This study investigated how acute alcohol intake affects contrast processing mediated by inferred magnocellular (MC) and parvocellular (PC) pathways. Achromatic contrast discrimination thresholds were measured in 16 young healthy participants using a steady-pedestal, pulsed-pedestal or pedestal-Δ-pedestal paradigm designed to favor the inferred MC or the PC pathway. Each participant completed t...

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to find a strength training protocol which maintains isometric contraction of the triceps surae during dorsal flexion of the ankle. [Subjects] The left feet of 22 young normal volunteers who did not have orthopedic injuries or lower limb pain participated in this study. [Methods] All subjects performed four sets of five repetitions of four sets calf-raise...

A novel, wideband, symmetrical, printed directional coupler is described, which has tight coupling and high directivity. The coupler consists of four interconnected strips printed in two layers. The dimensions of the strips are optimized to minimize the dispersion of propagating modes. Design data are provided for some typical practical cases. The theoretical results are verified experimentally...

A relativistic plasma shutter technique is proposed and tested to remove the sub-100 ps pedestal of a high-intensity laser pulse. The shutter is an ultrathin foil placed before the target of interest. As the leading edge of the laser ionizes the shutter material it will expand into a relativistically underdense plasma allowing for the peak pulse to propagate through while rejecting the low inte...

The pedestal (prepulse and postpulse) associated with a chirped-pulse-amplification (CPA) laser is studied. Four components have been identified that contribute to the pedestal. Pulses are spectrally shaped by gain narrowing in a frequency-matched, regenerative amplifier, while self-phase modulation is avoided. The intensity contrast is further improved through the use of a saturable absorber, ...

Single-crystal rare-earth doped YAG fiber lasers grown by the laser-heated pedestal growth technique Report Title High concentrations of the rare-earth elements erbium, holmium and thulium have been successfully doped into single crystal (SC) yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG, Y3Al5O12) fibers by use of the laser heated pedestal growth (LHPG) method. The spontaneous emission spectra and fluorescence...

We demonstrate almost chirpand pedestal-free optical pulse compression in a nonlinear fiber Bragg grating with exponentially decreasing dispersion. The exponential dispersion profile can be well-approximated by a few gratings with different constant dispersions. The required number of sections is proportional to the compression ratio, but inversely proportional to the initial chirp value. We pr...

Quasi-periodic Pedestal Burst Instabilities (PBIs), featuring alternative turbulence suppression and bursts, have been clearly identified by various edge diagnostics during I-mode to H-mode transition in the EAST Tokamak. The radial distribution of phase perturbation caused PBI shows that is localized pedestal. Prior each PBI, a significant increase density gradient close pedestal top can be di...