Slow Turn Research Articles

B-019 Reduction in Culture Media Costs, without Impacting Turnaround Time, Through Implementation of an Automated Microbiology Platform and Gram Stain Interpretation

Abstract Background Automated plating instruments have been shown to improve quality in Microbiology laboratories in a number of ways including consistent streaking patterns that provide better isolation of bacterial colonies compared to manual methods. The time per culture set up and automated camera imaging is dependent upon the amount of media set, such that more individual plates slow down turn around time. Conversely, smaller media surface area and the use of non-selective media may result in mixed colonies that require sub-culture for isolation before identification and susceptibilities can be performed. Based upon these findings, we attempted to reduce our media usage per culture with the implementation of automation, with the goal of using as few plates as possible while at the same time not negatively impacting the turn around time of the culture via the need to subculture poorly isolated colonies. We conducted a pre-and post-implementation study evaluating the costs per culture and turn around time delays related to subculturing in a subset. Methods In the pre-implementation period, from April-January 2023, three individual media plates (sheep blood agar, chocolate agar and CNA/MacConkey bi-plate) were routinely set for general aerobic bacterial culture sources including swabs and body fluids. In the post implementation period, from April-January 2024, a single sheep blood/chocolate agar bi-plate was set unless the gram stain showed evidence of mixed organisms (defined as more than one morphology) at which time a secondary selective media (CNA/MacConkey) was manually set. For urine cultures, in the pre-implementation period 2 plates were set (sheep blood and CNA/MacConkey bi-plate) and in the post-implementation period a single chromogenic agar/sheep blood bi-plate was set. Total numbers of cultures in both periods were collected as well as the number of cultures for which additional media were set based on gram stain results. Orders of subculture media in the laboratory information system were compared per positive cultures. Statistical analysis was performed in GraphPad Prism. Results In the pre- versus post-implementation periods, a total of 16,454 vs 17,782 general aerobic cultures and 50,680 vs 53,916 urine cultures were set, respectively. Only 3.6% of general cultures required additional media set based on gram stain. The difference in cost between pre- and post-implementation was approximately a two-thirds reduction in cost for general cultures and a 25% reduction for urine cultures, with a total savings of approximately $34,238 in media avoidance in the post-implementation period. The frequency of positive cultures requiring subculture was not significantly different between the pre- (average 36% of positive growth) and post-implementation (average 22% of positive growth) periods for both culture types and may actually have been reduced due to automation. Conclusions The implementation of reduced media concomitant with streaking via automation resulted in significant cost savings while not negatively impacting isolation, which in turn impacts culture turn around times. The automation may have reduced need for subculture, perhaps due to better isolation, thus subsequent analyses will explore this additional finding.

Biological sex-related differences in whole-body coordination during standing turns in healthy young adults

Biological sexes (male and female) have been reported to influence postural control and balance due to differences in musculoskeletal structures, hormonal factors, and neuromuscular control. These factors can contribute to the turning performance, potentially leading to an increased incidence of falls, particularly during turning. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the whole-body coordination and stepping characteristics and during standing turns in healthy adults to determine the effects of biological sex and turn speed. Fifty participants (25 males and 25 females) completed 180° standing turns on level ground. Inertial Measurement Units (XSENS) were used to measure whole-body movement turning kinematics and stepping characteristics. Moreover, clinical outcome of dynamic balance was measured by the Timed Up and Go (TUG). Participants were randomly tasked to turn at three speeds; fast, moderate, or slow to the left and right sides. Mann–Whitney U tests were used to compare the independent variables between male and females, and Friedman tests with Dunn’s tests for pairwise comparisons were used to compare between the three turning speeds within the two groups. The results demonstrated that significant differences were seen between males and females during fast turning for the leading foot onset (p = 0.048) and in the slow speed for the total step (p = 0.033), showing that these were greater in female with an increase in turn speed. In addition, significant differences were seen only in the males when comparing different speeds in the trailing foot onset latency (p = 0.035), step size (p = 0.009), and total number of steps (p = 0.002), while in the females a significant difference was found in peak head yaw velocity between fast and slow turn speeds, and moderate and slow turn speeds. Finally, there was no significant difference in TUG between groups. Therefore, these findings show differences between biological sexes in the response to whole-body coordination and step characteristics, indicating that females tend to have more changes in stepping characteristics compared to males due to differences in turning speed. This can affect their balance and stability. However, the differences in biological sex did not impact the dynamic balance and fall risk due to the lack of a significant difference shown by TUG between males and females.

A review of ultrasound for the diagnosis of acute appendicitis in adults

Acute appendicitis is one of the most common surgical emergencies globally, with a lifetime incidence of 8.6% in men and 6.7% in women. While acute appendicitis should be managed promptly to reduce the morbidity associated with perforated appendicitis, morbidity from negative appendicectomy is similar to morbidity from uncomplicated appendicitis. Computer tomography is widely used to aid in the diagnosis of acute appendicitis, however, is costly, often has a slow turn around time, and is associated with exposure to ionising radiation. In contrast, ultrasound is cheap, widely available, requires minimal patient preparation, and does not require exposure to ionising radiation. Ultrasonography is becoming increasingly used for adult patients in emergency settings. The literature has estimated the sensitivity of ultrasound for acute appendicitis in adult patients as between 39-96.4%. The sensitivity and specificity of ultrasound for the diagnosis of acute appendicitis is significantly increased when the appendix is visualised. In cases of a non visualised appendix, indirect ultrasound signs can improve the sensitivity to 93.9% and specificity to 85.7%. The variation in sensitivity and specificity for ultrasound in the diagnosis of acute appendicitis in adults may be due to multiple factors. Ultrasonographer experience, a retrocaecal appendix and obesity have all been described. Given the availability, cost and potential to reduce the rate of negative appendicectomy, ultrasound should be considered as the first line imaging modality for adult patients presenting with suspected AA.

Aesthetic Representation of Cultural Slow Modernity Turn in the Post-epidemic Era

At the beginning of the twentieth century, modernity came onto the scene with various masks. Modernity characterized by accelerated movement and speed echoes the art of the heyday of European aesthetic modernity. But on the other hand, the rapid development of modern industry blurs the perception of the present, and the public is immersed in the pleasure of speed, thus losing the ability to feel the multi-dimensional, appealing and communicating power of the current momentary emotions. The arrival of the epidemic forced this speed to a certain degree. People began to "gaze" at their own era, breaking through the boundaries of learned perception and individualistic thinking. Based on this, Kopnik puts forward the aesthetic point of "slowing down", indicating that a new turn has begun to appear in the accelerated development of the society, that is, through the movement and interaction of the subject in the space in the diversity of time. Momentary flow. Reflected in the field of literature, the state of "slowing down" also allows creators and literary workers to re-plan aesthetic choices, and to carry out a deep sorting and writing of such an important epidemic moment in human history.

Research on Hydraulic Properties and Energy Dissipation Mechanism of the Novel Water-Retaining Labyrinth Channel Emitters

As a key component of a drip irrigation system, the performance of the drip irrigation emitters is mainly determined by the flow channel structures and structural parameters. In this study, a novel type of circular water-retaining labyrinth channel (CWRLC) structure emitter was proposed, inspired by the effect of roundabouts that make vehicles slow down and turn. Using the single-factor experiment method, the influence of the hydraulic performance of CWRLC emitters was researched under different circular radii. The internal flow characteristics and energy dissipation mechanism were analyzed by a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation. It can be seen from the analysis that the energy dissipation abilities of the flow channel depend on the proportion of low-speed vortex areas. The larger the proportion of low-speed vortex areas, the smaller the flow index of the CWRLC emitter. Quadrate water-retaining labyrinth channel (QWRLC) and stellate water-retaining labyrinth channel (SWRLC) structures were obtained by structural improvements for increasing the proportion of low-speed vortex areas. The simulation results showed that the flow indexes of two improved structural emitters were significantly decreased. CWRLC, QWRLC, SWRLC, and widely used tooth labyrinth channel (TLC) emitters were manufactured by using technologies of electrical discharge machining (EDM) and injection molding (IM). The physical test results showed that the SWRLC emitter achieved the best hydraulic performance compared with the other three emitters. Therefore, the SWRLC emitter has a broad prospect of application in water-saving irrigation.

A lexical approach for identifying behavioural action sequences.

Animals display characteristic behavioural patterns when performing a task, such as the spiraling of a soaring bird or the surge-and-cast of a male moth searching for a female. Identifying such recurring sequences occurring rarely in noisy behavioural data is key to understanding the behavioural response to a distributed stimulus in unrestrained animals. Existing models seek to describe the dynamics of behaviour or segment individual locomotor episodes rather than to identify the rare and transient sequences of locomotor episodes that make up the behavioural response. To fill this gap, we develop a lexical, hierarchical model of behaviour. We designed an unsupervised algorithm called "BASS" to efficiently identify and segment recurring behavioural action sequences transiently occurring in long behavioural recordings. When applied to navigating larval zebrafish, BASS extracts a dictionary of remarkably long, non-Markovian sequences consisting of repeats and mixtures of slow forward and turn bouts. Applied to a novel chemotaxis assay, BASS uncovers chemotactic strategies deployed by zebrafish to avoid aversive cues consisting of sequences of fast large-angle turns and burst swims. In a simulated dataset of soaring gliders climbing thermals, BASS finds the spiraling patterns characteristic of soaring behaviour. In both cases, BASS succeeds in identifying rare action sequences in the behaviour deployed by freely moving animals. BASS can be easily incorporated into the pipelines of existing behavioural analyses across diverse species, and even more broadly used as a generic algorithm for pattern recognition in low-dimensional sequential data.

Control law design to improve the unexpected pitch motion in slow down turn maneuver

The highly maneuverable fighter aircraft is exposed to unexpected pitch motion such as over-Nz (normal acceleration) and Nz-drop characteristics in transonic and supersonic flight conditions with moderate angle of attack. These characteristics not only degrade flying qualities by destabilizing the aircraft but also threaten flight safety by increasing the structural load. This article proposes an additional augmentation control in the incremental nonlinear dynamic inversion structure, which feeds back the error of pitch angular acceleration to mitigate unexpected pitch motion in slow down turn maneuver. We evaluate the stability, flying qualities, and robustness of the proposed control system by performing the frequency-domain linear analysis and the time-domain numerical simulations based on the mathematical model of advanced trainer aircraft. As a result of the evaluation, the additional augmentation control further improves flying qualities and deceleration performance of the aircraft by decreasing over-Nz and Nz-drop characteristics in high-Nz maneuvering in the transonic flight condition as well as ensuring the stability and robustness of the control system against the major uncertainty factors of the aircraft system compared to the existing transonic pitching moment compensation (TPMC) control in which the predefined scheduling for Nz feedback is used.

Separation Anxiety: Recorded Dances from a Pandemic Year

Separation Anxiety: Recorded Dances from a Pandemic Year Jay Rogoff (bio) Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, well over a year has passed since most dance fans have enjoyed live ballet or modern dance, and many companies anxiously plan to flaunt the full vitality of flesh-and-blood dancing once again this fall before flesh-and-blood witnesses. Companies, such as the New York City Ballet, performed this summer with limited task forces for limited, socially distanced audiences. For the most part, however, dance lovers have continued to make do with online and streaming videos, some of them recordings of archival performances, others onstage presentations of new and repertory works captured in empty theaters, and still others experiments in designing dances expressly for the medium, whether recorded on smartphones, conducted by terpsichorean Zoom conference, or conceived as more ambitious films. Initially, as in one work I discussed last year by the L. A. Dance Project and others by members of the New York City and San Francisco Ballets, dancers devised new works, recorded themselves individually on their smartphones, and worked with editors to splice the results together into short dances. Soon choreographers realized that Zoom, the online meeting app, enabled them to teach new ballets to groups of dancers. The painstaking and frustrating process of Zoom choreography yielded necessarily brief works, of a few minutes. The modern dance choreographer Stephen Petronio released #GimmeShelter in June 2020, days after police killed George Floyd in Minneapolis. It runs four-and-a-half minutes, the length of the Rolling Stones song that became a pandemic anthem while we sheltered in place and mourned those dead of COVID-19. The song’s warnings of violence—“War, children [and later “Rape, murder”], it’s just a shot away”—acquired new urgency as the administration in Washington determined to battle some of its citizens, and its final fadeout, “Love, sister, it’s just a kiss away,” evoked the solidarity and kinship motivating protestors. The video opens with Petronio talking his company through part of the dance: “Gather up [lifts his arms up above his shoulders], cut across [hands sweep across his chest], leg [kicks forward], leg [kicks backward, while extending an arm forward].” The intro’s ticking guitar begins, and two dancers, Ryan Pliss and Mac Twining, ready themselves at home. A shot of a flowering bush, a body of water, then successive shots of Trump, computer animations of the COVID-19 virus, and a hospital ship heading for New York, initiate a Life Under Covid montage for the city and the company: fire escapes, hands lathering up, a man in the shower, Pliss applying glittery eye makeup, Larissa Asebedo and Petronio preparing, the COVID-19 animation, Anthony Fauci speaking. Petronio’s Zoom palette appears, showing all the dancers in the top right corner of each space, backs to the camera. As the Stones’ melody kicks in, they turn, one by one, to face us. Petronio’s choreography is highly formalist, with arms moving in precise geometry and quick cuts from dancer to dancer. The work’s political [End Page 468] attitude emerges not from the steps but from the images intercut with the performers, and via the dancers’ social segregation. The dancers turn and thrust their hips; Twining slowly turns and kicks; Asebedo plays her hands about her upper body. When the spinning virus reappears, we imagine Petronio has choreographed its solo as well. Petronio edits so gestures ripple like waves through his company. After Ernesto Breton gives dynamic flourishes to his arm and leg thrusts, Acebedo inherits his torque: a slow punch forward spins her body around, her long dark hair waving. Jaqlin Medlock’s hair continues the wave while she executes a slow turn, her extended leg adopted immediately by Breton. When Pliss hops in the air, his working leg extended, Twining lands in the same pose. Nicholas Sciscione, in a short blue robe, kicks toward the camera, and Breton follows the gesture through. Medlock, Twining, Tess Montoya, Breton, Sciscione, and Asebedo, each in turn, vogue cross-legged toward us, arms articulate in the air. Each dancer then approaches the camera, showing only eyes or lips, ready for a kiss. Petronio returns, doing...

Diagnostic Accuracy of the SARS-CoV-2 IgG/IgM Rapid Test Cassette (Healgen®) in the Management of Suspected Patients with Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Introduction: COVID-19 infection is the most rapidly growing pandemic in modern time. Its diagnosis in the hospital setting was limited by the lack of adequate laboratory diagnostic tools available in the Philippines. When the community outbreak was declared, only two national reference laboratories approved by WHO were capable of performing the reference standard test RT-PCR for the diagnosis of Covid-19 disease. However, due to the slow turn around time of processing of RT-PCR samples, lasting 6-10 days prior to release of result, we were crucially in need of a rapid test for diagnostic investigation. This highlights the urgent need to have widespread, reliable diagnostic test.Objective: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of SARS-COV-2 IgG/IgM Rapid Test Cassette (Healgen®) in the management of suspected patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Cardinal Santos Medical Center.Methods: Serum blood samples from 164 COVID suspects were collected and subjected to the IgG/IgM rapid antibody test. The results were correlated with the days of illness and their SARS-Cov-2 RT-PCR test result. Utilizing the gold standard SARS-Cov-2 RT-PCR, sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values, likelihood ratios and overall accuracy rates were computed. Antibody detection rates were also computed from onset of patient’s illness among the confirmed sample population.Results: The sensitivity of the rapid antibody test for symptomatic adult, Covid 19 positive patients seen at Cardinal Santos Medical Center, Philippines from March to May 2020 was 84% (IgM) and 76% (IgG). When both IgM and IgG are positive, the sensitivity and specificity are similar at 80%. The positive likelihood ratio if both antibodies are positive is 4. The specificity for asymptomatic individuals was 98% (IgM) and 96% (IgG). Likewise, the negative predictive values are 96% and 94% for IgM and IgG. Overall, the sensitivity and specificity of IgM are 82% and 86% respectively. IgM antibodies were detected early in the first week of illness in 54% of the hospitalized confirmed patients. Detection of IgG on the other hand was highest during the second and third weeks of illness. Total or both antibodies were detectable up to 4 weeks from illness onset. IgM antibodies were detected earlier than IgG. IgM positivity rate was higher than IgG by the second week illness (IgM 100% vs IgG 93%), both antibodies have the same positivity rates up to the fourth week of observation.Conclusion: The Healgen® antibody has good performance rates, it can be applied clinically for the diagnosis of Covid 19 disease in comparison with the standard RT-PCR . Results should be interpreted according to the patients’ duration of illness. It also has the potential for use to determine asymptomatic infection among those at risk.Funding Statement: None to declare.Declaration of Interests: There was no conflict of interest in conducting the study.Ethics Approval Statement: This study was approved by the ethics board at the Cardinal Santos Medical Center.

A neural heading estimate is compared with an internal goal to guide oriented navigation.

Goal-directed navigation is thought to rely on the activity of head-direction cells, but how this activity guides moment-to-moment action remains poorly understood. Here we characterize how heading neurons in the Drosophila central complex guide moment-to-moment actions. We establish an innate, heading-neuron dependent, tethered navigational behavior where walking flies maintain a straight trajectory along a specific angular bearing for hundreds of body lengths. While flies perform this task, we use chemogenetics to transiently rotate their neural heading estimate and observe that the flies slow down and turn in a direction that aims to return the heading estimate to the angle it occupied prior to stimulation. These results support a working model in which the fly brain quantitatively compares an internal estimate of current heading with an internal goal heading and uses the sign and magnitude of the difference to determine which way to turn, how hard to turn, and how fast to walk forward.

The Republic of Belarus: the Evolution of the Policy of Balancing between East and West

The article is devoted to the analysis of one of the main causes of the Russian-Belarusian crisis of 2018-2019 -the Pro-Western vector of the Belarusian foreign policy. Since the establishment of the Union state of the Republic of Belarus and the Russian Federation (1999), Minsk’s policy towards the European Union and the United States has always been of a special non-bloc nature. Minsk traditionally links its foreign policy with the task of preserving the sovereignty and independence of Belarus. At the same time, the Belarusian leadership has always stressed its status as Russias “only ally”. However, gradually the foreign policy of Minsk began to acquire a Pro-Western character, which began to have a negative impact on the Russian-Belarusian integration. Over time, Minsk for a number of reasons began to shy away from supporting its ally in the foreign arena, the foreign policy of Belarus has acquired the character of balancing between Russia and the West. The policy of balancing allowed Minsk to ignore the lack of political and economic balance of interests within the framework of Russian-Belarusian integration for more than twenty years. For many years, Minsk has used the Western vector of its foreign policy to stimulate Russian economic support for the Belarusian economy. In 20142018, amid the escalation of the confrontation between the West and Russia, the policy of balancing Minsk began to gradually reformat into a slow geopolitical turn of the Republic to the West. Currently, the Belarusian leadership uses the Western vector of its foreign policy to mask the gradual change of the geopolitical vector on the one hand, and to maintain access to Russian financial and energy resources on the other hand. By 2018, both formed opposite trends against the backdrop of the aggravation of the Ukrainian crisis resonated, which led to a crisis in relations between Russia and Belarus and jeopardized the preservation of the Union state.

Memory Offensives Where Impunity Reigns

What does it take to break impunity in societies where it remains entrenched? How do alternative histories emerge to counter official narratives, and recast memories of terror and resistance? This article reviews two works exploring such processes. Weld's ethnography details the unearthing of a massive police archive in Guatemala, the painstaking recovery of secret documents, and their significance; Atencio analyses Brazil's "slow turn" toward its authoritarian past, focusing on relationships between artistic-cultural memory work and formal reconciliation steps by Brazil's government. Both reveal hard-fought struggles to open up spaces long off-limits, and turn them into sites where "memory offensives" are waged.

Ex-vivo sensitivity profiling to guide clinical decision making in acute myeloid leukemia: A pilot study

A precision medicine approach is appealing for use in AML due to ease of access to tumor samples and the significant variability in the patients’ response to treatment. Attempts to establish a precision medicine platform for AML, however, have been unsuccessful, at least in part due to the use of small compound panels and having relatively slow turn over rates, which restricts the scope of treatment and delays its onset. For this pilot study, we evaluated a cohort of 12 patients with refractory AML using an ex vivo drug sensitivity testing (DST) platform. Purified AML blasts were screened with a panel of 215 FDA-approved compounds and treatment response was evaluated after 72h of exposure. Drug sensitivity scoring was reported to the treating physician, and patients were then treated with either DST- or non-DST guided therapy. We observed survival benefit of DST-guided therapy as compared to the survival of patients treated according to physician recommendation. Three out of four DST-treated patients displayed treatment response, while all of the non-DST-guided patients progressed during treatment. DST rapidly and effectively provides personalized treatment recommendations for patients with refractory AML.

A best space for assisted wheelchair users

Introduction Occupational therapists lack manual-handling sensitive tools to assist individual adaptation specifications for assisted wheelchair users, for example, corridor-room turns for extra-long wheelchairs. Method Engineering-based methods identified an experimental set-up. This provided a useful representation of possible manoeuvres in five tasks and proposed a turn difficulty order. Experienced wheelchair assistants ( n = 22) selected their maximum comfortable wheelchair weight for each turn. Results Some participants (3/22) were insensitive to turning-space but all other participants (19/22) chose their lowest maximum comfortable weight for the tightest turning-space and 17/19 chose their highest weights for space permitting a slow turn. Mean percentage weight increased by 30% from tight to slow turning-space. Results are statistically significant and clinically important. Experimental set-up was similar to assisting in confined spaces; participants were experienced in working in spacious environments and had recent manual-handling training so results are supported by good manual-handling practice. Assistant-size impact on easiest (highest weight) turning-space is small. Results are applicable to all floor coverings and wheelchair sizes but not to self-propelling wheelchair users. Results are incorporated into a tool, demonstrated by case study. Conclusion Tool-use specifies a best adaptation.

Spatiotemporal regulation of Heterochromatin Protein 1-alpha oligomerization and dynamics in live cells.

Heterochromatin protein 1 (HP1) is a central factor in establishing and maintaining the heterochromatin state. As consequence of playing a structural role in heterochromatin, HP1 proteins can have both an activating as well as repressive function in gene expression. Here we probe how oligomerisation of the HP1-α isoform modulates interaction with chromatin, by spatially resolved fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS). We find from fluctuation analysis of HP1-α dynamics that this isoform exists as a dimer around the periphery of heterochromatin foci and these foci locally rotate with characteristic turn rates that range from 5–100ms. From inhibition of HP1-α homo-oligomerization we find the slow turn rates (20–100 ms) are dimer dependent. From treatment with drugs that disrupt or promote chromatin compaction, we find that HP1-α dimers spatially redistribute to favor fast (5–10 ms) or slow (20–100 ms) turn rates. Collectively our results demonstrate HP1-α oligomerization is critical to the maintenance of heterochromatin and the tunable dynamics of this HP1 isoform.

Memory's turn: reckoning with dictatorship in Brazil

After twenty-one years of military dictatorship, Brazil returned to democratic rule in 1985. Yet over the following two decades, the country largely ignored human rights crimes committed by state security agents, crimes that included the torture, murder, and disappearance of those who opposed the authoritarian regime. In clear and engaging prose, Rebecca J. Atencio tells the story of the slow turn to memory in Brazil, a turn that has taken place in both politics and in cultural production. She shows how testimonial literature, telenovelas, literary novels, theatrical plays, and memorials have interacted with policies adopted by the Brazilian state, often in unexpected ways. Under the right circumstances, official and cultural forms of reckoning combine in Brazil to produce what Atencio calls cycles of cultural memory. Novel meanings of the past are forged, and new cultural works are inspired, thus creating the possibility for further turns in the cycle. The first book to analyze Brazil's reckoning with dictatorship through both institutional and cultural means, Memory's Turn is a rich, informative exploration of the interplay between these different modes of memory reconstruction.

Laser-field-free orientation of state-selected asymmetric top molecules

With combined electrostatic and shaped laser fields with a slow turn on and rapid turn off, laser-field-free orientation of asymmetric top iodobenzene molecules with higher degrees of orientation has been achieved. In order to further increase the degrees of orientation, state-selected molecules are used as a sample. It is confirmed that higher degrees of orientation are maintained in the laser-field-free condition for 5--10 ps, which is long enough to study femtosecond-attosecond dynamics in molecules, after the rapid turn off of the laser pulse. The observation of the slow dephasing time of 5--10 ps ensures future prospects in molecular orientation techniques. This accomplishment means not only that a unique molecular sample has become available in various applications but also that the present technique can be used as a spectroscopic technique to investigate ultrafast rotational dynamics of molecules.

Thickness dependent device characteristics of sandwich polymer light-emitting electrochemical cell

The polymer light-emitting electrochemical cell (LEC) is an attractive alternative to the widely studied polymer light-emitting diodes (PLEDs) for possible lighting and display applications. The main advantage of an LEC is its relative insensitivity to electrode work function and active layer thickness. While this is true when compared to a PLED, we show that active layer thickness can strongly influence several key LEC performance parameters. Sandwich LECs exhibit vastly different device characteristics when the active layer thickness is varied from approximately 75nm to 1206nm. Maximum luminance, current efficiency (in cd/A) and operating lifetime are all strongly thickness dependent. The 75nm LEC shows artificially slow turn on due to the presence of micro-shorts. The 1206nm LEC exhibits a peculiar partial recovery of luminance after prolonged operation. We attribute the thickness dependent LEC characteristics to variations in doping levels. Our results suggest that the active layer thickness of sandwich LECs is a non-trivial parameter that should be carefully optimized and studied.

THE LATE-VICTORIAN HISTORIES OF INDIAN ART OBJECTS: POLITICS AND AESTHETICS IN JAIPUR'S ALBERT HALL MUSEUM

Recent guidebooks for the Westernertraveling to Northern India generally refer the prospective visitor to a common range of cities around Delhi – Agra, Jaipur, and Udaipur; within these, the Taj Mahal, Jaipur's Pink City and nearby Amber Fort, and Udaipur's glamorous lake palaces usually merit must-see status. Until its refurbishment a few years ago, the Albert Hall Museum, an elaborate structure with old-fashioned interiors and a location a kilometer south of Jaipur's city center, ranked as a second- or even third-tier tourist attraction; travel guides from recent years mention it with indifference, describing its collections as “dusty” and “fine, if carelessly exhibited” (Bindloss and Singh 170), or even suggesting that “a slow circular turn around the building in a car will suffice” (Frommers520). Yet a century ago the Museum proudly occupied a primary place in British travel guides to India. It opened with ceremony and fanfare in 1887, and by 1898 almost three million Indian and over ten thousand European visitors had passed through its doors (Hendley,Report9). A striking example of colonial architecture, constructed of white stone with numerous courtyards, covered walkways, and ornamented domes (Figure 1), it was regarded as perhaps the most noteworthy edifice within a noteworthy Indian city. Thomas Holbein Hendley, resident Surgeon-Major in Jaipur, chief curator for the 1883 Jaipur Exhibition, and the Albert Hall Museum's Secretary and tireless champion, recommended that travelers in Jaipur for a single day make two visits, both morning and evening, to the site, and that those with an additional day to spend in the city schedule a third visit. Murray'sHandbook for Travellers in India, Burma and Ceylonconcurred, describing it as “a beautiful museum – an Oriental South Kensington, suitably housed” (174), and just after the turn of the century, English journalist Sidney Low recalled that it was “the best museum, with one exception, in all India, a museum which, in the careful selection and the judicious arrangement of its contents, is a model of what such an institution ought to be” (114).

Analysis and Design of IGBT Driving and Protection Circuit for Photovoltaic Grid-Connected Inverter

For the characteristics of high frequency of switching devices in the photovoltaic inverter and complexity of circuit topology, the insulated gate bipolar transistor driving protection circuit is designed which is suitable for photovoltaic inverter. The circuit which is based on thick film structure of M57962L has isolated power supply and threshold voltage regulator circuits. The control and regulation can be achieved precisely for the threshold voltage of over current protection. The internal structure of M57962L has been analyzed here. The process of slow turn off action is observed practically. For the circuit periphery parameters of M57962L, the general calculation methods are given according to various models and the level of protection for IGBT. The practical application shows that the method is correct and effective.