A New Approach to Barrier Verification

Objectives/Scope Verification and testing of a wellbore barrier, in older assets has proven to be challenging. Even more so when the well has structural issues, indemnities or weak spots in the barrier envelope, that limits the possibility to get a positive pressure verification of the barrier with an applied surface pressure. The paper will air on the operational use of this novel test method and the tools used, to allow an in well verification of any type of barrier to secure the well for a repair or a upcoming P/A operation. A pilot job case history will be included to illustrate use of the principles. Methods, Procedures, Process Find a suitable location with necessary support and strength in the well. If installing a mechanical barrier by means of a bridge plug as the primary barrier, we will monitor the installation forces in the anchoring and sealing sequence. This individual signature will be verified towards a nominal base line signature towards a library of thousands of collected installation profiles. Any abnormality can trigger a release and possible relocating of the barrier. A second verification barrier will then be installed above the primary barrier. When both installation signatures are accounted for, we can pressure test the installed barriers. This is done with a pressure inflow tool, where we introduce a calculated predetermined pressure drop between the installed primary barrier and the verification barrier. By monitoring this pressure alteration vs. the pressure above the verification barrier, we can determine if we have a verified barrier. Results, Observations, Conclusions We now have the Primary Barrier verified in the direction of flow (negative pressure test). And verification barrier as the secondary barrier (verified with a positive pressure test). If a dual barrier is requested, you can leave the verification barrier as secondary barrier. Novel/Additional Information Pressure manipulation is done with existing and proven technology and is re-usable after re-setting at surface. By monitoring this pressure alteration, we can verify the installed primary and verification barrier in one run. This without any time-consuming pressure manipulating from surface.

Cutting Edges: Professional Hierarchy vs. Creative Identity in Nicolas de Launay’s Fine Art Prints

In 1783, Nicolas De Launay copied Les Baignets by Jean-Honoré Fragonard, stating it was made “by his very humble and very obedient servant”, an evidence of the hierarchical tensions between painters and printmakers during the eighteenth-century. However, De Launay’s loyalty is not absolute, since a critical artistic statement is found at the edge: an illusory oval frame heavily adorned with leaves and fruits of Squash, Hazelnuts, and Oak. This paper wishes to acknowledge this meticulously engraved frame, and many more added to copies throughout De Launay’s successful career, as highly relevant in examining his ‘obedience’ and ‘humbleness’. With regard to eighteenth-century writings on botany and authenticity, and to current studies on the print market, I offer a new perspective in which engravers are appreciated as active commercial artists establishing an individual signature style. In their conceptual and physical marginality these decorations allow creative freedom which challenges concepts of art appropriation and reproduction, highly relevant then and today.

A small vocal repertoire during the breeding season expresses complex behavioral motivations and individual signature in the common coot

Background Although acoustic communication plays an essential role in the social interactions of Rallidae, our knowledge of how Rallidae encode diverse types of information using simple vocalizations is limited. We recorded and examined the vocalizations of a common coot (Fulica atra) population during the breeding season to test the hypotheses that 1) different call types can be emitted under different behavioral contexts, and 2) variation in the vocal structure of a single call type may be influenced both by behavioral motivations and individual signature. We measured a total of 61 recordings of 30 adults while noting the behavioral activities in which individuals were engaged. We compared several acoustic parameters of the same call type emitted under different behavioral activities to determine how frequency and temporal parameters changed depending on behavioral motivations and individual differences. Results We found that adult common coots had a small vocal repertoire, including 4 types of call, composed of a single syllable that was used during 9 types of behaviors. The 4 calls significantly differed in both frequency and temporal parameters and can be clearly distinguished by discriminant function analysis. Minimum frequency of fundamental frequency (F0min) and duration of syllable (T) contributed the most to acoustic divergence between calls. Call a was the most commonly used (in 8 of the 9 behaviors detected), and maximum frequency of fundamental frequency (F0max) and interval of syllables (TI) contributed the most to variation in call a. Duration of syllable (T) in a single call a can vary with different behavioral motivations after individual vocal signature being controlled. Conclusions These results demonstrate that several call types of a small repertoire, and a single call with function-related changes in the temporal parameter in common coots could potentially indicate various behavioral motivations and individual signature. This study advances our knowledge of how Rallidae use “simple” vocal systems to express diverse motivations and provides new models for future studies on the role of vocalization in avian communication and behavior.

Signature Verification Using Support Vector Machine and Convolution Neural Network

Signature is used for recognition of an individual. Signature is considered as a mark that an individual write on a paper for his/her identity or proof. It is used as a unique feature for identifying an individual. It is highly used in social and business functions which gives rise to verification of signature. There are chances of signature getting forged. Hence, the need to identify signature as genuine of forged is utmost important. In this paper, identification of signature as genuine or forged is done using two approaches. First approach is using SVM and second is using CNN. For SVM, pre-processing of signature image is done and feature extraction is performed. Features extracted are histogram of gradient, shape, aspect ratio, bounding area, contour area and convex hull area. Further, SVM is applied to classify signature as genuine or forged and accuracy is determined. In the second approach, signature image is pre-processed, CNN is used to classify signature as genuine or forged and accuracy is determined. Dataset used here is ICDAR Dutch dataset along with 80 signatures taken from 4 people.Dutch dataset consists of 362 signature imagesand signature images taken from 4 people consists 10 genuine and 10 forged signatures which sums to 442 signature images. The proposed system provides accuracy of 86.39% using SVM and around 83.78% using CNN.

The Gut Microbial Composition Is Species-Specific and Individual-Specific in Two Species of Estrildid Finches, the Bengalese Finch and the Zebra Finch

Microbial communities residing in the gastrointestinal tracts of animals have profound impacts on the physiological processes of their hosts. In humans, host-specific and environmental factors likely interact together to shape gut microbial communities, resulting in remarkable inter-individual differences. However, we still lack a full understanding of to what extent microbes are individual-specific and controlled by host-specific factors across different animal taxa. Here, we document the gut microbial characteristics in two estrildid finch species, the Bengalese finch (Lonchura striata domestica) and the zebra finch (Taeniopygia guttata) to investigate between-species and within-species differences. We collected fecal samples from breeding pairs that were housed under strictly controlled environmental and dietary conditions. All individuals were sampled at five different time points over a range of 120 days covering different stages of the reproductive cycle. We found significant species-specific differences in gut microbial assemblages. Over a period of 3 months, individuals exhibited unique, individual-specific microbial profiles. Although we found a strong individual signature in both sexes, within-individual variation in microbial communities was larger in males of both species. Furthermore, breeding pairs had more similar microbial profiles, compared to randomly chosen males and females. Our study conclusively shows that host-specific factors contribute structuring of gut microbiota.

Deep fusion of contextual and object-based representations for delineation of multiple nuclear phenotypes

Motivation Nuclear delineation and phenotypic profiling are important steps in the automated analysis of histology sections. However, these are challenging problems due to (i) technical variations (e.g. fixation, staining) that originate as a result of sample preparation; (ii) biological heterogeneity (e.g. vesicular versus high chromatin phenotypes, nuclear atypia) and (iii) overlapping nuclei. This Application-Note couples contextual information about the cellular organization with the individual signature of nuclei to improve performance. As a result, routine delineation of nuclei in H&E stained histology sections is enabled for either computer-aided pathology or integration with genome-wide molecular data. Results The method has been evaluated on two independent datasets. One dataset originates from our lab and includes H&E stained sections of brain and breast samples. The second dataset is publicly available through IEEE with a focus on gland-based tissue architecture. We report an approximate AJI of 0.592 and an F1-score 0.93 on both datasets. Availability and implementation The code-base, modified dataset and results are publicly available. Supplementary information Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.