The influence of subglottal acoustics on laboratory models of phonation

Many previous laboratory investigations of phonation involving physical models, excised larynges, and in vivo canine larynges have failed to fully specify the subglottal system. Many of these same studies have reported a variety of nonlinear phenomena, including bifurcations (e.g., various classes of phonation onset and offset, register changes, frequency jumps), subharmonics, and chaos, and attributed such phenomena to the biomechanical properties of the larynx. However, such nonlinear phenomena may also be indicative of strong coupling between the voice source and the subglottal tract. Consequently, in such studies, it has not been clear whether the underlying mechanisms of such nonlinear phenomena were acoustical, biomechanical, or a coupling of the acoustical and biomechanical systems. Using a physical model of vocal fold vibration, and tracheal tube lengths which have been commonly reported in the literature, it is hypothesized and subsequently shown that such nonlinear phenomena may be replicated solely on the basis of laryngeal interactions with the acoustical resonances of the subglottal system. Recommendations are given for ruling out acoustical resonances as the source of nonlinear phenomena in future laboratory studies of phonation.     

Distributed measurement of birefringence dispersion in polarization-maintaining fibers

A new method to measure the birefringence dispersion in high-birefringence polarization-maintaining fibers is presented using white-light interferometry. By analyzing broadening of low-coherence interferograms obtained in a scanning Michelson interferometer, the birefringence dispersion and its variation along different fiber sections are acquired with high sensitivity and accuracy. Birefringence dispersions of two PANDA fibers at their operation wavelength are measured to be 0.011 ps/(km nm) and 0.018 ps/(km nm), respectively. Distributed measurement capability of the method is also verified experimentally.     

3D building reconstruction from aerial CCD image and sparse laser sample data

An approach for 3D building reconstruction automatically based on aerial CCD image and sparse laser scanning sample points is presented in this paper. The geometry shape of a building is shown very clearly in the aerial high-resolution CCD image, so we use Laplacian sharpening operator and threshold segmentation to extract the edges of CCD image first, and then pixel connectivity is used to extract the linear features in the CCD image. Bi-direction projection histogram and line matching are proposed to extract the contours of buildings. The height of the building is determined from sparse laser sample points which are within the contour of the buildings extracted from CCD image; therefore the 3D information of each building is reconstructed. We reconstruct 3D buildings correctly by this approach using real aerial CCD and sparse laser rangefinder data.     

Separated AlxIn1−xN quantum dots grown by plasma-reactive co-sputtering

Separated Al_xIn_1−xN quantum dots (QDs) embedded in amorphous AlN films have been produced by radio-frequency co-sputtering technique on silicon (1 1 1) and quartz glass substrates. The mean size and density of Al_xIn_1−xN QDs can be conveniently monitored by deposition parameters. Transparent electron microscope, and X-ray diffraction were used to detect the structure of the Al_xIn_1−xN QDs system; field-emission scanning-electron microscope was adopted to measure the surface morphology and anticipate the size of the QDs; X-ray photoelectronic spectroscopy was used to measure the stoichiometric ratios of the QDs.     

Fast-electron optical spectrum of a two-dimensional electron gas in the presence of the Rashba effect

We examine how the Rashba spin-orbit interaction (SOI) affects the fast-electron optical spectrum of a two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG). It is found that for a spin-split 2DEG, the spectrum of optical absorption is mainly induced by plasmon excitation via inter-SO electronic transition. From the width and position of the spectrum, the Rashba spin-splitting can be identified optically and, therefore, important spintronic properties can be measured though optical experiments.     

Transmission properties of terahertz pulses through subwavelength double split-ring resonators

We present a terahertz time-domain spectroscopy study of the transmission properties of planar composite media made from subwavelength double split-ring resonators (SRRs). The measured amplitude transmission spectra reveal a resonance near 0.5 THz, the central frequency of most ultrafast terahertz systems, for one SRR orientation in normal-incidence geometry. This resonance is attributed to the effect of electric excitation of magnetic resonance of the SRR arrays. In addition, the influences of background substrate, lattice constant, and the shapes of the SRRs on the terahertz resonance are experimentally investigated and agree well with the results of recent numerical studies.     

Full-field quantitative phase imaging by white-light interferometry with active phase stabilization and its application to biological samples

We report a Koehler-illumination-based full-field, actively stabilized, low-coherence phase-shifting interferometer, which is built on a white-light Michelson interferometer. By using a phase-stepping technique we can obtain full-field phase images of the sample. An actively stabilized phase-lock circuit is employed in the system to reduce phase noise. An application to human epithelial cells (HeLa cells) is achieved in our experiment. The advancement of this technique rests in its ability to take images of unstained biological samples quantitatively and on a nanometer scale.