Moving least squares material point method (MLS-MPM) is a new method to allow for sharp separation of particles and to reduce the cell-crossing error in the material point method simulations. This paper uses MLS-MPM method to numerically simulate the trapdoor test and soil arching, a phenomenon which plays a vital role in the design of many geotechnical structures, such as pile-supported embankments, buried pipelines, tunnels, and trench excavations. Large deformation of soil is considered during the plastic phase of deformation. Non-associated Mohr-Coulomb plasticity is enhanced to capture strain hardening/softening typically seen in granular soils. The proposed method is validated against centrifuge trapdoor tests. The numerical stress fields agree with the formation of triangular shaped arch after medium relative displacements and mobilization of a prism of soil after large relative displacements of the trapdoor. It is shown that using MLS-MPM, the arching behavior of soil can be described in detail throughout the trapdoor test.

Background: The Multiwave Locked System (MLS) has been shown to reduce inflammation and enhance biostimulation. Objectives: The aim was to investigate the effect of using MLS laser in reducing pain severity in patients with chronic back pain. Methods: This randomized double-blind study was conducted on 30 patients (15 in each group) with chronic low back pain (LBP) who were referred to Imam Khomeini Hospital and diagnosed by a physical medicine specialist based on diagnostic criteria. The intervention group was treated with MLS multiple wave laser, performed 12 times, with patients receiving laser treatment twice a week. The control group was treated with exercise therapy. Pain intensity was evaluated using the Visual Analog Scale (VAS) before treatment and 6 weeks after treatment. Pain was analyzed before and after the intervention, both within and between groups. Results: Of the 30 evaluated patients, the mean and standard deviation of age (P = 0.392) and gender (P = 0.666) were not statistically significant between the two groups. The VAS value before treatment in the intervention and control groups was 7.66 ± 1.11 and 7.73 ± 1.16, respectively (P = 0.794). After treatment, the VAS values in the MLS and control groups were 5.60 ± 1.35 and 7.73 ± 1.16, respectively. Statistical evaluation showed a statistically significant difference between the two groups (P = 0.001), and the total change in VAS values was significant (P = 0.001). Conclusions: Multiwave Locked System laser can reduce the pain severity of chronic LBP, with the reduction rate in the intervention group being significantly higher than in the exercise group.

This paper proposes a novel hybrid conjugate gradient method for nonparametric statistical inference.The proposed method is a convex combination of the modified linear search (MLS) and Fletcher-Reeves (FR) methods, and it inherits the advantages of both methods. The FR method is known for its fast convergence, while the MLS method is known for its robustness to NOISE. The proposed method combines these advantages to achieve both fast convergence and robustness to NOISE. Our method is evaluated on a variety of nonparametric statistical problems, including kernel density estimation, regression, and classification. The results show that the new method outperforms the MLS and FR methods in terms of both accuracy and efficiency.

Introduction: Cochlear dead zones are defined as areas where the inner hair cells have been destroyed.Thresholds on the audiograms show the integrity of those parts of the ear that are tested. Care must be taken in interpretating audiograms. Thanks to the advances in understanding of cochlear functions, it is now possible to spot false responses that come from dead zones of the cochlea. Recently, cochlear dead regions have been detected via TEN (Threshold Equalizing NOISE) test in which ipsilateral broadband NOISE and threshold shifting are used.Materials and Methods: A review of the literature on the subject of dead zones published from 1993 to 2003 was performed using Pubmed, Ebsco, Science Direct, Google Scholar Thieme ProQuest databases and library sources. key word: were "cochlear dead zone", "traveling wave", "ten (threshold equalizing NOISE) test", "ipsilateral NOISE" and "real-ear measurement for hearing aids prescription".Conclusion: Hearing aids fitting process for patients with severe and sloping sensory neural hearing loss must be noted specially by amplifying active zone and avoiding amplification for dead region i.e., offering amplification to the transition frequencies that have better hearing than others, those among the fine regions and the dead zones. Dead zone detection may help in hearing aids fitting and fine tuning.

In this paper, a new method for extending and relaxing the NOISE-coupling (NC) technique is proposed to enhance the NOISE-shaping order without adding the number of integrators. The NOISE-shaping order of the introduced ∑∆ modulator whit applying a second-order NOISE-coupling technique is enhanced and its performance with optimizing the NOISE transfer function (NTF) zeros is improved. Also, by removing the analog adder at feedforward path and transferring it to a new feedback branch before the last integrator and adding second-order NC path can be decreased the input voltage swing to the quantizer. Thus, by improving the modulator resolution, power consumption can be reduced. Mathematical analyses and behavioural simulation results confirm the effectiveness of the new NC method. To examine its performance, a 2nd-order single loop ΣΔ modulator was designed. The new NOISE-coupling method is used to achieve the three-order NOISE shaping to increase the resolution with low complexity and low-power. The results show an outstanding improvement in signal-to-NOISE and distortion ratio (SNDR) compared to the conventional structure.

One of the main difficulties in the development of meshless methods using the Moving Least Squares approximation, such as Mixed Discrete Least Squares Meshless (MDLSM) method, is the imposition of the essential boundary conditions. In this paper the RPIM shape function, which satisfies the properties of the Kronecker delta condition, is employed in the Mixed Discrete Least Squares Meshless (MDLSM)method for solving the elasticity problems. Accordingly, two new MDLSM formulation is proposed in this article namely RPIM-based MDLSM and coupled MLS-RPIM MDLSM formulation. The essential boundary conditions can be imposed directly in both presented methods. The proposed methods are used for the solution of three benchmark elasticity problems and the results are presented and compared with the available analytical solutions and those of MLS-based MDLSM formulation. In addition, in each example different types of nodal distributions, regular and irregular configurations, are considered to test the performance of the presented methods. The numerical tests indicates higher accuracy of the suggested approaches in comparison with the MLS-based MDLSM method.

The smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) and moving particle semi-implicit (MPS) are well-known and efficient mesh-less numerical methods widely used to investigate a wide range of complicated practical engineering problems. Recently, two modified Laplacian models [1, 2] have been proposed by using different efficient mathematical techniques, and the analogy between SPH and MPS methods. These two models exhibit significantly superior precision in comparison with several existing modified schemes [3-9] but still suffer from lower accuracy near calculation domain boundaries as they work with the conventional weight or interpolation functions. In this paper, the models were reformulated and further improved by replacing the weight functions with well-known moving least squares (MLS) shape functions without requiring dummy calculation nodes beyond boundaries. The proposed Laplacian models in this study could achieve very accurate results compared with the existing models [1, 2] for the solution of four different two-dimensional Poisson equations on irregular node distributions.

Multi-layer steel (MLS) cylinder head gaskets (CHG) are widely used to seal the engine cylinder head. Therefore, the interaction between the engine cylinder head, cylinder block and the cylinder head gasket is very important from technical point of view. To avoid the escaping gas from the engine affecting the overall performance of the engine during operation, both the pre-stressing force of the bolts as well as the gasket design are critical factors in enhancing the efficiency of the sealing of the gasket.In this paper the finite element method (FEM) is used to investigate the interaction between the cylinder head and the cylinder block. Furthermore the distribution of the contact pressure on the gasket and the cylinder head and the cylinder block stresses at different condition, such as cold assembly, hot assembly, cold start, firing, engine cooling down to 20o(c) and -25°(c) are calculated. The validation is performed using Fuji paper test and thermal survey test. The results revealed that the sealing pressure on the gasket strongly depends on the pre-stressing force of the bolts. However, the location of minimum contact pressure on the gasket is changed by considering the thermal loading.

Modified Normalized Least Mean Square (MNLMS) algorithm, which is a sign form of NLMS based on set-membership (SM) theory in the class of optimal bounding ellipsoid (OBE) algorithms, requires a priori knowledge of error bounds that is unknown in most applications. In a special but popular case of measurement NOISE, a simple algorithm has been proposed. With some simulation examples the performance of algorithm is compared with MNLMS.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: NOISE-induced hearing loss remains as the most common problem in industrial societies. This research was conducted to study NOISE-induced hearing loss by distortion-product otoacoustic emissions (DPOAEs).METHODS: This study was carried out on 12 male New Zealand White rabbits including control (exposed to NOISE) and experimental (exposed to 95 dBA SPL white NOISE at 500-8000 Hz for 8 hours per day during 5 consecutive days). DPOAEs were measured and compared in days zero (before exposure as baseline), eighth (experimental: an hour after latest exposure to NOISE for Temporary Threshold Shifts: TTS), tenth (experimental: 48 hours after latest exposure to NOISE for Permanent Threshold Shifts: PTSs).FINDINGS: The most and the least values of TTSs, PTSs and DPOAEs amplitude in NOISE group were correspond to frequencies of 5888.50 Hz and 588.00 Hz, respectively (p<0.05). There was a significant difference between TTSs, PTSs and DPOAEs amplitude at different frequencies in right and left ear of NOISE group (p<0.05). This difference was related to frequency 5888.5 Hz in each of right and left ear of NOISE group compared to other frequencies in same ear (p<0.05). There were not any significant difference between TTSs, PTSs and DPOAEs amplitude of right and left ear of NOISE group at different frequencies (p>0.05).CONCLUSION: Excessive NOISE can cause TTSs and NOISE-induced PTSs and decreased DPOAEs amplitudes. Therefore, DPOAEs can be attributed as a useful tool for study of NOISE-induced hearing loss.