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In recent years, there has been a considerable amount of research on visual evoked potential (VEP)-based brain–computer interfaces (BCIs). However, it remains a big challenge to detect VEPs elicited by small visual stimuli. To address this challenge, this study employed a 256-electrode high-density electroencephalogram (EEG) cap with 66 electrodes in the parietal and occipital lobes to record EEG signals. An online BCI system based on code-modulated VEP (C-VEP) was designed and implemented with thirty targets modulated by a time-shifted binary pseudo-random sequence. A task-discriminant component analysis (TDCA) algorithm was employed for feature extraction and classification. The offline and online experiments were designed to assess EEG responses and classification performance for comparison across four different stimulus sizes at visual angles of 0.5°, 1°, 2°, and 3°. By optimizing the data length for each subject in the online experiment, information transfer rates (ITRs) of 126.48 ± 14.14 bits/min, 221.73 ± 15.69 bits/min, 258.39 ± 9.28 bits/min, and 266.40 ± 6.52 bits/min were achieved for 0.5°, 1°, 2°, and 3°, respectively. This study further compared the EEG features and classification performance of the 66-electrode layout from the 256-electrode EEG cap, the 32-electrode layout from the 128-electrode EEG cap, and the 21-electrode layout from the 64-electrode EEG cap, elucidating the pivotal importance of a higher electrode density in enhancing the performance of C-VEP BCI systems using small stimuli. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This experiment aimed to investigate effects of the different dietary levels of vitamin E (VE) on the growth performance, immunity and antioxidant capacity of goslings. A total of 240 1-day-old, male Jiangnan white goslings were selected and randomly divided into 6 groups. Each treatment included five replicates. The basal diet was supplemented with 6 concentrations of VE (0, 12, 24, 36, 48 and 60 mg DL-α-tocopherol acetate/kg). The results were as follows: (1) The α-tocopherol content in the serum and liver of goslings increased linearly as supplemental VE increased in diet (p < 0.05). (2) The body weight (BW) and average daily gain (ADG) increased quadratically with increasing dietary VE supplementation (p < 0.05). Dietary VE supplementation could significantly reduce the feed/gain ratio (F/G) (p < 0.05). (3) Dietary supplementation with VE could significantly improve the contents of immunoglobulin A (IgA) and immunoglobulin G (IgG) in the serum of the goslings (p < 0.05). The content of interferon-γ (IFN-γ) in the serum was significantly reduced with VE supplementation (p < 0.05). (4) Dietary supplementation with VE could significantly improve serum and liver catalase (CAT), superoxide dismutase (SOD) activities and liver total antioxidant capacity (T-AOC) (p < 0.05); Serum and liver MDA contents were significantly reduced with VE supplementation (p < 0.05). In summary, dietary supplementation with VE could improve growth performance, immunity and antioxidant capacity. Based on broken-line regression analysis, the dietary VE supplementation level for ADG was 12.51 mg/kg, but higher supplementation level should be considered to improve immunity and antioxidant capacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: The poultry industry faces challenges such as a shortage of protein feed and increased feed cost. Compared to soybean meal, rapeseed meal (RSM) is a cheaper protein source that can be used in poultry diets. China is both the largest RSM and geese producer in the world. Therefore, the active use of RSM for geese diets can contribute to the development of poultry production. We found that geese had a good adaptation to the diet containing 16% dietary RSM through the investigation. The use of inexpensive nonconventional feed materials, such as rapeseed meal (RSM), could help alleviate the shortage of feed materials in the poultry industry. This study was to investigate the effects of dietary double-low RSM on growth performance, carcass traits, serum parameters, and intestinal development of geese. A total of 270 healthy 35-day-old male Jiangnan White geese were randomly divided into five treatments, with six replicate pens of nine geese each. The geese were fed five isonitrogenous and isocaloric diets containing 0%, 4%, 8%, 12%, and 16% RSM replacing dietary soybean meal for 35 days. At 35, 49, and 70 d, the BW and feed intake were recorded. All Samples were collected at 70 d of age. The results showed that dietary RSM up to 16% did not affect the BW, ADFI, ADG, and feed/gain ratio (F/G) during 35 to 49 d, 49 to 70 d, and 35 to 70 d periods (p > 0.05). At 70 d, no difference was observed in carcass yield or serum biochemical parameters among groups (p > 0.05). Dietary 12% and 16% RSM significantly increased the concentration of serum GH compared with 0%, 4%, 8% groups (p < 0.01), but serum TSH, T3 and T4 were unaffected (p > 0.05). The relative weights of heart, liver, spleen, proventriculus, gizzard, and small intestine were similar among groups (p > 0.05). However, the geese fed dietary 16% RSM had greater bursa of Fabricius than geese in the 8% group (p < 0.05). Intestinal morphology was unaffected by treatments (p > 0.05). According to the findings, dietary RSM up to 16% can be used in geese diets without impact on production performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Silica waveguide planar lightwave circuit (PLC) technology is driving the broad applications of various functional components to meet the increasing demands of the industry due to its advanced performance in large-scale wafer mass production. Despite the intense research interests in understanding and relaxing the stress causing the optical birefringence, not much research has been devoted to investigating the stress distribution. In this article, the thermal stress, growth-caused stress, and structural stress are comparably studied. The birefringence distribution of a 6 μm-thick SiO2 film from the center to the edge on a 6-inch silicon wafer was measured to be 0.0006 to 0.0038, leading to an equivalent stress distribution cross the wafer from −170 to −1000 MPa. This implies that the compressive stress of the thick SiO2 film on the wafer was nonuniformly distributed; however, it gradually increased from the center to the edge. Meanwhile, the measured stress of a SiO2 film decreased with the flow rate of the doped GeH4 gas. The algebraic sum of the above three stresses reached excellent agreement with the measurement results in both distribution form and amplitude. In both research and production, the agreeable optical property distributions between the theoretical calculations and experimental measurements are more sustainable to further improving the yields of SiO2 thick film PLC products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]