Extração de contornos de telhado de edifícios no espaço-objeto baseada em snakes e programação dinâmica a partir de TIN/laser e imagens aéreas de alta resolução

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Refinamento geométrico de contornos e cumeeiras de telhados de edifícios extraídos de dados laser com uso de imagem aérea

In this paper, a method is proposed to refine the LASER 3D roofs geometrically by using a high-resolution aerial image and Markov Random Field (MRF) models. In order to do so, a MRF description for grouping straight lines is developed, assuming that each projected side contour and ridge is topologically correct and that it is only necessary to improve its accuracy. Although the combination of laser data with data from image is most justified for refining roof contour, the structure of ridges can give greater robustness in the topological description of the roof structure. The MRF model is formulated based on relationships (length, proximity, and orientation) between the straight lines extracted from the image and projected polygon and also on retangularity and corner injunctions. The energy function associated with MRF is minimized by the genetic algorithm optimization method, resulting in the grouping of straight lines for each roof object. Finally, each grouping of straight lines is topologically reconstructed based on the topology of the corresponding LASER scanning polygon projected onto the image-space. The results obtained were satisfactory. This method was able to provide polygons roof refined buildings in which most of its contour sides and ridges were geometrically improved.

Vacuum energy as a c-function for theories with dynamically generated masses

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

The effect of offering an energy and protein supplement to grazing canchim beef cows either postpartum or both pre- and postpartum on lipid blood metabolites and folliculogenesis

This study was designed to evaluate the effect of nutritional supplementation offered during the pre- and postpartum periods on serum cholesterol, triglycerides and total lipids of Canchim beef cows and their relationship with folliculogenesis. Thirty cows with predicted calving date between September and October, kept in pastures of Brachiaria brizantha cv. Marandu together with their calves, were randomly distributed into three experimental groups: the first received only a mineral mixture (Control Group, CG); the second group received a concentrate with 16% crude protein/kg dry matter (DM) and 3000 kcal digestible energy/kg DM offered for 45 days prepartum and 120 days postpartum (PREG); the third group received the concentrate from parturition until the 120th day postpartum (POSG). Consumption was estimated at 1% of body weight, and each cow received approximately 4.0 kg/day (fresh weight) of supplement. Blood samples were taken and an ultrasound examination of the ovaries was performed twice a week until the 60th day postpartum. The body condition score (BCS) and the weight of the cows were recorded at 15-day intervals from calving until the 60th day postpartum. Data are presented as mean +/- SEM. Mean weight and BCS at calving were, respectively, 448 +/- 54.9 kg and 6.2 +/- 0.25 (PREG); 432 +/- 71.1 kg and 5.5 +/- 0.69 (POSG); and 434 +/- 66.4 kg and 5.5 +/- 0.69 (CG). Total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TRIG) and total lipids (TLIP) were measured using colorimetry until the 60th day postpartum. TC averages were PREG 186 +/- 62.6 mg/dL, POSG 159 +/- 43.1 mg/dL and CG 133 +/- 35.1 mg/dL (P < 0.05). For TRIG, the means were PREG 29 +/- 11.3 mg/dL (P < 0.05), POSG 24 +/- 8.1 mg/dL and CG 26 +/- 12.1 mg/dL (P > 0.05). Serum concentrations of TLIP were PREG 588 +/- 145.6 mg/dL, POSG 512 +/- 137.6 mg/dL and CG 452 +/- 122.4 mg/dL (P < 0.05). The first dominant follicle (DF) was identified on Day 21 +/- 10.3 (PREG), 36 +/- 28.5 (POSG) and 51 +/- 32.8 (CG) after calving. The difference between PREG and CG was significant (P < 0.05). TC was positively correlated with the calving to first estrus interval (P < 0.05). Results showed that nutritional supplementation before parturition assured good body condition at calving and suggested that it was effective at increasing cholesterol availability to maintain ovarian follicle function and to favor earlier resumption of ovarian activity. (C) 2010 Published by Elsevier B.V.

The amount of solar energy made available for the production of a sabia (Mimosa caesalpinaefolia Benth.) seed has a determinating effect on its becoming dormant

The amount of solar energy made available for the production of a sabid seed varied as a function of the time of the year, the face of the plant in which, the position in the plant on which and the position in the pod in which it was produced.Variation in solar energy availability as a consequence of the time of the year was a direct consequence of latitude. At 21degrees5'22 S the highest amounts of Global Solar Radiation (GSR) reaching the site where the experiment was conducted took place during the months from November through February. During these months there were no marked differences between any two of the amounts of GSR reaching faces North (N), South (S), West (W) East (E). From February through November (period during which the sabid plants of this study flowered and the resulting seeds matured and were harvested) the total GSR's were the lowest and marked differences were found between faces N and S, with face N receiving much more GSR than face S. During that period, faces W and E received practically the same amount of GSR and it was much less than that received by face N and much more than the one received by face S.The amount of biological energy made available for the development of a seed seemed also to vary according to a dry matter partitioning strategy by the plant -the central third of the plant seemed to be the one receiving the highest amounts of energy, followed either by the upper or the lower third of the plant- it was not very clear which third of the plant immediately followed the central one. The partitioning of biological energy at the pod level also seemed to follow a strategy by which the central seeds would be the ones to receive more, followed by the proximal seeds and these by the distal ones.This availability of energy seemed to have a direct effect on seed size, weight and on the percentage of seeds which showed a degree of dormancy deep enough to prevent their germinating under the conditions of a standard germination test.The implications of these results for the improvement of methods for the overcoming of dormancy of sabia seeds are discussed.

Combined Pool/Bilateral Short-Term Hydrothermal Scheduling Model for Day-Ahead Energy Markets

This paper proposes a combined pool/bilateral short term hydrothermal scheduling model (PDC) for the context of the day-ahead energy markets. Some innovative aspects are introduced in the model, such as: i) the hydraulic generation is optimized through the opportunity cost function proposed; ii) there is no decoupling between physical and commercial dispatches, as is the case today in Brazil; iii) interrelationships between pool and bilateral markets are represented through a single optimization problem; iv) risk exposures related to future deficits are intrinsically mitigated; v) the model calculates spot prices in an hourly basis and the results show a coherent correlation between hydrological conditions and calculated prices. The proposed PDC model is solved by a primal-dual interior point method and is evaluated by simulations involving a test system. The results are focused on sensitivity analyses involving the parameters of the model, in such a way to emphasize its main modeling aspects. The results show that the proposed PDC provides a conceptual means for short term price formation for hydrothermal systems.

Analysis of the accumulated energy by thermal stratification of liquid inside storage tanks with porous layers

A mathematical model was developed in order to study the behavior of thermal stratification of liquid in a typical storage tank with porous medium. The model employs a transient stream function-vorticity formulation to predict the development of stream function and temperature fields in a charging process. Parameters analyzed include Biot, Darcy, Reynolds and Richardson numbers, position, and the thickness of the porous medium. The results show the influence of these physical parameters that should be considered for a good design of storage tanks with thermal stratification.

Pole placement method using the system matrix transfer function and sparsity

This paper presents a pole placement method using both the augmented Jacobian and the corresponding system transfer function matrices. From the manipulation of these matrices a straightforward approach results to get the coefficients of a non-linear system, whose solution gives the parameters of the stabilizers that can provide a pre-specified minimum damping to the system. (C) 2001 Elsevier B.V. Ltd. All rights reserved.

Orientation dependence of stored energy of cold work in semi-processed electrical steels after temper rolling

Microhardness measurements were carried out in a low carbon lamination steel after 6% of temper rolling, in order to evaluate local variations of work hardening as a function of crystallographic orientation. EBSD (electron back scattered diffraction) was used to determine grain orientations with respect to individual rolling planes and rolling directions. Hardness was shown to increase with the local Taylor factor. TEM observations and a well-known dislocation hardening model were used to confirm the equivalence between hardness values and the stored energy of cold work. A definite correlation between stored energy and Taylor factors could therefore be established, being more consistent than previous data reported in the literature. The improvement was thought to be related to the rather small plastic deformation, during which Taylor factors could be considered to remain constant. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Effects of adding polyclonal antibody preparations on ruminal fermentation patterns and digestibility of cows fed different energy sources

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Metabolizable energy and oil intake in brown commercial layers

With the objective to establish the best metabolizable energy (ME) intake for layers, and the best dietary vegetable oil addition level to optimize egg production, an experiment was carried out with 432 30-week-old Hisex Brown layers. Birds were distributed into nine treatments with six replicates of eight birds each according to a 3 × 3 factorial arrangement, consisting of three daily metabolizable energy intake (280, 300 or 320 kcal/bird/day) and three oil levels (0.00; 0.75 and 1.50 g/bird/day). Daily feed intake was limited to 115, 110 and 105 g/bird in order to obtain the desired energy and oil intake in each treatment. The following parameters were evaluated: initial weight, final weight, body weight change, egg production, egg mass, feed conversion ratio per dozen eggs and per egg mass and energy conversion. There was no influence of the treatments on egg production (%) or egg mass (g/bird/day). Final weight and body weight change were significantly affected by increasing energy intake. Feed conversion ratio per egg mass, feed conversion ratio per dozen eggs and energy conversion significantly worsened as a function of the increase in daily energy intake. An energy intake of 280 kcal/bird/day with no addition of dietary oil does not affect layer performance.

Strand Analysis, a free online program for the computational identification of the best RNA interference (RNAi) targets based on Gibbs free energy

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Consequences of dark matter-dark energy interaction on cosmological parameters derived from type Ia supernova data

Models where the dark matter component of the Universe interacts with the dark energy field have been proposed as a solution to the cosmic coincidence problem, since in the attractor regime both dark energy and dark matter scale in the same way. In these models the mass of the cold dark matter particles is a function of the dark energy field responsible for the present acceleration of the Universe, and different scenarios can be parametrized by how the mass of the cold dark matter particles evolves with time. In this article we study the impact of a constant coupling delta between dark energy and dark matter on the determination of a redshift dependent dark energy equation of state w(DE)(z) and on the dark matter density today from SNIa data. We derive an analytical expression for the luminosity distance in this case. In particular, we show that the presence of such a coupling increases the tension between the cosmic microwave background data from the analysis of the shift parameter in models with constant w(DE) and SNIa data for realistic values of the present dark matter density fraction. Thus, an independent measurement of the present dark matter density can place constraints on models with interacting dark energy.

Structure formation in the presence of dark energy perturbations

We study non-linear structure formation in the presence of dark energy. The influence of dark energy on the growth of large-scale cosmological structures is exerted both through its background effect on the expansion rate, and through its perturbations. In order to compute the rate of formation of massive objects we employ the spherical collapse formalism, which we generalize to include fluids with pressure. We show that the resulting non-linear evolution equations are identical to the ones obtained in the pseudo-Newtonian approach to cosmological perturbations, in the regime where an equation of state serves to describe both the background pressure relative to density, and the pressure perturbations relative to the density perturbations. We then consider a wide range of constant and time-dependent equations of state (including phantom models) parametrized in a standard way, and study their impact on the non-linear growth of structure. The main effect is the formation of dark energy structure associated with the dark matter halo: non-phantom equations of state induce the formation of a dark energy halo, damping the growth of structures; phantom models, on the other hand, generate dark energy voids, enhancing structure growth. Finally, we employ the Press-Schechter formalism to compute how dark energy affects the number of massive objects as a function of redshift (number counts).