A graph coloring constructive hyper-heuristic for examination timetabling problems

In this work we investigate a new graph coloring constructive hyper-heuristic for solving examination timetabling problems. We utilize the hierarchical hybridizations of four low level graph coloring heuristics, these being largest degree, saturation degree, largest colored degree and largest enrollment. These are hybridized to produce four ordered lists. For each list, the difficulty index of scheduling the first exam is calculated by considering its order in all lists to obtain a combined evaluation of its difficulty. The most difficult exam to be scheduled is scheduled first (i.e. the one with the minimum difficulty index). To improve the effectiveness of timeslot selection, a?roulette wheel selection mechanism is included in the algorithm to probabilistically select an appropriate timeslot for the chosen exam. We test our proposed approach on the most widely used un-capacitated Carter benchmarks and also on the recently introduced examination timetable dataset from the 2007 International Timetabling Competition. Compared against other methodologies, our results demonstrate that the graph coloring constructive hyper-heuristic produces good results and outperforms other approaches on some of the benchmark instances.     

一种Ka波段低相噪GaAs HBT压控振荡器

本文研究了一种采用GaAs HBT工艺实现的工作在Ka波段的压控振荡器。该振荡器采用共射级组态和对称式电容电感谐振腔结构以降低其相位噪声,采用π型反馈网络补偿180°相移。在片测试结果表明：偏离中心频率1 MHz处相位噪声为-96.47dBc/Hz,调谐范围为28.312到28.695GHz,在-6V电源电压下该振荡器直流功耗为18mA,振荡器芯片面积为0.7mm×0.7mm。     

Temperature dependent interfacial and electrical characteristics during atomic layer deposition and annealing of HfO2 films in p-GaAs metal-oxide-semiconductor capacitors

We have investigated the temperature dependent interfacial and electrical characteristics of p-GaAs metal-oxide-semiconductor capacitors during atomic layer deposition(ALD) and annealing of HfO₂ using the tetrakis(ethylmethyl) amino hafnium precursor. The leakage current decreases with the increase of the ALD temperature and the lowest current is obtained at 300℃ as a result of the Frenkel-Poole conduction induced leakage current being greatly weakened by the reduction of interfacial oxides at the higher temperature. Post deposition annealing(PDA) at 500℃ after ALD at 300℃ leads to the lowest leakage current compared with other annealing temperatures. A pronounced reduction in As oxides during PDA at 500℃ has been observed using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy at the interface resulting in a proportional increase in Ga₂O₃. The increment of Ga₂O₃ after PDA depends on the amount of residual As oxides after ALD. Thus, the ALD temperature plays an important role in determining the high-k/GaAs interface condition. Meanwhile, an optimum PDA temperature is essential for obtaining good dielectric properties.     

Narrow‐band interference suppression in wavelet packets based multicarrier multicode CDMA overlay system

The wavelet packets based multicarrier (MC) multicode (MCD) code‐division multiple‐access (CDMA) transceiver consists of the MCD part, which ensures the transmission for high speed and flexible data rate; the MC part contributing to robustness to frequency‐selective fading and flexibility for handling multiple data rates; and wavelet packets (WPs) modulation technique, which contributes to the mitigation of the interference problems. As WPs have lower sidelobes compared with sinusoidal carriers, this system is very effective in reducing the problem of inter‐carrier interference. Of course, like any CDMA system, the system can suppress a given amount of interference. This paper considers an interference suppression scheme which will enhance the performance of the system. The receiver employs suppression filters to mitigate the effect of narrow‐band jammer interference. The framework for the system and the performance evaluation are presented in terms of the bit error rate and the outage probability over a Nakagami fading channel. Also, we investigate how the performance is influenced by various parameters, such as the number of taps of the suppression filter and the ratio of narrow‐band interference bandwidth to the spread‐spectrum bandwidth. Finally, the performance of the system is compared with the performance of sinusoidal based MC/MCD‐CDMA system denoted Sin‐MC/MCD‐CDMA. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A modified thermodynamic insight to deliquescence of a void‐containing nanocrystal confirmed by MD simulation

Existence of voids in crystalline structures can affect their physical and chemical properties considerably. When the size of the crystal reaches to nanoscale, experimental determination of its void fraction is difficult. In this work, a molecular dynamics approach is introduced to find equilibrium void fractions of a simple cubic (CsCl) and fcc (KCl) nanocrystals by determination of their deliquescence relative humidity (DRH) for different sizes and void fractions and extrapolation of the results to the bulk limit. To confirm the simulation results, the size dependency of DRH to the nanoparticle size was studied thermodynamically by inclusion of size‐dependent density of water nanodroplet which leads to a simple homographic equation. This method proposes the equilibrium void percents of CsCl and KCl nanoparticles to be 10 and 15%, respectively, which are obtained by extrapolation of the results to the bulk limit. The success of obtained Möbius function was also confirmed by fitting it to experimental data for deliquescence of NaCl nanoparticles which implies the importance of considering density of water nanodroplet as a size dependent quantity. Also, using the mentioned thermodynamic approach, void dependency of deliquescence for the nanoparticles was found to be as a quasi‐linear trend which is compatible with the simulation results. It is noticeable that the approach used this work for determination of equilibrium void fraction is only valid if the utilized force fields are accurate. © 2016 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 62: 4066–4077, 2016     

Flocculation and viscoelastic behavior of industrial papermaking suspensions

The effects of the surface charge type and density C496, C492 and A130LMW polyacrylamides (PAMs) on the rheological behavior of real industrial papermaking suspensions were quantitatively related to the degree of flocculation for the same industrial papermaking suspensions. The floc sizes were larger but less dense when anionic PAM was used, and this due to the repulsive forces between the anionic PAM and colloidal particles, leading to the development of open structure flocs of less density. On the other hand, rheological measurements showed that the papermaking suspension is thixotropic with a measurable yield stress. The results showed that the magnitude of the critical stress, τ _c , complex viscosity, η*, elastic modulus, G′, and viscous modulus, G″, depend on the number of interactions between the PAM chains and particle surface and the strength of those interactions. Cationic PAM showed higher values of η*, G′, G″ and τ _c compared to anionic PAM. This behavior is in good agreement with Bingham yield stress, τ _B , adsorption and effective floc density results. Similar to oscillatory measurements, creep measurements also showed that the deformation was much lower for the cationic PAM based suspensions than for the anionic PAM based suspensions. Furthermore, the results revealed that increasing the cationic PAM surface charge decreases the floc size but increases the adsorption rate, elasticity and effective floc density proposing differences in the floc structures, which are not revealed clearly in the Bingham yield stress measurements.     

Nickel‐Catalyzed Reductive Benzylation of Aldehydes with Benzyl Halides and Pseudohalides

The reductive benzylation of aromatic and aliphatic aldehydes with benzylic halides is reported using a nickel/zinc catalyst system. In addition to benzylic halides, the first report on the addition of benzylic triflates, acetates, tosylates and tritylates to aldehydes is also presented. By this new method a range of alcohols was synthesized efficiently from aldehydes and benzylic substrates at room temperature in moderate to high yields. The mild reaction conditions and good functional group tolerance make this nickel‐catalyzed process synthetically useful for the synthesis of diverse benzylic alcohols.

     

Processing of High‐Density Magnesia Spinel Electro‐Conducting Ceramic Composite and its Oxidation at 1400°C

Dense conductive ceramic composites of MgAl₂O₄ and MoSi₂ were processed using combustion synthesis under‐load methodology. The starting reactants were blends of MoO₃, SiO₂, MgO, and Al powders. The study revealed that to obtain dense composite with homogeneous microstructure, 30 wt. % of MoSi₂, 18.5 μm Al average particle size, and 175 MPa load are required. The produced dense composite was found to have a low apparent porosity (<1.0 vol. %), moderate density 4.61 g/cm³, and low electrical resistivity 0.3 Ωcm. The dense composite exhibited excellent thermodynamic stability between its phases at 1400°C in open atmosphere.