Pin-on-disc tribometers are used by the academia to study friction and wear of disc brake materials. It has been debated if a simplified set-up could reproduce the friction and wear behaviour of the disc brake assembly. The aim of this paper is to investigate and discuss this topic by comparing the friction surfaces with diverse microscopy techniques. Also, coefficients of friction, wear, and coll

To limit global warming to 1.5°C, fossil fuel use must rapidly decline, but historical precedents for such large-scale transitions are lacking. Here we identify 147 historical episodes and policy pledges of fossil fuel decline in 105 countries and global regions between 1960 and 2018. We analyze 43 cases in larger systems most relevant to climate scenarios. One-half of 1.5°C-compatible scenarios e

An comprovisation on the concrete/visual poem "Meditation no. 1" by Emmett Williams.

Background: Circulating soluble urokinase plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR) is a marker of inflammation with prognostic value for elevated risk of morbidity and mortality. It has not yet been shown how the inflammatory process induced by cardiac surgery affects suPAR concentrations postoperatively Methods: In a prospective observational study, plasma suPAR levels were measured in 30 patients

We consider distributed control of double-integrator networks, where agents are subject to stochastic disturbances. We study performance of such networks in terms of coherence, defined through an H2 norm metric that represents the variance of nodal state fluctuations. Specifically, we address known performance limitations of the standard consensus protocol, which cause this variance to scale unbou

We reexamine anomaly free U(1) extensions of the standard model in the light of LHC Drell-Yan data, constraints from unitarity, and neutrino-electron scattering to put model-independent bounds in the parameter space populated by MZ′, the Z- Z′ mixing angle (αz ), and the extra U(1) effective gauge coupling (gx′ ). We propose a formalism where any model dependence is absorbed into these three param

Background: Breast-reduction techniques are increasingly used in oncoplastic breast surgery. Bilateral therapeutic mammoplasty has the benefit of decreasing breast volume, enabling resection of larger tumors, and the potential to assure good postoperative symmetry. The aims of this study were to objectively asses the cosmetic outcomes of therapeutic mammoplasty in patients with breast cancer, usin

This paper examined the effects of a blogging centered curriculum on the development of Internet self-efficacy of students taking a general education class. The class used a hybrid model (in class and online) that both integrated and strongly encouraged blogging on a community style, open source blog. The curriculum was designed to both create a more distributed educational structure and to develo

It has been commonly assumed that post-adolescent youth have fewer political discussions with parents than do adolescents, due to transitional events in young adulthood and the emergence of new age-appropriate socializing agents, like peers, colleagues, and romantic partners. We proposed a contrasting view that post-adolescent youth have more frequent political discussions with parents due to thei

How parents and adolescents perceive each other’s life values is a key to understanding successful value transmission. In the value socializations literature, it has been proposed that parents’ values become internalized when children correctly perceive their parents’ values and decide to adopt them as their own. In the current study, we propose that interpersonal value perception of broader life

An alternative surgical technique with closure of the uterine artery at its origin, known as lateral approach prior to TLH, has been proposed and it may offer important benefits to both patients and surgeons. Our objectives were to review the current literature regarding surgical outcomes between lateral and conventional approach in relation to TLH. We followed the ‘PRISMA’ guidelines and conducte

We consider frequency control of synchronous generator networks and study transient performance under both primary and secondary frequency control. We model random step changes in power loads and evaluate performance in terms of expected deviations from a synchronous frequency over the synchronization transient; what can be thought of as lack of frequency coherence. We compare a standard droop con

AimsPatients with advanced heart failure (AdHF) who are ineligible for heart transplantation (HTx) can become candidates for treatment with a left ventricular assist device (LVAD) in some countries, but not others. This reflects the lack of a systematic analysis of the usefulness of LVAD systems in this context, and of their benefits, limitations and cost-effectiveness. The SWEdish evaluation of l

Critical infrastructures (CIs) and the services they provide are imperative for the functioning of societies. CI safety and security have historically been addressed and regulated on a sectoral basis, despite their interdependent nature. These silo-structures potentially hinder achieving resilience from a system-of-systems governance perspective. Cross-sectoral initiatives addressing interdependen

The role played by the Internet in young people’s political lives has received great research attention. However, two gaps in the literature hinder the drawing of conclusions on how online political participation is related to its offline counterpart. First, although there are multiple hypotheses on the nature of the relationship, they have not been compared in any single study. Second, although t