A low-power, linear, permanent-magnet generator/energy storagesystem

This paper describes the design, analysis and characterization of a linear permanent magnet generator and capacitive energy storage system for generating electrical power from a single stroke of a salient-pole armature. It is suitable for applications that require relatively low levels of electrical power, such as remote electronic locks. An electromagnetic analysis of the generator is described, and a design optimization methodology for the system is presented. Finally, the performance of a prototype is validated against measurements     

Heating energy use management in residential buildings by temperature control

This paper presents the results of analytical investigations to determine the potential heating energy savings that can be achieved in residential buildings by controlling the house temperature through either night setback or night setback plus day zone setback. A typical U.S. single family house is analyzed for different levels of thermal integrity of the building envelope (i.e., levels of insulation, window glazing, and infiltration). Reduced infiltration, insulated interior walls, and various window orientations are also considered. Results are given for four major U.S. climate zones—cool, temperate, hot-humid, and hot-arid. The analysis shows that both types of setbacks are most effective in loose houses, with the greatest absolute savings for the cool climates, and the greatest percent savings for the hot climates. However, the benefits from thermostat setbacks are smaller for tighter houses, and may actually be counterproductive owing to corollary effects such as increased peak loads and degradation of system efficiency.     

SPARC deficiency leads to early-onset cataractogenesis

PURPOSE: To determine the role of SPARC (secreted protein, acidic, and rich in cysteine) in cataractogenesis by examining mice deficient in a matricellular protein SPARC. METHODS: Mice were rendered SPARC-deficient by a targeted disruption of the gene. Slit-lamp microscopy and histology were used to examine the eyes of SPARC-null and wild-type mice from birth to 14 months of age. RESULTS: SPARC-null mice developed opacities in the posterior cortex of the eye as early as 1.5 months after birth. The diffuse cataracts appeared to progress toward the anterior cortex and reached maturity in many animals by 3.5 months of age. Early stages of cataractogenesis in SPARC-null mice included inhibition of normal lens fiber cell differentiation, degeneration of fiber cells, vacuole formation at the equator, and liquefaction of the cortex. No cataracts were detected in wild-type mice up to the age of 8 months. CONCLUSIONS: The early onset of cataracts in SPARC-null mice establishes that the gene is essential to the maintenance of lens transparency.     

Spatially resolved X-ray diffraction phase mapping and α → β → α transformation kinetics in the heat-affected zone of commercially pure titanium arc welds

Spatially resolved X-ray diffraction (SRXRD) is used to map the α → β → α phase transformation in the heat-affected zone (HAZ) of commercially pure titanium gas tungsten arc welds. In situ SRXRD experiments were conducted using a 180-μm-diameter X-ray beam at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory (SSRL) (Stanford, CA) to probe the phases present in the HAZ of a 1.9 kW weld moving at 1.1 mm/s. Results of sequential linear X-ray diffraction scans made perpendicular to the weld direction were combined to construct a phase transformation map around the liquid weld pool. This map identifies six HAZ microstructural regions between the liquid weld pool and the base metal: (1) α-Ti that is undergoing annealing and recrystallization; (2) completely recrystallized α-Ti; (3) partially transformed α-Ti, where α-Ti and β-Ti coexist; (4) single-phase β-Ti; (5) back-transformed α-Ti; and (6) recrystallized α-Ti plus back-transformed α-Ti. Although the microstructure consisted predominantly of α-Ti, both prior to and after the weld, the crystallographically textured starting material was altered during welding to produce different α-Ti textures within the resulting HAZ. Based on the travel speed of the weld, the α → β transformation was measured to take 1.83 seconds during heating, while the β → α transformation was measured to take 0.91 seconds during cooling. The α → β transformation was characterized to be dominated by long-range diffusional growth on the leading (heating) side of the weld, while the β → α transformation was characterized to be predominantly massive on the trailing (cooling) side of the weld, with a massive growth rate on the order of 100 μm/s.     

The HaLoop approach to large-scale iterative data analysis

The growing demand for large-scale data mining and data analysis applications has led both industry and academia to design new types of highly scalable data-intensive computing platforms. MapReduce has enjoyed particular success. However, MapReduce lacks built-in support for iterative programs, which arise naturally in many applications including data mining, web ranking, graph analysis, and model fitting. This paper (This is an extended version of the VLDB 2010 paper “HaLoop: Efficient Iterative Data Processing on Large Clusters” PVLDB 3(1):285–296, 2010.) presents HaLoop, a modified version of the Hadoop MapReduce framework, that is designed to serve these applications. HaLoop allows iterative applications to be assembled from existing Hadoop programs without modification, and significantly improves their efficiency by providing inter-iteration caching mechanisms and a loop-aware scheduler to exploit these caches. HaLoop retains the fault-tolerance properties of MapReduce through automatic cache recovery and task re-execution. We evaluated HaLoop on a variety of real applications and real datasets. Compared with Hadoop, on average, HaLoop improved runtimes by a factor of 1.85 and shuffled only 4 % as much data between mappers and reducers in the applications that we tested.     

Collagen I Modifies Connexin-43 Hemichannel Activity via Integrin α2β1 Binding in TGFβ1-Evoked Renal Tubular Epithelial Cells

Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) is associated with sustained inflammation and progressive fibrosis, changes that have been linked to altered connexin hemichannel-mediated release of adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Kidney fibrosis develops in response to increased deposition of extracellular matrix (ECM), and up-regulation of collagen I is an early marker of renal disease. With ECM remodeling known to promote a loss of epithelial stability, in the current study we used a clonal human kidney (HK2) model of proximal tubular epithelial cells to determine if collagen I modulates changes in cell function, via connexin-43 (Cx43) hemichannel ATP release. HK2 cells were cultured on collagen I and treated with the beta 1 isoform of the pro-fibrotic cytokine transforming growth factor (TGFβ1) ± the Cx43 mimetic Peptide 5 and/or an anti-integrin α2β1 neutralizing antibody. Phase microscopy and immunocytochemistry observed changes in cell morphology and cytoskeletal reorganization, whilst immunoblotting and ELISA identified changes in protein expression and secretion. Carboxyfluorescein dye uptake and biosensing measured hemichannel activity and ATP release. A Cytoselect extracellular matrix adhesion assay assessed changes in cell-substrate interactions. Collagen I and TGFβ1 synergistically evoked increased hemichannel activity and ATP release. This was paralleled by changes to markers of tubular injury, partly mediated by integrin α2β1/integrin-like kinase signaling. The co-incubation of the hemichannel blocker Peptide 5, reduced collagen I/TGFβ1 induced alterations and inhibited a positive feedforward loop between Cx43/ATP release/collagen I. This study highlights a role for collagen I in regulating connexin-mediated hemichannel activity through integrin α2β1 signaling, ahead of establishing Peptide 5 as a potential intervention.     

Preparation of nanosize Pt clusters using ion exchange of Pt(NH3) 4 2+ inside mesoporous channel of MCM-41

Mesoporous molecular sieve MCM-41 with a Si/Al ratio of 35 was obtained by hydrothermal synthesis using a gel mixture with a molar composition of 6 SiO₂0.1 Al₂O₃1 hexadecyltrimethylammonium chloride 0.25 dodecyltrimethylammonium bromide 0.25 tetrapropylammonium bromide0.15 (NH₄)₂O1.5 Na₂O300 H₂O. The MCM-41 sample was calcined in O₂ flow at 813 K and subsequently ion exchanged with Ca²⁺. A small Pt cluster has been supported on the MCM-41 sample following a procedure using ion exchange of Pt(NH₃) ₄ ²⁺ . The Pt(NH₃) ₄ ²⁺ ion supported on MCM-41 has been activated in O₂ flow at 593 K and subsequently reduced with Fh flow at 573 K, in the same way used for the preparation of a Pt cluster entrapped inside the supercage of zeolite NaY. The resulting Pt cluster supported on the MCM-41 shows hydrogen chemisorption oftotal two H atoms per Pt at 296 K (based on the total amount of Pt) and high catalytic activity for hydrogenolysis of ethane. The chemical shift in¹²⁹Xe NMR spectroscopy of adsorbed xenon indicates that the Pt cluster is located inside the mesoporous molecular sieve.     

A power-efficient vertical handover with MIH-based network scanning through consistency check

We propose an power-efficient scanning scheme considering the consistency of the Information Element (IE) for the Media Independent Handover (MIH) based Vertical Handover. Since the Green IT is one of the key issues of the science, we suggested the power saving scheme by extending the information and the event service of the MIH framework to reduce the number of full scanning. We proposed the criteria to select the update MT to quantify the power consumption alongside various network scanning methods. Since the frequent and multiple network scanning incurred by small mobile terminals (MT) is considerable, the scanning avoidance is essential for the framework we suggest. The MIH Information Service (MIIS) provides many usable factors and features for the scanning avoidance. However, because of the absence of the criteria to select the update node, these values are not actually usable. Therefore, we suggest an Energy Efficient Function, which tests the validity of MIIS values and makes a decision on whether to avoid the scanning or not.     

On detecting co-resident cloud instances using network flow watermarking techniques

Virtualization is the cornerstone of the developing third-party compute industry, allowing cloud providers to instantiate multiple virtual machines (VMs) on a single set of physical resources. Customers utilize cloud resources alongside unknown and untrusted parties, creating the co-resident threat—unless perfect isolation is provided by the virtual hypervisor, there exists the possibility for unauthorized access to sensitive customer information through the exploitation of covert side channels. This paper presents co-resident watermarking, a traffic analysis attack that allows a malicious co-resident VM to inject a watermark signature into the network flow of a target instance. This watermark can be used to exfiltrate and broadcast co-residency data from the physical machine, compromising isolation without reliance on internal side channels. As a result, our approach is difficult to defend against without costly underutilization of the physical machine. We evaluate co-resident watermarkingunder a large variety of conditions, system loads and hardware configurations, from a local laboratory environment to production cloud environments (Futuregrid and the University of Oregon’s ACISS). We demonstrate the ability to initiate a covert channel of 4 bits per second, and we can confirm co-residency with a target VM instance in $<$ 10 s. We also show that passive load measurement of the target and subsequent behavior profiling is possible with this attack. We go on to consider the detectability of co-resident watermarking, extending our scheme to create a subtler watermarking attack by imitating legitimate cloud customer behavior. Our investigation demonstrates the need for the careful design of hardware to be used in the cloud.