Hydrophobic Cross-Linked Poly(dimethylsiloxane)-Based Sorbents for Oil Spill Applications

With the increase of industrialization and urbanization, humankind faces massive oil-based pollution due to tanker accidents, human error, and natural disasters. For this, hydrophobic sorbents are fabricated and their applications for the removal of oil from polluted water sources are investigated. These hydrophobic sorbents are prepared by the condensation reaction of poly(dimethylsiloxane) and tris[3-(trimethoxysilyl)propyl]isocyanurate cross-linker via bulk polymerization. The obtained sorbents exhibit high oil sorption capacity, fast absorption–desorption kinetics, and great reusability. Moreover, they can selectively absorb oil from the water surface, thus making them practical for water clean-up applications.     

Secure image encryption scheme using 4D-Hyperchaotic systems based reconfigurable pseudo-random number generator and S-Box

This paper introduces the design of a hardware efficient reconfigurable pseudorandom number generator (PRNG) using two different feedback controllers based four-dimensional (4D) hyperchaotic systems i.e. Hyperchaotic-1 and -2 to provide confidentiality for digital images. The parameter's value of these two hyperchaotic systems is set to be a specific value to get the benefits i.e. all the multiplications (except a few multiplications) are performed using hardwired shifting operations rather than the binary multiplications, which doesn't utilize any hardware resource. The ordinary differential equations (ODEs) of these two systems have been exploited to build a generic architecture that fits in a single architecture. The proposed architecture provides an opportunity to switch between two different 4D hyperchaotic systems depending on the required behavior. To ensure the security strength, that can be also used in the encryption process in which encrypt the input data up to two times successively, each time using a different PRNG configuration. The proposed reconfigurable PRNG has been designed using Verilog HDL, synthesized on the Xilinx tool using the Virtex-5 (XC5VLX50T) and Zynq (XC7Z045) FPGA, its analysis has been done using Matlab tool. It has been found that the proposed architecture of PRNG has the best hardware performance and good statistical properties as it passes all fifteen NIST statistical benchmark tests while it can operate at 79.101-MHz or 1898.424-Mbps and utilize only 0.036 %, 0.23 %, and 1.77 % from the Zynq (XC7Z045) FPGA's slice registers, slice LUTs, and DSP blocks respectively. Utilizing these PRNGs, we design two 16 × 16 substitution boxes (S-boxes). The proposed S-boxes fulfill the following criteria: Bijective, Balanced, Non-linearity, Dynamic Distance, Strict Avalanche Criterion (SAC) and BIC non-linearity criterion. To demonstrate these PRNGs and S-boxes, a new three different scheme of image encryption algorithms have been developed: a) Encryption using S-box-1, b) Encryption using S-box-2 and, c) Two times encryption using S-box-1 and S-box-2. To demonstrate that the proposed cryptosystem is highly secure, we perform the security analysis (in terms of the correlation coefficient, key space, NPCR, UACI, information entropy and image encryption quantitatively in terms of (MSE, PSNR and SSIM)).     

Understanding δ-Bi2O3 fluorite degradation mechanism and related solutions for promising applications in distributed multigeneration

Oxygen selective membrane on the base of cermet δ-Bi₂O₃/Ag with an interpenetrating structure has the maximum potential efficiency of air separation. However, the degradation processes, including the phase degradation of fluorite δ-Bi₂O₃, do not make it possible to create a membrane with the required perfection and durability. In this work, the ordering of oxygen vacancies with the transformation of fluorite into the rhombohedral phase (S.G. R-3) was studied by powder HT XRD in situ at 600 °C on dense Bi_0.78Er_0.2Hf_0.02O_1.51 ceramics. Fast regeneration of disordered fluorite occurs at T = 640–700 °C. The phase degradation of fluorite due to the segregation of dopants at the second stage leads into stable phases - sillenite, tetragonal or rhombohedral phase (S.G. R-3m), depending on the composition of δ-Bi₂O₃. Fast regeneration of fluorite occurs when heated to 820 °C, which is unacceptable for membranes. Analysis of all available data allows us to propose approaches to optimize the composition of δ-Bi₂O₃ and technical solutions for creating durable oxygen selective membranes with promising use in distributed multigeneration. As a result of the analysis, a new solid electrolyte with better parameters was obtained.     

Low area field-programmable gate array implementation of PRESENT image encryption with key rotation and substitution

Lightweight ciphers are increasingly employed in cryptography because of the high demand for secure data transmission in wireless sensor network, embedded devices, and Internet of Things. The PRESENT algorithm as an ultra-lightweight block cipher provides better solution for secure hardware cryptography with low power consumption and minimum resource. This study generates the key using key rotation and substitution method, which contains key rotation, key switching, and binary-coded decimal-based key generation used in image encryption. The key rotation and substitution-based PRESENT architecture is proposed to increase security level for data stream and randomness in cipher through providing high resistance to attacks. Lookup table is used to design the key scheduling module, thus reducing the area of architecture. Field-programmable gate array (FPGA) performances are evaluated for the proposed and conventional methods. In Virtex 6 device, the proposed key rotation and substitution PRESENT architecture occupied 72 lookup tables, 65 flip flops, and 35 slices which are comparably less to the existing architecture.     

Upgrading of low-grade manganese ore based on reduction roasting and magnetic separation technique

The selective reduction of low-grade manganese ore followed by magnetic separation was proposed to produce rich-manganese ore. The optimized parameters include a roasting temperature of 1050°C, a roasting time of 6 h, a manganese ore size of 8–13 mm, and an FC/O ratio of 2.5. The reduction roasting products of low-grade manganese ore, mainly comprising of MnO, metallic iron, and residual gangue, could be separated effectively to obtain rich-manganese ore and magnetic product. The RMn, RFe, and TMn can reach the peak values of 71.00%, 93.60%, and 56.20wt%, respectively, at a rational magnetic field strength of 100 mT. In particular, the Mn/Fe ratio is up to 10.85, which meets the requirements of ferromanganese alloy smelting.     

Drug release kinetics of pH-responsive microgels of different glass-transition temperatures

The pH-responsive microgels (MGs) consisting of methacrylic acid-ethyl acrylate (MAA-EA), methacrylic acid-butyl methacrylate (MAA-BMA) or methacrylic acid-methyl methacrylate (MAA-MMA) crosslinked with di-allyl phthalate (DAP) were synthesized via emulsion polymerization. It was found that the energy required to extract a proton from MGs with higher glass-transition temperature (T_g) was greater than at a lower T_g. Procaine hydrochloride (PrHy) was used to study the release of a model hydrophobic drug from MGs with different T_gs. A drug selective electrode (DSE) was used to monitor the release as a function of pHs and T_gs. With increasing pH or decreasing T_g, the swelling of MGs was enhanced, leading to greater release of the drug. From the Berens and Hopfenberg model, the contributions of chain relaxation and diffusion processes during a release process were determined. The drug release from lower T_g MGs and at high pH is dominated by diffusion rather than chain relaxation. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 136, 47284.     

Remarkable Antibacterial Activity of Reduced Graphene Oxide Functionalized by Copper Ions

Despite long-term efforts for exploring antibacterial agents or drugs, potentiating antibacterial activity and meanwhile minimizing toxicity to the environment remains a challenge. Here, it is experimentally shown that the functionality of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) through copper ions displays selective antibacterial activity that is significantly stronger than that of rGO itself and no toxicity to mammalian cells. Remarkably, this antibacterial activity is two-orders-of-magnitude greater than the activity of its surrounding copper ions. It is demonstrated that rGO is functionalized through the cation–π interaction to massively adsorb copper ions to form a rGO–copper composite and result in an extremely low concentration level of surrounding copper ions (less than ≈0.5 µm ). These copper ions on rGO are positively charged and strongly interact with negatively charged bacterial cells to selectively achieve antibacterial activity, while rGO exhibits the functionality to not only actuate rapid delivery of copper ions and massive assembly onto bacterial cells but also result in the valence shift in the copper ions from Cu²⁺ into Cu⁺, which greatly enhances the antibacterial activity. Notably, this rGO functionality through cation–π interaction with copper ions can similarly achieve algaecidal activity but does not exert cytotoxicity against neutrally charged mammalian cells.     

Design of switchable band‐notched frequency selective absorber

An active band‐notched frequency selective absorber (BNFSA) with switchable notch band is proposed in this article. The BNFSA is a two‐layer structure composed of a lossy layer at the top and a ground plane at the bottom, separated by an air spacer. The element of the lossy layer is a lumped‐resistor‐loaded metallic dipole with a parallel LC resonance structure, which is realized by complementary n‐shaped resonator (CnR) inserted in the center, and PIN diode is welded at two arms of CnR. The bias circuit printed on the back of the substrate of the lossy layer connects to anode and cathode of the diode by via hole and isolates by the inductor. Simulation results show that the notch bands are located at 4.50 and 6.81 GHz when the diode sets to ON and OFF, respectively. To validate the performance of switchable BNFSA, the prototypes are fabricated and measured, reasonable agreement between simulated and measured results is obtained.     

A novel miniaturized frequency selective surface

A novel single layer miniaturized frequency selective surface made of circular unit cell elements is presented in this article. The frequency selective surface (FSS) unit cell measures 0.055λ₀ × 0.055λ₀, where λ₀ corresponds to its free space wavelength. The proposed FSS offers band stop characteristics with bandwidth of 137.5 MHz centered at 1.39 GHz. The symmetrical structure of the unit cell elements provides polarization independency. The miniaturized unit cell elements help achieving angular independency for both TE and TM mode of polarization. The miniaturized design provides excellent angular independency with negligible frequency shift for varying incident angles. A prototype of the FSS is fabricated and its simulation results are validated using measurements.     

Selective Coating of SnS on the Bio‐Inspired Moth‐Eye Patterned PEDOT:PSS Polymer Films

A new strategy for the selective coating of tin sulfide (SnS) on the surface of moth‐eye patterned (MEP) conducting polymer film is studied by considering the optical properties of the antireflective moth‐eye pattern and flexibility of polymer films. The semiconductor SnS is selectively coated on the surface of MEP microdomes of poly(3,4‐ethylenedioxythiophene) poly(styrene‐sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) film. The SnS coated MEP film is obtained by using pore selectively SnS thin layer functionalized polystyrene honeycomb‐patterned porous (HCP) film as a template. Aqueous PEDOT:PSS solution is poured on the SnS functionalized HCP films and detached for the fabrication of SnS coated MEP films. The films show a satisfactory photo‐responsive property under solar stimulated light illumination due to the antireflective MEP structure of PEDOT film and homogenous SnS coating on the surface of the conducting polymer.