Quasi‐isothermal DSC testing of epoxy adhesives using initial fast heating rates

Three major factors decrease the accuracy of the cure measurement in standard‐isothermal testing using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). First, cure occurs during the heating step. Second, data are lost during the stabilization period between the dynamic and isothermal step. Third, the baseline selection requires a modification to the protocol. An alternative, which is explored in this study, is the use of fast ramps, which decrease the heating time, but this has been avoided due to overshoot that occurs between the dynamic and isothermal step, which is troublesome for systems with autocatalytic kinetics. By mitigating these factors, a quasi‐isothermal protocol was developed. Therefore, more complete cure kinetics were captured with the implementation of fast DSC to decrease the ramp time and through the optimization of furnace parameters to decrease stabilization time and temperature overshoot. The data suggested this quasi‐isothermal analysis more accurately measured the isothermal curing kinetics of a commercial epoxy adhesive at 110, 115, and 120 °C for fast ramps of 175, 350, and 500 K/min compared to the traditional ramp of 5 K/min. The enthalpy spike at the dynamic to isothermal transition remains an issue; however, an empirical shift can be used to compensate for the enthalpy signal lag. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2017 , 134, 45425.     

Sediment Pulse Behaviour Following Dam Removal in Gravel‐Bed Rivers

As dams approach the end of their useful life, there is need to predict where and how accumulated sediment will move following dam removal to estimate and mitigate the impacts of this process on aquatic habitat and infrastructure. Flume studies suggest that sediment pulses disperse in place for most dams, but it is hypothesized that certain conditions (e.g., low Froude number, fine pulse grain size, small pulse sizes, and large peak discharge) may characterize pulses that translate downstream. However, quantitative analyses of sediment pulse behavior have not been widely conducted in field settings. We thus analyzed bathymetric data from four field sites in Oregon to investigate the reliability of flume‐derived hypotheses (1) whether dispersion or translation dominates across a range of dam removal physiographies using multiple methods of evaluation and (2) if Froude number, pulse material grain size, relative pulse size, and discharge can predict reservoir sediment movement mode. Results indicated that dispersion generally dominated pulse behavior in the field setting, with some limited evidence of translational movement in individual years. The Froude number appeared to be the most reliable for anticipating pulse behavior. Further work is needed to link generalized sediment pulse behavior to sediment mobilization and transport processes. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An Arduino-based device for visually impaired people to play videogames

Multimedia Tools and Applications - Blind players have many difficulties to access video games since most of them rely on impressive graphics and immersive visual experiences. To overcome this...     

Optimization of freezing parameters for freeze-drying mango (Mangifera indica L.) slices

Today, there is an increasing trend toward consuming healthful food products, and dried fruits are one option for obtaining desirable nutrition in dehydrated products. Proper drying method selection is important for minimizing quality losses. Lyophilization (freeze-drying), a technique that removes water by sublimation at low temperature, can produce excellent dried products. Fast vacuum induction during freezing has been proposed as a way to control ice nucleation and to obtain enhanced lyophilized pharmaceutical products. However, this technique has not yet been applied to food freeze-drying. The aim of this work was to evaluate the effects of the freezing rate (0.4, 0.25, and 0.1°C/min), the minimum chamber pressure during vacuum-induced surface freezing (900, 700, and 500?mTorr) and the sample temperature at which the induced vacuum was applied (0, ?2, and ?4°C) on the total process time, final moisture content, rehydration capacity, total color difference, and total polyphenol content during the lyophilization of mango (Mangifera indica L.) slices. A Box–Behnken design with three factors at three levels was used to design the experiments, to generate the polynomial equations relating the dependent and independent variables, and to determine the optimal operational conditions. The results highlight the reduction of total process time (30%) at high freezing rates and the influence of the tested operating conditions on freeze-drying optimization. It was found that the optimal conditions that satisfy commercial quality goals were pressure between 500 and 650?mTorr, temperature between ?2 and 0°C, and freezing rate values close to 0.4°C/min.     

Modeling Superconducting Transmission Line Bends and Their Impact on Nonlinear Effects

This paper reports on a numerical technique to obtain the current distribution in the annular bent sections of planar layouts. This is used to obtain the linear and nonlinear circuit distributed parameters modeling a superconducting strip bend and its impact on intermodulation distortion. As an example, we analyze a superconductive open-loop resonator and assess the linear and nonlinear contribution of its bends in its overall linear and nonlinear performance. These simulations are very useful for optimizing the resonators of a filter in order to minimize its nonlinear distortion     

Simplifying the signature in second-order unification

Second-Order Unification is undecidable even for very specialized fragments. The signature plays a crucial role in these fragments. If all symbols are monadic, then the problem is NP-complete, whereas it is enough to have just one binary constant to lose decidability. In this work we reduce Second-Order Unification to Second-Order Unification with a signature that contains just one binary function symbol and constants. The reduction is based on partially currying the equations by using the binary function symbol for explicit application @. Our work simplifies the study of Second-Order Unification and some of its variants, like Context Unification and Bounded Second-Order Unification.     

Serotonin 5-HT1A and 5-HT? receptors in an impulsive–aggressive phenotype.

In adult male hamsters, individual differences in offensive aggression are correlated with differences in impulsive choice and decreased serotonin (5-HT) innervation. As serotonin 1A (5-HT1A) receptors participate in the inhibition of aggression, whereas 5-HT?receptor activation facilitates aggression, the authors hypothesized that differences in their expression are associated with differences in behavior. The authors confirmed previous behavioral associations, using a delay-discounting paradigm with various delays, as high-aggression (H-Agg) hamsters preferred the immediate-reward lever over the delayed-reward lever under most delays, compared with low-aggression (L-Agg) hamsters. Although the authors observed a greater density of 5-HT1A receptor immunoreactivity in H-Agg hamsters within several areas, it appears to be related to a lack of serotonin release, as supported by further observations of decreased immunoreactive perikarya and 5-HT1A receptors in fluoxetine-treated hamsters. Also, 5-HT? receptor density was greater in H-Agg hamsters within select areas. The data indicate a convergence of impulsive and aggressive characteristics to one phenotype that is associated with various aspects of serotonin function, such as serotonin release and differential expression of 5-HT1A and 5-HT? receptors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A note on decoupling of local and global behaviours for the Dagum Random Field

Self-affinity versus decoupling: this dichotomy represents a breakthrough with respect to the previous literature, that has grown under the dogma of self-affinity. The word decoupling refers to those correlation functions allowing to treat independently the Hausdorff–Besicovitch dimension and Hurst effect parameters. The former is a roughness measure associated to profiles or surfaces. The latter reflects possible persistent or antipersistent behaviours of the associated random process or random field. Thus, the decoupling philosophy opens new avenues for the analysis and interpretation of local and global properties of random fields. In this paper, we introduce a new class of isotropic correlation functions, called Dagum, show its permissibility on any n-dimensional space, and analyse its attitudes with respect to decoupling. Interesting aspects arise from an intensive simulation study, conducted in one and two dimensions. In particular, it seems that the decoupling attitude may depend on the space dimension.     

Intermodulation Distortion in Coupled-Resonator Filters With Nonuniformly Distributed Nonlinear Properties—Use in HTS IMD Compensation

We present a general procedure for calculating intermodulation distortion in coupled-resonator filters that allows one to predict the performance of a nonlinear filter as a function of the general nodal matrix defining the filter and the material parameters that cause the nonlinear behavior. It is valid for almost any type of nonlinear distributed effects, including those produced by high-temperature superconductors, nonlinear dielectrics such as ferroelectrics, or superconductor/ferroelectric bilayers, and it is valid when the spatial distribution of nonlinearities is not uniform. The procedure has been validated with experimental measurements in an eight-pole quasi-elliptic superconducting filter. Using this procedure, we have assessed a combination of materials with different types of nonlinear effects to partially or completely mitigate the filter's nonlinear response. This includes superconducting filters with a ferroelectric pre- or post-distorter stage or even with intermediate ferroelectric compensation stages     

Energy-saving light positioning using heuristic search

A new definition is given to the problem of light positioning in a closed environment, aiming at obtaining, for a global illumination radiosity solution, the position and emission power for a given number of lights that provide a desired illumination at a minimum total emission power. Such a desired illumination is expressed using minimum and/or maximum values of irradiance allowed, resulting in a combinatory optimization problem. A pre-process computes and stores irradiances for a pre-established set of light positions by means of a radiosity random walk. The reuse of photon paths makes this pre-process reasonably cheap. Different heuristic search algorithms, combined to linear programming, are discussed and compared, from the simplest hill climbing strategies to the more sophisticated population-based and hybrid approaches. The paper shows how the presented approaches make it possible to obtain a good solution to the problem at a reasonable cost.