Click- and chirp-evoked human compound action potentials

In the experiments reported here, the amplitude and the latency of human compound action potentials (CAPs) evoked from a chirp stimulus are compared to those evoked from a traditional click stimulus. The chirp stimulus was created with a frequency sweep to compensate for basilar membrane traveling wave delay using the O-Chirp equations from Fobel and Dau [(2004). J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 116, 2213-2222] derived from otoacoustic emission data. Human cochlear traveling wave delay estimates were obtained from derived compound band action potentials provided by Eggermont [(1979). J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 65, 463-470]. CAPs were recorded from an electrode placed on the tympanic membrane (TM), and the acoustic signals were monitored with a probe tube microphone attached to the TM electrode. Results showed that the amplitude and latency of chirp-evoked N1 of the CAP differed from click-evoked CAPs in several regards. For the chirp-evoked CAP, the N1 amplitude was significantly larger than the click-evoked N1s. The latency-intensity function was significantly shallower for chirp-evoked CAPs as compared to click-evoked CAPs. This suggests that auditory nerve fibers respond with more unison to a chirp stimulus than to a click stimulus.     

不同翅片单元外颗粒流换热特性的数值研究

由于成本低,运行稳定,重力驱动移动床在高温固体散料余热回收领域应用潜力较大。然而,相关强化传热技术目前仍待完善。本文基于离散单元法,对颗粒流外掠翅片单元的流动换热特性进行了数值研究。研究表明:通过翅片增加换热面,可以显著提高传热量,但不同翅片单元外颗粒流传热特性不同。颗粒流与不同表面的换热,由颗粒更新、颗粒接触、颗粒竞争掺混以及表面面积共同决定。总体来说,在迎流区,倾斜平表面能扩大面积并确保颗粒更新,更有利于换热增强。而对于背流区,竞争掺混与颗粒接触的影响更大,采用圆弧表面更有优势。     

An Experimental Study on Heat Transfer Coefficients of a CO2-Filled Thermosyphon

Abstract

Because carbon dioxide is ozone friendly and has negligible global warming potential, it has received renewed interest in recent years as an important alternative refrigerant. In this article, the heat transfer characteristics of a carbon dioxide-filled two-phase closed thermosyphon were investigated experimentally, and the empirical heat transfer correlations are reported. The heat transfer data were analyzed, and heat transfer coefficients were compared with conventional heat transfer correlations. The results represent that heat transfer correlation of the heated section can be expressed with Kutatelatze's correlation, and heat transfer coefficients of the condenser section are found to be in reasonable agreement with the Nusselt equation.     

Heat Transfer Experiments in a Rotary Drum for a Variety of Granular Materials

The influence of material properties on the contact heat transfer coefficient between the covered wall surface and the solid bed was investigated. The contact heat transfer coefficients were calculated from the measured radial and circumferential temperature profiles. Experiments were carried out with six different materials, including steel spheres, animal powder, cement clinker, quartz sand, glass beads, and expanded clay. The rotational speeds were varied from 1 to 6 rpm to evaluate the influence of rotational speed on the contact heat transfer coefficient. The measured contact heat transfer coefficients were compared with four models from the literature.     

Thermal Performance Enhancement of Thermosyphon Heat Pipe with Binary Working Fluids

Thermal performance of a thermosyphon heat pipe using ethanol-water and TEG-water with variations of parameters such as the mixture content, the pipe diameter, and the working temperature have been studied in this research work. From the experiments, it is found that at low temperature of heat source (less than 80^oC), the ethanol-water mixture has a higher heat transfer rate than that of water and close to that of pure ethanol. In the case of TEG-water mixture, the heat transfer rate of the thermosyphon varies with the content of TEG in the mixture, and it is found that TEG in the mixture can increase the critical heat flux due to the flooding limit in a small thermosyphon. The boiling equation of Rohsenow and the condensation equation of Nusselt are modified to predict the heat transfer coefficients inside the thermosyphon. For the mixtures, the weighted average of the heat transfer coefficient of each component can be used to predict the total heat transfer coefficient. Furthermore, it is found that Faghri's equation can be used to predict the critical heat flux due to the flooding limit of the thermosyphon with the binary mixtures.     

Effect of Coolant Temperature on the Condensation Heat Transfer in Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Applications

This article directly investigates the effect of a cooling medium's coolant temperature on the condensation of the refrigerant R-134a. The study presents an experimental investigation into condensation heat transfer, vapor quality, and pressure drop of R-134a flowing through a commercial annular helicoidal pipe under the severe climatic conditions of a Kuwait summer. The quality of the refrigerant is calculated using the temperature and pressure obtained from the experiment. Measurements were performed for refrigerant mass fluxes ranging from 50 to 650 kg/m²s, with a cooling water flow Reynolds number range of 950 to 15,000 at a fixed gas saturation temperature of 42°C and cooling wall temperatures of 5°C, 10°C, and 20°C. The data shows that with an increase of refrigerant mass flux, the overall condensation heat transfer coefficients of R-134a increased, and the pressure drops also increased. However, with the increase of mass flux of cooling water, the refrigerant-side heat transfer coefficients decreased. Using low mass flux in a helicoidal tube improves the heat transfer coefficient. Furthermore, selecting low wall temperature for the cooling medium gives a higher refrigerant-side heat transfer coefficient.     

Heat transfer between elastic solids with randomly rough surfaces

We study the heat transfer between elastic solids with randomly rough surfaces. We include both the heat transfer from the area of real contact, and the heat transfer between the surfaces in the non-contact regions. We apply a recently developed contact mechanics theory, which accounts for the hierarchical nature of the contact between solids with roughness on many different length scales. For elastic contact, at the highest (atomic) resolution the area of real contact typically consists of atomic (nanometer) sized regions, and we discuss the implications of this for the heat transfer. For solids with very smooth surfaces, as is typical in many modern engineering applications, the interfacial separation in the non-contact regions will be very small, and for this case we show the importance of the radiative heat transfer associated with the evanescent electromagnetic waves which exist outside of all bodies.     

Experimental Investigation of Heat Transfer in Two-phase Flow Boiling

In this article, an experimental investigation is performed to measure the boiling heat transfer coefficient of water flow in a microchannel with a hydraulic diameter of 500 μm. Experimental tests are conducted with heat fluxes ranging from 100 to 400 kW/m², vapor quality from 0 to 0.2, and mass fluxes of 200, 400, and 600 kg/m²s. Also, this study has modified the liquid Froude number to present a flow pattern transition toward an annular flow. Experimental results show that the flow boiling heat transfer coefficient is not dependent on mass flux and vapor quality but on heat flux to a certain degree. The measured heat transfer coefficient is compared with a few available correlations proposed for macroscales, and it is found that previous correlations have overestimated the flow boiling heat transfer coefficient for the test conditions considered in this work. This article proposes a new correlation model regarding the boiling heat transfer coefficient in mini- and microchannels using boiling number, Reynolds number, and modified Froude number.     

Heat Transfer Characteristics for Condensation of R134a in a Vertical Smooth Tube

In this study, condensation of pure refrigerant R134a vapor inside a smooth vertical tube was experimentally investigated. The test section was made of a copper tube with inside diameter of 7.52 mm and length of 1 m. Experimental tests were conducted for mass fluxes in the range of 20–175 kg/m²s with saturation pressure ranging between 5.8 and 7 bar. The effects of mass flux, saturation pressure, and temperature difference between the refrigerant and tube inner wall (ΔT) on the heat transfer performance were analyzed through experimental data. Obtained results showed that average condensation heat transfer coefficient decreases with increasing saturation pressure or temperature difference (ΔT). In addition, for the same temperature difference (ΔT), heat can be removed from the refrigerant at a higher rate at relatively low pressure values. Under the same operating conditions, it was shown that average condensation heat transfer coefficient increases as mass flux increases. Finally, the most widely used heat transfer coefficient correlations for condensation inside smooth tubes were analyzed through the experimental data. The best fit was obtained with Akers et al.'s (1959) correlation with an absolute mean deviation of 22.6%.     

Infrared optical imaging of matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) up regulation following ischemia reperfusion is ameliorated by hypothermia

Background

Continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) is a form of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation which has been shown to alter cortical excitability in the upper limb representation of primary somatosensory cortex (SI). However, it is unknown whether cTBS modulates cortical excitability within the lower limb representation in SI. The present study investigates the effects of cTBS over the SI lower limb representation on cortical somatosensory evoked potentials (SEPs) and Hoffmann reflex (H-reflex) following tibial nerve stimulation at the knee. SEPs and H-reflex were recorded before and in four time blocks up to 30 minutes following cTBS targeting the lower limb representation within SI.

Results

Following cTBS, the P1-N1 first cortical potential was significantly decreased at 12?C16 minutes. CTBS also suppressed the P2-N2 second cortical potential for up to 30 minutes following stimulation. The H-reflex remained statistically unchanged following cTBS although there was a modest suppression observed.

Conclusion

We conclude that cTBS decreases cortical excitability of the lower limb representation of SI as evidenced by suppressed SEP amplitude. The duration and magnitude of the cTBS after effects are similar to those observed in upper limb studies.     

Pure phase-locking of beta/gamma oscillation contributes to the N30 frontal component of somatosensory evoked potentials

Background  

Evoked potentials have been proposed to result from phase-locking of electroencephalographic (EEG) activities within specific frequency bands. However, the respective contribution of phasic activity and phase resetting of ongoing EEG oscillation remains largely debated. We here applied the EEGlab procedure in order to quantify the contribution of electroencephalographic oscillation in the generation of the frontal N30 component of the somatosensory evoked potentials (SEP) triggered by median nerve electrical stimulation at the wrist. Power spectrum and intertrial coherence analysis were performed on EEG recordings in relation to median nerve stimulation.     

Effects of stimulus frequency and complexity on the mismatch negativity and other components of the cortical auditory-evoked potential

This study investigated, first, the effect of stimulus frequency on mismatch negativity (MMN), N1, and P2 components of the cortical auditory event-related potential (ERP) evoked during passive listening to an oddball sequence. The hypothesis was that these components would show frequency-related changes, reflected in their latency and magnitude. Second, the effect of stimulus complexity on those same ERPs was investigated using words and consonant-vowel tokens (CVs) discriminated on the basis of formant change. Twelve normally hearing listeners were tested with tone bursts in the speech frequency range (400/440, 1,500/1,650, and 3,000/3,300 Hz), words (/baed/ vs /daed/) and CVs (/bae/ vs /dae/). N1 amplitude and latency decreased as frequency increased. P2 amplitude, but not latency, decreased as frequency increased. Frequency-related changes in MMN were similar to those for N1, resulting in a larger MMN area to low frequency contrasts. N1 amplitude and latency for speech sounds were similar to those found for low tones but MMN had a smaller area. Overall, MMN was present in 46%-71% of tests for tone contrasts but for only 25%-32% of speech contrasts. The magnitude of N1 and MMN for tones appear to be closely related, and both reflect the tonotopicity of the auditory cortex.     

High-synchrony cochlear compound action potentials evoked by rising frequency-swept tone bursts

The auditory compound action potential (CAP) represents synchronous VIIIth nerve activity. Clicks or impulses have been used in the past to produce this synchrony under the assumption that the wide spectral spread inherent in transient signals will activate a large portion of the cochlear partition. However, the observation that only auditory nerve units tuned above 3 kHz contribute to synchronous activity in the N1P1 complex of the CAP [Dolan et al., J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 73, 580-591 (1983)] suggests that temporal delays imposed by the traveling wave result in an asynchronous pattern of VIIIth nerve activation. In order to determine if units tuned below 3 kHz could be recruited into the CAP response, the present study uses tone bursts of exponentially rising frequency to hypothetically activate synchronous discharges of VIIIth nerve fibers along the length of the cochlear partition. The equations defining the frequency sweeps are calculated to be the inverse of the delay-line characteristics of the guinea pig cochlear partition. The resultant sweeps theoretically cause a constant phase displacement of a large portion of the cochlear partition at one time. Compound action potentials recorded in response to the rising frequency sweeps were compared to CAPs evoked by corresponding falling frequency sweeps and clicks. Analysis of the CAP waveforms showed narrower N1 widths and larger N1 and P1 amplitudes for rising sweeps when compared to falling sweeps. This is consistent with the hypothesis of increased synchrony. A further test of the hypothesis was made by using high-pass masking noise to evaluate the contributions of discrete cochlear locations to the CAP ("derived" CAP). Latency functions of the derived CAPs for clicks and falling frequency sweeps showed progressive increases in latency as the cutoff frequency of the high-pass filter was lowered. The latency of the derived CAP for these stimulus conditions reflects traveling wave delays [Aran and Cazals, "Electrocochleography: Animal studies," in Evoked Electrical Activity in The Auditory Nervous System (Academic, New York, 1978)]. In contrast, derived CAPs obtained from rising sweeps showed no change in latency for any cutoff frequencies, indicating a constant delay of response for fibers with different characteristic frequencies (CFs). These results support the theoretical premise underlying the derivation of the rising sweep: Spectral energy with the appropriate temporal organization, dictated by basilar membrane traveling wave properties, will increase CAP synchrony.     

围绕变壁温水平圆柱热源接触熔化的理论分析

研究围绕变壁温热源的接触熔化,建立表面温度随角度变化的水平圆柱热源接触熔化模型.对紧密接触熔化区的液体传热与运动状态进行分析,运用Nusselt液膜理论建立熔化控制方程,并采用理论求解,得到稳定熔化时的熔化速度解析解,所得结果包含了文献关于定壁温热源熔化的分析结果.通过分析不同温度分布下发生接触熔化的熔化速度、液膜厚度和压力分布情况,得到温度分布对熔化影响的规律.     

基于康托尔分形微通道流动与传热的模拟

高密度、 小体积和高集成的电子元器件散热困难, 易造成过早失效, 采用微通道换热器可以实现小体积内高热流的散热, 但流动阻力很大. 为了保证传热效果, 降低流动阻力, 本文提出了一种新型的微通道结构并对其流动与传热特性进行了数值模拟. 首先研究了微通道形状和结构, 模拟结果表明: 进出口截面宽高比为0.8 的矩形微通道的换热效果最好; 并在此基础上提出一种康托尔分型凹槽结构, 研究了有无康托尔分形以及不同分形级数对流动与传热性能的影响, 综合对比发现: 第二级康托尔分形模型 N2 既能保证热阻显著降低, 又能相比阵列结构降低压降, 具有明显的换热优势; 最后对这种康托尔分形结构的凹槽形状, 尺寸及不同方向上的分形进行研究, 结果表明梯形凹槽的下上表面长度比b/a 为0.6 、 流动方向分形比fx 为1 .25 和通道高度方向分形比fy 为1 .5 时换热流动性能最佳.     

热光耦合作用下的光纤传输特性

通过求解电磁波束包络方程和能量方程的耦合方程组,考虑温度对材料介电系数的影响及传输损耗产热的耦合作用,求解了复合热边界条件下光纤的基模态传输和损耗问题。研究表明:随着纤芯半径的增大,电场强度、能量耗散密度减小,传播常数增大;环境温度降低、对流换热系数增大和表面发射率升高都会使得传播常数减小,电场强度、能量耗散密度增大;能量耗散密度和电场强度随截面曲率的变化并不是线性的,还受到其他因素的共同作用。     

竖直圆管内超临界压力煤油传热特性实验研究

在压力2.5~4 MPa, 质量流量0.7~1.7 g/s, 热流密度0.06~1 MW/m2的实验条件下, 对煤油在内径1 mm, 长度300 mm竖直上升圆管内的流动与传热特性开展了实验研究, 并分析了传热系数随局部油温的变化及不同实验参数对传热的影响.结果表明, 超临界压力下煤油传热主要由自身物性和流动状态决定.超临界压力煤油传热过程大致可以分为3个区域:正常传热区传热强化区和传热恶化区.传热强化主要是湍流掺混增强和近壁面流体在拟临界温度附近物性剧烈变化的综合作用; 传热恶化则是因为壁温及近壁面流体温度远高于拟临界温度, 在近壁面发生了类似于亚临界状态下的“拟膜态沸腾”.      

Flow boiling characteristics of refrigerant mixture R-22/R-114 in the annulus of enhanced surface tubing

This paper presents an experimental study of flow boiling heat transfer characteristics of refrigerant mixture R-22/R-114 in the annuli of a horizontal enhanced surface tubing evaporator. The geometric parameters of the test section are: inner tube bore diameter of 17.5 mm, envelope diameter of 28.6 mm and outer smooth tube of 32.3 mm I.D. The ranges of heat flux and mass velocity covered in the tests were 5–25 kW m⁻² and 180–290 kg m²⁻s⁻¹ respectively, at a pressure of 570 kPa. The enhanced surface tubing data showed a significant enhancement of the heat transfer compared to an equivalent smooth tube depending on the mixture's components and their concentrations. Correlations were proposed to predict the heat transfer characteristics such as average heat transfer coefficients as well as pressure drops of R-22/R-114 non-azeotropic refrigerant mixture flow boiling inside enhanced surface tubing. In addition, it was found that the refrigerant mixture's pressure drop is a weak function of the mixture's composition.     

Experimental Investigation of Heat Transfer at Downflow Condensation of Refrigerant R-21 in Assemblage of Minichannels

Presented are results of experimental investigation of heat transfer at downflow condensation of refrigerant R-21 in a vertical assemblage of minichannels in a plate-fin heat exchanger with plane fins. Selection of refrigerant was caused by the fact that its physical properties at room temperature are similar to those of cryogenic liquids at low temperatures. A pattern of vapor-liquid downflow in the heat exchanger channels was plotted using the working section with a transparent wall. For the mass velocity in the range of 30 to 50 kg/m²s and the wall subcooling below ?2?C, the dependence of the heat transfer coefficient on the mass vapor content is determined and a method is proposed to calculate the heat transfer coefficient that is in good agreement with the experimental data.     

Auditory evoked potentials in females with high and low acceptance of background noise when listening to speech

Acceptable noise level (ANL) is a measure of a listener's acceptance of background noise when listening to speech. A consistent finding in research on ANL is large intersubject variability in the acceptance of background noise. This variability is not related to age, gender, hearing sensitivity, type of background noise, speech perception in noise performance, cochlear responses, or efferent activity of the medial olivocochlear pathway. In the present study, auditory evoked potentials were examined in 21 young females with normal hearing with low and high acceptance of background noise to determine whether differences in judgments of background noise are related to differences measured in aggregate physiological responses from the auditory nervous system. Group differences in the auditory brainstem response, auditory middle latency response, and cortical, auditory late latency response indicate that differences in more central regions of the nervous system account for, at least in part, the variability in listeners' willingness to accept background noise when listening to speech.