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Copyright of Annals of Burns & Fire Disasters is the property of Euro-Mediterranean Council for Burns & Fire Disasters and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Tradicionalmente, os retificadores do tipo Boost operando no modo de condução descontínua (MCD) não usam controle de corrente e operam com razão cíclica constante, mas apresentam uma distorção harmônica significativa devido à presença de uma componente de 3ª harmônica. O presente artigo equaciona matematicamente o problema e propõe o uso de uma técnica de modulação que corrige a razão cíclica durante o período da rede e, assim, elimina significativamente a distorção harmônica da corrente, sem adicionar sensores de corrente. A técnica de modulação utilizada já foi apresentada na literatura, no entanto, este artigo demonstra um maior detalhamento matemático da estratégia e propõe uma metodologia para determinar o índice de modulação ótimo. Adicionalmente, propõe-se também uma alternativa para tornar a técnica menos susceptível às variações da tensão de entrada. De modo a validar o estudo teórico, construiu-se um protótipo de 500 W do retificador Boost bridgeless modificado, com tensão eficaz de entrada de 220 V, tensão de saída de 450 V e frequência de comutação de 58,6 kHz. Resultados experimentais apresentaram uma melhoria na distorção harmônica total de 22,17% para 4,88% e no fator de potência de 0,977 para 0,996, ambos em carga nominal.

Context: Environmental conditions during hot weather decrease feed intake and cattle growth. Aims: This study conducted over three consecutive years, during the summer, evaluated access to shade as a strategy to mitigate heat stress of finishing cattle in Uruguay. Methods: Each year, 32 Bos taurus and/or Bos taurus crossbred steers (initially weighing 461 ± 28 kg) were blocked by initial liveweight and assigned to one of eight pens, where one of two treatments were applied, namely, no shade access or shade access (mean shaded area 4.5 m2/animal). Finishing diet was offered three times per day and cattle had ad libitum access to water. Twenty-four pens were considered in a randomised complete-block design. Average daily gain (ADG), dry matter intake (DMI) and feed efficiency were measured, and hot carcass weight was collected at slaughter. Ruminal pH and temperature were obtained using ruminal boluses. Feeding, drinking, rumination, inactive behaviours, respiration rate and painting score were observed. Key results: Mean days on feed were 70.6 ± 5.5. The average THI ranged from 70 to 72. Steers with access to shade had greater DMI (P = 0.003), ADG (P = 0.004), and feed:gain ratio (P = 0.05) than did not shaded steers. Ruminal pH was higher (P < 0.0001) in shaded than in not shaded animals. The slaughter weight of shaded steers was 10 kg greater (P = 0.02) than that of not shaded steers. A trend (P = 0.06) to higher hot carcass weight after dressing was obtained by shaded steers. The average respiration rate and panting score was consistently lower (P < 0.0001) for shaded than for not shaded steers, except in the early morning. Access to shade increased the time spent by animals feeding (P = 0.008) and ruminating (P = 0.001), decreasing inactive time (P < 0.0001). Conclusions: Shade could improve performance and welfare of feedlot cattle during summertime, even in regions with an average THI from 70 to 72. Implications: Access to shade allowed fattening cattle to dissipate heat stored during the day at night and to alleviate the effect of heat load during summer in subtropical region. Cattle in outdoor feedlots are candidates for heat stress. We evaluated the shade effect in steers during finishing under humid subtropical climate. Shade access increased feeding and ruminating time, daily dry-matter intake, average daily gain, feed:gain ratio and carcass weight, and decreased inactive time, respiration rate and panting. Shade improves steers performance, behaviour, and physiology in a region with an average THI from 70 to 72. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context: Environmental conditions during hot weather decrease feed intake and cattle growth. Aims: This study conducted over three consecutive years, during the summer, evaluated access to shade as a strategy to mitigate heat stress of finishing cattle in Uruguay. Methods: Each year, 32 Bos taurus and/or Bos taurus crossbred steers (initially weighing 461 ± 28 kg) were blocked by initial liveweight and assigned to one of eight pens, where one of two treatments were applied, namely, no shade access or shade access (mean shaded area 4.5 m2/animal). Finishing diet was offered three times per day and cattle had ad libitum access to water. Twenty-four pens were considered in a randomised complete-block design. Average daily gain (ADG), dry matter intake (DMI) and feed efficiency were measured, and hot carcass weight was collected at slaughter. Ruminal pH and temperature were obtained using ruminal boluses. Feeding, drinking, rumination, inactive behaviours, respiration rate and painting score were observed. Key results: Mean days on feed were 70.6 ± 5.5. The average THI ranged from 70 to 72. Steers with access to shade had greater DMI (P = 0.003), ADG (P = 0.004), and feed:gain ratio (P = 0.05) than did not shaded steers. Ruminal pH was higher (P < 0.0001) in shaded than in not shaded animals. The slaughter weight of shaded steers was 10 kg greater (P = 0.02) than that of not shaded steers. A trend (P = 0.06) to higher hot carcass weight after dressing was obtained by shaded steers. The average respiration rate and panting score was consistently lower (P < 0.0001) for shaded than for not shaded steers, except in the early morning. Access to shade increased the time spent by animals feeding (P = 0.008) and ruminating (P = 0.001), decreasing inactive time (P < 0.0001). Conclusions: Shade could improve performance and welfare of feedlot cattle during summertime, even in regions with an average THI from 70 to 72. Implications: Access to shade allowed fattening cattle to dissipate heat stored during the day at night and to alleviate the effect of heat load during summer in subtropical region. Cattle in outdoor feedlots are candidates for heat stress. We evaluated the shade effect in steers during finishing under humid subtropical climate. Shade access increased feeding and ruminating time, daily dry-matter intake, average daily gain, feed:gain ratio and carcass weight, and decreased inactive time, respiration rate and panting. Shade improves steers performance, behaviour, and physiology in a region with an average THI from 70 to 72. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

EMOKINE is a software package and dataset creation suite for emotional full-body movement research in experimental psychology, affective neuroscience, and computer vision. A computational framework, comprehensive instructions, a pilot dataset, observer ratings, and kinematic feature extraction code are provided to facilitate future dataset creations at scale. In addition, the EMOKINE framework outlines how complex sequences of movements may advance emotion research. Traditionally, often emotional-'action'-based stimuli are used in such research, like hand-waving or walking motions. Here instead, a pilot dataset is provided with short dance choreographies, repeated several times by a dancer who expressed different emotional intentions at each repetition: anger, contentment, fear, joy, neutrality, and sadness. The dataset was simultaneously filmed professionally, and recorded using XSENS® motion capture technology (17 sensors, 240 frames/second). Thirty-two statistics from 12 kinematic features were extracted offline, for the first time in one single dataset: speed, acceleration, angular speed, angular acceleration, limb contraction, distance to center of mass, quantity of motion, dimensionless jerk (integral), head angle (with regards to vertical axis and to back), and space (convex hull 2D and 3D). Average, median absolute deviation (MAD), and maximum value were computed as applicable. The EMOKINE software is appliable to other motion-capture systems and is openly available on the Zenodo Repository. Releases on GitHub include: (i) the code to extract the 32 statistics, (ii) a rigging plugin for Python for MVNX file-conversion to Blender format (MVNX=output file XSENS® system), and (iii) a Python-script-powered custom software to assist with blurring faces; latter two under GPLv3 licenses., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Studying the neural basis of human dynamic visual perception requires extensive experimental data to evaluate the large swathes of functionally diverse brain neural networks driven by perceiving visual events. Here, we introduce the BOLD Moments Dataset (BMD), a repository of whole-brain fMRI responses to over 1000 short (3 s) naturalistic video clips of visual events across ten human subjects. We use the videos' extensive metadata to show how the brain represents word- and sentence-level descriptions of visual events and identify correlates of video memorability scores extending into the parietal cortex. Furthermore, we reveal a match in hierarchical processing between cortical regions of interest and video-computable deep neural networks, and we showcase that BMD successfully captures temporal dynamics of visual events at second resolution. With its rich metadata, BMD offers new perspectives and accelerates research on the human brain basis of visual event perception., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

The aim of this present clinical trial is to evaluate the effectiveness of a multicomponent prehabilitation programme administered through educational videos versus another programme based on written exercise recommendations, in patients scheduled for lumbar radiculopathy surgery. This study will be a multicentre, controlled, randomised, parallel clinical trial. One hundred participants undergoing lumbar radiculopathy surgery who meet the established inclusion criteria will be recruited at different Spanish hospitals. The experimental group will follow a 4-week prehabilitation programme combining therapeutic exercise, back care education, and pain neuroscience education delivered through videos designed for consumption at home. The control group will be provided with written instructions to perform therapeutic exercises during the same prehabilitation time period. The primary outcome of the study will be disability, assessed using the Spanish version of the Oswestry Disability Index. The secondary outcomes will be pain perception, health-related quality of life, fear avoidance, kinesiophobia, catastrophising, anxiety, depression, physical activity, and the treatment satisfaction of the patients. This study will provide evidence for the effectiveness of a home-based multicomponent prehabilitation programme that addresses some already identified barriers to patient attendance in face-to-face programmes. Understanding the medium and long-term effects of pre-surgery lumbar muscle training and pain neuroscience education administered via instructional videos watched by patients at home, will help improve the design of prehabilitation programmes in this population while also improving the cost-effectiveness of such interventions., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Arguisuelas et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)