Kaolinite-mullite reaction series: a TEM study

The kaolinite-mullite reaction series in single crystal kaolinite has been characterized by transmission electron microscopy. The exotherm observed at 980° C is attributed to the formation of a spinel phase. Mullite crystallites have also been observed with the spinel phase and both phases have a composition near that of 32 mullite. Subsequent heat treatment leads to the growth of mullite crystallites on the original kaolinite plates with the c-axis perpendicular to the plate.     

Structural health monitoring of railway tracks using IoT-based multi-robot system

Neural Computing and Applications - A multi-robot-based fault detection system for railway tracks is proposed to eliminate manual human visual inspection. A hardware prototype is designed to...     

VLSI and SPICE modeling of ALU

The Arithmetic and Logic Unit （ALU） is a combination circuit that performs a number of arithmetic and logical operations within a microprocessor. The demand for faster and compact ALUs makes it desirable to test the ALU in conjunction with pre-design parts prior to manufacture. This may be accomplished in a process using CAD and SPICE simulation software. Our purpose is to realize a method for importing a layout drawn in Tanner L-edit and simulated in T-Spice into PSpice which is referred to as software talking. To do so we use an eight-function instruction set called Complimentary Metal Oxide Semiconductor Arithmetic and Logic Unit （CMOS ALU） which is laid out in Tanner L-edit and produces an extracted net-list which is simulated in T-Spice. An ALU equivalent design is then modeled in PSpice for further testing with pre-manufactured parts of the PSpice library.     

Twin capacitor compensation of high voltage transmission line

Twin capacitor series compensation is highly effective in the reduction of the line impedance and thus improves the power transfer capability of the transmission system as a whole. An analytical approach is developed for the first time for the ‘effectiveness factor’. A numerical comparison of performance factors such as transmission efficiency, shunt reactive voltampere requirements at the terminals and the line operating angle under a maximum received power criterion brings out the influence of compensation as well as location. It is shown that the scheme which places capacitors both at the sending and the receiving end is preferable.     

Efficient VLSI Architectures for Multiuser Channel Estimation in Wireless Base-Station Receivers

This paper presents a reduced-complexity, fixed-point algorithm and efficient real-time VLSI architectures for multiuser channel estimation, one of the core baseband processing operations in wireless base-station receivers for CDMA. Future wireless base-station receivers will need to use sophisticated algorithms to support extremely high data rates and multimedia. Current DSP implementations of these algorithms are unable to meet real-time requirements. However, there exists massive parallelism and bit level arithmetic present in these algorithms than can be revealed and efficiently implemented in a VLSI architecture. We re-design an existing channel estimation algorithm from an implementation perspective for a reduced complexity, fixed-point hardware implementation. Fixed point simulations are presented to evaluate the precision requirements of the algorithm. A dependence graph of the algorithm is presented and area-time trade-offs are developed. An area-constrained architecture achieves low data rates with minimum hardware, which may be used in pico-cell base-stations. A time-constrained solution exploits the entire available parallelism and determines the maximum theoretical data processing rates. An area-time efficient architecture meets real-time requirements with minimum area overhead.     

A novel method to co-localize glycosaminoglycan-core oligosaccharide glycosyltransferases in rat liver Golgi. Co-localization of galactosyltransferase I with a sialyltransferase

4-Methylumbelliferyl-beta-xyloside (Xyl beta MU) primes glycosaminoglycan synthesis by first serving as an acceptor for the addition of 2 galactoses and 1 glucuronic acid residue to make the typical core structure, GlcUA beta 1, 3Gal beta 1,3Gal beta 1,4Xyl beta MU. To investigate the relative localization of these biosynthetic enzymes, intact and properly oriented rat liver Golgi preparations were incubated with Xyl beta MU and 1 microM UDP-[3H]Gal and then chased with 5 microM of unlabeled UDP-Gal, UDP-GlcUA, UDP-GlcNAc, UDP-GalNAc, and CMP-Neu5Ac. Under these conditions, no intervesicular transport occurs and acceptor labeling depends entirely upon transporter-mediated delivery of the labeled sugar nucleotides into the lumen of a vesicle and co-localization of the appropriate glycosyltransferases. The labeled products were isolated from the incubation medium and from within the Golgi and their structures analyzed by C18, anion-exchange, and amine adsorption high performance liquid chromatography in combination with glycosidase digestions. Surprisingly, the major products within the Golgi were two sialylated xylosides (Sia alpha 2,3Gal beta 1,4Xyl-beta MU and Sia alpha 2,8Sia alpha 2,3Gal beta 1,4Xyl beta MU) rather than the expected group of partially completed GAG core structures. Less than 10% of the products within the Golgi are the expected core structures containing a second Gal residue or, in addition, GlcUA. The amount of the sialylated products is only partially decreased if the chase is omitted or if the chase is done in the absence of added CMP-Sia, suggesting a pool of previously transported CMP-Sia drives synthesis of the major products. Conversely, when detergent permeabilized vesicles are provided with high concentration of the same sugar nucleotides, the ratio of sialylated products is reduced and replaced by an increase in GAG-like products. These results argue that GAG core-specific Ga1 transferase I and II are not extensively co-localized within the same Golgi compartment. By contrast, glycosaminoglycan core Gal transferase I is substantially co-localized with an alpha-2,3-sialyltransferase and an alpha-2,8-sialyltransferase. Incubating intact Golgi vesicles with exogenous diffusible acceptors offers a novel method to assess the functional co-localization of glycosyltransferases of multiple pathways within the Golgi compartments.     

Template‐Assisted Synthesis of π‐Conjugated Molecular Organic Nanowires in the Sub‐100 nm Regime and Device Implications

π‐conjugated molecular organics such as rubrene, Alq₃, fullerene, and PCBM have been used extensively over the last few decades in numerous organic electronic devices, including solar cells, thin‐film transistors, and large‐area, low‐cost flexible displays. Rubrene and Alq₃, have emerged as promising platforms for spin‐based classical and quantum information processing, which has triggered significant research activity in the relatively new area of organic spintronics. Synthesis of these materials in a nanowire geometry, with feature sizes in the sub‐100 nm regime, is desirable as it often enhances device performance and is essential for development of high‐density molecular electronic devices. However, fabrication techniques that meet this stringent size constraint are still largely underdeveloped. Here, a novel, versatile, and reagentless method that enables growth of nanowire arrays of the above‐mentioned organics in the cylindrical nanopores of anodic aluminum oxide (AAO) templates is demonstrated. This method 1) allows synthesis of high‐density organic nanowire arrays on arbitrary substrates, 2) provides electrical access to the nanowire arrays, 3) offers tunability of the array geometry in a range overlapping with the relevant physical length scales of many organic devices, and 4) can potentially be extended to synthesize axially and radially heterostructured organic nanowires. Thus prepared nanowires are characterized extensively with an aim to identify their potential applications in diverse areas such as organic optoelectronics, photovoltaics, molecular nanoelectronics, and spintronics.     

An efficient one-pot four-component Gewald reaction: Synthesis of substituted 2-aminothiophenes with coumarin–thiazole scaffolds under environmentally benign conditions

An elegant and efficient method has been outlined for the synthesis of novel 5-amino-4-[4-(2-oxo-2H-chromen-3-yl)thiazol-2-yl]-3-arylthiophene-2-carbonitriles employing a one-pot four-component reaction of various aldehydes, 2-[4-(2-oxo-2H-chromen-3-yl)thiazol-2-yl]acetonitrile, malononitrile and molecular sulfur independently in the presence of L-proline as a catalyst, under green reaction conditions. In an alternative approach, initially, the Knoevenagel condensation of these various aldehydes has been carried out with active methylene compounds malononitrile or 2-[4-(2-oxo-2H-chromen-3-yl)thiazol-2-yl]acetonitrile to obtain the corresponding condensed compounds. These compounds then further subjected to a one-pot three-component Gewald reaction with molecular sulfur using sodium bicarbonate as a simple and inexpensive catalyst to obtain the target compounds. The effect of solvent and catalyst on these reactions has been screened to obtain the optimal conditions. The advantages of this protocol are the use of mild reaction conditions at ambient temperature, environmental friendliness, good yields in faster reaction times, convenient operation procedures, and broad substrate scope.