Human in check:new threat from superbugs equipped with NDM-1

Just one day after the official announcement for the end of H1N1 influenza by WHO,Kumarasamy et al.(2010)reported the emergence of a new global health problem,which was caused by Gram-negative Enterobacteriaceae with resistance to a broad range of beta-lactam antibiotics due to the presence of blaNDM-1 that encodes NDM-1,which inactivates allβ-lactam antibiotics.Now,the NDM-1 superbugs have been identified in multiple countries,including India,Pakistan,UK,USA,Japan,Brazil,Canada,Australia,France,Holland and China.A Belgian patient who was infected in Pakistan following a car accident became the first known fatality from NDM-1.NDM-1 belongs to metallo-β-lactamase(MBL),which is a characterized family of carbapenem antibiotics inactivating enzymes.However,the broad resistance to currently available antibiotics and the strong capability of contemporary horizontal gene transfer(HGT)bring the threat from NDM-1 bacteria into top news throughout the world.In the neverstopped game between human being and pathogens,we are in check again.

Tool wear estimation method in milling process using air turbine spindle rotation-control system equipped with disturbance force observer

The authors investigate a disturbance-compensating and energy-saving control method for air turbine spindles equipped with a rotation control system designed for use in ultra-precision milling. The controllability and energy-conserving characteristics of the proposed method using the proposed pneumatic regulating device, called a high-precision quick-response pneumatic pressure regulator, were demonstrated experimentally previously. Herein, the proposed rotation-controlled air turbine spindle is first summarised. Subsequently, the proposed rotation-controlled air turbine spindle is set to a milling machine and applied to the milling of an alloy tool steel, to gain data and validate the effectiveness of the in-process tool wear estimation method that have been recently developed and proposed by the authors. Particularly, to evaluate the possibility of applying the proposed estimation method to three-dimensional milling, milling experiments where the air turbine spindle is set at a 45° incline were conducted and the results indicate a high possibility of the proposed method.

Forecast of Observing Time Delay of Strongly Lensed Quasars with the Muztagh-Ata 1.93m Telescope

As a completely independent method,the measurement of time delay of strongly lensed quasars(TDSL)are crucial to resolve the Hubble tension.Extensive monitoring is required but so far limited to a small sample of strongly lensed quasars.Together with several partner institutes,Beijing Normal University is constructing a 1.93 m reflector telescope at the Muztagh-Ata site in west China,which has the world class observing conditions with median seeing of 082 and median sky brightness of 21.74 mag arcsec-2 in V-band during the dark time.The telescope will be equipped with both a three-channel imager/photometer which covers 3500–11,000?wavelength band,and a low-medium resolution(λ/δλ=500/2000/7500)spectrograph.In this paper,we investigate the capability of the Muztagh-Ata 1.93 m telescope in measuring time delays of strongly lensed quasars.We generate mock strongly lensed quasar systems and light curves with microlensing effects based on five known strongly lensed quasars,i.e.,RX J1131-1231,HE 0435-1223,PG 1115+080,WFI 2033-4723 and SDSS 1206+4332.In particular,RX J1131-1231 is generated based on the lens modeling results of Suyu et al.Due to the lack of enough information,the other four systems are calculated by a simple analytical approximation.According to simulations,for RX J1131-like systems(wide variation in time delay between images)the TDSL measurement can be achieved with the precision aboutΔt=0.5 day with four seasons campaign length and 1 day cadence.This accuracy is comparable to the up-coming TDCOSMO project.And it would be better when the campaign length keeps longer and with high cadence.As a result,the capability of the Muztagh-Ata 1.93 m telescope allows it to join the network of TDSL observatories.It will enrich the database for strongly lensed quasar observations and make more precise measurements of time delays,especially considering the unique coordinate of the site.

Experiences of Social Isolation in Older Hospitalized Patients with COVID-19 and Their Close Relatives: A Qualitative Study

Background: Proximity between older patients and their close relatives is essential during hospitalisation. During the first wave of the pandemic, the Danish Patient Safety Authority restricted no hospital visitors. Aim: To explore how older patients with COVID-19 and their close relatives experienced physical separation during hospitalization. Method: A qualitative study using semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis was employed. Findings: Six interviews were conducted: three patients with a mean age of 81 years and three close relatives—two daughters and one spouse. The patients felt boredom, loneliness, and a sense of imprisonment, yet they felt safe and satisfied. Isolation was known beforehand from the media. Close relatives emphasised that information, involvement, and collaboration with hospital staff were crucial. Conclusion: Although older patients with COVID-19 and their close relatives widely accept their situation during hospitalization, they experience negative consequences from social isolation.

Development and prospects of molten steel deoxidation in steelmaking process

In the long traditional process of steelmaking,excess oxygen is blown into the converter,and alloying elements are used for deoxidation.This inevitably results in excessive deoxidation of products remaining within the steel liquid,affecting the cleanliness of the steel.With the increasing requirements for steel performance,reducing the oxygen content in the steel liquid and ensuring its high cleanliness is necessary.After more than a hundred years of development,the total oxygen content in steel has been reduced from approximately 100×10^(-6)to approximately 10×10^(-6),and it can be controlled below 5×10^(-6)in some steel grades.A relatively stable and mature deoxidation technology has been formed,but further reducing the oxygen content in steel is no longer significant for improving steel quality.Our research team developed a deoxidation technology for bearing steel by optimizing the entire conventional process.The technology combines silicon–manganese predeoxidation,ladle furnace diffusion deoxidation,and vacuum final deoxidation.We successfully conducted industrial experiments and produced interstitial-free steel with natural decarbonization predeoxidation.Non-aluminum deoxidation was found to control the oxygen content in bearing steel to between 4×10^(-6) and 8×10^(-6),altering the type of inclusions,eliminating large particle Ds-type inclusions,improving the flowability of the steel liquid,and deriving a higher fatigue life.The natural decarbonization predeoxidation of interstitial-free steel reduced aluminum consumption and production costs and significantly improved the quality of cast billets.

Shaking table test study on performance and functionality of a typical telecommunication room after earthquakes

Large numbers of basic transceiver stations,where the telecommunication room is one of the main components,comprise an important part of the telecommunication system.After earthquakes,considerable economic loss from telecommunication systems is often associated with seismic damage and functional loss of the telecommunication room.However,research related to this has been limited.In this study,shaking table tests were conducted for a full-scale typical telecommunication room,including a light-steel house and the necessary communication and power supply equipment.The tests not only focused on the seismic damage to all the structures but also considered the functions of the communication and power supply of the equipment.The interactions between these facilities and their effects on communication function were also investigated.Compared with the damage to structures,the interruption of the power supply due to earthquakes is a weak link.Finally,the damage indexes,together with their threshold values of different damage states for the communication and power supply equipment,were derived from the test results.The results of this research can contribute to the literature gaps regarding seismic performance studies of telecommunication rooms,and can serve as a valuable reference for future research on its seismic fragility and economic losses evaluation.

Dynamic Response of Foundations during Startup of High-Frequency Tunnel Equipment

The specialized equipment utilized in long-line tunnel engineering is evolving towards large-scale,multifunctional,and complex orientations.The vibration caused by the high-frequency units during regular operation is supported by the foundation of the units,and the magnitude of vibration and the operating frequency fluctuate in different engineering contexts,leading to variations in the dynamic response of the foundation.The high-frequency units yield significantly diverse outcomes under different startup conditions and times,resulting in failure to meet operational requirements,influencing the normal function of the tunnel,and causing harm to the foundation structure,personnel,and property in severe cases.This article formulates a finite element numerical computation model for solid elements using three-dimensional elastic body theory and integrates field measurements to substantiate and ascertain the crucial parameter configurations of the finite element model.By proposing a comprehensive startup timing function for high-frequency dynamic machines under different startup conditions,simulating the frequency andmagnitude variations during the startup process,and suggesting functions for changes in frequency and magnitude,a simulated startup schedule function for high-frequency machines is created through coupling.Taking into account the selection of the transient dynamic analysis step length,the dynamic response results for the lower dynamic foundation during its fundamental frequency crossing process are obtained.The validation checks if the structural magnitude surpasses the safety threshold during the critical phase of unit startup traversing the structural resonance region.The design recommendations for high-frequency units’dynamic foundations are provided,taking into account the startup process of the machine and ensuring the safe operation of the tunnel.

A novel small-animal locomotor activity recording device for biological clock research

The rodent running-wheel recording apparatus is a reliable approach for studying cir-cadian rhythm.This study demonstrated how to construct a simple and intelligent running-wheel recording system.The running wheel was attached to the cage's base,whereas the Hall sensor was attached to the cage's cover.Then,the RJ25 adaptor relayed the running signal to the main control board.Finally,the main control board was connected to the USB port of the computer with the USB connection.Data were collected using the online-accessible,self-created software Magturning.Through Magturning,generated data were saved and exported in real time.Afterward,the device was validated by collecting data on the locomotor activities of mice under dif-ferent light conditions.In conclusion,this new device can record circadian activity of rodents.Our device is appropriate for interdisciplinary investigations related to biological clock research.

Power equipment vibration visualization using intelligent sensing method based on event-sensing principle

Vibration measurements can be used to evaluate the operation status of power equipment and are widely applied in equipment quality inspection and fault identification.Event-sensing technology can sense the change in surface light intensity caused by object vibration and provide a visual description of vibration behavior.Based on the analysis of the principle underlying the transformation of vibration behavior into event flow data by an event sensor,this paper proposes an algorithm to reconstruct event flow data into a relationship correlating vibration displacement and time to extract the amplitude-frequency characteristics of the vibration signal.A vibration measurement test platform is constructed,and feasibility and effectiveness tests are performed for the vibration motor and other power equipment.The results show that event-sensing technology can effectively perceive the surface vibration behavior of power and provide a wide dynamic range.Furthermore,the vibration measurement and visualization algorithm for power equipment constructed using this technology offers high measurement accuracy and efficiency.The results of this study provide a new noncontact and visual method for locating vibrations and performing amplitude-frequency analysis on power equipment.

Effects of Milling Methods on Rice Flour Properties and Rice Product Quality:A Review

High-quality rice flour is the foundation for the production of various rice-based products.Milling is an essential step in obtaining rice flour,during which significant changes occur in the physicochemical and quality characteristics of the flour.Although rice flour obtained through mainstream wet milling methods exhibits superior quality,low production efficiency and wastewater discharge limit the development of the industry.Dry milling,on the other hand,conserves water resources,but adversely affects flour performance due to excessive heat generation.As an emerging powder-making technique,semi-dry milling offers a promising solution by enhancing flour quality and reducing environmental impact.This is achieved by minimizing soaking time through hot air treatment while reducing mechanical energy consumption to reach saturated water absorption levels.However,continuous production remains a challenge.This comprehensive review summarizes the effects of various milling technologies on rice flour properties and product qualities.It also discusses key control indicators and technical considerations for rice flour processing equipment and processes.

Simplified prediction models for acoustic installation effects of train-mounted equipment

Acoustic models of railway vehicles in standstill and pass-by conditions can be used as part of a virtual certification process for new trains.For each piece of auxiliary equipment,the sound power measured on a test bench is combined with meas-ured or predicted transfer functions.It is important,however,to allow for installation effects due to shielding by fairings or the train body.In the current work,fast-running analytical models are developed to determine these installation effects.The model for roof-mounted sources takes account of diffraction at the corner of the train body or fairing,using a barrier model.For equipment mounted under the train,the acoustic propagation from the sides of the source is based on free-field Green’s functions.The bottom surfaces are assumed to radiate initially into a cavity under the train,which is modelled with a simple diffuse field approach.The sound emitted from the gaps at the side of the cavity is then assumed to propagate to the receivers according to free-field Green’s functions.Results show good agreement with a 2.5D boundary element model and with measurements.Modelling uncertainty and parametric uncertainty are evaluated.The largest variability occurs due to the height and impedance of the ground,especially for a low receiver.This leads to standard deviations of up to 4 dB at low frequencies.For the roof-mounted sources,uncertainty over the location of the corner used in the equivalent barrier model can also lead to large standard deviations.

An Improved Solov2 Based on Attention Mechanism and Weighted Loss Function for Electrical Equipment Instance Segmentation

The current existing problem of deep learning framework for the detection and segmentation of electrical equipment is dominantly related to low precision.Because of the reliable,safe and easy-to-operate technology provided by deep learning-based video surveillance for unmanned inspection of electrical equipment,this paper uses the bottleneck attention module(BAM)attention mechanism to improve the Solov2 model and proposes a new electrical equipment segmentation mode.Firstly,the BAM attention mechanism is integrated into the feature extraction network to adaptively learn the correlation between feature channels,thereby improving the expression ability of the feature map;secondly,the weighted sum of CrossEntropy Loss and Dice loss is designed as the mask loss to improve the segmentation accuracy and robustness of the model;finally,the non-maximal suppression(NMS)algorithm to better handle the overlap problem in instance segmentation.Experimental results show that the proposed method achieves an average segmentation accuracy of mAP of 80.4% on three types of electrical equipment datasets,including transformers,insulators and voltage transformers,which improve the detection accuracy by more than 5.7% compared with the original Solov2 model.The segmentation model proposed can provide a focusing technical means for the intelligent management of power systems.

Study on a conical bearing for acceleration-sensitive equipment

Seismic isolation effectively reduces seismic demands on building structures by isolating the superstructure from ground vibrations during earthquakes.However,isolation strategies give less attention to acceleration-sensitive systems or equipment.Meanwhile,as the isolation layer’s displacement grows,the stiffness and frequency of traditional rolling and sliding isolation bearings increases,potentially causing self-centering and resonance concerns.As a result,a new conical pendulum bearing has been selected for acceleration-sensitive equipment to increase self-centering capacity,and additional viscous dampers are incorporated to enhance system damping.Moreover,the theoretical formula for conical pendulum bearings is supplied to analyze the device’s dynamic parameters,and shake table experiments are used to determine the proposed device’s isolation efficiency under various conditions.According to the test results,the newly proposed devices have remarkable isolation performance in terms of minimizing both acceleration and displacement responses.Finally,a numerical model of the isolation system is provided for further research,and the accuracy is demonstrated by the aforementioned experiments.

Operational requirements analysis method based on question answering of WEKG

The weapon and equipment operational requirement analysis(WEORA) is a necessary condition to win a future war,among which the acquisition of knowledge about weapons and equipment is a great challenge. The main challenge is that the existing weapons and equipment data fails to carry out structured knowledge representation, and knowledge navigation based on natural language cannot efficiently support the WEORA. To solve above problem, this research proposes a method based on question answering(QA) of weapons and equipment knowledge graph(WEKG) to construct and navigate the knowledge related to weapons and equipment in the WEORA. This method firstly constructs the WEKG, and builds a neutral network-based QA system over the WEKG by means of semantic parsing for knowledge navigation. Finally, the method is evaluated and a chatbot on the QA system is developed for the WEORA. Our proposed method has good performance in the accuracy and efficiency of searching target knowledge, and can well assist the WEORA.

VR-based digital twin for remote monitoring of mining equipment:Architecture and a case study

Background Traditional methods for monitoring mining equipment rely primarily on visual inspections,which are time-consuming,inefficient,and hazardous.This article introduces a novel approach to monitoring mission-critical systems and services in the mining industry by integrating virtual reality(VR)and digital twin(DT)technologies.VR-based DTs enable remote equipment monitoring,advanced analysis of machine health,enhanced visualization,and improved decision making.Methods This article presents an architecture for VR-based DT development,including the developmental stages,activities,and stakeholders involved.A case study on the condition monitoring of a conveyor belt using real-time synthetic vibration sensor data was conducted using the proposed methodology.The study demonstrated the application of the methodology in remote monitoring and identified the need for further development for implementation in active mining operations.The article also discusses interdisciplinarity,choice of tools,computational resources,time and cost,human involvement,user acceptance,frequency of inspection,multiuser environment,potential risks,and applications beyond the mining industry.Results The findings of this study provide a foundation for future research in the domain of VR-based DTs for remote equipment monitoring and a novel application area for VR in mining.

Equipment damage measurement method of wartime based on FCE-PCA-RF

As the“engine”of equipment continuous operation and repeated operation, equipment maintenance support plays a more prominent role in the confrontation of symmetrical combat systems. As the basis and guide for the planning and implementation of equipment maintenance tasks, the equipment damage measurement is an important guarantee for the effective implementation of maintenance support. Firstly,this article comprehensively analyses the influence factors to damage measurement from the enemy’s attributes, our attributes and the battlefield environment starting from the basic problem of wartime equipment damage measurement. Secondly, this article determines the key factors based on fuzzy comprehensive evaluation(FCE) and performed principal component analysis (PCA) on the key factors. Finally, the principal components representing more than 85%of the data features are taken as the input and the equipment damage quantity is taken as the output. The data are trained and tested by artificial neural network (ANN) and random forest (RF). In a word, FCE-PCA-RF can be used as a reference for the research of equipment damage estimation in wartime.

Similarity evaluation model for the internal defect detection of strip steel

An internal defect meter is an instrument to detect the internal inclusion defects of cold-rolled strip steel.The detection accuracy of the equipment can be evaluated based on the similarity of the multiple detection data obtained for the same steel coil.Based on the cosine similarity model and eigenvalue matrix model,a comprehensive evaluation method to calculate the weighted average of similarity is proposed.Results show that the new method is consistent with and can even replace artificial evaluation to realize the automatic evaluation of strip defect detection results.

Exploration of Teaching Reform of Food Machinery and Equipment Course Based on New Engineering Concept

The new engineering concept aims to train high-quality engineering talents to meet the needs of future science and technology and industrial development through the reform of education and teaching.Under the background of"new engineering",by introducing cutting-edge knowledge of the industry and interdisciplinary integration,adopting innovative teaching methods such as project-driven teaching and flipped classroom,strengthening experimental teaching and school-enterprise cooperation,and establishing comprehensive evaluation and feedback mechanism,Food Machinery and Equipment course is reformed to improve the teaching quality and train high-quality engineering talents to meet the needs of modern food processing industry.

Scheduling Model and Algorithm of Construction Equipment under Milestone Constraint

The scheduling of construction equipment is a means to realize network planning.With the large-scale and low-cost requirements of engineering construction,the cooperation among members of the engineering supply chain has become very important,and effective coordination of project plans at all levels to optimize the resource management and scheduling of a project is helpful to reduce project duration and cost.In this paper,under the milestone constraint conditions,the scheduling problems of multiple construction devices in the same sequence of operation were described and hypothesized mathematically,and the scheduling models of multiple equipment were established.The Palmer algorithm,CDS algorithm and Gupta algorithm were respectively used to solve the optimal scheduling of construction equipment to achieve the optimization of the construction period.The optimization scheduling of a single construction device and multiple construction devices was solved by using sequencing theory under milestone constraint,and these methods can obtain reasonable results,which has important guiding significance for the scheduling of construction equipment.

省委书记调研轮胎厂投资超120亿

日前,辽宁省委书记、省人大常委会主任郝鹏到米其林沈阳轮胎有限公司进行调研。郝鹏走进车间察看生产线,听取企业经营发展、规划建设、产品销售等情况介绍。他表示,米其林集团在辽宁投资建厂近30年,目前已累计投资超过120亿元,充分体现了扎根辽宁发展的信心决心。