Novel core-shell-like Ni-supported hierarchical beta zeolite catalysts on bioethanol steam reforming

Hierarchical-Beta zeolites have been hydrothermally synthesized by adding a new gemini organic surfactant. The used gemini surfactant play the role of a “pore-forming agents” on the mesoscale, on the same time, providing alkaline environment for the system. With this hierarchical Beta zeolite as the core support, we successfully prepared a shell layer of Ni-containing (22 wt%) petal-like core-shell-like catalyst and applied it to bioethanol steam reforming. At the reaction temperature of 350 °C–550 °C, the conversion rate of ethanol and the selectivity of hydrogen were always above 85% and 70%. After reaction of 100 h on stream at 400 °C, there were not obvious inactivation could be observed on NiNPs/OH-MBeta catalyst.     

Enhanced transduction coefficient in piezoelectric PZT ceramics by mixing powders calcined at different temperatures

Large transduction coefficient ($d_{33}\times g_{33}$) is difficult to obtain in piezoelectric ceramics because these two parameters show opposite trends with compositional modifications. Herein, the Pb(Zr_0.53Ti_0.47)O₃ ceramic powders were calcinated under different temperatures (A:830 °C, B:860 °C, and C:890 °C), and then mixed together according to different weight ratios (1A:1B:1C, 1A:2B:1C, 1A:2B:3C and 3A:2B:1C) for ceramics preparation. Both d₃₃ and g₃₃ are improved successfully, and the transduction coefficient with the weight ratio of 1A:2B:3C reaches up to 17,500 × 10⁻¹⁵ m²/N, which is 60 % higher than that with the powders calcinated under 830 °C, and at least twice those of commercial PZT-4, PZT-5A and PZT-8 ceramics. The improved transduction coefficient is owing to the enhanced piezoelectric constant and spontaneous polarization resulted from the increased grain size, relative density and the fraction of tetragonal phase. These results indicate that this is a simple but effective way to tailor the transduction coefficient in piezoelectric ceramics.     

3D polymeric microfluidic device fabrication via contact liquid photolithographic polymerization (CLiPP)

In this contribution, a new method for the fabrication of complex polymeric microfluidic devices is presented. The technology, contact liquid photolithographic polymerization (CLiPP), overcomes many of the drawbacks associated with other rapid prototyping schemes, such as limited materials choices and time-consuming microassembly protocols. CLiPP shares many traits with other photolithographic methods, but three distinct features: (i) liquid photoresists in contact with the photomask, (ii) readily removed sacrificial materials, and (iii) living radical processes, enable multiple polymeric chemistries and mechanical properties while simultaneously enabling facile fabrication of 3D geometries and surface chemistry control. This contribution details fabrication techniques and methods for the fabrication of high aspect ratio posts covalently bonded to a polymeric substrate, an array of independently stacked bars on top of perpendicular bars, multiple undercut structures fabricated simultaneously, and a complex 3D geometry with intertwined channels.     

Experiments and simulations of the mechanical performance of repaired panels

Firstly, the compress experiment is undertaken to investigate the efficiency of repaired panels in this paper, and then modeling of the mechanical behavior of the repaired composite panel under compressive static load is conducted by using of the finite element method. The effect of geometric non-linearity on the stress–strain response is considered in the numeric analysis. Fatherly, the user material subroutine (UMAT) is integrated with the ABAQUS package with the geometric non-linearity effect for studying the damage initiation and its progression in the composite structure, and quadrilateral, linear, thick shell elements (S8R) are adopted. Finally, the predicted strain distribution, damage evolution and strength of the laminate are compared with the test results.     

A Web-based flood forecasting system for Shuangpai region

Traditional flood forecasting and operation of reservoirs in China are based on manual calculations by hydrologists or through standalone computer programs. The main drawbacks of these methods are long forecasting time due to time-consuming nature, individual knowledge, lack of communication, absence of experts, etc. A Web-based flood forecasting system (WFFS), which includes five main modules: real-time rainfall data conversion, model-driven hydrologic forecasting, model calibration, precipitation forecasting, and flood analysis, is presented in this paper. The WFFS brings significant convenience to personnel engaged in flood forecasting and control and allows real-time contribution of a wide range of experts at other spatial locations in times of emergency. The conceptual framework and detailed components of the proposed WFFS, which employs a multi-tiered architecture, are illustrated. Multi-tiered architecture offers great flexibility, portability, reusability and reliability. The prototype WFFS has been developed in Java programming language and applied in Shuangpai region with a satisfactory result.     

Sensor fault tolerant control using sliding mode observers

Previous work has considered the use of sliding mode observers for fault detection and isolation (FDI) in uncertain linear systems whereby the unknown faults are reconstructed by appropriate processing of the so-called equivalent output error injection. The paper builds on this work and considers such a scheme within the broader context of fault tolerant control. Specifically, by correcting the faulty measurement by an estimate of the fault obtained from the sliding mode FDI scheme, good closed-loop performance is still maintained. An example of such a scheme, which has been implemented in real-time on a laboratory dc motor rig, is described.     

光泵磁敏传感器中FPGA调频器设计与实现

射频场调频器是氦光泵磁敏传感器核心驱动部件。模拟压控振荡式调频器存在频率不稳、调试困难和需要高精度测频电路等问题,集成芯片调频器存在控制复杂和功耗高等不足,而FPGA调频器具有频率稳定度高、不需要高精度测频电路和集成在FPGA控制器里的优点。提出氦光泵磁敏传感器数字检测原理和调频器技术指标,阐述FPGA调频器原理并完成设计。调频信号解调实验和扫频式磁共振信号检测实验的结果表明FPGA调频器满足氦光泵磁敏传感器数字化检测要求。     

EMD消噪在取样光栅滤波器设计中的应用

通过改变取样光栅的各参数来仿真其反射谱,调试出四种基于取样光纤光栅的光学梳状滤波器。为了优化取样光栅梳状滤波器功能,提出了利用经验模态分解对信号进行滤波分析和降噪处理的方法。该方法是将经验模态分解得到的固有模态函数,分为信号分量起主导作用模态与噪音分量起主导作用模态,去除噪音分量起主导作用模态,并利用反映信号主要结构的模态对信号进行重构实现去噪。文中最后以一种含噪声的反射谱为例,进行降噪后得到平滑的反射谱。     

Efficient FPGA implementation and verification of difference expansion based reversible watermarking with improved time and resource utilization

This paper presents Xilinx System Generator (XSG) model design for realization of reversible watermarking algorithm using Difference Expansion (DE) approach in System-On-Chip (SoC) Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) environment. The reversible watermarking is verified by taking a (4 × 4) sized test image and is applicable for larger sizes of cover images. The outcomes of the result demonstrate that the proposed structural design allows combining MATLAB-Simulink and XSG during graphical user interface for image processing applications. The superiority of the algorithm is justified by using comparative analysis with some well-known methods in both software and hardware environments. The method provides effectively higher PSNR at higher embedding capacity. It is also found that the method requires less time and hardware resources with throughput of 13.516 Mb/s at operational frequency of 80 MHz for real time implementation using FPGA.     

Fast calculation of computer generated hologram based on single Fourier transform for holographic three-dimensional display

We present an efficient method for the fast calculation of computer generated hologram (CGH). The 3D object is split into sub-layers according to its depth information. A 2D all-in-focus image is generated by sequential tiling all the layers in one plane. A Fourier hologram that contains all the information of 3D object is calculated from the fast Fourier transform (FFT) of the reassembled 2D image. By multiplying a pre-calculated multifocal off-axis digital phase mask (DPM) to the Fourier hologram, the content of each layer is axially relocated to different depth in the Fourier transform optical system to reconstruct the 3D object. The computation speed of the proposed method is greatly improved with only single FFT calculation process. Both of simulation and experimental results proves the validation of the proposed method.