Fast transmission CT for determining attenuation maps using a collimated line source, rotatable air-copper-lead attenuators and fan-beam collimation

We describe a technique using a line source and a rotatable air-copper-lead assembly to acquire gamma transmission computed tomographic (TCT) data for determining attenuation maps to compensate SPECT emission scans. The technique minimizes problems associated with discriminating 99mTc transmission and 201Tl emission photons and requires only a modest increase in total study time. A 99mTc line source and a stacked foil ("multislat") collimator are placed near the focal line of a fan-beam collimator (114 cm focal length) mounted on one detector of a triple-camera SPECT system. We acquired TCT data of plastic rod and anthropomorphic thorax phantoms to investigate the capability of the line source and rotatable air-copper-lead attenuators to determine attenuation maps. The data were acquired with and without 5.4 MBq (145 microCi) of 201Tl placed in the myocardial chamber of the thorax phantom. Phantoms also were scanned using a curved transmission slab source mounted to a parallel-hole collimator. Fan-beam TCT images have improved resolution compared with parallel-beam TCT images. Two patient scans also were performed to evaluate the clinical usefulness of fan-beam TCT. The rotatable air-copper-lead attenuator method eliminates contamination of emission data by transmission photons and reduces spill-over of emission data into the transmission energy window for some cases. Results show the feasibility of using fast, sequential or interlaced transmission scans of a line source within a rotatable air-copper-lead attenuator assembly to obtain accurate attenuation maps for SPECT attenuation compensation.     

Disordering of the Ni3Si intermetallic compound by mechanical milling

The ordered f c c intermetallic compound Ni₃Si was mechanically milled in a high-energy ball mill. The severe plastic deformation produced by milling induced transformations with increasing milling time as follows: ordered f c c disordered f c c nanocrystalline f c c. The structural and microstructural evolution with milling time was followed by X-ray diffraction, TEM, hardness tests, and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). Complete disordering occurred at milling times of 2 h and kept the saturated H of the DSC peak in the range of estimated enthalpy even after 60 h milling. The structural development during milling of the f c c solid solution for Ni₃Si was presumably dominated by the formation and refinement of a dislocation cell structure into microcrystallites which eventually reached nanometre dimensions.     

A clustering method for concurrent photos obtained from multiple cameras using max-flow network model

With the popularization of digital cameras, the use of several cameras by group photographers at the same event is becoming common. Photographers can share their contents and even take pictures of each other. So it is becoming important to manage concurrent photos from multiple cameras in order to classify many accumulated photos into proper clusters. In this paper, we propose a novel photo clustering method based on the max-flow network algorithm, and we visualize a network graph for cluster verification. To apply our algorithm, input concurrent photos are used to create an edge-weighted graph structure. In order to transform the photo clustering problem into a graph partition one, first we need to construct an Augmented Concurrent photo Graph (ACG) and then rewrite our original problem in terms of the graph partition one using the min-cut max-flow network model. The previous methods dealt with photo clustering as a 1-D problem using a linear partition. But we consider clustering for concurrent group photos as a 2-D partition based on other users’ photo contents. Each photo is used to create a node and similarities between photos are used to create the edge weights (capacities) of the network. We partition the network into two subgraphs according to the min-cut, which represents the weakest edge connections between the photos. Using repeated graph partitions for each subgraph (sub-network), we can obtain suitable subgraphs corresponding to photo clusters. The graph construction or partition can be adjusted according to user preferences in order to obtain the intended results.     

Development and optimal design of a HDD spindle motor with pulling magnet to reduce electrical loss

A conventional hard disk drive (HDD) spindle motor has a pulling plate to generate the axial magnetic force. However, the pulling plate consumes significant amount of iron loss due to the alternating magnetic field on the pulling plate. We propose the new design of a HDD spindle motor with pulling magnet to generate the pre-load as well as to eliminate the iron loss of the pulling plate. We also develop an optimal design methodology to minimize iron and copper losses from the spindle motor of a computer HDD while maintaining the same level of torque ripple and pulling force. The new design is optimized by the developed optimal design methodology. A metamodel is constructed from the three-dimensional finite element analysis of the magnetic field and the meta-modeling techniques, and the accuracies of the metamodels are discussed. The proposed optimal design problem is solved by the progressive quadratic approximation method. The proposed design reduces the electrical loss of the HDD spindle motor by 30.42?% while maintaining the same level of torque ripple and pulling force.     

Design of small-area and high-efficiency DC-DC converter for 1 T SRAM

The direct current-direct current (DC-DC) converter is designed for 1 T static random access memory (SRAM) used in display driver integrated circuits (ICs), which consists of positive word-line voltage (V _PWL), negative word-line voltage (V _NWL) and half-V _DD voltage (V _HDD) generator. To generate a process voltage temperature (PVT)-insensitive V _PWL and V _NWL, a set of circuits were proposed to generate reference voltages using bandgap reference current generators for respective voltage level detectors. Also, a V _PWL regulator and a V _NWL charge pump were proposed for a small-area and low-power design. The proposed V _PWL regulator can provide a large driving current with a small area since it regulates an input voltage (VCI) from 2.5 to 3.3 V. The V _NWL charge pump can be implemented as a high-efficiency circuit with a small area and low power since it can transfer pumped charges to V _NWL node entirely. The DC-DC converter for 1 T SRAM were designed with 0.11 μm mixed signal process and operated well with satisfactory measurement results.     

Integration of evolutional BOMs for design of ship outfitting equipment

PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) as well as enterprise information systems commonly use the BOM (Bill of Material) as a means of communication during product development. BOM has been used for product design, production scheduling, procurement, manufacturing and maintenance as it contains the part list of a subassembly or assembly product. BOM currently plays a key role in the PLM environment because it is an essential product information platform in the industry. In practice, product data should be arranged based on the BOM and product structure. Many shipyards or PLM vendors have attempted to develop a PLM adequate for shipbuilding. However, it is always the premise of the successful PLM implementation to prepare the efficient product structure and BOM.This paper suggests an enterprise BOM which addresses the hierarchy of parts and assembly, product structure and product information of outfitting equipment in marine vessel design. In order to express the evolution of product structures and outfitting information during the ship design, the enterprise BOM is modeled by the structure BOM and the display BOM. Concepts are developed for modeling all levels of product relations with a uniform set of relationships supported by the enterprise BOM. It is shown that the architecture of the structure BOM can be used to define the relationships between assemblies, parts, and a multi-view of an evolutional BOM in ship design. The architecture of the outfitting BOM is also presented using an example of a piping system.     

Sol-Gel Processing and Pyroelectric Properties of Highly Oriented Pb(Mg,Zn)1/3Nb2/3O3 Thin Films

Thin films of Pb(Mg,Zn)_1/3Nb_2/3O₃ (PMZN) were fabricated by spin casting the partially hydrolyzed Pb-Mg-Zn-Nb-O complex alkoxide sols on (111)Pt-coated MgO (100) planes. A strong preferential orientation of (100) perovskite was observed in the thin film derived from the sol exhibiting pseudoplastic behavior. A small-angle X-ray scattering experiment in the Porod region was performed to correlate the observed preferential orientation with the network structure of precursor in the PMZN sol. It was shown that weakly branched precursor systems led to highly oriented perovskite grains after thin-film formation. The highly (100) oriented PMZN film exhibited a larger pyroelectric coefficient (>2 μC/(cm²-K)) and pyroelectric figure-of-merit ( F _D > 4 × 10^1–4 Pa^−1/2) than the PMZN thin film having randomly oriented grains.     

A method for evaluating fault coverage using simulated fault injection for digitalized systems in nuclear power plants

The fault coverage for digital system in nuclear power plants is evaluated using a simulated fault injection method. Digital systems have numerous advantages, such as hardware elements share and hardware replication of the needed number of independent channels. However, the application of digital systems to safety-critical systems in nuclear power plants has been limited due to reliability concerns. In the reliability issues, fault coverage is one of the most important factors. In this study, we propose an evaluation method of the fault coverage for safety-critical digital systems in nuclear power plants. The system under assessment is a local coincidence logic processor for a digital plant protection system at Ulchin nuclear power plant units 5 and 6. The assessed system is simplified and then a simulated fault injection method is applied to evaluate the fault coverage of two fault detection mechanisms. From the simulated fault injection experiment, the fault detection coverage of the watchdog timer is 44.2% and that of the read only memory (ROM) checksum is 50.5%. Our experiments show that the fault coverage of a safety-critical digital system is effectively quantified using the simulated fault injection method.     

Controlled density of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes in a triode plasma chemical vapor deposition system

We report on the growth mechanism and density control of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes using a triode plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition system. The deposition reactor was designed in order to allow the intermediate mesh electrode to be biased independently from the ground and power electrodes. The CNTs grown with a mesh bias of + 300 V show a density of ∼ 1.5 μm^− 2 and a height of ∼ 5 μm. However, CNTs do not grow when the mesh electrode is biased to − 300 V. The growth of CNTs can be controlled by the mesh electrode bias which in turn controls the plasma density and ion flux on the sample.     

Low turn-on voltage and series resistance of polarization-induced InGaN-GaN LEDs by using p-InGaN/p-GaN superlattice

We have demonstrated high-performance InGaN-GaN multiple quantum-wells light-emitting diodes (LEDs) using polarization-induced (PI) p-InGaN-GaN superlattice. Electrical measurements show that PI LEDs produce much lower series resistance and turn-on voltage (at 20 mA) as compared to those of normal LEDs without the superlattice. It is also shown that the output power and photon wavelength of the PI LEDs remain electrically stable up to a high stress region of 200 mA. However, those of normal LEDs become electrically and optically degraded in excess of 120 mA. These results show that the use of the PI effect is very effective to the improvement of the electrical properties of LEDs.