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Publisher Summary This chapter presents the molecular dynamics results on the diffusion and density fluctuation properties of a fluid compressed beyond its freezing point and on the structural and elastic responses of a crystal disordered by the introduction of interstitial particles. While the two studies are of interest for different reasons, they both illustrate a significant advantage of the simulation approach, namely, access to a variety of properties systematically determined under well-controlled conditions . It has been found that molecular dynamics data provide evidence for a dynamical transition in metastable fluids, which is distinct from the glass transition observed in the laboratory. A second result is that in the case of amorphization induced by the introduction of point defects, simulation is able to show that the transition threshold is dependent on both the rate of introduction and the defect concentration. Vitrification and amorphihization may have connections that are relevant to the fundamental understanding of transitions between a liquid and a crystal, namely, melting and crystallization.

Alaska salmon fisheries are a source of commercial revenue, renewable subsistence resource, cultural identity, and recreational destination for Alaskans, native populations, and out of state eco-tourists alike. We constructed a high fidelity, adaptable, data-driven agent based model that generalizes the socio-ecological dynamics of Kenai River, Alaska. Interactions among the model’s agents can be altered to study the impact of fishing regulation changes or salmon run-timing dynamics. Agents are driven by stochastic principles derived from 35 years of integrated data including salmon runs, municipality management reports, and Alaska Department of Fish and Game management reports. Longitudinal and seasonal correlations between the model’s simulation outputs and the reported system measurements are used to validate the model.

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the methods of eliciting antibodies, detection of antibodies, determination of specificity of antibodies, and iminunoassay methods. The development of sensitive methods for detecting and quantitating reactions between hapten and antibody and the perfection of techniques for obtaining highly purified preparations of antihapten antibodies have played a significant role in the development of modern immunological concepts. Antihapten antibodies have proved particularly useful in the study of antigenic determinants, structural requirements for immunogenicity, the nature of antigen-antibody reactions, and the chemical, physical, and biological properties of antibody. In recent years, the haptens of biological importance have been studied with increasing frequency, and the chapter discusses the production, detection, characterization, biological properties, and clinical applications of antibodies with specificity for such haptens.

Some previous works use discrete wavelet transform (DWT) to extract license plate (LP), however, most of them are not capable of dealing with complex environments such as the low-contrast source images and the dynamic-range problems. In this paper, we propose a license plate localization (LPL) algorithm based on DWT. The LP can be extracted from complex environments and different quality of source images by using two frequency subbands. We first use the HL subband to search the features of LP and then verify the features by checking whether a horizontal line around the feature exists in the LH subband or not.The proposed method can extract both front and back LPs of various vehicles. The experiments show that the proposed method can achieve good LPL results with both short run-time and high accurate detection rate.

Very little has been written about ethics pertaining to sleep medicine, as opposed to specific rules and regulations. The ACGME states the need for competence in medical ethics and its application in sleep medicine and some expertise regarding the legal aspects of sleep medicine, all related to professionalism. These topics on ethical, legal, and social issues prove challenging to fellows, faculty, and those practicing in the community.

Chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL) is a malignant lymphoproliferative disease characterized by a dramatic resistance to spontaneous and drug-induced apoptosis. In the present review the role of endogenous nitric oxide (NO) in this resistance has been analysed. Although a contribution of NOS3 cannot be excluded, NO is mainly produced by an inducible NOS (NOS2) that is constitutively expressed by the leukaemia cells, at variance with normal B lymphocytes. The expression of this enzyme in the tumour cells appears to be regulated by engagement of the toll-like receptor-7 (TLR-7) and is modulated by the ligation of the low-affinity IgE receptor/CD23 and by various cytokines such as interleukin-4 (IL-4) and IFN-γ.

Publisher Summary This chapter presents a survey of the methods of labeling lipid molecules with radioactive elements by organic synthesis, biosynthesis, and isotope-exchange techniques. It also discusses procedures that can be employed for establishing the purity of lipid compounds. Chromatographic procedures are used to establish both radioactive and chemical purities of lipids for biological experiments. Thin-layer chromatography and gas–liquid chromatography complement each other very well when used to check lipid purity, as the former separates lipids into classes by adsorption processes and the latter can separate the resulting individual lipid classes into homologs by partition processes. In this way, for instance, fatty acids can be isolated from monoglycerides, diglycerides, and triglycerides by thin-layer chromatography; then, the constituent fatty acids of each of these classes can be defined by gas–liquid chromatography.

Chapters 1 through 17 have provided a foundation for the understanding and design of microcomputer-based control systems. The final chapter in this book addresses considerations in the field application of microcomputer controllers to thermal and mechanical systems. The chapter opens with a review of the linear proportional-integral (PI) control laws previously discussed in Chapters 16 and 17 and a discussion of their limitations. PI control algorithms suitable for field application are then described in Secs. 18-3 and 18-4.