Objective Voice Quality Analysis Before and After Onset of Unilateral Vocal Fold Paralysis

This study was designed to investigate objective voice quality measurements in unilateral vocal fold paralysis (UVFP) by eliminating intersubject variability. To our knowledge this is the first report objectively analyzing paralytic dysphonia as compared to the same voice before onset of UVFP. The voices of two male subjects were prospectively recorded before and after the onset of iatrogenic UVFP (thoracic surgery).The following acoustic measurements of the vowel /a/ were performed using the CSL and MDVP (Kay Elemetrics): jitter, shimmer, harmonics-to-noise ratio, cepstral peak prominence, the relative energy levels of the first harmonic, the first formant and the third formant, the spectral slope in the low-frequency zone (0-1 kHz and 0-2 kHz), and the relative level of energy above 6 kHz. Distribution of spectral energy was analyzed from a long-term average spectrum of 40 seconds of text. Laryngeal aerodynamic measurements were obtained for one patient before and after onset of paralysis using the Aerophone II (Kay Elemetrics). Pitch and amplitude perturbation increased secondary to UVFP, while the harmonics-to-noise ratio and the cepstral peak prominence decreased. A relative increase in the mid-frequency and high-frequency ranges and a decrease in the low-frequency spectral slope were observed. Mean airflow rate and intraoral pressure increased, and glottal resistance and vocal efficiency decreased secondary to UVFP. The findings of this self-paired study confirm some but not all the results of previous studies. Measures involving the fundamental and the formants did not corroborate previous findings. Further investigation with vocal tract modeling is warranted.     

风险敏感度激励学习的广义平均算法

提出了一种新的算法．这个算法通过潜在地牺牲控制策略的最优性来获取其鲁棒性．这是因为,如果在理论模型与实际的物理系统之间存在不匹配,或者实际系统是非静态的,或者控制动作的可使用性随时间的变化而变化时,那么鲁棒性就可能成为一个十分重要的问题．主要工作是给出了一组逼近算法和它们的收敛结果．利用广义平均算子来替代最优算子max(或min),对激励学习中的一类最重要的算法——动态规划算法——进行了研究,并讨论了它们的收敛性,目的就是为了提高激励学习算法的鲁棒性．同时使用了更具一般性的风险敏感度性能评价体系,发现基于动态规划的学习算法中的一般结论在这种体系之下并不完全成立．     

Invariant Properties for Finding Distance in Space of?Elasticity Tensors

Using orthogonal projections, we investigate distance of a given elasticity tensor to classes of elasticity tensors exhibiting particular material symmetries. These projections depend on the orientation of the elasticity tensor; hence the distance is obtained as the minimization of corresponding expressions with respect to the action of the orthogonal group. These expressions are stated in terms of the eigenvalues of both the given tensor and the projected one. The process of minimization is facilitated by the fact that, as we prove, the traces of the corresponding Voigt and dilatation tensors are invariant under these orthogonal projections. For isotropy, cubic symmetry and transverse isotropy, we formulate algorithms to find both the orientation and the eigenvalues of the elasticity tensor endowed with a particular symmetry and closest to the given elasticity tensor.      

Means and their applications

General considerations about means and expectations are preceded by a short historical overview. The existing approaches to the definition of means are classified into three groups: approximational, functional, and axiomatic. In some particular cases all of them are equivalent. The problem of meaningfulness of means is discussed for ordinal data and for some important cases of metric data. A survey of the main areas of applications: decision theory, group decision, insurance, economical equity and inequality is also provided. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

用相似接近度法从多目标优化非劣解中求最优解

本文讨论了从多目标优化非劣解中求最优解的各种方法及其不足,提出了用灰色关联度解决非劣解各序列间的形状差异问题,用模糊数学中海明距离和贴近度解决非劣解各序列间位置差异问题,然后加以合并,综合衡量两差异得到相似接近度概念,并用以确定最优解。     

Practical Method for Analysis of Immiscible Displacement in Laboratory Core Tests

Abstract. An accurate analytical interpretation method to determine the Leverett function (f_w)and its derivative (f_w) from immiscible displacement data in core plugs is presented. Linear equations are developed to describe the displacement processes occurring before and after breakthrough. A quadratic function is introduced to represent the saturation distribution along the cores. The relationships derived in this study can be used for analysis of core tests involving constant injection rates and constant pressure differences. The applicability, practicality, and accuracy of the new analytical method are verified by means of the experimental data obtained in the present study and by those reported in the literature.     

Vibrational Convection in Nontranslationally Oscillating Cavity (Isothermal Case)

The average motion of an isothermal fluid in a cylindrical square-cross-section cavity performing rotational oscillations about the axis of symmetry is investigated experimentally. The structure of the vibration flow, its stability and laws of transformation are studied as functions of the dimensionless frequency on an interval embracing the regions of extremely low and extremely high frequencies.     

ADSORPTION OF NANO-PARTICLES ON BUBBLE SURFACE IN NANO-PARTICLE SUSPENSION

The adsorption of nano-particles on bubble surface is discussed for saturated boiling on thin wire of nano-particle suspensions. Owing to the decrease of surface tension for suspensions, the nano-particles tend to adsorb on the bubble surface to decrease the Gibbs free energy for stability, and meanwhile the velocity of nano-particles would be smaller than that of bubble growth. The long-range van der Waals force existing between “water particles” and nano-particles is considered the attractive force between the nano-particles and the bubble surface. Thus, the nano-particles would attach on the bubble surface if the particle-surface distance is smaller than its critical value. The distribution of nano-particles on the bubble surface and in the adjacent region is also investigated.     

Optimal estimates of common remainder for the robust Chinese Remainder Theorem

Common remainder is significant to the estimation of the robust Chinese Remainder Theorem (CRT). This paper presents two optimal estimates of common remainder for the robust CRT. The two different optimal estimates are obtained based on different definitions of circular distance. Both of the two estimations are more effective with lower computational complexity than the existing searching method. Simulation results show that the two estimations have nearly the same performance, however, the second optimal estimation has less computation than the first one. These optimal estimates can improve the performance of the estimation of the robust CRT.