Sharif Digital Repository

In this paper, we discuss modeling issues of the Parkinson's tremor. Through the work we have employed physiological structure as well as functioning of the parts in brain that are involved in the disease. To obtain more practical similarity, random behaviors of the connection paths are also considered. Medication or treatment of the disease both by drug prescription and electrical signal stimulation are modeled based on the same model introduced for the disease itself. Two new medication strategies are proposed based on the model to reduce the side effects caused by the present drug prescription. © 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved  

Nonlinear ultrasound modeling is finding an increasing number of applications in both medical and industrial areas where due to high pressure amplitudes the effects of nonlinear propagation are no longer negligible. Taking nonlinear effects into account makes the ultrasound beam analysis more accurate in these applications. One of the most widely used nonlinear models for propagation of 3D diffractive sound beams in dissipative media is the KZK (Khokhlov, Kuznetsov, Zabolotskaya) parabolic nonlinear wave equation. Various numerical algorithms have been developed to solve the KZK equation. Generally, these algorithms fall into one of three main categories: frequency domain, time domain and... 

We have investigated the influence of perovskite morphology on slow and fast charge transport in the perovskite solar cells. Solar cells with different perovskite cuboid sizes (50-300 nm) have been fabricated using various methylammonium iodide concentrations. Both the low-frequency capacitance and hysteresis are maximum for the cell with the largest perovskite grains (300 nm). The low-frequency capacitance is about three orders of magnitude greater than the intermediate frequency capacitance, indicating the great role of ions on the slow responses and hysteresis. The measurement of open-circuit voltage decay indicates that for the large grains of 300 nm up to 70% of Voc remains across the... 

Tow-mode theories explain that risky behaviors in young individuals may be the result of competition between an affective system (e.g., Empathizing system) and a deliberative system (e.g., Systemizing system). We aimed to investigate a total of 134 children aged 7-12. years old on scores of risky decision making and empathizing and systemizing measures. The primary analysis indicated that systemizers showed higher sensitivity to punishment than those in balanced or empathizer classes (F (2,130) = 14.8, p < 0.001). Furthermore empathizers indicated higher level of risk taking than balanced and empathizer children (F (2,130) = 5.027, p = 0.005). Providing further support for two-mode theories... 

In dealing with human nervous system, the sensation of pain is as sophisticated as other physiological phenomena. To obtain an acceptable model of the pain, physiology of the pain has been analysed in the present paper. Pain mechanisms are explained in block diagram representation form. Because of the nonlinear interactions existing among different sections in the diagram, artificial neural networks (ANNs) have been exploited. The basic patterns associated with chronic and acute pain have been collected and then used to obtain proper features for training the neural networks. Both static and dynamic representations of the ANNs were used in this regard. The trained networks then were employed... 

Cerebellum has been assumed as an array of adjustable pattern generators (APGs). In recent years, electrophysiological researches have suggested the existence of modular structures in spinal cord called motor primitives. In our proposed model, each "adjustable primitive pattern generator" (APPG) module in the cerebellum is consisted of a large number of parallel APGs, the output of each module being the weighted sum of the outputs of these APGs. Each spinal field is tuned by a coefficient, representing a descending supraspinal command, which is modulated by ith APPG correspondingly. According to this model, motor control can be interpreted in terms of the modification of these coefficients.... 

Background: The typical features of eccentric exercise-induced muscle damage are delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS) and prolonged loss of muscle strength. It has been shown that passive warmth is effective in reducing muscle injury. Due to the interaction of different systems in vivo, we used isolated perfused medial gastrocnemius skeletal muscle to study the direct effect of temperature on the eccentric contraction-induced force loss. Methods: After femoral artery cannulation of a rat, the left medial gastrocnemius muscle was separated and then the entire lower limb was transferred into a prewarmed (35oC) chamber. With the chamber temperature at 31, 35 and 39oC before and during eccentric... 

We report on fabrication of halide perovskite solar cells using a two-step spin-spray coating rout. The applied method is one of the most straight forward procedures for fabricating uniform stoichiometry and crystalline perovskite cells. To fabricate a high quality perovskite layer, various concentrations of methyl-ammonium iodide (CH3NH3I) were sprayed on a spin coated PbI2 layer using a simple airbrush gun. The characterization results indicate that the size of cuboid perovskite morphology depends on the concentration of methylammonium iodide in the spray procedure. The photovoltaic performance of the fabricated solar cells has been measured and a high dependency on the cuboid sizes was... 

In this study isolated perfused rat muscle was used to examine the direct effect of temperature changes on the eccentric contraction-induced force and desmin loss. The left medial gastrocnemius muscle was separated and the entire lower limb was transferred into a prewarmed (35°C) organ bath. Temperature was adjusted to 31 or 39°C before and during eccentric contractions. Maximal isometric force and desmin loss were measured after 15 isometric or eccentric contractions. According to our data, organ bath temperature changes before or during eccentric contractions had no significant effect on force loss. However, a strong correlation between desmin loss and temperature changes before (r = 0.93,... 

Normal human breathing exhibits complex variability in both respiratory rhythm and volume. Analyzing such nonlinear fluctuations may provide clinically relevant information in patients with complex illnesses such as asthma. We compared the cycle-by-cycle fluctuations of inter-breath interval (IBI) and lung volume (LV) among healthy volunteers and patients with various types of asthma. Continuous respiratory datasets were collected from forty agematched men including 10 healthy volunteers, 10 patients with controlled atopic asthma, 10 patients with uncontrolled atopic asthma, and 10 patients with uncontrolled non-atopic asthma during 60 min spontaneous breathing. Complexity of breathing... 

A simple and practical approach is introduced for the deposition of CuI as an inexpensive inorganic hole-transport material (HTM) for the fabrication of low cost perovskite solar cells (PSCs) by gas–solid phase transformation of Cu to CuI. The method provides a uniform and well-controlled CuI layer with large grains and good compactness that prevents the direct connection between the contact electrodes. Solar cells prepared with CuI as the HTM with Au electrodes displays an exceptionally high short-circuit current density of 32 mA cm−2, owing to an interfacial species formed between the perovskite and the Cu resulting in a long wavelength contribution to the incident photon-to-electron... 

Learning a foreign language encompasses a process of trial and error that can lead to the progression of the learner's interlanguage, meaning that the learners make use of their language knowledge that receives feedback and brings about progress through diagnosis of the problems and being corrected by the teacher. Therefore, there exists a need to analyze the underlying reasons causing the students to remain taciturn with a low willingness to communicate (WTC) during a language class. There has been much work done investigating the role of the learner's stable personal characteristics (traits) along with their situational changes at a specific time (states) that influence the student's... 

Accurate system identification (SI) is essential for flight controller design of unmanned aerial vehicles and microaerial vehicles (MAVs). SI can be performed either in frequency or time domain using flight test data. As flight testing is often costly and may even lead to catastrophic events before some flight stability analysis is at hand, a low-cost 5 degree-of-freedom free motion platform (FMP) is designed and used for initial identification of MAVs via wind tunnel testing. A typical MAV is constructed as a test case and equipped with inertial sensors for testing and validation purposes. The proposed FMP allows for both rotational as well as translational motions that in turn provide for... 

Using 3-D scanned data to analyze and extract pore network plays a vital role in investigation of porous media's characteristics. In this paper, a new simple method is developed to detect pores and throats for analyzing the connectivity and permeability of the network. This automated method utilizes some of the common and well-known image processing functions which are widely accessible by researchers and this has led to an easy algorithm implementation. In this method, after polishing and quality control of images, using city-block distance function and watershed segmentation algorithm, pores and throats are detected and 3-D network is produced. This method can also be applied on 2-D images... 

In this paper, we try to recognize and distinguish different groups of arrhythmia using novel features which have been obtained from the heart rate's phase space in recent years. For this purpose, we used Triangular Phase Space Mapping (TPSM) and Parabolic Phase Space Mapping (PPSM). For recognition, we used three groups of 15 subjects using the Physionet database (Arrhythmia, Congestive Heart Failure (CHF), and Atrial Fibrillation (AF)) with Normal Sinus Rhythm (NSR). The obtained features discriminate arrhythmia from NSR by p