Current-voltage characteristics of nanoplatelet-based conductive nanocomposites

In this study, a numerical modeling approach was used to investigate the current-voltage behavior of conductive nanoplatelet-based nanocomposites. A three-dimensional continuum Monte Carlo model was employed to randomly disperse the nanoplatelets in a cubic representative volume element. A nonlinear finite element-based model was developed to evaluate the electrical behavior of the nanocomposite for different levels of the applied electric field. Also, the effect of filler loading on nonlinear conductivity behavior of nanocomposites was investigated. The validity of the developed model was verified through qualitative comparison of the simulation results with results obtained from experimental works.     

Electro-Elastic Wetting: A Method to Migrate and Deform Droplets

A new wetting mechanism, termed electro-elastic wetting, and methods to exploit it for droplet manipulation are proposed and demonstrated. The system consists of a droplet of dielectric liquid, an elastic and conductive membrane as its shell, and an electrode-dielectric composite as its substrate. Activation is by an electric field applied between the membrane and the substrate. The equilibrium shape of the droplet is determined by the balance of membrane tension and electrostatic attraction. It is shown that the contact angle of the droplet is governed by a modified Young–Lipmann Equation. It is then demonstrated that it is possible to transport the droplet along a controlled direction, as well as to actively tune its shape, topography, and position by manipulating the spatial distribution of the electrical force.     

Preparation and evaluation of low‐calorie functional ice cream containing inulin,lactulose and Bifidobacterium lactis

This study was aimed to investigate the effects of replacing 5% fat and sugar by inulin and lactulose, respectively, on the survival of Bifidobacterium lactis and physicochemical and sensorial characteristics of the ice cream. Total solids, pH, melting rate and sensory scores of low‐fat and/or low‐sugar ice cream samples did not differ significantly from the control. Overrun and hardness of low‐fat samples were significantly higher than that of the control group (P < 0.01). The viable counts of B. lactis in the low‐sugar synbiotic ice creams were significantly lower than that of other groups at the end of 90‐day storage (P < 0.01).     

Persian speech synthesis using enhanced tacotron based on multi-resolution convolution layers and a convex optimization method

Multimedia Tools and Applications - An end-to-end text-to-speech system generates acoustic features directly from input text to synthesize speech from it. The challenges of using these models for...     

Privacy-preserving federated learning for scalable and high data quality computational-intelligence-as-a-service in Society 5.0

Multimedia Tools and Applications - Training supervised machine learning models like deep learning requires high-quality labelled datasets that contain enough samples from various categories and...     

Change Point Estimation Methods for Control Chart Postsignal Diagnostics: A Literature Review

Control charts are the most popular monitoring tools used to distinguish between special (assignable) and common causes of variation and to detect any changes in processes. The time that a control chart gives an out‐of‐control signal is not the real time of change. The actual time of the change is called the change point. Knowing the real time of the change will help and simplify finding the assignable causes of the signal, which may be the result of a shift in the process mean or change in process variability. This article gives an overview of change point estimation in control charts, provides a classification scheme, and describes the research that has previously appeared in the literature. In addition, a gap analysis in this area provides direction for future research. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Muon Dynamics in the Multilayered Target H�CT/D2/H2�CD2 at Low Temperature

Recently, muon catalyzed fusion in the multilayered targets H/D/T at temperature 3 K has been investigated. The latest theoretical and experimental works have confirmed that muon conversion efficiency in such multilayered systems is low. This strongly affects the muon cycling coefficient in the structure H?CT/D₂/H₂?CD₂. The first layer emits t??(1s) atoms. They are moderated in the pure deuterium layer. In the third layer, the muonic deuterium atoms rapidly cascade and reach the ground state. The probability that a ??p atom reaches the 1s state depends on deuterium concentration. In low concentration of deuterium, the hyperfine transition of d??(1s) atom is of particular interest. A kinetic model for such processes is given. Our work clearly shows Wolfenstein?CGerstein (W.G.) effect.     

Application of neural network and genetic algorithm to powder metallurgy of pure iron

In the present paper, soft computing techniques are applied to optimize the powder metallurgy processing of pure iron. An artificial neural network is trained to predict the stress resulting from a given trend in strain and sintering temperature. To prepare an appropriate model, pure iron powders are compacted and sintered at various temperatures. Subsequently, compression test is conducted at room temperature on the bulked samples. The sintering temperatures and the corresponding stress–strain records are used as sets of data for the training process. The performance of the network is verified by putting aside one set of data and testing the network against it. Eventually, by using a genetic algorithm, an optimization tool is created to predict the optimum sintering temperature for a desired stress–strain behavior. Comparison of the predicted and experimental data confirms the accuracy of the model.     

Thermal and biodegradation properties of poly(lactic acid)/rice straw composites: effects of modified pulping products

Iranian Polymer Journal - In this work, rice straw (RS) as an abundant biomass was chemically thermoplasticized through alkali pulping and benzylation reactions, which destroy inter- and...     

Synthesis and characterization of electrospun cerium-doped bioactive glass/chitosan/polyethylene oxide composite scaffolds for tissue engineering applications

In this study, a series of electrospun chitosan/polyethylene oxide (PEO) nanofibrous scaffolds containing different amount of cerium-doped bioactive glasses (Ce-BGs) have been fabricated and proposed for tissue engineering applications. On a biological level, higher 8Ce-BG content significantly improved cytocompatibility of the scaffolds. Moreover, results of fibroblast cell culture study showed that greater 8Ce-BG content could enhance cell attachment and cell expansion on fiber mesh. Characterization of the scaffolds revealed that increasing 8Ce-BG content caused bioactive glass nanoparticles to agglomerate at a higher rate. The SEM mapping revealed thorough dispersion of submicrometric clusters in all areas of the polymeric matrix. Contact angle measurements showed that increasing 8Ce-BG/CH ratio from 0 to 10 (wt.%) improved wettability of the scaffold significantly. However, by increasing the ratio beyond 10 (wt.%), the wettability values decreased gradually. In conclusion, it was found that increasing 8Ce-BG/CH weight ratio up to 40 (wt.%) in the scaffold system was practical and useful for soft tissue engineering applications.