Microstructural evolution,non‐Ohmic properties,and giant dielectric response in CaCu3Ti4−xGexO12 ceramics

The microstructural evolution, non‐Ohmic properties, and giant dielectric properties of CaCu₃Ti_4?xGe_xO₁₂ ceramics (x=0‐0.10) are systematically investigated. The Rietveld refinement confirms the existence of a pure CaCu₃Ti₄O₁₂ phase in all samples. Significantly enlarged grain sizes of CaCu₃Ti_4?xGe_xO₁₂ ceramics are associated with the liquid phase sintering mechanism. Enhanced dielectric permittivity from 6.90×10⁴ to 1.08×10⁵ can be achieved by increasing Ge⁴⁺ dopant from x=0‐0.10, whereas the loss tangent is remarkably reduced by a factor of ≈10. Non‐Ohmic properties are enhanced by Ge⁴⁺ doping ions. Using impedance and admittance spectroscopies, the underlying mechanisms for the dielectric and nonlinear properties are well described. The improved nonlinear properties and reduced loss tangent are attributed to the enhanced resistance and conduction activation energy of the grain boundaries. The largely enhanced permittivity is closely associated with the enlarged grain sizes and the increase in the Cu⁺/Cu²⁺ and Ti³⁺/Ti⁴⁺ ratios, which are calculated from the X‐ray absorption near‐edge structure.     

The structural roles of conserved Pro196, Pro197 and His199 in the mechanism of thymidylate synthase

We generated replacement sets for three highly conserved residues,Pro196, Pro197 and His199, that flank the catalytic nucleophile,Cys198. Pro196 and Pro197 have restricted mobility that couldbe important for the structural transitions known to be essentialfor activity. To test this hypothesis we obtained and characterized13 amino acid substitutions for Pro196, 14 for Pro197 and 14for His199. All of the Pro196 and Pro197 variants, except P197R,and four of the His199 variants complemented TS-deficient Escherichiacoli cells, indicating they had at least 1% of wild-type activity.For all His199 mutations, k_cat/K_m for substrate and cofactordecreased more than 40-fold, suggesting that the conserved hydrogenbond network co-ordinated by His199 is important for catalysis.Pro196 can be substituted with small hydrophilic residues withlittle loss in k_cat, but 15- to 23-fold increases in K_m^dUMP.Small hydrophobic substitutions for Pro197 were most active,and the most conservative mutant, P197A, had only a 5-fold lowerk_cat/K_m^dUMP than wild-type TS. Several Pro196 and Pro197 variantswere temperature sensitive. The small effects of Pro196 or Pro197mutations on enzyme kinetics suggest that the conformationalrestrictions encoded by the Pro–Pro sequence are largelymaintained when either member of the pair is mutated. Received February 24, 2003; revised June 19, 2003; accepted June 20, 2003.     

Stochastic finite element simulation of random structure on uncertain foundation under random loading

Statistical uncertainty is bound to occur due to the randomness in material and geometric properties, support conditions, soil variability, etc. in structural engineering problems. An attempt has been made to study the stochastic structural responses, in particular, their mean and variances under such uncertain system parameters. The random parameters are modeled as homogeneous Gaussian stochastic processes and discretized by efficient local averaging method. The discretized Gaussian field is simulated by Cholesky decomposition of the respective covariance matrix. The present paper takes the advantage of Neumann expansion technique in deriving the finite element solution of response variability within the framework of Monte Carlo simulation. Neumann expansion technique needs inversion of only the deterministic part of the stiffness matrix for all sample structures, and thus increases the computational efficiency. Numerical examples are presented to study the advantage of Neumann expansion based simulation method with respect to accuracy and efficiency. The comparison of the results shows that the values approach towards that obtained by direct Monte Carlo simulation as the order of expansion in Neumann series is increased.     

Spread spectrum image watermark detection on degraded compressed sensing measurements with distortion minimization

Multimedia Tools and Applications - In the age of digital world, the wide dissemination of images need bandwidth (BW) efficient transmission as well as ownership protection during transmission over...     

Special issue on computing,communication and sensor network: CCSN,Puri, Odisha,India, 2014

Microsystem Technologies -     

An image-in-image communication scheme using secret sharing and M-ary spread spectrum watermarking

Microsystem Technologies - Secret image sharing is a means of secure transmission of images on an open network through meaningful share generation that reduces suspiciousness of conventional image...     

Containment behaviour in the event of core melt with gaseous and aerosol releases (CONGA)

The CONGA project concentrated on theoretical and experimental studies investigating the behaviour of advanced light water reactor containments containing passive containment heat removal systems and catalytic recombiners expected to be effectively operational during a hypothetical severe accident involving large quantities of aerosol particles and noncondensable gases. The central point of interest was the investigation of the effect of aerosol deposition on the condensation heat transfer of specially designed finned-type heat exchangers (HX) as well as the recombination efficiency of catalytic recombiners. A conceptual double-wall Italian PWR design and a SWR1000 design from Siemens were considered specifically as the reference Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR) and Boiling Water Reactor (BWR) designs. An assessment of selected accident scenarios was performed in order to define the range of boundary conditions necessary to perform the experimental studies of the other work packages. Experimental investigations indicated that aerosol deposition accounted for up to 37% loss in the heat removal capacity of the two-tube-layer BWR HX units. However, no significant heat transfer degradation could be observed for the PWR HX units. These results can be attributed to the important differences in the designs and operating conditions of the two units. The tests to study the effect of hydrogen (simulated by helium) on the heat transfer rate for heat exchanger units designed for BWR and PWR applications indicated a degradation less than 30% under various conditions. This was found to be acceptable within the over capacity designed for the heat exchangers or containment characteristics. The tests performed to study the long-term aerosol behaviour in the pressure suppression chamber of the current operating BWRs indicated that the water pool scrubs the aerosol particles effectively and reduces the ultimate aerosol load expected on the off-gas system. The efficiency of the catalytic recombiner system designed by Siemens for the off-gas system was found to be insensitive to the aerosol deposited in the recombiner. A computation code, HTCFOUL, was developed to predict the heat transfer rate of a finned-type heat exchanger subjected to a steam–noncondensable gas mixture containing airborne aerosol particles. The model predicts the non-aerosol part of two tests within a variation of 26% and the aerosol part within 32%.     

Physical Modeling of Fast p-i-n Diodes With Carrier Lifetime Zoning, Part I: Device Model

This paper presents the development and implementation of a physics-based diode model which can simulate aspects of high-voltage diodes such as snappy recovery during punch-through and the modified carrier density profile due to local lifetime control. It uses a Fourier series solution for the ambipolar diffusion equation in the lightly doped base region. The model is compared with finite-element device simulations. A parameter extraction procedure for the diode with lifetime control is proposed in Part II.     

Simulation and Optimization of Diode and Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistor Interaction in a Chopper Cell Using MATLAB and Simulink

Recently, a simulation method for power electronic devices has emerged, which has high accuracy and short run times based on a Fourier model of the device physics. This paper describes the use of the Fourier models for diodes and insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) and implementation in MATLAB and Simulink in a formal optimization strategy. In particular, this paper investigates coupled circuit, diode, and IGBT behavior. Conclusions are drawn concerning device loading and circuit design, particularly the role of stray inductance.     

Operative diagnosis of graph-based systems with multiple faults

The problem of multiple faults diagnosis in safety-critical systems is considered. Error propagation between system components is modeled as a directed graph, where the errors propagate instantaneously along the edges. Some of the system components are equipped with alarms, which ring when abnormal conditions are detected. A diagnosis algorithm identifies the set of potential failure sources based on the set of ringing alarms. The paper introduces the D-FAULTS algorithm, which diagnoses the system when at most two nodes can be failure sources at any time. The concept of sequential diagnosis is also introduced, to deal with an unknown number of faults. Sequential diagnosis is aimed at locating the smallest set of nodes containing at least one fault. Using this approach, a faulty system can be restored to normal condition by executing repeatedly the diagnosis and repair phases. To this purpose, we introduce the sequential diagnosis algorithm S-DIAG with optimal time complexity