Search results for "dance"

Flotillin-involved uptake of silica nanoparticles and responses of an alveolar-capillary barrier in vitro

2013

AbstractDrug and gene delivery via nanoparticles across biological barriers such as the alveolar-capillary barrier of the lung constitutes an interesting and increasingly relevant field in nanomedicine. Nevertheless, potential hazardous effects of nanoparticles (NPs) as well as their cellular and systemic fate should be thoroughly examined. Hence, this study was designed to evaluate the effects of amorphous silica NPs (Sicastar) and (poly)organosiloxane NPs (AmOrSil) on the viability and the inflammatory response as well as on the cellular uptake mechanisms and fate in cells of the alveolar barrier. For this purpose, the alveolar epithelial cell line (NCI H441) and microvascular endothelial…

The effects of armed conflict on schooling in Sub-Saharan Africa

2012

In the past decades, most of the countries in sub-Saharan Africa have been affected by armed conflicts. By means of a time-series cross-sectional (TSCS) database, we attempt to measure the impact of war on a sample of 43 countries in Africa from 1950 to 2010. These conflicts, and especially civil wars, are shown to have a strong negative effect on the educational performances of the countries studied. The rate of children not attending school, as well as secondary school enrollment rates, seems particularly sensitive to periods of conflict. It also appears that government expenditures in social sectors including education are a positive factor in increasing school enrollment. In contrast, m…

The reflection coefficient of a flared microstrip line radiating in an infinite parallel-plate waveguide

1993

In this article the reflection coefficient of a tapered microstrip line radiating in an infinite parallel-plate conducting waveguide is calculated. The reflection coefficient at the feed line is evaluated by using the aperture admittance of the horn and the scattering matrix of the continuous taper. The theoretical behavior of the aperture admittance is shown and the reflection coefficient of a microstrip horn radiating in the parallel-plate region of a bootlace lens is measured in order to verify the model. © 1993 John Wiley & sons, Inc.

User Activity Recognition for Energy Saving in Smart Homes

2015

Abstract Energy demand in typical home environments accounts for a significant fraction of the overall consumption in industrialized countries. In such context, the heterogeneity of the involved devices, and the non negligible influence of the human factor make the optimization of energy use a challenging task; effective automated approaches must take into account basic information about users, such as the prediction of their course of actions. Our proposal consists in learning customized structural models for common user activities for predicting the trend of energy consumption; the approach aims to lower energy demand in the proximity of predicted peak loads so as to keep the overall cons…

An ecological dynamics framework for the acquisition of perceptual-motor skills in climbing

2016

Uncertainty in extreme sports performance environments, like rock and ice climbing, provides considerable psycho-emotional and physiological demands which challenge the acquisition of perceptual-motor skills. An ecological dynamics theoretical framework adopts concepts and tools of nonlinear dynamics and ecological psychology to investigate and model the relationships that emerge in extreme sports between athletes and their performance environments. In this relation, the interactions of athletes with key objects, surfaces, events and significant others during a sport like climbing emerge from interdependent personal, task and environmental constraints on performance. Performance behaviours …

A Package for the Analysis of Automated MV Distribution Networks

2005

A New Low Cost Coupling System for Power Line Communication on Medium Voltage Smart Grids

2018

This paper proposes and verifies the performance of an innovative and low cost coupling system for power line communication (PLC) on medium voltage (MV) smart grids. The coupling system makes use of the capacitive divider of the voltage detecting systems (VDSs) to inject and receive the PLC signal. VDS are usually already installed in the MV switchboards of the major electrical manufacturer all over the world according to IEC 61243-5. VDS are used to detect the presence of the mains voltage to guarantee personnel safety. An interface circuit has been developed to be connected between the PLC transceiver and the VDS socket. In this way, the PLC signal can be coupled to the MV network without…

A Method to Evaluate Voltages to Earth During an Earth Fault in an HV Network in a System of Interconnected Earth Electrodes of MV/LV Substations

2008

An easy and swift method to evaluate, in a system of interconnected earth electrodes, earth potentials on earthing systems of medium-voltage/low-voltage (MV/LV) substations, in an event of single-line-to-earth fault inside a high-voltage/medium- voltage (HV/MV) station, is presented. The advantage of the method is the simplicity of the mathematical model for solving complex systems of any size with a sufficient accuracy for practical purposes. This paper shows the results of simulations, performed on networks with different extensions and characteristics, organized in easy-to-read graphs and tables. A comparison of these results with the values obtained according to the procedure explained …

Design considerations for transformerless series resonant inverters for induction heating

2002

The aim of the paper is to present some preliminary ideas in order to overcome the output transformer in series resonant inverters for induction heating applications. By adding a third reactive element to the conventional two element resonant inverter, the output matching transformer can be eliminated, allowing accommodation of the resonant frequency and load with the only drawback being the need for an overdimensioning of the output capacitor bank, and benefiting from inherent short-circuit protection.

Wideband modeling of cascaded H-plane waveguide junctions using the generalised impedance matrix representation

2009

A strong interest in H-plane waveguide components composed of a large number of cascaded planar junctions is recently renewed. Therefore, the more efficient development of full-wave analysis tools of such devices is again receiving consideration, specially for its potential use within modern design tools. A novel technique for providing the wideband generalised impedance matrix representation of the inductive devices in the form of pole expansions, thus extracting the most expensive computations from the frequency loop is proposed. For such purpose, the whole device is first decomposed into simpler building blocks, i.e. planar junctions and uniform waveguides, which are modelled in terms of…