Influence of Drying Conditions on Volatile Compounds of Pasta

The effect of drying temperatures on the profile of volatile compounds of pasta was studied. The solid phase microextraction coupled with gas chromatography/mass spectrometry allowed to identify 72 volatile compounds in the samples of not-dried, low-temperature-dried (LT-dried), high-temperature-dried (HT-dried), and wrongly very-high-temperature-dried (WVHT-dried) pastas. The samples of not-dried pasta contained alcohols, aldehydes, short-chain ketones, esters, furans, and some sulfur compounds. In the LT-dried pasta, the volatile aldehydes derived from lipid oxidation were more abundant than in HT-dried pasta. HT-dried pasta showed higher levels of furan and furan derivatives (especially 2-furanmethanol), derived from the Maillard reaction, than LT-dried pasta (p?<?0.05). Pyrazines arose from WVHT treatment. Significant differences were observed also for the color indices when comparing pasta subjected to LT and HT drying (p?<?0.001). Several volatile Maillard reaction products were significantly correlated (p?<?0.05 and p?<?0.01) to a* and 100???L*. The ratio aldehydes/furans allowed distinguishing in a significant way the treatments, independently from the lot characteristics.     

Exploiting Machine Learning for the Identification of Locomotives’ Position in Large Freight Trains

ABSTRACT

Accurate identification of locomotives’ position in large freight trains is important due to maintenance and management aspects. Current solutions employ RFIDs, image cameras or GPS, while the first two are expensive, the third is not an off-the-shelf hardware for all locomotives. In this paper we investigate a data driven solution to automatically identify locomotives’ position in large freight trains. We take into account off-the-shelf hardware alone (that gather instant fuel consumption) seeking for a less expensive solution. We evaluate different machine learning approaches and algorithms and different inputs attributes, achieving significant results.     

Liposome Destabilization by a 2,7‐Diazapyrenium Derivative Through Formation of Transient Pores in the Lipid Bilayer

The effect of the luminescent heteroaromatic electron acceptor N,N′‐dimethyl‐2,7‐diazapyrenium dichloride (DM‐DAP²⁺) on the stability of 1‐palmitoyl‐2‐oleoylphosphatydilcholine (POPC) liposomes is determined on the basis of the rate of release of different fluorescent probes entrapped within the liposome. The experiments show that DM‐DAP²⁺ exerts a substantial destabilizing action on the liposomal bilayer, particularly at low concentrations. Molecular dynamics simulations suggest that the activity of DM‐DAP²⁺ is related to its tendency to surround itself with water molecules, conceivably favoring the formation of transient pores across the bilayer.     

The detection of malingered pain-related disability with the Personality Assessment Inventory.

Objective: This study presents and evaluates a method to detect malingered pain-related disability (MPRD) using the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI), a multiscale self-report instrument with a number of useful applications in pain assessment. Method: In this study PAI scores from respondents in a chronic pain clinic (N = 317) and college students instructed to feign chronic pain (N = 152) were compared. Results: Although existing PAI validity indicators demonstrated strong effects in discriminating actual pain and MPRD cases, these indicators were not sufficiently sensitive to feigned pain to recommend for clinical practice. A discriminant function was developed and cross-validated, which improved upon the sensitivity of the other indicators and yielded an overall hit rate of 88% for detecting individuals instructed to malinger pain-related disability. Conclusion: These data suggest that this new PAI indicator holds some promise for more effective detection of MPRD. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Chemical composition and antioxidant activities of Myrtus communis L. berries extracts

Myrtle (Myrtus communis L.) berries extracts were prepared with solvents at different polarity (water, ethanol, and ethyl acetate) and analysed using different in vitro tests in order to evaluate their antioxidant properties. Antiradical and total antioxidant activities were measured with DPPH and FRAP tests, respectively. Their ability to protect biological molecules was assessed using the cholesterol and LDL oxidation assays. In addition, phenolic compounds and unsaturated fatty acids composition was analysed by HPLC–DAD and HPLC–MS/MS. Ethanol and water extracts showed the highest amount of extracted compounds, but the highest antiradical and antioxidant activities were found in ethanol and ethyl acetate extracts. These extracts were also the ones with the highest content of phenolic compounds. In addition, our results showed a highly significant correlation between the amount of total phenols and antiradical (R² = 0.9993) or antioxidant activities (R² = 0.9985) in these extracts. HPLC–DAD and HPLC–MS analyses showed significant quantitative and qualitative differences among these three extracts. The ethyl acetate extract had the highest protective effect in assays of thermal (140 °C) cholesterol degradation and Cu²⁺-mediated LDL oxidation, inhibiting the reduction of polyunsaturated fatty acids and cholesterol, and the increase of their oxidative products. These results suggest that because of these properties, myrtle berries could be used in dietary supplements preparations or as food additives.     

Exploring the feasibility of volatile desorption studies by means of a quartz crystal microbalance with an integrated micro-heater

In this work the ability to perform desorption studies by using a micro-thermogravimetric device is demonstrated. The instrument consists of an oscillating quartz crystal microbalance with an integrated micro-heater that might turn out to be extremely useful in the study of the desorption of volatile compounds from refractory materials. The experiment here discussed has been performed by studying the release of adsorbed water from clay.Clay has been principally chosen because it is a material known for its ability to desorb and subsequently re-adsorb water at low temperatures and it might be considered a test mineral for a large number of applications, from first guess analysis of agricultural soil to quick inspection of materials of planetological interest (e.g., asteroid regolith).Results show that the device can be in stable operative conditions at 100 °C with 0.5 W of power supplied, allowing to measure the amount of desorbed water. In particular, as expected, it has been possible to assess that the desorbed water amount depends upon the working temperature, being less than 3 wt.% at 70 °C and about 5 wt.% at 90 °C.     

Numerical Investigation of a Variable Damping Semiactive Device for the Mitigation of the Seismic Response of Adjacent Structures

Abstract:   When two structures in close proximity and with different properties (heights, structural systems, materials) are subjected to a strong seismic ground motion there is the possibility that pounding between them may occur. The large impact loads induced by this phenomenon usually lead to catastrophic results. One way to overcome this effect is to couple the structures through elastic or damping elements. This article examines the use of a new variable damping device as a coupling element. The system, which is termed a variable damping semiactive (VDSA) device, consists of two dampers with constant parameters whose lower ends are attached to a common vertical rod whereas the upper ends are attached to the two structures. As the structures vibrate due to the ground motion, the lower end is moved up and down by means of an actuator. By changing the orientation of the dampers, the effective damping in the two structures can be changed in time in an appropriate manner to minimize the response. A new control law is used to calculate the optimal position of the dampers. The algorithm, referred to as Q v , is a variation of the Instantaneous Optimal Control and it is based on the minimization of a performance index J quadratic in the state vector, the control force vector, and a vector of absolute velocities measured at selected points. The algorithm includes a generalized LQR scheme where penalties are imposed on the state vector, on the control vector, and on the absolute velocity vector through three predefined matrices. A numerical simulation is used to verify the performance of the proposed protective system in reducing the seismic response to a series of historic earthquakes. The results show that the proposed device is able not only to eliminate the pounding effects but also to significantly reduce the response of the individual adjacent structures .     

GALPROP WebRun: An internet-based service for calculating galactic cosmic ray propagation and associated photon emissions

GALPROP is a numerical code for calculating the galactic propagation of relativistic charged particles and the diffuse emissions produced during their propagation. The code incorporates as much realistic astrophysical input as possible together with latest theoretical developments and has become a de facto standard in astrophysics of cosmic rays. We present GALPROP WebRun, a service to the scientific community enabling easy use of the freely available GALPROP code via web browsers. In addition, we introduce the latest GALPROP version 54, available through this service.