Highway agencies continuously strive to expedite pavement construction and repairs and to evaluate materials and methods to provide long-lasting pavements. As part of this effort, agencies have used precast concrete slabs for more than 10 years with successive improvements in processes and systems. The Virginia Department of Transportation recently used two precast systems along with conventional cast-in-place repairs on a section of jointed reinforced concrete pavement on I-66 near Washington, D.C. One precast system, precast concrete pavement (PCP), used doweled joints. The other precast system, prestressed precast concrete pavement (PPCP), used transversely prestressed slabs post-tensioned in the longitudinal direction. Both precast systems are performing satisfactorily after 1.5 years of traffic, and the contractor was satisfied with the constructability. In multiple locations, transverse expansion joints in PPCP were observed to be wider than the 12-in width specified; excessively wide joints often compromise joint sealant performance, and erosion from water flowing through such joints may result in eventual loss of support over time. There were a few cracks in the PPCP section, originating mainly from grouting holes, cracks in the block-out patches, cracks and loss of epoxy at lifting hook holes, and corner breaks. There were some mid-slab cracks in the PCP slabs immediately after opening to traffic, but they are still tight and stable after 1.5 years of traffic. Even though the precast slabs initially cost more than the cast-in-place repairs to construct, the ability to construct the pavement within a short period of lane closure per day and the probability of improved quality control of plant-cast concrete warrant their use. Since this was the first application in Virginia, certain issues occurred and most were overcome, such as matching of slabs and grout leakage. The project was successfully completed and further implementation is recommended.

关键词：路面；预制系统；混凝土；质量控制

查看摘要 索取原文[84页]

In October 2011, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released the report Cognitive Rehabilitation Therapy for Traumatic Brain Injury: Evaluating the Evidence, assessing the published evidence for the effectiveness of using cognitive rehabilitation therapy (CRT) to treat people with traumatic brain injury (TBI). TBI has gained increasing attention in the past 15 years because of its status as the signature wound of American military conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Growing numbers of U.S. service members are suffering traumatic brain injuries and are surviving them, given that (a) the majority of traumatic brain injuries are mild and (b) lifesaving measures for more severe injuries have significantly improved. People with any level of injury can require ongoing health care in their recovery, helping them to regain (or compensate for) their losses of function and supporting their full integration into their social structure and an improved quality of life.

关键词：治疗技术；康复治疗(CRT)；创伤性脑损伤(TBI)

查看摘要 索取原文[70页]

The U.S. military is currently fitting amputees with state-of-the- art prosthetic devices. In addition to walking and changing direction on a variety of surfaces, amputees must be able to manage uneven terrain, crowded environments, stairs, ramps, and hills. The largest problem for a lower extremity amputee is falls. Among individuals with a lower extremity amputation, 52reported having fallen in the previous 12 months, 49reported being fearful of falling, and 65had low balance confidence scores. Falling history and balance confidence are associated with reduced mobility capability and social activity. As a result, lower extremity amputees with limited balance and stability are at risk for diminished quality of life. The goal of this research effort is to rehabilitate lower extremity amputees to reduce falls using a novel training method. In this first year of the research effort, we have developed a novel experimental method to induce unexpected trips to amputees under controlled laboratory conditions. We have identified objective biomechanical variables that are causally related to the success or failure in avoiding a fall after a trip, objective tests to quantify functional outcomes, and a subject-specific questionnaire to determine if the training method is effective. Enrollment has begun. Our target is to deliver a quantitatively derived, deployment-ready, advanced gait rehabilitation system that can improve functional outcomes and/or shorten the time required for injured servicemen and women to return to active duty or to a productive civilian life.

关键词：康复计划；截肢；艺术假肢设备

查看摘要 索取原文[6页]

Multiple Target Tracking (MTT) is the problem of identifying and estimating the state of an unknown, time-varying number of targets. A successful algorithm will identify how many unique targets have existed, at what times they were active, and what sequence of states they followed when active. This work presents two novel algorithms for MTT, Particle Markov Chain Monte Carlo Data Association (PMCMCDA) and Particle Filter Data Association (PFDA). These algorithms consider MTT in a Bayesian Framework and seek to approximate the posterior distribution over track states, data associations, and model parameters by combining Markov Chain Monte Carlo and Particle Filtering to perform approximate inference. Both algorithms are evaluated experimentally on two pedagogical examples, and proofs of convergence in the limit of in nite samples are given.

关键词：多目标跟踪；识别；评估；算法

查看摘要 索取原文[81页]

This dissertation describes using program analysis to document and debug modern open sourcesystems software. We address three problems: documenting configuration, debugging configurationerrors, and improving logger configuration.Thanks to the Cloud, developers today often have access to dozens or hundreds of nodes.Managing this hardware requires a large software stack. Often, this software is open-source andcommunity developed. As a result of this development model and the complexities of distributedresource management, modern software systems can have dozens or even hundreds of configurableoptions. The open source development process makes it easy for developers to add options and easyfor documentation to become stale. We offer a static analysis to identify the options present in agiven program and to infer types for them. Our analysis is often more precise than the existinghuman-written documentation.

关键词：程序分析；现代开源程序

查看摘要 索取原文[122页]

Wireless networks are experiencing an explosive growth in the number of users and the demandfor data capacity. One of the methods to improve capacity is to use tighter cooperationbetween terminals. In order to design a cooperative wireless link, several theoretical as wellas practical challenges need to be addressed. In this dissertation we develop tools for thedesign of practical cooperative links that perform very close to fundamental limits.

关键词：无线网络；无线连接合作

查看摘要 索取原文[120页]

Tamoxifen, the first targeted therapy, has shown great success in treating estrogen receptor (ER) positive breast cancer. However, both acquired and de novo resistance to this therapy prevents it from being effective in all situations. Multiple lines of evidence indicate that increased signaling through growth factor pathways, such as the IGF pathway, mediates resistance to tamoxifen. The link between ER and ICGF1R leads us to hypothesize that IGF system crosstalk with the ER contributes to tamoxifen resistance. Tamoxifen resistance has thus provided researchers with a reason to investigate other growth factor pathways involved in breast cancer. As new targeted therapies are being developed, it will be important to examine their benefit with existing therapies. In order to examine the effectiveness of anti-IGF1R inhibitors in vitro, tamoxifen resistant (TamR) cells were generated by culturing MCF-7L and T47D cells in the presence of 4-OH-tamoxifen for >6 months. TamR cells had dimished levels of IGF1R, with unchanged levels of insulin receptor (IR). Further, TamR cells failed to respond to IGF-I induced p-AKT activation, while retaining responsiveness to both insulin and IGF-II. Additionally, IGF-I failed to enhance the proliferation and anchorage-independent growth of TamR cells; however, both insulin and IGF-II were able to enhance proliferation in MCF anchorage-independent growth. An IGF1R antibody was effective in inhibiting signaling, anchorage-independent growth, and proliferation in MCF-7L cells, but had no effect in TamR cells. In contract, an IGF1R/TR tyrosine kinase inhibitor was effective in both MCF-7L and TamR cells. In a xenograft model, an IGF1R antibody was able to inhibit estrogen stimulated tumor growth, but had no additive effect when combined with tamoxifen treatment. Further, tamoxifen-treated xenografts had diminished IGF1R levels.

关键词：治疗计划；雌激素受体；乳腺癌

查看摘要 索取原文[33页]

Smartphone operating systems expose a wide range of functions and user data to third-party applications. However,past research on mobile privacy has focused exclusively onthe risks pertaining to sharing location. To expand the scope of smartphone security and privacy research, we surveyed3,115 smartphone users about 99 risks associated with 54smartphone privileges. We asked participants to rate howupset they would be if a given risk occurred. Based on thisdata, we ranked risks by the number of users who stated thatthey would be very upset" if the risks occurred. We thenperformed an open ended survey of 41 smartphone users, which let respondents discuss the risks in their own words.The follow-up study con rmed that people nd the lowestranked risks merely annoying but might seek legal or nancial retribution for the highest-ranked risks. Our rankingcould be used to guide the severity or selection of warningson smartphone platforms. Notably, our results show that location is not a high-ranked user concern.

关键词：智能手机；用户调查；智能手机操作系统；智能手机安全和隐私

查看摘要 索取原文[8页]

Although the combination of radiation therapy and androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) is initially effective in many patients, biochemical failure rates of 20at 5-years to 50at 10-years have been reported, highlighting the need for improved treatments, particularly for men with high- risk prostate cancer. ADT in the neo-adjuvant setting is used to reduce tumor volume and improve the response to radiation. Additionally, ADT causes infiltration of lymphocytes into the prostate. B cell infiltrates may promote prostate cancer progression and development of castration resistant prostate cancer by the production of inflammatory cytokines and skewing CD4+ T cell responses towards Th2. We hypothesized that depletion of B cells at the time of castration would improve tumor control. Our results demonstrate that the depletion of B cells at the time of castration improves tumor latency.

关键词：治疗技术；前列腺；放疗和雄激素剥夺疗法(ADT)

查看摘要 索取原文[9页]

Recently, there has been a dramatic increase in the popularity of cloud computing systems that rent computing resources on-demand, bill on a pay-as-you-go basis, and multiplex many users on the same physical infrastructure. These cloud computing environments provide an illusion of in nite computing resources to cloud users so that they can increase or decrease their resource consumption rate according to the demands.

关键词：云计算；物理系统；资源分配

查看摘要 索取原文[111页]