Pressure leaching of metals from waste printed circuit boards using sulfuric acid

Printed circuit boards (PCBs) are essential components of electronic equipments which contain various metallic values. This paper reports a hydrometallurgical recycling process for waste PCBs, which consists of the novel pretreatment consisting of organic swelling of PCBs followed by sulfuric acid leaching of metals from waste PCBs. To recycle the waste PCBs, experiments were carried out for the recovery of copper from the crushed and organic swelled materials of waste PCBs using sulfuric acid leaching in presence of hydrogen peroxide under atmospheric and pressure condition. The leaching of PCBs at 90°C, pulp density 100 g/L under atmospheric condition, using 6M sulfuric acid resulted in the dissolution of a minor amount of copper due to the presence of plastic coating on the surface of metallic layers. On the other hand, when the liberated metal sheets from organic swelled PCBs were treated with dilute sulfuric acid of concentration 2M along with hydrogen peroxide in an autoclave under oxygen atmosphere, the percentage recovery of copper was found to increase from 59.63% to 97.01% with an increase in hydrogen peroxide concentration from 5 to 15% (v/v) keeping constant pulp density 30 g/L.     

Change-Point Detection in Binomial Thinning Processes,with Applications in Epidemiology

Abstract

Most of the classical change-point detection schemes are designed for the sequences of independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) random variables. In this article, motivated by the outbreak of 2009 H1N1 pandemic influenza, we develop change-point detection procedures for the susceptible–infected–recovered (SIR) epidemic model, where a change-point in the infection rate parameter signifies either the beginning or the end of an epidemic trend.

The considered model falls into a general class of binomial thinning processes, which is a Markov chain. The cumulative sum (CUSUM) change-point detection procedure is developed for this class, and its performance is evaluated. Apparently, the CUSUM stopping rule is no longer optimal for this non-i.i.d. case. It can be improved by introducing a non constant adaptive threshold. The resulting modified scheme attains a shorter mean delay and at the same time a longer expected time of a false alarm, given that a false alarm eventually occurs.

Proposed detection procedures are applied to the 2001–2012 influenza data published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.     

Enhancing hydrogen storage capacity of pyridine-based metal organic framework

Using first principles calculations, we show that the storage capacity as well as desorption temperature of MOFs can be significantly enhanced by decorating pyridine (a common linker in MOFs) by metal atoms. The storage capacity of metal-pyridine complexes are found to be dependent on the type of decorating metal atom. Among the 3d transition metal atoms, Sc turns out to be the most efficient storing unto four H₂ molecules. Most importantly, Sc does not suffer dimerisation on the surface of pyridine, keeping the storage capacity of every metal atom intact. Based on these findings, we propose a metal-decorated pyridine-based MOFs, which has potential to meet the required H₂ storage capacity for vehicular usage.     

Analysis of end straightness of rail during manufacturing

Analysis has been carried out in order to judge the straightness of a finished rail for a specific set of parameters of the straightening machine. Finite element method has been used here for simulation and analysis. It has been noted that straightness of rail near the ends differ considerably compared to the straightness in the middle portion of the rail. The article provides guidance for the minimum length of the rail to be cut, in order to achieve the end straightness of a new rail within acceptable limits. The present study has also proposed to use a finite element model of 7.0 m rail length only for similar study, in order to save computer time and storage space largely.     

Secure CLS and CL-AS schemes designed for VANETs

The Journal of Supercomputing - Vehicular Ad hoc Network (VANET) is a part of intelligent transport system facing the problem of limited bandwidth. Certificateless aggregate signature (CL-AS)...     

Trajectory Tracking Control with Heterogeneous Input Delay in Multi-Agent System

In this paper we present a protocol to track a general trajectory for a multi-agent system in the presence of heterogeneous constant finite input delays. We consider two different multi-agent cases: agents with single-integrator and double-integrator dynamics. For the single-integrator case, we assume that the velocity along the desired trajectory is known to all agents for all time. Similar assumption is made only for the acceleration along the desired trajectory for the double-integrator case. It is assumed that at least one agent has the complete information about the desired trajectory for all time. The tracking strategy comprises of a consensus-based estimator and a simple independent tracking controller for each agent in the system. Only the state estimates are exchanged among the agents. The communication graph for the multi-agent system along with the desired trajectory has a rooted directed spanning tree with the desired trajectory being the root. The proposed tracking strategy ensures asymptotic convergence of the multi-agent system. The controller and estimator gains do not depend on the edge weights of the graph. The chosen controller gains of individual agent are bounded by their respective input delays. We present a particular form of control gains in order to achieve a desired possible exponential convergence rate and maximize the upper bound of the convergence rate for these selective gains. Finally, we present simulation results to substantiate the effectiveness of the proposed methodology. Comparison of the proposed strategy with the existing work in the literature show a better performance.     

Intelligent Physical Layer Secure Relay Selection for Wireless Cooperative Networks with Multiple Eavesdroppers

Wireless Personal Communications - The modern and emerging wireless communication technologies are benefiting from relaying techniques, which is already adopted in long term evolution (LTE) Release...     

Wear and friction characteristics of atmospheric plasma sprayed Cr3C2–NiCr coatings

ABSTRACT

The present work focuses on investigating the wear and friction characteristics of the Atmospheric Plasma Sprayed Cr₃C₂-NiCr coatings deposited onto the surface of die steel material. The as-sprayed specimens were characterized. The coating porosity, bond strength and microhardness values were evaluated. Wear tests were performed on the high-temperature pin-on-disc tribometer at room temperatures, 400°C and 800°C under two loads as 25N and 50N in the laboratory. The wear mechanisms of all the worn-out samples were studied by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) technique. The specific wear rates and the coefficient of friction values were analyzed. The developed coating showed better wear resistance than its uncoated counterpart. The coefficient of friction values for coated specimens decreased at elevated temperatures. At room temperatures, the wear mode was observed to be adhesive and further at elevated temperatures of testing, the wear mode was observed to be the combination of oxidative, adhesive and abrasive.     

Does the length of the short chain branch affect the mechanical properties of linear low density polyethylenes? An investigation based on films of copolymers of ethylene/1-butene, ethylene/1-hexene and ethylene/1-octene synthesized by a single site metallocene catalyst

Three nearly identical linear low density polyethylene resins based on copolymers of ethylene with 1-butene (B), 1-hexene (H) and 1-octene (O) were utilized to investigate the effect of short chain branch length on the mechanical properties of blown and compression molded (quenched and slow cooled) films. The content of short chain comononer in the three copolymers was ca. 2.5-2.9 mol% that corresponded to a density of 0.917-0.918 g/cm³. Within a given series, the tensile properties of these films do not show any significant difference at slow deformation rates (up to 510 mm/min), even though the DSC and TREF profiles of ‘H’ and ‘O’ differed slightly in comparison to ‘B’. However, at higher deformation rates (ca. 1 m/s), the breaking strength of these films was found to increase with increasing short chain branch length. In addition, the Spencer impact and Elmendorf tear strength of the blown films were also observed to increase with increasing short chain branch length. Further, dart impact strength and high-speed puncture resistance (5.1 m/s) of 1-octene and 1-hexene based samples was also observed to be higher than that based on 1-butene. The blown films displayed low and comparable levels of equivalent in-plane birefringence and crystalline orientation by wide angle X-ray scattering. This confirms that the differences in mechanical properties in the blown film series are not attributable to differences in molecular orientation. The deformation behavior of both the compression molded and blown films were also investigated in a well-defined controlled regime by analyzing their essential work of fracture. It was found that the essential work of fracture of films based on 1-hexene and 1-octene was higher than that of films based on 1-butene. While the origin of these differences in mechanical properties with increasing short chain branch length is not fully understood, the present investigation confirms this effect to be pronounced at high deformation rates for both the blown and compression molded quenched films.