Texture Function Research Articles

Approche fonctionnelle de l’emploi de l’huile de palme – Perspectives d’évolution réglementaire en matière d’étiquetage

Formulating food products requires taking into account the functional characteristics of the ingredients as well as nutrition facts and recommendations, quality of the end-product, supplying and production, regulatory compliance… For food recipes where fats do play an important texturing function (based on their crystallisation properties), the selection of adequate oils or fats may become rather complex with emerging additional requirements, like finding alternatives to palm oil – the oil that became itself an efficient substitute to partially hydrogenated fats when the trans fatty acids issue occurred in the nineties. Looking for optimised formulations should first and foremost focus on nutritional facts (reduction of saturated fatty acids – SAFA, reduction of fat contents when relevant) and functionality. As far as palm oil respond to the required specifications, too systematic attempts for avoiding it, may lead to less satisfactory options in terms of nutrition or quality result.The main existing options are described and related to the dependence of the formulations to the ‘‘solid function’’ of fats : when possible, the changes have already or will be done (frying oils, certain applications in bakery fats…) ; in some cases (namely puff pastry), reduction of SAFA or fat content is much more critical.The paper ends on regulatory aspects of food labelling as far as the ingredients specific origin and the nutrition facts will have to be mentioned by the end of 2016.

Electroanatomical Characterization of Atrial Microfibrosis in a Histologically Detailed Computer Model

Fibrosis is thought to play an important role in the formation and maintenance of atrial fibrillation (AF). The propensity of fibrosis to increase AF vulnerability depends not only on its amount, its texture plays a crucial role as well. While the detection of fibrotic tissue patches in the atria with extracellular recordings is feasible based on the analysis of electrogram fractionation, as used in clinical practice to identify ablation targets, the classification of fibrotic texture is a more challenging problem. This study seeks to establish a method for the electroanatomical characterization of the fibrotic textures based on the analysis of electrogram fractionation. The proposed method exploits the dependence of fractionation patterns on the incidence direction of wavefronts which differs significantly as a function of texture. A histologically detailed computer model of the right atrial isthmus was developed for testing the method. A stimulation protocol was conceived which generated various incidence directions for any given recording site where electrograms were computed. A classification method is derived then for discriminating three types of fibrosis, no fibrosis (control), diffuse, and patchy fibrosis. Simulation results showed that electrogram fractionation and amplitudes and their dependence upon incidence direction allow a robust discrimination between different classes of fibrosis. Finally, to minimize the technical effort, sensitivity analysis was performed to identify a minimum number of incidence directions required for robust classification.

Temperature- and Texture-Dependent Dielectric Model for Moist Soils at 1.4 GHz

In this letter, a monofrequent dielectric model for moist soils taking into account dependences on the temperature and texture is proposed, in the case of an electromagnetic frequency equal to 1.4 GHz. The proposed model is deduced from a more general model proposed by Mironov and Fomin (2009) that provides estimations of the complex relative permittivity (CRP) of moist soils as a function of frequency, temperature, moisture, and texture of soils. The latter employs the physical laws of Debye and Clausius-Mossotti and the law of ion conductance to calculate the CRP of water solutions in the soil. The parameters of the respective physical laws were determined by using the CRPs of moist soils measured by Curtis (1995) for a wide ensemble of soil textures (clay content from 0% to 76%), moistures (from drying at 105 °C to nearly saturation), temperatures (10 °C -40 °C), and frequencies (0.3-26.5 GHz). This model has standard deviations of calculated CRPs from the measured values equal to 1.9 and 1.3 for the real and imaginary parts of CRP, respectively. In the model proposed in this letter, the respective standard deviations were decreased to the values of 0.87 and 0.26. In addition, the equations to calculate the complex dielectric permittivity as a function of moisture, temperature, and texture were represented in a simple form of the refractive mixing dielectric model, which is commonly used in the algorithms of radiometric and radar remote sensing to retrieve moisture in the soil.

An Efficient Adaptive Image Steganographic Method for ± k Embedding

Adaptive steganography which avoids changing the sensitive area in carrier, can efectively improve the security of steganography. Firstly, the schemes of side information synchronization in adaptive steganography are summarized and analyzed. Secondly, using the freedom degree which is extented by the previous one-way texture functions, a new orderpreserving texture function as side information of adaptive steganography is constructed. Finally, by combining wet paper codes and the method of multi-layered embedding, ± 1 algorithm and ± 2 algorithm are proposed. The proposed scheme can efciently enhance the security of adaptive steganography while maintaining fast side information synchronization between communicators. Theoretical analysis and experimental results show the efciency of the proposed scheme.

Experimental Study of Evolution of Aqueous SiO2 in the Mineral Water in Basalt Beds of Jingyu County, China

The mineral water in Jingyu County, Jilin Province of China, was selected as the research target. Laboratory water- basalt interaction experiments were conducted to investigate the concentrations and rate of release of aqueous SiO2, a characteristic component in the mineral water from this region. Results show that the release of SiO2 from water-rock interactions conform to a log-log curve law. In 155-day experiments, the amount of SiO2 released from the basalt powder is 138-196mg/kg, and that from basalt blocks is lower at 46.2-62.6mg/kg. The pH values tend to be neutral. The electrical conductivity of aqueous solutions tends to increase gradually. The release rate of SiO2 is basically constant at about 0.04-0.14mg/kg.d after 155 days. The released silica concentrations and rates are functions of rock texture, rock surface area, and reaction time.

Experimental-based model for predicting the skid resistance of asphalt pavements

The skid resistance of asphalt pavement is a major characteristic of road safety. This study aimed at the development of a model that expresses skid resistance as a function of mixture gradation, aggregate texture and traffic level. The model was developed based on comprehensive measurements and analysis of asphalt mixture surface characteristics (friction, texture and skid resistance) in the laboratory and the field. In addition, aggregates were characterised using the aggregate imaging system after different polishing intervals in the Micro-Deval. The aggregate gradation was described using the two-parameter cumulative Weibull distribution function. The developed model provides an estimate of the skid number in the field. Consequently, this model can be used by engineers to select different combinations of aggregate types and mixture designs such that the desired level of skid resistance at a given traffic level is achieved.

Calibration of an on-line sensor for measurement of topsoil bulk density in all soil textures

An on-line sensor for the prediction of bulk density (BD) has been previously developed, and calibrated for light textured soils. This study aims to expand the implementation of this sensor for all soil types, including clay soils. The on-line sensor consists of a single ended shear beam load cell to measure draught (D), a visible and near infrared (vis–NIR) sensor to measure moisture content (MC), and a wheel gauge equipped with a draw wire linear sensor to measure depth (d). This sensor was used to collect data from 14 fields across four European countries (Denmark, Czech Republic, the Netherlands and the UK) with different soil textures. The three measured parameters were substituted into a previously developed model to calculate BD. The calculated BD for 333 samples was compared with BD measured with a core sampling kit to validate the system and to calculate correction factors (CF) valid for each additional soil texture. A multiple linear regression (MLR), nonlinear multiple regression (NMR) and artificial neural network (ANN) analyses were carried out to establish models to predict CF, as a function of average field MC and soil texture fractions.For clay soils, the correlation between the measured and on-line predicted BD was satisfactory (R2=0.54–0.69), and suggested a large negative CF>−0.248Mgm−3. For other soil types with lighter soil textures, accuracy of measurements varied (R2=0.51–0.96), with lower CF values than those calculated for clay soils and ranged between negative and positive values (−0.007Mgm−3<CF<0.079Mgm−3). The ANN analysis resulted in the best model to predict CF as function of MC and soil texture fractions (R2=0.96), which allowed the utilisation of the on-line measurement system for any field having any texture and average MC. The on-line BD sensor was shown to be capable of predicting field dry BD rapidly for a large number of samples, as compared with traditional methods.

Contact of a Finger on Rigid Surfaces and Textiles: Friction Coefficient and Induced Vibrations

The tactile information about object surfaces is obtained through perceived contact stresses and friction-induced vibrations generated by the relative motion between the fingertip and the touched object. The friction forces affect the skin stress-state distribution during surface scanning, while the sliding contact generates vibrations that propagate in the finger skin activating the receptors (mechanoreceptors) and allowing the brain to identify objects and perceive information about their properties. In this article, the friction coefficient between a real human finger and both rigid surfaces and fabrics is retrieved as a function of the contact parameters (load and scanning speed). Then, the analysis of the vibration spectra is carried out to investigate the features of the induced vibrations, measured on the fingernail, as a function of surface textures and contact parameters. While the friction coefficient measurements on rigid surfaces agree with empirical laws found in literature, the behaviour of the friction coefficient when touching a fabric is more complex, and is mainly the function of the textile constructional properties. Results show that frequency spectrum distribution, when touching a rigid surface, is mainly determined by the relative geometry of the two contact surfaces and by the contact parameters. On the contrary, when scanning a fabric, the structure and the deformation of the textile itself largely affect the spectrum of the induced vibration. Finally, some major features of the measured vibrations (frequency distribution and amplitude) are found to be representative of tactile perception compared to psychophysical and neurophysiologic works in literature.

K-clustered tensor approximation

With the increasing demands for photo-realistic image synthesis in real time, we propose a sparse multilinear model, which is named K-Clustered Tensor Approximation (K-CTA), to efficiently analyze and approximate large-scale multidimensional visual datasets, so that both storage space and rendering time are substantially reduced. K-CTA not only extends previous work on Clustered Tensor Approximation (CTA) to exploit inter-cluster coherence, but also allows a compact and sparse representation for high-dimensional datasets with just a few low-order factors and reduced multidimensional cluster core tensors. Thus, K-CTA can be regarded as a sparse extension of CTA and a multilinear generalization of sparse representation. Experimental results demonstrate that K-CTA can accurately approximate spatially varying visual datasets, such as bidirectional texture functions, view-dependent occlusion texture functions, and biscale radiance transfer functions for efficient rendering in real-time applications.

Canadian Field Soils II. Modeling of Quartz Occurrence

The measured mineral composition data (XRD/XRF) of 40 Canadian soils were modeled for the presence of quartz as a function of soil texture. Preliminary modeling revealed a lack of strict correlation between quartz content and mass fraction of sand. For that reason, the occurrence of quartz content was modeled as dependent on a combined fraction of sand and silt, which produced an improved correlation for all tested soils. Then, all soils were modeled separately for five assigned provinces/regions of Canada and strong correlations of quartz versus combined sand and silt fractions were obtained. Estimates of quartz content and an average thermal conductivity of other minerals were also obtained by the reverse analysis of the weighted geometric mean model applied to the experimental thermal conductivity data of saturated soils. In general, quartz estimates followed XRD/XRF data sufficiently well. The thermal conductivity of the remaining soil minerals was about 2.13 W · m−1 · K−1 on average and did not depend on the soil texture.

Comparison of Experimental and Numerical Results for the Quasi-Static and Dynamic Tensile Behaviour of a Commercial Ti6Al4V Alloy as a Function of Initial Crystallographic Texture

Quasi-static tensile tests and high strain rate split Hopkinson bar tensile experiments were used to mechanically characterize a commercially available Ti6Al4V alloy. The material was tested along different directions as to assess the influence of the initial crystallographic texture on the mechanical behaviour. In order to circumvent the problem of the limited thickness of the base material, special usage was made of the Linear Friction Welding technique. The results of the experiments were afterwards compared to the numerical results of a crystal plasticity code based on the viscoplastic self-consistent approach, taking into account twinning as an active deformation mode.

Plastic limits of agricultural soils as functions of soil texture and organic matter content

The plastic limits (lower plastic limit, PL; and liquid limit, LL) are important soil properties that can yield information on soil mechanical behaviour. The objective of this paper is to study the plastic limits of agricultural soils as functions of soil texture and organic matter (OM) content. The plastic limits were highly related to the clay content. The LL was more strongly correlated with clay than was PL, but the reasons are unclear. Interestingly, PL was virtually unaffected by clay content for soils with clay contents below ~35%. The OM had a strong effect on the plastic limits. This effect was clearly demonstrated when analysing soils of similar texture with a range of OM. We present equations (pedotransfer functions) for estimation of PL, LL, and plasticity index (PI) from soil texture and OM. Finally, we predict that the clay content must be ≥10% for soils without OM to be plastic; however, soils with &lt;10% clay can be plastic if OM is present. More research is needed to investigate OM effects on soil consistency.

Random sampling of stony and non-stony soils for testing a national soil carbon monitoring system

The New Zealand Soil Carbon Monitoring System (Soil CMS) was designed, and has been used, to account for soil organic carbon change under land-use change, during New Zealand’s first Commitment Period (2008–2012) to the Kyoto Protocol. The efficacy of the Soil CMS model has been tested for assessing soil organic carbon stocks in a selected climate–land-use–soil grouping (cell). The cell selected for this test represents an area of 709 683 ha and contains soils with a high-activity clay mineralogy promoting long-term stabilisation of organic matter, and is under low-producing grassland in a dry temperate New Zealand climate. These soils have been sampled at randomly selected positions to assess total soil organic carbon stocks to 0.3 m, and to compare with the modelled value. Results show no significant difference between the field estimation (67 ± 30 Mg C/ha), the mean value of the model calibration dataset (79 ± 28 Mg C/ha), and the value predicted by the model (101 ± 41 Mg C/ha), although all estimates have large uncertainties associated with them. The model predicts national soil organic carbon stocks as a function of soil texture, clay mineralogy, land use, climate class, and a slope–rainfall erosivity product. Components of uncertainty within the model include the size and distribution of the calibration dataset, and lack of representativeness of the calibration soil samples, which were sampled for other reasons, e.g. soil survey and forest mensuration. Our study has shown that major components of uncertainty in our field estimation of soil organic carbon stocks (investigated using the indices reproducibility, RP; and coefficient of variation, CV) are short-range (within-plot) and regional (between-sites) spatial variability. Soil organic carbon stocks vary within our selected climate–land-use–soil cell due to varying stoniness (stony soils RP 44%, CV 21%; non-stony soils RP 27%, CV 13%), soil depth, slope position, and climatic effects. When one outlier soil was removed from the model calibration dataset, and the three very stony sites were removed from the randomly selected field validation set, the model calibration dataset and the field dataset means agreed well (78 ± 26 and 78 ± 21 Mg C/ha, respectively). The higher modelled value, before removal of the outlier, is likely to reflect a bias in the model dataset towards conventionally selected modal profiles containing less stony soils than those encountered by the random sampling strategy of our field campaign. Therefore, our results indicate (1) that the Soil CMS provides an adequate estimation of soil organic carbon for the selected cell, and (2) ongoing refinements are required to reduce the uncertainty of prediction.

Advanced Material Rendering in Blender

Physically correct and realistic visual appearance rendering or analysis of material surface visual properties require complex descriptive models capable of modelling material dependence on variable illumination and viewing conditions. The recent most advanced representation of visual properties of surface materials is a Bidirectional texture function (BTF). BTF is 7D function of planar coordinates, spectral coordinate, and viewing and illumination angles, respectively. Unlike smooth textures, it specifies their altering appearance due to varying illumination and viewing conditions. This BTF visual appearance dependency on viewing and illumination conditions significantly complicates not only its acquisition, representation, and modelling but also makes its rendering noticeably more demanding. BTF textures are acquired by costly measurements of real materials and their subsequent nontrivial processing. While several techniques for measurement or processing of BTF textures have been described already, there is no environment allowing BTF texture rendering. This contribution describes novel Blender texture plugin for the purpose of BTF texture mapping and rendering. The plugin benefits from our previously developed BTF Roller texture enlargement method which is the integral part of its implementation. The presented plugin allows creating realistic computer animations with additional BTF textures of any required size mapped onto an object surfaces while the other functionality of Blender retains

Modeling broad-scale patterns of avian species richness across the Midwestern United States with measures of satellite image texture

Avian biodiversity is threatened, and in order to prioritize limited conservation resources and conduct effective conservation planning a better understanding of avian species richness patterns is needed. The use of image texture measures, as a proxy for the spatial structure of land cover and vegetation, has proven useful in explaining patterns of avian abundance and species richness. However, prior studies that modeled habitat with texture measures were conducted over small geographical extents and typically focused on a single habitat type. Our goal was to evaluate the performance of texture measures over broad spatial extents and across multiple habitat types with varying levels of vertical habitat structure. We calculated a suite of texture measures from 114 Landsat images over a study area of 1,498,000km2 in the Midwestern United States, which included habitats ranging from grassland to forest. Avian species richness was modeled for several functional guilds as a function of image texture. We subsequently compared the explanatory power of texture-only models with models fitted using landscape composition metrics derived from the National Land Cover Dataset, as well as models fitted using both texture and composition metrics. Measures of image texture were effective in modeling spatial patterns of avian species richness in multiple habitat types, explaining up to 51% of the variability in species richness of permanent resident birds. In comparison, landscape composition metrics explained up to 56% of the variability in permanent resident species richness. In the most heavily forested ecoregion, texture-measures outperformed landscape metrics, and the two types of measurements were complementary in multivariate models. However, in two out of three ecoregions examined, landscape composition metrics consistently performed slightly better than texture measures, and the variance explained by the two types of measures overlapped considerably. These results show that image texture measures derived from satellite imagery can be an important tool for modeling patterns of avian species richness at broad spatial extents, and thus assist in conservation planning. However, texture measures were slightly inferior to landscape composition metrics in about three-fourths of our models. Therefore texture measures are best considered in conjunction with landscape metrics (if available) and are best used when they show explanatory ability that is complementarity to landscape metrics.

Characterization and Modeling of Twinning in a Titanium Alloy Ti-6Al-4V

The twinning behavior of a commercial Ti-6Al-4V alloy is studied using a combined experimental and numerical approach. An extensive microstructural investigation was performed to identify and quantify the active twin systems. The mechanical behavior as a function of initial texture and strain rate was then modeled using a visco-plastic self-consistent crystal plasticity code (VPSC7). Earlier obtained quasi-static and dynamic data served to fit the parameters of the model, giving good agreement. However, even if the model gave qualitatively good predictions of the stress-strain curves and the texture evolution for the different loadings, the calculated twin fractions differed considerably of the experimental results.

Use of Digital Image Modeling for Evaluation of Concrete Pavement Macrotexture and Wear

Modeling of the pavement image formation process by using reflection properties of macrotexture showed that digital images of concrete pavements can be used to monitor pavement wear. The specific optical characteristics of images and the optimum camera settings that can be used for this purpose were determined by theoretically formulating the Bidirectional Reflection Distribution Function (BRDF) of surface texture with uniform color. In the analytical phase of the study, desired levels of pavement texture were generated by combining a series of 3D sine surfaces of varying wavelengths and amplitudes. The optimum specular settings of the overhead point light source and the digital area-scan camera for effective highlighting of the imaged wheel path macrotexture were determined with an analytical formulation on the basis of a simplistic and physically meaningful BRDF model. It was also shown that the images obtained by the theoretical formulation closely resemble those captured from a similarly textured experimental surface under identical lighting and imaging conditions. In particular, the pavement image formation model revealed that quantifiable changes in the brightness of images do occur because of changes in texture depth and spacing (wavelength). In the next phase of the study, the traffic-induced pavement wearing process was simulated by gradual smoothening of the modeled surfaces, and then images corresponding to each wearing stage were generated. The theoretically predicted variation of the image brightness resulting from wear was experimentally verified by using images from a gradually worn-out concrete specimen. Finally, it was illustrated how the brightness evaluation of wheel path images has the potential to be a screening tool to monitor the degradation of macrotexture and, hence, the skid-resistance of pavements at the network-level.

A Method to Measure the Relative Brine Release Capacity of Geologic Material

Abstract A method to estimate the brine released by pumping a brine-saturated geologic unit has been developed. This method addresses the need of those evaluating mineral-rich brine-saturated deposits for a rapid screening test that is suitable for multiple samples and textures and that avoids issues associated with brine as the pore fluid. The method involves applying a vacuum to a group of saturated samples in a parallel configuration. The parallel configuration allows rapid analysis of up to 10 samples simultaneously. The amount of brine produced in response to the vacuum, referred to as the “relative brine release capacity” (RBRC), provides a basis for comparison of the amount of brine produced from different samples. The RBRC is related to the specific yield of a material, which is principally a function of material texture. In this study the method was first applied to sand, clay, and sandstone samples saturated with tap water so that the results could be compared to water retention data developed from standard methods. The results were consistent with the water retention data as well as with the range of published specific yield values for these textures. Subsequent measurements on several hundred brine-saturated samples produced RBRC values in an expected range consistent with the texture of the samples.

Modified Alex–Behari model for soil moisture as a function of salinity, texture and frequency

Alex and Behari obtained experimental soil moisture data at microwave frequencies and computed emissivity from these. Following this they suggested an empirical model which provides a good agreement up to a soil moisture value of 25%. Taking into consideration the soil texture, the modified Alex–Behari (MAB) model provides agreement with the available data up to 40%. A non-linear relationship between volumetric soil moisture and emissivity is obtained. The dielectric constant shows an increase with volumetric soil moisture. The dielectric properties of the soil are known to depend on soil moisture content along with other factors like salinity, texture and frequency. In the present investigations the experimental dielectric constant of various types of soils was taken in the frequency range (1.4–18.0 GHz) to fit the modified model in the given range of moisture content. The computed data show that the real part of the dielectric constant decreases and imaginary part increases with soil salinity. It is suggested that the proposed model will be of interest to agricultural scientists, and applicable to remote sensing of salt-affected areas.

Influence of Crystallographic Texture on the High Cycle Fatigue of Extruded AZ31 Magnesium Alloy

The influence of crystallographic texture on high cycle fatigue behaviour has been studied using an extruded rectangular profile of the AZ31 (Mg-Al-3wt%-Zn-wt1%) alloy. The fatigue samples, cut at 0, 45 and 90° to the extrusion direction correspond to different initial textures. Besides high cycle fatigue tests, quasi-static tensile and compression tests were performed to assess the tension-compression asymmetries as a function of the initial texture. The micro-mechanisms of fatigue crack initiation were investigated using scanning electron microscopy and electron backscatter diffraction. Differences in the mechanical properties and the endurance limit for the different sample directions are related to the initial texture and, subsequently, the easiness or difficulty of slip/twinning.