A Confirmatory Model for Characterizing Social Dimensions of Cigarette Dependence

Chih-Ling Huang,Chih-Yin Chen 한국간호과학회 2009 한국간호과학회 학술대회 Vol.2009 No.10

Application of Smartphone and Cloud Server Technology with Near Infrared Spectroscopy on Sugar Content Measurement

( Pin-chih Fang ),( Suming Chen ),( Chao-yin Tsai ),( Jin-ming Tsai ) 한국농업기계학회 2018 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.23 No.1

Near infrared (NIR) spectroscopy has been widely used in agricultural product inspection because it is non-destructive, fast, and easy to operate. In this research, portable near infrared light detection instrument was used to develop a smartphone interface that could analyze the sugar content of agricultural products via the cloud system. Using the android operating system smartphone as an intermediary software to control the spectrometer configuration, spectra data are transferred and calculated in the cloud system. The user interface would then display the predicted result. So far, an intermediary software has been developed that could transfer spectra data to the cloud server, and a pre-trained guavas calibration equation was used to predict the sugar content of guava. The entire process of scanning, calculating and transferring data takes approximately 10 seconds. In the future, the functionality of the user interface could be improved by allowing manipulation of data configuration during scanning, creating a more diversified user interface with faster analysis time.

Study on a Wireless Environmental Monitoring System for Duck Incubator

( Rou-yan Peng ),( Suming Chen ),( Kuang-wen Hsieh ),( Chao-yin Tsai ),( Chih-hsiang Hsu ),( Jin-ming Tsai ) 한국농업기계학회 2018 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.23 No.1

Taiwan's domestic development of incubators are in simple structure, at low prices, and generally used by the industry. However, high number of regional dead eggs, the inability to understand the environmental conditions of incubator and other issues occurred frequently, resulting in operation and production difficulties. This research developed a wireless environmental monitoring system to collect data and upload to the cloud. A variety of environmental sensors and Raspberry Pi 3 were used in the establishment of wireless sensing module and environmental information detection platform. The environmental information was displayed in real-time and uploaded to the cloud. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was also used to simulate the internal flow field inside the incubator to determine the environmental control features, and control heating and humidification equipment with a PID controller. In this study, the establishment of wireless environmental monitoring system was completed. The wireless sensing module and the environment information detection platform have also been developed and tested. The stability of wireless sensing module was 98.5%, and the CFD simulation error was under 20%, which was low enough to predict the actual field temperature changes, and can be applied to the regulation of the incubator environment.

Impact Deformation Behavior of Duplex and Superaustenitic Stainless Steels Welds by Split Hopkinson Pressure Bar

Shing-Hoa Wang,Chih-Sheng Huang,Woei-Shyan Lee,Tao-Hsing Chen,Chia-Chang Wu,Hung-Yin Tsai,Charles Lien 대한금속·재료학회 2009 METALS AND MATERIALS International Vol.15 No.6

A considerable volume of γ phase increases in the fusion zone (weld metal) for two duplex stainless steels after a high-strain-rate impact. The strain-induced γ phase formation in the fusion zone results in local hardness variation depending on the strain rate. The α phase content in the fusion zone decreases as the impact strain rate increases for SAF 2205 DSS and SAF 2507 DSS. The results of the two-phase content measured by Ferritoscope correspond to that assessed by image analyses. In contrast, superaustenite stainless steel is unaffected by such an impact owing to its fully stable austenization. Impacted welds at a high strain rate of 5 × 10 3 s−1 reveal feather-like surface creases along the solidified curved columnar grain boundaries. The apparent surface creases are formed due to the presence of diffuse Lüders bands, which are caused by heavy plastic deformation in coarse-grain materials. A considerable volume of γ phase increases in the fusion zone (weld metal) for two duplex stainless steels after a high-strain-rate impact. The strain-induced γ phase formation in the fusion zone results in local hardness variation depending on the strain rate. The α phase content in the fusion zone decreases as the impact strain rate increases for SAF 2205 DSS and SAF 2507 DSS. The results of the two-phase content measured by Ferritoscope correspond to that assessed by image analyses. In contrast, superaustenite stainless steel is unaffected by such an impact owing to its fully stable austenization. Impacted welds at a high strain rate of 5 × 10 3 s−1 reveal feather-like surface creases along the solidified curved columnar grain boundaries. The apparent surface creases are formed due to the presence of diffuse Lüders bands, which are caused by heavy plastic deformation in coarse-grain materials.

The Robotic Arm Velocity Planning Based on Reinforcement Learning

Hao-Hsuan Huang,Chih‑Kai Cheng,Yi‑Hung Chen,Hung‑Yin Tsai 한국정밀공학회 2023 International Journal of Precision Engineering and Vol.24 No.9

In order to improve the performance of the robotic arm effectively, this study established a robotic arm velocity planning model developed by artificial intelligence in the simulation system. The model not only considered the dynamic factors of the robotic arm but was also able to set different customized conditions such as machining accuracy and rotation angle. The study could be divided into three parts. First, the simulation environment was constructed with the ABB IRB140 six axes multipurpose industrial robot. To be consistent with real-world situations, a Vortex physics engine was applied to the simulation supplying varying locomotion parameters. In this research, friction, kinematics, and inertia were considered. Second, artificial intelligence was imported into the robotic arm through the establishment of connecting V-rep and Python. The proposed model was developed in the Python environment by deep deterministic policy gradients. Eventually, a design of the appropriate reward function governing the ultimate results was presented. Compared with traditional velocity planning, the proposed method can decline moving error by 0.05 degrees under the considerations involving dynamic factors in a robotic arm. Besides, the proposed velocity planning strategy could be obtained after taking the training time of one hour which can meet the demand for the time cost of the industry.

The Evaluation of Drying Qualities of Tea Dryers in Taiwan

( Cheng-hou Chang ),( Suming Chen ),( Chao-yin Tsai ),( Kuo-chih Tung ) 한국농업기계학회 2018 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.23 No.1

Tea drying is a necessary process of tea manufacturing to prevent deterioration, stabilize the tea quality, and to facilitate packaging and storage. Therefore, the tea dryer is an essential equipment for the tea industry; and the tea drying quality is an index to evaluate tea dryers. In this study, four types of tea dryers were used to conduct tea leaves drying experiments. Four tests of sensory evaluation, color analysis, soluble ingredients analysis and chemical composition analysis were used to evaluate the drying quality of the tea dryers. The experiment results showed that the vacuum roller dryer (VRD) in the overall tea drying qualities had a better evaluation, the next were low-humidity dryer (LHD) and multiple-layer conveyer dryer (MLD), the electric hot air dryer (HAD) was worst among all tea dryers. The comprehensive evaluation of tea drying qualities were investigated using area analysis of radar chart which were VRD (2.38) > LHD (2.15) > MLD(2.12) > HAD(2.06). Therefore, the vacuum drying with moderate stirring could improve qualities of tea drying. Based on the results of this study, tea farmers or makers can choose the proper dryer, and tea equipment manufacturers can improve and enhance the performance of tea dryers

Development of a Sorting System for Inspection of Mushroom Mycelium Growth

( Vivian Liao ),( Suming Chen ),( Chao-yin Tsai ),( Kuang-wen Hsieh ),( Kuo-chih Tung ) 한국농업기계학회 2018 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.23 No.1

Mushroom cultivation is one of the important industries in Taiwan's agriculture. In current mushroom cultivation process, which includes spawn production, substrate preparation & bottling, inoculation, spawning, scratching, fruiting, harvest and packing, required a large amount of labor. In this research, the improvement in fault inspection for spawn level and bacterial infection before scratching process was conducted. The aim of this research is to establish an inspection system using machine vision, pneumatic mechanism and Programmable Logic Controller (PLC). First, an experiment-used small lighting chamber was made to study the image processing method, which can get the development (expansion) of self-made simulated samples from its side view image. The accuracy to recognize the fault in self-made simulated samples is up to 99.9%. In real cultivation bottle samples fault inspection, it spent for about 10 seconds and can get well recognition. A prototype of sorting system has also been established to conduct the inspecting process and remove bottles with fault conditions of spawn level and bacterial infection.

Prediction of Sugar and Acidity Contents in Pineapple using Near Infrared Spectroscopy

( Bo-an Shang Kuan ),( Suming Chen ),( Chao-yin Tsai ),( Chih-hsiang Hsu ),( Ha-chun Hsu ),( Yung-huei Chang ) 한국농업기계학회 2018 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.23 No.1

Pineapples are not only nutritious, but also have significant economic importance in Taiwan. Traditional technique used to determine the fruit’s quality is by hitting the fruit with palm. However, such method requires experience and is highly dependent on the condition of the fruit. More importantly, decisions made are often subjective. This research used near infrared spectroscopy to develop a fast and non-destructive method to measure the quality of pineapples. Tai-Nung No. 17 pineapple was used in this research to construct the calibration equation. During the experiments, pineapple samples are separated into three sections: top, middle, and bottom. Optical measurements are taken around each section in 90 degree increments, with a total of 131 samples. A multivariate model was then established by mathematical pre-treatments and modified partial least squared regression. Results showed strong correlation between constituents and optical spectrum, with a coefficient of determination r_c²=0.78,r_p²=0.747,SEP=1.142°Brix,RPD=1.803. Future experiment aims to increase the predictability of spectrum model by enhancing experimental methods, increasing sample size as well as minimizing experimental error.

Magnolol induces apoptosis via caspase-independent pathways in non-small cell lung cancer cells

Tsai, Jong-Rung,Chong, Inn-Wen,Chen, Yung-Hsiang,Hwang, Jhi-Jhu,Yin, Wei-Hsian,Chen, Hsiu-Lin,Chou, Shah-Hwa,Chiu, Chien-Chih,Liu, Po-Len 대한약학회 2014 Archives of Pharmacal Research Vol.37 No.4

Magnolol, a hydroxylated biphenyl agent isolated from herbal planet Magnolia officinalis, is a component of traditional Asian herbal teas. It has been reported to have anti-microbial, anti-inflammatory, and anti-cancer activity. Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cell lines (A549, H441 and H520) and normal human bronchial epithelial cells (HBECs) were used to evaluate the cytotoxic effect of magnolol. We show that magnolol inhibited cellular proliferation, increased DNA fragmentation, and decreased mitochondrial membrane potential in all NSCLC cells, but had no cytotoxic effect on HBECs. Magnolol triggered the release of pro-apoptotic proteins: Bid, Bax and cytochrome c from mitochondria, but did not activate the caspase-3, -8, and -9, suggesting that magnolol induces apoptosis of NSCLC cell lines via a caspase-independent pathway. The caspase-independent pathway is mediated through the activation of nuclear translocation of apoptosis-inducing factor, endonuclease G and cleaved poly(-ADP-ribose) polymerase, which played important roles in mediating cell death. Furthermore, magnolol inhibited PI3K/AKT and ERK1/2 activity, but up-regulated p38 and JNK activity in A549 cell lines. The results of this study provided a basis for understanding and developing magnolol as a novel treatment of NSCLC.

Clinical Outcomes and Cost-Effectiveness of Osteoporosis Screening With Dual-Energy X-ray Absorptiometry

Hsu Chiao-Lin,Wu Pin-Chieh,Yin Chun-Hao,Chen Chung-Hwan,Lee King-Teh,Lin Chih-Lung,Shi Hon-Yi 대한영상의학회 2023 Korean Journal of Radiology Vol.24 No.12

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the clinical outcomes and cost-effectiveness of dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) for osteoporosis screening. Materials and Methods: Eligible patients who had and had not undergone DXA screening were identified from among those aged 50 years or older at Kaohsiung Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan. Age, sex, screening year (index year), and Charlson comorbidity index of the DXA and non-DXA groups were matched using inverse probability of treatment weighting (IPTW) for propensity score analysis. For cost-effectiveness analysis, a societal perspective, 1-year cycle length, 20-year time horizon, and discount rate of 2% per year for both effectiveness and costs were adopted in the incremental cost-effectiveness (ICER) model. Results: The outcome analysis included 10337 patients (female:male, 63.8%:36.2%) who were screened for osteoporosis in southern Taiwan between January 1, 2012, and December 31, 2021. The DXA group had significantly better outcomes than the non-DXA group in terms of fragility fractures (7.6% vs. 12.5%, P < 0.001) and mortality (0.6% vs. 4.3%, P < 0.001). The DXA screening strategy gained an ICER of US$ -2794 per quality-adjusted life year (QALY) relative to the non-DXA at the willingness-to-pay threshold of US$ 33004 (Taiwan’s per capita gross domestic product). The ICER after stratifying by ages of 50–59, 60–69, 70–79, and ≥ 80 years were US$ -17815, US$ -26862, US$ -28981, and US$ -34816 per QALY, respectively. Conclusion: Using DXA to screen adults aged 50 years or older for osteoporosis resulted in a reduced incidence of fragility fractures, lower mortality rate, and reduced total costs. Screening for osteoporosis is a cost-saving strategy and its effectiveness increases with age. However, caution is needed when generalizing these cost-effectiveness results to all older populations because the study population consisted mainly of women.