Invasive Right Ventricular Pressure-Volume Analysis: Basic Principles, Clinical Applications, and Practical Recommendations

Right ventricular pressure-volume (PV) analysis characterizes ventricular systolic and diastolic properties independent of loading conditions like volume status and afterload. While long-considered the gold-standard method for quantifying myocardial chamber performance, it was traditionally only performed in highly specialized research settings. With recent advances in catheter technology and more sophisticated approaches to analyze PV data, it is now more commonly used in a variety of clinical and research settings. Herein, we review the basic techniques for PV loop measurement, analysis, and interpretation with the aim of providing readers with a deeper understanding of the strengths and limitations of PV analysis. In the second half of the review, we detail key scenarios in which right ventricular PV analysis has influenced our understanding of clinically relevant topics and where the technique can be applied to resolve additional areas of uncertainty. All told, PV analysis has an important role in advancing our understanding of right ventricular physiology and its contribution to cardiovascular function in health and disease.

Problem-Based Learning for an Electrical Machines Course

This article seeks to describe the implementation of a problem-based learning (PBL) teaching-learning method in a university classroom. The aim is for the stu-dent through given real-life situations to acquire knowledge, abilities, and atti-tudes in the subject of electrical machines in the undergraduate electrical engineer-ing program of the Catholic University of Cuenca. Solving problems related to static machines will be similar to the problems that students will face in their pro-fessional lives; namely, to be able to identify a static machine and its operation, parameters, model its equivalent circuits (open- and short-circuit tests), calculate losses, and carry out hysteresis loop measurement. Most of these concepts are abstract and challenging for students to assimilate. Therefore, the present research shows how using the PBL model in studying static machines improves the aca-demic performance and achievement of students in an experimental group. There was an improvement of 7 points out of 100 in relation to the average of the grades of three groups of students from previous semesters. Also, the standard deviation is lower in the experimental group (SD 4.5584), which shows that most of the students improved in their performance. Finally, there was no failure of the study year nor remedial exams among this group.

Design and Development of a Novel Invasive Blood Pressure Simulator for Patient’s Monitor Testing

This paper presents a newly-designed and realized Invasive Blood Pressure (IBP) device for the simulation on patient’s monitors. This device shows improvements and presents extended features with respect to a first prototype presented by the authors and similar systems available in the state-of-the-art. A peculiarity of the presented device is that all implemented features can be customized from the developer and from the point of view of the end user. The realized device has been tested, and its performances in terms of accuracy and of the back-loop measurement of the output for the blood pressure regulation utilization have been described. In particular, an accuracy of ±1 mmHg at 25 °C, on a range from −30 to 300 mmHg, was evaluated under different test conditions. The designed device is an ideal tool for testing IBP modules, for zero setting, and for calibrations. The implemented extended features, like the generation of custom waveforms and the Universal Serial Bus (USB) connectivity, allow use of this device in a wide range of applications, from research to equipment maintenance in clinical environments to educational purposes. Moreover, the presented device represents an innovation, both in terms of technology and methodologies: It allows quick and efficient tests to verify the proper functioning of IBP module of patients’ monitors. With this innovative device, tests can be performed directly in the field and faster procedures can be implemented by the clinical maintenance personnel. This device is an open source project and all materials, hardware, and software are fully available for interested developers or researchers.

Physical Properties of Encapsulated Iron Oxide

The size effect of magnetic nanoparticles provides a various magnetic characteristic as a change of domain size. We report, synthesis of core-shell iron oxide and magnetic properties. Iron oxide particles were synthesized by co-precipitation method of iron (III) FeCl3.6H2O, iron (II) FeCl2.4H2O, in the mixture of with or without TEOS to investigated the physical properties. From XRD measurement, it was observed that all iron oxide particles with or without mixture of SiO2 has a hematite phase of a-Fe2O3. From M-H loop measurement, it was observed that the iron oxide without SiO2 has a ferromagnetic characteristic, while the iron oxide with SiO2 showed a medium state as a contribution of superparamagnetic and ferromagnetic properties.

Experimental Study on High Temperature Creep Damage of 1Cr5Mo Steel Based on Magnetic Parameters

Aiming at the evaluation of creep damage at elevated temperature of ferromagnetic materials in engineering application, the hysteresis loop measurement technology was adopted to study the creep damage behaviour of 1Cr5Mo steel. The creep testing at 600°C/90MPa of 1Cr5Mo steel were carried out to prepare specimens with various degrees of creep damage. The variation of magnetic parameter including coercivity (HC) and remanence (Br) with creep damage was analyzed. The microstructure evolution of 1Cr5Mo steel with different degrees of creep damage was observed by optical microscope. The results show that the coercivity and remanence show certain regularity with creep damage at elevated temperature. Moreover, the regularity is repeatable which indicates that the measurement technology based on magnetic parameters can be used for the evaluation of high temperature creep damage.