290 research outputs found
The Boundary between the Han and Mountain Aborigines and the Role of the Fan-ge as Seen from the Perspective of Armed Conflicts in 19th-Century Taiwan
No full textIn this article I examine the source materials viewed at the National Palace Museum and the Academia Sinica concerning the armed conflicts at Danshui in Daoguang 6 (1826) and Feng-shan in Daoguang 12 (1832) and consider the role of the fan-ge 番割 who operated on the "boundary between the Han Chinese and Mountain Aborigines" during 19th-century Taiwan and their social background. As a result, I found that due to the relationship between the fan-ge and the Mountain Aborigines 生番, they developed intimate ties, out of which the fan-ge learned the aboriginal language, and some not only wed Mountain Aborigine women, but there were in addition cases of their changing hairstyles, clothing and living places. The "overcoming of boundaries" by the fan-ge was not simply a geographic overcoming of boundaries in the sense of moving from Han land to barbarian land but also an overcoming of boundaries in terms of culture and customs, in short a physical transformation, aboriginization, became visible. The premise of this understanding was that the fan-ge were Han Chinese, but in fact making such a presumption is dangerous in the border area. The reason for this was can be seen in the fact that nearly all the fan-ge involved in the conflicts were wed to Mountain Aborigines or were of mixed blood. A classic example would be the case of fan-ge who were tu seng zai 土生仔, children of a Han Chinese and Mountain Aborigine couple. Here the distinction between ethnic groups such as Han, Mountain and Plains Aborigines 熟番 had ceased to make sense. The disappearance of standards of dress for Han Chinese men, i.e. the shaved head and braided hair, meant taking a stance of resistance toward the ruling system to the Qing dynasty, and the wearing of clothing that used animal hides, such as deerskin, was a symbol of being one of the "unassimilated peoples." Therefore, these practices were strictly forbidden by law in an attempt to make the boundary between Han and fan-ge visible, but the attempt was not always successful. Ironically, with changes in the international situation at the end of the Qing dynasty, particularly when the problem of jurisdiction over Mountain Aborigine lands emerged, the fan-ge, who had been so abhorred and restricted, were instead positively evaluated and incorporated as the lowest-ranking unit of governmental administration
Design of LDPC Codes: A Survey and New Results
No full textThis survey paper provides fundamentals in the design of LDPC codes. To provide a target for the code designer, we first summarize the EXIT chart technique for determining (near-)optimal degree distributions for LDPC code ensembles. We also demonstrate the simplicity of representing codes by
protographs and how this naturally leads to quasi-cyclic LDPC codes. The EXIT chart technique is then extended to the special case of protograph-based LDPC codes. Next, we present several design approaches for LDPC codes which incorporate one or more accumulators, including quasi-cyclic accumulatorbased codes. The second half the paper then surveys several
algebraic LDPC code design techniques. First, codes based on finite geometries are discussed and then codes whose designs are based on Reed-Solomon codes are covered. The algebraic designs lead to cyclic, quasi-cyclic, and structured codes. The masking technique for converting regular quasi-cyclic LDPC codes to irregular codes is also presented. Some of these results and codes have not been presented elsewhere. The paper focuses
on the binary-input AWGN channel (BI-AWGNC). However, as discussed in the paper, good BI-AWGNC codes tend to be universally good across many channels. Alternatively, the reader may treat this paper as a starting point for extensions to more advanced channels. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of open problems
Fan and Ventilation Rate Monitoring of Cage-Free Layer Houses in California
No full textVentilation rates were continuously monitored in two cage-free layer houses located in California from March 1, 2012 to May 13, 2013. The average number of brown Lohmann laying hens in each house was 33,300. Temperature, relative humidity, static pressure, and running status of 48 ventilation fans were continuously monitored and recorded every minute. Regression models were developed to relate house temperature and ventilation rate to inlet air temperature, and to relate airflow rate to building static pressure (R2 = 0.98). Results showed that the daily mean ventilation rate per hen ranged from 1.91 to 8.72 m3 h-1 hen-1, averaging at 4.49 ±1.53 m3 h-1 hen-1. The standard uncertainty of daily mean ventilation rate was determined to be 3.7%. The 91-cm and 130-cm fans were found to perform at 82% and 63% of the manufacturer rated airflow rates, respectively. The minimum and maximum static pressure was 11.0 and 50.6 Pa, respectively, corresponding to 2 and 16 running tunnel fans. When the house temperature exceeded 30ºC, an evaporative cooling system was activated, which could reduce the inlet air temperature by 6.3ºC and concurrently increased the indoor air humidity ratio by 3.4 g per kg dry air. Cooling pad efficiency was 66%. The sidewall fans and tunnel fans were operated at 65% and 20% of the total time when layers occupied the houses. The new rational formula to calculate dry base ventilation rates was developed based upon the ratio of water vapor volume to moist air volume. The developed models and data collected in this research can be used to calculate the ventilation rates in cage-free layer houses so that it can be possible to assure healthy conditions needed for layers. They can also be used in the design of cage free houses and in the calculations of emissions of air pollutants from these houses.This article is published as Lin, Xingjun, Ruihong Zhang, Shumei Jiang, Hamed M. El-Mashad, and Hongwei Xin. "Fan and Ventilation Rate Monitoring of Cage-Free Layer Houses in California." Transactions of the ASABE 61, no. 6 (2018): 1939-1950. DOI: 10.13031/trans.12831. Posted with permission.</p
Loss of TP53 cooperates with c-MET overexpression to drive hepatocarcinogenesis
No full textHepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a deadly malignancy with high genetic heterogeneity. TP53 mutation and c-MET activation are frequent events in human HCCs. Here, we discovered that the simultaneous mutations in TP53 and activation of c-MET occur in ~20% of human HCCs, and these patients show a poor prognosis. Importantly, we found that concomitant deletion of Trp53 and overexpression of c-MET (c-MET/sgp53) in the mouse liver led to HCC formation in vivo. Consistent with human HCCs, RNAseq showed that c-MET/sgp53 mouse HCCs were characterized by activated c-MET and Ras/MAPK cascades and increased tumor cell proliferation. Subsequently, a stably passaged cell line derived from a c-MET/sgp53 HCC and corresponding subcutaneous xenografts were generated. Also, in silico analysis suggested that the MEK inhibitor trametinib has a higher inhibition score in TP53 null human HCC cell lines, which was validated experimentally. We consistently found that trametinib effectively inhibited the growth of c-MET/sgp53 HCC cells and xenografts, supporting the possible usefulness of this drug for treating human HCCs with TP53-null mutations. Altogether, our study demonstrates that loss of TP53 cooperates with c-MET to drive hepatocarcinogenesis in vivo. The c-MET/sgp53 mouse model and derived HCC cell lines represent novel and useful preclinical tools to study hepatocarcinogenesis in the TP53 null background
Abstract 3444: <i>LINC00152</i> regulates cell proliferation via p38 signaling and overexpression predicts poor patient survival in lung cancer
No full textAbstract
Lung cancer is a molecularly-heterogenous disease and the leading cause of cancer mortality. The molecular basis for this heterogeneity remains incompletely understood. In the past few years, long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) have emerged as novel mechanisms in mediating cancer biology, although most lncRNAs are still undiscovered. LINC00152 has been identified as highly associated with the tumorigenesis and development in gastric cancer, colon cancer and hepatocellular carcinoma, however, the expression level and its oncogenic roles in lung cancer remains unknown. In the present study, we employed next generation RNA sequencing analysis to reveal dysregulated lncRNAs in lung cancer utilizing datasets of 461 lung adenocarcinomas (LUAD) and 156 normal lung tissues from 3 separate institutions. We found that LINC00152 was 4-fold (p &lt;0.001) overexpressed in lung tumors as compared to their adjacent normal tissues with AUC &gt; 0.8 in these 3 data sets. Patients with high LINC00152 expression have significantly poorer survival than those with low expression (log-rank test, p = 0.003). We verified this diagnostic/prognostic potential in an independent cohort of lung tumor tissues by quantitative RT-PCR. Cell proliferation and colony formation ability were decreased after knockdown of LINC00152 using siRNAs in lung cancer cell lines. The expression of LINC00152 was found primarily in the cytoplasm by qRT-PCR analysis. Trichostatin A treatment indicated that histone acetylation could be one of the mechanisms underlying LINC00152 overexpression in NSCLC and cell-based analyses showed p38 signaling was mainly affected by LINC00152 in vitro. Taken together, our study suggests that LINC00152 is involved in lung tumor growth, may have potential as diagnostic/prognostic marker and that further characterization of this lncRNA as a novel therapeutic target for lung cancer is warranted.
Note: This abstract was not presented at the meeting.
Citation Format: Shumei Feng, Jie Zhang, Wenmei Su, Shengbin Bai, Lei Xiao, Zhuwen Wang, Jules Lin, Rishindra Reddy, Andrew Chang, David Beer, Guoan Chen. LINC00152 regulates cell proliferation via p38 signaling and overexpression predicts poor patient survival in lung cancer [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 3444. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-3444</jats:p
Optimal inverse magnetorheological damper modeling using shuffled frog-leaping algorithm–based adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system approach
No full textMagnetorheological dampers have become prominent semi-active control devices for vibration mitigation of structures which are subjected to severe loads. However, the damping force cannot be controlled directly due to the inherent nonlinear characteristics of the magnetorheological dampers. Therefore, for fully exploiting the capabilities of the magnetorheological dampers, one of the challenging aspects is to develop an accurate inverse model which can appropriately predict the input voltage to control the damping force. In this article, a hybrid modeling strategy combining shuffled frog-leaping algorithm and adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system is proposed to model the inverse dynamic characteristics of the magnetorheological dampers for improving the modeling accuracy. The shuffled frog-leaping algorithm is employed to optimize the premise parameters of the adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system while the consequent parameters are tuned by a least square estimation method, here known as shuffled frog-leaping algorithm-based adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system approach. To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach, the inverse modeling results based on the shuffled frog-leaping algorithm-based adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system approach are compared with those based on the adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system and genetic algorithm–based adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system approaches. Analysis of variance test is carried out to statistically compare the performance of the proposed methods and the results demonstrate that the shuffled frog-leaping algorithm-based adaptive-network-based fuzzy inference system strategy outperforms the other two methods in terms of modeling (training) accuracy and checking accuracy
Research on ESGM for Solving Waste Problems of Companies: Taking W Company as an Example
No full textAbstractCombining the extension strategy generating method (ESGM) with the lean method, the paper makes the quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis on the incompatible problems caused by the waste problems, and develops the ESGM being adaptable for solving the waste problems in companies. Besides, it also makes empirical research on the living examples to develop the optimal extension strategy. The combination of these two methods provides the company with a new thinking for solving the waste problems and realizing targets of the company, which is more effective than applying the lean method exclusively
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