c+id). All the sample phases forms a group G_R. Taking G_R as the sampling potential, combined with the dynamic phase group G_U，we establish a unified model of U-procedure and R-procedure for the evolution of wavefunction. Based on the Born rule, the probability of a sample is given by the squared magnitude of （c+id）. Some metaproperties of the new U-R model, such as natural transformation, consistency, and completeness, are presented. The present work provides a new picture of quantum mechanics and alike. The measurement problem widely exists in dynamic analysis, higher cognition, and large data modeling. Thus, the work reported here has a wide range of applications. Keywords: The measurement problem; U-R procedures; the Yes/No type measurement; stochastic sampling; sample phase; Born probability.

Market uncertainty has a significant impact on market performance. Previous studies put much efforts in investigations on market uncertainty related to information asymmetry and risk. However, they have neglected the uncertainty inherent in market transactions, which is also an important aspect of market performance, besides quantity of transactions and market efficiency. In this paper, we put forward the concept of transaction entropy to measure the market uncertainty and see how it changes with price. The definition of transaction entropy is the ratio of total information entropy of all traders to quantity of transactions, reflecting the level of uncertainty in making transactions. And the transaction entropy is the lowest at equilibrium, it will be decreasing in a shortage market, and increasing in a surplus market. Additionally, we make a comparison of total entropy of the centralized market with that of the decentralized market, revealing that the price filtering mechanism could effectively reduce market uncertainty. Overall, the introduction of transaction entropy enriches our understanding of market uncertainty and facilitates a more comprehensive assessment of market performance.

High-dimensional measurement error data are becoming more prevalent across various fields. Research on measurement error regression models has gained increasing attention due to the risk of drawing inaccurate conclusions if measurement errors are ignored. When the dimension p is larger than the sample size n, it is challenging to develop statistical inference methods for high-dimensional measurement error regression models due to the existence of bias, nonconvexity of objective function, high computational cost and many other difficulties. Over the past few years, some works have overcome the aforementioned difficulties and proposed several statistical inference methods. This paper mainly reviews the current development on estimation, hypothesis testing and variable screening methods for high-dimensional measurement error regression models and shows the theoretical results of these methods with some directions worthy of exploring for future research.

This paper presents a calibration and thermal compensation method that aims to minimize cost and processing time while maintaining high accuracy. First, the number of positions to perform the calibration procedure is optimized, and then, based on this optimized calibration number, thermal compensation is performed, which is necessary for environments with large temperature variations, since calibration parameters change at different temperatures. The calibration procedures and algorithms were experimentally validated on marketed accelerometers. Based on the optimized calibration method, the calibrated results have been obtained nearly 100 times improvement. Thermal drift calibration experiments on the triaxial accelerometer show that the thermal compensation scheme in this paper can effectively reduce drift in the temperature range of -40°C to 60°C. The temperature drifts of x- and y-axes are reduced from -13.2 and 11.8 mg to -0.9 and -1.1 mg, respectively. The z-axis temperature drift is reduced from -17.9 to 1.8 mg. We have conducted various experiments on the proposed calibration method and demonstrated its capacity to calibrate the sensor frame error model (SFEM) parameters. Therefore, the MEMS sensors calibrated in this paper have certain engineering application values for tilt measurement.

We communicate the theoretical results in the study of utilizing the quantum phenomena in optical current for quantum computation in the context of high precision voltage measurements. These results can be used around computation by quantum sampling and quantum communication as the basis for further research and physical implementations. We propose a Main Optical Setup (MOS) for such computation which allows to make a superstructure to implement specific computations and algorithms. To create MOS we used the nonlinear units (e.g., beta- barium borate crystal), arranged in series, powered with pulsed laser pump, and ended with the beam splitter to generate the output state of a number of entangled photon pairs. The computation is made by propagation of entanglement with beam splitters applied crossword and adjustable phase shifters that are tools for parameter steering. We show how to implement the series of cosine-based components on the example of two-component case. The results opens a broad area for future research in the area of building quantum optimizer using the quantum sampling methods and in the area of high precision temporal measurement of voltage, which is the important process for building high-fidelity devices.

A method for measuring the mechanical parameters of viscoelastic polymers by nanoindentation technology was proposed and verified. Through the mechanical response of load-displacement curves at different loading rates, then creep compliances and relaxation modulus were fitted. Polyimide thin film was employed in this research and experiments for five different loading rates were conducted. The fitting load-displacement loading curves obtained by the inversion method were identical to the experimental curves at five different loading rates，confirming the validity of the method. Moreover, with the loading rates increased，the fitting curves were more consistent commensurately with the nanoindentation experiment. DMA experiments were tested, and the generalized Kelvin/ Maxwell model were used for fitting experiment data. Results from DMA tests generally agree well with data from nanoindentation method, thereby verifying the feasibility of the method. The Prony series obtained by the two methods were used to simulate the creep experiments, which further verified the method.

Aiming at the defects of low precision and time cumulative error, an external wireless signal weighted centroid localization algorithm aided inertial positioning method is designed in this paper. According to the signal strength of each anchor node received at the test point, the distance between the anchor node and the anchor node is obtained by using the attenuation model of the wireless signal. Three anchor nodes are used to measure the distance between the anchor node and the measured point. We can obtain the area to be measured according to the actual situation, the position of the measured point is obtained by the weighted centroid localization algorithm and a combined model of wireless signal aided inertial navigation system is established. The simulation results show that the method can greatly improve the positioning accuracy and restrain the divergence of the longitude error and latitude error.

Refractive index measurements have been an important task for a long time because that index plays an essential role in describing the optical properties of a material. Many methods have been developed to perform that task. Some of them use interferometry to achieve high precision, however these configurations are complicated. Some measure the critical angle using simple structures, but the accuracy is not satisfactory because it is difficult to judge the exact critical angle with intensity variations. Here we propose several new schemes based on measuring the polarization change in the total internal reflection. The proposed method has the merits of simple structure and easy incident angle determination that gives the maximum phase change. Additionally, it is possible to find the material dispersion by measuring the wavelength dependence of the polarization ellipticity. Some useful formulas relating the refractive index with the maximum phase change are obtained. This work can provide valuable alternatives for index measurement.

The human-readable simplicity with which the CSV format was devised, together with the absence of a standard that strictly defines this format, has allowed the proliferation of several variants in the dialects with which these files are written. The latter has meant that the exchange of information between data management systems, or between countries and regions, requires human intervention during the data mining and cleansing process. This has led to the development of various computational tools that aim to accurately determine the dialects of CSV files, in order to avoid data loss at data loading stage in a given system. However, the dialect detection is a complex problem and current systems have limitations or make assumptions that need to be improved and/or extended. This paper proposes a method for determining CSV file dialects through table uniformity, a statistical approach based on table consistency and records dispersion measurement along with the detection of data type over each field. The new method has a 100\% accuracy on a dataset with 148 CSV files composed of samples coming from a data load testing framework and some others added as verification of the parsing routines. In tests on truly messy data, the proposed solution outperforms the state-of-the-art tool by achieving an improvement of about 10\% in the accuracy with which dialects are detected. Furthermore, the proposed method is accurate enough to determine dialects by reading only ten records, requiring more data to disambiguate those cases where the first records do not contain the necessary information to conclude with a dialect determination.

Accurately estimating the pose of spacecraft is indispensable for space applications. However, such targets are generally non-cooperative, i.e., no markers are mounted on it and no parts for operation. Therefore, the detection and measurement of a non-cooperative target is very challenging. Stereovision sensors are important solutions in the near field. In this paper, a rectangular natural feature recognition and pose measurement method for non-cooperative spacecraft is proposed. Solar panels or the bodies of spacecraft are selected as detection objects and their image features are captured by stereo vision. These rectangle features are then reconstructed in 3D Cartesian space through parallelogram fitting on the image planes of two cameras. The vertexes are used to calculate the center position of the rectangle and the direction of the fixed coordinate system to solve the pose and attitude of the non-cooperative target. An experimental system is built to validate the effectiveness of the algorithm. The experimental results show that the average position measurement error of the algorithm is about 10mm and the average attitude measurement error is less than 1°. The results show that the proposed method has high accuracy and efficiency.

Bayesian nonlinear mixed effects models for data in the form of continuous, repeated measurements from a population, also known as Bayesian hierarchical nonlinear models, are a popular platform for analysis when interest focuses on individual specific characteristics and relevant uncertainty quantification. Due to the limitation of computational power, this framework was relatively dormant until the late 1980s, but in recent years, the statistical research community saw vigorous development of new methodological and computational techniques for these models, the emergence of software, and wide application of the models in numerous industrial and academic fields. This article presents an overview of the formulation, interpretation, and implementation of Bayesian nonlinear mixed effects models and surveys recent advances and applications.

Ammonia (NH3), the most prevalent alkaline gas in the atmosphere, plays a significant role in PM2.5 formation, atmospheric chemistry, and new particle formation. This paper reviews quantification of [NH3] through measurements, satellite-remote-sensing, and modeling reported in over 500 publications towards synthesizing current knowledge of [NH3], focusing on spatiotemporal variations, controlling processes, and quantification issues. Most measurements are through regional passive sampler networks. [NH3] hotspots are typically over agricultural regions like the Midwest US and North China Plain, with elevated concentrations reaching monthly averages of 20 and 74 ppbv, respectively. Topographical effects dramatically increase [NH3] over the Indo-Gangetic Plains, North India and San Joaquin Valley, US. Measurements are sparse over oceans, where [NH3] ≈ few tens of ppbv, variations of which can affect aerosol formation. Satellite-remote-sensing (AIRS, CrIS, IASI, TANSO-FTS, TES) provides global [NH3] quantification in the column and at surface since 2002. Modeling is crucial for improving understanding of NH3 chemistry and transport, its spatiotemporal variations, source apportionment, exploring physicochemical mechanisms, and predicting future scenarios. GEOS-Chem (global) and FRAME (UK) models are commonly applied for this. A synergistic approach of measurements↔satellite-inference↔modeling is needed towards improved understanding of atmospheric ammonia, of concern from the standpoint of human health and the ecosystem.

Does the choice of proxy for stock market development matter? This paper suggests that the growth effect of stock market development is sensitive to the choice of proxy and using alternative financial development indicators have practically no influence on the results. We found that using either the stock market capitalization to GDP ratio or the stock market returns; have a positive and significant effect on growth. However, we cannot make same conclusion when one uses either the ratio of total value of trades on the major stock exchanges to GDP or stock market turnover ratio to proxy for stock market development as the coefficient on these variables were found to be statistically insignificant. The indexes extracted from principal component analysis confirm the sensitivity of the effect to the choice of proxy. This finding suggest that stock market development is a conceptual terms, thus, representing it with single indicators make it impossible to identify which stock market development indicators have a significant positive growth effects.

Marketing is the manner of how to make our sales the best in the market, our prices the most accessible, our clients satisfactory, and thus our brand is the largest distributed. This needs sophisticated and advanced understanding of the total network related. Indeed, marketing data may be seen in different forms such as qualitative and quantitative. However, in the literature, it is easily noticed that large bibliography may be collected about qualitative studies, against few studies on the quantitative point of view. This is a major drawback that makes the marketing science still focusing on the design, although the market is strongly depending on quantities such as money and time. Indeed, marketing data may be a time series such as brand sales per specified periods, brand related-prices over specified periods, market shares, ..., etc. The purpose of the present work is to investigate some marketing models based on time series due to brands. We will precisely study the effect of the time scale on the persistence of brands sales in the market and on the forecasting of such a persistence according to the characteristics of the brand and the related market competition or competitors. Our study is acted on a sample of Saudi brands during the period November 22, 2017 to December 30, 2021.

In this paper, we identify issues and possible solutions in the key area of large-scale antenna systems, also know as Massive Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) systems. Additionally, we propose the use of Massive MIMO technology as a means to tackle the uplink mixed-service communication problem. Under the assumption of an available physical narrowband shared channel (PNSCH), the capacity of the MTC network and, in turn, that of the whole system, can be increased by grouping Machine-Type Communication (MTC) devices into clusters and letting each cluster share the same time-frequency physical resource blocks. We study the feasibility of applying sub-optimal linear detection to the problem of detecting a large number of MTC devices sharing the same time-frequency resources at the uplink of a base station (BS) equipped with a large number of antennas, M. In our study, we derive the achievable lower-bound rates for the studied sub-optimal linear detectors and show that the transmitted power of each MTC device can be reduced as M increases, which is a very important result for powerconstrained MTC devices running on batteries. Our simulation results suggest that, as M is made progressively larger, the performance of sub-optimal linear detection methods approach the matched filter bound, also known as perfect interference-cancellation bound.

Walnut trees are grown worldwide for their edible fruits of high nutritional value. To address climate change, researchers have studied walnut phenology to create cultivars adapted to warmer climates. The standardisation of walnut phenological observations is needed and the Biologische Bundesanstalt, Bundessortenamt und CHemische Industrie (BBCH) scale is the most accurate and internationally accepted for this purpose. Here, the principal growth stages (PGS) of Persian walnut (Juglans regia L.) are described using stages from a previously available alphanumerical scale. This standardised phenological scale describes Persian walnut growth from the dormant vegetative state through reproductive budding to senescence. This phenological scale is expected to increase the efficiency of walnut phenological monitoring. Fifty-seven stages were used to describe the life cycle of Persian walnut in this BBCH scale. Of these 57 stages, 3 stages are dedicated to seed germination (PGS-0), 4 stages to bud development (PGS-0), 7 stages to leaf development (PGS-1), 4 stages to stem elongation (PGS-3), 8 stages to inflorescence emergence (PGS-5), 5 stages to male flowering (PGS-6), 5 stages to female flowering (PGS-6), 5 stages to fruit development (PGS-7), 12 stages to fruit ripening (PGS-8) and 4 stages to leaf senescence (PGS-9).

Formula feeding, as an alternative to breastfeeding, offers benefits such as convenience and consistent nutrition. Among the drawbacks of formula feeding, however, is potential dilution or concentration errors in the of formula during preparation that may lead to infant health issues. The present study aimed to investigate the accuracy of caregiver measurements as they prepared infant formula under multiple conditions, compared with manufacturer specifications. A diverse sample of caregivers (N = 84) participated in this cross-over experimental study. Participants hand-scooped infant formula powder and poured water to prepare 4oz and 7oz feedings, using both a standardized set of infant formula products and participants’ own products. Linear mixed effects models were used to estimate fixed effects of target amount (4oz versus 7oz) and products (participant versus researcher) on mean absolute percent error (MAPE) of measurement. Across all conditions MAPE was significantly greater for measuring powder than for water (9.0% vs. 4.4%; p&lt;0.001) with a combined powder and water MAPE at 13.0%. Greater measurement error was associated with the odd-sized 7oz preparation and participants’ own products. We observed considerable variability and substantial error during infant formula preparation, particularly for hand-scooping of powder, which tended toward higher values than the theoretical gold standard.

(1)Background: Early-age concrete shrinkage induces stress that impact the cost and service life of concrete pavements. (2)Methods: In this study, strain measurements of field slabs were conducted and a methodology was presented that independently derived autogenous, drying, and thermal shrinkages in the initial stages of concrete placement. Total strain was measured according to five different environmental conditions and shrinkage strain was calculated for each condition. (3)Results: By measuring the strain of the slab and the specimen, the drying shrinkage strain was measured to be approximately 54% better than that by the conventional non-stressed cylinder method because it was possible to measure the drying shrinkage strain at the surface rather than in the middle part of the slab along its depth direction. When the water-to-cement ratio increased (35→40%), there was a considerable reduction (317με→82με) of autogenous shrinkage strain for the concrete at 28 days of age. Furthermore, calculation of stress-dependent strain allowed the presentation of more intuitive and accurate results. (4)Conclusion: As the measurement of independent shrinkage occurrence is possible, the consequent calculated result of the stress-dependent strain acting on real slabs will facilitate improvement in the construction quality, reduction in the development of defects in the concrete structure, and increase in the service life.

Autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) is an inherited disorder characterized by renal tubular cystic dilatations. The cysts can develop anywhere along the nephron and over time the cystic dilatation lead to kidney enlargement. On the other hand, the cysts begin to reduce the number of functional nephrons as a consequence of cystic expansion that further contributes to the decline in renal function over the years. The pressure exerted by the dilated cysts lead to compensatory mechanisms that further contribute to the decline in renal function. These structural changes are responsible of glomerular hyperfiltration states, albuminuria, proteinuria, and haematuria. However, the presentation of ADPKD varies in children from a completely asymptomatic child with incidental ultrasound detection of cysts to a rapidly progressive disease. There have been reports of early onset of ADPKD in children younger than 2 years that showed a more rapid decline in renal function. ADPKD is caused by mutation in PKD1 and PKD2 genes. Today, the PKD1 gene mutation seems to account for up to 85% of the cases worldwide, and it is associated with worse renal outcomes. Individuals with PKD2 gene mutation seem to present a milder form of the disease, with a more delayed onset of end stage kidney disease. The cardinal sign of ADPKD is the presence of renal cysts during renal ultrasound. The current guidelines provide the clinicians the recommendations for genetic testing in children with a positive family history. Given that the vast majority of children with ADPKD present with normal or supra normal kidney function we explored the glomerular filtration rates dynamics and the renal ultrasound adjusted percentiles. 14 out of 16 patients had kidney percentile over 90%. The gene mutations were equally distributed among our cohort. In addition, we compared the modified Schwartz formula to the quadratic equation after adjusting the serum creatinine measurements. It seems that even though children with ADPKD have enlarged kidneys, the renal function is more likely normal or near normal when the quadratic estimation of glomerular filtration rate is used (qGFR tended to be lower, 111.95 ± 12.43 ml/min/1.73m2 compared to Schwartz eGFR 126.28 ± 33.07ml/min/1.73m2, p=0.14). Also, when the quadratic equation was employed, not even a patient reached the glomerular hyperfiltration thresholds. The quadratic formula showed that glomerular filtration rates are linear or slightly decreasing after 1-year of follow-up (Quadratic ΔeGFR=0.32±5.78ml/min/1.73m2) as opposed to Schwartz formula that can falsely classify children in a hyperfiltration state ΔeGFR=7.51±19.46ml/min/1.73m2), p=0.019.

Magnetoelectric (ME) sensor is a new type magnetic sensor with ultrahigh sensitivity, low power consumption, and suitable for the measurement of low frequency weak magnetic field. In this study, metglas/PZT-5B ME sensor with a mechanical resonance frequency f_res of 60.041 kHz was prepared. It is interesting to note that its magnetic field resolution reaches 0.20 nT at f_res and 0.34 nT for DC field, respectively. In order to measure the ultralow frequency AC magnetic fields, a frequency upconversion technique was employed. Under this technique, a limit of detection (LOD) of AC magnetic field lower than 1 nT at 8 Hz is obtained, and the minimum LOD of 0.51 nT is achieved at 20 Hz. The high resolution ME sensor with sub-pT level is promising in the field of low frequency weak magnetic field measurement technology.

Measurement uncertainty is typically expressed in terms of a symmetric interval , where denotes the measurement result and the expanded uncertainty. However, in the case of heteroscedasticity, symmetric uncertainty intervals can be misleading. In this paper, a different approach for the calculation of uncertainty intervals is introduced. This approach is applicable when a validation study has been conducted with samples with known concentrations. It will be shown how, under certain circumstances, asymmetric uncertainty intervals arise quite naturally and lead to more reliable uncertainty intervals.

The analysis and measurement of poverty is a crucial issue in the field of social science. Poverty is a multidimensional notion that can be measured using composite indicators relevant to synthesizing statistical indicators. Subjective choices could, however, affect these indicators. We propose interval-based composite indicators to avoid the problem, enabling us in this context to obtain robust and reliable measures. Based on a relevant conceptual model of poverty we have identified, we will consider all the various factors identified. Then, considering a different random configuration of the various factors, we will compute a different composite indicator. We can obtain a different interval for each region based on the distinct factor choices on the different assumptions for constructing the composite indicator. So we will create an interval-based composite indicator based on the results obtained by the Monte-Carlo simulation of all the different assumptions. The different intervals can be compared, and various rankings for poverty can be obtained. For their parameters, such as center, minimum, maximum, and range, the poverty interval composite indicator can be considered and compared. The results demonstrate a relevant and consistent measurement of the indicator and the shadow sector's relevant impact on the final measures.

The energy yield of the Vehicle-integrated photovoltaic (VIPV) differs from that of the standard photovoltaics (PV). It is mainly by the difference of the solar irradiance onto the car-roof and car-bodies as well as its curved-shape. Both meaningful and practical modeling and measurement of the solar irradiance for VIPV are needed to be newly established, not the extension of the current technologies. The solar irradiance was modeled by a random distribution of the shading objects and car-orientation with the correction of the curved surface of the PV modules. The measurement of the solar irradiance onto the car-roof and car-body was done using five pyranometers in five local axes on the car for one year. The measured dynamic solar irradiance onto the car-body and car-roof was used for validation of the solar irradiance model in the car.

A new circuit model of the self-powered device for heart rate measurement is presented in this paper. This device consists of piezoelectric energy harvester (PEH), power management circuit (PMC) with energy storage, microcontroller, Photoplethysmography (PPG) sensor, and Wi-Fi module. The PEH is placed under the insole to harvest the pressure energy from human foot-step to generate ac power. In our model, a PEH is represented by sine voltage source, where its parameters were taken from experiments with 20 volunteers. The PMC is simplified by a switch with gain δ placed in series with the main circuit. The model of the main circuit is RC elements in parallel, where C is the capacitance of the storage device, and R is the equivalent parallel resistance of the microcontroller, PPG sensor, and Wi-Fi modules, respectively. The value of R depends on the power and current absorbed by those modules during sleep, deep sleep, sense, and transmit modes which collected from the datasheet. Finally, the proposed circuit model of the self-powered device was built and simulated in SPICE. The simulation results were compared with the laboratory experiment using commercial devices. Based on the results, the proposed model had small gaps compared to the real self-powered devices in terms of average current, voltage, power and efficiency.

The deterioration of soil-cement in corrosive environment leads to the reduction of strength and the increase of permeability. Effective methods of determining deteriorated layer permeability coefficient of soil-cement are currently lacking. A laboratory test method for permeability coefficient of deteriorated layer was proposed using the modified permeability coefficient testing apparatus. According to the proposed method, the permeability coefficient of deteriorated layer can be obtained after testing the permeability coefficient of the soil-cement specimen in curing room and the equivalent permeability coefficient and deterioration depth of the soil-cement specimen in corrosion environment. Taking the marine dredger fill of Jiaozhou Bay for example, the deteriorated layer permeability coefficients of soil-cements with different cement contents were tested. It turned out that the permeability of deteriorated layer increases with the increase of age. At the beginning of curing age, larger cement content leads to smaller permeability coefficient of the deteriorated layer of soil-cement. As the curing age increases, the deteriorated layer permeability coefficient of the soil-cement with larger cement content becomes larger. The evolution of the permeability coefficient of deteriorated layer with age can be formulated as the Logistic function. This study provides a support for anti-permeability designs of soil-cement structures in corrosive environment.

A new approach to the measurement with elastic lidar of depolarization produced by atmospheric aerosols is presented. The system uses two different telescopes: one for depolarization measurements and another for total-power measurements. The system architecture and principle of operation are described. The first experimental results are also presented, corresponding to a collection of atmospheric conditions over the city of Barcelona.

Film cooling technology is of great significance to enhance the performance of aero-engines and extend service life. With the increasing requirements for film cooling efficiency, researchers and engineers have carried out a lot of work on the precision and digital measurement of cooling holes. Based on the above, this paper outlines the importance and principles of film cooling technology, reviews the evolution of cooling holes. Also, this paper details the traditional measurement methods of the cooling hole used in current engineering scenarios with their limitations and categorizes digital measurement methods into five main types, including probing measurement technology, optical measurement technology, infrared imaging technology, computer tomography(CT) scanning technology, and composite measurement technology. The five types of methods and integrated automated measurement platforms are also analyzed. Finally, through a generalize and analysis of cooling hole measurement methods, this paper points out technical challenges and future trends, providing a reference and guidance for forward researches.