EPR Study of CeO2 Nano Particles

In this paper, we have studied the EPR spectra, X-ray diffraction and Raman Analysis, Microstructures-morphology of the Ceria NPs calcined at different temperatures of 700 °C, 850 °C ,these materials have been synthesized by Co precipitation (CPT) method by using Cerium tri-nitrate hexahydrate and potassium carbonate solutions. Then synthesized precipitate was heated at 70 °C for 20 hour. Slow grinding of the precipitate and calcined for 3 hours at different temperatures viz. 700 °C and 850 °C to form fine Cerium oxide powder-Ceria NPs. The EPR measurements were made using continuous wave spectrometer (X-band, Bruker Biospin EMX Plus). The g values were obtained by using diphynelpirichylhydrageyl (DPPH-C18H12N5O6) sample and got g value is around 1.97. This g tensor is decreased when the calcined temperature are increased, EPR parameters are also changed as the calcined temperature increases. When the calcined temperature is increased from 700 °C to 850 °C, a doublet separated, intensity increased. The X-Ray diffraction pattern shows the nature of the Ceria NPs crystal, with a cubic structure and got the lattice parameters 5.392 Å for samples calcined at temperature of 700 °C and 5.357 Å at 850 °C which shows decreasing trend in lattice parameter with calcination temperature. The intensity of Raman peaks is also shifted upwards with a rise in temperature. This intensity difference could be because of the rise in vibrational amplitudes of the closest neighboring bonds because of the increase in particle size 11.3± 1.0 to 15.6± 1.0 nm at calcination temperatures of 700 °C and 850 °C and the Raman peak of peak I, 461 cm-1 and peak II, 463 cm-1 respectively. Other peaks were not observed in this Raman pattern. The EDS analysis confirms the presence of the Ce and O atoms in the synthesized samples. Spherical shapes and homogeneously distributed Ceria NPs and a rather tendency for agglomeration were confirmed.

Mobilization of seed storage proteins is crucial to high vigor in common bean seeds

ABSTRACT: Seed germination is a complex process controlled by many factors, in which physical and biochemical mechanisms are involved and the mobilization of reserves is crucial for this process to occur. Although, seed reserve mobilization is usually thought to be a post-germination process, seed reserve proteins mobilization occurs during germination. This study quantified seed proteins of bean genotypes during different hydration times, in order to understand the process of protein mobilization and whether there is relationship of this biochemical component with seed vigor. This study was conducted using seeds with different levels of vigor, genotypes with highest (13, 42, 55 and 81) and lowest (07, 23, 44, 50, IPR-88-Uirapurú and Iapar 81) physiological quality. High vigor genotypes showed greater efficiency in hydrolysis and mobilization of protein component, because they presented low globulins content in cotyledons at radicle protrusion in relation to low vigor genotypes (07, 23 and 50). The protein alpha-amylase inhibitor, observed in all genotypes, is involved with the longer time needed for radicle protrusion, according to the band intensity difference in genotypes 07, 44 and Iapar 81.

Inter-Provincial Power Transmission and Its Embodied Carbon Flow in China: Uneven Green Energy Transition Road to East and West

Inter-provincial power transmission in China solved the problem of electricity production and consumption spatial mismatch, which also facilitated Chinese green energy transition and sustainable development. Aiming to understand the spatial patterns and main driving factors, this paper accounted the aggregate carbon intensity per electricity produced by each province, built the inter-provincial Out–Destination matrixes of carbon emission embodied in power transmission among 27 provincial areas of 2006 and 2019, and quantitatively analyzed the change in spatial patterns of carbon flow and carbon intensity difference between power inward and outward provinces. We found that the inter-provincial power transmission has led to the reduction in the national average carbon intensity per electricity produced from 0.855 kg/kWh in 2006 to 0.628 kg/kWh in 2019 and the green energy transition of all provinces. The spatial morphology characteristics of carbon flow show the ‘three corridors of West-East Power Transmission (WEPT)’ pattern, in which power is transmitted from some main thermal power-dominated provinces in central and north-west China to the eastern coastal provinces. Further, it resulted in the carbon leakage from electricity consumption of the coastal provinces and carbon overload of the hinterland provinces. Despite natural resource endowment, the location of the provinces in the national power grid, the national low-carbon energy transition strategy, as well as advances in long-distance ultra-high-voltage power transmission technologies were the main factors to the formation and evolution of Chinese electricity green transition.

PENERAPAN PEWARNA ALAMI BIJI ALPUKAT PADA KAIN KATUN

ABSTRAKBiji alpukat dapat diekstrak menjadi zat warna alam karena mengandung senyawa tanin yang dapat menimbulkan warna cokelat atau kecokelatan. Kelemahan zat warna alam dalam proses pewarnaan tekstil yakni memiliki ketahanan luntur yang rendah. Oleh karena itu, pada proses pencelupan bahan tekstil dengan zat warna alam dibutuhkan proses fiksasi agar warna memiliki ketahanan luntur yang baik. Pewarna alami dari biji alpukat telah diterapkan pada kain katun. Ketahanan luntur pewarna alami telah diuji dengan memvariasikan massa tawas sebagai bahan fiksasi terhadap nilai perubahan intensitas cahaya pada air residu hasil pencucian kain katun. Perlakuan menggunakan variasi massa tawas 10g hingga 60g dengan waktu pencelupan selama 10 menit. Desain penelitian terdiri dari ekstraksi biji alpukat sebagai sumber zat warna alam, mordanting dan pencelupan kain katun ke dalam larutan zat warna, fiksasi kain katun, dan pengujian ketahanan luntur warna pada kain katun menggunakan luxmeter setelah pencucian menggunakan air biasa dan air deterjen. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa sampel yang menggunakan massa tawas 60g menghasilkan tingkat kelunturan warna paling kecil dengan nilai perubahan intensitas cahaya 9,58lux pada hasil pencucian dengan air biasa dan 3,11lux pada hasil pencucian dengan air deterjen. Semakin tinggi massa tawas yang digunakan sebagai bahan fiksasi pada kain katun, maka pewarna alami biji alpukat memiliki ketahanan luntur yang semakin baik. Penggunaan sampel tawas 60g sebagai bahan fiksasi efektif dalam menjaga ketahanan luntur pewarna alami biji alpukat pada kain katun. Kata kunci: Biji Alpukat; Kain Katun; Pewarna Alami; Tawas. ABSTRACTAvocado seeds could be extracted into natural dyes because they contained of tannin. Tannin as a dyes substances would cause brown or brownish color. The weakness of natural dyes in the textile dyeing process that has a low fade resistance. Therefore, the dyeing process of textile materials with natural dyes were needed fixation process in order that color had a well fade resistance. The natural dyes from avocado seeds had been applicated on cotton textile. The fade resistance of natural dyes had been tested by varying the mass of Al2(SO4)3as a fixation to the value of light intensity difference on the residue water of the cotton textile washing. The treatment used the mass variation of 10g to 60g Al2(SO4)3by dyeing for 10 minutes. The study design consisted of avocado seeds extraction as a source of natural dyes, mordanting of cotton textile, dyeing of cotton textile in a dye solution, fixation of cotton textile and test the fade resistance of natural dyes on cotton textile using a luxmeter after washing by water and detergent solution. The results showed that the sample used a mass of 60g Al2(SO4)3produced the smallest color fade degree with the value of light intensity difference on the residue water was 9.58lux of washing by water and 3.11lux of washing by detergent solution. The higher mass of Al2(SO4)3was used as fixation on cotton textile, the natural dyes of avocado seeds had a better fade resistance. The using of 60g Al2(SO4)3sample as a fixation material was effective for kept the fade resistance of natural dyes from avocado seeds on cotton textile. Keywords: Avocado Seeds; Cotton Textile; Natural Dyes.

Test of PSHA Map of China – A Case Study of Sichuan Region

The PSHA map must be tested, since hypothesis testing is the heart of a scientific method, and it is inappropriate to adopt the map as the basis of seismic fortification in whole country without any test. Two paths of testing are suggested in this paper. The test result by counting up positive intensity difference shows that up to 2015 the percentages of total underestimation areas on 1990 and 2001 maps of China are equivalences of 5.6% and 6.0% in 50 years, both less than the exceeding probability 10% adopted in the map compiling procedure. The result of a case study of the common buildings with brick-concrete structure and frame structure in Sichuan region by evaluating the benefit of seismic fortification according to the two maps shows that the PSHA maps contribute benefits as economic loss reduction 67.9 and 79.7 billion RMB, death reduction 19439 and 17504 persons, and serious injury reduction 42632 and 37700 persons respectively during 2008 great Wenchuan Earthquake.

Hybrid UNet Architecture based on Residual Learning of Fundus Images for Retinal Vessel Segmentation

This paper deals with the new segmentation techniques for retinal blood vessels on fundus images. This technique aims at extracting thin vessels to reduce the intensity difference between thick and thin vessels. This paper proposes the modified UNet model by incorporating ResNet blocks into it which includes structured prediction. In this work we generate the visualization of blood vessels from retinal fundus image for two loss functions namely cross entropy loss and Dice loss where the network classifies several pixels simultaneously. The results shows higher accuracy by considering a much more expressive UNet algorithm and outperforms the past algorithms for Retinal Vessel Segmentation. The benefits of this approach will be demonstrated empirically.

Fundamental sensitivity bounds for quantum enhanced optical resonance sensors based on transmission and phase estimation

Quantum states of light can enable sensing configurations with sensitivities beyond the shot-noise limit (SNL). In order to better take advantage of available quantum resources and obtain the maximum possible sensitivity, it is necessary to determine fundamental sensitivity limits for different possible configurations for a given sensing system. Here, due to their wide applicability, we focus on optical resonance sensors, which detect a change in a parameter of interest through a resonance shift. We compare their fundamental sensitivity limits set by the quantum Cramér-Rao bound (QCRB) based on the estimation of changes in transmission or phase of a probing bright two-mode squeezed state (bTMSS) of light. We show that the fundamental sensitivity results from an interplay between the QCRB and the transfer function of the system. As a result, for a resonance sensor with a Lorentzian lineshape a phase-based scheme outperforms a transmission-based one for most of the parameter space; however, this is not the case for lineshapes with steeper slopes, such as higher order Butterworth lineshapes. Furthermore, such an interplay results in conditions under which the phase-based scheme provides a higher sensitivity but a smaller degree of quantum enhancement than the transmission-based scheme. We also study the effect of losses external to the sensor on the degree of quantum enhancement and show that for certain conditions, probing with a classical state can provide a higher sensitivity than probing with a bTMSS. Finally, we discuss detection schemes, namely optimized intensity-difference and optimized homodyne detection, that can achieve the fundamental sensitivity limits even in the presence of external losses.

3D Measurement of Discontinuous Objects with Optimized Dual-frequency Grating Profilometry

Three-dimensional profilometry tends to be less effective at measuring discontinuous surfaces. To overcome this problem, an optimized profilometry based on fringe projection is proposed in this paper. Due to the limitation of the shooting angle, there are projection blind spots on the surface of discontinuous objects. Since the noises and unwrapping errors are always localized at the projection blind spots, an algorithm is designed to determine the blind spots automatically with the light intensity difference information. Besides, in order to improve the measurement accuracy, a processing scheme is introduced to deal with the local height distortion introduced by the dual-frequency grating profilometry. Lots of measurement tests on various surfaces are carried out to assess the optimized profilometry, and experimental results indicate that the modified profilometry system works more robust with high reliability and accuracy in measuring different kinds of surfaces, especially discontinuous ones.

Analgesic effect of oral ibuprofen 400, 600, and 800 mg; paracetamol 500 and 1000 mg; and paracetamol 1000 mg plus 60 mg codeine in acute postoperative pain: a single-dose, randomized, placebo-controlled, and double-blind study

Purpose Effect size estimates of analgesic drugs can be misleading. Ibuprofen (400 mg, 600 mg, 800 mg), paracetamol (1000 mg, 500 mg), paracetamol 1000 mg/codeine 60 mg, and placebo were investigated to establish the multidimensional pharmacodynamic profiles of each drug on acute pain with calculated effect size estimates. Methods A randomized, double-blind, single-dose, placebo-controlled, parallel-group, single-centre, outpatient, and single-dose study used 350 patients (mean age 25 year, range 18 to 30 years) of homogenous ethnicity after third molar surgery. Primary outcome was sum pain intensity over 6 h. Secondary outcomes were time to analgesic onset, duration of analgesia, time to rescue drug intake, number of patients taking rescue drug, sum pain intensity difference, maximum pain intensity difference, time to maximum pain intensity difference, number needed to treat values, adverse effects, overall drug assessment as patient-reported outcome measure (PROM), and the effect size estimates NNT and NNTp. Results Ibuprofen doses above 400 mg do not significantly increase analgesic effect. Paracetamol has a very flat analgesic dose–response profile. Paracetamol 1000/codeine 60 mg gives similar analgesia as ibuprofen from 400 mg, but has a shorter time to analgesic onset. Active drugs show no significant difference in maximal analgesic effect. Other secondary outcomes support these findings. The frequencies of adverse effects were low, mild to moderate in all active groups. NNT and NTTp values did not coincide well with PROMs. Conclusion Ibuprofen doses above 400 mg for acute pain offer limited analgesic gain. Paracetamol 1000 mg/codeine 60 mg is comparable to ibuprofen doses from 400 mg. Calculated effect size estimates and PROM in our study seem not to relate well as clinical analgesic efficacy estimators. Trial registration NCT00699114.

EXPRESS: Correlation and Difference Between Raman Spectral Characteristic and Feature Evaluation for Leukocytes and Tumor Cells

Tumor detection supported by Raman spectroscopy is becoming increasingly popular, yet the relevance of spectral variation and feature selection retains unclear. Here we determined the correlation and difference between spectral characteristic and feature evaluation for leukocytes and tumor cells. Some peaks were found to show noticeable spectral differences, and their intensity distributions were investigated, finding using Log-Normal distribution to describe Raman intensity pattern may be more appropriate. Further the importance of all Raman features was calculated, where some other peak features occupied the top status. By surveying the intensity variation and feature evaluation for those peaks, we concluded the peak with the highest importance does not correspond to the peak location with the most noticeable intensity difference in spectra. Moreover, the peak-intensity-ratio of I₁₅₁₇/I₇₁₉ associated with protein to nucleic acid level presented the maximum separation, thus it can be recognized as a special indicator to develop an alternative cancer detection. It is inspiring to introduce advanced statistical models into bio-spectroscopic fields but those intrinsic spectral variations rather than classification performance should be valued. Our explorations can provide possibilities to reveal the essences within tumor carcinogenesis based on Raman spectroscopy, further overwhelming the obstacles during the translation into clinical applications.