Design and Prototype Test of key components of Segmented Ligusticum wallichii Harvester

According to the harvest demand of Ligusticum wallichii, a segmented Ligusticum wallichii harvester was designed. The crushing device was set in the front end of tractor and the vibrating harvester was mounted in the rear end of tractor. Firstly, the strength test of Ligusticum wallichii stalks was carried out, and the basic parameters of the crushing device were determined. The results showed that the minimum required speed of the crushing device was 3880r/min. Secondly, the vibration structure was modeled and analyzed by vector equation, and the vibration structure was simulated and analyzed by ADAMS, and the parameters of the vibration structure were determined. The results showed that when the crank angle was 22~100°, the Ligusticum wallichii-soil mixture was thrown backward away from the vibration steel bar, and throw away distance was 88.42mm. Finally, the field prototype test was carried out. During the test, the crushing device could crush the stems of Ligusticum wallichii normally. The rotational speed was measured at 4020r/min. The obvious rate, loss rate and damage rate of Ligusticum wallichii stem were calculated. The stems obvious rate was 95%, loss rate was 4.5% and damage rate was 0.4%, which met the harvest requirements of Ligusticum wallichii.

Methods used for Gas Tightness Test and percent Oxygen Monitoring of the NSW Micromegas Detectors of LHC-ATLAS Experiment

In the frame of the LHC-ATLAS Upgrade of phase I, the New Small Wheel detector system is under integration and commissioning at CERN Laboratories. One of the detector type, the Micromegas detectors, during their integration are tested in several stages for gas tightness validation. In particular, the novel method we are using for the gas tightness test, that we called “Flow Rate Loss”, has been realized in several semi-automatic fixed, portable and stand-alone setups for testing either the Micromegas Quads or the final Double Wedges. The obtained measurements up-to-date are presented as well as their obtained statistical distribution. Additionally, during the performance evaluation of the detectors, a percent oxygen monitoring is also performed in 24-hour base. The methods and techniques we developed and used are presented analytically in this work.

Sounds of Silence in Times of COVID-19: Distress and Loss of Cardiac Coherence in People With Misophonia Caused by Real, Imagined or Evoked Triggering Sounds

The extreme, unprecedented situations in the current COVID-19 pandemic are risk factors for psychosocial stress for the entire population. However, strict confinement had a particular impact on people suffering from misophonia and their families. Misophonia is a condition in which hearing certain sounds triggers intense anger, disgust and even severe autonomic nervous system responses. This prospective cohort study examined the impact of strict confinement (Spain, March 14–June 21, 2020) on a sample of 24 people (16 women and eight men) who had been diagnosed with moderate to extreme misophonia and were regularly attending a medical psychology center in Barcelona. The 3-month period of confinement caused general emotional maladjustment, distress, and a transitory crisis. Long-term biomonitoring of their heart variability rate (HRV) enabled to identify a significant increase in physiological arousal after the confinement period, which had already been recorded in a loss of cardiac coherence under basal rest/relaxation conditions. Certain auditory stimuli triggered adverse responses, lowered HRV scores, and an increased stress level and heart rate. Loss of cardiac coherence in their responses to these auditory stimuli (triggering mouth, nose and other sounds), as well as to non-triggering mouth, nose and other sounds was increased when compared to two assessments performed during the previous year. Despite the limited sample size, sex differences were observed in the incidence. Loss of cardiac coherence worsened with the severity of the misophonia. Most importantly, imagined or evoked triggering sounds, as well as real ones, were enough to cause the aversive responses, as displayed by the increased loss of cardiac coherence with respect to the at-rest basal level. A semi-structured interview revealed the exceptional nature of the situations, increased hyper-sensorial sensitivity, fear of being infected with or dying from COVID-19, the patients' coping strategies, and the difficulties and constraints they faced. Finally, the article gives recommendations for better management of misophonia. Improved knowledge of this disorder would help address the current lack of health and social care, hopefully preventing this shortfall's impact on social and affective relationships, which are particulary important for well-being now and in the coming periods of physical distancing measures.

SOCIAL RISKS FOR THE YOUTH IN THE DYNAMICS OF UKRAINIAN SOCIETY

Today’s adolescents and youth form a quarter of the world’s population. They are shaping social and economic development, challenging social norms and values, and building the foundation of the world’s future. The beginning of the XXI century is marked by the aggravation of youth problems in different countries, among which Ukraine is no exception. Nowadays, Ukrainian youth is affected by: political and economic crisis in the country; unemployment; unresolved housing conditions; poor health; social disorders; economic and psychological dependence on parents; marital and family problems (high divorce rate, family conflicts); low birth rate; loss of ideals, social perspective, and life optimism.

Synthesis and characterization of a new conjugated polymer containing bithiazole group and its thermal decomposition kinetics

A new conjugated polymer containing a bithiazole group is prepared by the polycondensation of 2,2'-diamino-4,4'-bithiazole and terephthaldialdehyde in the presence of glacial acetic acid. The kinetics of thermal degradation of the new polymer are investigated by thermogravimetric analysis at different heating rates. The temperature corresponding to the maximum rate loss shifts to higher temperatures with increasing heating rate. The thermal decomposition activation energies of the conjugated polymer in a conversion range of 3–15 % are 288.4 and 281.1 kJ/mol by the Flynn–Wall–Ozawa and Kissinger methods, respectively. The Horowitz–Metzger method shows that the thermodegradation mechanism of the conjugated polymer proceeds over a three-dimensional diffusion type deceleration D3 mechanism. The optimum heating rate is 20 ºC/min.

Determinação da atividade respiratória (CO2) em frutos de Juazeiro colhidos em cinco estádios de maturação

<p>Juazeiro (Ziziphus joazeiro Mart.) is a prominent plant in the midst of adverse conditions in Caatinga. Its fruit is small, fleshy, sweet and very perishable and it has a white pulp. This condition induces a high rate of respiration to the fruit and, therefore, interferes with its ripening. Thus, the objective of this study was to determine the quality and respiratory activity (CO2) in Juazeiro fruits. Juazeiro fruit were harvested from plants located at the Center of Science and Agri-Food Technology, at the Federal University of Campina Grande, Campus Pombal-PB, and taken to the Laboratory of Chemistry, Biochemistry and Food Analysis . The fruits were selected for the absence of damage and classified in five stages of maturation, being evaluated for pH, titratable acidity, soluble solids, soluble sugars, ascorbic acid and respiratory rate. Stage IV maturation fruits were stored under controlled temperature (25±2 ºC and 34±1% RH) for 4 days and evaluated on all storage days for respiratory rate, loss of fresh weight, titratable acidity and soluble solids. The advancement of maturation resulted in sweeter, slightly more acid juazeiro fruits and with a subtle reduction in the concentration of ascorbic acid. The highest respiratory rate was obtained in stage III maturation fruits, indicating that until this stage of maturation the fruits did not reach their full maturity, being probably in the final stage of growth. Regarding storage, there was a peak in the respiratory rate with 2 days of storage, indicating that the Juazeiro fruits present a climacteric behavior, reinforced by the responses observed in soluble solids and titratable acidity.</p>

Bagged Tree Based Frame-Wise Beforehand Prediction Approach for HEVC Intra-Coding Unit Partitioning

High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) has achieved about 50% bit-rates saving compared with its predecessor H.264 standard, while the encoding complexity increases dramatically. Due to the introduction of more flexible partition structures and more optional prediction directions, HEVC takes a brute force approach to find the optimal partitioning result which is much more time consuming. Therefore, this paper proposes a bagged trees based fast approach (BTFA) and focuses on the coding unit (CU) size decision for HEVC intra-coding. First, several key features of a target CU are extracted for three-output classifiers. Then, to avoid feature extraction and prediction time over head, our approach is designed frame-wisely, and the procedure is applied parallel with the encoding process. Using the adaptive threshold determination algorithm, our approach achieves 42.04% time saving with negligible 0.92% Bit-Distortion (BD)-rate loss. Furthermore, in order to calculate the optimal thresholds to balance BD-rate loss and complexity reduction, the neural network based mathematical fitting is added to BTFA, which is called the advanced bagged trees based fast approach (ABTFA). Finally, experimental results show that ABTFA achieves 47.87% time saving with only 0.96% BD-rate loss, which outperforms other state-of-the-art approaches.