1,721,027 research outputs found

    Cardiovascular age of aviation personnel: based on principal component analysis of heart rate and blood pressure variability

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    Objective: To introduce a method to calculate cardiovascular age, a new, accurate and much simpler index for assessing cardiovascular autonomic regulatory function, based on statistical analysis of heart rate and blood pressure variability (HRV and BPV) and baroreflex sensitivity (BRS) data. Methods: Firstly, HRV and BPV of 89 healthy aviation personnel were analyzed by the conventional autoregressive (AR) spectral analysis and their spontaneous BRS was obtained by the sequence method. Secondly, principal component analysis was conducted over original and derived indices of HRV, BPV and BRS data and the relevant principal components, Pciorig and Pcideri (I=1, 2, 3,...) were obtained. Finally, the equation for calculating cardiovascular age was obtained by multiple regression with the chronological age being assigned as the dependent variable and the principal components significantly related to age as the regressors. Results: The first four principal components of original indices accounted for over 90? of total variance of the indices, so did the first three principal components of derived indices. So, these seven principal components could reflect the information of cardiovascular autonomic regulation which was embodied in the 17 indices of HRV, BPV and BRS exactly with a minimal loss of information. Of the seven principal components, PC2orig, PC4orig and PC2deri were negatively correlated with the chronological age (P<0.05), whereas the PC3orig was positively correlated with the chronological age (P<0.01). The cardiovascular age thus calculated from the regression equation was significantly correlated with the chronological age among the 89 aviation personnel (r=0.73, P<0.01). Conclusion: The cardiovascular age calculated based on a multi-variate analysis of HRV, BPV and BRS could be regarded as a comprehensive indicator reflecting the age dependency of autonomic regulation of cardiovascular system in healthy aviation personnel

    Age dependency and correlation of heart rate variability, pressure variability and baroreflex sensitivity

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    Simultaneous analysis of heart rate variability (HRV), blood pressure variability (BPV) and baroreflex sensitivity (BRS) with different types of measures may provide non-duplicative information about autonomic cardiovascular regulation. Therefore, a multiple signal analysis of cardiovascular time series will enhance the physiological understanding of neuro cardiovascular regulation with deconditioning in bedrest or related gravitational physiological studies. It has been shown that age is an important determinant of HRV and BRS in healthy subjects. Whereas in the case of BPV, the effect of aging seems to depend upon the activity status of the subjects. In view of the facts that most of the previous works were dealing with only the variability of one kind of cardiovascular parameters in one study with conventional time-domain and/or frequency-domain analysis, we therefore designed the present work to compare the HRV, BPV and BRS between young and middle-aged male healthy subjects in one study with the same subjects using various techniques, including the approximate entropy (ApEn) measurement, a statistic quantifying HRV "complexity" derived from non-linear dynamics

    The Civil Aviation Pilots hypertensive patients heart rate variability and baroreflex sensitivity analysis: analysis of heart rate variability and baroreflex sensitivity in civil flying personnel with hypertension

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    To explore the Civil Aviation Pilots hypertensive patients cardiovascular autonomic nervous regulation of the changes to provide a reasonable basis for hypertension control. Methods: To use conventional AR spectral analysis methods on 14 cases of civil aviation pilots hypertensive patients and 14 healthy pilots Short-term heart rate variability (HRV) signal analysis, sequential analysis at the same time using its baroreflex sensitivity (BRS). Results: Compared with the control group, the HRV hypertensive patients decreased significantly, the difference was significant (P <0.05), showed total power (TP), low-frequency power (LF), high-frequency power (HF) and the normalization of the high-frequency components (HFn) lower, and normalization of the low-frequency component (LFn) and LF / HF increased; ? the BRS hypertensive patients compared with the control group decreased, the difference was significant (P <0.01). Conclusions: Pilots hypertensive patients regulatory function of the cardiovascular autonomic nervous obvious anomaly, a relatively sympathetic regulatory activities increased, vagus nerve regulatory activities be curbed. flight personnel in the control of hypertension, should strengthen its regulatory function of the autonomic nervous analysis

    Dryland maize yields and water use efficiency in response to tillage and nutrient management practices in China

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    Rainfed crop production in northern China is constrained by low and variable rainfall. This study explored the effects of tillage and nutrient management practices on maize (Zea mays L.) yield and water use efficiency (WUE), at Shouyang Dryland Farming Experimental Station in northern China during 2003-2008. The experiment was set-up using a split-plot design with 3 tillage methods as main treatments: conventional, reduced (till with crop residue incoperated in fall but no-till in spring), and no-till. Sub-treatments were 3 NP fertilizer rates: 105-46, 179-78 and 210-92 kg N and P ha. -1 Maize grain yields were greatly influenced by the amount of growing season rainfall, and by soil water contents at sowing. Mean grain yields over the 6-year period in response to tillage treatments were 5604, 5347 and 5185 kg ha, under reduced, no-till and conventional tillage, respectively. Mean WUE was 13.7, 13.6 and 12.6 kg ha mm under reduced, no-till, and conventional tillage, respectively. Mean soil water contents at sowing and at harvest were significantly influenced by tillage treatments. At harvest time, the no-till treatment had ~8-12% more water in the soil than the conventional and reduced tillage treatments. Under conventional tillage, grain yields increased with NP fertilizer application rates. However, under reduced tillage, grain yields were highest with lowest NP fertilizer application rate. In conclusion, grain yields and WUE were highest under reduced tillage at modest NP fertilizer application rates of 105 kg N and 46 kg P per ha. No-till increased soil water storage by 8-12% and improved WUE compared to conventional tillage

    Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis

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    The present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed

    Variations on the Author

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    “Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship

    Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis

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    We provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
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