BACKGROUND Several methods that are currently used for contouring analysis have problems providing reliable and/or meaningful results. In this paper a solution to these problems is proposed in a form of a novel measure, which was developed based on requirements defined for contouring studies. MATERIALS AND METHODS The proposed distance deviation measure can be understood as an extension of th...

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the influence of air-abrasion and subsequent heat treatment on the shear bond strength of the bond between indirect composites and a zirconia material. Four surface preparations were employed; ground flat, then heated to regenerate the crystal phase (C); air-abraded with alumina for 10 s (S10), for 20 s (S20), and air-abraded for 10 s and heated (H). Di...

We introduce a strategy for the verification of relational specifications based on the analysis of monotonicity of variables within formulas. By comparing with the Alloy Analyzer, we show that for a relevant class of problems this technique outperforms analysis of the same problems using SAT-solvers, while consuming a fraction of the memory SAT-solvers require.

Alloy is a formal modeling language based on first-order relational logic, with no native support for specifying reactive systems. We propose an extension of Alloy to allow the specification of temporal formulas using LTL, and show how they can be verified by bounded model checking with the Alloy Analyzer.

There are errors in the Funding section. The correct funding information is as follows: This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (NNSFC31400091) (http://www.nsfc.gov.cn), Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (BK2012202) (http://www.jstd.gov.cn/), Chinese Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2013M540518) (http://res.chinapostdoctor.org.cn/BshWeb/index.shtml),...

Objective: To evaluate the effect of different metal primers and surface treatment methods on the bond strength of 2 resin cements to yttrium-stabilized tetragonal zirconia (Y-TZP) ceramic material. Methods: 240 cylindrical dentin specimens were cut from extracted human third molars. The same number of zirconia ceramic (Cercon) plates were made and assigned to 24 groups based on combinations of...

inspired multi-objective optimisation algorithm Jun Chena, Mahdi Mahfouf, Gaffour Sidahmed, doi:10.1016/j.engappai.2014.08.014 Highlights • We model mechanical properties of heat treated alloy steel using interpretable fuzzy models. • We demonstrate how to locate the ‘best’ processing parameters and chemical compositions. • We demonstrate how to achieve certain mechanical properties. • We demon...

background: echinocuccus granulosus, the causative agent of cystic echinococcosis has long been recognized as having a high degree of genetic divergence. the strains characterization seems to be essential for the establishment of a preventive and control strategy in every endemic area. using dna based methods for strain /genotype characterizations of e. granulosus have some difficulties, especi...