Time-dependent strength and fatigue resistance of dental direct restorative materials

Elastic modulus (EM), initial fracture strength (FS) and flexural fatigue limit (FFL) of dental restorative materials were measured in a simulated oral environment to correlate mechanical response under the influence of water with the chemical nature of the test materials under investigation. One resin composite (RC; Tetric Ceram, Ivoclar-Vivadent Corp., Liechtenstein), an ion-leaching resin composite (ILRC; Ariston pHc, Ivoclar-Vivadent Corp., Liechtenstein) a compomer (CO; Dyract AP, Dentsply Corp., USA) and a glass-ionomer cement (GIC; Ketac Molar, 3MEspe Corp., Germany) were tested. Static EM, FS and dynamic FFL experiments were performed. The FFL was determined under cyclic loading for 10(5) cycles in terms of a staircase approach. The materials were stored for 1, 8, 30, 90 and 180 days in 37 degrees C distilled water, respectively. The RC degraded over time due to water adsorption followed by failure within the resin matrix. The ILRC suffered from a pronounced decrease in FS as well as in FFL due to a constant ion-leaching and macroscopic crack growth. CO failed over time due to resin-filler interface cracking. The GIC exhibited improved mechanical performance over time due to a post-hardening mechanism. The results reveal the necessity for substantial preclinical evaluation of direct restorative materials. The material parameters under investigation are capable of predicting clinical performance over time.     

Kryptographie: Von der Geheimwissenschaft zur alltäglichen Nutzanwendung (VI) — Zweck und grundlegende Funktionsweise von Public-Key-Infrastrukturen

Zusammenfassung  Nachdem wir im letzten Artikel die Funktionen einer digitalen Signatur kennen gelernt und den Bedarf an kryptographischen Prüfsummen und Zertifikaten erl?utert haben, wollen wir diesmal auf die Infrastrukturen zur Verwaltung von Schlüsseln bzw. Zertifikaten eingehen: die so genannten Public-Key-Infrastrukturen (PKI). Prof. Dr. Norbert Pohlmann ist Gesch?ftsführender Direktor des Instituts für Internet-Sicherheit der Fachhochschule Gelsenkirchen. Malte Hesse ist Mitarbeiter am Institut für Internet-Sicherheit der Fachhochschule Gelsenkirchen.     

Finance, Policy and Industrial Dynamics—The Rise of Co-productions in the Film Industry

This paper explores the growing phenomenon of international co-productions in the film industry. We argue that the rise of co-productions is part of a wider narrative of financial and institutional innovation shaping industrial organization in the film industry. This narrative centres on film finance as a central risk distribution mechanism, and discusses how changes in film support policy, increased tax competition, the search for finance and an abundance of inflowing capital are increasingly driving industrial dynamics in the film industry.     

Melting and crystallization of UHMWPE skived film

Commercial skived film from ultra-high molecular-weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) with considerable uniaxial orientation of lamellae is studied by ultra-small-angle X-ray scattering (USAXS) and wide-angle X-ray scattering (WAXS) during melting and crystallization in order to identify its mechanisms of crystallization. For the analysis of the nanostructure two-dimensional USAXS patterns are analyzed by means of the multidimensional chord distribution function (CDF) method. WAXS shows that crystallization is always isotropic and fast. WAXS reflections are observed before—under certain processing conditions—the SAXS pattern becomes anisotropic. Thus crystallization is decoupled from a slower process of oriented nanostructure formation (nanoforming). If nanoforming is performed isothermally at 105 °C, the evolving nanodomain layers obtain some preferential orientation, as long as the orientation of the melt has not previously been erased by melt-annealing at temperatures of 140 °C or above. Crystallization at temperatures ≥110 °C followed by quenching leads to isotropic nanostructure. Although crystallization is always observed early in the WAXS patterns, the USAXS patterns exhibit only weak discrete scattering during isothermal treatment at temperatures of 110 °C and higher. At 105 °C anisotropic isothermal nanoforming starts after 1.5 min. The melting of the original material resembles an inverted random car-parking mechanism. Only next-neighbor correlations are observed among the crystalline layers. The average nanodomain layer thickness is only slightly increasing (26–30 nm), whereas the long period increase is strong (from 60 nm to 140 nm).     

Using Boolean factors for the construction of an artificial neural networks

ABSTRACT

We propose a novel approach to define Artificial Neural Network(ANN) architecture from Boolean factors. ANNs are a subfield of machine learning applicable to several areas of life. However, defining its architecture for solving a given problem is not formalized and remains an open research problem. Since it is difficult to look into the network and figure out exactly what it has learnt, the complexity of such a technique makes its interpretation more tedious. We propose in this paper to build feedforward ANNs using the optimal factors obtained from the Boolean context representing a data. Since optimal factors completely cover the data and therefore give an explanation to these data, We could give an interpretation to the neurons activation and justify the presence of a neuron in our proposed neural network. We show through experiments and comparisons on the use data sets that this approach provides relatively better results for some key performance measures.     

Performance evaluation of ambient services by combining robotic frameworks and a smart environment platform

Mobile robots and smart environments are two areas of research that can easily profit from each other. Smart environments, which are spaces unobtrusively equipped with sensors and actuators, providing ambient services to the people living within. Mobile robots inside those smart environments can use the existing infrastructure to increase their performance while decreasing the cost of local sensor systems. On the other side, evaluation of ambient services is often a laborious task. This work presents an approach that simplifies the evaluation by making use of two frameworks from robotics to perform tests in simulated smart environments. A method based on the language as action principle is used to extract realistic behavior of people living in real-world smart environments. Using this data, many different scenarios with varying configurations (different floor layouts, numbers and types of sensors, different number of people and pets) can easily be simulated and the performance of the ambient services evaluated.     

RLQ and fourth-corner analysis of plant species traits and spectral indices derived from HyMap and CHRIS-PROBA imagery

Databases on plant traits as well as the availability of global coverage of high spatial and spectral resolution remote-sensing data are constantly growing. However, little effort has been made to analyse the relationship between plant traits and remote-sensing data while simultaneously taking species identity and abundance into consideration. We correlated quantitative and qualitative plant traits from a dwarf shrub savanna in Namibia, with spectral indices derived from two hyperspectral sensors, HyMap and the Compact High Resolution Imaging Spectrometer Project for On-Board Autonomy (CHRIS-PROBA), which differ in their spatial and spectral resolution. We used RLQ analysis and the fourth-corner statistic, which are two three-table ordination approaches that circumvent the so-called fourth-corner problem. A higher spatial resolution helped to identify trait–index correlations linked to vegetation structure, while a lower spatial resolution pointed at traits linked to vegetation cover. A higher spectral resolution did not improve the relationships between spectral indices and plant traits. However, continuous hyperspectral signatures allowed for the calculation of spectral indices that make use of the detailed spectra allowing for more sophisticated spectral indices. We propose RLQ and the fourth-corner statistic as suitable tools for the remote sensing and Earth observation community that allow the direct correlation of trait databases with remotely sensed information.     

Reduced myofibroblast differentiation on femtosecond laser treated 316LS stainless steel

In-stent restenosis is a common complication after stent surgery which leads to a dangerous wall narrowing of a blood vessel. Laser assisted patterning is one of the effective methods to modify the stent surface to control cell–surface interactions which play a major role in the restenosis. In this current study, 316LS stainless steel substrates are structured by focusing a femtosecond laser beam down to a spot size of 50 μm. By altering the laser induced spot density three distinct surfaces (low density (LD), medium density (MD) and high density (HD)) were prepared. While such surfaces are composed of primary microstructures, due to fast melting and re-solidification by ultra-short laser pulses, nanofeatures are also observed as secondary structures. Following a detailed surface characterization (chemical and physical properties of the surface), we used a well-established co-culture assay of human microvascular endothelial cells and human fibroblasts to check the cell compatibility of the prepared surfaces. The surfaces were analyzed in terms of cell adherence, proliferation, cell morphology and the differentiation of the fibroblast into the myofibroblast, which is a process indicating a general fibrotic shift within a certain tissue. It is observed that myofibroblast proliferation decreases significantly on laser treated samples in comparison to non-treated ones. On the other hand endothelial cell proliferation is not affected by the surface topography which is composed of micro- and nanostructures. Such surfaces may be used to modify stent surfaces for prevention or at least reduction of restenosis.     

Ideales Internet-Frühwarnsystem

Wie müsste ein ideales und globales Internet-Frühwarnsystem aussehen? Der Beitrag stellt ein Modell für ein Frühwarnsystem vor und führt aus, welche Komponenten dafür ben?tigt werden und warum eine Frühwarnung nur durch kollaborative Ans?tze und eine Vielzahl von Systemen funktionieren kann. Anschlie?end werden einige aktuelle Forschungsvorarbeiten im Bereich Internet-Frühwarnung skizziert.