Rayleigh‐Bénard convective PCR is a simple and effective design for amplification of DNA. Convective PCR is, however, extremely sensitive to environmental temperature fluctuations, especially when using small‐ diameter test tubes. Therefore, this method is inherently unstable with limited applications. Here, we present a convective PCR device that has been modified by adding thermal baffles. With this thermally baffled device the influence from fluctuations in environmental temperature were significantly reduced, even in a wind tunnel (1 m/s). The thermally baffled PCR instrument described here has the potential to be used as a low‐cost, point‐of‐care device for PCR‐based molecular diagnostics in the field.

Both multiview and light-field reconstructions are proposed for a multiple-projector 3D display system. To compare the performance of the reconstruction algorithms in the same system, an optimized multiview reconstruction algorithm with sub-view-zones (SVZs) is proposed. The algorithm divided the conventional view zones in multiview display into several SVZs and allocates more view images. The optimized reconstruction algorithm unifies the conventional multiview reconstruction and light-field reconstruction algorithms, which can indicate the difference in performance when multiview reconstruction is changed to light-field reconstruction. A prototype consisting of 60 projectors with an arc diffuser as its screen is constructed to verify the algorithms. Comparison of different configurations of SVZs shows that light-field reconstruction provides large-scale 3D images with the smoothest motion parallax; thus it may provide better overall performance for large-scale 360° display than multiview reconstruction.

In this study, 334 accelerograms of 42 small‐to‐moderate earthquakes recorded at 36 strong‐motion stations were used to investigate the ground‐motion characteristics of the southwestern margin of the Sichuan–Yunnan rhombic block (SWM‐SYRB), one of the most active seismic regions in China. The high‐frequency attenuation parameter was estimated using the spectral decay method, and the site component (⁠ $κ0$⁠) was fitted. The $κ0$ estimates decrease with the increasing time‐averaged S‐wave velocity of the uppermost 30 m (⁠ $VS30$⁠). Using the generalized inversion technique, the source spectra, quality factor (Q), and site amplification were derived from the Fourier amplitude spectra (FAS). The obtained average stress drop for earthquakes occurred in SWM‐SYRB was the second largest among various boundary areas of SYRB. The inverted Q model was $Q(f)=115.1f0.616$⁠. The low Q structure that extends southwestward from the Songpan–Garze block to SWM‐SYRB could be responsible for the strong regional attenuation of ground motion with distance. At frequencies above 10 Hz, the average site amplifications were influenced by the high‐frequency attenuation effect. The site amplification of site class D reached a factor of 6 at 0.7 Hz. Moreover, it was observed that site amplification factors can be even higher when peak ground acceleration is larger than $0.8m/s2$⁠. Finally, the obtained parameters were used in the stochastic finite‐fault simulation method to reproduce the FAS, 5%‐damped pseudospectral acceleration, and time series of the 2021 $Mw$ 6.1 Yangbi earthquake. The simulated spectra properly matched the observations in a broad frequency band of 0.1–25 Hz. Furthermore, the simulated time series could generally represent the amplitude of the S‐wave portion of observed ones.