3D MERGE与3D SPACE STIR序列在腰椎间盘突出症检查中的应用比较

目的:对比三维多回波恢复梯度回波(3D MERGE)、三维可变反转角快速自旋回波(3D SPACE STIR)序列在腰椎间盘突出症(LDH)检查中的应用效果。方法:选择2020年1月~2022年11月收治的135例LDH患者,回顾性分析患者临床和磁共振成像(MRI)资料,所有患者均接受常规MRI扫描及3D MERGE、3D SPACE STIR序列扫描,对比3D MERGE、3D SPACE STIR序列测量神经根直径的一致性,评价两种序列的图像质量参数[信噪比(SNR)、对比噪声比(CNR)]、图像清晰度评分。结果:3D MERGE和3D SPACE STIR序列测量的L3~S1神经根直径比较差异无统计学意义(P>0.05),且两组序列测量的L3、L4、L5和S1直径均显示出较高相关性(r=0.957,0.986,0.975,0.972,P<0.05);3D MERGE序列的SNR及CNR均高于3D SPACE STIR序列,神经根显示分级、图像清晰度评分优于3D SPACE STIR序列,差异有统计学意义(P<0.05)。结论:3D MERGE、3D SPACE STIR序列在LDH神经根直径测量中具有极高一致性,3D MERGE序列较3D SPACE STIR序列能够更清晰显示神经跟的解剖形态,图像质量更好。

中医药多元证据整合方法学MERGE框架

在循证医学时代下,依托规范的技术方法和标准化的操作规程发掘中医药独特优势,是实现中医药现代化、国际化发展并惠泽人类的必由之路。中医理论、人用经验和研究证据三结合证据体系的提出标志着中医药特色评价体系思维方法取得了重要进步,经过恰当方法整合后的多元证据体是中医药临床指南推荐意见和循证卫生决策的有力支撑。本文基于当前国际证据合成与分级方法学前沿进展,初步提出中医药多元证据整合的方法学框架——MERGE(Merge Evidence-based Research and artificial intelliGence to support smart dEcision)框架,以期为中医药循证医学方法学体系的完善和发展提供借鉴和参考。

MRI 3D-MERGE序列对三角纤维软骨复合体损伤的诊断价值

目的探讨MRI三维-多回波恢复梯度回波(three dimensional-multiple-echo recalled gradient echo,3D-MERGE)序列在腕关节三角纤维软骨复合体(triangular fib roc a rt ilage complex,TFCC)损伤中的诊断价值。方法回顾性分析四川省骨科医院2021年1月-2022年1月因腕尺侧疼痛就诊的76例患者的临床资料,其中男性35例,女性41例,年龄16-52岁,平均年龄39.6岁。所有患者行腕关节MRI 3D-MERGE序列检查,并在随后接受腕关节镜手术。将TFCC损伤分为中心型损伤和边缘型损伤。以腕关节镜结果为金标准,探讨分析MRI 3D-MERGE序列诊断TFCC损伤的敏感度、特异度。结果腕关节镜检查确诊TFCC损伤者60例,其中中心型16例,边缘型28例,中心型和边缘型损伤同时存在16例;MRI 3D-MERGE序列检查TFCC损伤70例,中心型13例,边缘型35例,22例同时存在中心型和边缘型损伤。对比得出MRI 3D-MERGE序列诊断TFCC损伤中心型损伤的敏感度、特异度分别为0.93、0.89,边缘型损伤的敏感度、特异度分别为0.80、0.62。结论MRI3D-MERGE序列对TFCC损伤有较高的诊断价值,但相对于中心型损伤,MRI 3D-MERGE序列对边缘型损伤显示较低的特异度,因此在临床中,对于MRI提示的边缘型损伤患者,医师还需结合患者临床病史和体格检查进行谨慎诊断。

A New Merged Product Reveals Precipitation Features over Drylands in China

Due to the considerable uncertainties inherent in the datasets describing the spatiotemporal distributions of precipitation in the drylands of China,this study presents a new merged monthly precipitation product with a spatial resolution of approximately 0.2°×0.2°during 1980–2019.The newly developed precipitation product was validated at different temporal scales(e.g.,monthly,seasonally,and annually).The results show that the new product consistently aligns with the spatiotemporal distributions reported by the Chinese Meteorological Administration Land Data Assimilation System(CLDAS)product and Multi-Source Weighted Ensemble Precipitation(MSWEP).The merged product exhibits exceptional quality in describing the drylands of China,with a bias of–2.19 mm month^(–1)relative to MSWEP.In addition,the annual trend of the merged product(0.09 mm month^(–1)yr^(−1))also closely aligns with that of the MSWEP(0.11 mm month^(–1)yr^(−1))during 1980–2019.The increasing trend indicates that the water cycle and wetting process intensified in the drylands of China during this period.In particular,there was an increase in wetting during the period from 2001–2019.Generally,the merged product exhibits potential value for improving our understanding of the climate and water cycle in the drylands of China.

Capacity model of on-rampmerging section of urban expressway

To establish the empirical capacity model of an on- ramp merging section, the Erlang distribution is first selected to define the time headway distribution, and then the gap acceptance theory is applied to develop the basic capacity model of the on-ramp merging section. Since not all the time headways on the shoulder lane can be made full use of by on- ramp vehicles, a modified capacity model is developed, which takes the usage probability of time headway into consideration. Then, a model of capacity discount coefficient ~： is developed. Finally, based on the modified capacity model and the model of capacity discount coefficient, an empirical merge capacity model which contains the shoulder lane volume, critical gap, and the distance from nose to merging point, is constructed. Results show that, compared with other models, the proposed model is more reasonable since it takes merging section geometry into consideration, and it is easy to apply. The merge capacity varies with the shoulder lane volume, the critical gap, the distance between the nose and the merging point, and the design velocity of the shoulder lane and ramp.

Application of neural network merging model in dam deformation analysis

In order to improve the prediction accuracy and test the generalization ability of the dam deformation analysis model, the back-propagation（BP） neural network model for dam deformation analysis is studied, and the merging model is built based on the neural network BP algorithm and the traditional statistical model. The three models mentioned above are calculated and analyzed according to the long-term deformation observation data in Chencun Dam. The analytical results show that the average prediction accuracies of the statistical model and the BP neural network model are ~ 0.477 and ＋- 0.390 mm, respectively, while the prediction accuracy of the merging model is ~0. 318 mm, which is improved by 33% and 18% compared to the other two models, respectively. And the merging model has a better generalization ability and broad applicability.

xStripeMerge:基于纠删码存储的高效宽条带生成方法

为了解决纠删码存储系统的已有宽条带生成方法中扩容方案将产生大量宽条带生成带宽,合并方案受限于双条带的问题,提出了一种针对多条带合并下的宽条带生成问题的高效宽条带生成方法。定义了多条带合并过程的2个关键算子,并将宽条带生成问题建模为组合优化问题,提出了优先寻找具有小的奇偶校验块传输成本的窄条带组合方案的高效宽条带生成方法xStripeMerge。实验结果表明,与目前最优的存储扩容方法相比,xStripeMerge可以减少75%宽条带生成带宽。xStripeMerge的时间和空间复杂度远优于扩展的双条带合并方法,xStripeMerge可以在更短的时间内获得与其性能相近的宽条带生成方案,并且xStripeMerge可以适用于大规模存储系统。

Improving Energy Performance of Water Allocation Networks Through Appropriate Stream Merging

Water-using operations in the process industry have demands for water usually both on water quality and temperature, and the existing mathematical models of heat exchange networks cannot guarantee the energy performance of a water network optimal. In this paper, the effects of non-isothermal merging on energy performance of water allocation networks are analyzed, which include utility consumption, total heat exchange load, and number of heat exchange matches. Three principles are proposed to express the effects of non-isothermal merging on energy performance of water allocation networks. A rule of non-isothermal merging without increasing utility consumption is deduced. And an approach to improve energy performance of water allocation network is presented. A case study is given to demonstrate the method.

A Strategy for Merging Objective Estimates of Global Daily Precipitation from Gauge Observations, Satellite Estimates, and Numerical Predictions

This paper describes a strategy for merging daily precipitation information from gauge observations, satellite estimates （SEs）, and numerical predictions at the global scale. The strategy is designed to remove systemic bias and random error from each individual daily precipitation source to produce a better gridded global daily precipitation product through three steps. First, a cumulative distribution function matching procedure is performed to remove systemic bias over gauge-located land areas. Then, the overall biases in SEs and model predictions （MPs） over ocean areas are corrected using a rescaled strategy based on monthly precipitation. Third, an optimal interpolation （OI）-based merging scheme （referred as the HL-OI scheme） is used to combine unbiased gahge observations, SEs, and MPs to reduce random error from each source and to produce a gauge--satellite-model merged daily precipitation analysis, called BMEP-d （Beijing Climate Center Merged Estimation of Precipitation with daily resolution）, with complete global coverage. The BMEP-d data from a four-year period （2011- 14） demonstrate the ability of the merging strategy to provide global daily precipitation of substantially improved quality. Benefiting from the advantages of the HL-OI scheme for quantitative error estimates, the better source data can obtain more weights during the merging processes. The BMEP-d data exhibit higher consistency with satellite and gauge source data at middle and low latitudes, and with model source data at high latitudes. Overall, independent validations against GPCP-1DD （GPCP one-degree daily） show that the consistencies between B MEP-d and GPCP-1DD are higher than those of each source dataset in terms of spatial pattern, temporal variability, probability distribution, and statistical precipitation events.

Analyzing floor-stair merging flow based on experiments and simulation

In most situations,staircase is the only egress to evacuate from high-rise buildings.The merging flow on the stair landing has a great influence on the evacuation efficiency.In this paper,we develop an improved cellular automaton model to describe the merging behavior,and the model is validated by a series of real experiments.It is found that the flow rate of simulation results is similar to the drills,which means that the improved model is reasonable and can be used to describe the merging behavior on stairs.Furthermore,some scenarios with different door locations and building floor numbers are simulated by the model.The results show that(i)the best door location is next to the upward staircase;(ii)the total evacuation time and the building floor number are linearly related to each other;(iii)the pedestrians on upper floors have a negative influence on the evacuation flow rate.

MERGING AND SPLITTING SECOND-ORDER SELF-SIMILAR PROCESSES (TRAFFICS)

Recent traffic measurements in corporate LANs, Variable Bit Rate (VBR) video sources, ISDN control channels, and other communication systems, have indicated traffic behavior of self similar nature, which has implications for design, control and analysis of high speed networks. Merging and splitting are two basic networking operations. This paper gave the necessary and sufficient conditions for that merging of second order self similar traffic streams also results in a second order self similar stream. It shows that splitting traffic streams of the second order self similar stream are still self similar streams by the independent splitting operation.

An investigation of merging and diverging cars on a multi-lane road using a cellular automation model

In this paper, we have investigated two observed situations in a multi-lane road. The first one concerns a fast merging vehicle. The second situation is related to the case of a fast vehicle leaving the fastest lane back into the slowest lane and targeting a specific way out. We are interested in the relaxation time T, i.e., which is the time that the merging （diverging） vehicle spends before reaching the desired lane. Using analytical treatment and numerical simulations for the NaSch model, we have found two states, namely, the free state in which the merging （diverging） vehicle reaches the desired lane, and the trapped state in which T diverges. We have established phase diagrams for several values of the braking probability. In the second situation, we have shown that diverging from the fast lane targeting a specific way out is not a simple task. Even if the diverging vehicle is in the free phase, two different states can be distinguished. One is the critical state, in which the diverging car can probably reach the desired way out. The other is the safe state, in which the diverging car can surely reach the desired way out. In order to be in the safe state, we have found that the driver of the diverging car must know the critical distance （below which the way out will be out of his reach） in each lane. Furthermore, this critical distance depends on the density of cars, and it follows an exponential law.

Approximate merging of B-spline curves and surfaces

Applying the distance function between two B-spline curves with respect to the L2 norm as the approximate error, we investigate the problem of approximate merging of two adjacent B-spline curves into one B-spline curve. Then this method can be easily extended to the approximate merging problem of multiple B-spline curves and of two adjacent surfaces. After minimizing the approximate error between curves or surfaces, the approximate merging problem can be transformed into equations solving. We express both the new control points and the precise error of approximation explicitly in matrix form. Based on homogeneous coordinates and quadratic programming, we also introduce a new framework for approximate merging of two adjacent NURBS curves. Finally, several numerical examples demonstrate the effectiveness and validity of the algorithm.

Improved Region Merging Algorithm for Remote Sensing Images

To segment high-resolution remote sensing images(RSIs)accurately on an object level and meet the precise boundary dividing requirement,an improved superpixel segmentation and region merging algorithm is proposed.Simple linear iterative clustering(SLIC)is widely used because of its advantages in performance and effect;however,it causes over-segmentation,which is very disadvantageous to information extraction.In this proposed method,SLIC is firstly adopted for initial superpixel partition.The second stage follows the iterative merging procedure,which uses a hierarchical clustering algorithm and introduces a local binary pattern(LBP)texture feature operator during the process of merging.The experimental results indicate that the proposed method achieved a good segmentation and region merging performance,and worked effectively on cloud detection preprocessing in high-resolution RSIs with cloud and snow overlap situations.

Visualizing diffusion tensor fields on streamsurfaces with merging ellipsoids

Streamsurfaces in diffusion tensor fields are used to represent structures with pri- marily planar diffusion. So far, however, no effort has been made on the visualization of the anisotropy of diffusion on them, although this information is very important to identify the problematic regions of these structures. We propose two methods to display this anisotropy information. The first one employs a set of merging ellipsoids, which simultaneously character- ize the local tensor details - anisotropy - on them and portray the shape of the streamsurfaces. The weight between the streamsurfaces continuity and the discrete local tensors can be inter- actively adjusted by changing some given parameters. The second one generates a dense LIC （line integral convolution） texture of the two tangent eigenvector fields along the streamsurfaces firstly, and then blends in some color mapping indicating the anisotropy information. For high speed and high quality of texture images, we confine both the generation and the advection of the LIC texture in the image space. Merging ellipsoids method reveals the entire anisotropy information at discrete points by exploiting the geometric attribute of ellipsoids, and thus suits for local and detailed examination of the anisotropy; the texture-based method gives a global representation of the anisotropy on the whole streamsurfaces with texture and color attributes. To reveal the anisotropy information more efficiently, we integrate the two methods and use them at two different levels of details.

A Ka-band Solid-state Transmitter Cloud Radar and Data Merging Algorithm for Its Measurements

This study concerns a Ka-band solid-state transmitter cloud radar, made in China, which can operate in three different work modes, with different pulse widths, and coherent and incoherent integration numbers, to meet the requirements for cloud remote sensing over the Tibetan Plateau. Specifically, the design of the three operational modes of the radar（i.e., boundary mode M1, cirrus mode M2, and precipitation mode M3） is introduced. Also, a cloud radar data merging algorithm for the three modes is proposed. Using one month＇s continuous measurements during summertime at Naqu on the Tibetan Plateau,we analyzed the consistency between the cloud radar measurements of the three modes. The number of occurrences of radar detections of hydrometeors and the percentage contributions of the different modes＇ data to the merged data were estimated.The performance of the merging algorithm was evaluated. The results indicated that the minimum detectable reflectivity for each mode was consistent with theoretical results. Merged data provided measurements with a minimum reflectivity of -35 dBZ at the height of 5 km, and obtained information above the height of 0.2 km. Measurements of radial velocity by the three operational modes agreed very well, and systematic errors in measurements of reflectivity were less than 2 dB. However,large discrepancies existed in the measurements of the linear depolarization ratio taken from the different operational modes.The percentage of radar detections of hydrometeors in mid- and high-level clouds increased by 60% through application of pulse compression techniques. In conclusion, the merged data are appropriate for cloud and precipitation studies over the Tibetan Plateau.

Designing an EGP+ESP merging Curriculum for Technical Vocational College Students

The English curriculum in vocational colleges must stress the practical and professional characteristics.This concept should be conducted throughout the entire teaching process,but not just some of the teaching stages.By analysis of the curriculum goals and context of vocational colleges,based on theories of ESP,needs analysis,and experimental research,this article intends to prove the rationality and necessity of the curriculum pattern for non-English majors of vocational colleges by merging ESP into EGP which emphasizing communication as the basic and job orientation as the guidance.

An Improvement of Data Cleaning Method for Grain Big Data Processing Using Task Merging

Data quality has exerted important influence over the application of grain big data, so data cleaning is a necessary and important work. In MapReduce frame, parallel technique is often used to execute data cleaning in high scalability mode, but due to the lack of effective design, there are amounts of computing redundancy in the process of data cleaning, which results in lower performance. In this research, we found that some tasks often are carried out multiple times on same input files, or require same operation results in the process of data cleaning. For this problem, we proposed a new optimization technique that is based on task merge. By merging simple or redundancy computations on same input files, the number of the loop computation in MapReduce can be reduced greatly. The experiment shows, by this means, the overall system runtime is significantly reduced, which proves that the process of data cleaning is optimized. In this paper, we optimized several modules of data cleaning such as entity identification, inconsistent data restoration, and missing value filling. Experimental results show that the proposed method in this paper can increase efficiency for grain big data cleaning.

RESEARCH ON OPTIMIZING THE MERGING RESULTS OF MULTIPLE INDEPENDENT RETRIEVAL SYSTEMS BY A DISCRETE PARTICLE SWARM OPTIMIZATION

The result merging for multiple Independent Resource Retrieval Systems (IRRSs), which is a key component in developing a meta-search engine, is a difficult problem that still not effectively solved. Most of the existing result merging methods, usually suffered a great influence from the usefulness weight of different IRRS results and overlap rate among them. In this paper, we proposed a scheme that being capable of coalescing and optimizing a group of existing multi-sources-retrieval merging results effectively by Discrete Particle Swarm Optimization (DPSO). The experimental results show that the DPSO, not only can overall outperform all the other result merging algorithms it employed, but also has better adaptability in application for unnecessarily taking into account different IRRS's usefulness weight and their overlap rate with respect to a concrete query. Compared to other result merging algorithms it employed, the DPSO's recognition precision can increase nearly 24.6%, while the precision standard deviation for different queries can decrease about 68.3%.

Cooperative merging control strategy of connected and automated vehicles on highways

To improve traffic performance when on-ramp vehicles merge into the mainstream,a collaborative merging control strategy is proposed to determine the merging sequence and trajectory control of vehicles.Merging trajectory planning takes the minimization of vehicle acceleration as the optimization objective.Either the variational method or the quadratic programming method is utilized to determine arrival time,optimal time and control variables for each vehicle.As a supplement,the adaptive cruise control(ACC)model is used to calculate each control variable in each time interval on special occasions.Simulation results show that the cooperative merging control strategy outperforms the optimal control strategy.The root mean square(RMS)of acceleration and the root mean square error(RMSE)of time headway are significantly decreased,with the reductions up to 90.1%and 25.2%,respectively.Under the cooperative control strategy,the difference between the average speed and desired speed consistently approaches zero.In addition,few or no collisions occur.To conclude,the proposed strategy favours the improvements in passenger comfort,traffic efficiency,traffic stability and safety around highway on-ramps.