Plane (esotericism) | EPFL Graph Search

In esoteric cosmology, a plane is conceived as a subtle state, level, or region of reality, each plane corresponding to some type, kind, or category of being. The concept may be found in religious and esoteric teachings—e.g. Vedanta (Advaita Vedanta), Ayyavazhi, shamanism, Hermeticism, Neoplatonism, Gnosticism, Kashmir Shaivism, Sant Mat/Surat Shabd Yoga, Sufism, Druze, Kabbalah, Theosophy, Anthroposophy, Rosicrucianism (Esoteric Christian), Eckankar, Ascended Master Teachings, etc.—which propound the idea of a whole series of subtle planes or worlds or dimensions which, from a center, interpenetrate themselves and the physical planet in which we live, the solar systems, and all the physical structures of the universe. This interpenetration of planes culminates in the universe itself as a physical structured, dynamic and evolutive expression emanated through a series of steadily denser stages, becoming progressively more material and embodied. The emanation is conceived, according

A sound diffusion system for directional sound enhancement

Baptiste Crettaz, Alexandre Delidais, Alain Dufaux, Xavier Falourd, Hervé Lissek, Patrick Marmaroli, Cédric Monchâtre

A loudspeaker array is described including several circular sound emitters that are bunked. One circular sound emitter can be either a circular array of loudspeakers (kind 1) or a toroidal loudspeaker (kind 2). The loudspeaker array can be composed of circular sound emitters of kind 1, kind 2 or both.A toroidal loudspeaker is a loudspeaker whose membrane is annular and whose enclosure has a central hole. Both toroidal loudspeaker and circular array radiate mainly in their normal axis, i.e., perpendicular to the plane comprising the membrane or the loudspeakers. Circular sound emitters are arranged like an end-fire array so that all the circular sound emitters centers are on the same axis. Each circular sound emitter is driven by its own signal, which results from a filtered version of the input signal, allowing the sound to be focused in the radiation direction.

André Roland S.A.2015

Stress fields for the interaction of in-plane and out-of-plane forces in reinforced concrete shell elements

Marie-Rose Backes

Plane reinforced concrete (RC) elements are used in a large variety of structures. Their principal function is to carry forces that act in the plane of the element, but external actions and connections to other structural elements generally introduce additional out-of-plane forces. In practice, the design of such elements is often performed in a simplified manner, neglecting the interaction between these different internal forces. However, especially for existing structures the need for more precise and kinematically consistent analysis tools arises. This thesis provides novel tools based on the elastic-plastic stress field (EPSF) method to investigate the interaction between in-plane and out-of-plane forces in plane RC elements in general and the effect of transverse bending on the longitudinal shear resistance of beams in particular. A multi-layered (ML) EPSF approach is developed. Applied to a unitary web segment, in-plane shear-transverse bending interaction diagrams are established and compared to existing rigid-plastic (RP) interaction models. In general it is found that the influence on the shear resistance is less pronounced, especially in case of small transverse moments. The shear transfer actions admitted in RP models that consist in a shift of the compression field to the bending compression side and a rearrangement of the stirrup forces are confirmed. However, it is shown that the stress field is highly non-linear in the transverse directions (stress/strain distribution and inclination) and strongly depends on the intensity of the applied transverse moment. The concrete strength reduction factor Î·Îµ is generally higher and high shear reinforcement ratios or asymmetric layouts allow equilibrating small moments without disturbing the stress field in the concrete. This increases the predicted shear resistance. The longitudinal deformation is shown to have a non-negligible effect on the overall interaction and ultimate resistance. A simplified verification method for beams in practice is proposed. Based on the EPSF finite element method (FEM), it considers the influence of the transverse moment by means of a reduced web width and an effective shear reinforcement ratio. Validation with tests from the literature gave safe but not overly conservative results and consistent predictions of the failure modes. The method provides enhanced lower-bound solutions. Plane EPSF analyses of experimental tests suggest that the influence of the transverse bending moment in beams is less pronounced than predicted by interaction models, especially if ductile failure modes occur. But more experimental data is required to validate this observation. A non-linear FEM based on the ML-EPSF is developed. It aims to extend the field of application of the EPSF FEM by accounting for in-plane (normal and shear) and out-of-plane (bending and shear) actions in plane RC elements. Concrete is modelled by ML in-plane elements that are combined with out-of-plane shear elements. Reinforcing steel is modelled separately by bar elements. Benchmark tests and validation with experimental data show that the proposed FEM is a promising tool for the design and assessment of plane reinforced concrete elements primarily subjected to combinations of in-plane forces and out-of-plane bending moments.

EPFL2017

A software solution for recording circadian oscillator features in time-lapse live cell microscopy

Daniel Sage, Michaël Unser

Background: Fluorescent and bioluminescent time-lapse microscopy approaches have been successfully used to investigate molecular mechanisms underlying the mammalian circadian oscillator at the single cell level. However, most of the available software and common methods based on intensity-threshold segmentation and frame-to-frame tracking are not applicable in these experiments. This is due to cell movement and dramatic changes in the fluorescent/bioluminescent reporter protein during the circadian cycle, with the lowest expression level very close to the background intensity. At present, the standard approach to analyze data sets obtained from time lapse microscopy is either manual tracking or application of generic image-processing software/dedicated tracking software. To our knowledge, these existing software solutions for manual and automatic tracking have strong limitations in tracking individual cells if their plane shifts.

BioMed Central Ltd.2010

Stress fields for the interaction of in-plane and out-of-plane forces in reinforced concrete shell elements

Marie-Rose Backes

EPFL2017