A TEM study on the microstructure of spark plasma sintered ZrB_2-based composite with nano-sized SiC dopant

Sintering behavior of ZrB_2 ceramic with nano-sized SiC dopant was studied. ZrB_2-25 vol% nano-sized SiC was selected as the starting mixture to fabricate the composite. The manufacturing process was accomplished at 1800℃ for 5 min under 25 MPa via spark plasma sintering(SPS). The as-sintered sample reached a relative density of 99%. Besides the initial phases, namely ZrB_2 and SiC, the high-resolution X-ray diffraction(HRXRD) was used to study the formation of an in-situ ZrC phase. The possible chemical interactions during the ZrC phase formation were scrutinized. The microstructure of the composite was studied by the field emission scanning electron microscopy(FESEM) and transmission electron microscopy(TEM). Elemental analysis through FESEM evaluations revealed the formation of amorphous phases, rich in Zr, C, Si, B, and O elements, which was in harmony with the thermodynamical assessments. TEM studies endorsed the formation of such phases, containing a glassy bed of Si–B–O with ZrC and C islands dispersed therein.     

Forecasting economic indicators using a consumer sentiment index: Survey‐based versus text‐based data

Given the confirmed effectiveness of the survey‐based consumer sentiment index (CSI) as a leading indicator of real economic conditions, the CSI is actively used in making policy judgments and decisions in many countries. However, although the CSI offers qualitative information for presenting current conditions and predicting a household's future economic activity, the survey‐based method has several limitations. In this context, we extracted sentiment information from online economic news articles and demonstrated that the Korean cases are a good illustration of applying a text mining technique when generating a CSI using sentiment analysis. By applying a simple sentiment analysis based on the lexicon approach, this paper confirmed that news articles can be an effective source for generating an economic indicator in Korea. Even though cross‐national comparative research results are suited better than national‐level data to generalize and verify the method used in this study, international comparisons are quite challenging to draw due to the necessary linguistic preprocessing. We hope to encourage further cross‐national comparative research to apply the approach proposed in this study.     

Robustness of alternative non‐linearity tests for SETAR models

In recent years there has been a growing interest in exploiting potential forecast gains from the non‐linear structure of self‐exciting threshold autoregressive (SETAR) models. Statistical tests have been proposed in the literature to help analysts check for the presence of SETAR‐type non‐linearities in an observed time series. It is important to study the power and robustness properties of these tests since erroneous test results might lead to misspecified prediction problems. In this paper we investigate the robustness properties of several commonly used non‐linearity tests. Both the robustness with respect to outlying observations and the robustness with respect to model specification are considered. The power comparison of these testing procedures is carried out using Monte Carlo simulation. The results indicate that all of the existing tests are not robust to outliers and model misspecification. Finally, an empirical application applies the statistical tests to stock market returns of the four little dragons (Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan) in East Asia. The non‐linearity tests fail to provide consistent conclusions most of the time. The results in this article stress the need for a more robust test for SETAR‐type non‐linearity in time series analysis and forecasting. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Population-based resequencing of ANGPTL4 uncovers variations that reduce triglycerides and increase HDL

Resequencing genes provides the opportunity to assess the full spectrum of variants that influence complex traits. Here we report the first application of resequencing to a large population (n = 3,551) to examine the role of the adipokine ANGPTL4 in lipid metabolism. Nonsynonymous variants in ANGPTL4 were more prevalent in individuals with triglyceride levels in the lowest quartile than in individuals with levels in the highest quartile (P = 0.016). One variant (E40K), present in approximately 3% of European Americans, was associated with significantly lower plasma levels of triglyceride and higher levels of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol in European Americans from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study and in Danes from the Copenhagen City Heart Study. The ratio of nonsynonymous to synonymous variants was higher in European Americans than in African Americans (4:1 versus 1.3:1), suggesting population-specific relaxation of purifying selection. Thus, resequencing of ANGPTL4 in a multiethnic population allowed analysis of the phenotypic effects of both rare and common variants while taking advantage of genetic variation arising from ethnic differences in population history.     

Stepwise replication identifies a low-producing lymphotoxin-alpha allele as a major risk factor for early-onset leprosy

Host genetics has an important role in leprosy, and variants in the shared promoter region of PARK2 and PACRG were the first major susceptibility factors identified by positional cloning. Here we report the linkage disequilibrium mapping of the second linkage peak of our previous genome-wide scan, located close to the HLA complex. In both a Vietnamese familial sample and an Indian case-control sample, the low-producing lymphotoxin-alpha (LTA)+80 A allele was significantly associated with an increase in leprosy risk (P = 0.007 and P = 0.01, respectively). Analysis of an additional case-control sample from Brazil and an additional familial sample from Vietnam showed that the LTA+80 effect was much stronger in young individuals. In the combined sample of 298 Vietnamese familial trios, the odds ratio of leprosy for LTA+80 AA/AC versus CC subjects was 2.11 (P = 0.000024), which increased to 5.63 (P = 0.0000004) in the subsample of 121 trios of affected individuals diagnosed before 16 years of age. In addition to identifying LTA as a major gene associated with early-onset leprosy, our study highlights the critical role of case- and population-specific factors in the dissection of susceptibility variants in complex diseases.     

Non-Minimum Phase Nonlinear System Predictive Control Based on Local Recurrent Neural Networks

Abstract: After a recursive multi-step-ahead predictor for nonlinear systems based on local recurrent neural networks isintroduced, an intelligent PID controller is adopted to correct the errors including identified model errors and accumulatederrors produced in the recursive process. Characterized by predictive control, this method can achieve a good controlaccuracy and has good robustness. A simulation study shows that this control algorithm is very effective.     

Variation in FTO contributes to childhood obesity and severe adult obesity

We identified a set of SNPs in the first intron of the FTO (fat mass and obesity associated) gene on chromosome 16q12.2 that is consistently strongly associated with early-onset and severe obesity in both adults and children of European ancestry with an experiment-wise P value of 1.67 x 10(-26) in 2,900 affected individuals and 5,100 controls. The at-risk haplotype yields a proportion of attributable risk of 22% for common obesity. We conclude that FTO contributes to human obesity and hence may be a target for subsequent functional analyses.