Analytical Determination of the Distribution of Polishing Time over the Surface of Polished Tiles

Several kinds of glossiness pattern can be seen on the surface of porcelain stoneware tiles right after the polishing process, as a function of the kinematics performed by the polishing heads. For the newest generation of industrial polishing trains, where a transverse oscillation is included, there is still a great need for literature about the resulting patterns. This paper intends to find the spatial distribution of time under polishing analytically using the kinematics equations involved in the polishing process. The measured values of glossiness collected from three polished tiles are also presented. The importance of adopting a good kinematics for the polishing process has been highlighted, and the equations developed herein are useful tools for further attempts at optimizing the polishing process.     

Fiber Coating Concepts for Brittle-Matrix Composites

The current interest in tough, high-temperature materials has motivated fiber coating development for brittle-matrix composites with brittle reinforcements. Such coatings are needed for controlled interface debonding and frictional sliding. The system investigated in this study was sapphire fiber-reinforced alumina. This system is thermochemically stable for severe use conditions, exhibits little thermal expansion mismatch, and utilizes the excellent strength and creep resistance of sapphire reinforcements. Porous oxide and refractory metal coatings which satisfy requirements for toughness improvement in these composites were identified by employing a variety of newly developed mechanical testing techniques for determining the interfacial fracture energies and sliding resistances.     

Impacts of new technologies on media usage and social behaviour in domestic environments

Technological infrastructure at home is changing continuously and is becoming increasingly interconnected. Media devices, including the TV set, provide access to the Internet and offer manifold opportunities to consume media on demand. Additionally, personal devices, such as smartphones, also enable flexible consumption and sharing of media. Questions about how these technologies change the user's media usage and how these changes affect the social structure of a household, however, remain largely unanswered. In order to gain insight into the adoption of new technologies into daily routines, we explored these changes in respect of people's media usage in a qualitative long-term Living Lab study. We will present findings regarding personal routines, flexible integration of new devices into existing practices, influences on households as social systems and related issues in device access and collective use. We will highlight potentials and conflicts regarding device shifts and roles; restrictions in device access; social influences in the living room; and individual changes in media consumption.     

Scalable Realistic Rendering with Many‐Light Methods

Recent years have seen increasing attention and significant progress in many‐light rendering, a class of methods for efficient computation of global illumination. The many‐light formulation offers a unified mathematical framework for the problem reducing the full lighting transport simulation to the calculation of the direct illumination from many virtual light sources. These methods are unrivaled in their scalability: they are able to produce plausible images in a fraction of a second but also converge to the full solution over time. In this state‐of‐the‐art report, we give an easy‐to‐follow, introductory tutorial of the many‐light theory; provide a comprehensive, unified survey of the topic with a comparison of the main algorithms; discuss limitations regarding materials and light transport phenomena and present a vision to motivate and guide future research. We will cover both the fundamental concepts as well as improvements, extensions and applications of many‐light rendering.     

Nucleating activity of the quinacridone and phthalocyanine pigments in polypropylene crystallization

The nucleating ability of two organic pigments, quinacridone and phthalocyanine, in nonisothermal polypropylene (PP) crystallization was investigated. The investigations were carried out using DSC and polarizing microscopy. The efficiency of pigments in the nucleation process was determined in a simple test comparing the crystallization temperature of the PP‐containing pigments with respect to the pure polymer. Both pigments revealed good nucleating activity. In the presence of pigments the increment of the crystallization temperature and the increase of nucleation rate were observed. The nucleating efficiency of pigments was confirmed in investigations of the obtained structure. The nucleating activity of pigments was explained by their features fulfilling several requirements for good nucleating agents. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 90: 3957–3964, 2003     

APPLICATION OF LINEARIZED MODELS OF MULTICOMPONENT MASS TRANSFER FOR CALCULATION OF EVAPORATION-CONDENSATION PROCESS IN TERNARY SYSTEMS

Results of calculations based on a linearized multicomponent mass transfer theory developed by Burghardt and Krupiczka are compared with experimental data of Modine for condensation-evaporation process in ternary systems. These data have been obtained for acetone-benzene-nitrogen and acetone-benzene-helium in a welted wall column. Models I and II, which take into account diffusional interactions of components in a mullicomponent mixture show good agreement with the experiments as well as with other calculation methods (Krishna-Standart and Toor-Stewart-Prober). When multicomponent mass transfer occurs in the presence of inert species, a straightforward Model II is recommended. Model I, which is more universal, requires some iterative calculations with respect to the sum of mass fluxes. According to theoretical considerations the latter model is limited to the case of low total mass flux. The results of calculations for the systems studied were reasonably good though the total mass fluxes were not small. The calculation procedure based on the presented linearized models are convergent to the proper solutions in contrast to the Krishna-Standart Model IV which in some cases can be unstable.     

Driving as a human: a track learning based adaptable architecture for a car racing controller

We present the evolution and current state of the Mr. Racer car racing controller that excelled at the corresponding TORCS competitions of the last years. Although several heuristics and black-box optimization methods are employed, the basic idea of the controller architecture has been to take over many of the mechanisms human racing drivers apply. They learn the track geometry, plan ahead, and wherever necessary, adapt their plans to the current circumstances quickly. Mr. Racer consists of several modules that have partly been adapted and optimized separately, where the final tuning is usually done with respect to a certain racing track during the warmup phase of the TORCS competitions. We also undertake an experimental evaluation that investigates how the controller profits from adding some of the modules to a basic configuration and which modules are most important for reaching the best possible performance.     

Photocatalytic degradation rate of oxalic acid on the semiconductive layer of n-TiO2 particles in the batch mode plate reactor Part I: Mass transfer limits

Organic compounds dissolved in water can be decomposed on a layer of n-TiO2 particles irradiated by u.v. light, which generates holes and electrons in the TiO2 material. Dissolved oxygen was used as electron scavenger and holes reacted with water to give OH radicals. The rate of degradation of the dissolved organic compounds by OH radicals is limited by the transfer of either oxygen or of theorganic compounds to the surface of n-TiO2 particles. The consequence of these limits is that, in the batch mode reactor with recirculation of the liquid, the dependence of the concentration of an organic compound on time has either a linear or an exponential form. Experiments with decomposition of oxalic acid in aqueous solutions using a plate reactor (60 cm × 120 cm) confirmed the analysis. Equations for evaluation of the mass transfer coefficient of the dissolved species to the surface of the plate reactor with a moving liquid fil m were developed for the case of the thickness of the Nernst diffusion layer being thinner than the thickness of the liquid. The experimentally obtained decomposition rate of oxalic acid was about 60 to 80% of the theoretical decomposition rate limited by oxygen flux through the film of a moving liquid. The present theory neglects the diffusion of oxygen into the porous layer of n-TiO2.     

HamleDT: Harmonized multi-language dependency treebank

We present HamleDT—a HArmonized Multi-LanguagE Dependency Treebank. HamleDT is a compilation of existing dependency treebanks (or dependency conversions of other treebanks), transformed so that they all conform to the same annotation style. In the present article, we provide a thorough investigation and discussion of a number of phenomena that are comparable across languages, though their annotation in treebanks often differs. We claim that transformation procedures can be designed to automatically identify most such phenomena and convert them to a unified annotation style. This unification is beneficial both to comparative corpus linguistics and to machine learning of syntactic parsing.     

Drying-induced stresses in elastic and viscoelastic saturated materials

The paper presents a theoretical analysis of stresses generated during convective drying of kaolin, based on elastic and viscoelastic models. The equations of these models were solved analytically for a cylindrically shaped sample; the distribution and evolution of the radial and circumferential stresses are illustrated in diagrams. The acoustic emission method was used in experimental tests for identification on line of the time period during which the stresses reach their maximal values. A better correlation has been found between the experimental tests and the theoretical predictions obtained on the basis of the viscoelastic model.