Background: The presence of a wedge filter in the beam trajectory can modify the beam quality and cause some changes in the dosimetry parameters which are usually difficult to be measured directly and accurately. Material and Methods: In this study the MCNP-4C Monte Carlo code was used to simulate the 9 MV photon beam generated by a linear accelerator. Upon getting a good agreement bet...

Background: Physical wedges are still widely used as beam modifiers in external beam radiotherapy. However the presence of them in the beam trace may cause beam hardening which may not be considered in many treatment planning systems. The aim of this study is to investigate the beam hardening effect generated by physical wedges via different beam quality indexes as photon spectrum, half value l...

Bignonia comprises 29 species of lianas characterized by eight phloem wedges, leaves usually 2-foliolate, mostly simple tendrils and opaque seed wings. The analysis of herbarium specimens in preparation for a taxonomic revision of the genus led to the recognition of two new species: (i) Bignonia cararensis from Costa Rica, characterized by a thyrse with lateral compound dichasia and lack of int...

Traditional methods of correcting malunited distal humeral fractures in children involve complex wedge osteotomies held with pins or internal fixation devices. These require a large exposure and challenging fixation. We elected to perform simple transverse osteotomies, without wedges, using a lateral incision. These were maintained by the small AO external fixator. Between 1987 and 2004, five c...

This paper proposes a simple method for guiding researchers in developing quantitative models of economic fluctuations. We show that a large class of models, including models with various frictions, are equivalent to a prototype growth model with time varying wedges that, at least on face value, look like time-varying productivity, labor taxes, and capital income taxes. We label the time varyin...

We obtain lower bounds in the algebraic computation tree model for deciding the separability of two disjoint point sets. In particular, we show Ω(n log n) time lower bounds for separability by means of strips, wedges, wedges with apices on a given line, fixed-slopes double wedges, and triangles, which match the complexity of the existing algorithms, and therefore prove their optimality.

In this paper we quantitatively investigate the boom and the bust of the Japanese economy during 1980–2000 using the business cycle accounting technique. This method helps us identify the distortion margins called ''wedges'' that played a significant role in accounting for the output fluctuations. Applying our model to Japan, we find that efficiency and investment wedges can almost wholly accou...