Multifractal analysis of Mg-doped ZnO thin films deposited by sol–gel spin coating method

A multifractal analysis has been performed on the 3D (three-dimensional) surface microtexture of magnesium-doped zinc oxide (ZnO:Mg) thin films with doping concentration of 0, 2, 4, and 5%. Thin films were deposited onto the glass substrates via the sol–gel spin coating method. The effect of magnesium doping, on the crystal structure, morphology, and band gap for ZnO:Mg thin films has been analyzed by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), and UV–Vis spectroscopy. It has been observed that the surface of ZnO thin films is multifractal in nature. However, multifractality and complexity observed to decrease with increasing content of Mg in ZnO thin films due to formation of islands on the surface in accordance with Volmer–Weber growth mechanism. The investigations revealed that crystallinity, microtexture, morphology, and optical properties of the thin films can be tuned by controlling the Mg content within the ZnO lattice. In particular, their optical band gap energies were 3.27, 3.31, 3.34, and 3.33 eV at 0, 2, 4, and 5%, respectively. The prepared thin films of ZnO:Mg with tuned characteristics would have promising applications in optoelectronic devices.     

Dynamic array PIN:A novel approach to secure NFC electronic payment between ATM and smartphone

ABSTRACT

Near Field Communication (NFC) technology has been used recently for electronic payment between an Automated Teller Machine (ATM) and a Smartphone. It is threatened by several attacks that can steal the user personal data like the password or the Personal Identification Number (PIN). In this paper, we present Dynamic Array PIN (DAP), a novel approach for user authentication on a Smartphone that uses NFC electronic payment with an ATM. Our analysis and experimentation prove that this technique protects against thirteen different attacks and is cost-effective in terms of required hardware, authentication time, computing power and storage space.     

A new modeling and placement of shunt FACTS devices in the secondary voltage regulation environment

Recently, the Secondary Voltage Regulation (SVR) is installed in some power systems in order to ensure the coordination voltage control devices. In other hand, the shunt FACTS devices such as the Static Var Compensator (SVC) and the STATic COMpensator (STATCOM) are extensively used for the local voltage control without any coordination with other voltage control devices, without any reciprocal coordination. In this paper, new models of SVC and STATCOM are proposed to be adopted in power flow models that include the SVR. The proposed models are implemented and tested on a model of the Italian power system. Furthermore, a new method based on sensitivity analysis is proposed to find the most sensitive placements for the installation of SVC and STATCOM. The results obtained show the highly computational performance of the propose models and also the effectiveness of the sensitivity analysis to find the best placements of SVC and STATCOM taking into account the SVR.     

Stability and Exponential Synchronization of High-Order Hopfield Neural Networks with Mixed Delays

This paper investigates the problems of stability and synchronization for high-order recurrent neural networks with mixed delays. Firstly, we establish sufficient conditions to ensure the asymptotic stability and then the exponential synchronization. Furthermore, our results are applied to two chosen systems to demonstrate the effectiveness of the obtained theoretical results.     

Docking Studies on Binding Modes between the CatechoI-O-Methyltransferase and Catechol Derivatives for Antiparkinson Drug

Inhibition of the enzyme COMT （catechol-O-methyltransferase） is an important approach in the treatment of Parkinson＇s disease. A series of potent catechols for COMT may give insight to develop new ways of antiparkinson drug. COMT inhibitors represent a new class of antiparkinson drugs, when they are coadministered with levodopa. Our goal of research is to study the inhibition of catechol-O-methyltransferase by molecular modeling methods. Different molecular modeling tools are used to perform this work （molecular mechanics, molecular dynamics and molecular docking （molegro virtnaldocker））. The results obtained from this work, into which the inhibition of catechol-O-methyltransferase by molecular modeling methods was elucidated, allow us to conclude that different catechols presents a more optimised inhibition of catechol-O-methyltransferase. The results suggest reducing the severity of Parkinson＇s disease.     

Optimization of UPFCs using hierarchical multi-objective optimization algorithms

Optimal location, number, and settings of unified power flow controllers (UPFC) using various multi-objective optimization algorithms is presented in this paper. The UPFC parameters, locations and number are computed to maximize the voltage stability margin and minimize the real power losses at the same time. For this, developed hierarchical optimization versions of three recent multi-objective algorithms are proposed namely: non-dominated genetic algorithms (NSGA-II), non-dominated sorting particle swarm optimization (NSPSO) and Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm 2 (SPEA2). The fuzzy logic is proposed to extract the best compromise solution from the Pareto set. The proposed algorithms are applied to IEEE 30-bus power system. The line flow and load bus voltage limits are taken into account. The obtained results show that the installation of the UPFC in the power system minimizes the power losses, enhances the static voltage stability, and improves the voltage profiles. Furthermore, the proposed methods are able to solve a hard discrete?Ccontinuous constrained multi-objective optimization problem. In addition, they do not show any limitation on the number of objective functions under consideration.     

Respiratory parameters of onion bulbs (Allium cepa) during storage. Effects of ionising radiation and temperature

The O₂ and CO₂ respiration rates of untreated and irradiated onion bulbs (Allium cepa) at 0.15 and 0.30 kGy were measured at 4, 10 and 20 °C. The O₂ respiration rate increased for 24 h after treatment from 0.19 mmole kg⁻¹ h⁻¹ at 20 °C for control samples up to 0.26 and 0.39 mmole kg⁻¹ h⁻¹ for 0.15 and 0.3 kGy irradiated onions respectively. Respiratory quotient (RQ) increased with temperature. The Q₁₀ of the respiration of the control samples (1.61) was lower than that of any other plant tissue, but it increased with storage duration and irradiation dose. The respiration rate of control onions increased steadily over 25 weeks of storage at 4 °C, while that of the irradiated samples decreased during the same period after a peak observed after irradiation treatment. The apparent K_m for the Menten–Michaelis equation was determined on a new respirometer and averaged 1.6 kPa at 10 °C and 6.3 kPa at 20 °C. However, at this higher temperature (20 °C) apparent K_m varied with O₂ partial pressure, proving that the respiration of onion bulbs does not follow a Menten–Michaelis‐like process. The Fermentative Index (FI) of onions was measured under anoxic conditions as CO₂ production rates in mmole kg⁻¹ h⁻¹ at 4, 10 and 20 °C. © 2000 Society of Chemical Industry     

Ferroelectric Phase Transition,Interfaces Quality,and Stress Evolution of TiOx/BaxSr1−xTiO3 Structures

Ba(Sr,Ti)O₃ material presents a remarkable property that lies in the possibility to change the permittivity by applying a dc electric field, i.e., BST is a tunable material. That makes BST a very interesting material for the development of reconfigurable devices in microelectronics. In this study, we focus our work on Ba(Sr,Ti)O₃ with Ba/Sr = 30/70, the films are deposited by radio‐frequency magnetron sputtering on Al₂O₃ (0001). A buffer layer of TiO_x is used to control the film orientation. The influence of this buffer layer on the dielectric properties, the interfaces quality with respect to the film thickness, and the temperature is analyzed. An increase of 30% of the relative permittivity was measured and a tunability of 50% was attained at 300 KV/cm. The dielectric measurements on BST/TiO_x as a function of the temperature show a shift of the Curie temperature (T_c = ?40°C) in comparison to BST without TiO_x layer (T_c = ?80°C). We demonstrate that the Curie temperature does not correspond to the maximum permittivity. The important stress measured on the films (930 MPa) could explain this behavior.