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We previously proposed contextual spelling correction (CSC) to correct the output of end-to-end (E2E) automatic speech recognition (ASR) models with contextual information such as name, place, etc. Although CSC has achieved reasonable improvement in the biasing problem, there are still two drawbacks for further accuracy improvement. First, due to information limitation in text only hypothesis or weak performance of ASR model on rare domains, the CSC model may fail to correct phrases with similar pronunciation or anti-context cases where all biasing phrases are not present in the utterance. Second, there is a discrepancy between the training and inference of CSC. The bias list in training is randomly selected but in inference there may be more similarity between ground truth phrase and other phrases. To solve above limitations, in this paper we propose an improved non-autoregressive (NAR) spelling correction model for contextual biasing in E2E neural transducer-based ASR systems to improve the previous CSC model from two perspectives: Firstly, we incorporate acoustics information with an external attention as well as text hypotheses into CSC to better distinguish target phrase from dissimilar or irrelevant phrases. Secondly, we design a semantic aware data augmentation schema in training phrase to reduce the mismatch between training and inference to further boost the biasing accuracy. Experiments show that the improved method outperforms the baseline ASR+Biasing system by as much as 20.3% relative name recall gain and achieves stable improvement compared to the previous CSC method over different bias list name coverage ratio., Accepted by ICASSP 2023

We present $\textbf{$\texttt{SkillQG}$}$: a question generation framework with controllable comprehension types for assessing and improving machine reading comprehension models. Existing question generation systems widely differentiate questions by $\textit{literal}$ information such as question words and answer types to generate semantically relevant questions for a given context. However, they rarely consider the $\textit{comprehension}$ nature of questions, i.e. the different comprehension capabilities embodied by different questions. In comparison, our $\texttt{SkillQG}$ is able to tailor a fine-grained assessment and improvement to the capabilities of question answering models built on it. Specifically, we first frame the comprehension type of questions based on a hierarchical skill-based schema, then formulate $\texttt{SkillQG}$ as a skill-conditioned question generator. Furthermore, to improve the controllability of generation, we augment the input text with question focus and skill-specific knowledge, which are constructed by iteratively prompting the pre-trained language models. Empirical results demonstrate that $\texttt{SkillQG}$ outperforms baselines in terms of quality, relevance, and skill-controllability while showing a promising performance boost in downstream question answering task., Comment: Accepted at ACL 2023 Findings

In this paper, a hybrid control strategy is studied and implemented on an Inductive Power Transfer (IPT) system to simultaneously realize zero-voltage switching (ZVS) and constant current (CC) and constant voltage (CV) battery charging. A steady-state analysis of pulse frequency modulation was conducted, based on the characteristic of voltage gain versus switching frequency, and CC and CV charging modes were promised. The ZVS of the inverter was obtained by satisfying the minimum requirement of full discharge of the junction capacitor on the MOSFETs using a commutation current during the dead-time interval. Two control degrees of freedom are needed to realize the two control targets. This hybrid control strategy adopts a self-oscillating (SO) control to achieve ZVS and phase shift (PS) control and a constant output for the series–series (SS)-compensated IPT system. To validate the hybrid control strategy, a 1.6 kW prototype with 360–440 V input voltage and 250–400 V output voltage was built and the experimental results show that the peak efficiency can reach 96.1%. Compared with the conventional variable frequency (VF) control, the hybrid control method proves that an additional control variable can fulfill the control target in a more flexible manner, which makes the switching frequency close to the resonant frequency during the charging process, minimizing the reactive current in the resonant tank and improving system efficiency.

Constacyclic codes over finite fields are a family of linear codes and contain cyclic codes as a subclass. Constacyclic codes are related to many areas of mathematics and outperform cyclic codes in several aspects. Hence, constacyclic codes are of theoretical importance. On the other hand, constacyclic codes are important in practice, as they have rich algebraic structures and may have efficient decoding algorithms. In this paper, two classes of constacyclic codes are constructed using a general construction of constacyclic codes with cyclic codes. The first class of constacyclic codes is motivated by the punctured Dilix cyclic codes and the second class is motivated by the punctured generalised Reed-Muller codes. The two classes of constacyclic codes contain optimal linear codes. The parameters of the two classes of constacyclic codes are analysed and some open problems are presented in this paper.

This paper proposes a new "decompose-and-edit" paradigm for the text-based speech insertion task that facilitates arbitrary-length speech insertion and even full sentence generation. In the proposed paradigm, global and local factors in speech are explicitly decomposed and separately manipulated to achieve high speaker similarity and continuous prosody. Specifically, we proposed to represent the global factors by multiple tokens, which are extracted by cross-attention operation and then injected back by link-attention operation. Due to the rich representation of global factors, we manage to achieve high speaker similarity in a zero-shot manner. In addition, we introduce a prosody smoothing task to make the local prosody factor context-aware and therefore achieve satisfactory prosody continuity. We further achieve high voice quality with an adversarial training stage. In the subjective test, our method achieves state-of-the-art performance in both naturalness and similarity. Audio samples can be found at https://ydcustc.github.io/retrieverTTS-demo/., Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure, 3 tables. Accepted by Interspeech 2022

BCH codes and their dual codes are two special subclasses of cyclic codes and are the best linear codes in many cases. A lot of progress on the study of BCH cyclic codes has been made, but little is known about the minimum distances of the duals of BCH codes. Recently, a new concept called dually-BCH code was introduced to investigate the duals of BCH codes and the lower bounds on their minimum distances in \cite{GDL21}. For a prime power $q$ and an integer $m \ge 4$, let $n=\frac{q^m-1}{q+1}$ \ ($m$ even), or $n=\frac{q^m-1}{q-1}$ \ ($q>2$). In this paper, some sufficient and necessary conditions in terms of the designed distance will be given to ensure that the narrow-sense BCH codes of length $n$ are dually-BCH codes, which extended the results in \cite{GDL21}. Lower bounds on the minimum distances of their dual codes are developed for $n=\frac{q^m-1}{q+1}$ \ ($m$ even). As byproducts, we present the largest coset leader $\delta_1$ modulo $n$ being of two types, which proves a conjecture in \cite{WLP19} and partially solves an open problem in \cite{Li2017}. We also investigate the parameters of the narrow-sense BCH codes of length $n$ with design distance $\delta_1$. The BCH codes presented in this paper have good parameters in general.

How to effectively and accurately evaluate the reliability of the design, structure, material and process of flip-chip packaging devices in mass production has always been a hot topic in the industry. Currently, the destructive physical analysis (DPA) on high-reliability conventional packaging devices worldwide is carried out mainly based on the Methods of Destructive Physical Analysis for Military Electronic Components (GJB4027) or the Destructive Physical Analysis for Electronic, Electromagnetic, and Electromechanical Parts (MIL-STD-1580). However, the structure and process of flip-chip packaging devices are significantly different from those of traditional packaging devices, so traditional evaluation items are unable to effectively evaluate the reliability of flip-chip packaging devices. In this paper, typical ceramic and plastic encapsulated flip-chip packaging devices are chosen for study. The structural feature and the reliability weaknesses of flip-chip packaging devices are identified. Moreover, highly comprehensive DPA methods for flip-chip packaged devices with high applicability and efficiency are proposed by combining the typical failure modes of flip-chip packaging devices, which were verified by the examples. Herein, the reliability of key structural units such as flip-chip covers, bumps, underfill, substrates and solder balls can be effectively assessed by the new DPA method, providing a basis and assistance for revisions of advanced packaging device standards and destructive physical analysis.

The Burkholderia pyrrocinia Lyc2 strain isolated from healthy plant rhizosphere showed significant antimicrobial activities against a variety of plant pathogens. In this study, a random mutation library was constructed using an EZ-Tn5 transposome kit and Erwinia amylovora was used as an indicator to screen for mutants with defective antibacterial activity. The transposon gene was verified in the chromosome of the Lyc2 strain using polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The gene that was disrupted by transposon was amplified by rescue cloning for functional and bioinformatics analyses. Antibacterial analysis indicated that the mutant Lyc2-MT2918 was defective in antibacterial activity. Sequence alignment of the mutant suggested that the disrupted gene Glu-2918 was homologous to the glutathione (GSH) synthase gene Bamb-2918 of strain B. ambifaria AMMD. Genetic functional analysis and complementary assay of the disrupted gene, which was predicted to encode GSH synthase, indicated the essential role of the Glu-2918 gene in the antibacterial activity of strain Lyc2.

Rich functionalities of transition-metal oxides and their interfaces bear an enormous technological potential. Its realization in practical devices requires, however, a significant improvement of yet relatively low electron mobility in oxide materials. Recently, a mobility boost of about two orders of magnitude has been demonstrated at the spinel/perovskite ��-Al2O3/SrTiO3 interface compared to the paradigm perovskite/perovskite LaAlO3/SrTiO3. We explore the fundamental physics behind this phenomenon from direct measurements of the momentum-resolved electronic structure of this interface using resonant soft-X-ray angle-resolved photoemission. We find an anomaly in orbital ordering of the mobile electrons in ��-Al2O3/SrTiO3 which depopulates electron states in the top STO layer. This rearrangement of the mobile electron system pushes the electron density away from the interface that reduces its overlap with the interfacial defects and weakens the electron-phonon interaction, both effects contributing to the mobility boost. A crystal-field analysis shows that the band order alters owing to the symmetry breaking between the spinel ��-Al2O3 and perovskite SrTiO3. The band-order engineering exploiting the fundamental symmetry properties emerges as another route to boost the performance of oxide devices.

BCH codes are an interesting class of cyclic codes due to their efficient encoding and decoding algorithms. In many cases, BCH codes are the best linear codes. However, the dimension and minimum distance of BCH codes have been seldom solved. Until now, there have been few results on BCH codes over $\gf(q)$ with length $q^m+1$, especially when $q$ is a prime power and $m$ is even. The objective of this paper is to study BCH codes of this type over finite fields and analyse their parameters. The BCH codes presented in this paper have good parameters in general, and contain many optimal linear codes., Comment: This paper is amalgamated with another paper

It is well-known that cyclic codes have efficient encoding and decoding algorithms. In recent years, antiprimitive BCH codes have attracted a lot of attention. The objective of this paper is to study BCH codes of this type over finite fields and analyse their parameters. Some lower bounds on the minimum distance of antiprimitive BCH codes are given. The BCH codes presented in this paper have good parameters in general, containing many optimal linear codes. In particular, two open problems about the minimum distance of BCH codes of this type are partially solved in this paper., Comment: This manuscript was first submitted to IEEE Tran. Inf. Theory in 06, April, 2021

We proposed and analyzed a scheme to generate large-size Schrödinger cat states based on linear operations of Fock states and squeezed vacuum states and conditional measurements. By conducting conditional measurements via photon number detectors, two unbalanced Schrödinger kitten states combined by a beam splitter can be amplified to a large-size cat state with the same parity. According to simulation results, two Schrödinger odd kitten states of $β=1.06$ and $β=1.11$ generated from one-photon-subtracted squeezed vacuum states of $-$3 dB, are amplified to an odd cat state of $β=1.73$ with a fidelity of $F=99\%$. A large-size Schrödinger odd cat state with $β=2.51$ and $F=97.30\%$ is predicted when the input squeezed vacuum states are increased to $-$5.91 dB. According to the analysis on the impacts of experimental imperfections in practice, Schrödinger odd cat states of $β>2$ are available. A feasible configuration based on a quantum frequency comb is developed to realize the large-size cat state generation scheme we proposed.

Additional file 1: Table S1. Primer sequences.

In this paper, the morphological and optical properties of LTO/TaOx composite structure films and electrochromic properties of “ITO/NiOx/LTO/TaOx/WOx/ITO” electrochromic devices (ECDs) based on LTO/TaOx composite structure films are reported. The composite films are deposited on the ITO substrate by reactive magnetron sputtering. The results of XRD, SEM, and AFM show that LTO film is amorphous and the performance of films prepared by sputtering power of 100 W for 5 h is the best. The optical transmittance of the multilayer structure is tested using an ultraviolet-visible spectrum and the refractive index dispersion is calculated using the relationship between the peaks in the spectrum based on equal inclination interference theory. Optical transmittance and refractive index dispersion are changed with the increase of magnetron sputtering power. Electrochromic tests show that all-solid-state ECDs based on composite films have 13 s coloring and 14 s fading response time, and the average optical modulation amplitude is 58%.

Buckling restrained braces (BRBs) are normally incorporated in the beam-column structures to serve as energy dissipation members due to their stable hysteretic behavior. However, the structures equipped with BRBs may suffer excessive residual deformations when they are subjected to large earthquakes. To minimize the residual deformations of the structures with traditional BRBs, a novel self-centering buckling restrained brace (SC-BRB) consisting of a self-centering system and a traditional BRB system is developed in the present study. Large-scale experimental studies are carried out and the hysteretic behavior of the proposed system is compared with the traditional BRB and self-centering brace (SCB). Experimental results show that the SC-BRB exhibits flag-shaped hysteresis response with a small residual deformation and a moderate energy dissipation capability. The proposed SC-BRB is applied to a reinforced concrete (RC) double-column bridge pier for seismic retrofitting. Nonlinear dynamic analyses are carried out to examine its effect on the seismic behavior of the bridge. Numerical results demonstrate that the bridge equipped with SC-BRB system shows much smaller residual displacement compared to the ones equipped with traditional BRB and SCB systems. Numerical results also indicate that SC-BRB system tends to amplify the peak acceleration of the bridge.

The composite overwrapped pressure vessel (COPV) with its excellent properties is used for high-pressure storage in aerospace industries. Before they can be reliably incorporated into space flight applications, a significant amount of work has been conducted for better predicting the condition status and residual life of COPVs. A novel MXene film sensor technology that can provide real-time and in situ structural health monitoring of composite structures was proposed in this work. An excellent MXene film sensor can be obtained based on the method proposed in this paper. Before sensor is applied to pressure vessels, coupon tests include tensile loading testing and fatigue loading testing is carried out. For coupon tests, the piezoresistive response of MXene sensor is understood. MXene sensors made on a flexible printed circuit (FPC) have been integrated into a composite pressure vessel, and are used to monitor changes in the hoop and axial strain fields during hydraulic pressure tests. The piezoresistive response of MXene sensor is obtained and the main working mechanism of MXene is explained. The distributed strain measurement of the vessel provides a more efficient process of monitoring structural integrity to further understand the failure mechanisms of the vessel.

Higher order singular value decomposition (HOSVD) is an important tool for analyzing big data in multilinear algebra and machine learning. In this paper, we present two quantum algorithms for HOSVD. Our methods allow one to decompose a tensor into a core tensor containing tensor singular values and some unitary matrices by quantum computers. Compared to the classical HOSVD algorithm, our quantum algorithms provide an exponential speedup. Furthermore, we introduce a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm of HOSVD model applied in recommendation systems., Comment: 14 pages; 6 figures; submitted for publication; comments are welcome!

Let $\mathbb{F}_{p^m}$ be the finite field of order $p^m$, where $p$ is an odd prime and $m$ is a positive integer. In this paper, we investigate a class of subfield codes of linear codes and obtain the weight distribution of \begin{equation*} \begin{split} \mathcal{C}_k=\left\{\left(\left( {\rm Tr}_1^m\left(ax^{p^k+1}+bx\right)+c\right)_{x \in \mathbb{F}_{p^m}}, {\rm Tr}_1^m(a)\right) : \, a,b \in \mathbb{F}_{p^m}, c \in \mathbb{F}_p\right\}, \end{split} \end{equation*} where $k$ is a nonnegative integer. Our results generalize the results of the subfield codes of the conic codes in \cite{Hengar}. Among other results, we study the punctured code of $\mathcal{C}_k$, which is defined as $$\mathcal{\bar{C}}_k=\left\{\left( {\rm Tr}_1^m\left(a x^{{p^k}+1}+bx\right)+c\right)_{x \in \mathbb{F}_{p^m}} : \, a,b \in \mathbb{F}_{p^m}, \,\,c \in \mathbb{F}_p\right\}.$$ The parameters of these linear codes are new in some cases. Some of the presented codes are optimal or almost optimal. Moreover, let $v_2(\cdot)$ denote the 2-adic order function and $v_2(0)=\infty$, the duals of $\mathcal{C}_k$ and $\mathcal{\bar{C}}_k$ are optimal with respect to the Sphere Packing bound if $p>3$, and the dual of $\mathcal{\bar{C}}_k$ is an optimal ternary linear code for the case $v_2(m)\leq v_2(k)$ if $p=3$ and $m>1$.

Tobacco brown spot disease, caused by Alternaria alternata, is responsible for causing significant losses in tobacco production in China. The use of biocontrol microorganisms to prevent and control this disease represent an important, environment-friendly, management strategy. In the present study, 17 bacterial strains with antimicrobial activity were isolated from 40 rhizosphere soil samples and evaluated for antifungal activity to identify an effective biocontrol agent for the control of tobacco brown spot disease in tobacco. Among the isolated strains, Bacillus siamensis, strain LZ88, exhibited the strongest antifungal activity with an inhibition rate of 81.96%. We confirmed that strain LZ88 controlled both mycelial growth and spore production in A. alternata by secreting protein-like antifungal metabolites and through the release of volatile organic compounds. Strain LZ88 also had the ability to induce plant basal immunity as evidenced by increased expression of the defense-related enzymes, peroxidase (POD) and polyphenol oxidase (PPO), in tobacco leaves. Results of greenhouse experiments indicated that LZ88 could effectively reduce the occurrence and degree of severity of tobacco brown spot disease. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report regarding the use of B. siamensis to control brown spot disease in tobacco.

Chatter is one of the most unexpected and uncontrollable phenomenon during the milling operation. It is very important to develop an effective monitoring method to identify the chatter as soon as possible, while existing methods still cannot detect it before the workpiece has been damaged. This paper proposes an energy aggregation characteristic-based Hilbert–Huang transform method for online chatter detection. The measured vibration signal is firstly decomposed into a series of intrinsic mode functions (IMFs) using ensemble empirical mode decomposition. Feature IMFs are then selected according to the majority energy rule. Subsequently Hilbert spectral analysis is applied on these feature IMFs to calculate the Hilbert time/frequency spectrum. Two indicators are proposed to quantify the spectrum and thresholds are automatically calculated using Gaussian mixed model. Milling experiments prove the proposed method to be effective in protecting the workpiece from severe chatter damage within acceptable time complexity.

It has been reported that RhoA activation and Rho-kinase (ROCK) expression are increased in chronic hypoxic lungs, and the long-term inhibition of ROCK markedly improves the survival of patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). However, whether Rho-kinase α (ROCK2) participates in regulation of the growth of pulmonary arterial endothelial cells (PAECs) remains unknown. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of hypoxia on the proliferation of PAECs and the role of ROCK2 in the underlying mechanism. The results of western blotting and reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction analysis showed that hypoxia increased the activity and expression of ROCK2 in PAECs, and the stimulating effects of hypoxia on the proliferation of PAECs were attenuated by either the ROCK inhibitor Y27632 or transfection with ROCK2 small interfering RNA. Moreover, analysis of cyclin A and cyclin D1 mRNA expression indicated that ROCK2 mediates the cell cycle progression promoted by hypoxia. These results indicate that hypoxia promotes the proliferation of pulmonary arterial endothelial cells via activation of the ROCK2 signaling pathway.

Ca₂Gd₈(SiO₄)₆O₂:A (A = Eu³⁺ and Dy³⁺) phosphors were successfully synthesized by the sol-gel process. X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric and differential thermal analysis (TG-DTA), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and photoluminescence spectra were used to characterize the resulting phosphors. The results of XRD indicated that the diffraction peaks of the phosphor powder agreed well with the standard card. Under short ultraviolet excitation, the doped rare earth ions (A) showed their characteristic emis- sions in Ca⁺Gd₈(SiO₄)₆O₂ phophors, i.e., ⁵D₀ --> ⁷F₂ (615 nm) for Eu³⁺ and ⁴F₉/₂2 --> ⁶H₁₅/₂ (483 nm) and ⁴F₉/₂ --> ⁶H₁₃/₂ (575 nm) for Dy³⁺. The optimum concentration for doped rare earth ions was determined to be 9 mol% Eu³⁺ and 3 mol% Dy³⁺ of Gd³⁺ in Ca₂Gd₈(SiO₄)₆O₂

This paper reports the synthesis and luminescence properties of rare earth doped CaYAI₃O₇ prepared via a sol-gel process. The phosphors have intense luminescence. In Ce³⁺/Tb³⁺ co-doped materials, there is energy transfer from Ce³⁺ to Tb³⁺ that enhances the luminescence of Tb³⁺. These materials may find applications in solid state lighting and radiation detection.

Ficus carica L., belonging to the Moraceae family, is one of the earliest cultivated fruit trees. Fig is an important crop for dry and fresh consumption worldwide because it contains an abundant source of minerals and vitamins. Moreover, fig fruit has been a typical component in health-promoting diets for millennia. A previously uncharacterized disease was observed on fig fruit during 2016 and 2017 in Qingdao, Shandong Province, China (N 36°08′49″, E 120°25′5″). Approximately 5 to 8% of fruit on greater than 500 trees was lost due to the disease during the 2016 and 2017 seasons. The symptoms were first observed on green fruit, and infected fruit initially showed soaked symptoms on the surface, which subsequently became covered with fluffy mycelia that ultimately caused fruit decay. Infected fruit were collected, and small pieces of discolored or necrotic tissues were rinsed with 70% alcohol for 10 s followed by 1% NaOCl for 60 s, after which they were washed with sterile distilled water (Wang et al. 2015). Pieces were subsequently plated in Petri dishes containing potato dextrose agar (PDA) and incubated for 4 days at 28°C in the dark. The obtained isolates were purified through single-spore culture. Colonies of all isolates on the PDA plates were identical, producing mycelia that were initially white and fluffy but that subsequently turned gray and then black as they matured. Mycelia were hyaline, smooth, septate, 110.5 to 260 × 3 to 4 μm; stipe extension septate, erect to flexuous, 123.5 to 179 μm long, and 2 to 3.5 μm wide at the apical septum. Hyphae were hyaline and septate, consistent with the description of Botryosphaeria dothidea. The pycnidia contained hyaline, nonseptate, fusiform conidia measuring 13.5 to 26.5 × 4.8 to 8.0 μm. Perithecia contained clavate asci, which averaged 130.5 × 17 μm. The internal transcribed spacer region, partial translation elongation factor 1-alpha, and β-tubulin genes of the rDNA of the isolate were sequenced using primers ITS4/ITS5 (GenBank accession no. MN428793), EF1-728F/EF1-986R (MN478488), and Bt2a/Bt2b (MN508257), respectively (Sun et al. 2014). Based on morphological features and phylogenetic analysis, we concluded that the isolates belonged to B. dothidea. To test the pathogenicity, F. carica fruit were collected, surface sterilized with 1% NaOCl, and rinsed with sterilized distilled water. Plugs (5 × 5 mm) of B. dothidea from the PDA plate were placed on the surface of the fruit (n = 10) and incubated at 28°C and 60% humidity in the dark. Four days after inoculation, bot rot symptoms appeared, and the surfaces of the fruit were covered with fluffy mycelia. In contrast, fruit inoculated with PDA plugs that did not contain B. dothidea remained symptom-free. B. dothidea was reisolated from diseased fruit, fulfilling Koch’s postulates. To our knowledge, this is the first report of B. dothidea causing bot rot in F. carica in China.

Polymer materials are excellent insulation materials due to low conductivity, low loss and high breakdown field strength. In recent years, with the improvement of power system voltage level and the increase of transmission capacity, the dielectric property, mechanical performance and thermal stability of conventional insulating materials are put forward higher requirements. By using organic nanoparticles to modify the polymer, it can effectively improve the breakdown strength, suppress space charge injection, reduce dielectric loss and thus improve the insulation performance. In this paper, the nano-SiO 2 particles treated by different surface modifiers were melting blended with crosslinked polyethylene to prepare the XLPE/SiO 2 nanocomposites. The nano-SiO 2 particles is well dispersed in the XLPE matrix observing by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), the dispersion effect depends on the polarity of the compatibilizer and the matching effect of the surface modifier. The melting and crystallization behavior of the nanocomposites were studied by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), the crystal morphology and crystal distribution of the samples were observed by SEM. The results show that the organic SiO2 plays a role of the heterogeneous nucleation in the polymer to reduce the melting point of the polymer, decrease the crystal size and distribute more evenly. The nucleation effect of nanoparticles leads to an increase in the crystallization rate. The space charge characteristics of nanocomposites are measured by pulse electro-acoustic method (PEA). The results indicate that the interfacial effects of organic nano-SiO 2 introduce deep traps in the polymer matrix, which are beneficial to bound charge and reduce the carrier mobility, thus effectively avoiding the accumulation and migration of space charges. The effect of organic surface modifier on the space charge transfer and suppression characteristics of nanocomposites is discussed based on the structural characteristics.

We consider a $\mathbb{R}^d$-valued branching random walk with a stationary and ergodic environment $\xi=(\xi_n)$ indexed by time $n\in\mathbb{N}$. Let $Z_n$ be the counting measure of particles of generation $n$. With the help of the uniform convergence of martingale and the multifractal analysis, we establish a large deviation result for the measures $Z_n$ as well as a moderate deviation principle.

Inverse square root has played an important role in Cholesky decomposition, which devoted to hardware efficient compressed sensing. However, the performance is usually limited by the trade-off between throughput and precision. This paper presents hardware implementation of fixed-point single iterated multiplicative inverse square root. Multiple piecewise linear approximation in softly nonlinear range is used to compute the initial value. Single iterated Newton-Raphson method is employed to obtain high precision. Multiple constants multiplication technique is proposed to achieve high throughput. The combination of these techniques yields high performance in terms of throughput and precision. It obtains more than 70 % of throughput improvement and almost 100 × higher precision over the inverse square root Intellectual Property (IP) from Altera. In addition, Cholesky decomposition has been presented to validate the proposed architecture, which shows that 42 % of throughput improvement is achieved compared with the IP.

The electrochemical detection of phytohormones is extremely difficult owing to their poor electrochemical activities, strong electrode passivation (fouling), and complicated electrochemical behaviors and reaction mechanism. In this paper, an interesting electrochemical phenomenon on voltammetric behaviors for the electrochemical oxidation of 6-benzylaminopurine (6-BAP) which was one of the well-known phytohormones under the different pH conditions was investigated, and the content of 6-BAP in real samples was detected by the adsorptive stripping voltammetry using MWCNT/GCE. The pH-controlled voltammetric behaviors like peak potentials, peak currents, peak shapes and peak number of 6-BAP were discussed by the protonation–dissociation equilibria of 6-BAP in combination with electrocatalytic oxidation mechanism of 6-BAP. The electrochemical sensing performance such as the linear range, limit of detection (LOD), limit of quantification (LOQ), sensitivity, selectivity, precision and applicability for the pH-controlled stripping voltammetric detection of 6-BAP was also evaluated. There was an observable difference in the number of peaks for the electrochemical oxidation of 6-BAP under strong acidic (three peaks), near neutral (two peaks), and strong alkaline (one peak) pH conditions. The electrochemical oxidation reaction of 6-BAP was adsorption-controlled irreversible processes, which were not affected by three different pH values. Oxidation peaks with relatively well-defined peak shapes and high peak currents were selected for the adsorptive stripping voltammetric detection of 6-BAP, and peak currents were proportional to 6-BAP concentrations in linear ranges of 0.3–50 μM with LOD of 0.098 μM and LOQ of 0.326 μM at pH 3.0, 0.5–60 μM with LOD of 0.165 μM and LOQ of 0.545 μM at pH 7.0, and 0.7–60 μM with LOD of 0.235 μM and LOQ of 0.776 μM at pH 10.0. The adsorptive stripping voltammetric determination of 6-BAP content with real samples in acid solution was more feasible and applicable.

The hoverfly, Eupeodes corollae, is a worldwide natural enemy of aphids and a plant pollinator. To provide insights into the biology of this species, we examined its population genetic structure by obtaining 1.15-GB random genomic sequences using next-generation sequencing and developing genome-wide microsatellite markers. A total of 79,138 microsatellite loci were initially isolated from the genomic sequences; after strict selection and further testing of 40 primer pairs in eight individuals, 24 polymorphic microsatellites with high amplification rates were developed. These microsatellites were used to examine the population genetic structure of 96 individuals from four field populations collected across southern to northern China. The number of alleles per locus ranged from 5 to 13 with an average of 8.75; the observed and expected heterozygosity varied from 0.235 to 0.768 and from 0.333 to 0.785, respectively. Population genetic structure analysis showed weak genetic differentiation among the four geographical populations of E. corollae, suggesting a high rate of gene flow reflecting likely widespread migration of E. corollae in China.

To solve the problem of the accuracy of the numerical simulations of cold rolling, the thermomechanical responses of 40Cr under uniaxial compression loading are presented. The strain rates include quasistatic (0.004 s−1) at temperature of 293 K and dynamic loading regime (632 s−1~5160 s−1) at temperature regime (293 K~673 K). Significant strain rate and temperature sensitivity are measured. Based on these observations, the Johnson-Cook phenomenological constitutive model is proposed to predict the mechanical behavior of the 40Cr over wide ranges of strain rate and temperature. The solution process of the equation parameters is given. Correlations with this Johnson-Cook model are shown very close to the observed responses. Important material parameters are provided to the application of numerical analysis in project.

Issues around the loss of diversity caused by fast-growing tree plantations such as Eucalyptus have aroused controversy for many years.It is generally believed that Eucaluptus plantations bring about a decrease of plant′s biodiversity by influencing resource competitions,allelopathy,or the level of soil fertility.Above and below-ground of forest ecosystems interact implicitly.Complex interactions between above-belowground biodiversity may provide important feedbacks regulating ecosystem.However,seldom information was available on the soil organism′s diversity in Eucalyptus plantations.Furthermore,most of the previous studies were being conducted in the short-term rotation Eucalyptus plantations with a certain plantation age,which might limit our understanding of the actual plantation ecosystem process.Therefore,the abundance and diversity of plants and soil biodiversity were simultaneously measured across a range of eucalypt plantation ages(1—10 years) in southwest China to determine how Eucalyptus grandis afforestation of agricultural lands affected the native biodiversity.The present results showed that afforestation of E.grandis caused changes in plant and soil biodiversity with soil depth and was dependent on the stand age.The species richness,abundance and the diversity of understory plants and soil organisms showed a parallel development during the process of the succession,viz.both of them increased significantly with time but with a 'dip' around 4 years old.CCA analysis showed that the plant′s life forms transited from liana,hemicryptophytes and therophytes into perennial herbaceous-phanerophytes and phanerophytes.Bacteria quantitatively dominated the soil microbe in E.grandis regardless of plantation age.The individual proportion of saprozoic group quantitatively dominated in the soils of the all the study sites,followed by omnivorous group.The proportion of saprozoic groups decreased in 1—7 year old stands and then increased significantly with time.The proportion of omnivorous group increased as S shape with the plantation age.The proportion of predators and phytophage groups decreased significantly with time.The individual percentage of nematode decreased with the plantation age,but that of acarina and the number ratio of the acarina and collembola present the S shape increasing trend over time.The multiple comparisons test showed that plant diversity of the understory vegetation in 1,2 and 4—7 years-old plantations were significantly lower than that in the control forests(Pinus massoniana).Plant diversity in 1—10 year-old E.grandis plantations were significantly higher than that of the control arable land.Soil biodiversity in the plantations before the rotation period has no significant differences compared with agricultural lands,but were significantly higher in the plantations on or after the rotation period than the crop land.There were significant correlations between the plant′ s and soil organism′s diversity index and the correlation coefficient decreased with soil depth.

This paper reports the synthesis and luminescence properties of rare earth doped CaYAI₃O₇ prepared via a sol-gel process. The phosphors have intense luminescence. In Ce³⁺/Tb³⁺ co-doped materials, there is energy transfer from Ce³⁺ to Tb³⁺ that enhances the luminescence of Tb³⁺. These materials may find applications in solid state lighting and radiation detection.

This study was aimed to investigate the control efficiency of crop rotation (CR) and intercropping systems for root-knot nematodes (Meloidogyne sp.) in angelica (Angelica sinensis). Plants of angel...

Blast-induced ground vibration is an enormous hazardous event in the mining industry. Prediction of peak particle velocity (PPV) is very complicated due to the number of influencing parameters affecting seism wave propagation. In this paper, artificial neural network (ANN) is implemented to develop a model to predict PPV in a blasting operation. Based on the measured parameters of maximum explosive charge used per delay and distance between blast face to monitoring point, a three-layer ANN was found to be optimum with architecture 2-5-1. To investigate the suitability of this approach, ANN predictions are compared with Sodev’s predictions. Through the analysis of coefficient of determination (CoD) and mean absolute error (MAE) between monitored and predicted values of PPV, it indicates that the forecast data by the ANN model are closer to the actua1 values than Sodev’s predictor.

A dual-functional extreme ultraviolet(EUV) multilayer (ML) mirror was designed for high-reflectivity at 19.5 nm ( Fe Ⅻ line ) and low-reflectivity at 30.4 nm ( He Ⅱ line ). The design based on genetic algorithm (GA) utilized a stack composed of two periodic multilayers: a bottom multilayer for high reflectivity at 19.5 nm, and a top multilayer for low-reflectivity at 30.4 nm. The multilayer mirror was prepared by direct current magnetron sputtering, and characterized by grazing-incident X-ray diffraction(XRD) and synchrotron radiation(SR). The experiment results show that the dual-functional multilayer achieves the reflectivity of 33.3% at 19.5 nm and 9.6×10-4 at 30.4 nm at incident angle of 13°.

The dynamics and performance of hydropneumatic fender were studied. A theoretical model of the hydropneumatic fender was established to calculate its reaction forces and energy absorption capability. The influences of the length, diameter, volume percentage of water, and the internal air pressure upon the mechanical properties were analyzed. The reaction force and energy absorption capability of the hydropneumatic fender were numerically studied with the finite element analysis software MSC.Dytran. The numerical results were in agreement with the theoretical results, which showed that the theoretical model has well accuracy and is significative for the design of the hydropneumatic fender.

Photothermal effects associated with noble metal nanostructures have shown wide potential applications in photo-thermal cancer therapy, photo-thermal imaging, nanomedicine, etc. These applications benefit from the localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) effect of the nanoparticles. Due to the LSPR effect, the nanoparticles exhibit unique optical properties such as strong scattering and absorption in the band ranging from visible to near-infrared region. The absorption enables the plasmonic nanoparticle to be a thermal source to increase the temperature of itself and the localized surrounding environment. Among these particels, the anisotropic core-capped nanostructures distinguish themselves by their strong polarization selectivity. The absorptions are different when the incident light is polarized in the directions vertical (90) and parallel (0) to its symmetry axis, respectively. At 90, a large red-shift can be achieved and the absorption cross section is greatly enhanced. Moreover, their absorption peaks can be flexibly manipulated by slightly adjusting one of the geometrical parameters. However, the photothermal responses to these parameters are left blank. In this paper, photothermal effects of SiO2@Au core-capped nanoparticles are studied based on the numerical finite elemental analysis method (COMSOL software). The thermal response to each of the paramenters, including shell thickness, core diameter, core-shell ratio, and metal surface coverage is achieved. The calculation shows that the temperature of these core-capped nanoparticles can be adjusted efficiently in the near infrared band by easily rotating the polarization, i.e. slightly adjusting the geometric parameters. Especially in a range between 30 and 70, the temperature varying with the polarization follows almost a linear relationship. The comparisons with other popular structures including solid sphere, core-shell and nanorod are also made. The results indicate that at a similar size, the core-capped structure can offer a higher temperature than solid spheres and core-shell structures. To obtain the same temperature variation, the core-capped one has a smaller size than a nanorod. The comparisons demonstrate that the core-capped structure can be an alternative to a high-efficient nano heat source in the photothemal applications.

The association between hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and coronary artery disease (CAD) is controversial. We conducted this study to determine and quantify this association.We used an established, national, observational cohort of all HCV-infected veterans receiving care at all Veterans Affairs facilities, the Electronically Retrieved Cohort of HCV Infected Veterans, to identify HCV-infected subjects and HCV-uninfected control subjects. We used the Cox proportional-hazards model to determine the risk of CAD among HCV-infected subjects and control subjects.We identified 82,083 HCV-infected and 89,582 HCV-uninfected subjects. HCV-infected subjects were less likely to have hypertension, hyperlipidemia, and diabetes but were more likely to abuse alcohol and drugs and to have renal failure and anemia. HCV-infected subjects had lower mean (+/- standard deviation) total plasma cholesterol (175 +/- 40.8 mg/dL vs. 198 +/- 41.0 mg/dL), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (102 +/- 36.8 mg/dL vs. 119 +/- 38.2 mg/dL), and triglyceride (144 +/- 119 mg/dL vs. 179 +/- 151 mg/dL) levels, compared with HCV-uninfected subjects (P.001 for all comparisons). In multivariable analysis, HCV infection was associated with a higher risk of CAD (hazard ratio, 1.25; 95% confidence interval, 1.20-1.30). Traditional risk factors (age, hypertension, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, and hyperlipidemia) were associated with a higher risk of CAD in both groups, whereas minority race and female sex were associated with a lower risk of CAD.HCV-infected persons are younger and have lower lipid levels and a lower prevalence of hypertension. Despite a favorable risk profile, HCV infection is associated with a higher risk of CAD after adjustment for traditional risk factors.

The pattern and range of present crustal movement as well as characteristic of deformation-strain play a key role in cognizing seismogenic mechanism in the Jiashi region, Xinjiang, northwestern China. Using GPS geodesy in 1994 and 1998, here we give geodetic evidence of rapid convergence of about 19 mm/a across the western Tianshan, which is about 50% greater than the seismic moment solution (13 mm/a) by assembling major earthquake in the 20th century. The discrepancy of deformation rate between geodetic observation and seismic energy releasing indicates the possibilities that, there exists a lot of aseismic strain and strain during seismic interval in the western Tianshan, or seismic fault slip in this century could not be enough to compensate the present deformation in the whole area. Whichever it maybe, from the view of accumulation of stress-strain, it suggests that there will be potential strong earthquakes in the western segment of Tianshan and the northeastern corner of Pamir in a long period.

This article demonstrates that China's large state-owned enterprises (SOEs) are not stagnant fossils waiting to die. Under economic reform policies this sector has undergone large change due to enhanced enterprise autonomy, the impact of market forces, rapid growth of domestic demand for upstream products, strategic integration with the world economy and the state's policy to promote large businesses. China's large SOEs are developing new institutional forms that do not neatly fit into existing patterns. China is experimentally changing its institutions through a combination of central policy, local initiative and interaction with international investment. This presents a challenge to the “transitional orthodoxy” and to ideas concerning property rights in development economics. There is not a universal model of property rights and government action that works best in all circumstances. China's experience with the reform of large SOEs shows the diverse possibilities for effective industrial institutions.

The manufacture of power generating equipment is characterised by high technology, rapid technical progress and powerful economies of scale and scope. Only a few firms dominate the industry globally. Rapid growth of demand for power generating equipment in China provides a big opportunity for its indigenous power equipment suppliers. However, the Chinese market has become a battleground for the multinationals. Despite large progress, China's leading power equipment manufacturer, Harbin, still is far behind the leading multinationals in terms of both scale and technology. If China's major power equipment manufacturers are to establish internationally competitive firms, they need to make the transition from autonomous plants within a national ‘quasi-firm’, to a true, large-scale, multi-plant firm benefiting from economies of scale and scope. To achieve this requires extensive assistance from state industrial policy, especially to ensure technology transfer from the multinationals, and to orchestrate a merger of leading domestic companies. Powerful forces, both domestic and international, are working against this outcome, wishing instead to transform China's leading firms into sub-branches of the multinationals. The industry is in the middle of a tense battle, of great significance for China's industrial evolution in the epoch of high globalisation.

Ca 2 RE 8 (SiO 4 ) 6 O 2 (RE = Y, Gd, La) is a kind of ternary rare-earth-metal silicate with the oxyapatite structure, which was used as host materials for the luminescence of various rare earth and mercury-like ions. Ca 2 Gd 8 (SiO 4 ) 6 O 2 :Er 3+ phosphors were prepared through the sol-gel process. X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and photoluminescence spectra were used to characterize the resulting phosphors. The results of XRD indicate that the phosphors crystallized completely at 1000 °C. SEM study reveals that the average grain size is 400 ∼ 1000 nm. In Ca 2 Gd 8 (SiO 4 ) 6 O 2 : Er 3+ shows its characteristic green emission at 528 nm ( 2 H 11/2 - 4 I 15/2 ) and 548 nm ( 4 S 3/2 - 4 I 15/2 ) upon excitation into 382 nm, with an optimum doping concentration of 5% (mole fraction) of Gd 3+ in the host lattices.