Mechanical response and multilevel structure of biomimetic hydroxyapatite/polygalacturonic/chitosan nanocomposites

Using an in situ mineralization process that is biomimetic we have synthesized new nanocomposites of chitosan/hydroxyapatite in 50–50 ratio(ChiHAP50), polygalacturonic acid/hydroxyapatite in 50–50 ratio (PgAHAP50) and Chitosan/hydroxyapatite/Polygalacturonic acid (ChiPgAHAP50). Polygalacturonic acid (PgA) is electrostatically complementary to chitosan, and thus is expected to provide stronger interfacial interactions and improve mechanical response. Atomic force imaging of fractured and polished surfaces suggests a multilevel organization in the hydroxyapatite/biopolymer nanocomposite. The AFM images of ChiPgAHAP50 nanocomposite display presence of chitosan rich and polygalacturonic rich domains. These chitosan rich and PgA rich domains are made of smaller globular shaped particles in which, hydroxyapatite nano-particles are embedded in the biopolymer matrix. The average size of the hydroxyapatite particles in PgAHAP50, ChiHAP50 and ChiPgAHAP50 were found to be 25, 42 and 34 nm respectively. The elastic moduli determined from nanoindentation of PgAHAP50, ChiHAP50 and ChiPgAHAP50 composites are 29.81, 17.56 and 23.62 GPa respectively. Hardness values of the three composites in the same order were found to be 1.56, 0.65 and 1.14 GPa respectively. Macro-mechanical tests showed significant enhancement in elastic moduli, strain to failure and compressive strength of ChiPgAHAP50 composites over ChiHAP50 and PgAHAP50.     

Synthesis of high-surface-area complex zirconium phosphates via mechanochemical activation route

 High-power ball mill activation of the mixture of hydrated zirconium and lanthanum salts (oxonitrates, oxochlorides) with ammonium phosphate followed by hydrothermal treatment at temperatures not exceeding 200°C and a nearly neutral pH was found to yield crystalline dispersed phase of a cubic NH₄Zr₂(PO₄)₃ type along with admixtures of disordered orthorhombic compounds of a zirconium orthophosphate type. In the same conditions and at the same Zr/P ratio, hydrothermal treatment of gels obtained by reacting mixed zirconium and lanthanum nitrates solutions with ammonium phosphates yields no crystalline products, and only treatment in acid media generates a phase of the α-ZrPO₄(OH) type coexisting with the NH₄Zr₂(PO₄)₃ phase if polyethylene oxide is present. X-ray powder diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, ³¹MAS-NMR, FTIRS and thermal analysis were applied to elucidate factors affecting crystallization of complex zirconium phosphates in the hydrothermal conditions. The most essential factor appears to be generation of some nuclei of zirconium phosphates under high pressures developed in the course of mixed solids mechanical activation. These nuclei are embedded into matrix of such well-crystallized solid products as ammonium nitrate or chloride. Hence, metastable cubic or orthorhombic structure of the phases obtained via mechanical activation route can be assigned to the nuclei-matrix orientation relationship. Due to easily scaled-up synthesis procedure, these results appear to be very promising for manufacturing of dispersed framework zirconium phosphates as acid catalysts or fast proton conductors. Received: 18 November 1998 / Reviewed and accepted: 2 December 1998     

Damage scenario analysis of bridges using crowdsourced smartphone data from passing vehicles

Bridge wear and deterioration occur over time under typical operations. Inspections can be resource intensive, infrequent, and sometimes require bridge closure. Instrumented passing vehicles may be used to record vibration responses and extract damage-sensitive bridge frequency response characteristics. This paper presents a methodology for extracting bridge frequencies from crowdsourced dynamic response data recorded within passing vehicles. Detected bridge frequency changes and a novel point cloud methodology are used to identify critical damage scenarios and estimate remaining life. The use of a novel crowdsourced Welch methodology allows for spectra averaging that reduces the influence of noise and transient events. Numerical and experimental studies illustrate that bridge frequencies can be accurately estimated and that changes in bridge frequency caused by different damage scenarios can be characterized. Numerical examples for the damage scenario analysis, including estimation of remaining life, are provided for two bridge types and three specific damage scenarios.     

Design and evaluation of an efficient traffic control scheme for integrated voice,video, and data over asynchronous transfer mode networks: Explicit allowed rate algorithm

Asychronous transfer mode (ATM) networks are high‐speed networks with guaranteed quality of service. The main cause of congestion in ATM networks is over utilization of physical bandwidth. Unlike constant bit‐rate (CBR) traffic, the bandwidth reserved by variable bit‐rate (VBR) traffic is not fully utilized at all instances. Hence, this unused bandwidth is allocated to available bit‐rate (ABR) traffic. As the bandwidth used by VBR traffic changes, available bandwidth for ABR traffic varies; i.e., available bandwidth for ABR traffic is inversely proportional to the bandwidth used by the VBR traffic. Based on this fact, a rate‐based congestion control algorithm, Explicit Allowed Rate Algorithm (EARA), is presented in this paper. EARA is compared with Proportional Rate Control Algorithm (PRCA) and Explicit Rate Indication Congestion Avoidance Algorithm (ERICA), in both LAN and WAN environments. Simulations of all three algorithms are conducted under both congestion and fairness configurations with simultaneous generation of CBR, rt‐VBR, nrt‐VBR and ABR traffic. The results show that, with very small over‐head on the switch, EARA significantly decreases the required buffer space and improves the network throughput. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

GPS: a constraint-based gene position procurement in chromosome for solving large-scale multiobjective multiple knapsack problems

The multiple knapsack problem (MKP) forms a base for resolving many real-life problems. This has also been considered with multiple objectives in genetic algorithms (GAs) for proving its efficiency. GAs use self-adaptability to effectively solve complex problems with constraints, but in certain cases, self-adaptability fails by converging toward an infeasible region. This pitfall can be resolved by using different existing repairing techniques; however, this cannot assure convergence toward attaining the optimal solution. To overcome this issue, gene position-based suppression (GPS) has been modeled and embedded as a new phase in a classical GA. This phase works on the genes of a newly generated individual after the recombination phase to retain the solution vector within its feasible region and to improve the solution vector to attain the optimal solution. Genes holding the highest expressibility are reserved into a subset, as the best genes identified from the current individuals by replacing the weaker genes from the subset. This subset is used by the next generated individual to improve the solution vector and to retain the best genes of the individuals. Each gene’s positional point and its genotype exposure for each region in an environment are used to fit the best unique genes. Further, suppression of expression in conflicting gene’s relies on the requirement toward the level of exposure in the environment or in eliminating the duplicate genes from the environment. TheMKP benchmark instances from the OR-library are taken for the experiment to test the new model. The outcome portrays that GPS in a classical GA is superior in most of the cases compared to the other existing repairing techniques.     

Benefits of optical system diversity for multiplexed image reconstruction

Algorithms that use optical system diversity to improve multiplexed image reconstruction from multiple low-resolution images are analyzed and demonstrated. Compared with systems using identical imagers, systems using additional lower-resolution imagers can have improved accuracy and computation. The diverse system is not sensitive to boundary conditions and can take full advantage of improvements that decrease noise and allow an increased number of bits per pixel to represent spatial information in a scene.     

Nanoparticle multilayers: surface modification of photosensitive drug microparticles for increased stability and in vitro bioavailability

The results of this study report the novel use of electrostatic layer-by-layer nanoassembly of biocompatible nanoparticulate TiO2 multilayers to coat irregular nifedipine (NF) microcrystals to increase the photostability of the drug when exposed to simulated sunlight and to increase the dissolution rate and possibly the bioavailability of the drug after oral administration. The photostability of NF microcrystals (35 microm) coated with multiple bilayers of positively charged PDDA and negatively charged nanosized TiO2 particles (20-25 nm) was measured when exposed to an illuminance of 12 W/m2 corresponding to a light dose of 30 k lux or 25 W/m2 corresponding to light dose of 60 k lux. The dissolution rate of nifedipine from the coated microcrystals was measured in simulated gastric fluid containing 0.05% w/v polysorbate 80. Coating with one TiO2 layer increased the shelf life of nifedipine by 30 hours independent of the intensity of the light exposure. With an increase in the number of TiO2 layers; the photostability of the drug was enhanced even more. A TiO2 monolayer decreased the contact angle by 20 degrees for water and 33 degrees for the dissolution medium as compared with uncoated NF surfaces. This increase in wettability due to a decrease in contact angle increased the dissolution rate of nifedipine microcrystals coated with 1 PDDA/TiO2 bilayer 13-fold after 10 minutes, 5-fold after 1 hour, and 2-fold after 12 hours when compared to uncoated microcrystals. It is assumed that TiO2 increased the photostability because the nanoparticulate multilayers acts as a potential filter protecting the drug from damaging light rays reaching the drug crystals. The dissolution rate was increased because the hydrophilic TiO2 nanoparticles increased the aqueous wettability of the drug crystals thereby preventing aggregation in the dissolution medium. This ensured that the maximum drug surface area was exposed to the dissolution medium.     

Spray pyrolytically deposited nanoporous Ti doped hematite thin films for efficient photoelectrochemical splitting of water

Nanoporous hematite (α-Fe₂O₃) thin films doped with Ti⁴⁺ deposited by spray-pyrolysis were successfully used in photoelectrochemical splitting of water for solar hydrogen production. X-ray diffraction, field emission scanning electron microscopy, UV–visible absorption and photoelectrochemical studies have been performed on the undoped and Ti⁴⁺ doped hematite thin films. Morphology of α-Fe₂O₃ thin films was observed to be nanoporous, with increased porosity (pore size ∼12 to 20 nm) on increasing doping concentration. A significant decrease in the bandgap energy from 1.95 to 1.27 eV was found due to doping. α-Fe₂O₃ film doped with 0.02 M Ti⁴⁺ ions exhibited best solar to hydrogen conversion efficiency (photoconversion efficiency) of 1.38% at 0.5 V/SCE. Highest photocurrent densities of 0.34 mA/cm² at zero bias and 1.98 mA/cm² at 0.5 V/SCE were obtained by incorporating 0.02 M Ti⁴⁺ in α-Fe₂O₃, which are significantly larger than earlier reported values. Donor density (30.8 × 10²⁰ cm⁻³) and flatband potential (−1.01 V/SCE) obtained were also maximum for this sample. Hydrogen collected in 1 hr at Pt electrode with the best photoelectrode was 2.44 mL with 150 mW/cm² visible light source.