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In this paper, scanning electron microscope (SEM) tests and 3D scanning technologies were adopted to investigate the creep failure mechanism of sandy mudstone from a micromesoscopic view. The SEM test results showed that the fracture surface micromorphology of the specimens that suffered creep loading was more fractured and rougher. It was also found by the fractal analysis of the SEM microscopic images that the fractal dimensions of the creep failure specimens were larger than those of the uniaxial compression failure, indicating that the creep damage increased the irregularity and a larger degree of roughness fluctuation. The 3D scanning technologies combining with the 3D reconstruction methods proved that the crack expansion path of crept specimens was more complicated, showing a more prominent asperity height and slope angle. Finally, a mesostrain dilating microelement model of the sandy mudstone specimen's fracture surface was proposed to prove that the dilatancy effect would be more pronounced in the creep process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose. To explore the potential of monocyte-to-lymphocyte ratio (MLR) at hospital admission for predicting acute traumatic intraparenchymal hematoma (tICH) expansion in patients with cerebral contusion. Patients and Methods. This multicenter, observational study included patients with available at-hospital admission (baseline) and follow-up computed tomography for volumetric analysis (retrospective development cohort: 1146 patients; prospective validation cohort: 207 patients). Semiautomated software assessed tICH expansion (defined as ≥33% or 5 mL absolute growth). MLR was acquired from routine blood tests upon admission. We constructed two predictive models: basic combined model of clinical and imaging variables and MLR combined model of both MLR and other variables in the basic model. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis and decision curve analysis (DCA) were used to estimate the performance of MLR for predicting acute tICH expansion. Results. MLR was significantly larger in patients with acute tICH expansion compared to those without acute tICH expansion (mean [SD], 1.08 [1.05] vs. 0.59 [0.37], P < 0.001). A nonlinear positive relationship between MLR and the incidence of acute tICH expansion was observed. Multivariate logistic regression indicated MLR as an independent risk factor for acute tICH expansion (odds ratio (OR), 5.88; 95% confidence interval (CI), 4.02-8.61). The power of the multivariate model for predicting acute tICH expansion was substantially improved with the inclusion of MLR (AUC 0.86 vs. AUC 0.74, P < 0.001), as was also observed in an external validation cohort (AUC 0.83 vs. AUC 0.71, P < 0.001). The net benefit of MLR model was higher between threshold probabilities of 20-100% in DCA. For clinical application, a nomogram derived from the multivariate model with MLR was introduced. In addition, MLR was positively associated with 6-month unfavorable outcome. Conclusion. MLR is a novel predictor for traumatic parenchymatous hematoma expansion. A nomogram derived from the MLR model may provide an easy-to-use tool for predicting acute tICH expansion and promoting the individualized treatment of patients with hemorrhagic cerebral contusion. MLR is associated with long-term outcome after cerebral contusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The employed energy management strategy plays an important role in energy saving performance and exhausted emission reduction of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). An application of dynamic programming for optimization of power allocation is implemented in this paper with certain driving cycle and a limited driving range. Considering the DP algorithm can barely be used in real-time control because of its huge computational task and the dependence on a priori driving cycle, several online useful control rules are established based on the offline optimization results of DP. With the above efforts, an online energy management strategy is proposed finally. The presented energy management strategy concerns the prolongation of all-electric driving range as well as the energy saving performance. A simulation study is deployed to evaluate the control performance of the proposed energy management approach. All-electric range of the plug-in HEV can be prolonged by up to 2.86% for a certain driving condition. The energy saving performance is relative to the driving distance. The presented energy management strategy brings a little higher energy cost when driving distance is short, but for a long driving distance, it can reduce the energy consumption by up to 5.77% compared to the traditional CD-CS strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]