From sustainability to sustainizability

Following the recent introduction of the Sustainability over Sets (SOS) concept as a sustainability analysis tool with broad flexibility in incorporating human input, in this work, the concepts of Sustainizability (SIZ) and Sustainizability over Sets (SIZOS) are introduced, as novel frameworks for sustainable system synthesis. Springing off the conceptual foundation of sustainability, SIZ (and SIZOS) refers to the existence of allowable external actions, and/or design changes that can render sustainable (sustainable over a set) an unsustainable (unsustainable over a set) system. Utilizing earlier mathematical results for SOS, rigorous necessary and sufficient conditions for SIZOS are presented. Two case studies, on a two-dimensional biological waste treatment system, and a three-dimensional food chain system, are then presented to illustrate the developed necessary and sufficient conditions for SIZOS.     

Application of statistical methodology for the evaluation of mechanically activated phase transformation in nanocrystalline TiO2

Response surface methodology was employed to study the effect of three factors, namely as milling time, milling speed and ball to powder weight ratio, on the mechanical activation of polymorphic phase transformation in nanocrystalline TiO₂ powder and identify the probable interactions between these factors. The response was the rutile percentage after annealing the samples. Based on the statistical analysis, ball to powder weight ratio was found as the most effective factor and just one statistically significant interaction was found between milling speed and ball to powder ratio. It was also shown that increasing the milling time has no significant effect on the phase transformation since the required activation energy for the phase transformation is unattainable under these conditions. The rutile percentage was calculated from X-ray diffraction patterns of the samples via Rietveld refinement method. Raman spectroscopy was employed to verify the phase composition analysis based on X-ray diffraction results.     

Formula to Get Desired Soil Density

Changing the soil characteristics is a main concern to all civil engineers. Highway and foundation engineers are particularly more concerned with the subject. There are several methods to improve the soil characteristics. One of these methods is to add fine material, which fills the voids between the grains of the soil, helping to make the soil denser, thus gaining high resistance to penetration. This study uses statistical parameters of the soil grains distribution to predict the soil maximum dry density, then uses the fine biasness coefficient to predict the new density of the soil after mixing any amount of fine particles with the original soil. A mathematical formula is developed to make such a prediction. Lab testing results were compared with the results of the prediction. They were found to be in total agreement, and the margin of error was found to be quite low.     

Oncogene rearrangement in non-Hodgkin's lymphoma with a 14q+ chromosome of unknown origin

Southern blot analysis was performed with a panel of DNA probes to detect rearrangements of c-myc, bcl-1, bcl-2 and bcl-3 in 14 cases of B-cell non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) with a clonal cytogenetic rearrangement involving the chromosome 14q32 locus and no known donor chromosome [t(14;?)(q32;?)]. In our experience, 21% of all chromosomal abnormalities involving the 14q32 locus in B-cell NHL are of this type. We found oncogene rearrangements in five of the 14 cases: bcl-1 rearrangement on one mantle zone lymphoma, bcl-2 rearrangements in two follicular lymphomas, and c-myc rearrangements in two small noncleaved cell lymphomas. We conclude that a 14q32+ abnormality of unknown origin is a relatively frequent karyotypic finding in B-cell NHL. In one third of the cases, known oncogenes that have been previously described in reciprocal translocations involving the immunoglobulin heavy chain locus were shown to be involved in the 14q32+ abnormality. The translocations in the other cases are likely to have involved one of the above oncogenes with breakpoints not revealed by the probes employed, other known oncogenes, or oncogenes that have not yet been identified.     

Real-time server-based communication with CAN

This paper investigates the concept of share-driven scheduling of networks using servers with real-time properties. Share-driven scheduling provides fairness and bandwidth isolation between predictable as well as unpredictable streams of messages on the network. The need for this kind of scheduled real-time communication network is high in applications that have requirements on flexibility, both during development for assigning communication bandwidth to different applications, and during run-time to facilitate dynamic addition and removal of system components. We illustrate the share-driven scheduling concept by applying it to the popular controller area network (CAN). We propose a scheduling mechanism that we call simple server-scheduled CAN (S/sup 3/-CAN), for which we also present an associated timing analysis. Additionally, we present a variant of S/sup 3/-CAN called periodic server-scheduled CAN (PS/sup 2/-CAN), which for some network configurations gives lower worst-case response-times than S/sup 3/-CAN. Also for this improvement, a timing analysis is presented. Moreover, we use simulation to evaluate the timing performance of both S/sup 3/-CAN and PS/sup 2/-CAN, comparing them with other scheduling mechanisms.     

A Comparative Evaluation of Air-Jet Sieve for Particle Size Analysis of Pharmaceutical Powders

The performance of the air-jet sieve (AJS), for the particle size analysis of pharmaceutical powder, was evaluated and compared with the conventional sieve shaker (ESS). Two grades of acetaminophen (APAP) were used as test pharmaceutical powders. The particle size analysis by the AJS was simple, reproducible, efficient and accurate. The problematic powder, possessing excessive electrostatic charges and ranging in mean diameter from 17 nm to 800 nm (beyond the scope of ESS) could be evaluated accurately by AJS. The analysis time required by AJS was relatively less than that required by ESS. The accuracy of the determination by AJS was not affected by the sample size. Both the speed of rotation (vibrations and/or shaking) and the total time of sifting affected the results of the determination by ESS. The particle size value of APAP-special determined by ESS and AJS were 680.0 ± 0.14 nm and 40.0 ± 0.32 respectively, whereas the value assigned by the manufacturer was below 74 nm (-200 mesh). The precision of either method for particle size analysis of powder possessing excessive electrostatic charge was improved by the use of carbon black as an anti-static agent.     

Accuracy assessment of the MODIS 16-day albedo product for snow: comparisons with Greenland in situ measurements

The accuracy of the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) 16-day albedo product (MOD43) is assessed using ground-based albedo observations from automatic weather stations (AWS) over spatially homogeneous snow and semihomogeneous ice-covered surfaces on the Greenland ice sheet. Data from 16 AWS locations, spanning the years 2000-2003, were used for this assessment. In situ reflected shortwave data were corrected for a systematic positive spectral sensitivity bias of between 0.01 and 0.09 on a site-by-site basis using precise optical black radiometer data. Results indicate that the MOD43 albedo product retrieves snow albedo with an average root mean square error (RMSE) of ±0.07 as compared to the station measurements, which have ±0.035 RMSE uncertainty. If we eliminate all satellite retrievals that rely on the backup algorithm and consider only the highest quality results from the primary bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) algorithm, the MODIS albedo RMSE is ±0.04, slightly larger than the in situ measurement uncertainty. There is general agreement between MODIS and in situ observations for albedo <0.7, while near the upper limit, a −0.05 MODIS albedo bias is evident from the scatter of the 16-site composite.     

A recursive algorithm for solving “a secret sharing” problem

Abstract

This paper presents a recursive algorithm for solving “a secret sharing” problem. This problem is one of the unsolved problems in the Second International Students Olympiad in Cryptography (NSUCRYPTO2015). Recently, Geut et al. solved the problem in a special case. We show that our algorithm is able to solve it in general.