Is the Internet going NUTSS?

For nearly 10 years now, the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) and Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) have been telling us that the pool of available IP addresses will soon be exhausted, and that Internet growth will come to a grinding halt. They have heavily promoted their solution, IPv6, which the commercial world has all but ignored. It is now becoming clear that IP address exhaustion is years off, at best. The primary reason for this is network address translation (NAT), the rogue technology that allows almost unlimited address reuse. Despite NAT's nagging technical problems that limit IP connectivity and make peer-to-peer (P2P) applications difficult to deploy, the commercial world has universally embraced the technology even as the IAB and IETF actively discourage its use.     

Local control strategies for groups of mobile autonomous agents

The problem of achieving a specified formation among a group of mobile autonomous agents by distributed control is studied. If convergence to a point is feasible, then more general formations are achievable too, so the focus is on convergence to a point (the agreement problem). Three formation strategies are studied and convergence is proved under certain conditions. Also, motivated by the question of whether collisions occur, formation evolution is studied.     

Use of vibratory polishing for the location of ion-bombardment induced voids in metal foils

The technique of vibratory polishing has been successfully applied to the controlled removal of surfaces for examination of ion-irradiation damage structure in nickel, a nickel-based alloy, and stainless steel. The application of this technique to the study of voids formed in localized layers in nickel and stainless steel during high dose 20 MeV carbon ion irradiation is described. Transmission electron microscopy observations of the vibratory polished surfaces reveal mechanical damage in the form of linear tracks (～ 100 nm wide) which are produced by the abrasive Al₂O₃ particles used for polishing. These tracks do not prevent observation of irradiation damage structure. An example is shown of a thin (～ 100 nm edge thickness) foil produced entirely by this mechanical polishing process. It is proposed that this technique will be equally applicable to the preparation of transmission electron microscope specimens from a wide range of metals, from alloys containing second-phase particles and from ceramics, glasses and oxides which are not amenable to preparation by chemical or electro-polishing.     

Decades of progress, or the progress of decades?

In the almost 40?years since we wrote Evaluative bibliometrics enormous advances have been made in data availability and analytic technique. The journal impact factor of the 1960s has clearly not kept up with the state of the art. However, for both old and new indicators, basic validity and relevance issues remain, such as by what standard can we validate our results, and what external use can appropriately be made of them? As funding support becomes more difficult, we should not lose sight of the necessity to again demonstrate the importance of our research, and must keep in mind that it is the relevance of our results that count, not the elegance of our mathematics.     

Controlling Salmonella infections in pig farms: A framework modelling approach

Human salmonellosis is an important food-borne disease and S. Typhimurium is the most common serotype attributed to pork products. Under a farm-to-fork strategy, reducing the levels of Salmonella-positive pigs entering the slaughterhouse is an important goal. A framework model was developed, where the effect of dynamic (infection characteristics) and non-dynamic (cleanness and disinfection, biosecurity measures, etc.) factors were considered. Four baseline scenarios were created, corresponding to different levels associated with national Salmonella monitoring programs, and sensitivity analyses were run for the non-dynamic factors. Moreover, the option of vaccination was incorporated into the model, in order to provide with a tool for the formulation of an optimum vaccination strategy depending on the characteristics of the vaccine.     

Gastric Cancer: Advances in Carcinogenesis Research and New Therapeutic Strategies

Gastric cancer’s bad incidence, prognosis, cellular and molecular heterogeneity amongst others make this disease a major health issue worldwide. Understanding this affliction is a priority for proper patients’ management and for the development of efficient therapeutical strategies. This review gives an overview of major scientific advances, made during the past 5-years, to improve the comprehension of gastric adenocarcinoma. A focus was made on the different actors of gastric carcinogenesis, including, Helicobacter pylori cancer stem cells, tumour microenvironment and microbiota. New and recent potential biomarkers were assessed as well as emerging therapeutical strategies involving cancer stem cells targeting as well as immunotherapy. Finally, recent experimental models to study this highly complex disease were discussed, highlighting the importance of gastric cancer understanding in the hard-fought struggle against cancer relapse, metastasis and bad prognosis.     

用于汽车自动变速器的温压涡轮毂

温压是一种可将增高密度与选择高使用性能材料相结合的技术。增高密度有助于提高零件的力学性能,以及整体使用性能。将密度增高与高使用性能相结合,可使制造的零件的使用性能超过相应的铸锻材料产品,同时可制成具有最终形的零件,从而显著减低生产成本。因此,自动变速器的涡轮毂就成为了温压的一个理想对象。这篇论文将评述,将用于高扭矩自动变速器的常规锻件切削加工的涡轮毂转换为用一次压制/一次烧结制造的粉末冶金涡轮毂。粉末冶金涡轮毂使用的材料是FD-0405。在试验室对这种扩散合金化材料进行了评价,和报告了几个密度水平的力学性能。温压可使高应力的内花键区全面达到高密度。为了证明粉末冶金零件的适用性,进行了广泛的力学与零件的特定试验。     

Ice‐Templated Scaffolds with Microridged Pores Direct DRG Neurite Growth

Successful spinal cord repair is thought to be promoted with hierarchically structured scaffolds. These should combine aligned porosity with additional linear features on the micrometer scale to guide axons across multiple length scales. Such scaffolds are generated through the carefully controlled directional solidification of an aqueous biopolymer solution, followed by lyophilization. Under specific freezing conditions this yields a highly regular and aligned lamellar architecture. This architecture exhibits uniform ridges of controlled height and width on the lamellar surface. These ridges run parallel to the pore axis, serving as secondary guidance features. The ridges are capable of linearly aligning 62.4% of chick dorsal root ganglia neurites to within ±10° of the ridge direction. Notably, neurites sprouting perpendicular to the ridge are guided into alignment with these microridged features.